good things:

-no bug sightings since the scorpion/centipede fiasco.
-my friend from training quit peace corps and got married to her nicaraguan boyfriend. a little weird, but the wedding was crazy fun and she is a happy happy girl, which makes me happy. i put up a few pictures on my flickr.
-next weekend i get to go out to ometepe (the volcanic island in the big lake) for a retreat for the committee i’m on within peace corps.  we talk about sustainable development and gender and all that delicious theoretical stuff and i get to feel smart and hang out with people i really like.
-sarah and kyle come in two weeks! we are going down to the beach, cause i want to.
-i get to go “home” to minnesota to see the fam in september for a MUCH needed break.
-my backyard has gone from barren sand dune to jungle thicket in a matter of months, and the other day i found a rogue tomato plant among the weeds, with some plump green tomatoes growing. so… hey! free tomatoes.

bad things:
-the boss of our program (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) is quitting. our last boss quit LAST year at exactly this time. i guess its a really hard job, considering its the pilot TEFL program in latin america, and that dealing with the ministry of education here is a massive nightmare.  so, en fin, this is really really unfortunate for the TEFL program, and unfortunate for TEFL volunteers. bad news.
-peace corps is dealing with bigtime budget cuts, so a whole load of resources that were once available to us are now gone.  they even had to cancel our annual all-volunteer conference in november. also, the inflation rate here is like 25% (the 3rd highest in the WORLD) and our stipend is NOT pegged to the inflation rate, and no amount of complaining is getting us any more money. so, this is bad news too.
-i’m still feeling pretty awful most of the time. my “job” is pointless and the general state of this country is so sad and self-destructive that its almost impossible to keep my head up.  the good part is that the peace corps doctors are amazing and taking very good care of me, and hopefully things will start to pick back up in the next few months.

pray for me, please.  love you all.

jealous?

backsliding.

I’ve spent the last month underwater. Everything moves in slow motion, sounds are muted and I feel like a piece of seaweed, drifting around in the currents of daily life. Heightening this sensation is the fact that it’s been raining for almost 3 weeks straight. My shoes are growing mold.

My two emotional states are deep down body-wrenching grief (the kind where you can only exhale) or barely-functional depression. I’ve heard it said that grief is like epilepsy, and I’m feeling that … I have to sleep all the time. I’m constantly exhausted. I’ve also gotten really testy about small things, a la “cultural intolerance” blog. It’s my town’s fiestas patronales (patron saint festival) that last for 2 months and means an almost constant barrage of awful, jarringly loud fireworks (bombas) and loud tuneless marching bands (chicheros), both of which only let up between 12am and 4am (on good days.) I’m impressed with my own ability to sleep through them, but after the first month, it’s starting to make me a little crazy. I tried to have my own quiet day of mourning on the day of Jeff’s memorial service… hah. Nice try.

I can usually get through my couple hours of class at the instituto, but after an extremely disappointing round of exams, I’m so angry and frusterated with my students that it’s all I can do to sit in the classroom with them these days. I made the catastrophic mistake of having an expectation for them (that they would pass my exam) and when my lowest expectations didn’t come near being met, I can’t help but wonder what the hell it is I’m doing here. I’m disappointed in myself, mostly… I know better than to have hopes for them, no matter how low. I’m not an inherently “positive” person to begin with, so dealing with this sort of apathy and lack of respect is especially difficult. I used to make fun of the teachers for always harping on about “this generation” and how “these days” kids don’t care about anything except dating and sports and t.v. because… come on. They’re teenagers. But now I’m really starting to understand that perspective. I really thought that it was the quality of the classes that was to blame for the lack of motivation. However, classes are GOOD now, thanks to my counterpart and I, but the results were zero. I feel kind of stupid complaining about a lack of “results,” I mean it was one test. But it was clear that it wasn’t a matter of my students not understanding the material, it was a blatant lack of effort, and it makes me feel like I’m just taking all my talent and skills and energy and throwing them into a black hole.

Anyway. The semester is over and I’ve got a (very necessary) week break. I’m expecting some visitors and I’ve got some more house fixing-up to do, but mostly I’m planning on sleeping, cooking myself good food, making frequent trips to Granada for a little normalcy, and painting. I’ve been lighting candles for Jeff and praying and trying to remember that “God isn’t there to take away our suffering or our pain but to fill it with his or her presence” (Anne Lamott). Today God’s presence showed up in a few hours of sun with which I was able to finally wash my underwear, and enough artistic motivation to underpaint a couple canvases. And thus begins the slow process of picking up the fragments of whatever it was that I had assembled.

