Hey All!
Todo tuanis aqui en Costa Rica. Ahorita estoy en In Service Training en San Josè. Es un placer ver a todos los voluntarios en mi programa y parece que todos se estan integrando en sus comùnidades muy bien.....Ok....so I just said that things are going well in Costa Rica....Right now I am in In Service Training in (beautiful....not) San Josè and that it is really great to see all of the volunteers in my program and that it seems like all of them are integrating into their sites pretty well.
In Service Training is something that all volunteers have after about 4 months in site. We receive charlas about different things/ideas that we could start for projects in our communities. So far, we have learned about Rainforest Alliance which is an organization that certifies hotels and organizations as being environmentally friendly and that also offers a kind of database (free publicity) for smaller eco-tourism groups that many of us are working with. This is great because there is an opportunity to basically have your own website put up on this page for free....this is a lifesaver for the groups that want to be on the web but that dont have the $ to pay for their own websites. We also learned about different Junior Achievement programs. With this, we have a few options. We can work with elementary school kids on teaching them why it is good to stay in school. There is also a different program that allows us to work with a group of high school students in which they develop a product and start a business. It is a 14 week course and in this time they learn all about the different areas that have to do with running a business....at the end of the 14 weeks everything is liquidated and the profits are split up among the group.
Lets see...we have also been having spanish classes every day. We FINALLY learned a bit about how to use the subjunctive form....which is a vast world in itself or so I´ve heard. This is used to express desires, reccommendations, and to talk about things that are uncertain among other things (pretty broad, right?). Other than this, we have been taking full advantage of the free....yes i said free...wireless....yes i said wireless....internet here in the hotel as well as the cable TV. I must admit that I am now used to having just 1 channel of TV in my life. Good old TeleTica. Re-entering the world of cable just puts me over the edge....I want to watch everything at the same time! How can you keep tabs on what is going on on each channel!? You cant! Ahhhhh!! My uncle, Barry, mentioned that I seemed less addicted to television when I was visiting for christmas vacation. I now realize that this is true....however pitiful this may be....but breaking the cable addiction is probably the first, biggest, personal change that has happened to me since I came here. Thanks Peace Corps!!!
I want to give a re-cap of my FABULOUS christmas vacation which was spent in both Huntington Beach, CA and Seattle, WA. I had a great time relaxing, catching up with family, decorating christmas cookies, going to movies, getting starbucks, sleeping in my bed, eating christmas food, consuming my weight in chocolate and pie, and just hanging out. I couldnt have asked for a better vacation. I was definitely scared that I would not want to return to CR after being tempted by all the comforts of home, but when the time came to leave, I was ok with it. I got back to my site and definitely flubbed my spanish for a good day or so and felt completely out of whack but after a few days I felt back to normal. Costa Ricans are still on summer vacation mode and will be until the end of February. Instead of fighting the system and trying to get people to do stuff I have decided to go with the flow and just kind of hang out until things get going again in February.
There are always an endless amount of ideas and possibilities for projects that I have. It is seriously overwhelming. Pejivalle (aka: Pejibaye or Pejiballe....we really need to decide on an official spelling) has so many formed community groups with a good amount of history to them and has a surprising amount of pull with the government that we are much luckier than a lot of other peace corps communities. It just feels as though sometimes we take the attention that is given to us for granted and just let it slip away. This is such a weird and unexpected concept for me. I assumed that I would be working in a community that is completely ignored and would be taking part in a fight to receive things that had been denied. I hope to change the current patterns that are going on....or at least make a dent...in my two years so that when I leave the community will be prepared to better handle the attention that it is given.
I took a bike ride the other day....usually I do the same loop that is about 12 km....and I always pass by this spot where you can see this HUGE tree off in the distance. So the other day I decided to veer off my path and go for the tree. It is up on this hill where you can see an incredible view of sugar cane fields for miles with a few dirt roads cutting through them and the Rìo Pejivalle. There is a plaque that is nailed to the tree saying what species it is and how tall it is (43 meters) but not how old it is. There was one guy that I passed on my way back down the hill and when I asked him he said that he was 45 years old and had always remembered the tree being exactly the same as it is now. I have to take a picture of this tree and the view that you can see from it to give you guys an idea of how cool it is.
