Today is the anniversary of my one year in country. Thinking about it now, I can't decide if it went fast or slow. Some moments went unbelievably fast, while others seemed to have crept by at a snail's pace. I heard a volunteer talking about how time passes for volunteers and I think he pinned it perfectly, "the days go slow, but the months go fast." Is that even possible? Sure, because anything is possible in the Dominican Republic. And with that in mind, I think I'll just take a few minutes to reflect the changes I've seen within myself over the past year.
1)I feel uncomfortable standing for too long in social situations. - Yes, I am serious. Dominican culture insists that you sit. So no matter where I go, or what I'm doing, I am always offered a chair. If you go to someone's house and stand for too long, they start to look at you strangely, especially when they've already offered you a chair. And I would never dream about turning down a chair once it's been offered to me. I mean, come on, that's like social suicide.
2)I am more assertive yet more passive - All of us volunteers have discussed this- how since coming to this island we feel meaner. I can feel myself being more assertive and aggressive when I want something, I hear it in my voice and I see it in my actions. The things I do on this island to get my way would never in a million years be acceptable in the states. For example, when I walk into a colmado (or corner store), the first thing I do is edge myself right up front with whoever is waiting to be served, start yelling at the person behind the counter for what I want, and if necessary even banging my fist a little on the counter to rouse attention. It's not rude here, it's how it's done. I can't imagine myself going to a supermarket back home, walking straight to the cashier and saying in this language, "Give me 3 tomatoes, a bag of pasta, two cloves of garlic and a gatorade. Hurry." Without the slightest thought of a please or thank you, mind you. And this I have noticed, has transferred into my professional life. It's not that I want to be a mean and aggressive person, but when everyone else is communicating with each other in this way, you have to keep up.
Oppositely, I do feel more passive, because being here has been the most humbling experience of my life. Much of that came with not knowing Spanish or this culture, and when I first got to this country, especially to my site last May, even trying to buy a tomato from the colmado was extremely intimidating. I found myself (and still do) in situations I would never put myself in, because either I don't fully understand what is being asked of me, or I don't quite know the right way to say No. Sometimes I wish I could put a spell on my entire town so they could all speak and understand English for one day- then we could talk and they could really see that I do know what I'm talking about, that I am educated, that I do have experience, that I am passionate etc. In the meantime, I still am finding my inner Spanish voice. I know it's in there and everyday I can feel it slowly emerging.
3. Sharing is not a choice, but a way of life - I am continuously amazed at this culture and its people's ability to share. Today for example, Mari, a co-worker at my center, had a mint that she was willing to break in half for me if I wanted some. It doesn't matter how big or how small something is- there is no mine in the DR. This is a habit that is wearing off on me, and one I hope will continue after I leave here. What good is that candy bar, cookies, soda, gum, if you have to eat it all by yourself?
4. There is no place like America - I have always known this, but after living in a foreign country that is just that, foreign for a year, my old way of life never seems to lose its appeal. Being here and never really feeling like I fit in, makes me understand how immigrants in American can spend 30 years in the US and never learn English, and why in New York City, there is a Polish section, a Jewish section, a Greek section, a Dominican section. As people, we get comfortable and want to stick with what is comfortable, especially in uncomfortable situations. I'm proud of myself for being uncomfortable for a year. Proud of myself for putting myself out there, even if it means I will always be an outsider. But I'm also grateful, that in 14 months, I will be able to return to my home country, with my American values and ways.
5. Dang, it feels good to be a woman - I have always been proud to be a female and up to the challenges of it, and being here and seeing woman in a more "traditional" role- only helps to appreciate who I am and who I am not as a woman. Moreover, how lucky I am to be an American woman- where being 24 and unmarried doesn't make me a spinster. Further than that, I do have a new appreciation for Dominican woman and how hard they work for their home and their children. When I think of the word selfless, I think of my own mother and Silvia, the mom of the family that I eat lunch with everyday. Her whole life is consumed around her family, everything she does, literally everything, is for them. It is her lives work, and it is a beautiful and noble thing.
6. Family - I have always known how important family is and how you yourself can be defined by your family. Being here and being surround by other families that are not my own, but who have opened their doors, their hearts and their kitchen tables to me- has put a new perspective on my life. I have realized in my own life, if I can serve this world to do good and to make my family proud, than I have accomplished everything that is possible and important for me.
And so, what I would really like to say in this self-reflection blog entry, is thank you. Thank you to all my freaking coolest friends on the planet, Corinne, Remi and his family, everyone from church, all my aunts and uncles, my two amazing grandmothers, and especially my wonderful family - Mom, Baba, Jim, Mike, Meghan and everyone else who has supported me over this last year. Thank you for packages, your emails, your thoughts and prayers. It has not been an easy year, and it has been one filled with challenging and wonderful surprises. I am so grateful for all of you, and even though I only have this blog to say it- I love you all and can't wait for you to come visit!!!!!!
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Monday, February 22, 2010
From Jimani
I have thought for awhile now about what I would write about my time spent volunteering at a relief hospital in Jimani, on the border of the Dominican Republic and Haiti. Every day I was there, there seemed to be something unbelievable, shocking and unexpected both in good and bad ways that will leave me thinking about this experience for the rest of my life. I feel different now than I did before I left. I feel more grateful for my life. I feel sad and frustrated with cultural and language differences. I feel depressed knowing no matter how similar people can be, there seems to always be two distinct groups: those giving the aid and those taking the aid. I feel hopeful for change and reconstruction- not just of a city, but for the people living within that fallen city. “Haiti is alive!” is something my short eight days in Jimani taught me, and although I would like to include every detail as it happened while I was there, the following are a few of my stories, in hopes to share a better understanding with anyone who is interested to know.
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On my second full day, I had a breakdown. It was sunset, and as the hot, dry day slowly turned into the cool night air, I had to pull away from everything and walk out into the desert alone. It hit me-the death, the despair, the destruction this earthquake had caused. I had been trying to ignore it since I arrived. Trying to ignore the obvious hurt and suffering when you see a 12-year-old or a 60-year-old with an amputated arm. These people had lost everything. Their homes, their schools, their businesses, their family. And now they were the lucky ones, because they had somehow managed to get to the Dominican side of the border to a hospital that was staffed internationally with doctors, nurses and volunteers.
At first the tears were inconspicuous and controlled, but after one fell down my cheek and attempted to wash away the dirt and sweat that was embedded in my pours from the day’s work, they soon flooded out of me with no control. I didn’t know if I was crying for the eminent loss that was everywhere, or the fact that we had just spent the whole day separating family members from patients- telling everyone that only one family member was allowed to every one patient. I watched as patients were given a choice between their family and their doctors. I, along with my Peace Corps peers were not the least bit surprised when patients chose not to break up or separate their family, and instead of waiting for a needed surgery, boarded a bus to go back to Haiti. When the American doctors, nurses and volunteers were puzzled over this choice, or worse indifferent, I couldn’t help but feel ashamed.
I guess as Americans, we are taught to take care of ourselves first, especially when it comes to our health. That if what you need is an operation to live, then of course it will be your first priority. Not everyone in the world thinks like Americans. There are those that would never put anything first before their family. Not themselves, not their success, not even their broken leg, which without surgery will probably never heal correctly. And so we watched and helped the process, as women, men and children with metal rods sticking out of their legs, elbows and arms boarded the bus to return to Haiti.
Crying alone in the desert, I was in a squatting position, stabling myself with my hands in the dirt. Enough, I told myself. I walked back over the pediatric ward, which was a converted chapel on the grounds. I went back to help finish the job- to continue telling these people only one family member could remain. The moment I entered, a young Haitian woman made eye-contact. I didn’t have the guts to look back at her. And as I walked up to another volunteer telling a translator the same repeated message, the woman grabbed my arm and shook her head telling me without words that I didn’t need to cry. I finally made eye contact with her and she smiled. I said in Spanish, “yo se,” or “I know.” Not because she spoke Spanish, but because English just didn’t seem right.
