Trying Again

From the day I applied to the Peace Corps, I had an idealized vision of what it meant to be a Peace Corps Volunteer.  I saw myself living in a mud hut in Africa.  No electricity, no running water, no phone, no internet, no facebook.  It would be a journey of self-discovery, one that would turn me into a better person.

The first shock came when I found out that Peace Corps was sending me to Guatemala.  I wondered how I could really disconnect myself from the outside world while living so close to home.  Then I found out that volunteers in Guatemala are given cell phones.  And that most have internet access at their houses.  And just like that, my dreams of a simpler life were washed away.

When I received my first site, I was excited that Peace Corps had chosen to give me a more rural, isolated site.  While Comitancillo wasn’t Sub-Saharan Africa, it was a community where need was prevalent, and I felt at least a little bit disconnected from the United States.  Except that I wasn’t.  I skyped with friends and family almost every night.  I was on facebook, e-mail, pinterest, among others.  I began to feel bogged down by my own connectivity.  All I kept thinking was, “this isn’t really Peace Corps.  I should be reading a book by candlelight, not downloading movies to watch on my laptop.  I should be cooking over an open flame, not baking cookies in my oven.”

Slowly, I became accustomed to the idea that my Peace Corps experience would be defined by different things than I had originally expected.  I realized that Peace Corps did not have to be some otherworldly experience that was completely disconnected from the reality I grew up in.  While it wasn’t what I had dreamed about or hoped for, I began to love my work and my life in Guatemala.  I formed a new idealized vision of what my Peace Corps service would look like.  I made plans for completing the rest of my two years in Comitancillo.

And then, that idealized vision, like the one before it, came crashing down.  In February I was evacuated from Comitancillo and reassigned to Aldea Chivarreto.  I was heartbroken, to say the least.  I was being pulled out of my isolated rural dreamland and thrown into a community only 1 ½ hours outside the second biggest city in Guatemala.  A community that has such a large population living in the US that I regularly found myself having conversations with people in English.  I think I cried for about a week.

I jumped into my work in Chivarreto, hoping to find the same happiness I found in Comitancillo.  Unfortunately, Chiva wasn’t Comi, and I had to adjust my expectations for the rest of my service.  I didn’t love my new site, but I tirelessly worked to plan and execute a large career fair and at the same time worked hard with my schools to implement the Youth in Development curriculum.  After receiving a training on project design and management, I threw myself into a large infrastructure project in my favorite school.  Working hand-in-hand with the director, we planned an ecologically friendly computer lab that would greatly benefit the youth of this poor community.  I was happy to have something meaningful to focus on.  Once again, I was working on something that would really define my service.

And then a crazy guy broke into my sitemate’s house and trashed the place.  And once again my Peace Corps experience came screeching to a halt.  After Christopher came to spend Thanksgiving with me, Peace Corps told me to stick around the office for a while instead of going back to site.  A few days later, they told me they were evacuating me from Chiva because it had been deemed “unsafe for female volunteers.”  I found myself facing the challenge of starting over yet again, with only six months left to achieve anything.  Peace Corps offered me Interrupted Service, which was basically an easy out.  I could have gone home with the full honors of a volunteer that completed their full term.  Walked away. Washed my hands of it all.  Quit.  I just couldn’t do it.  I felt like I hadn’t yet given all I had to give.  I knew I would regret it if I didn’t complete my full term.  Around this time, a friend of mine, Matt Dalio, sent me an e-mail with the following quote:

“Courage does not always roar. Sometimes courage is the little voice at the end of the day that says I'll try again tomorrow.”

Mary Anne Radmacher -

And so I decided to try again.

And so, this was the beginning of a three-week stint living in the hotel near the Peace Corps office.  I was lucky enough to be able to take private Spanish classes and get some much-needed quiet time to work on my graduate school applications.  During this time, my project manager, Rocío, gave me some options for a new site and invited me to come visit the various communities.  After a few site visits, I made up my mind: I would complete the last six months of my service in San Martín Jilotepeque, Chimaltenango.