My boss Felicia called me on Monday to tell me that the new volunteers (who start their training at the end of February) will be coming to visit me on their first field trip. How exciting, right?! I will be hosting half of the trainees from the community and economic development program for two days. The purpose of the field trip is to observe what kinds of work volunteers are doing, practice spanish, and visit new areas of costa rica. I could not be more excited and I have a million things that I want to organize for them. I also feel really lucky to have been picked to host them as only 4 volunteers have this opportunity. I am also a bit nervous because my site will be the first actual peace corps site that they will be seeing in costa rica and I want to make a good impression and hope that they leave excited and enthusiastic rather than scared and nervous. I am sure I will give many more updates as far as this goes....
We have two more days of this In-Service-Training and then on Saturday morning I am going to Puerto Viejo (southern caribbean coast) with two other volunteers from my group. I think the plan is to stay in Puerto Viejo and then rent bikes or something and go exploring all of the other small beaches that are near there. I have heard that Manzanillo, which is near there, is a really beautiful beach and national park so I would like to check that out too. Im sure I´ll take far too many pictures and hope to post some for your viewing pleasure asap.
Much love and best wishes,
Emily
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
Saturday, December 15, 2007
Happy Holidays
Im coming home to Seattle for Christmas in less than a week! I am definitely excited to come home and see my family and have a vacation.
Things in my site are going pretty well...the biggest thing at the moment is trying to promote a community recycling program that will be starting in january. The municipality will be coming around each week collecting organics, non organics but recyclables, and non recyclables, each in a separate bag. This past week we had different charlas to explain this program to the community members. I went door to door in different neighborhoods of the community inviting people to these charlas. We had different charlas specially for the people who live in the different neighborhoods. One of the neighboorhoods I visited had about 75 houses and I went to every single one with a member of the development association to invite people to the charla and only 10 people showed up.... I went around in another neighborhood with about 50 houses and only 4 people came to the charla.....
We knew that this would be difficult to get the community members to do. Many people burn their trash either because they are lazy or because they havent been educated on the bad effects this causes. Other families throw their trash in the river or in other places in the community. This is terrible because the river is the number one tourist attraction here and if people continue to pollute it the town´s reputation will be at stake. We definitely have our work cut out for us, but we also have the resources to work with. There is the Grupo Ecologico whos members are educated on recycling and are prepared to give more charlas. There is also the Colegio which is an Environmental high school....all of the students receive mandatory environmental education classes. Using high school students to motivate the rest of the community to recycle would be key. The problem is that these kids receive environmental classes and then continue to throw their trash on the ground....it must be that using the garbage can is "uncool" just like in many high schools in the US.
Still working on the community newsletter. I sold 120 of the publication for November and December. I am using that money as well as what I have charged for placing an ad in the next edition to make the copies for the next one which will be ready for January. The idea is to make one every 2 months. I am still looking for a group of community members to take over this project so that it can be sustainable. I would love to turn it over to a student organization in the high school. This way if there are people who are interested in studying journalism can get some experience while they are still in high school.
The weather is getting hotter and dryer, we are heading into summer (the dry season). Highs are around 30 degrees celsius....which is about 90 degress ferenheit (if my calculations are right).
I took a spill on my bike a few days ago. I was going too fast down a hill full of big rocks. I hit the front break on my bike at the same time that I went over a really big rock and ended up flying over my handle bars. My hands, knees, and elbows got scraped up pretty bad but nothing serious. And nobody saw me crash and burn which I consider to be the most important thing!
Hope all is well and Happy Holidays!!!
