Out of Town

I just wanted to give you a heads up that I will be MIA for a while. Today I leave for another field-based training (FBT), which will last for ten days. I’ll likely be quite tired when I get back, but I’ll try to post about my trip as soon as I can.

So where am I going? This time around I’ll be heading to the province of Ancash. Affectionately called the Colorado of Peru, Ancash is known for it’s stunning beauty. It’s very mountainous and the land is supposedly lush and green and, sometimes, capped with snow. I’ll be there for about five days while facilitating sessions about early childhood development and nutrition amongst various communities. Afterwards I’ll spend the night in Lima only to head out the next day to my site.

That’s right! I now know my site, where I’ll be living for the next two years. I will be placed in a community in Huancavelica called Aurahua (pronounced “ow-rah-wah”). It’s a regional capital, so it’s slightly bigger than the other towns I visited in Huancavelica. The region has about 4,000 people, but the town itself only has a population of about 600 or so. I’ll be working closely with a health center, which is staffed by a nurse, an obstetrician, a doctor, and other various technicians. In addition, I’ll be living with another homestay family. My mom works in a general store located on the bottom floor of our house, my dad tends grazing animals, and I also have a 14-year-old sister and a 12-year-old brother. Two other volunteers are located quite close to my site, so we’ll likely be consulting and working with each other on and off for a long while.

I hope you are all doing well! Take care and check back soon!

Highs and Lows

One of the perks of working for a government agency is that there are studies and statistics for everything. There are flip-charts that document the typical adjustment cycle of volunteers, the rate that they normally adapt to culture shock, the standard timeline they follow for personal development and growth, etc. From this data, the Peace Corps notes that around weeks 5-7, volunteers leave the “honeymoon phase.” That is, life no longer seems like one, big happy adventure. Rather, volunteers’ emotional health becomes more sinusoidal. They go through extreme highs and lows, reaching intense moments of happiness and satisfaction only to plunge down into apathy and frustration a few moments later. As a result, volunteers begin to feel battered, beaten and worn thin. Normally I’m not one to pay much attention to these sorts of psychology studies, but when I take a good, honest look at how I’ve been this past week, I’d have to agree with them 100%. My honeymoon is drawing to a close.

Now, that’s not to say I’m not enjoying myself or that I regret being here. Far from it. I still love my life as a Peace Corps Volunteer and I am excited for what’s coming next. Also, I’ve been having a wonderful time and enjoying some of those “highs” that are typical for this time. I’ll list some of my favorites below:  

•  Last week I hosted a charla, or rather, an educational lecture and discussion, within my community. Those who speak advanced Spanish are encouraged to conduct some sort of community outreach or capacitation in order to not only further their Spanish skills, but also to practice the techniques and tools they’ll employ once they begin their full service. I have been interested in a municipal program here called Vaso de Leche, which translates as “glass of milk.” Vaso de Leche is a nutritional outreach program that provides mothers, children, and the elderly with a glass of milk every day and, on occasion, hot cereal. It’s a great organization that has greatly improved the health of high-risk families, and for this reason I thought it would be great to do some sort of project with them. Luckily for me, my host mother happens to be the health coordinator for one of the Vaso de Leche committees in my neighborhood. After talking with her and the president of the organization, I discovered that although the program itself was strong, there was an overall lack of participation. Even though the community still had economic and health needs that made Vaso de Leche necessary, volunteers were noticing a drop in the number of mothers and children who used its services. I also discovered that volunteers who staffed the committees were not trained and had very little understanding about why milk was important for health. I reasoned that if the volunteers were taught exactly why milk was important for child development and maternal health, they would be more enthusiastic and more active in the program. This in turn could increase awareness of Vaso de Leche and encourage more people to use its services. So, with the help of another volunteer, this past Thursday I co-facilitated an educational session about the nutritional benefits of milk along with oats, quinoa, and amaranth, which are used in the hot cereal mix provided by Vaso de Leche. Overall, it was a great success. To boost attendance, we had gone to all the coordinators’ houses that previous Saturday to invite them to the program. Unfortunately, that didn’t work so well. When our chat was supposed to start, we found that no one had arrived. That was to be expected. Time is viewed loosely here, so when you say a meeting starts at 3:00, be prepared to actually start at 4:00-4:30. We got started at 4:00 and had an hour-long session, which seemed to be fun and beneficial for the people who came. It was satisfying to actually do a project all on my own, and now I look forward to doing similar charlas in my community.

