Daydreamin'- "I fell asleep beneath the flowers, on such a beautiful day.."

Beginning line up for sports day

Sometimes I wonder when we day dream if it is a way to reset our minds, to flush out everything inside for a minute and fill it with some sort of great desire.  Today I woke up straight day dreamin’.  I visualized how I was going to run and then actually went for a run.  I day dreamed about far off things, tried to get through the rest of my work-out but ended up laying on the floor day dreamin’ for almost an hour.  I decided to chop off a good bit of my hair and went into work.  Nothing much was going on except the looming excitement of sports day on Friday.  In Guyana, there is a whole month where schools are dedicated to sports.  They compete against one another and it’s a really big deal.  Not many schools actually have organized sports so it is an opportunity for the kids who like sports to really shine.  Some of the events for our sports day include late for work, where you have to get dressed in a sort of relay race, staff race, and more traditional 400 meter runs.  I seriously challenged a student of mine to a roti curry eating contest and I’m pretty stoked if I get to participate.  I can chow down some food like it is nobody’s business.

Showing off their cheers and banners

 

My co-worker and her son watching sport day

African Honey Bees that the "Beeman" removed from my school last year

LOVE this river view at sunset

I gaffed a bit more at work and headed out to meet a counselor for GLOW.  Of course, I had nothing at home for dinner so I stopped by my favorite baked good stand and ran into the Beeman who is one of my favorite guys in Guyana.  He is the NICEST person ever and sort of reminds me of Bubba Gump when he talks about shrimp, except talking about bees.  He told me once that Guyana has one of the largest varieties of bees in the world and many scientists come down to study them.  I happened to be biking towards where he lives, so we rode down together.  The GLOW counselor lives in a spot I’ve never been to before, but it was a quiet and seemed like a very neighbor oriented community.  A charming setting of an Indo community nestled right on the outskirts of a cane field.  The family was so nice and in true Guyanese fashion, offered me cashew fruit and drink and some sweeties.  We talked a little about camp and everyone was excited about it.  A little over a month to go!  I biked back home on the last tails of the sun and greeted other neighbors along the way.  I was smiling and just felt truly at peace.  It was one of those moments that you think “this is why I’m here, this is what it is all for.”   I mean everywhere you are, you have days like that, but this moment was unique to my life here in Guyana, the just sigh and soak it all in sort of thing.  My little neighbors came running to greet me and I had to stave them off a bit so I could get changed and wolf down the chicken sandwich I purchased earlier.  It was good, like everything they make, but it was the first time I had it.  Definitely hit the spot.  I realized I was out of toilet tissue so I had to ride down to Rasta man’s shop and along the way ended up walking my bike and gaffing with a neighbor.  I don’t know what it is about this time of year, but everyone has bbqs or fairs or weddings, or something.  I have been invited to several things already.   I was here last time this year and didn’t seem to notice all these things.  It is interesting what time will do.  Of course you can’t just sit idly, I’ve been striving to be considered “neighbor” for a long time now.  And ya know what?  I got it, at least by one person.   She said “you know, you’ve always been a good neighbor, always helping out when we need something and being there.”  I honestly couldn’t be more proud of that.  Part of the reason why today seemed to flow so harmoniously is because my present and future are intertwined with my community and I guess today I was feeling especially connected.

Walking out on the road in my village

  It is amazing how important that connection is to the key to your happiness and success here. 

I road back up to my house and the kids came running back down again.  We did some drawings and I was going to do some work on my computer, but my one little neighbors started reading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory out loud.  I shut my computer and helped her sound out words or explained definitions.  So many of these kids I see here might not know how to read or write too well, but they also seem eager to know.  I wrote the word TIME on a sheet of paper and kept tracing it over again in different colors.  Sometimes you want it to speed up and sometimes there just never is enough of it. It is one of the most precious things we can measure out, divide, and make use of yet it remains quite the anomaly.  How does it pass so quickly?  How much do we have?  If only I had enough time to sit and read with each of these kids each night.  How amazing would they be at reading?  While it may never seem like enough, nothing can replace the time you do make for all the little or big things you do.  Maybe it was starting the end of my MPH or feeling particularly part of the community today, but for now I feel like I’m going at the right speed; content. Just  daydreamin’.  :-)

A bunch of us went to town to watch Guy25 (the newbies) swear in

My friend's picture I sent in of an Amerindian boy in Guyana made the front cover!!

Cooking in Guyana....Pepper Sauce!!!

If you like spicy things, you would fit in well in Guyana.  Many food items are made with the addition of a small little pepper called the Wiri Wiri, that packs quite the punch.

 "A jalapeño, which measures approximately 2,500 – 10,000 SHUs depending on its maturity or ripeness. Based on Scoville Heat Unit measurement the Wiri Wiri is a scorching 150,000 SHUs when mature – a whopping 15 times hotter than the ripest jalapeño."-According to http://guyanamasala.hubpages.com/hub/GuyanaPepperSauce.