Emily
Things in my site are going pretty well...the biggest thing at the moment is trying to promote a community recycling program that will be starting in january. The municipality will be coming around each week collecting organics, non organics but recyclables, and non recyclables, each in a separate bag. This past week we had different charlas to explain this program to the community members. I went door to door in different neighborhoods of the community inviting people to these charlas. We had different charlas specially for the people who live in the different neighborhoods. One of the neighboorhoods I visited had about 75 houses and I went to every single one with a member of the development association to invite people to the charla and only 10 people showed up.... I went around in another neighborhood with about 50 houses and only 4 people came to the charla.....
We knew that this would be difficult to get the community members to do. Many people burn their trash either because they are lazy or because they havent been educated on the bad effects this causes. Other families throw their trash in the river or in other places in the community. This is terrible because the river is the number one tourist attraction here and if people continue to pollute it the town´s reputation will be at stake. We definitely have our work cut out for us, but we also have the resources to work with. There is the Grupo Ecologico whos members are educated on recycling and are prepared to give more charlas. There is also the Colegio which is an Environmental high school....all of the students receive mandatory environmental education classes. Using high school students to motivate the rest of the community to recycle would be key. The problem is that these kids receive environmental classes and then continue to throw their trash on the ground....it must be that using the garbage can is "uncool" just like in many high schools in the US.
Still working on the community newsletter. I sold 120 of the publication for November and December. I am using that money as well as what I have charged for placing an ad in the next edition to make the copies for the next one which will be ready for January. The idea is to make one every 2 months. I am still looking for a group of community members to take over this project so that it can be sustainable. I would love to turn it over to a student organization in the high school. This way if there are people who are interested in studying journalism can get some experience while they are still in high school.
The weather is getting hotter and dryer, we are heading into summer (the dry season). Highs are around 30 degrees celsius....which is about 90 degress ferenheit (if my calculations are right).
I took a spill on my bike a few days ago. I was going too fast down a hill full of big rocks. I hit the front break on my bike at the same time that I went over a really big rock and ended up flying over my handle bars. My hands, knees, and elbows got scraped up pretty bad but nothing serious. And nobody saw me crash and burn which I consider to be the most important thing!
Hope all is well and Happy Holidays!!!
Emily
Tuesday, November 20, 2007
Two months in...
Hey All -
I have now been in Pejivalle for two months. Much has happened and I feel more integrated into the community every day. People are starting to recognize me as someone who lives here and is not like most of the other gringos they are used to seeing here for only a day or just a few hours. I am spending most of my time attending meetings of different community groups. Each of these groups has their specific meeting time once a week or once every two weeks. Although I am not necessarily working on projects with each of these groups I think it is important to be at their meetings to get to know how the group functions and to get to know the members better. It is common that the members of these groups are the most important and influential people in town, therefore it is a good idea that I get to know them! The groups I am currently meeting with in Pejivalle are the Camara de Turismo (the Tourism Board), Grupo Ecologico (the Ecological Group), and Coopejivalle (the town cooperative).