I was not sad about leaving Chiva, but I was heartbroken about the prospect of losing the computer lab project in Cuesta del Aire.  After a number of meetings with Rocío and other Peace Corps staff members, I convinced them to let me continue my project, while signing Rich (my former sitemate still living in Chiva) on as the project lead.  We finished all the paperwork to solicit the final funding from USAID on Thursday last week, and now we’re waiting for the decision of the Small Grants Committee.

At the same time, I moved to San Martín on December 20^th and jumped into my new job placement working with the Oficina Municipal de la Juventud (Municipal Youth Office).  This office has formed 26 youth leadership groups in the rural communities of San Martín.  They train these youths in topics similar to the topics I had been teaching in the middle schools – Self-esteem, goals, careers, leadership, sexuality, drug and alcohol use, violence, etc.  I was assigned to this office to support them in the development of certain trainings and projects, while also learning about their work model, which Peace Corps is interested in replicating in other sites in the future.

Horseback riding with my new counterpart, Briyi

As difficult as it was to change sites again, I really love San Martín.  I moved in with a 93-year-old woman who is basically the Guatemalan version of Charlotte (my grandmother).  She is super active, caring, and smart.  She reads the newspaper every day and we’ve had some really interesting conversations.  Her granddaughter, great-granddaughter and great-grandson also live in the house with us.  It’s a really nice house, with a hot shower and lots of creature comforts.  San Martín itself is very nice.  It has a warm climate, which I had missed out on in Comi and Chiva.  I live right in the center of town and can buy almost anything I need without walking more than a few blocks.  I’ve been able to run a lot here, and there’s even a track – albeit a paved one – at the soccer stadium.  I’m also less than 1 ½ hours from Antigua, which is pretty nice.

My new bedroom.  Complete with fake fireplace

My life here feels less like Peace Corps than ever before.  I’m working 8-hour days, mostly in an office (with wi-fi!), running and taking a hot shower every day, and eating almost like I did in the states.  I recently started thinking again about my initial idealized vision of what Peace Corps would be, and how it has changed.  Over the past couple of weeks, I have formed a new idealized vision of Peace Corps service: Your service is what you make of it.  Regardless of the house you live in, or the office, school, or fields you work in, you have been sent to make a difference in a community that needs your help.  You can have a cell phone, computer, hot shower and warm bed, and still be a “real” Peace Corps Volunteer.  If you don’t get to complete your service in one site, see it as an opportunity to touch the lives of even more people.  I am a real Peace Corps Volunteer, three times over.  I have done meaningful work in two communities, and am beginning to do so in yet another.  At the end of every day of my Peace Corps service, I tell myself that I’ll try again tomorrow.  Because that’s why I came here.

I honestly can't think of a caption for this one...  Make one up!

"Custom"

Helpless.  At the moment, this is the only word I can find to describe the way I feel.  I just saw, first hand, why Guatemala is losing its struggle to overcome the rampant poverty that plagues the lives of so many of its citizens.

The past few days have been very busy.  The teacher workshop I’m leading tomorrow afternoon will finish off a week that included two teacher workshops, a parent workshop, a day of teaching classes in one of my schools, a half-day meeting with the departmental ministry of education, and a full-fledged battle with Peace Corps to get them to allow me to continue living in my house.  As I was finishing preparing for tomorrow’s workshop, Saturnina (my host mom) came into my room and told me that Juana, her 13-year-old niece, didn’t return home from school today.  She then informed me that Juana had run off to her boyfriend’s house, and that the two of them had decided to marry.  Juana’s parents apparently said that their daughter made her decision, and that there was nothing that they could do about it.  After talking to Satu about this for 10 minutes or so, she asked me to go talk to the parents.  So, at 10PM, I called my sitemate Rachael and asked her to accompany me on my quest to talk some sense into the parents. 