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This process of cutting our numbers did not happen in just one day, and there were even some patients and family members who were more than happy to leave the hospital grounds. Two women in particular, could not have been more relieved to go back to their home country.
A child to each of the women, their number was actually five. While staying at the hospital, they had taken in an orphaned boy whose supposed father was in Port-au-Prince waiting for him. The two women, each holding their own toddler had been protecting the boy while he recovered in the hospital and had promised to take him to his father when they all returned to Haiti.
For the first hour, as the five of them waited for the late bus to arrive, they were happily enjoying the shade of an old, big tree. With no warning, however, this all changed and one of the women started screaming at the top of her lungs at one of the translators. Her eyes were wild and fierce and no one needed to speak Creole to understand that something had just gone horribly wrong.
The translators are a group of 18 Haitian men, also victims of the earthquake, who either had family at the hospital as patients or had found themselves at the hospital with no family or work. Many of them spoke English, Spanish, French and of course Creole- or some combination of these languages. They “volunteered” as translators, and worked with the doctors and nurses to help them with patients. In all honesty, without these 18 guys, the hospital would never be able to function.
One of the translators had been helping me all day with guarding the gate to tell incoming visitors they only had until 4 p.m. for visiting hours. As the two of us stood there in the beating sun, the woman’s anger intensified and she directed it toward the man next to me.
“Tell me what she’s saying,” my voice started to panic.
He hesitated. “She’s not saying anything,” he finally replied in accented English.
“This woman is crazy, do not listen to her.”
“Well just tell me what’s wrong. Why is she screaming? What’s wrong with her?”
“Do not worry,” he said again. “This woman is crazy, she is speaking crazy things.”
I am not a mother, but the way this woman exploded out of nowhere, could only lead me to believe that she was doing everything she could to protect her family, including the orphaned boy. After another translator came over, he finally told us that the woman was in fact protecting the boy because other people (patients, family members, visitors) in the hospital had threatened to steal him and sell him. This is why the whole family was so happy to leave in the first place. They were going back to Haiti to find the boy’s father before he could become another victim of child trafficking.
Once this message had been translated from Creole to Spanish to English and then back to Creole, the boy became the top priority. But these women did not have any kind of papers for him, just their word. They had spoken to his father via cell phone, had made a plan to meet him in Port-au-Prince and then bring him to the boy.
In this moment, I noticed how my thinking had changed. How when the frenzy was happening not because we realized people wanted to steal this boy for profit, but to find papers to make it “okay” for him to travel with these women– I just wanted to get the keys to a pick-up, tell the family to get in and take them across the border myself. The formalities of the situation seemed ridiculous and completely unnecessary. The bottom line was that this boy was unsafe in our hospital and these women had without a doubt saved his life. Why were we putting up a fight about “proper documentation” when once they crossed the border, that paper would mean absolutely nothing anyway?
After more deliberation, waiting and translating it was finally decided the boy would travel with these women without papers (because in reality, the papers never existed and never would exist). A few more hours of waiting for the now very late bus, the family of five finally boarded the bus and went back to Haiti.
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That night, I found myself wondering to the pediatric ward. It had been a long, hot and hard day, and what I wanted most was just to talk with someone about nothing, even if we didn’t have a language in common. The moment I walked into the converted chapel, there were two young patients (12 and eight) who were practicing counting in Spanish. The 12-year-old had a notebook and had written down 1-30 in Spanish and was teaching his eight-year-old bedside neighbor. Without asking, I sat down on the edge of the 12-year-old’s bed and started counting with them. They never missed a beat and we counted all the way to 100 in Spanish together. After this, he wrote down 1-30 again and I knew he wanted to learn to count in English. We started again, and counted 1-50 this time in English.
Both these boys were in the hospital for broken legs. How severely, I am still not sure, but I do know they both had surgery while I was there. As we continued counting, I told them I wanted to learn to count in Creole. We started to count 1-10 in Creole, and every time I would make a mistake or mispronounce a number they would stop, slowly say the number and exaggerate the pronunciation as to make sure I really understood how to pronounce it. They were so serious about teaching me how to say things correctly, and more often than not I would mess-up they would laugh, sigh and start over. It made my life. By this time, another girl, about 10-years-old with stitches that made a crown around her head came over and started to help as well. For the next hour, we all practiced counting in three different languages as other kids, parents and family looked on and smiled at my incorrect pronunciation of Creole.
Every day after this, I made a point to visit these kids (my kids, as I came to call them) at least twice a day. When I would walk in for other reasons, either to bring food or ask the doctors and nurses questions, they would stop me and quiz me on my Creole number skills. Through everything, seeing them became the best part of everyday.
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There were other good things that happened though. One day, about mid-afternoon, I was frantically running around the grounds doing whatever needed to be done at that moment, and I randomly heard the strumming of a guitar. It was coming from one of the giant tents where the patients were, and I quickly ducked inside to see if my ears had heard the correct sound (when the hospital first opened after the quake, the patients refused to stay inside buildings for fear they would collapse again. Because of this, three large tents were erected to serve as wards where the patients were housed). Inside the tent, was a group of misfits: two of the translators, family members, a few patients that could walk, an American nurse, the Spanish team psychologist and fellow Peace Corps Volunteer, Leeann. I walked into the tent to see the two translators, Olsson and Stanley leading the group in a jam-session. They sang in Creole, French, Spanish and English. The words were simple.
Haiti is alive. Haiti no se murio. The same in French and Creole.
I have never seen a smile like I did that day on Olsson’s face. Olsson’s mother was a patient and he initially came to the hospital with his father and mother to get help for his mom. Soon it was discovered that he could speak fluent English and he started to help the nurses and doctors translate with other patients in the same tent as his mom’s. The previous day, when we had limited every patient to have only one family member, Olsson technically should have been forced to leave, because his dad served as the one family member to his mom. However, Olsson took to everyone’s heart and even the doctors and nurses did whatever they could to keep him at the hospital.
Olsson led the group playing the guitar, along with Stanley, another translator who lost 10 members of his family in the quake. We all clapped in unison and alternated the message, “Haiti is alive!” in the four different languages. It didn’t matter if you spoke all four or none; the point of the song was hope. As I watched Olsson, Stanley, patients in their beds or standing, family members, doctors and nurses sing these words at the top of their lungs, the tears poured out of me again.
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The 18 translators had the toughest job out of all of us. Not only were they victims themselves of the earthquake, but they were obviously translating all the needs, hurts and ailments to the doctors and nurses. Think about this. Every time a patient had a question for a doctor or a doctor for a patient, they had to ask it. They heard all the pain, all the suffering and in return they had to tell their fellow Haitians news and instructions from the doctor. When a patient had to have an arm or leg amputated or something similar in devastation, the doctors didn’t tell them, the translators did
One translator, Valentin, left an impression on me that I will never forget. Before the quake, Valentin was a lawyer in Port-au-Prince. He spoke fluent Creole, Spanish, English and French. At lunch one day, a group of us were talking about him and one of the doctors said, “I told Valentin that if I play my cards right, one day I’ll be smart enough to be the translator and he’ll be the doctor.” To say this guy was impressive is an understatement. He had come to the hospital initially because his daughter had been injured in the quake. Soon, however, his abilities were noticed and he quickly became the lead translator.
This day with the translators and Valentin started off wrong. One of us Peace Corps Volunteers decided to go into Haiti (we only have two rules in Peace Corps and if you break them, you are immediately administratively separated: 1) wear a helmet while riding a motorcycle and 2) don’t go to Haiti). Despite this, the temptation for all of us to go over the border was pressing, to say the least. Jimani is literally right on the border and crossing it is not like going through US airport security on your way home from the Middle East. One of us did decide to go, but that’s a whole different story for a different time.