Currently, the Camara de Turismo is working on a project that is being partially financed by the Programa de Pequeno Donaciones. They are being given a total of $5,200.00 in three different installments. They have had the first portion of the money for several months and they have to present a report at the end of this month stating what they have spent the money on, what progress they have made, what they plan to do next, in order to receive the next chunk of money. A big problem with the organizations in Pejivalle is a lack of motivation and procrastination. Proof of this is that as of the beginning of November they had only bought two flash drives and were spending their meetings talking around what they had to do but not really accomplishing anything. My instinct was to yell at them to get moving, “You guys have the money! All you have to do is go out there and freaking spend it!” But this is not a good idea because I haven’t established a solid enough relationship with the group to start saying things like this without being viewed as someone who is coming in to try to take over rather than work with the group. Thankfully, around mid month they realized on their own that they needed to get a move on and have started focusing more on the project and have spend more of the money on things. I honestly don’t know if they will have completed enough and have a good enough plan to receive the second and third parts of the grant. We shall see…
Grupo Ecologico is a group that is dedicated to educating the community on ways to protect the environment here in Pejivalle. The community is part of a program called Bandera Azul Ecologico, a program that awards communities based on the level of cleanliness in the water and other areas in respect to the environment in general. The program is divided into schools, beach communities, regular communities (like pejivalle), and protected areas. The program uses a three-star system to designate each level of cleanliness. Right now the community of Pejivalle has two stars and the high school has the maximum of three stars. Grupo Ecologico works to give workshops to the community members about recycling, trash pickup, prevention of soil erosion, the effects of agrochemicals, etc. Right now the group is preparing to start a community wide recycling program. Starting in January the Municipality will be coming around house to house collecting recyclables. The group is collaborating with the high school to plan workshops to teach people how to recycle and to educate them about how this recycle program will work. The high school is participating because since it is an Ambientalista high school and the kids receive environmental education all of them know how to recycle they will be able to lead these workshops along with members of the Grupo Ecologico. The Camara de Turismo is also participating because one of the requirements of their project is that they help with educating the people here on the subject of recycling. So far the main thing I am doing is trying to coordinate times and places for meetings that work for all of these groups. Grupo Ecologico is also planning a BINGO to raise funds for the group. We have secured the location, date, and time. Now we are working on getting donations for prizes to award the winners. Each member of the group is going to bring some kind of food to sell as well (I am bringing chocolate chip cookies).
I am also meeting with the town Cooperative but I am sorry, I don’t have the energy to write a description of what they do right now as I am still in the process of trying to figure that out.
One rather strange issue that I am dealing with is that these groups are not giving me much to do and I kind of feel like there is a lack of trust on their behalf. I am being given tasks that are small and often people feel the need to either tell me how to do them in great detail or insist on helping me do them. I was not expecting to deal with things like this as a Peace Corps Volunteer. I was anticipating that people I work with depend on me to help them get things done and that they would need me to guide them. But right now it feels like the opposite, like people here know what they are doing and think I dont. How strange, right? For example, I was asked to help out with activities that were going on all day one saturday to raise money for a kid. I am generally all up for helping out in whatever ways are usefull but as long as I feel like I am doing something worthwhile. I went to the activities and asked how I could help and was told to go around with a can and approach people for donations (fuuuuun). Then after this I didnt have anything to do so I hung around and watched the events taking place. I approached a community member who was in charge of the activities and told them I was going to go home. They responded by pleading that I stay and that they really needed my help with a BINGO that was going to start. Of course, I stayed thinking oh great! they want more help! I was assigned to the task of collecting the money and handing out BINGO cards as people entered. This was fine, except they thought that i needed help doing this so they sent over a guy who was basically just in the way because it was crowded and the job was only enough work for one person. I guess I am just frustrated because I have an education but the people I am working with are treating me like I dont know hardly anything. I am going to chalk this up to being new and that people dont know me well. But this is definitely something I am going to be working on. I wanted to get this out there so that hopefully in 3 months things will have changed and I will be able to look back on this entry and say, ¨look how silly you were emily, you just needed to be patient with people.¨
And now, I have received strict orders from my mom to document a dream (more like nightmare) that I had just about every night for the first month and a half I was here. The setting is a pitch-black room. I am sitting in on a meeting with a community group. I have introduced myself as best I can with what Spanish I know and have attempted to explain what Peace Corps is although I am sure I have completely butchered it. Now the conversation has moved on and the group members are talking. They are talking so fast I cannot understand what they are saying, if they are talking to me, if they are making statements, or if they are asking questions. In the Spanish language I have found that it is hard to tell if someone is asking a question or just making a statement because they don’t really vary their tone of voice like English speakers do. Everything comes out as a statement. Anyway, this dream is terrible because all of the sudden there are all of these awkward silences and I have this feeling that I need to respond or say something to break the silence and to prove that I am a worthy group member but I have no idea what they were talking about, where the individual voices are coming from, or if they were even talking to me because I cant see anyone because the room is pitch black. So I to fill the silence I end up making this “mmhmm” sound or just saying “si” or something stupid. Then eventually the group continues talking again, obviously growing uncomfortable with my awkwardness which makes me more nervous. Then the dream repeats as all of the sudden there is a silence and damn it I wasn’t paying attention to what they were saying because I couldn’t understand anything and now I feel obligated to say something to prove I’m alive at least. So again I make the “mmhmm” sound or say “siiiiii” in a pensive manner to try to make it seem like I know whats going on. This dream repeats and repeats until I finally realize I’m dreaming and then I stop. Just about every morning for my first month and a half my brothers, who sleep in the next room over, would comment that I was talking in my sleep and making a sound like “mmmmhmmmm” and “siiiiii.” Finally this dream has stopped. I think its because my Spanish is better and I can pretty much understand what people are talking about and can respond somewhat more intelligently if prompted. I must say this is the first re-occurring dream that I have ever had in my life and its probably the only one I am able to retell completely. Usually I remember that I had a dream about something but I cannot describe it.