We arrived at the house, and after exchanging the customary Guatemalan pleasantries, I got right to the point.  I explained to them that Juana is still a child, and that, physiologically, she does not yet have the capacity to make this kind of a decision.  I explained to them that it would be years before her brain is fully developed, and that in this situation; they need to make this decision for her.  I also explained that many adolescents and teenagers are rebellious, and that their parents need to set rules and limits to protect their children from making mistakes that they will regret later on.  Finally, I added on the fact that, if she goes through with this marriage, she will be a mother in 9 months, before she even turns 14.  I explained that this is dangerous, and that her body is not ready to bear a child.  At that point, I was so close to breaking into tears that I had to pass the torch on to Rachael. 

Rachael went on to explain to them that it is their responsibility, as parents, to go and bring Juana home.  She emphasized my point that this girl is still a child, and is not prepared to make these decisions.  Juana’s uncle, who was also present, cut in to explain that, he understands where we’re coming from, but this is Guatemala, not the United States, and the customs here are different.  He also said that there have been cases where, after the parents go to bring their daughter home, the family of the boyfriend has the daughter killed.  I had never heard of this, and obviously needed to take this new information into account, but neither Rachael nor I could sit and listen to the same old excuse: “this is the custom here.” 

Guatemalans always talk about how awful the poverty is in their country.  “¿Cómo vamos a salir de la pobreza?” (direct translation: how are we going to leave from the poverty?).  They want to see a change, but they don’t see a way out.  And then, in walks a situation that gives them an opportunity to make a change, and they don’t take it.  Instead, they blame the problem on the local customs, and continue to feed into the cycle of poverty.  They want to see a change, but they don’t want to be the ones making the changes.

“Times have changed,” I told Juana’s father, “girls are marrying later because more girls are studying.  This is your opportunity to make a decision that will have a positive effect on the future of this country.”  He smiled and nodded, but clearly had no intention of changing his mind. “Girls who study,” I continued, “wait longer to marry and wait longer to have children.  When they do have children, they are healthier and more likely to study as much as, if not more than, their parents did.” 

I could tell at this point that Rachael was fuming.  She continued to press the issue with the father, while I tried to hold back the tears as I watched Juana’s grandmother begin to cry.  Rachael asked Juana’s mother what she thought.  The mother responded, very quietly, that Juana had made the decision to go, and there was nothing to be done.  It was clear that she was following what her husband said, but did not believe in what she was saying.

At this point, I broke back in and explained that it had become clear to me that they were not going to change their minds, especially if they were worried about the prospect of the family of the boy killing their daughter.  “You have to promise me two things.” I said, “When the boy’s parents come to see you tomorrow, you need to demand that your daughter goes to the health post and starts birth control.  Also, she needs to keep studying.  At this point, any hope of her being a professional may be out the window, but if she continues studying, she can at least learn how to better care for her children and manage a household budget, among other things.”

“On this point, I agree with you,” said her father, “and we’ll talk about this with the boy’s parents tomorrow.” 

Rachael made one more effort to get them to go bring their daughter home, but, at this point, it was a lost cause.  I told them that I appreciated that they had listened to us, and that, if Juana wants, I’d love to talk to her.  They thanked Rachel and I, and we headed home. 

Realistically, I can’t become more involved in this situation, because it could jeopardize my position in the community.  I’ll just have to wait and see what happens.  Just yesterday, I was joking around and laughing with Juana, without the slightest notion of what was going through her head.  If only I had known, I can’t help thinking; maybe I could have said something to keep her from running off today.

I wish more than anything there was something I could do.  I feel completely helpless.

Getting Back on Track...