The person who left was in charge of the translators. Their job was to basically keep them happy. This day, unfortunately, they were not happy. At about 10:00 a.m. I got news that the translators may or may not start a revolt against the whole place. I raced outside to the tents and was faced with angry men telling me they were hungry, nobody would feed them, and that they had worked all night and now had to work all day. I agreed with them and told them that we were going to have a meeting that night at 7 p.m. where we will implement a new schedule and make sure the translators could come eat upstairs, with all the doctors, nurses and other volunteers.
The hospital itself was two stories. The first floor served as the ICU, operation rooms and PACU (Post Anesthesia Care Unit) units. The second floor had rooms were the volunteers, nurses and doctors slept, a kitchen and a common room with four large couches were all these people, including all of us Peace Corps kids, could eat and rest.
At 7:00 p.m., Valentin led his group of translators up to the second floor of the hospital where they expected to have their scheduled meeting. Seven o’clock was also the time of the nightly meetings with all the doctors, nurses and volunteers. The man running the show, we’ll call him Steve, called these nightly meetings and thinking Valentin and his fellow translators didn’t belong, kicked them out immediately.
Feeling disrespected and unappreciated, the translators blew up. By this time, they were outside of the hospital in front of one of the patient tents. All of us PC kids were trying to calm them down, telling them that Steve was a moron and didn’t know anybody who was actually volunteering at the hospital. We tried to tell them it was a misunderstanding and that they were in fact allowed to be upstairs just like the rest of us. Valentin looked me dead in the eyes when I tried to personally plead these words with him.
“This was NOT a misunderstanding,” he angrily and intensely said in English. “We are nothing to these people.” And then switching to Spanish without any hesitation, “Nosotros somos perros. Nosotros somos perros. (We are dogs. We are dogs).” And then back to English, “We are not people to them. And you will never understand it, because you are a white girl. What do you know about us? Nosotros somos perros. Perros.”
He never blinked while he said these words to me. He looked me straight in the eyes and never faltered. When he finished, it felt like my stomach had swallowed my heart. I had no words to say to him, because what I really wanted to say was that he was right.
As much as I wanted to disagree with him and even convince myself that I should disagree with him, what happened sort-of blew my mind. The people running the hospital, the people in charge of the whole operation of helping the Haitian people had shown racism does exist in charity.
I believe the entire circumstance was an issue of skin color. At 7:00 p.m., the room had been scanned to start the nightly meeting with doctors, nurses and volunteers. The people who looked different obviously did not belong there and had been kicked out without any explanation or questioning. Valentin was right. They had been treated like dogs that were not welcome inside the house. These people didn’t care, and what did I know- a white girl- about any of it? As much as I could pretend to understand and sympathize, how could I ever really know what it is like to be one of them? Yes I could see the pain and suffering that was happening all around me, but would I ever be able to feel it?
The Spanish psychologist said something to my friend Leeann that hit home with both of us, “these people lost their family, their friends, their homes, their schools, their work and now they come here and they lose an arm or a leg… what hurts worse?” Valentin was right- how would I, a white girl, ever really understand that?
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The next morning, the patients and family members had a church service in the open space in between the tents. Gathered in a big circle, they sang and chanted Haitian church hymns and folk songs. The truth is, I still don’t really know what kind of songs they were- just that as soon as one would start, every single person, no matter how old or young knew the words.
It made me think about my own culture. During Katrina, when thousands of Americans found themselves in a similar situation as Haitians do now – what song did they all sing in a circle? Did everyone know it? Or was it sectionalized and esoteric in a way? Maybe there is something to be said for a national religion. If nothing else, it brings people together through song.
For the last three days I was there, church would happen every morning. Valentin was the leader. Along with other doctors, nurses and volunteers I stood in the giant circle with the patients and family members and would do my best to follow the Creole songs. As we all sang, danced and clapped, I felt like I belonged and the tears would come again, everyday without fail. It didn’t matter that I was not a victim of the quake. I was there, along with all the volunteers trying to help- and that’s what people needed most.
At church, in these moments, you could see people’s true happiness; it was like a glimpse into the person they were before the earthquake. The men and women that could walk would dance in place to the songs and kids and adults on crutches or in wheelchairs would come out from their beds and smile as they watched, sang and clapped. People waved their hands in the air to praise Jesus and God and to thank them for giving them life. Through everything: the hurt, the pain, the suffering- they were still grateful for life. Being a part of this, I have never felt more proud to be associated with such a dignified group of people.
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There are so many other things that happened, day-to-day tasks that we (Peace Corps Volunteers) were all assigned to, like feeding the patients and family member three times a day, providing an updated daily patient census for the doctors and nurses, keeping the translators happy, translating at any random moment from Spanish to English for anyone who needed it, carrying blood bags to and from the hospital, going into town to bargain for wood from the local hardware store to build shelves in the pharmacy, moving patients from the tents to the hospital for surgery, working with amazing people from all over the world, among others. The stories above were just a few that stood out in my mind that I wanted to share. If you have actually made it this far and read the whole thing- the most important thing to know is that HAITI IS ALIVE. And it’s the people in these camps- the kids I counted with, Valentin, Olsson, the women dancing during church to praise God and the doctors, nurses and volunteers from all over the world spending their time to help, that is going to rebuild Haiti. HAITI IS ALIVE and I for one am excited to see it grow.
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On my second full day, I had a breakdown. It was sunset, and as the hot, dry day slowly turned into the cool night air, I had to pull away from everything and walk out into the desert alone. It hit me-the death, the despair, the destruction this earthquake had caused. I had been trying to ignore it since I arrived. Trying to ignore the obvious hurt and suffering when you see a 12-year-old or a 60-year-old with an amputated arm. These people had lost everything. Their homes, their schools, their businesses, their family. And now they were the lucky ones, because they had somehow managed to get to the Dominican side of the border to a hospital that was staffed internationally with doctors, nurses and volunteers.
At first the tears were inconspicuous and controlled, but after one fell down my cheek and attempted to wash away the dirt and sweat that was embedded in my pours from the day’s work, they soon flooded out of me with no control. I didn’t know if I was crying for the eminent loss that was everywhere, or the fact that we had just spent the whole day separating family members from patients- telling everyone that only one family member was allowed to every one patient. I watched as patients were given a choice between their family and their doctors. I, along with my Peace Corps peers were not the least bit surprised when patients chose not to break up or separate their family, and instead of waiting for a needed surgery, boarded a bus to go back to Haiti. When the American doctors, nurses and volunteers were puzzled over this choice, or worse indifferent, I couldn’t help but feel ashamed.
I guess as Americans, we are taught to take care of ourselves first, especially when it comes to our health. That if what you need is an operation to live, then of course it will be your first priority. Not everyone in the world thinks like Americans. There are those that would never put anything first before their family. Not themselves, not their success, not even their broken leg, which without surgery will probably never heal correctly. And so we watched and helped the process, as women, men and children with metal rods sticking out of their legs, elbows and arms boarded the bus to return to Haiti.
Crying alone in the desert, I was in a squatting position, stabling myself with my hands in the dirt. Enough, I told myself. I walked back over the pediatric ward, which was a converted chapel on the grounds. I went back to help finish the job- to continue telling these people only one family member could remain. The moment I entered, a young Haitian woman made eye-contact. I didn’t have the guts to look back at her. And as I walked up to another volunteer telling a translator the same repeated message, the woman grabbed my arm and shook her head telling me without words that I didn’t need to cry. I finally made eye contact with her and she smiled. I said in Spanish, “yo se,” or “I know.” Not because she spoke Spanish, but because English just didn’t seem right.
