Mail

I've had some of you ask about sending me mail; I have a P.O. box now near my site, so now you can send mail directly to me:

Hannah Gdalman
Cuerpo de Paz
Apartado Postal 66
Coban, Alta Verapaz 16001
Guatemala, Centro America

Send me letters!!!

And for those of you who wanna send me packages (please don't feel obligated), here is a short list of things I would love from the States..just no FedEx/DHL/UPS please, they'll charge me a ton in taxes when I claim it.

Hannah's Wishlist (in no particular order):

1. Almond butter!
2. DVD's (anything and everything…crappy American TV shows will be appreciated…as will Yoga DVD's, movies, etc.)
3. Dark Chocolate Peanut M&M's
4. Cliff Bars/Luna Bars
5. Trader Joe's Honey Sesame Almonds
6. Used Books/Magazines
7. Good inky pens

And if you really wanna be awesome, I can always use prizes for my students: pencils, pens, notebooks, little notepads, index cards, books/magazines in Spanish, easy books/magazines in English.

xoxo,
Hannah

Dear Mike

Dear Mike,

Happy Birthday!

xoxo,
Hannah

Another Wednesday

Market day again. I'm beginning to dread market days. I can't avoid them, since it's the only chance I get to buy my food for the week. And it's a good time to run into people in the community. But it's overwhelming, to say the least. The "Gringa," and "Cancha" ("blondey", "whitey") comments increase exponentially on Market Days since so many people from neighboring communities come in to buy and sell things. On a normal day, I can walk down my street and most people know who I am and what I'm doing here…probably also my name, where I live, my favorite color… But on market days I'm not always recognized. And therefore I create a bit of a scene.

So I've made it a habit of trying to buy all of my essentials quickly, and then get out. One plus of market day: street food vendors. On the way home I always stop and lunch on my favorite: Tayuyos and Empanadas de banano…tortillas stuffed with spicy black beans, fresh off the griddle, and banana-bread-balls, deep-fried, coated in sugar (kinda like banana donuts). Mm.

This afternoon I hiked up to Tzibol for my first women's group meeting. I got there about 5 before 1pm, the time our meeting was supposed to start. But this is Guatemala. I got to the church to find it locked up, nobody in sight. Luckily I managed to track down one of the few women who can speak Spanish, and who magically had the key to the church. She let me in, and then left, telling me that she'd be right back with everybody. Twenty minutes later, she was back, telling me we're meeting everybody at the school, instead. So we walk to the school. Which was locked. She left again, and returned with a few teachers (many of whom aren't women, either). They decide that it would be best to go back to the church to have the meeting. So we go back, sit down, and in about 20 minutes all but few of the adults from the town have convened, town-meeting style in the church. The leader of the cocode (basically the representative of the village) showed up too, got up and formally introduces me, explains my role, and then gives me the floor. Luckily one of the female teachers from the school speaks both Spanish and Q'eqchi' fluently, and translated for me. Apparently the women were under the impression that I was there to give them classes and training on certain topics, and were skeptical about how much time it would take, what would be expected of them, etc. When I tried to explain that it was really up to them what we did with our time, that I just wanted to hang out basically, maybe share some recipes, they seemed a lot more at ease. We managed to nail down a time for our women's group meetings (since apparently we hadn't done that yet), and that was that. But then the cocode got down to real business. Apparently he decided that since the whole town was convened, anyways, he might as well address some issues. In Q'eqchi'. For 2 hours. During which it rained. On my clothes, which have been now hanging out on the line for 3 days.

But home at last, in dry clothes. Tonight's menu: Bean Chili and Cornbread muffins. Thank GOD for my pressure cooker, or I would never eat. I never realized how much of a luxury it was to open a can of beans, a can of tomatoes, and throw it all in a pot. I'm not complaining…cooking has been a great thing…it's not like I don't have the time, it just takes a lot more preparation and foresight to get dinner on the table.