• I made a zucchini cake! This past Saturday while I was at the market with my sister, I decided that it was time for me to bake another treat for my family. Baking is a little difficult here, so any dessert recipes should be pretty easy and painless. I’m lucky that I have an oven at home, but it’s pretty touchy and there are no temperature gauges. So, you have to rely on sight and smell to know if something is done baking. Since I was craving vegetables, I decided to get the supplies to make a simple zucchini cake. When I arrived back home, my family was spellbound.

          “You’re going to put vegetables…in a cake?”

          “Yes! It’ll be delicious.”

          “…and it’ll be sweet?”

          “Yup! Trust me, it’ll be great.”

          “…you’re sure this is a dessert?”

          “YOU WILL LOVE IT.”

When the cake finally came out of the oven, they all wanted to try it. They kept crumbling the cake trying to find where I had hidden the zucchini. When I pointed out the green specks, they “oohed” and “aahed.” They had expected there to be big, massive chunks of raw zucchini in the middle of cake. Wrong! By the end of the day, the cake was gone. I guess you could say they liked it!

• For the past week, there’s been a circus in my neighborhood. It’s not exactly a showstopper. The circus is very run down and old and is run by a single family. Everyone form the grandparents to the 4-year-old kids to the second cousins twice removed participate in the show, sometimes even doing more than one act. One of our volunteers loves circus art and is an aerial dancer. Have you ever seen Cirque du Solei? Just like in the shows, she loves to do acrobatics on hanging silks. When a group of us went to the circus together, she approached the ringmaster and asked if she could participate in the next show. He said yes. The next day we all piled into the small tent and watched as her silks were suspended from the ceiling. Note: there were no safety lines or nets. With the medical staff on speed dial on our phones, we watched as she scaled the silks and spun, twirled, and posed in the air. It was beautiful. Afterwards, the circus staff begged her to drop the Peace Corps and travel with them. She was flattered, but kindly refused. Who knew the phrase “to run away and join the circus” could actually be true.

• There is a new puppy in my house! He is just 3-months-old and cute as can be. Well, “cute” may be kind of a stretch. He’s a Peruvian dog. Now, that doesn’t just mean he’s from Peru. A Peruvian dog is a breed native to Peru that’s been around since the time of the Incans. They are medium-sized, black, hairless dogs that kind of resemble greyhounds. So, I guess you could say he’s so ugly that he’s adorable.

• As many of you will recall, Halloween is my favorite holiday. I was rather worried that I wouldn’t have much of an opportunity to celebrate it here, but thankfully that wasn’t the case at all. I had not one, but two Halloween parties! The Saturday before Halloween the volunteers decided to have a more adult-oriented celebration. One of the volunteers talked with a nightclub manager and got him to wave the entry fee if we arrived in a big group. No problem! Of course we all went, and we went in costume. Although I used to be obsessed with costumes when I was little, nowadays I don’t get too carried away with them. And, because I’m also living on a Peace Corps Volunteer salary (just 8 soles a day, which amounts to about $3.20), I wanted a costume that was very, very cheap. Even though I went with a group to go costume shopping, in the end I decided to make my own outfit. I wore all black, cut out a bunch of paper stars and a moon, and safety-pinned them to my shirt. I was the night sky. Going to the nightclub was a lot of fun. There was a lot of salsa music, American 80’s rock, and other fun tunes to dance to. My second Halloween celebration was held on the 31^st at our training center. Here in Peru, there are two holidays that fall on Oct. 31^st: Halloween, which is an American holiday that is starting to get popular with the youth here, and la canción criolla (“the Creole song”), which celebrates Creole music, culture, and dance. Quick history lesson: when the Spanish came from Europe and settled in Peru, they of course had families. The second generation of Spaniards were called Creoles. They were ethnically Spanish, but because they were born in Peru they were considered second-class citizens and faced many social restrictions. However, they also developed a very rich culture that is primarily known for its dance and music. When we arrived at the training center in Chaclacayo, we first celebrated la canción criolla. There was food, a Spanish sing-along, dancing, and our professors even put on a skit in full Creole dress. It was a ton of fun. In the late afternoon we switched to Halloween. We had a costume contest, we splurged and bought a ton of candy, and, once classes were over, we had a potluck and a Halloween movie party. There were pasta salads, roasted pumpkin seeds, apple cider, pizza rolls…you know, all the healthy stuff.