Hope all is well! Much love.
Emily
I have now been in Pejivalle for two months. Much has happened and I feel more integrated into the community every day. People are starting to recognize me as someone who lives here and is not like most of the other gringos they are used to seeing here for only a day or just a few hours. I am spending most of my time attending meetings of different community groups. Each of these groups has their specific meeting time once a week or once every two weeks. Although I am not necessarily working on projects with each of these groups I think it is important to be at their meetings to get to know how the group functions and to get to know the members better. It is common that the members of these groups are the most important and influential people in town, therefore it is a good idea that I get to know them! The groups I am currently meeting with in Pejivalle are the Camara de Turismo (the Tourism Board), Grupo Ecologico (the Ecological Group), and Coopejivalle (the town cooperative).
Currently, the Camara de Turismo is working on a project that is being partially financed by the Programa de Pequeno Donaciones. They are being given a total of $5,200.00 in three different installments. They have had the first portion of the money for several months and they have to present a report at the end of this month stating what they have spent the money on, what progress they have made, what they plan to do next, in order to receive the next chunk of money. A big problem with the organizations in Pejivalle is a lack of motivation and procrastination. Proof of this is that as of the beginning of November they had only bought two flash drives and were spending their meetings talking around what they had to do but not really accomplishing anything. My instinct was to yell at them to get moving, “You guys have the money! All you have to do is go out there and freaking spend it!” But this is not a good idea because I haven’t established a solid enough relationship with the group to start saying things like this without being viewed as someone who is coming in to try to take over rather than work with the group. Thankfully, around mid month they realized on their own that they needed to get a move on and have started focusing more on the project and have spend more of the money on things. I honestly don’t know if they will have completed enough and have a good enough plan to receive the second and third parts of the grant. We shall see…
Grupo Ecologico is a group that is dedicated to educating the community on ways to protect the environment here in Pejivalle. The community is part of a program called Bandera Azul Ecologico, a program that awards communities based on the level of cleanliness in the water and other areas in respect to the environment in general. The program is divided into schools, beach communities, regular communities (like pejivalle), and protected areas. The program uses a three-star system to designate each level of cleanliness. Right now the community of Pejivalle has two stars and the high school has the maximum of three stars. Grupo Ecologico works to give workshops to the community members about recycling, trash pickup, prevention of soil erosion, the effects of agrochemicals, etc. Right now the group is preparing to start a community wide recycling program. Starting in January the Municipality will be coming around house to house collecting recyclables. The group is collaborating with the high school to plan workshops to teach people how to recycle and to educate them about how this recycle program will work. The high school is participating because since it is an Ambientalista high school and the kids receive environmental education all of them know how to recycle they will be able to lead these workshops along with members of the Grupo Ecologico. The Camara de Turismo is also participating because one of the requirements of their project is that they help with educating the people here on the subject of recycling. So far the main thing I am doing is trying to coordinate times and places for meetings that work for all of these groups. Grupo Ecologico is also planning a BINGO to raise funds for the group. We have secured the location, date, and time. Now we are working on getting donations for prizes to award the winners. Each member of the group is going to bring some kind of food to sell as well (I am bringing chocolate chip cookies).