Poco a poco

Life is moving along here. My schedule is slowly but surely picking up…I'm teaching/observing every afternoon, and I'm going to be teaching English at 2 of my schools, twice a week. The director of the local institute also asked me to help put together the library; the previous volunteer managed to get a bunch of books donated and dropped off, which are now just sitting in piles in a locked room. So I'll be the librarian a few mornings a week. I've started running most mornings, too, which has been really nice. My knee is holding up well, despite the rough terrain.

Today I taught my very first charla ("talk") all by myself…I've been given Berta's Primero class due to scheduling problems (honestly I think she lied about her sudden schedule change so I'd have no choice but to take her class…I only let it happen because I'm desperate for something to do). It still throws me for a loop the way students are trained to learn here. I wanted to get to know the class better, so I brought them all an index card, and asked them to list some basic information: their names, gender, age, number of people in their family (living with them), favorite hobby, future plans, and a question for me. I even drew an example index card on the board, listing each piece of information I wanted. It took these kids 20 of the 35 minutes in our class period to finish what I planned would take less than 5. And it wasn't that they weren't on task. It just took them forever to consider each question and come up with the answer. It was frustrating, because at first I thought it was my fault, that I had written something in bad Spanish or hadn't explained it properly. But it wasn't that. They are fed everything by their teachers; learning is by rote, they are told what to write down in their notebooks word for word. So when I come in and ask them to write their own answers, it's difficult. They can do it (they all eventually turned in completed cards), it just takes them a lot more to do it. Definitely something I'll be keeping in mind when planning my lessons.

Teacher workshop tomorrow. My site mate invited me to attend the workshop he'd planned if I'd agree to do a few dinamicas with the teachers to keep the energy up (it's like a 6 hour workshop). He's also giving me some time in the schedule to give a short talk about starting a local women's group (basically I'm going to beg for friends haha). Can't believe it's already the end of the week…it's Feria in Coban this weekend so I'll probably spend the day there on Saturday. Then Sunday it's soccer with the teachers. Next week there's no class due to exams, so I'll have a week to twiddle my thumbs. I'll use the time to work on my Q'eqchi'.

Dear Mike

Dear Mike,

Good day today. Enjoying the simple things. Took the trip into Coban today to go shopping with Sabiha and Jenia. It's a long trip. Especially for groceries. And internet. On the ride home, though, I saw the most beautiful rainbow I've ever seen. It looked fake, to be honest. A huge arch, touching the ground on both sides, vidid colors…amazing. I came home and, thanks to my shopping trip, made myself a peanut-butter and jelly sandwich, on wheat sandwich bread, cut down the middle diagonally. It was the best pbj I've had in a long, long time. The little things, you know? Even if it's just for peanut-butter, yogurt, and Facebook, I'll keep making that trip. It'll get easier.

Enjoy the studio.

Miss you.
xoxo
Hannah

One week down

One week down…I survived. Read a whole book, got my house together, and visited all my schools. I'm slowly learning the lay of the land…no friends yet, though. I've been hanging around Olga's shop downstairs a lot…she's fun to talk to. Otherwise, poco a poco. I'm just gonna have to be patient. And get used to some quality Hannah time.

This afternoon I went to observe again at the main institute in my aldea, and upon walking through the gates, saw 2 dozen or so students laying, covered in fake blood, on the basketball court, while other groups of students acted as rescue paramedics, issuing toilet-paper bandages and water-bottle IV drips. The rest of the student body huddled on the sidelines, uttering sobs of anguish. This was an earthquake drill. Where I come from, fire drills happened a handful of times a year, the alarm would sound, we would line up, file out, wait 10 minutes, return to class and resume the lesson. Not here. The earthquake drill was pre-planned for 3:05 pm, and the students had ample time to prepare costumes, fake blood…they even somehow had real firemen's vests and stretchers. The drill then lasted an entire hour, while the mourners mourned and the victims bled, and the paramedics assessed the damage. After an hour of this, the director of the school gathered everybody together and spoke for 20 minutes about how, being on a faultline, a major earthquake is always a risk. And that, shockingly enough, it wouldn't really happen like this drill. I guess that's one way to make kids pay attention to emergency drills.

