February to May, in Brief

5/8/2015

Phew, it’s been awhile since I posted but now is as good a time as any. A lot has been going on, almost too much to keep track of but I’ll update you on the big ones and fill in the little ones as you text and email me. Hint, hint.

February

February was a total loss for me. I was in site maybe a few days. All the other days I was in trainings or seminars in Georgetown. I can’t remember all of them but I did a week long one where we adjusted and reviewed trainings for the incoming group. I did a PEPFAR training where we worked on ideas for how to use PEPFAR money at our big girls’ camp, camp GLOW. There was one more training but I jus can’t remember it so it can’t have been that good.

My friend Mollie’s sister came out to visit her. We all hiked out to Machabo which was very cool. We saw a few monkies jumping from one tree to another like we were in a documentary or something. It was very cool.

That’s it for February, bit of a short month so not a lot of time to fit stuff in.

March

March was a bit of a blur as well, time has taken on another meaning here. “The days go slow but the months go fast” as one well-meaning temp DPT said once. March was spent hurriedly getting ready for Camp BRO which was in April. I had to lock down the location, money, supplies, food for 30 people for 3 days. This was one of those real Facebook Peace Corps moments.

April

The first week of April was also spent getting ready for BRO. Luckily, we were ready for BRO just in time. The Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday of the second week of April we had our first camp BRO in Essequibo and second one in Guyana. There were some pretty great moments that came out of that and I’m happy I was able to be a part of it. That being said, it was a bunch of work that I wouldn’t wish on a soul individual again. After that, April was all downhill and I sailed through it pretty quickly.

My good friends John and Scott came to see me, which was pretty cool. They stayed for about 12 days or so. We went to Machabo to see Ally, Santa Mission to see Kelly, Mahaicony to fish and see Kaylee, then we just hung out in Essequibo for a while and chilled. It was very nice to see some familiar faces. This has been the longest I’ve gone without seeing John in the last 10 years so it was a real treat. We had a lot of fun and I really enjoyed it, thanks for coming, fellas.

Also at the end of April we had another volunteer, and my friend, leave. Ryan went back to Florida. He’s a good guy, he will be missed.

May

Well, it’s May 8^th as I write this. The big election is May 11^th, this coming Monday. We’ve been told by Peace Corps that we shouldn’t do anything on Monday and just be real chill for a few days after. Some volunteers are being consolidated and they’re all staying at a hotel together in a supposedly less dangerous area.

Essentially, this is the political landscape as I understand it. The People’s Political Party (PPP) has been in power for the last few decades. They haven’t been doing a great job so far and most people suspect them of stealing money as the majority of people in the government have large houses and their children go to school in the US. Basically everything you could conceive as being a blatant violation of their civic duty, they’ve been accused of including rigging elections. The APNU/AFC is a combination of two of the opposing groups that only recently joined forces last year. Rewind to last year, there were rumblings of them combining their parliamentary votes and calling for a vote of no confidence (like Star Wars and Chancellor Valorum) in the current president, Donald Ramotar. Donnie didn’t like this so he enacted a proroguement that stated Parliament would not be able to meet for the next six months. That six months ended in January, I think, the APNU/AFC called for a vote of no confidence, succeeded and now there’s this election. So that’s the setup for this election. If you recall, I said the PPP has been accused of rigging elections before and that is why there’s a concern for us volunteers.

The elections work similarly to elections in the US. There’s polling places people go to and vote and there’s reps from both parties counting votes and that kind of gives us an idea of who will win. Then they spend the next two days recounting and consolidating votes and an official winner is announced. There’s four scenarios that are possible here. First, the PPP is forecasted to win that first day then is officially announced two days later. Second, the PPP is forecasted again but then APNU wins. Third, the APNU is forecasted and wins. Fourth, the APNU is forecasted but then the PPP wins. I legitimately don’t know what the fallout will be from the results. I’ve been told if the fourth option occurs that’s when we might need to be a little worried but we’ll see what happens.

Well, until next time I guess. Y’all take it easy and I’ll be home real soon. 

The Last Days in Mabaruma

1/31/14


Hi all, pretty busy week so I figured I'd give y'all a rundown of what happened.


Monday started with PDM but I actually came in Saturday to attend the party of our great and fearless leader, Linda, the current Country Director. One thing they don't tell you about Peace Corps staff is that they are on a two year cycle just like we are. No one stays at their post for longer than two years which seems really unhelpful when you think about it.


Anyways, we went to the party, myself, Mark and Lauren who I met up with in Parika. We all hung out together, played some ping pong and had a good time in general. Afterwards we stayed at a hotel in town and the following day we headed out for Grand Coastal for the Project Design Management conference/training.


Normally, you're supposed to bring a counterpart to the conference and the idea is that you work on a project together with your counterpart that you can bring back to the community and implement. I was unsuccessful in finding a counterpart and, as it turns out, so were Mark and Lauren. So the three of us spent some quality time together at the conference, counterpartless.


Looking back at it now, I can't remember a single thing about the conference. The information that was presented was how to design a project using different strength and weakness tools. Now, these tools might work in an American environment where everyone is fairly well educated but out here where easily half of all adults, adults mind you, can't read it makes everything a lot harder. Not to say the techniques that were presented weren't useful, I'm sure they are but they aren't appropriate for their audience in their current form. And this was never, ever addressed by the staff presenting the material. I don't know if it was a given or they legitimately thought these tools would be helpful.


So that went on for three days. Then, I accompanied my good friend Andrew up to his site in Mabaruma. The only way to get there is by plane. It was quite a small plane, a Cessna 208B Caravan, it held about 12 people. So we flew out about 8am and arrived in Mabaruma about 9. It was a great flight, plenty to look at.


Mabaruma is a hilltop community. When we landed I noted that the altimeter said we were at 1000 feet which is probably the highest I've been in Guyana so that was pretty cool. Anyways, Mabaruma is sort of an extended community that flows down the road into a little valley where Kamaka is. Past Kamaka was Andrew's site, Wauna. We got a ride into town then walked down to Kumaka where we found a bus going to Wauna. Andrew picked the bus and as soon as we got in, I knew we'd made a mistake. Upon entry, we were met by a racket of chirps made by chicks sitting in a cardboard box. There were about 50 of them and throughout the whole ride every time they quieted down we'd hit a bump in the road and they'd start all over again. it was terrible.