I don’t even know how many months it’s been since I last posted… Sorry about that.  Every time I meant to write a new entry, I got really overwhelmed with all that’s happened over the past few months, and just gave up.  Then my computer died, which didn’t really help the situation.  Anyway, there’s no way I can give a detailed explanation of everything that’s happened since I moved to my new site, so I’ll give a recap of sorts…

I moved from Comi to Chivarreto in mid-February.  I have three schools here, with a total of about 650 students.  My two bigger schools are 3^rd generation schools, which means that there have been two volunteers in them before me, so I’m mostly working with teachers and parents, while the teachers are teaching my curriculum to the students.  My small school is a first generation school, which I really like, because I love working directly with the students like I did in all my schools in Comi.  Work has gotten off to a really good start.  I’ve already led 4 teacher workshops, 3 parent workshops, and I’ve taught a number of classes to the students.  I’ve also been planning a large career fair that will take place tomorrow.  The tercero (9^th grade) students from my three schools and two other local schools will all be attending – 181 students in total.  I have 27 professionals coming to give lectures to the students about their careers and the various educational opportunities available to them after they finish básico.  I applied for and received funding from Peace Corps’ Small Projects Assistance fund, so we will be holding a lunch for all the invitees, offering snacks to the students, and paying the transportation costs for the students coming from outside the community.  Today we have some last minute preparations to do, but really, at this point, all I can do is hope that it goes well and that everyone shows up!  I’m also in the early planning stages of a large project at my little school in Cuesta del Aire.  We are hoping to construct a 2-room addition on to the school.  This addition would house a computer lab with 15 computers and an administrative office.  We want to build the walls using a technique called “eco-ladrillos,” or “eco-bricks.”  This basically means that apart from weight bearing columns, the walls will be built using plastic bottles filled with inorganic trash.  The bottles are tied to chicken wire, and then concrete is poured around the bottles to complete the wall.  I’ll keep you updated on the progress of this project.

Nice Sunset in Chiva

I’ve been doing a lot more running in Chiva than I was in Comi.  I actually ran 116 miles in May, which was my biggest running month ever.  I also ran an incredibly difficult half marathon on May 26^th in Panajachel, on the shores of Lake Atitlán.  It was the hilliest course I’ve ever run, and it was at approximately 5,000 feet altitude.  Needless to say I was absolutely wasted when I finished, even though I ran 20+ minutes slower than my previous slowest half marathon.  I’ve got another race coming up on July 17^th in Antigua.

After the Panajachel 1/2 Marathon w/ Christine and Justin

My dad came down to visit last week, and we had the opportunity to go spend a couple days in Tikal.  It was one of the most amazing places I’ve ever been!  I highly recommend it.  Words can’t even describe how wonderful it was.  It was the slow season, so there was hardly anyone there.  There were only 3 people in our hotel!  We also had a day to wander around Antigua, which was really nice.  We ate lots of good food, and I took some nice hot showers and got to sleep in comfy beds.  It was great!

Dad and I in Front of a Ceiba (Guatemala's National Tree)

Temples 1, 2, and 3 at Dawn, Tikal National Park

The rainy season got under way about a month ago, and I started to notice that the exterior walls of my room were getting rather damp, and my clothes felt wet.  I told Peace Corps about it, and they decided to send someone out to look at the house to see if there’s anything that can be done to mitigate the situation.  I have become really close with my host family, and I didn’t want to have to move if I could avoid it.  When the Peace Corps guy came out to look at the house, my genius host dad started bragging to him about how he built this house with all the money he made working as a coyote.  No, Don Gilberto, the government organization I work for does not want me living with someone who illegally smuggles people into the US.  Needless to say, I’m now in the process of finding a new house, because Peace Corps has a strict “no living with coyotes” policy.  It’s probably for the best, because the dampness situation is starting to give me bronchial problems.  My boss is coming for the career fair tomorrow, and he’ll look at the housing options I’ve found, and we’ll decide where I’m going to live.

That’s all for now…  

"Become Anxious, Details to Follow"

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 19^th, 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 – 3^rd and 4^th 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.

Hanging out in the Xela hotel

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.

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 15^th, 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 24^th 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.  

Students in Tojcheche building towers out of straws and pins for a teamwork activity

Towers built by students in Tojcheche

Roasting marshmallows over a pile of burning trash with the neighborhood kids

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.

My new site

I'll be about 2 hours from Xela (Quetzaltenango, lower left corner), and about 5 hours from Antigua.

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