---
This process of cutting our numbers did not happen in just one day, and there were even some patients and family members who were more than happy to leave the hospital grounds. Two women in particular, could not have been more relieved to go back to their home country.
A child to each of the women, their number was actually five. While staying at the hospital, they had taken in an orphaned boy whose supposed father was in Port-au-Prince waiting for him. The two women, each holding their own toddler had been protecting the boy while he recovered in the hospital and had promised to take him to his father when they all returned to Haiti.
For the first hour, as the five of them waited for the late bus to arrive, they were happily enjoying the shade of an old, big tree. With no warning, however, this all changed and one of the women started screaming at the top of her lungs at one of the translators. Her eyes were wild and fierce and no one needed to speak Creole to understand that something had just gone horribly wrong.
The translators are a group of 18 Haitian men, also victims of the earthquake, who either had family at the hospital as patients or had found themselves at the hospital with no family or work. Many of them spoke English, Spanish, French and of course Creole- or some combination of these languages. They “volunteered” as translators, and worked with the doctors and nurses to help them with patients. In all honesty, without these 18 guys, the hospital would never be able to function.
One of the translators had been helping me all day with guarding the gate to tell incoming visitors they only had until 4 p.m. for visiting hours. As the two of us stood there in the beating sun, the woman’s anger intensified and she directed it toward the man next to me.
“Tell me what she’s saying,” my voice started to panic.
He hesitated. “She’s not saying anything,” he finally replied in accented English.
“This woman is crazy, do not listen to her.”
“Well just tell me what’s wrong. Why is she screaming? What’s wrong with her?”
“Do not worry,” he said again. “This woman is crazy, she is speaking crazy things.”
I am not a mother, but the way this woman exploded out of nowhere, could only lead me to believe that she was doing everything she could to protect her family, including the orphaned boy. After another translator came over, he finally told us that the woman was in fact protecting the boy because other people (patients, family members, visitors) in the hospital had threatened to steal him and sell him. This is why the whole family was so happy to leave in the first place. They were going back to Haiti to find the boy’s father before he could become another victim of child trafficking.
Once this message had been translated from Creole to Spanish to English and then back to Creole, the boy became the top priority. But these women did not have any kind of papers for him, just their word. They had spoken to his father via cell phone, had made a plan to meet him in Port-au-Prince and then bring him to the boy.
In this moment, I noticed how my thinking had changed. How when the frenzy was happening not because we realized people wanted to steal this boy for profit, but to find papers to make it “okay” for him to travel with these women– I just wanted to get the keys to a pick-up, tell the family to get in and take them across the border myself. The formalities of the situation seemed ridiculous and completely unnecessary. The bottom line was that this boy was unsafe in our hospital and these women had without a doubt saved his life. Why were we putting up a fight about “proper documentation” when once they crossed the border, that paper would mean absolutely nothing anyway?
After more deliberation, waiting and translating it was finally decided the boy would travel with these women without papers (because in reality, the papers never existed and never would exist). A few more hours of waiting for the now very late bus, the family of five finally boarded the bus and went back to Haiti.
---
That night, I found myself wondering to the pediatric ward. It had been a long, hot and hard day, and what I wanted most was just to talk with someone about nothing, even if we didn’t have a language in common. The moment I walked into the converted chapel, there were two young patients (12 and eight) who were practicing counting in Spanish. The 12-year-old had a notebook and had written down 1-30 in Spanish and was teaching his eight-year-old bedside neighbor. Without asking, I sat down on the edge of the 12-year-old’s bed and started counting with them. They never missed a beat and we counted all the way to 100 in Spanish together. After this, he wrote down 1-30 again and I knew he wanted to learn to count in English. We started again, and counted 1-50 this time in English.
Both these boys were in the hospital for broken legs. How severely, I am still not sure, but I do know they both had surgery while I was there. As we continued counting, I told them I wanted to learn to count in Creole. We started to count 1-10 in Creole, and every time I would make a mistake or mispronounce a number they would stop, slowly say the number and exaggerate the pronunciation as to make sure I really understood how to pronounce it. They were so serious about teaching me how to say things correctly, and more often than not I would mess-up they would laugh, sigh and start over. It made my life. By this time, another girl, about 10-years-old with stitches that made a crown around her head came over and started to help as well. For the next hour, we all practiced counting in three different languages as other kids, parents and family looked on and smiled at my incorrect pronunciation of Creole.
Every day after this, I made a point to visit these kids (my kids, as I came to call them) at least twice a day. When I would walk in for other reasons, either to bring food or ask the doctors and nurses questions, they would stop me and quiz me on my Creole number skills. Through everything, seeing them became the best part of everyday.
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There were other good things that happened though. One day, about mid-afternoon, I was frantically running around the grounds doing whatever needed to be done at that moment, and I randomly heard the strumming of a guitar. It was coming from one of the giant tents where the patients were, and I quickly ducked inside to see if my ears had heard the correct sound (when the hospital first opened after the quake, the patients refused to stay inside buildings for fear they would collapse again. Because of this, three large tents were erected to serve as wards where the patients were housed). Inside the tent, was a group of misfits: two of the translators, family members, a few patients that could walk, an American nurse, the Spanish team psychologist and fellow Peace Corps Volunteer, Leeann. I walked into the tent to see the two translators, Olsson and Stanley leading the group in a jam-session. They sang in Creole, French, Spanish and English. The words were simple.
Haiti is alive. Haiti no se murio. The same in French and Creole.
I have never seen a smile like I did that day on Olsson’s face. Olsson’s mother was a patient and he initially came to the hospital with his father and mother to get help for his mom. Soon it was discovered that he could speak fluent English and he started to help the nurses and doctors translate with other patients in the same tent as his mom’s. The previous day, when we had limited every patient to have only one family member, Olsson technically should have been forced to leave, because his dad served as the one family member to his mom. However, Olsson took to everyone’s heart and even the doctors and nurses did whatever they could to keep him at the hospital.
Olsson led the group playing the guitar, along with Stanley, another translator who lost 10 members of his family in the quake. We all clapped in unison and alternated the message, “Haiti is alive!” in the four different languages. It didn’t matter if you spoke all four or none; the point of the song was hope. As I watched Olsson, Stanley, patients in their beds or standing, family members, doctors and nurses sing these words at the top of their lungs, the tears poured out of me again.
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The 18 translators had the toughest job out of all of us. Not only were they victims themselves of the earthquake, but they were obviously translating all the needs, hurts and ailments to the doctors and nurses. Think about this. Every time a patient had a question for a doctor or a doctor for a patient, they had to ask it. They heard all the pain, all the suffering and in return they had to tell their fellow Haitians news and instructions from the doctor. When a patient had to have an arm or leg amputated or something similar in devastation, the doctors didn’t tell them, the translators did
One translator, Valentin, left an impression on me that I will never forget. Before the quake, Valentin was a lawyer in Port-au-Prince. He spoke fluent Creole, Spanish, English and French. At lunch one day, a group of us were talking about him and one of the doctors said, “I told Valentin that if I play my cards right, one day I’ll be smart enough to be the translator and he’ll be the doctor.” To say this guy was impressive is an understatement. He had come to the hospital initially because his daughter had been injured in the quake. Soon, however, his abilities were noticed and he quickly became the lead translator.
This day with the translators and Valentin started off wrong. One of us Peace Corps Volunteers decided to go into Haiti (we only have two rules in Peace Corps and if you break them, you are immediately administratively separated: 1) wear a helmet while riding a motorcycle and 2) don’t go to Haiti). Despite this, the temptation for all of us to go over the border was pressing, to say the least. Jimani is literally right on the border and crossing it is not like going through US airport security on your way home from the Middle East. One of us did decide to go, but that’s a whole different story for a different time.