After 45 minutes of our own personal hell we arrived in Wauna, which was beautiful Everywhere you looked, fruit trees, coconut trees, anything and everything that grows in Guyana grows in Mabaruma. We hiked up to Andrew's house packed up his stuff then we walked around Wauna. Literally, around, the whole village exits on a loop in the road that takes about 15 minutes to walk. It's a small dirt road that you take your car's life in it's own hands if you try to drive on it there's so many ditches and holes. We walked down to Andrew's health center where I saw the sign he had hung and the skeleton he'd painted. We went and met the Project Trust volunteers, the British equivalent of Peace Corps but way worse, and a few people that had been particularly kind to Andrew.


We left in the afternoon, back to Kumaka and stayed at a guest house there and the flew out in the morning. If you hadn't guessed, Andrew is leaving. He's a good guy and a good friend that I'll miss a lot. For those of you that are counting, that's five that have left now. Kristen, Rob, Emily, Kelly H, and now Andrew.


On the flight back, I got to sit in the copilot's seat. When you're a kid and you get to go in the cockpit and it's pretty cool. That still holds true as an adult. And if the flight was great on the way to Mabaruma the way back was even better. The whole time, All you could see was the lush, green jungle stretching out to the horizon. It was truly amazing and one of those moments that you realize that you're just a very small piece of something bigger than yourself. It felt good. And our pilot was actually an American from San Diego, California. Obviously, I told him my brother was a flight instructor in Oregon so if the pilot needed someone to take over the controls I was willing and able. and I might just do it for fun. He didn't laugh at the last part.


That brings us to today. Joe and I saw Andrew off at the airport. He's not leaving quite yet. He had a vacation planned in Barbados with his mom so he's doing that, coming back to finish the required paperwork then he'll be gone for good.


Thanks for listening everyone. If you want to Facetime or something I'll be in town week after next from the 9th to the 13th. My number is 592 674 8145 there's probably a country code or something, you'll have to figure that out on your own. That number is also good for whatsapp if you want to do some texting. I really do love hearing from people at home so don't be shy. They say one of the hardest things for volunteers coming back is realizing that life went on without them so please let me know what you're doing.


Okay, I've taken up enough of your time, take it easy everyone.

New Years

1/13/15

New Years was pretty cool this year. Maybe two weeks before I was talking to another volunteer, Ryan, about previous new years and we came up with the hypothesis that going somewhere special for New Years is preferable to staying in the same area. This year, I can’t imagine a better place than Suriname, easily in my top three New Years. Even though, for the first time in at least 5 years, I celebrated without John Kammerzelt.

I left for Suriname on the 28^th. There’s a new ferry schedule across the Essequibo, it leaves at 6am, 11am, and 4pm. My friend and Andrew was supposed to be getting to the Peace Corps office in Georgetown about 10 so I thought I’d take the 6am ferry and get to town about the same time if everything went well. I got to the office about 9:30 and Andrew informed me that his plane, the only way out of his site, was delayed by weather. Apparently the plane had made it to the airport in Mabaruma, seen the weather, and turned around so now Andrew wouldn’t make it to town until early afternoon. Secretly, I was pleased to hear the news because it meant I could hang out at the office and use the internet.

Other volunteers passed through the office also on their way to Berbice on the east coast where we would meet up and enter Suriname. A group had just finished hiking Kaiteur Falls and they congregated at the office then dispersed. I continued to wait for Andrew, soaking in all the news and content I’d missed since my last trip into the interwebs. I didn’t want to bring my computer to Suriname so I set it to download some things and found a spot for it in the office where I’d pick it up on my way home.

Finally Andrew made it to the office and we amassed a small party, myself, Andrew, Holleigh, Mollie, Ashley and Ashley’s girlfriend from Spain who spoke very little English, Miriam. The bus park was a nightmare. As soon as we got close drivers and conductors pawed and grabbed at us trying to get us to board their bus. It was not my favorite moment. They swarmed and harassed us until we got onto a bus. It was like feeding time at the zoo, and we were the food.

After we got on a bus we waited for a solid 20 minutes for it to fill then headed for the east coast. We arrived at Matt and Kathrina’s house where most of the group had congregated for the White Elephant game. White Elephant is that game where everyone brings a gift and everyone takes turns stealing and opening gifts. Long story short, I brought three tennis balls and two decks of cards in a black plastic bag and left with a bottle of neutrophil, a nerve tonic.

Most people left to continue the party at Jackie’s house. Andrew, Kelly, Jerrell, Ashley, Miriam, Eben, Naomi, and I all stayed behind. Some of us started slinging our hammocks since we planned on sleeping outside. Normally, since the average temperature at night is in the high 70s, this wouldn't be an issue. I’ll return to this in a second.

A few days before this as I was getting ready to leave I decided I needed a net for my hammock. So I went down to the pharmacy and got one. Now, nets specifically for hammocks are a little hard to come by so I bought one for a bed, brought it home, wrapped it cocoon style around my hammock, and pronounced it good enough. I was and continue to be pretty impressed by my ingenuity and it held up perfectly in its real world application, plus, sleeping in a hammock is pretty cool.

The bus came to get us the next night at midnight. The ferry didn’t leave until 10 but it had been filling more quickly and we wanted to guarantee our spot. We got there about 4am and proceeded to wait until 10AM. Then, we remembered this is Guyana and realized we’d be lucky to leave the shore before 12. 12 comes around and we finally get on the boat for a 20 minute ride to Suriname.

As we got closer, people started to bunch near the front of the boat. We were all quizzical and I was standing on the second level so I could see the horde getting more and more anxious. When the boat landed and the ramp dropped it was pure anarchy. Masses of people rushed for the immigration building. I mean just flat out running like the ferry was on fire. Needless to say, we were all confused by this. We proceeded to disembark like normal humans in an orderly manner.