I am also meeting with the town Cooperative but I am sorry, I don’t have the energy to write a description of what they do right now as I am still in the process of trying to figure that out.
One rather strange issue that I am dealing with is that these groups are not giving me much to do and I kind of feel like there is a lack of trust on their behalf. I am being given tasks that are small and often people feel the need to either tell me how to do them in great detail or insist on helping me do them. I was not expecting to deal with things like this as a Peace Corps Volunteer. I was anticipating that people I work with depend on me to help them get things done and that they would need me to guide them. But right now it feels like the opposite, like people here know what they are doing and think I dont. How strange, right? For example, I was asked to help out with activities that were going on all day one saturday to raise money for a kid. I am generally all up for helping out in whatever ways are usefull but as long as I feel like I am doing something worthwhile. I went to the activities and asked how I could help and was told to go around with a can and approach people for donations (fuuuuun). Then after this I didnt have anything to do so I hung around and watched the events taking place. I approached a community member who was in charge of the activities and told them I was going to go home. They responded by pleading that I stay and that they really needed my help with a BINGO that was going to start. Of course, I stayed thinking oh great! they want more help! I was assigned to the task of collecting the money and handing out BINGO cards as people entered. This was fine, except they thought that i needed help doing this so they sent over a guy who was basically just in the way because it was crowded and the job was only enough work for one person. I guess I am just frustrated because I have an education but the people I am working with are treating me like I dont know hardly anything. I am going to chalk this up to being new and that people dont know me well. But this is definitely something I am going to be working on. I wanted to get this out there so that hopefully in 3 months things will have changed and I will be able to look back on this entry and say, ¨look how silly you were emily, you just needed to be patient with people.¨
And now, I have received strict orders from my mom to document a dream (more like nightmare) that I had just about every night for the first month and a half I was here. The setting is a pitch-black room. I am sitting in on a meeting with a community group. I have introduced myself as best I can with what Spanish I know and have attempted to explain what Peace Corps is although I am sure I have completely butchered it. Now the conversation has moved on and the group members are talking. They are talking so fast I cannot understand what they are saying, if they are talking to me, if they are making statements, or if they are asking questions. In the Spanish language I have found that it is hard to tell if someone is asking a question or just making a statement because they don’t really vary their tone of voice like English speakers do. Everything comes out as a statement. Anyway, this dream is terrible because all of the sudden there are all of these awkward silences and I have this feeling that I need to respond or say something to break the silence and to prove that I am a worthy group member but I have no idea what they were talking about, where the individual voices are coming from, or if they were even talking to me because I cant see anyone because the room is pitch black. So I to fill the silence I end up making this “mmhmm” sound or just saying “si” or something stupid. Then eventually the group continues talking again, obviously growing uncomfortable with my awkwardness which makes me more nervous. Then the dream repeats as all of the sudden there is a silence and damn it I wasn’t paying attention to what they were saying because I couldn’t understand anything and now I feel obligated to say something to prove I’m alive at least. So again I make the “mmhmm” sound or say “siiiiii” in a pensive manner to try to make it seem like I know whats going on. This dream repeats and repeats until I finally realize I’m dreaming and then I stop. Just about every morning for my first month and a half my brothers, who sleep in the next room over, would comment that I was talking in my sleep and making a sound like “mmmmhmmmm” and “siiiiii.” Finally this dream has stopped. I think its because my Spanish is better and I can pretty much understand what people are talking about and can respond somewhat more intelligently if prompted. I must say this is the first re-occurring dream that I have ever had in my life and its probably the only one I am able to retell completely. Usually I remember that I had a dream about something but I cannot describe it.
Hope all is well! Much love.
Emily
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