The person who left was in charge of the translators. Their job was to basically keep them happy. This day, unfortunately, they were not happy. At about 10:00 a.m. I got news that the translators may or may not start a revolt against the whole place. I raced outside to the tents and was faced with angry men telling me they were hungry, nobody would feed them, and that they had worked all night and now had to work all day. I agreed with them and told them that we were going to have a meeting that night at 7 p.m. where we will implement a new schedule and make sure the translators could come eat upstairs, with all the doctors, nurses and other volunteers.
The hospital itself was two stories. The first floor served as the ICU, operation rooms and PACU (Post Anesthesia Care Unit) units. The second floor had rooms were the volunteers, nurses and doctors slept, a kitchen and a common room with four large couches were all these people, including all of us Peace Corps kids, could eat and rest.
At 7:00 p.m., Valentin led his group of translators up to the second floor of the hospital where they expected to have their scheduled meeting. Seven o’clock was also the time of the nightly meetings with all the doctors, nurses and volunteers. The man running the show, we’ll call him Steve, called these nightly meetings and thinking Valentin and his fellow translators didn’t belong, kicked them out immediately.
Feeling disrespected and unappreciated, the translators blew up. By this time, they were outside of the hospital in front of one of the patient tents. All of us PC kids were trying to calm them down, telling them that Steve was a moron and didn’t know anybody who was actually volunteering at the hospital. We tried to tell them it was a misunderstanding and that they were in fact allowed to be upstairs just like the rest of us. Valentin looked me dead in the eyes when I tried to personally plead these words with him.
“This was NOT a misunderstanding,” he angrily and intensely said in English. “We are nothing to these people.” And then switching to Spanish without any hesitation, “Nosotros somos perros. Nosotros somos perros. (We are dogs. We are dogs).” And then back to English, “We are not people to them. And you will never understand it, because you are a white girl. What do you know about us? Nosotros somos perros. Perros.”
He never blinked while he said these words to me. He looked me straight in the eyes and never faltered. When he finished, it felt like my stomach had swallowed my heart. I had no words to say to him, because what I really wanted to say was that he was right.
As much as I wanted to disagree with him and even convince myself that I should disagree with him, what happened sort-of blew my mind. The people running the hospital, the people in charge of the whole operation of helping the Haitian people had shown racism does exist in charity.
I believe the entire circumstance was an issue of skin color. At 7:00 p.m., the room had been scanned to start the nightly meeting with doctors, nurses and volunteers. The people who looked different obviously did not belong there and had been kicked out without any explanation or questioning. Valentin was right. They had been treated like dogs that were not welcome inside the house. These people didn’t care, and what did I know- a white girl- about any of it? As much as I could pretend to understand and sympathize, how could I ever really know what it is like to be one of them? Yes I could see the pain and suffering that was happening all around me, but would I ever be able to feel it?
The Spanish psychologist said something to my friend Leeann that hit home with both of us, “these people lost their family, their friends, their homes, their schools, their work and now they come here and they lose an arm or a leg… what hurts worse?” Valentin was right- how would I, a white girl, ever really understand that?
---
The next morning, the patients and family members had a church service in the open space in between the tents. Gathered in a big circle, they sang and chanted Haitian church hymns and folk songs. The truth is, I still don’t really know what kind of songs they were- just that as soon as one would start, every single person, no matter how old or young knew the words.
It made me think about my own culture. During Katrina, when thousands of Americans found themselves in a similar situation as Haitians do now – what song did they all sing in a circle? Did everyone know it? Or was it sectionalized and esoteric in a way? Maybe there is something to be said for a national religion. If nothing else, it brings people together through song.
For the last three days I was there, church would happen every morning. Valentin was the leader. Along with other doctors, nurses and volunteers I stood in the giant circle with the patients and family members and would do my best to follow the Creole songs. As we all sang, danced and clapped, I felt like I belonged and the tears would come again, everyday without fail. It didn’t matter that I was not a victim of the quake. I was there, along with all the volunteers trying to help- and that’s what people needed most.
At church, in these moments, you could see people’s true happiness; it was like a glimpse into the person they were before the earthquake. The men and women that could walk would dance in place to the songs and kids and adults on crutches or in wheelchairs would come out from their beds and smile as they watched, sang and clapped. People waved their hands in the air to praise Jesus and God and to thank them for giving them life. Through everything: the hurt, the pain, the suffering- they were still grateful for life. Being a part of this, I have never felt more proud to be associated with such a dignified group of people.
---
There are so many other things that happened, day-to-day tasks that we (Peace Corps Volunteers) were all assigned to, like feeding the patients and family member three times a day, providing an updated daily patient census for the doctors and nurses, keeping the translators happy, translating at any random moment from Spanish to English for anyone who needed it, carrying blood bags to and from the hospital, going into town to bargain for wood from the local hardware store to build shelves in the pharmacy, moving patients from the tents to the hospital for surgery, working with amazing people from all over the world, among others. The stories above were just a few that stood out in my mind that I wanted to share. If you have actually made it this far and read the whole thing- the most important thing to know is that HAITI IS ALIVE. And it’s the people in these camps- the kids I counted with, Valentin, Olsson, the women dancing during church to praise God and the doctors, nurses and volunteers from all over the world spending their time to help, that is going to rebuild Haiti. HAITI IS ALIVE and I for one am excited to see it grow.
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
Marriage
Last week I went into the capital for various reasons, but one of them was because a fellow Peace Corps Volunteer married her Dominican boyfriend. She has been dating him since about the time she arrived in country (Summer 2008) and will finish her Peace Corps service this May. Although I’m not sure if she always dreamed of having her wedding in the Dominican Republic, marrying him now helps to ensure that she can take her now husband back to the states by May or soon after May.
Peace Corps Volunteers marrying Dominicans happens much more often than I ever imagined, and I know this will not be the last marriage I celebrate before I leave in May 2011. It’s strange, because being here has brought marriage to my attention in so many unexpected ways. PCV’s are marrying Dominicans, PCV’s are marrying each other, young Dominican girls are running away to “marry” older Dominican men and even me, as an American woman, am asked repeatedly from Dominican men to marry them so they can come back to the states with me. The list of goes on and on….
There is a girl from my town named Noemi. She took my first English class and did fairly well. Well enough that she passed my test to move onto the second level of English starting this week. Noemi, however, will not be taking my second English class, because one night in the middle of January, she went out and never came home the next morning. In our American culture, this of course would cause worry, but most people would probably assume she was causing some trouble and stayed out all night with her friends. Here in Dominican culture, it means only one thing: marriage. Noemi never came home that night because her older (I still have yet to discover how much older) boyfriend picked her up and took her to his house, which means Noemi chose him over her family and is now officially “his woman.”
Have I mentioned yet that Noemi is 13-years-old? When Noemi decided to not come home that night, it told everyone, her family, the community, the school, that she was a married and had given everything in her old life up. There is no piece of paper, no legal document needed to prove this. She left and never came home. A 13-year-old girl married, dropped out of school, living in a nearby town with most likely a man at least 10 years older than her.
This is marriage in the Dominican Republic. Noemi is not the first and she definitely will not be the last.
But what about a Peace Corps Volunteer marrying their Dominican boyfriend or girlfriend in a hurry to take them home to the states? In this situation, you have two people who love each other (hopefully) but really live in two different worlds, although for a brief moment in time their worlds are one on a beautiful Caribbean island. When the time comes and the PCV is supposed to return to their previous life in America, I can understand the pressure to make arrangements so the relationship does not have to end. I respect this and admire it in some ways. If you love someone, you should do whatever it takes to make it work. Even if that means uprooting them from everything they now, bringing them to a place where, most likely there are very few other Dominican –Americans (let’s say everywhere outside of New York City and Miami) and telling them to start a brand new life in a place completely new and foreign. What’s the difference between this situation and Noemi’s? Legality? She gave up everything too, is living in a new place away from her family. Granted it’s not America, but in her mind if she loves this man, she is just as noble as the American and Dominican signing legal documents to make one of them a legal citizen.