It was only as we approached the terminal we realized our mistake. Before us lay a swath of humans. A line 10 people wide, and 40 people deep had manifested in front of the building. Initially our thoughts were that this was not a big deal. Suriname customs must be way better than the Guyanese we had just come through. We were wrong. 4 hours later we had all made it through the line. But finally, we were in Suriname. Right?

Wrong, were about a 4 hour drive from Paramaribo where we were all staying. At this point, I was getting tired of the uncomfortable seats and unbearable temperature. Luckily, I had a friend who could take care of that. The bottle of Neutrophil was a godsend. Looking at the ingredients, I read that it was basically a bottle of nicotine. Recalling my psychopharmacology class, I remembered that nicotine is a mild stimulant with some muscle relaxant properties. Between me and my seat mate Lauren we had about half the bottle and sat in relative comfort until Paramaribo.

The next day, we walked around town a little bit, scoping out the place for good New Year’s spots. There was lots of music and people partying. And a plethora of cute Dutch girls. The streets were filled with people drinking and dancing. We hung around for most of the afternoon then about 2pm we headed back to the hotel, napped for a little, then headed out about 9 to party a little bit. It was at this time I really started to have fun. Andrew, Mark, Jerrell, and met up with most of the other crew at Subway, one of the many American influences on Suriname. When we got there another volunteer, Ryan, suggested we go put 20 Suriname dollars on black at the nearby Princess casino. So Andrew, Ryan and I went down to the casino. For some reason, we decided to warm up with a little blackjack. A little blackjack turned into a lot of blackjack and a lot of alcohol. But the alcohol fueled my luck, I was up $300 when we decided to call it quits about 11 or so. At that point the rest of the crew had caught up with us and here’s where things got a little hazy because of how lucky I was feeling.

Ryan had acquired some free passes to the local night club, Starz. Apparently we went there, it was close to the casino, and they said they didn’t open until 1am. Whatever, if they wanted to turn away business that’s their problem. After that, I remember being on the rooftop bar of the casino counting down to midnight. And as we reached midnight fireworks went off all over the city. Jets of streaking light soared up and exploded in the sky. It was like watching 20 fireworks shows at once. It was pretty cool. We continued to hang around the rooftop bar, meet some Dutch oil prospectors and have a few more drinks.

That about sums up the night, really. The next day we went on a dolphin site seeing tour. Saw some dolphins and then we left at midnight, again.

1/23/15

On my way back from Suriname I met up with a volunteer from another organization, Project Trust. It’s an English organization and the volunteers name is Natasha, Tash for short. As we’re getting on the ferry, I look down and realize the water is really low. I figure this must be because of the new ferry schedule. Before the New Year, the ferry changed from running every 13 hours, to accommodate the tide, to running at 6am, 11am, and 4 pm. When I heard this, I even said, “that’s not going to work with the tide”. So there we are, on the ferry, she’d never been on the ferry before and she was excited about how little it cost compared to a speedboat, almost $1000. So the ferry departs, we’re sitting outside on the side deck enjoying the jungle cruise when all of a sudden, something bad happens.

The boat starts inclining. The front starts angling up and we could hear a horrific grinding noise. Then the boat shudders, which was scary for a boat that size, and slams back down into the water. The best I could figure, the boat hit bottom, rose up as it pushed through, and came back down the other side. After wiping myself I felt fairly validated in my assessment of the ferry’s capabilities.

Now, one of the ferries is broken and there is absolutely no schedule. They have literally no idea when the boat will show up. The only way to find out is to call down to the office which wouldn’t be a bad system if they actually picked up the phone. The new schedule lasted exactly 3 weeks before one of the ferries broke down. Classic Guyana.

Stuff That Happened

12/10/14

Two weeks ago we celebrated Thanksgiving down in Linden. Linden takes about an hour and half to get to from Georgetown and Georgetown is between 3 and 5 hours from my home in Suddie.

The whole thing went very smoothly, getting there, enjoying friends, and getting back. Here’s my favorite part.

That Saturday, the 29^th, my friend Ryan announced that he had a radio show to do from 7:30-9:30. He said that his friend and co-host said that we’d get into the club for free later that night so it seemed like we should go. Longtime friends of mine, and short time, will recall that I used to do a radio show with a couple of cool cats back in the day. K-hurtz, Snack Daddy, and DJ Bailout, you know who you are, what you did and what’s on film.

Obviously, I jumped at the chance to get back on the airwaves so Ryan had one of his buds drive us out there. When we got there, we were greeted by the producer and, I think, manager of the station 104.3 Power. The station looked like it was set up in someone’s house. The foyer was a huge room with a pile of speakers in one corner blasting the voices of the people in the booth that you could see through the giant window. Ryan’s co-host comes out and it’s this giant Afro-Guyanese man wearing a tank top revealing an intricate network of tribal tattoos covering his arms and chest. He introduces himself as Gavin. I recently read that if someone maintains eye contact with you for more than 6 seconds they either want to kill you or have sex with you. Apparently he wanted to kill all of us. I don’t care to think about the alternative.

 Initially there were about 10 people that came to the station but most of the party got bored and left early leaving only me, Ryan, the “Boo Crew”, and Gavin his DJ name was G. Ryan’s DJ name was West and obviously mine was JT. The “Boo Crew” were three Guyanese women who looked like they had been tricked into coming and definitely didn’t appreciate the moniker.

The way the booth was set up G had a mic stand next to him sitting on the desk between him and me and Ryan. Ryan and I shared a handheld microphone. It was not a great set up but it was a good time. We talked celebrity news and talked about all the stupid stuff DJs talk about. We also played a top 10 list pilfered from some American music site. It was definitely a return to something that I really enjoyed and still enjoy.

This week, our Safety and Security Coordinator is checking out all our homes and workplaces making sure we are all safe and secure. I went out to Machabo with him today because I had literally nothing to do today. Some of you will have already seen the pictures. Written words don’t do it justice but it is definitely an Eden nestled on the coast of Guyana. I’ll try to post a picture or two when I post this.