My most beloved Uncle Jeff Crozier passed away at the end of May. He had been sick for a long time and they found a malignant brain tumor, operated, and he died a day or two later in ICU. I lot of you knew him, and knew what an extraordinary human being he was. He was a dad, a mentor, and a good friend. He raised me, loved me, encouraged me, listened to me, fed me, taught me to paint, and always made me feel like the most precious girl in the world. He and Christine raised me to believe in art, music, beauty, love and good food. They have been solid safety nets for me throughout my life.

Jeff is an invaluable part of me and I am endlessly grateful that I got to be a part of his life. His death was sudden and surreal and unfair and devastating. My heart is broken.

tah-dah!

Well I think this is at least a partial follow-up to the wildly contentious “Cultural Intolerance” blog, because suddenly, everything I was raging against has just sort of fallen away and I feel, dare I say… content?

Actually, “suddenly” is the wrong word… it’s been happening in increments all along, but just below the radar, and not until now have I really felt it (or felt comfortable saying that I feel it, without fear of jinxing it.)

 

I know for certain that my two trips back to the States helped.  I’m not entirely sure how, but it must have something to do with needing to touch down somewhere safe after what had been one of the most difficult years of my life.  Even though it was really hard to re-adjust when I came back to Nicaragua, I think in the long run those few weeks really fueled me deep down and replenished me in ways that were not noticeable until farther on down the road. I can’t think of a better source of natural energy than family, friends, and food. And good wine, you can’t underestimate the power of good wine.

 

It must also be noted that on the professional front, having a cooperative counterpart makes all the difference in the world.  My counterpart and I are friends, she is receptive to me, and there are no traces of the tension and misunderstanding that embodied my relationship with my old counterpart.  After a few difficult weeks with her counterpart, one of my Peace Corps friends apologized to me for “not being as understanding as she could have been” about my problems with my old counterpart.  I mean, you can’t really understand unless you’re living it,  but it’s really is stunning the difference that it makes when you walk to school with a light heart as a opposed to a heavy one.  My first year of service was defined by a constant feeling of dread, and that’s all but melted away.

 

A third factor has been getting my new house. And although I’m not quite over the initial hump of being totally overwhelmed/scared/grossed out by the whole experience, it’s becoming more and more apparent how much having my own space is going to improve my emotional well-being.  Having the option to withdraw when I need to is huge for me. I haven’t been “alone” in years, really, and I haven’t had a moment of “alone time” since I got to Nicaragua.

The house itself is still coming together slowly, and the bugs are big and it rains inside when it rains outside and my landlord is awful, but I’m starting to love it with the same grudging affection with which I love really ugly dogs.  Playing my music increases my happiness tenfold.  I listen to Iron & Wine and Feist in the mornings when I make my tea and oatmeal,  I listen to garish pop when I do my aerobic housecleaning in the afternoons, and I listen to De La Soul while I cook or putter around or entertain guests or paint in the evenings.  I keep my front windows open all the time so people walking by can gape at me (a 23 year old female living alone is literally unheard of), or my students come up and say hi, or my friends come in and chat.  I try and go to sleep before 10 or so cause when the neighborhood quiets down and it gets late, the weirdo bugs come out and every little noise makes me jump, so I’d just as rather be asleep.

 

The last part is that I’m BUSY. I’m actually teaching every day in the high school,  and I’m planning classes and activities with my counterpart.  I give my community English class Tuesday and Thursday nights, and I give computer classes to women on Saturday mornings. Now that my artistic abilities have been “discovered,” there’s always someone who needs help with a project or a painting or something, and I’ve been asked by a group of girls to give art classes (how fun does THAT sound??) I’m also on a committee within Peace Corps that promotes our role as volunteers, and how we connect to the development community at large.  We give “charlas,” which are like small workshops/discussions to the new trainees on things like gender issues, behavior change theory, and tools that development workers use (tools like community mapping activities, not tools like shovels and hoes.)  So I’ve also been busy planning and giving charlas, while simultaneously checking out all the fresh meat (the trainees.) 

 

All of these different factors have helped make me feel much more at peace with myself and with my situation.  Emotionally, working on my “caring and not caring” has been huge.  The things that filled me with rage not a few months ago no longer have any affect on me.  It’s not that I’m turning a blind eye, its just that I’ve just decided to stop taking responsibility for everyone around me.  Gross analogy: The toilet may be clogged (or at least I may think it is) but I’m not a plumber. I’m not going to keep using the toilet, but I’m not going to roll up my sleeves and try to fix it.  All I can possibly be is an example of a different way of doing things. I can ask people not to throw garbage in my yard, but I can’t tell someone not to throw their trash out the window of the bus. All I can do is try and be as obvious as possible as holding on to my diet coke bottle until we get to a trash can.  I can live alone and be “just fine.”  I can be a twenty-something woman and choose not to have a boyfriend (something else unheard of.)  I can treat everyone with respect, even gross men and little kids. 