Last week, Angel, the three-year-old boy who is apart of the family I eat lunch with daily asked me why I don’t have any kids. He was actually fairly perplexed by it, because why wouldn’t I? I am the same age as all the other women in town, including his mom, who have kids. It only makes sense in his mind that I would have kids. And plus, if I did, it would be someone else he could play with. What is most important about his question, however, are a couple of things, 1) Angel was not the first little kid of the week to ask me this question. My neighbor girl, who is either three or four, a few days previous, asked me the same thing. Why I don’t have kids? Do I want kids? 2) Neither one of these little kids asked me if I had a husband. Just kids.
I can’t help but feel liberated when I tell them no- to both the kids and the husband question.
When I tell them that I’m 24 and still don’t have kids or a husband, that’s when the old ladies of my town start to worry. They tell me I need to start having children so I’ll have someone to take care of me when I’m old. I agree with them and tell them I hope to have kids one day and even a husband (Si Dios quiere or God willing), but on my own time. That never goes over well. They just remind me that my time is slipping; I’m already 24 (practically ancient, really) and if I want to get a good man and have kids, I need to get started.
I guess it’s the rush that gets to me. Noemi, at thirteen-years-old, volunteers rushing to marry Dominicans in order to finish paperwork and me feeling the pressure to procreate before my body parts stop working properly.
Being here and seeing marriage in ways I honestly never had before thought about, gives me so much appreciation for my life. And every time a three-year-old or an older lady ask me about marriage, or even a Dominican man asks me to marry him for a visa, I will take great pleasure in the simple word, no.
Peace Corps Volunteers marrying Dominicans happens much more often than I ever imagined, and I know this will not be the last marriage I celebrate before I leave in May 2011. It’s strange, because being here has brought marriage to my attention in so many unexpected ways. PCV’s are marrying Dominicans, PCV’s are marrying each other, young Dominican girls are running away to “marry” older Dominican men and even me, as an American woman, am asked repeatedly from Dominican men to marry them so they can come back to the states with me. The list of goes on and on….
There is a girl from my town named Noemi. She took my first English class and did fairly well. Well enough that she passed my test to move onto the second level of English starting this week. Noemi, however, will not be taking my second English class, because one night in the middle of January, she went out and never came home the next morning. In our American culture, this of course would cause worry, but most people would probably assume she was causing some trouble and stayed out all night with her friends. Here in Dominican culture, it means only one thing: marriage. Noemi never came home that night because her older (I still have yet to discover how much older) boyfriend picked her up and took her to his house, which means Noemi chose him over her family and is now officially “his woman.”
Have I mentioned yet that Noemi is 13-years-old? When Noemi decided to not come home that night, it told everyone, her family, the community, the school, that she was a married and had given everything in her old life up. There is no piece of paper, no legal document needed to prove this. She left and never came home. A 13-year-old girl married, dropped out of school, living in a nearby town with most likely a man at least 10 years older than her.
This is marriage in the Dominican Republic. Noemi is not the first and she definitely will not be the last.
But what about a Peace Corps Volunteer marrying their Dominican boyfriend or girlfriend in a hurry to take them home to the states? In this situation, you have two people who love each other (hopefully) but really live in two different worlds, although for a brief moment in time their worlds are one on a beautiful Caribbean island. When the time comes and the PCV is supposed to return to their previous life in America, I can understand the pressure to make arrangements so the relationship does not have to end. I respect this and admire it in some ways. If you love someone, you should do whatever it takes to make it work. Even if that means uprooting them from everything they now, bringing them to a place where, most likely there are very few other Dominican –Americans (let’s say everywhere outside of New York City and Miami) and telling them to start a brand new life in a place completely new and foreign. What’s the difference between this situation and Noemi’s? Legality? She gave up everything too, is living in a new place away from her family. Granted it’s not America, but in her mind if she loves this man, she is just as noble as the American and Dominican signing legal documents to make one of them a legal citizen.
Last week, Angel, the three-year-old boy who is apart of the family I eat lunch with daily asked me why I don’t have any kids. He was actually fairly perplexed by it, because why wouldn’t I? I am the same age as all the other women in town, including his mom, who have kids. It only makes sense in his mind that I would have kids. And plus, if I did, it would be someone else he could play with. What is most important about his question, however, are a couple of things, 1) Angel was not the first little kid of the week to ask me this question. My neighbor girl, who is either three or four, a few days previous, asked me the same thing. Why I don’t have kids? Do I want kids? 2) Neither one of these little kids asked me if I had a husband. Just kids.
I can’t help but feel liberated when I tell them no- to both the kids and the husband question.
When I tell them that I’m 24 and still don’t have kids or a husband, that’s when the old ladies of my town start to worry. They tell me I need to start having children so I’ll have someone to take care of me when I’m old. I agree with them and tell them I hope to have kids one day and even a husband (Si Dios quiere or God willing), but on my own time. That never goes over well. They just remind me that my time is slipping; I’m already 24 (practically ancient, really) and if I want to get a good man and have kids, I need to get started.
I guess it’s the rush that gets to me. Noemi, at thirteen-years-old, volunteers rushing to marry Dominicans in order to finish paperwork and me feeling the pressure to procreate before my body parts stop working properly.
Being here and seeing marriage in ways I honestly never had before thought about, gives me so much appreciation for my life. And every time a three-year-old or an older lady ask me about marriage, or even a Dominican man asks me to marry him for a visa, I will take great pleasure in the simple word, no.
Saturday, January 23, 2010
Investigation on the Mountaintop
Quick Update: Francia just told me that Eddy, my resident "drug dealer," and her half-brother who is also running for mayor was investigated by the Federal Police to see if he really did have ties with drug dealers.
Apparently, two men from town (who happen to be the head guy of my center and the dad of the family who I eat lunch with) who are both coincidentally named Juan Ramon called the Feds to have Eddy investigated. I mean, I can understand their suspicion, but it also so happens that both Juan Ramon's support the opposite political party from Eddy.
Anyway, they called the police, the police showed up to Eddy's house- the "Mountaintop Mansion," as my Peace Corps friends have called it- and searched Eddy and all his workers high and low. They took a passport from someone (not sure who) and a few other cedulas (which is basically a Dominican ID card).
Francia spent most of the mid-morning and afternoon praying up in her room. I could hear her sort of chanting, but I had no idea what she was really doing. Turns out, she was praying everything went well during the investigation.
Well, God answered because the police did not find anything at Eddy's house. He was cleared and is now currently blasting his own personalized themed meringue campaign song, which translates into something like, "For your neighbors, for your friends, for your family- Eddy is the mayor for everyone."
I mean, I can't say I blame him. If the whole world thought I was a drug dealer and found out I really wasn't, I'd also blast a song telling them to vote for me for mayor.
Apparently, two men from town (who happen to be the head guy of my center and the dad of the family who I eat lunch with) who are both coincidentally named Juan Ramon called the Feds to have Eddy investigated. I mean, I can understand their suspicion, but it also so happens that both Juan Ramon's support the opposite political party from Eddy.
Anyway, they called the police, the police showed up to Eddy's house- the "Mountaintop Mansion," as my Peace Corps friends have called it- and searched Eddy and all his workers high and low. They took a passport from someone (not sure who) and a few other cedulas (which is basically a Dominican ID card).