12/16/14

Hi everyone, just a quick check in I just got back from Linden again. We were doing a GLOW (Girls Leading Our World) camp. There were about 20 or so girls there at different times. It was a good learning experience for me at least since I'll be doing about the same thing with a boys camp at the end of March. I don't want to give anything away just now so I'll post more details later on. Have a few pictures in the mean time.

This is me drinking the last gallon or so of juice from the camp GLOW in Linden. If I had to describe the flavor it would be ground up Pez mixed with water.

This is a skeleton my friend Andrew painted at his health center.

This is an arty photograph of Joe holding the remains of breakfast.

This is my trusty hammock. I spend several hours a day in this bad boy.

From left to right, Erika (top), Mollie (bottom), Andrew, Kaylee, Me, and Ryan. This is from Linden two weeks ago and we're eating vanilla Oreos donated by Matt and Kathrina (not pictured).

This is Machabo lake, we had to cross it to get to Machabo.

This is Machabo. It's Ally's, another volunteer, site. Very beautiful. That little building is her house.

This is the boat that four grown men took across the lake for a half hour. I wish you could see the scale of the boat better but it got scary, quick.

This is from Essequibo Night, a big cultural event from my neck of the woods. That's me on the left, Ally in the middle and Mark on the right.

This is the view from my porch.

This is the group at kaietur falls. Too many people to name without confusing you. Just know that everyone is pretty cool.

While I've got your attention, I'm trying a new thing. Find me on whatsapp and I'll add you to my broadcast list and you can see all my photos, hear all my thoughts, and get all my cool updates. To do that, download Whatsapp on your smartphone and add this number as a contact 5926748145. Also follow me on Twitter @_This_is_Tim_. You just might like it.

Back Again

10/8/14

Hi everybody, I’m back again.

Last Sunday I went to an Eid celebration at the masjid. Apparently masjid is another term for mosque. You learn something new every day, even if you don’t want to. It was pretty cool. Joe was in town and we were hanging out all weekend so we went together with Mollie, Naomi and David. We missed the actual slaughtering but we watched some of the butchering. The men there slaughtered a dozen bulls, chopped them up and handed out the meat. Luckily we were there early, and white, so we got some meat that we took back to Mollie’s and cooked up immediately.

So there we were, eating steak that had literally been slaughtered about 90 minutes before and drinking cold beers. Some days are better than others. Future volunteers don’t take this as the rule, days like this are by and far the exception. But it’s fun to focus on the few high points instead of the multitudes of low ones.

There’s a movie, The Guardian maybe, Kevin Costner and Ashton Kutcher and they’re rescue divers. In it, Costner says something to the effect of, “you’ll spend 90% of your diving career in a mild state of hypothermia” as he mercilessly trains the new divers. I’d say that sentiment echoes one’s experience Peace Corps. Not mildly hypothermic, but very mildly depressed.

We’re all so concentrated on what we’re doing here because it’s now our lives. When I did volunteer work before even when I didn’t like it at least I got to go home at the end of the day. When something irritates me at work or at home there’s almost nothing that I can do about it. While it’s possible, it’s not feasible to move out of a neighborhood I don’t like or find a job that I do. I’m stuck here. I am living this volunteer life whether I like it or not.

It’s unnatural to always be giving of one’s time. To be volunteering 24/7. There has to be some degree of selfishness or narcissism to lend balance to one’s life. Taking time for one’s self, self-care, is important to the human species. Being able to take care of yourself is necessary for life to go on and out here there’s fewer opportunities and options to do that. I also hate whining so I’m done for now, it’s just hard out here some times.

One thing that’s been weighing on my mind is my host family. For at least the last week they’ve been keeping one of their dogs in a small 2’x3’ house on about a 4’chain. It’s barbaric the way they’re treating this dog. And it whines all through the day and night like no one’s fed it. I haven’t actually seen them feed it but I have to imagine they do while I’m not home, right? God I hope so. The worst part is that I don’t feel like I can say anything and if I could, what would I say? “Hey, stop torturing your dog.”? Combined with the fact that my host sister keeps bringing me dinner it’s like they’re being so nice to me and complete assholes towards this dog. Animals are not treated well here. This is the rule, not the exception. I see plenty of abused animals here every day and it’s truly disgusting. They’re real emotional terrorists.

10/13/14

Hey everyone, I went to Kaiteur Falls on Saturday. I’ve seen it spelled a lot of different ways so that’s what we’ll go with. It was pretty cool. Supposedly, it’s the highest single drop waterfall in the world at 741 feet high. I wonder who had to measure that.

But better than that was getting to see some other volunteers that I hadn’t seen in 3 months. We went through all the training and PC bullshit and through that firestorm of bad decisions and useless training sessions we forged a real family. It really was like seeing some brothers and sisters I hadn’t seen in a while, we just picked up where we left off.

What I was really struck by was the boundless optimism I saw from these people. It was more inspiring than any water falling off a cliff. Out on the Essequibo coast we really are isolated from most of the other volunteers who live on the other side of the river. Traveling to town on a good day can take upwards of 3 hours and it’s mentally taxing. I really don’t like traveling into town or even being in town. There’s too many people and I can feel my anxiety rising. My friend Holly said that it’s important to be flexible and be able to adapt to differences. I think I’ll have to try that next time I’m in town.

But back to why I was struck by the optimism. On the coast, the other volunteers that I do see are the jaded 25ers, the group that came before us. I like them a lot, CJ, Mollie, Iris, Ally, Doug, they are all really cool people and they’ve helped me get used to Guyana. One thing that I like is the fact that there are no illusions with them. They don’t pull punches about how shit things can be sometimes and don’t pretend to love every second of every day. They’re realists to the max and I appreciate that. It comes, I think, from being here for the last year and a half. They know that having expectations that are too high will only end disappoint. I like being around realistic people.

