I’ve realized that I've been thinking about the saying “when life hands you lemons, make lemonade” a lot lately. I think this is because, in Peace Corps Guatemala, life not only hands you lemons, it pelts you in the back of the head with them when you’re least expecting it. Over the past two weeks, my world has been completely turned upside down, and I’m now about to start over with a completely different Peace Corps experience.
Let me start at the beginning. On January 19th, we received a letter from the country director that explained some major changes in Peace Corps Guatemala. First, the incoming training groups for the rest of 2012 had all been cancelled. Second, the two groups of volunteers who were slated to COS (close of service) in March and July will now COS in February and March. Third, all volunteers will be consolidated into the central western highlands. We were also asked to attend an all-volunteer conference the following week in Xela.
The next day, I went about my business normally; figuring I wouldn’t be affected by these changes, since I never thought that San Marcos would be excluded from what Peace Corps considers to be the “central western highlands.” That morning I went to school, and when I got out at 1pm, I had ten missed calls from Peace Corps. I called David, the head of safety and security, to see what was up. It turns out that there were some problems in San Marcos involving the police and the military, and we were being asked to evacuate the department for a week. We all headed into Xela for a sponsored weekend at the Peace Corps hotel. When I arrived, I had a chance to talk to the PCVLs (Peace Corps Volunteer Leaders – 3rd and 4th year volunteers who have a leadership position) about the San Marcos situation. Both of them confirmed the fears that had been sneaking into my mind all day. Peace Corps would be permanently relocating all of the volunteers in San Marcos.
I can’t even begin to explain the tidal wave of emotions that all but knocked me off my feet. I couldn’t stop thinking of all the work I’ve done and all the relationships I’ve built in Comitancillo. Comi is like my second home. I have a family, friends, a house, and a job that I love, and I had just been told that I would be forced to abandon it all and start over. I literally became sick to my stomach. Now, all the volunteers from San Marcos were stuck together in a hotel for four days, waiting for a meeting in which we would learn our fates.
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| Hanging out in the Xela hotel |
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| A night out in Xela with some friends |
Thankfully, my friend Justin invited me to climb a volcano with him and a group of friends on Saturday. This was a much-needed diversion. We woke up early on Saturday morning, met some friends who were staying at a nearby hostel, and headed off to summit Volcán Santa Maria, an active volcano measuring 12,375 feet. After about 3 ½ hours of a rather steep hike, we made it to the summit. Unfortunately, the clouds had rolled in, so we couldn’t see out to the Pacific, or look down on the constantly erupting Santiaguito, but the views were still spectacular! Even better, we all perched on a boulder to snap a group photo, and felt the ground shaking. It turned out to be a 6.1 magnitude earthquake that lasted for over a minute! It was really cool.
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| The ladies on top of Santa Maria! |
We all whiled away the next few days in Xela, wandering around and generally doing a whole lot of nothing. On Tuesday, we moved to a large hotel on the outskirts of town where the three days of meetings were to be held. The meetings started with Carlos Torres, the regional director of the Inter-American and Pacific region of Peace Corps, explaining the current situation in the northern triangle of Central America (Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador), and what steps Peace Corps was taking to ensure the safety of the volunteers. The bottom line is that this region of Central America is getting more dangerous. The rates of drug-related violence have risen. Armed robberies on buses are everyday occurrences that have affected volunteers on more than a few occasions. In a recent armed robbery on a bus in Honduras, a female Peace Corps volunteer was shot in the leg. Director Torres told us that he had a chance to talk to the PCV who was shot, and as they were speaking about the incident, she told him that she had done everything her Safety and Security Officer had trained her to do if shots are fired on a bus - sit close to the window, duck under the seat and do not try to protect anyone. Director Torres had to step back for a minute and think about this one. "They're training you how to avoid bullets?" he thought. At what point, he asked himself, do we say to ourselves "what are we doing here?"
Peace Corps is doing all they can to keep us out of harm’s way, however the fact remains that 1 out of 10 volunteers experiences a "serious crime incident" (SCI) every year in Guatemala. SCIs are different from "general crime," (petty theft, etc), and include incidents such as rape or armed robbery, etc. This statistic is a red flag for Peace Corps. The statistics related to volunteer safety in the northern triangle region led to a portfolio review of the three countries. In March of 2011, Peace Corps sent a team to the region to perform a fact-finding mission in order to learn more about the increase in crimes on PCVs. At the same time, the World Bank and the United Nations Office of Drug and Crime released statistical reports about Central America. The World Bank study said that the population of Spain and the northern triangle region of Central America are roughly equal, and that in 2010, Spain experienced 336 murders, while the northern triangle experienced 14,257. That is an increase in the homicide rate by a factor of 40. The northern triangle has the highest murder rate in the world outside of an active war zone.