Francia spent most of the mid-morning and afternoon praying up in her room. I could hear her sort of chanting, but I had no idea what she was really doing. Turns out, she was praying everything went well during the investigation.
Well, God answered because the police did not find anything at Eddy's house. He was cleared and is now currently blasting his own personalized themed meringue campaign song, which translates into something like, "For your neighbors, for your friends, for your family- Eddy is the mayor for everyone."
I mean, I can't say I blame him. If the whole world thought I was a drug dealer and found out I really wasn't, I'd also blast a song telling them to vote for me for mayor.
Sunday, January 17, 2010
Chores
Today I thought seriously about moving out on my own. To my own wooden house with cracks in between every plank, a zinc roof, cement floors and a latrine in the backyard. My own Dominican dream house...
I came home this afternoon, after spending the weekend in the capital (Santo Domingo) and Santiago to an empty house. Francia "salio," or left, as my neighbor told me. Who knows when... yesterday? Friday? This morning? 5 minutes before I arrived from my motorcycle taxi ride? Yet the house still seemed to have the air of abandonment.
I walked up the stairs to my room and noticed cat poop and throw-up on the floor, the floor-mat and the bed where the guard sleeps outside of my window. "Well I guess cleaning never hurt anyone," I thought to myself.
I walked back down the stairs, unlocked the downstairs part of the house to the kitchen and found moldy fruit being invaded by a nation of fruit flies in the sink. Dirt and leaves had blown in from the open windows to leave a general cover of grime on the counters and floor. "Well, I guess cleaning the whole house never hurt anyone," I thought to myself now.
I went to do laundry, since we had power and water at the same time, and found the semi-automatic washing machine to also have a nice layer of dirt in the bottom of the machine. I cleaned the washing machine in order to clean my clothes, and then the work began.
Washed a load of clothes, my sheets and a defected floor-mat. Swept and mopped the floors upstairs and downstairs. Disinfected my entire bathroom. Came downstairs and did the same to the kitchen counters and the stove. I was too lazy to clean the downstairs bathroom, but I did scrub the kitchen walls, because as the clouds parted and sun shone through the windows, there was a ridiculous amount of grease splotches on both walls by the stove.
Finished laundry and swept a part of the outside patio. Moved my air-drying clothes to follow the fleeting sun, when all of a sudden the water faucet (where the house is, what's that called?) exploded. It was like the Tivoli Fountain in my front-yard. I ran over and tried to put the PCP pipe back together, which had rocketed off from all the pressure.
I failed miserably. In attempts to put the already jerry-rigged pipe pieces back together, I basically took a shower instead. The entire front of my body got drenched in the downpour. It was hilarious. I tried again and drenched myself even more. I decided I was a fool for trying to do this alone and ran through the water and my yard to my neighbor's house, and with water dripping down my face asked her frantically to come help me.
After a little bit more of a struggle and some more direct facial water shots, together we eventually fixed the water geyser. By this time, the grass and the dirt had become flooded to become a swamp and a mud-pit.
I told my neighbor, Lidia, thank you very much and how sorry I was that she got her clothes wet. She just smiled and said she was going to change anyway so not to worry and she was always there for help. She patted her now wet jeans, laughed and walked away, and I knew that she really did mean that she would always be there to help me.
I decided after this moment, that a dirty house that would never truly by mine was worth a good neighbor who would always be there to help control the floods.
I came home this afternoon, after spending the weekend in the capital (Santo Domingo) and Santiago to an empty house. Francia "salio," or left, as my neighbor told me. Who knows when... yesterday? Friday? This morning? 5 minutes before I arrived from my motorcycle taxi ride? Yet the house still seemed to have the air of abandonment.
I walked up the stairs to my room and noticed cat poop and throw-up on the floor, the floor-mat and the bed where the guard sleeps outside of my window. "Well I guess cleaning never hurt anyone," I thought to myself.
I walked back down the stairs, unlocked the downstairs part of the house to the kitchen and found moldy fruit being invaded by a nation of fruit flies in the sink. Dirt and leaves had blown in from the open windows to leave a general cover of grime on the counters and floor. "Well, I guess cleaning the whole house never hurt anyone," I thought to myself now.
I went to do laundry, since we had power and water at the same time, and found the semi-automatic washing machine to also have a nice layer of dirt in the bottom of the machine. I cleaned the washing machine in order to clean my clothes, and then the work began.
Washed a load of clothes, my sheets and a defected floor-mat. Swept and mopped the floors upstairs and downstairs. Disinfected my entire bathroom. Came downstairs and did the same to the kitchen counters and the stove. I was too lazy to clean the downstairs bathroom, but I did scrub the kitchen walls, because as the clouds parted and sun shone through the windows, there was a ridiculous amount of grease splotches on both walls by the stove.
Finished laundry and swept a part of the outside patio. Moved my air-drying clothes to follow the fleeting sun, when all of a sudden the water faucet (where the house is, what's that called?) exploded. It was like the Tivoli Fountain in my front-yard. I ran over and tried to put the PCP pipe back together, which had rocketed off from all the pressure.
I failed miserably. In attempts to put the already jerry-rigged pipe pieces back together, I basically took a shower instead. The entire front of my body got drenched in the downpour. It was hilarious. I tried again and drenched myself even more. I decided I was a fool for trying to do this alone and ran through the water and my yard to my neighbor's house, and with water dripping down my face asked her frantically to come help me.
After a little bit more of a struggle and some more direct facial water shots, together we eventually fixed the water geyser. By this time, the grass and the dirt had become flooded to become a swamp and a mud-pit.
I told my neighbor, Lidia, thank you very much and how sorry I was that she got her clothes wet. She just smiled and said she was going to change anyway so not to worry and she was always there for help. She patted her now wet jeans, laughed and walked away, and I knew that she really did mean that she would always be there to help me.
I decided after this moment, that a dirty house that would never truly by mine was worth a good neighbor who would always be there to help control the floods.
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Earthquake
As most of you probably already know there was a catastrophic earthquake in Haiti last night. With a 7.3 magnitude, I can only imagine the kind of real devastation it caused. The pictures in the papers and on the news will never truly show how much real damage these people are dealing with and will continue to deal with for countless years to come.
Here in the DR, I didn’t really feel anything when the quake happened. I was walking around the outside of my house and the tank that the rain water empties into, so we can drink it, started spilling out over the top. I thought it was nearly impossible how water could be spilling out over the top of this 10 foot-high tank, and as I walked over there to examine it, I wondered if an animal had somehow fallen in and was splashing around just to get out.
Moments later, my neighbor came running through the yard asking me if I felt the earth move. I sort of laughed, not knowing how grave the quake really had been and looked back up at the water tank that was now back to its original calm. Within seconds, a herd of people came flooding out of the Catholic Church that is my neighbor. An older woman had fainted when she felt the earthquake and at least 15 people were carrying her to the nearest car to race her up to the clinic in my town. No word today on her progress, but I’m assuming no news is good news right?
Francia and I watched the news repeat itself last night for over an hour. With no correspondents in Haiti, CNN Espanol just kept switching between a computer graphic image of the epicenter of the quake and a distant satellite photo of the area before the quake. Part of me was relieved to not see the real images. I couldn’t help but imagine if this earthquake would have happened in Santo Domingo or Santiago, what it would mean for all of us on the Eastern side of the island. What it means now for all those on the Western side.
Kathy, another Peace Corps Volunteer who is my sector’s leader if you will, called me a few hours later to make sure I was okay and nothing drastic happened. She didn’t feel anything in Santo Domingo. We talked casually about our recent trips back to the states over Christmas.