That’s why the optimism and idealism that I heard from the other 26ers surprised me, I wasn’t used to it. Initially, I affixed it to their naiveté and the fact they still held some of that je nai se qua (was that right, Nick and Chris?) and innocence that allowed them to believe they were making a difference every day. It actually kind of annoyed me, it felt like they were ignoring all the bad stuff about being here and only focusing on the good and how great things were. It felt like they were lying to themselves. Telling themselves how great this whole experience has been and ignoring the parts that were bad. In my mind, that’s the pinnacle of unhealthy psychological behavior. I don’t think you should focus purely on the positives and deny the negatives because that’s not real life. That’s a fantasy world where nothing bad ever happens and it’s just not real. Bad stuff happens, I’ve seen it, you’ve seen it and when someone denies that they’ve never had a bad day or minimizes their own sadness it’s unhealthy. Acknowledging that, yeah, sometimes I have a really shitty day where I don’t accomplish anything is important, I think.

I’ve never been one to push my beliefs on other people. And while I didn’t agree with the other volunteer’s views of things, the last thing I’d do is condemn them for their views. But then I thought about why they might be doing that and I think it comes down to the differences in ways people approach their lives. Where I like to have balance and acknowledge both the bad and the good some others may want to emphasize the good. It’s not my place to tell them what I think about their strategy but I should support them regardless. And as I thought about it I realized that maybe I was going about my service in the wrong way. Maybe I needed to be more positive about what I was doing.

10/16/14

                I know, I know, I was supposed to post yesterday but I just forgot. I’ll post tomorrow, I promise.

                Some days it seems like Peace Corps lied to us. When you think about PC you think about going to some exotic locale, living in a small hut, and strolling around the village clad only in a loincloth. Well I don’t have a loincloth. This stereotypical view of a volunteer is obviously not everyone’s experience, I’m not an idiot. I guess I was just hoping that someone in this entire country would actually want volunteers here. Everyone I’ve talked to just doesn’t really seem to give a shit that I’m here. If they don’t care, why should I?

                Everyone I talk to, nurses, doctors, people in the community just gives me the smile and nod, disbelief that I’ll be here for two years and a promise to call if I can be helpful. And that’s a best case scenario. Then I never hear from them again. Being here is like being in quicksand. I’m slowly sinking into a pit of my own fear and doubts and every time I try to reach for a branch, a reason to be here, it gets pulled away. The people here wouldn’t be doing anything differently whether or not Peace Corps was here, I think. All the technical expertise and willingness to help is wasted here. I’ve worked hard, I’m not afraid to do something that’s never been done before but without the buy-in from the people that are here, what’s the point?

                Every day is a struggle to do something meaningful and most days, I fail. And I’m getting tired of it.

                It definitely feels like I’m whining right now. “Oh look at me, I get to live in South America totally funded by the US. Woe is me.” I’m not trying to bitch and moan too much but it’s seriously frustrating being hired to help in a country that doesn’t want my help. It’s like getting hired for a new job then showing up and realizing there is no job and you have to build the company from the ground up on your own in a country of people you’ve never met who’s culture and customs you don’t understand. Thank God they speak English, kind of. But if it was easy, everyone would do it. Right?

11/7/2014

                So you may have noticed that this post is very very late. A whole host of excuses could follow and not fully explain what’s been going on. I’ve just been the right kind of busy and bored not to post this.

                Last week, we had reconnect. All the volunteers showed up at the same hotel and we all went through more bullshit PC training. The training was completely useless and unhelpful. I wish they’d stop. Getting to see everyone was really the best part and most people seem to be doing well. I want to be like them. Reading through what I’ve written before I realize it sounds very negative. Having this blog is like a reverse facebook. Instead of seeing all the great parts of my life you are exposed to only my worst thoughts. In the future, I’ll try to temper them with more positive things that have been going on. For example, today I’m going to my friend Ashley’s school and working with some of the boys. Working on what? I don’t know. But I’ll do some activity they enjoy, debase myself a little and maybe things will turn out okay. See y’all later. I miss all of you lots, I’m 6 months in now and I’ve got 21 months left. Here we go.

11/10/14

I had a bit of distressing news from my conference a few weeks ago.

                Peace Corps has stated on several occasions that they begin developing sites far in advance of our arrival. They do the groundwork and, are supposed to, make sure that the community has things for a volunteer to work on and willing members to help.

                At this conference I got confirmation of a suspicion I’ve held for a while. It turns out that Peace Corps did have a site that they thought would be perfect for me. From what I can gather it was in Georgetown and would have been working with administration in the Ministry of Health to help implement their new psychological health plan for the country. Sounds pretty cool. Apparently, two days before they announced our sites an unknown staff member stated that my site would not be safe since it was in town and that it would no longer be a viable site. 2 days before sites were announced when this staff member had months to say something. A new site was then located for me over the course of two days. All these months and months of preparation were down the toilet in a minute and my site was basically whatever someone could scrape from the bottom of the barrel in 48 hours.

                It’s unfortunate but what am I gonna do? Cry? Whine? What’s that going to do? Instead I’m taking it as a learning experience. It sucks but no one can fix my problems except me so that’s what I’m going to do. And as for Peace Corps, I appreciate the staff’s honesty but I don’t feel comfortable asking them for anything after this. That’s not to say they can’t be inadvertently helpful but I think Peace Corps has done me enough favors at this point. Now I’m on my own, in my opinion. Peace Corps has no bearing on what I do anymore. I’m going to do exactly what I want to do. They had their shot and it didn’t work out so I’ll take things from here.

Birthday Post

9/17/14

                Good morning everyone. It’s 5:30AM Guyana time, do you know where Tim is? He’s sitting in front of his computer with barely working internet checking Oregonlive for Beaver news. Sipping a cup of coffee. Relaxing in the early morning stillness punctuated by the god damn annoying cries of the local roosters.

                Nearby, a small bottle of mosquito repellent taunts him. It says, “Hey, put me on!” The repellent here is quite an interesting beast. It’s basically an industrial strength solvent. It might as well say “Do not apply to skin.” Because it burns as soon as you put it on. It’s like a chemical peel in a bottle. My eyelids are on fire but I feel 10 years younger.