 

I just had to let go of feeling like there was something I was going to be able to do that would “change” things.  I have a sneaking suspicion that the key to a sucessful Peace Corps experience may have more to do with passivity than proactivity.  The second I stopped trying, things started happening on their own and now I only have to jump into the current and ride it out.

 

My best Peace Corps friend and I have a little customary exchange for nights when we are sad or sick that goes, “Well, take a sleeping pill and get some rest and hopefully you’ll wake up tomorrow in the United States and this will all have been a crazy dream.”

 

She said it to me last night and I laughed, but for the first time, I didn’t mean it.

 

 

cabin fever.

-well the transportation strike is finally over, after two weeks of bus drivers making lots of noise and burning tires and blocking the roads, and all of us being stuck and going crazy with cabin fever. i spent way too much money text messaging my friends, ”I´M HOT!”, ”I´M BORED!”, ”THIS IS STUPID!”

The strike really messed up my personal plans as I´ve been ”frozen,” as they say, and couldn’t get out to get stuff for my house (like a stove and food.)  It also messed up the nation’s plans… what is already a difficult existence for almost everyone here has been made much worse.  I’m not supposed to post anything overtly political, but I’ll just say that the president’s big slogan is “Arriba los pobres del mundo!” (rise up, poor people of the world!) accompanied by a picture of him with his shirtsleeves rolled up with a fist in the air. Ah, Latin American populism… history repeating again, and again, and again, and again…

-The house situation is slowly improving. The directora (the principal of my school) loaned me a bunch of chairs and some little tables, so I sort of have furniture.  On Saturday, a bunch of my senior boys came over and painted it for me! We played loud reggaeton and made a mess and laughed a lot and I think they had fun “helping out the profesora” and taking their shirts off in front of me.  I’ve still got to paint the trim, but they did all the hardest parts and now its gone from baby-poo yellow to a nice peach. I feel mostly safe, but I still sleep with a big stick by my bed. The neighbors dogs like to wander into my yard, so I inadvertantly get to borrow them for protection. I’m honestly way more scared of bugs and scorpions than intruders, though I have yet to see anything creepier or crawlier than a few ants.  Pictures soon.

-Classes are the same as always.  Some days are great, some are awful.  The only class I really enjoy working with are the Quinto kids (the seniors), the littler kids are completely out of control and make me crazy.  I don’t actually feel like I work very much… school is cancelled all the time for the silliest reasons (silly to me at least… “It’s national bird day! Let’s all go home early!”) And then once the Fiestas Patronales start in June, it’s going to be a total free-for-all. The good thing is that I really like my counterpart, she and I get along well, even if we don’t plan our classes all the time or do everything perfectly. At the very least, I can see that she’s picking up on some small but important teaching traits that I try and use to get the kids to participate a little more and make class a bit more of a dialogue than a lecture. 

 

let’s complicate our lives!

First of all, last Thursday was my one year in country mark! When I think about the person I was when I got here last year, and who I am now, I am totally blown away. Not that I’ve changed in fundamentals, but I’ve just come so far and overcome so much. I feel like a survivor. And even though things aren’t perfect here, it definitely feels like “my life” now, instead of a crazy dream.

We celebrated our anniversary by going out to fancy-schmancy champagne brunch in Managua, which was fabulous. It was nice to get dressed up and feel “civilized” for a couple of hours, though you would have thought we were starving people… I think I went back to the cheese table like 4 times.

So after taking a year to finally get truly “comfortable,” I’ve decided to complicate my life and go for the big prize…. my own house! Actually, I’ve been trying this entire time to get my own place but it has not been easy. I’m still unsure as to whether it is a blessing or a burden (I’m leaning towards both.) I’ve only spent two nights here, and it’s a little scary being alone, though I’m sure I’ll get used to it. The house is pretty BIG for me all by my loneself, which means lots and lots of cleaning. I used to laugh at Nicaraguans for sweeping and mopping incessantly, but I can now see that I will indeed be sweeping and mopping incessantly.

I also made the huge mistake of offering to paint the thing, which I’m now realizing is going to be a T-O-N of work. I don’t know what I was thinking, but I also knew that the mustard-yellow and dark brown theme the last tenant chose wasn’t going to work for me. It’s also extremely empty… houses here come completely unfurnished. I was lucky enough to snag a bed from a friend, but for now it’s just me and my bed, surrounded by plastic grocery bags of all my stuff on the floor. It’s all going to come together bit by bit, which is frusterating as I’d like to just have a big truck and a bag of money and drive around get everything I need at once and be done with it (I’m American, can you tell?)