I hung up the phone feeling so lucky: I went to America for nearly three weeks to see family and friends over the holidays. I came back to a beautiful island where I have a monthly paycheck. No, it’s hardly any money when you convert it to US Dollars, but it’s a paycheck. I have a job, which is something many people my age can’t say right now. I felt an earthquake last night but wondered if it was some kind of animal enjoying a dip in the water tank. I am blessed and I am grateful. Please have your prayers and thoughts with all those in the world who are not nearly as lucky.
Here in the DR, I didn’t really feel anything when the quake happened. I was walking around the outside of my house and the tank that the rain water empties into, so we can drink it, started spilling out over the top. I thought it was nearly impossible how water could be spilling out over the top of this 10 foot-high tank, and as I walked over there to examine it, I wondered if an animal had somehow fallen in and was splashing around just to get out.
Moments later, my neighbor came running through the yard asking me if I felt the earth move. I sort of laughed, not knowing how grave the quake really had been and looked back up at the water tank that was now back to its original calm. Within seconds, a herd of people came flooding out of the Catholic Church that is my neighbor. An older woman had fainted when she felt the earthquake and at least 15 people were carrying her to the nearest car to race her up to the clinic in my town. No word today on her progress, but I’m assuming no news is good news right?
Francia and I watched the news repeat itself last night for over an hour. With no correspondents in Haiti, CNN Espanol just kept switching between a computer graphic image of the epicenter of the quake and a distant satellite photo of the area before the quake. Part of me was relieved to not see the real images. I couldn’t help but imagine if this earthquake would have happened in Santo Domingo or Santiago, what it would mean for all of us on the Eastern side of the island. What it means now for all those on the Western side.
Kathy, another Peace Corps Volunteer who is my sector’s leader if you will, called me a few hours later to make sure I was okay and nothing drastic happened. She didn’t feel anything in Santo Domingo. We talked casually about our recent trips back to the states over Christmas.
I hung up the phone feeling so lucky: I went to America for nearly three weeks to see family and friends over the holidays. I came back to a beautiful island where I have a monthly paycheck. No, it’s hardly any money when you convert it to US Dollars, but it’s a paycheck. I have a job, which is something many people my age can’t say right now. I felt an earthquake last night but wondered if it was some kind of animal enjoying a dip in the water tank. I am blessed and I am grateful. Please have your prayers and thoughts with all those in the world who are not nearly as lucky.
Monday, December 14, 2009
Wallet-less and Full.
After a week of language training in the capital, I am back in La Caya, waiting for four days to pass so I can fly to America.
Oh America, the beautiful. Which, were I live in Reno Nevada, is currently covered in snow. People keeping asking me what I want to do while I'm home. The truth is, I don't care, as long as we're eating. We can do whatever everyone wants, as long at some point we will eat something and share the wonder in good food, in variety of food, in the plenty of food.
A frustration: Last night, I got home from the capital at about 7 p.m. I took a bucket bath (with notably colder water- it's "winter" here too now, I guess) and ate dinner. After these tasks, I took out my wallet and counted my money to see if I needed to get some cash out before I left for the states. I had about $1200 pesos (or about $40 US), so no worries.
I woke up this morning, went on my usual run with Francia's dogs. After my run, I went up to my room to get my wallet so I could buy breakfast (eggs and stale bread) from the colmado (store) close to my house. I started to search for my wallet, and ended up searching for the next two hours. The wallet that was in my room last night was not in my room this morning.
After about 2 hours of literally tearing my room apart, with some help from Francia as well, I still am wallet-less. I have no idea if I put it in a great hiding place or if someone seriously came into my room and took it while I was on my run. Both are possible.
After screaming (no joke) I decided to go up to my family's house for lunch. I told them about what happened and of course they were greatly concerned about my lost wallet, but Silvia, the Mom of the house- my other Dona, was much more concerned with my stomach...
Me: When I was done running, I went to my room to get my wallet so I could buy breakfast, but it wasn't there. I looked for two hours and still couldn't find it.
Silvia: Wait, did you ever eat breakfast this morning?
Me: Well no, because I never found my wallet to buy food.
Silvia: Mi amor! And you didn't come up here to my house to eat?! (as she hits me hard on the shoulder)
Me: Well, I couldn't because, like I said, I spent the whole morning looking for my wallet.
Silvia: Ei yi yi, I have already told you, when you are hungry, you need to come to my house and eat here.
Me: I know Dona, I know. But really, I spent the whole morning looking for it, so I wouldn't have eaten anyway.
Silvia: (Shakes her head slowly while making a "tsk tsk" sound). This child needs to eat now. Gracias A Dios (Thanks to God) it is time for lunch.
And then she proceeded to give me the biggest bowl in the house so I could have the biggest share of the soup she had made for lunch. She even took it away when I was about halfway done and refilled it for me. She was right, I was hungry. I ate all of with it no problem.
I'm going to give my entire house one last search tonight to see if my wallet will magically appear. Put some good detective thoughts in the Universe for me. And if it is never found, I hope the money is in the hands of someone who needs it. Maybe my Peace Corps ID will get someone a voyage to the states. Because even though I am angry and annoyed that I lost my wallet with all that money, my bankcard and Peace Corps ID, especially four days before I go home- I'm definitely not hungry. And for that I am thankful.
Oh America, the beautiful. Which, were I live in Reno Nevada, is currently covered in snow. People keeping asking me what I want to do while I'm home. The truth is, I don't care, as long as we're eating. We can do whatever everyone wants, as long at some point we will eat something and share the wonder in good food, in variety of food, in the plenty of food.
A frustration: Last night, I got home from the capital at about 7 p.m. I took a bucket bath (with notably colder water- it's "winter" here too now, I guess) and ate dinner. After these tasks, I took out my wallet and counted my money to see if I needed to get some cash out before I left for the states. I had about $1200 pesos (or about $40 US), so no worries.
I woke up this morning, went on my usual run with Francia's dogs. After my run, I went up to my room to get my wallet so I could buy breakfast (eggs and stale bread) from the colmado (store) close to my house. I started to search for my wallet, and ended up searching for the next two hours. The wallet that was in my room last night was not in my room this morning.
After about 2 hours of literally tearing my room apart, with some help from Francia as well, I still am wallet-less. I have no idea if I put it in a great hiding place or if someone seriously came into my room and took it while I was on my run. Both are possible.
After screaming (no joke) I decided to go up to my family's house for lunch. I told them about what happened and of course they were greatly concerned about my lost wallet, but Silvia, the Mom of the house- my other Dona, was much more concerned with my stomach...
Me: When I was done running, I went to my room to get my wallet so I could buy breakfast, but it wasn't there. I looked for two hours and still couldn't find it.
Silvia: Wait, did you ever eat breakfast this morning?
Me: Well no, because I never found my wallet to buy food.
Silvia: Mi amor! And you didn't come up here to my house to eat?! (as she hits me hard on the shoulder)
Me: Well, I couldn't because, like I said, I spent the whole morning looking for my wallet.
Silvia: Ei yi yi, I have already told you, when you are hungry, you need to come to my house and eat here.
Me: I know Dona, I know. But really, I spent the whole morning looking for it, so I wouldn't have eaten anyway.
Silvia: (Shakes her head slowly while making a "tsk tsk" sound). This child needs to eat now. Gracias A Dios (Thanks to God) it is time for lunch.
And then she proceeded to give me the biggest bowl in the house so I could have the biggest share of the soup she had made for lunch. She even took it away when I was about halfway done and refilled it for me. She was right, I was hungry. I ate all of with it no problem.
I'm going to give my entire house one last search tonight to see if my wallet will magically appear. Put some good detective thoughts in the Universe for me. And if it is never found, I hope the money is in the hands of someone who needs it. Maybe my Peace Corps ID will get someone a voyage to the states. Because even though I am angry and annoyed that I lost my wallet with all that money, my bankcard and Peace Corps ID, especially four days before I go home- I'm definitely not hungry. And for that I am thankful.
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