                I’m getting real tired of being asked if I can type. When I went down to the records department that ill-fated day that was one of the first things they asked me. When I went to the Regional Health Officer’s office and asked for something to do they asked me if I could type. When I went to the regional Medex office she asked me if I could type. Embarrassingly, the answer is not well. I didn’t join the Peace Corps to have adventures, see the world, and become a secretary.

                My supervisors at PC Guyana, who are really sweet people, linked me with the regional Medex and said she would have some work for me where I would get to travel into the interior and visit health centers. I went to meet the regional Medex the only thing she wanted help with was writing reports, hence the typing question. I don’t think PC lied to me, I really don’t. I imagine the Medex told them one thing to impress them, they told me, and when I actually showed up all of a sudden the Medex had nothing for me to do. That’s the culture here, no one expects anyone to follow through on anything. This leads to a complex in which the expectations are so low, people try to boost their own self-concept by blowing other things out of proportion. So, finally, when someone follows through, nothing goes the way it should. People here know that they should show up on time, go to appointments, and generally do what they say they’re going to do but the culture is too permissive, forgiving, and without real punishments for not sticking to commitments. Avoidance has few consequences here.

9/23/14

A stroke of good luck today. When I first got here, I may have mentioned this, but I heard about this place called the New Opportunities Corps. From what I’ve understand it’s essentially a reform program for at risk youth. This sounded great because this is, essentially, the type of kids that I was working with back home. I talked to my supervisor about it, she’s the Regional Health Officer, and she said that she had to send them a letter, it’s right down the road, they had to send a letter into Georgetown and then a letter would be sent back approving me to volunteer there.

Well, last week my PC supervisors came to town to check up on me. They asked me about the NOC and I told them I hadn’t heard anything. Simone then told me that there had been a volunteer placed there a few years ago and that she knew the supervisor back then and that if he was still there all it would take is a phone call from her for me to be allowed there. Today, I called her about what happened in my last blog post and mentioned I hadn’t heard from NOC yet. Simone promised to make the call today and lo and behold she called me back probably an hour later saying I was good to go at the NOC. Apparently, a letter had been mailed from Georgetown and arrived somewhere in my vicinity but no one had ever told me. But to be fair, the RHO has been on vacation for the last 4 weeks and my counterpart was on vacation for the 4 weeks previous to that.

So hopefully this pans out and turns into something. I just feel like I’m doing so little these days so I hope this can fill up some of my time. I’m going there tomorrow afternoon. I’ll check back in with y’all tomorrow. Thanks, Simone!

9/24/13

                Hi everybody, kind of a lot to talk about today.

                I’ve had this cough/cold like disease for almost 3 weeks now. I felt sick this morning so I called in to the Bacchus School and said I wasn’t coming in. I planned on going to the NOC in the afternoon anyway so I figured I would take the morning off and try to feel better.

                About 12:00 my friend, and fellow volunteer, Iris called and asked me if I wanted to come down to the Chinese restaurant by the post office. I accepted and headed over. We hung out for a little while, she had a meeting to go to for school at 1 so we both left a little before then.

                I approached the NOC campus on foot, it was about a 20 minute walk from my house on the main road. It didn’t seem like anyone was there, kids or adults. As I got closer to the campus I saw a car drop off an adult and watched him walk into a building. I followed him in. There was no lock on the gate, no guard just an open gate. On a juvenile detention center. Not a great first impression.

                The first building I entered turned out to be a recreation room and the staff was just restocking the juice. He directed me to another building on the other side of campus. I walked that direction and some of the kids called out to me, “White man, white man!” I acknowledged them, smiled to myself, and kept walking. I knew these were my type of kids.

                After introducing myself to a few of the wrong staff members I finally met the head honcho. Mr. Dover. He told me a little about what the NOC was all about. Essentially, kids either go to regular school, which judging by the size of the classrooms is not many, or go to one of the training programs. There are programs in IT, Agriculture, Catering and other things. Internally, I question how these are better than regular school.

                I talked with some of the staff, then they kind of abandoned me for a meeting. After that, I just wandered around for a little while. None of the kids seemed interested in talking. Most of them wanted to stare me down. It reminded me of some of my times at YES House and CFH. I felt kind of homesick.

                One kid stopped and talked with me for a little bit. Nicholas, he was 14, from Georgetown and he had several tattoos. Some were on his face. But the way he talked about staff and the facility really was just like the kids I worked with back home. He was a nice kid for the most part.

                I stopped by the shop on the way home. There were two white people at the store which was interesting. I stopped and introduced myself. I wasn’t sure they were white until I got closer. There are some light skinned Portuguese and Cubans that I sometimes mistake for white people. The white peope I met at the store were Jehovah’s Witnesses missionaries from Holland, Roy and Marionne. They had real thick Dutch accents, tried to convert me, and were really nice people. I hope I run into them again. The only other Jehovah’s Witness that I can think of was girl named Salem in 6^th grade.

                I bought a Coke from the shop and finished walking home. I had a long swallow of the soda and I was reminded of something. When I was younger, my Dad would tell his sons stories. Driving to the beach, driving up to the mountains, just any sort of long time period in which we would all be together. He really only told two stories. The one I was thinking about while I was having a long, cool drink of Coke was the one about Harry. Harry was in the military or something. Through some circumstances, he comes to being a boat captain that rents his boat out to some guys that want to do some diving. I think they find a treasure ship or something and they don’t want Harry to know so they go to shoot him and he jumps overboard. Harry then resurfaces, pulls himself onto the boat ends up passing out in the sun while the bad guys leave. Then, when Harry wakes up he goes to the galley and drinks 3 Cokes back to back to back. There’s more to the story but I don’t want to give it away all in one shot. Also, years later I read the book that my dad got this story from. It’s called Eye of the Tiger, if you want to know what happens.

                So what I’m trying to say is that it was so damn hot today that when I took a drink of Coke I felt like I had been shot and then unconscious in the sun for several hours.

9/25/14

                Something else happened the other day that I wanted to write about. I was talking to another volunteer, I don’t want to mention any names this time, and they said that they understood why teachers hit their students. Here, the method of discipline is a fair departure from what it is back home. Teachers here are allowed to “give lashes.” That is, hit their students with a stick. The method sometimes varies with the school, sometimes only the headmistress is allowed to give lashes but he intent remains the same.

