out of the fish bowl...

I spent a back-breaking day all of Saturday at work packing food stuffs that will be brought out to various communities this week. Corn, rice, beans, powdered milk, mosh (kind of like oatmeal), sugar. It was a ton of work... but at least I got a good workout out of it!










Yesterday, the crew of CCI volunteers and other various gringos hiked up Las Muelas, a mountain not far from Xela. We were led by one of the Spanish teachers, Bayron, from Celas Maya and what a day! It was a beautiful hike and just what we all needed to ¨get away¨.

It was pretty tough too... having been at a higher altitude for 3 weeks, you´d think I´d be use to the lesser oxygen by now! But for many of us, we were gasping as we headed up!

(Picture taken by Yasu, the Japanese guy on the far left)

In the household I am living in, there is an "Assistant" - at least that´s how my host-mom introduced her to me, but really she´s more of a servant. She does all the chores in the house (clean, cook, laundry, etc.), takes care of the kids when necessary, and makes the food the house sells as a side business. She gets up early and goes to sleep late. After making meals she eats alone in the kitchen and not with the family at the table and she sleeps downstairs in a room separate from the family (and students) staying upstairs. I´ve never seen or heard her call or talk to friends, or even family for that matter. Every 2 months, she gets to go home - she leaves early Sunday morning and returns early Monday morning, the next day. Joli is Mayan, a member of one of the many indigenous cultures found in Guatemala. She is 21 years old.

She started working when she was 10.

She, her cousins, and most other girls in her village were taught by their mom´s how to cook, clean etc. starting at the age of 7, and by the age of 10 they are out in the bigger communities and cities of Guatemala working as ¨servants¨in various households. She speaks Quiché, local indigenous language, and learned her Spanish from working. The longest she´s ever stayed in one household is 3 years and her 11 years of working experience is split between Guatemala City and Xela - the 2 largest cities in Guatemala.

I don´t know how much she makes or whether she sends the money she makes home or ....? And I wonder if she ever gets lonely without really having a close friend she can relate to.

Don´t get me wrong, my host-mom is really great and she and Joli get along really well together. Honestly I think Joli is probably being treated better in my house than many other Mayans in similar positions and she seems quite happy to be where she is. She´s always smiling and happy to help.

So really, I don´t know what to think of the whole situation. I was brought up in Canada with the idea of human equality. The idea of someone eating alone while the rest of us enjoy eachother´s company at the table is completely foreign to me and I can´t say I´m completely comfortable with it. I´m not sure if I´m breaking any cultural rules, but I often bring my dishes into the kitchen after meals and do what I can to help her in the kitchen before meals. She´s definitely needed in the household because I don´t think my host-mom has the time to do what she needs to do and everything Joli does as well. But... I´m not sure if I´ll ever completely get use to her status in the household - still don´t know what to think...

Of what I´ve seen and heard so far, relief aid has got to be one of the most haphazard and disorganized operations ever. At least it appears as the truth here.

I haven´t been able to really do anything all week because I´m committed to Spanish school in the morning from 8am-1am. By the time I got to work in the afternoon everyone in the office had gone out to work in the communities, so there wasn´t really even anyone for me to talk to. Andrea, another CCI participant, was in a similar boat and we´ve both been itching to help out and be a part of the relief effort. Since we couldn´t, we decided yesterday to go out to the Xela airport as we heard they needed extra hands there.

It was an excess of hands more than anything.

We spent the first 30min standing and watching, asking the other 80 gringos (foreigners) questions to figure out what was going on. The answer? ¨We´re waiting for the helicopter¨. What the operation at the airport consisted of was an excess of people forming a line so that water or food could be passed from one person to the next to get it from A to B, and another excess amount of people waiting in the back of trucks to load food into the helicopters that were flying the aid to affected communities.

A little disappointed we wandered over to a corner where a few people sat puzzling over a pile of small boxes. ¨Hey, do you guys need a hand?¨ we asked. ¨Sure do,¨ they replied, ¨do you have any medical background or can you read a bit of Spanish?¨

We had finally found our little help niche.

What did they want us to do? In front of laid a large pile of small boxes varying in colour and size, and with our incredibly expansive medical knowledge, they wanted us to sort the different types of donated medicine into various boxes marked ¨pain¨, ¨parasitic infection¨, ¨vitamin¨, etc. This proved to be quite the challenge not only because it was in Spanish, but also because these were behind-the-counter medications and nearly all different. Eventually, with the help of some doctors nearby, it all got worked out and sorted. What kills me is what we did after this.








The boxes were lined up all in a row so that we could bag x number of medications from each, and then have them shipped off to the various doctors in the communities. In other words, we sorted everything so that they could be mixed up again and resorted by the clinics/doctors again later.