After the drill, I went to observe Profe. Ronald's Tercero class. This was the third class I'd observed at this particular school, and so far I'm incredibly impressed. Not only have the teachers implemented our Youth Development curriculum into their schedule as a class period, but the teachers are teaching the curriculum themselves, without help from a volunteer. In Ronald's class today he taught a lesson on ways to say no to sexual pressure. He even incorporated me into the lesson, asking me to act as a judge for an activity they did. It was really incredibly inspiring to see a Guatemalan teacher take the reigns of the lesson and encourage an open dialogue about something as taboo as premarital sex, sexual pressure, gender roles, etc. It also made me start to worry about my role here. I'm second generation, so I'm supposed to be working more with the teachers and parents. But at this particular school, the teachers are already teaching our material, and doing so well, and parents, well, that will be a challenge. I guess I just need to take it one step at a time. I know my role will develop with time, and that the community needs to warm up to me first. But at the same time I'm anxious to get started and find some kind of purpose for being here. Otherwise I'm just on a really strange vacation.

Wednesday

Wednesday. What a day. Three days in site. Just like I suspected, days go by really slowly here. I like the pace of life here, though. It's relatively relaxed, and people are really social. My days start early with the sun, and end early. Wednesday is market day here, and so I walked down to get some much needed housewares and food. It's amazing how the aldea transforms on market day. There's all sorts of vendors and food carts all along the main road, and the market building itself is huge, and stocked with all sorts of things. I tried to chat with each of the vendors, although some were more willing to talk than others. The women I bought kitchen towels from, Erlinda, was particularly friendly, as was the woman selling bananas. With adults here, I get one of two reactions: recognition and friendliness (Oh! You're the new Kelsey! Where are you from?) or skepticism/confusion.

Example: I wanted to buy tortillas last night for my dinner of protemás (it's Guatemalan dehydrated tofu they sell everywhere…it's actually pretty good if you season the hell out of it) so I went across the road to a little vendor I thought might be able to tell me where to go. I walked in, and the owner women shot me this look of "What the hell are you doing here." I asked her if she sold tortillas or knew where I might find some. She said no, and went back to her conversation. As I turned to leave, her daughter asked me if I wanted the tortillas right then, and if I played soccer. I told her yes, to both things, and she kindly explained that 6 o clock is much to early for tortillas…they don't start torteando until closer to dinnertime (7 o clock). Duh. Then she invited me to play soccer with them on Sundays, and told her mom to go make me some tortillas. I told her she didn't have to, but the deal was done. Fifteen minutes later, 2 quetzals worth of fresh tortillas were dropped off at my door by the women's son.

It's the elders of this aldea that will be the hardest for me to warm up to. They just seem so skeptical. Could have to do with how weird I look to them, that I look German and Germans stole all of their land years ago and still own it all, or that they just don't trust me yet. Poco a poco. The kids, however, seem to love me. Enough to follow me around. And hang outside my apartment door. And yell things at me in Qeqchi then bust out laughing when I tell them I don't understand. Gotta love being the token foreigner in a town this small.

Went to my third school this afternoon, to observe the social studies class (they've incorporated the Peace Corps curriculum into their social studies). I'd called the director beforehand to let them know; so when I arrived, I was surprised to find out that I, in fact, was teaching the class! There must have been some sort of miscommunication on the phone earlier (phone Spanish is still hard for me…you can't read the person when you can't see them), because the teacher handed me the book and announced to the class that I was starting today! So there I was, sweaty from my 30 minute hike to the school, no books, no notes, no plans, and an hour to kill. So I pulled some ice-breakers out of my behind, and made them do an activity where they had to describe typical local dishes. It wasn't as horrible as it could have been, but it definitely was not the first impression I would have liked to make. Oh well. Then, on my walk back home, a pig chased me. I mean, I guess I shouldn't have run from a pig (can they bite?) but it came out of nowhere, and started trotting towards me, and I didn't know what to do. It ran behind me until I jumped up onto a log out of reach, while a group of kids across the road laughed their heads off at the crazy gringo on the log, running from a pig. Uy. What a Wednesday. No wonder I sleep so well here.