                I was talking with this volunteer and somehow this came up. The volunteer, who I’ll call Sam from here on out for brevity’s sake, said that hitting students is the only way they know how to learn not to do something. I’ll concede that in this culture it’s a very real possibility that with all the violence that children are exposed to, both at home and at school, it’s possible they have been conditioned to learn that violence is an acceptable form of punishment. From that they’ve learned that if they’re really not meant to do something then someone, generally an adult, will threaten them with or carry out violence against the child. I’ll concede that. What I won’t concede that it is the only way kids here can learn. When Sam said that, I just got outrageously upset. I’ve known so many kids that have been in violent and abusive situations and I’ve never had to use violence to get my point across.

                Now I know that when Sam said that they weren’t encouraging violence or sanctioning it, they were only stating that they understood why it was used. Sam, you know who you are, I know you don’t condone violence but I wanted to highlight your opinion. I don’t think you’re entirely wrong and I wanted to use your statement as a jumping off point to make my own.

 I guess I was just outraged that Sam wasn’t outraged. But you could also chalk that up to a difference in convictions. Some things that I really care about maybe Sam doesn’t care so much about. This might jst be one of those personal growth moments everyone keeps talking about, Matt.

I’m truly of the opinion that hitting children shouldn’t be allowed in schools. I feel like I have enough context to make that statement. In private, at home, I would condemn excessive violence with prejudice. Something like spanking, while I will say I am against it, I’ve never been a parent and I wouldn’t feel comfortable passing judgment on parents when I haven’t had that experience.

                But I have been in schools here and in the US. And I can see no earthly reason why violence in classrooms is necessary for or beneficial. A child doesn’t learn better with a threat of violence looming over them in the form of a teacher.

                A lot of schools here have a problem with attendance, here’s a pro tip; don’t hit kids. They get scared of coming to school.

10/1/14

                I know, I know, I was supposed to post today. I just got caught up this morning working on other stuff that I didn’t get a chance to post. Let me update you on a few things that have happened first, then I’ll upload this.

                I did an HIV workshop/presentation with some other volunteers at a secondary school on Monday. It went really well and I really enjoyed doing it. The best part is that I went to NOC the next day and asked if they would like to have us do the same presentation there. They couldn’t accept fast enough. They seem to really be starved for programming or maybe they have a quota or something. I’m not sure what their motives are but I imagine I’ll find out quickly as I spend more time there.

                Peace Corps funds a few committees and task forces lead by and made up of volunteers. Before yesterday I was just on Peer Support Network, we just work on supporting volunteers. There’s no budget, I’m quickly finding out that it is kind of designed like the party planning committee but I’ve got plans to change that. Yesterday, I found out that I got selected for the GAD task force. The Gender And Development Task Force. Anyone that knows me knows I’m all about gender issues. I’ve been lucky enough to have a lot of opportunities to work in gender equality fields and I’m really excited to do that in a developing country.

                I have lots of mental health ideas that I’m moving forward with. Depression screenings, suicide prevention workshops, individual counseling. There’s a lot to do in the mental health department here. Actually, there’s everything to do here since so little has been done. The country of 700,000 or so people only has one psychiatrist in the entire country and no psychologists. I don’t blame them though, according to Maslow there’s a lot of things they need to work on first before mental health becomes a main issue. But I’ll do what I can until then. I can feel myself getting busier. That’s a good thing.

I still miss you all, and everything familiar back home. With the other volunteers we constantly talk about how there’s no one big difference here just a lot of little ones. Staying in Peace Corps is really just how many little inconveniences can you deal with before you can’t anymore. I’ve definitely had days that I wanted to come home. Every day, actually. Most times I can talk myself out of it. Sometimes I can’t and those days suck. It’s not easy in any sense of the word. I definitely joined for different reasons than I’m staying for. All the support I get from everyone back home helps a ton. It was my birthday on Sunday, the big quarter century. I’ve now been friends with John Kammerzelt for 10 years or just about. Thanks for being there, bud.

If you feel like it, shoot me an email at timdaniel25@gmail.com. Tell me what you’re up to. I can’t always answer right away but if I can, I will. Alternatively, if you have a smart phone you can download whatsapp and put my phone number in, 592-674-8145.

Living That Guyana Life

9/1/14

Well that was weird. I might have mentioned before that I have a lot of time to kill so I’ve been doing a lot of reading. Recently I’ve been reading Helter Skelter, it’s about Charles Manson and the Manson Family. Very gruesome. So I’m sitting here reading I get up and move to put the book on the table and something falls out. I can see it’s a newspaper clipping and, judging from the printing I can see and the shape of the cutout, the article of interest is on the reverse side. This book is very creepy, anyone who’s heard about Charles Manson knows that he and his family were pretty strange.

So there I am. Standing, looking down at where this newspaper clipping has fallen. I could tell the clipping was old, it was yellowed and on the side I could see was a partial picture of policeman. Judging from his manner of dress combined with the color of the paper I could tell the article was not from this decade. I assumed the article must have been from a time period closer to when the book, and the Manson Family murders, took place.

I reached down and picked up the clipping. I fully expected to see the smiling face of Charles Manson on the other side. I turned it over and the reality wasn’t much better. It was an article, dated by hand in 1977, stating that Roman Polanski would be indicted for the rape of a 13 year old. Roman Polanski’s wife, Sharon Tate, was one of the victims of the Manson Family so that connection made sense but it was a strange thing to hold onto for 37 years. I wonder if whoever put it in the book knew that someday someone would find their article in South America. And to whoever did, that really freaked me out since I was just reading the part about the actual murders. Please don’t do it again.

9/2/14

                Well, its day 3 without running water and only intermittent, unreliable power. I was going to take to Facebook and verbalize my woes a little but then I realized: there are people, some of them very near me and some I know who don’t have water or power at all.