The fact that this inquiry was going on in the months leading up to my departure for Guatemala left me wondering: “why did they send a training group of 52 volunteers to this country when they were so concerned about safety?” Someone asked Director Torres this same question. He replied that, in hindsight, that decision was most likely a mistake. They sent 52 of us to a post where a third of the country is off-limits to us, and transportation policies are designed to keep us on a rather tight leash. None of us expected to come live in Guatemala for 27 months and never even be able to go see Tikal.
Due to all of the increasing security concerns, the Peace Corps pulled all volunteers out of Honduras on January 15th, and are cutting the programs in Guatemala and El Salvador by half. They are also relocating almost half of the remaining volunteers (from San Marcos, Huehuetenango, and the entire eastern part of the country) in an effort to “cluster” volunteers into what they consider to be safer areas of the country. All volunteers have also been given the option to take an early COS, which is basically like an honorable discharge, in which the volunteers would still be eligible for all of the benefits received by a volunteer that completed their full 27 months. This option is only offered in very rare circumstances. It became clear that PC Guatemala was doing anything they could to get their numbers down.
I sat through these meetings continuously thinking about Comitancillo. I haven’t felt safer anywhere else in Guatemala, yet I’m being told that I’ll have to leave by March 24th because Peace Corps doesn’t think I’m safe. This is partly because of the distance we have to travel to get to PC-related events, and also because of the proximity to the Mexican borders, where much of the narco-trafficking occurs. After the meeting, the San Marcos volunteers met with David so that he could brief us on the security situation. He told us that, in an effort to battle the narcos, the new president, Otto Pérez Molina, would be declaring a “state of siege” in San Marcos in the near future. Once a state of siege is declared, the PCVs will have 24 hours to evacuate the department. FML.
At this point, the early COS option was starting to look better and better. That night, I spoke with a counselor, because all I could think was that, no matter where they put me, there’s no way it could ever be as good as Comitancillo. She told me what my dad had told me the night before: “Comitancillo isn’t awesome on its own; your experience has been awesome because you entered into that community with a positive attitude, and you worked hard to make it your new home. If you did it there, I have no doubt that you will do it again in your new site." After talking to her, I decided that I would stay. The rest of the week revolved around logistics for those who were staying, those who were going home, and those who would be changing sites. A number of volunteers learned what their new sites would be, however the youth development volunteers were told that we would have to wait until the following week.
I returned to Comitancillo and spent the past week explaining to everyone I know why it is that Peace Corps feels the need to move me. Many don’t understand, because Comi is so safe. I have to explain to them that Peace Corps is thinking of the general situation in the country, rather than the individual sites. Many still think that it’s all a joke and that I’m not really leaving. The week has been an emotional roller-coaster. I’ve called my parents on more than one occasion, crying and telling them that I just wanna go home. My dad continually assures me that, if I came home, I would regret it in the future. I know that he’s right.
I’ve been super stressed about what my new site would be as well. I knew that Gonzalo, my APCD (program director) had two sites in mind for me, one of which I absolutely didn’t want, and another that would be just fine, however it’s at 10,000 feet and really cold. In order to keep my mind off my worries, I threw myself back into work this week, intent on leaving my schools prepared to work with my curriculum after my departure. I taught 17 charlas on teamwork to my students, and gave a 3.5 hour teacher workshop. I also spent time with community members that I’ve been meaning to visit, and my sitemates came over one night and I made a ton of pizza for us.
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| Students in Tojcheche building towers out of straws and pins for a teamwork activity |
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| Towers built by students in Tojcheche |
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| Roasting marshmallows over a pile of burning trash with the neighborhood kids |
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| My little neighborhood gang... I'm gonna miss these kids |
Yesterday, I couldn’t stand the thought of going through the weekend without knowing my new site, so I called Gonzalo to ask him if he had any ideas yet. He told me that he didn’t want me to tell all the other volunteers yet, because it wasn’t 100% for sure, but that I would be going to Aldea Chivarreto, San Francisco el Alto, Totonicapán. This is the site that is at 10,000 feet. All in all, I’m really excited to go there, because even though I’m gonna freeze my butt off, I’ll feel safe there, and that’s really all that matters. I still don’t know exactly when I’m going to move, but I’m hoping to move my stuff over there ASAP in case there’s a state of siege and we’re evacuated. After moving my stuff, I plan to return to Comitancillo and at least finish out the month of February.
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| My new site |
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| I'll be about 2 hours from Xela (Quetzaltenango, lower left corner), and about 5 hours from Antigua. |
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| My new site comes with its very own Hollywood sign! |
These past two weeks have been the most emotionally draining weeks of my life. I’m definitely ready for things to start looking up again!
p.s. Many of you have asked if you could send me a care package or something, and I said to wait because I didn’t know where they should be sent. For the time being, I’m gonna receive my mail at the Peace Corps Xela office:
PCV Lucy Cutler
25 Avenida 8-32
Zona 3
Quetzaltenango, Quetzaltenango
Guatemala
Zona 3
Quetzaltenango, Quetzaltenango
Guatemala