Moving has been kind of a turn-your-world-upside-down experience… it has thrown me into pretty intense emotional turmoil… (“what the hell am I doing” in reference to the specific always turns into “what the hell am I doing” in reference to the Big Picture.) It has also involved a lot of “being proactive,” which is not something I’m necessarily good at. For me it’s always such a struggle and it takes so much effort and courage to do the smallest things (go to the bank, order thai food on the phone) and now I’m handed a massive list of things I HAVE to do. I’ve always admired people who can “get things done,” and I’m trying to take advantage of the situation to bulk up my capacity in that area.

not caring.

Good news, yall. I finally figured things out and got myself a real mailbox.

Actually, I did nothing. I’m sharing it with some other volunteers who made me a key.

So, my new mailing address is as follows:

Marcella Gillis
Apartado Postal 59
Masaya, Nicaragua

That’s it. You have all been ridiculously good to me in terms of care packages, I can’t thank you enough. For that reason, I feel a little guilty wishlisting, but IF for whatever reason you want to send me more stuff, I can always use things that smell good (or make ME smell good), taste good (chocolate…!), and school/art supplies (crayons, markers, index cards, construction paper.) Also, if anyone can get ahold of Thai green curry, some of that would make my life. I miss Thai food more than I miss my parents.

(just kidding.)

My job is going well enough. My new counterpart is a little nervous about (thought not opposed to) trying new techniques in the classroom, so we’re integrating different activities bit by bit. This means more work for me, but I like it. My community English class is going really well, I would even call it fun. Generally, the people who come actually want to learn and they study and participate, and it is such a pleasure getting to use my own curriculum, and to teach what I want. I think the reason I feel so disempowered at the high school is because I really am… disempowered. There is so little that I can actually do there, working in such a confined academic space. My own classes though, are wonderful, and I feel totally brilliant and in charge (which are two emotions I haven’t felt in a year.)

The big trick for me at this point is trying to reach the right balance between being committed to my work, but also remaining slightly removed. T.S. Eliot said, “Teach us to care and not to care,” and that’s what I’m trying to keep in mind. I have learned (the hard way) that if I throw myself into my job here, I go crazy because it’s so frustrating and unfullfilling. Local and national politics, the culture of time, and the prevailing attitude towards the students make me want to scream. When I descend completely into my job, my deep well of anger gets tapped and I end up doing things like getting in loud fights with the officials from the Ministry of Education…. whoops! If I try to “not care” a little, it’s much easier to go with the flow, and let go of my ideas about “efficiency,” “time management” and “discipline.” The key to contentment is choosing your battles.

It is strange however, coming to the realization that my job is most likely never going to be fulfilling. Work is such an important part of American culture, and not to say that everyone is happy and satisfied with their job (the opposite, probably) but I grew up knowing that I didn’t ever want a job that wasn’t satistfying or rewarding. Obviously this situation is a little more complicated than if I was working a boring desk job in the States (which is something I fantasize about, by the way), and I know that my life is being enriched a thousand times more than it would be if I had not come here. Still… it’s bizarre having to purposefully NOT give 100%.

Other than that, things are just sort of slowly plodding along. Who knew small town life was this boring? I never imagined. If I’m not exhausted by the end of the day, I go to my friends’ house and watch T.V. in their bakery. Sometimes my students come by and we sit out on the porch and chat. My sitemate and I hang out in one of our bedrooms and sit in front of the fan, eating chocolate and complaining. I have some fun weekends coming up, which should lighten the monotony a bit… plus, the new TEFL group comes in 2 weeks, and once they’re here I’ll probably be insanely busy helping out with them (one of the results of living close to everything.) May 2^nd is my one year in country mark, which is not nearly as special as our July 20^th one year of service, but still… can you believe it?! Woo!

it’s the heat, stupid.