                There’s a comic strip that I really enjoy, Calvin and Hobbes. Nick and Chris enjoy it as well, so much so that Chris named one of his stuffed tigers Hobbes. Now, Calvin has a very philosophical way of putting things if you haven’t read the strip it’s essentially morals and life lessons framed by a 6 year old. In one strip, Calvin takes hold of a helium balloon and it lifts him into space. I forget the actual set up but at the end of it Calvin says, “Life’s never so bad that it can’t get worse.” I’ve tried to keep this in mind during my time here. No matter how bad I have it there’s always someone that has it worse. And often times that person is another Peace Corps Volunteer. What right do I have to complain when there are so many others that don’t have anything close to the few luxuries that I have?

                Interestingly, there is a psychological component to this train of thought. Multiple studies, none of which I can site because of my lack of internet access, have shown that people in lower middle and lower classes will often rank themselves in a higher class then they really are. The idea that someone else always has it worse is a truly human thought and ingrained into our very beings. Food for thought. Or at least a sandwich.

                And as I write this I am enjoying one of the most beautiful vistas from my porch. I’ve posted photos on Facebook and I’ll try to post one here but it is indeed postcard worthy.

9/4/14

                I got water last night! Albeit it was a deep shade of brown red but it was liquid enough to wash my dishes without having to go downstairs for a bucket of rainwater from a quickly emptying rain catchment. Sometimes it’s the little things.

                Apparently someone hit a pole and took the power out on Saturday. Since then electricity had been intermittent. Another volunteer, Naomi, told me that they’re cycling the power from one side of the coast to the other every six hours. They finally got the cycling right so now I have electricity from 12AM-6AM and 12PM-6PM. The water pumps need power to work so pair that up with the water station that’s supposed to, but hardly does, run from 4AM-10AM and 4PM-10PM and I’ve got water for, at best, almost four hours a day! Exciting!

9/6/14

                Unfortunately the water has gone back to not working. My rain tank is emptying quickly there’s about an eighth of a tank left (it’s 200 gallons, supposedly) but it’s not just me using it, the rest of the family does as well. But things will work themselves out I’m sure, at least I have access to water.

                One thing I’ve noticed is that whenever I’m casually strolling down the street and there’s a small child grasping his mother’s hand coming the opposite direction they always stare at me. I think, for some of these children and maybe some adults as well, I must be the first white person they’ve ever seen. It’s an interesting feeling and I resist the urge to pick my nose for fear of labeling the entire white community that I am now an ambassador for.

9/14/14

                I’ve been working on finding things to do lately. Right now, I might have an in with a local primary school. I’m going to try to paint a world map for them. I went to the school on Friday but the Head Mistress (Pricipal) wasn’t there. I spoke with the Secondary Mistress (Vice Principal) and she said she was all for the world map idea. Then she said it was her last day at the school and that she was transferring to a new one on Monday. That’s actually pretty typical down here.

                Yesterday morning I was washing my dishes and I found a dead cockroach in the sink. As I looked at it I had a singularly disturbing thought. Cockroaches, I’ve heard, can basically never die. They are supposed to be able to survive a nuclear apocalypse. The thought that I had was if this cockroach is indeed dead, and not just playing dead to lull me into a false sense of security before leaping up and biting me, there is an aspect of my life that is so toxic it has killed the one creature designed to survive a nuclear explosion. Something I do on a daily basis is able to kill what, essentially, cannot be killed. How filthy of a human being am I?

                Yesterday afternoon I helped another volunteer with a project. She started building a library for her school. It was the first day so she was literally just starting. When I got there it was just her and 2 parents of children at the school sawing rebar and wiring it together to make forms for the concrete to grip. I pitched in as much as I could. This was definitely one of those brochure moments that you hear about in Peace Corps, building a library in a developing country. It was cool.

                When I first got there I felt a little out of place. I don’t really know Iris that well and I wasn’t sure what to do. Then I remembered, “What happens when you go outside your comfort zone? It gets bigger.” After that I tried to be as proactive and volunteered to do anything they needed. Thanks Kristin.

                My mom taught me to be proactive. Whenever she had my brothers and I out in the field or in the garage working on some project she always stressed being proactive and anticipating needs. It’s something that’s been instilled in me and I’ve been trying to use it here. I think it’s working. I can feel my schedule filling up. Thanks Mom.

                My grandpa Pat has to be one of the most friendly and outgoing people I’ve ever had the joy of knowing. There have been moments when I’ve thought, “What would grandpa do?” Generally, I try to do whatever I think he would do. Thanks Grandpa.

                My friend Reed emailed me this past week. This is a guy I haven’t talked to in at least 3 or 4 years but it’s still good to hear from him. All it took was me moving to South America. He said that he sometimes envisions leaving his office job and coming down here. Reed you’re always welcome here. Thanks for the email. It really does mean a lot.

                My friend Abby sent me a Facebook message after that last post. Abby and I aren’t the closest but I still appreciated her reaching out. She’s also become a co-owner of my fantasy football team. Thanks for the support Abby, I appreciate it. A lot.

                Thanks Scott for being commissioner fantasy football gives me something to do in my free time. It can be a great distraction from some of the stuff that goes on down here.

                My friend Sarah has provided me with some technical and moral support. I don’t think she realizes how much she has helped me even before I left. Thanks, friend.

                And thanks to everyone for all your support, moral and otherwise. It gets tough down here sometimes. I’m tearing up just a little thinking about all of you and I know I say it all the time but I miss all of you. I miss Oregon. I miss the rain. I miss hating the U of O. I miss waking up cold. I miss just about everything at one time or another. But I’m going to stick it out for as long as I can, this really is a great opportunity that I’m going to try to make the most of.

P.S.

Emily, I don’t know if you read this but I imagine someone will forward it to you, maybe Chase? I really will miss you, you’re a pretty cool cat and I know that you’re going to do some pretty great things back home. We’ll definitely meet again sometime.

P.P.S

                Also, as I’m posting this the morning of September 15, 2014 I saw that this blog has been viewed 1084 times! This is probably the most successful blog ever. Thanks for reading, everybody! Shoot me an email sometime, timdaniel25@gmail.com.