Right.

I couldn´t believe what was happening or what I was seeing. Tons of people wanting and ready to help with really nothing to do. From all the various stories and efforts I´ve been hearing, I wonder how effective this Relief Aid stuff actually is. There´s really no one coordinating all the efforts making sure people who want to help can help, or making sure affected families are really getting the aid they need. It´s really quite frustrating because you know time and energy is being wasted where it isn´t needed.

For example, another account from an afternoon in the Xela Airport hangar (by Andrea):

So Id say the highlight of the day for me, humour wise was acting as a translator for this American military officer. I guess, I failed to mention that of the eight helicopters present I’d say half were probably American. So this woman was trying to talk to the Guatemalan Red Cross but was having no success since she had a thick southern accent and was talking way to fast. It was painful to witness so I approached her and asked if I could translate for her. She was trying to say that she had been out in Concepcion and a doctor there had told her that they really needed medicine. The Guatemalan Red Cross wanted to know if this woman could go in her helicopter to take it. She said no. So translation successful now comes the ridiculous part. The woman goes on to tell us that she is a "Medical Assessment Officer" She does exactly what the title says with a translator. So does this mean that she relays her information after her assessment by simply approaching the Red Cross without a translator! What the hell sort of system is this. One can only hope this was an extraneous circumstance and not normal practice of the American military.

Sigh. There´s no question that aid money is absolutely necessary when it comes to emergency relief, but it also really makes me wonder how effective that dollar you give actually is.

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Would you be surprised if I told you while everyone ate the simple Guatemalan lunch that was being served, the American soldiers there came in with giant bags of McDonalds?

Learning Spanish is one thing.

- Speaking Spanish in a casual conversation is another.

- - And using Spanish in the workplace in an entirely and completely different ballgame.

I met a girl in the micro-credit office this afternoon, and nearly broke down and cried because I could barely understand her, and I felt as if I was more of an annoyance to her than anything.

(It´s funny, in the midst of all the Guatemalan disaster, there´s someone here giving me a rundown about a micro-credit program that they´re using and some of the problems that they´re having with it. But, there´s no one else really in the office because they´re all out in the communities helping with immediate relief efforts. Jeez it really put some things in perspective and made that hour seem entirely useless).

She spoke really fast. Really really fast. And even though I asked her to slow down, there really was no slowing down. So I thought to myself - I am screwed.

But I went back the following days and felt waaaaaaay better. I could understand what people were saying! I hope it´s just that one girl I have a tough time understanding... but vamos a ver because supposedly I am working in the micro-credit office and inevitably with her. Soooooo... two things can either happen: she speaks more slowly and clearly, or I start understanding Spanish better.

I have a feeling all the ownest will be on me with this girl.

i just changed host families last night... and WHAT a difference! i´m suppose to be there on my own, but because some people are having trouble leaving the city at the moment, there is another student there as well. the room i´m in now, even though i´ll have to change later,
is much much better than my last, and the mother, kids and nanny(?) are incredibly nice. usually they´re referred to as ¨the people who sell chocolate covered fruit across the street¨ :D

the food is also fantastic - i´ve only had one breakast and lunch there so far, but i´ve actually been able to have a full serving of vegetables and fruit! amazing (talking to many other people, this is indeed a true rarity)

so... this still isn´t suppose to be the family i stay with. but we´ll see, maybe some negotiation can be done and maybe i can stay =P

take care everyone!

I am in the midst of a hurricane.

There is rain here like I have never seen before.

My room is big, damp, dark and absolutely miserable.

Thank goodness for working batteries and some good ol´ Collective Soul =)

Hello!

So... I made it to Xela! But not first with a stop in Antigua and a short trip to Copan, Honduras.

Right now I´m staying with a family through the language school... I´m suppose to be staying with a family through CEDEPEM, the organization I will be working with, but ít´s a long and complicated story that I won´t go into. This family is only temporary (thank god) - the family
is nice, but my room is, as Kathy nicely put it, very simple. I think of it more as a sh*t hole - i.e. I´ve stayed at some cheap skethcy hostels, and this doesn´t even measure up to that. It´s a crazy not so wonderful adventure everytime I want to leave my room meaning I have to encounter 3 large dogs (one rather not so friendly), open-close 4 gates and manouvre my way through a maze of stairs. And this is simply to go to the bathroom. So... hopefully I will be able to move in with my original host family soon. CEPEDEM is also going to try and find me
a different family sooner =P

Anyways... other than that, things are great! My Spanish teacher is awesome and the school is really good. Class in the morning and work in the afternoon make for longer days, but it´s all good ;)

Cheerio!