We were given pepper sauce the first full day we were in Guyana.  Of course, we didn't think too much of putting some hot sauce on our eggs so we dabbed a good bit on.  Boy were we mistaken!  Our mouths lit fire because this stuff is HOT!  After a good bit of time living in Guyana, I have grown accustom to pepper.  I put it on most of my food, but only in small amounts.  I thought it would be a great thing to bring back to my friends in the U.S. so I had my co-worker make a bunch for me and packed it up real well and prayed it made it back in one piece.  I warned my friends at home to be careful with the spiciness of the sauce and they cautiously gave it a try.  To my surprise many of them really liked it and were happy to have a whole jar to themself.  :-)

Ingredients

• 2lbs wiri wiri pepper or scotch bonnet peppers (stems removed)
• 1 green mango (unripe mango) or 2 large cucumbers, peeled and diced
• 1 head of garlic, peeled
• 2 tsp salt
• 1/2 cup white distilled vinegar

Directions

1. Rinse peppers and remove all stems
2. Add about 1 cup of peppers to a blender with a little mango or cucumber, a little bit of vinegar and garlic, blend until smooth. 
3. Repeat process until all ingredients are used up and sauce is smooth and not watery (it should have a tomato/pasta sauce texture). 
4. Store sauce in a mason jar.  

Recipe adapted from: http://www.inner-gourmet.com/2011/01/west-indian-pepper-sauce.html

A Visit to America

Whew!  What a mixed bag it was visiting the U.S.!   I imagined what it would be like for so long and now it has turned into kind of a blip on the map.  It definitely turned out much different than I thought it would.  In a way, I thought I’d be running down the streets skipping with joy, but I think I was a lot more dazed and confused.  Luckily I wasn't too confused to eat 5 Chipotle burritos!  

  Everything felt normal or maybe I was just silently overwhelmed.  Home always has a tendency to fit like your favorite pair of shoes, but for some reason it was just a little bit off.  Maybe it was the clash of living between two worlds that both vie for my attention.  I was incredibly happy to see my family and friends.  They were extremely welcoming and excited and absolutely wonderful.  People came by cars, planes, and trains just to hangout and it was amazing.

   In an odd way though, there was some weird gap that I felt hung right between our lives.  I left the U.S., D.C., my friends, and family bundled up inside, away from the chilly East Coast winter.  In my mind, bundled up was where they stayed.  Yes, I heard about big events and chatted away on Skype dates, but in a way everything was just standing still in my mind.  It felt different than coming home from college because everyone’s home life is put on hold when you go away to school.  Everyone picks it back up again when they return.  In this case, I was the only one who had pushed pause and everyone was going about comfortably in play.  So I returned back in a state of fast forward.  It wasn’t too bad, but I could sense that I was emotional and a bit tired from trying to keep up with everything.  I wanted to just dive into things as if they didn’t change and I hadn’t left, which is unrealistic.  It is unsettling when you miss a “home” in your mind that is different from what it actually is now. 

I did have those moments though that I could just breathe in and relish in.  Like riding on the metro late at night with jumbo slice pizza, doing work in my favorite coffee shop, watching the city bustle for the morning commute, eating AMAZING Italian food and crying from laughing so hard, making fun of SLOW MO features, driving and blasting music, seeing my old co-workers from Mary’s Center, sitting and snuggling on the coach with my dog and chatting with my family, crescent trail running, sharing good food and drinks with friends and reliving crazy memories of road trips or studying abroad, and wearing silly hats while hangin out.  

One morning I was watching people get on their way with their morning commute, grabbing coffee and reading the Express and I was envious, nostalgic really.  There is something about being a working person in the city that has always been romantic to me.  The funny thing is that I used to have a 9-5 job, with that same metro commute.  Half the time I wished I could just go travel and live somewhere else.  It is funny sometimes how the grass always seems greener.  But as the saying goes, it is always greener where you water it.  

I think that’s the thing. I have spent a lot of time making a life in Guyana and I can see I’ve done a pretty good job; my life isn’t exactly in D.C. anymore.  I also realized that a part of me has always been there hanging on, boots stuck in the mud like a stubborn little girl throwing a tantrum.  This time when I left, I scooped her up; it was time to take her with me and she knew it.  It is hard to be fully somewhere when another part of you is trying to get you to turn back around.  You have to leave things as they were and maybe they were meant to be left that way, so that years later you can get together and talk about them, like that trip to Spain, or that crazy night. 

I do know that friendship is one thing that bridges space and time.  It was amazing how you can just pick back up with people like old times.  It is truly the love and support of friends and family that have made it possible for me to even have the courage to do something like the Peace Corps, well anything in life really.  Although I’d love to go back and just be, we all have our own lives that have carried us to different places, which is pretty amazing to see.  