As you can see, I’ve been having a lot of fun during my Pre-Service Training. However, some of the magic has begun to slip away.

According to the Peace Corps studies, my “end of honeymoon” phase should look something like this:

Month	Issue	Behavior/reaction	Intervention
2	Too much structure, routine. Fatigue.	Frustration, easy irritation. Restlessness. Withdrawal.	Explore independence. Make plans for the first 3 mo. of service. Establish relationships with Peace Corps Volunteers and staff.

I’d say they hit the nail on the head. For the past week, I’ve felt like I’m going out of my mind. For a long while, I couldn’t figure out why I was feeling so frustrated and agitated. I started getting tired all the time. I’d be short and terse with people, snapping easily and being overly critical about small mistakes. I’d tune out during my tech sessions and language classes and just stare at the wall. When classes were over, I’d go home feeling like a human vegetable and not want to do anything. My quality time with my host family was drastically affected and I spoke to them less and less. It also didn’t help that I caught a fever and felt like crap for three days. I tried to find quiet time to let myself think, relax, and reflect, and normally after spending some time alone I’d leave feeling refreshed. However, as soon as I walked through the gate of the training center I’d deflate like a balloon and slip back into apathy. That’s when I realized what was happening to me. I was starting to go stir crazy. I felt stifled by the extreme structure of my life and fed up with the constant routine. I was beginning to hate being at the center from 8:00-5:00 Monday-Friday and then also having training sessions all Saturday morning and early afternoon. I had no time to do what I wanted and needed to do, and, now that we’re beginning to approach the end of Pre-Service Training, I was starting to get fed up. I didn’t want to waste time sitting through hours of repetitive lectures that wouldn’t address the topics that I needed reinforced. I was tired of being the only advanced Spanish speaker in a class of intermediate students and not having the ability to do more a detailed study of the language. Also, I was just plain tired. My rigid, stagnant routine was starting to make me feel claustrophobic to the point of screaming. When I finally sat down with my training director to have an emotional blow-up session, I said that I felt like an animal stuck in a cage that was too small for it. In my head I was pacing back and forth, back and forth, completely absorbed in nothing and tuning out everything. This was not how I wanted to spend the last couple of weeks of training.

Thankfully, what I’ve been feeling is 100% normal. Many of my peers feel the same way and it’s reassuring that our restlessness and frustration are part of the normal adjustment process. Consequentially, our frustration has caused us to bond together very strongly. In the past week, I’ve gotten very close to some of the other volunteers, especially those who will be my site mates for the next two years. We’ve formed a very strong support network and we know that no matter how bad it gets we are never alone. Thankfully, we’ll all surface from our indifference soon. As our Pre-Service Training draws to a close, so will the rigid routine. Before long we’ll be in our sites and, most likely, pining for the strict structure we once resented. If I’ve learned one thing from this momentary low point, it’s that it’s never wise to suffer in silence. Strength isn’t measured individually. In fact, to continue bearing pain alone isn’t strength, it’s stupidity. Knowing when to step back and ask for help is a huge asset that not only helps you survive, but also makes you grow and forge new relationships. I can now say I’m ready to take the next step and dive into my work and integrate into my community. The honeymoon is now over, but my life as a true Peace Corps Volunteer has just begun.