After an intense and sad but also wonderful week back home for Grampy’s memorial service, I’m trying to ease back into my life here a little more smoothly than last time.  However, it’s full summer and hotter than I can possibly describe, and my culture shock coping mechanism seems to be denial… or more accurately worded, “withdrawal into my own head.”  I’ve been living mostly in books, movies, trip-hop, and daydreams.  Neither of my “worlds” seem real anymore… the US is like a series of foreign memories and Nicaragua is a dream… sultry and ethereal. It has to be the heat that’s making me so… lightheaded? Dreamy? It’s hard to keep your feet tethered to the ground. The whole landscape changes. The colors are unnaturally bright and everything slows down. Cicadas drone lazily, fans blow the muggy air right back at you, and the air smells like jasmine tea. The sky is a spotless hot blue during the day, but late at night I’m awakened by rolling thunder in the distance, and sometimes violent, deafening storms that last for 5 minutes and disappear. I daydream about sprinklers, freezer pops, limade, slip-n-slides, sailboats, and crystalline swimming pools. I’m somehow managing to get my work done… thank god for moments of clarity and a good internal auto-pilot. I imagine things will snap back a bit once the rains start, but we’ve got another month or so of oppressive heat.  It’s pretty unpleasant, but I’m sort of enjoying drifting around in as little clothing as I can get away with, listening to lots of Massive Attack and eating ice cubes.

 

how not to react.

As a teacher here, it seems like an undue amount of emphasis is placed on “discipline.” All I hear is about how unruly the kids are and how “today’s youth” just don’t care about anything except dating and t.v. and playing soccer (since when has any day’s “youth” really cared about anything else!?) Unfortunately, here, “classroom management” consists of verbal abuse and empty threats. I watch teachers spend entire classes yelling at the students, calling them “stupid” and telling them they’re going to be “parasites of society.” In the home (and in public places) child abuse is commonplace. I’m certainly not implying that this doesn’t exist in other parts of the world, but frankly, it does not exist in MY world (no one gets spanked in Montessori.)

This is what really does it for me… as an insult, teachers frequently call their students “maleducado,” and parents call their children “malcriado.” These words directly translate as “poorly educated” and “poorly raised,” respectively. I mean, gramatically, doesn’t that place the blame squarely on the parent/teacher? It would make me laugh, if it weren’t so… totally not funny.

Anyway, I’ve been thinking about this a lot and us English teachers like to get together and complain about it… I mean, discipline seems to be the priority, yet no one DOES anything. Kids live with no boundaries whatsoever, and get slapped when whatever they’re doing gets too annoying. I’m certainly not one for harcore knuckle-slapping discipline, but as a lifelong babysitter and camp counselor, I do think that kids (like anyone) need to take responsibility for themselves. But here, there’s no follow-through, so kids run free with a long string of empty abuses running behind them. So one day, channeling my Grandmother, I decided to take matters into my own hands.

We were sitting out on the stoop as the sun set, enjoying the cool wind after a long, hot day. The little boy, who is notoriously “necio,” (Nicaraguan for bratty/annoying) was playing with the neighbor boy, of about the same age. They’re teasing eachother and I’m trying to not pay attention. “Stop it, Kevin. Don’t do that,” says one Aunt, listlessly. Soon the boys are throwing pebbles at eachother. “Come over here. Stop. Don’t play like that.” Yet nobody makes a move. I’m sitting here sort of stewing over this “discipline” issue thinking, “someone needs to go over there and give him the what’s-what.”
THEN, the boys start spitting at eachother. “Don’t do that, don’t be necio,” they repeat. “If you don’t stop, I’m getting up and getting you.” Still, nothing. They keep spitting. Finally I’m like, “I’ll get up. They can’t keep spitting at eachother and ignoring you guys.” So I get all self-righteous and angry and start walking over, and the boys get all giggly, like I’m playing a game. “Stop spitting and come over here, or I’m going to come get you myself.” And the little boy bolts. I get a sudden burst of adrenaline/stupidity and decide to chase him. We run, giggling and yelling, down at least 2 blocks… past all of the neighbors sitting out on their stoops. That little guy is FAST. Finally, I catch up to him and grab him, whereupon he begins to scream. I can see that he’s actually terrified (I mean that has to be a little scary, you know how your primal animal insticts kick in when you’re getting chased, even if it’s just “fun”) so he starts to flail and kick in my arms and goes into some sort of conniption, and I have to carry him all the way past all the neighbors to the house… it’s a huge scene. So part of me is going, “hey, gotta face the consequences, kid. If you behave like that, you’re gonna get busted.” And the other part is like, “Marcella, you monster, how could you do that?” I apologize, to him and to the family, but they all think its totally hilarious and tells the story the rest of the night. So, I didn’t get in trouble (can you imagine how an American parent would react if I did that to their child? I’d have a lawsuit on my hands) But… deep down I feel terrible.

The thing is, the second I started to run, I knew it was a mistake. So, this is an example of how to NEGATIVELY channel one’s “cultural intolerance energy.” I said at the end of that long blog that I want to try and use all of these feelings towards a positive end, and here I am, chasing terrified small children through the neighborhood.

So, lesson learned: I can teach English and talk about AIDS, but I can’t discipline other people’s children.