  So alas, I am back in Guyana with another 10 months to go.  I have already hit the ground running with Camp GLOW planning, meeting the newbies, among other things.  I think July and August are going to be busy months filled with camps so I’m gearing up for that.  If you don’t hear from me til late August, you know why.  

 

 Overall, I am so happy I was able to go home to visit and I want to thank everyone for their love and support.  I’ll be back jus’ now and in the meantime, you are always welcome to come visit me in the wild land of Guyana! :-)

-KB

P.S. I made in through an entire blog entry without using any quotes….whhaaatt???!

Another Year Older, Maybe Wiser?

“Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit, wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad”

My co-workers and I eating chocolate pudding pie

Well it has happened.  Give a school child a rounding drill and you would see me lumped in with the 30s. Of course, there is still a lot to do between now and my 30^th birthday, but sometimes I wish I had a bit of an extension in my younger 20s.  Since this is my second birthday I have celebrated here, I can make some comparisons.  My first birthday I called my “Merry Little Birthday” because I was mostly new here and didn’t know that many people.  While I don’t like getting older, I like celebrating birthdays so it was strange to just sit at home watching movies and eating French Fries.  This year I can honestly say was one of the best birthdays I have had in a while.
  I made chocolate pudding pie and Quesadillas at work and then went to Karaoke at night with some friends.  I was very sleep deprived Friday, but managed to make sushi. Saturday I went to the beach and that night went out with a set of women from a group I work with.  Everyone was incredibly sweet and I was impressed that so many people remembered it was my birthday.  Many people offered many words of kindness and even a few surprise gifts.  I am very fortunate to have met such nice, kind people here.  One of my friends commented on what we would do next year.  The crazy thing is that next year I am supposed to COS April 4^th, right before my birthday.  I really can’t say right now whether I will have already left Guyana or if I will still be here. 

Playing for Indian Arrival Day

While the timing of my trip in 2014 is still uncertain, I am getting closer to my first visit to the U.S. since I’ve moved to Guyana.  It will have been 15 months since I have been home.  I have always gone to school far away or have jumped at any chance to travel, but the longest I have been away from home is about 3 months.  I am charting unknown territory, which is nothing new but this time it is bit more personal.  This time I am a visitor to my home, to what I have missed for 15 months, to people I haven’t seen.  I have been pretty lucky in terms of communicating with many people, but it is still not the same thing as being there.  On one hand I am so so so excited to be back home, to see my family and friends, and to eat all the foods I’ve been missing.  On the other hand, I am nervous.  Every time you are away for a while, you don’t see things in the same way as before.  Your vision changes, some things become uglier when under a different focus. Sometimes a different type of beauty can appear.  Am I going to like what I see as I did before?  I am also quite good at convincing myself that I don’t miss things.  But as they did in Barbados, I am certain the things that I have buried for so long will come back to the surface like those dang Cicadas that are supposed to be out when I return home.  When you find comfort again in things you have missed, it can be a tough process to give them up all over again.

Indian Arrival Day

Last day of diabetes class

So how do I find myself wiser?  Well, many Guyanese will tell you to nah tek stress.  If you ever worry or stress over all of the things that are supposed to take place or are planned here, you would easily have a heart attack.  Most of the time things change drastically from what they are supposed to be.  They start late, get cancelled at the last minute, or are somehow interrupted.  I was recently in a play for a very important Indian Arrival Day with another volunteer.  There were supposed to be thousands of audience members and it was supposed to start at a certain time.   In the end we started about an hour late, there were much less people than expected, oh and our play was cut short so I didn’t even say all of my lines.  I kind of expected something strange to happen and I was barely nervous even though I HATE public speaking.  When it comes down to it, you never know what really will happen the only thing you can do is try to be prepared.  In the end, life is always right so why worry too much?

I also know I will be leaving Guyana with a whole set of things to do once I get back.  We have NEWBIES!!!  GUY25 is here (we welcomed them bleary eyed at the airport) so I will get to do a training session with them.  Not to mention spending time getting to know them.  Also, Camp GLOW is coming up again and there is a never ending to do list related to that.  Of course I have a lot of other plans that keep cropping up, such as milking a cow for the first time and other important matters.  Unfortunately, time is starting to run out on my growing list of things to do. 

Taking blood pressure at my last diabetes class

So instead of signing off hoping you all are doing well, I can hope that I will see you in the good ole U S of A, so you can tell me in person….
 jus now! :-D

-KB

Cooking in Guyana.....Casseri

Rachael, another PCV is drinking a traditional Amerindian drink Cassiri.  It is made by chewing Cassava and then letting it ferment.  The cassava is brought in to the villages from farms that can be a 2 hour walk away.  It is custom for hosts to bring out a bowl of Cassiri or yam drink to visitors.  The longer they want you to stay, the larger the bowl they give you.