You Don't Have to go Home...

How does it feel to leave Peace Corps?  How are you feeling about coming "home?"  I don't know how many times I have been asked that, and I don't think I will ever have an adequate answer.  I think it feels like going through a breakup.  Guatemala and I have been going out for three years.  It's been a tumultuous relationship, but we both know it's ending.  It isn't you, it's me.

I keep getting into little fights with Guatemala to make it easier.  I think to myself, in a moment of frustration, "Gosh, I won't miss X at all."  X is usually along the lines of too much attention, or slow customer service.  Then, the moment passes, I see it in another light, and I realize that I probably will miss those things.  I won't miss cat calls, but it will be strange completely blending into a crowd.  There will be days when I would love to be put on hold or wait a long time for the check to come at a restaurant just so I can look around a little longer or read the paper.  Guatemala and I always make up in the end.

The big difference here is that, instead of throwing out trinkets and putting pictures in storage, I am running around like a cruise ship tourist who spent all morning at the coffee bar, gathering little reminders of Guatemala to incorporate into my new life.  If people in my new home can't entirely appreciate my experience, at least they can appreciate my decorating (or not, but they certainly won't miss it).

It's always the decorating that takes me away for a little while, like a pint of Ben and Jerry's Karamel Sutra.  I start thinking of incorporating Guatemalan textiles into my apartment and it leads to thinking about all the wonderful ways that I can incorporate Guatemala into the rest of my life.  I am going back to school to get my certificate in medical translation and interpretation while I complete prerequisites in psychology.  I hope to go on to get my Masters and PsyD in clinical psychology with a focus on intercultural and trauma psychology.  I am in contact with a local hospital and will be volunteering in a program to help Latino families eat healthy and have fun exercising with their children.  I found a local group that meets once a week just to speak in Spanish.  I am already in love with the next phase of my life, and Guatemala will always be at least a little part of that.

With ten days left in my Peace Corps service and only a little over a month left in country, my emotions are a mixed-bag.  I am sad that something that has been so interwoven with my life for the last three years is coming to an end.  I am excited by my future.  I am anxious about how I will respond to the changes.  I am concerned about the judgement I will hear from my new neighbors about my old neighbors.  I wonder when I will be back.  I feel both empowered and isolated by the experience I have had and how difficult it is to explain.  I will be one of those irritating people who is constantly bring up their ex, at least for a while.

No Country for Whose Men

As a 5'8" blue-eyed blonde, I am used to the person next to me on the bus asking me where I'm from.  With old school buses serving as public transportation on what can be treacherous mountain terrain, I am also used to fighting with two other adults and gravity to keep from falling from a seat built for three small children.  However, after squeezing in next to a woman and wiggling back into the seat after a few hard turns, I was shocked to overhear her comment to her daughter in Spanish that my type should go back to our own country.  I was hurt, shocked, angry, indignant, and embarrassed.  I was embarrassed because I realized quite quickly that someone somewhere (likely in the United States) had probably said that same thing to her.

In the words of Gary Jules, "It's a very, very mad world."  Many of us are trying to make homes for ourselves and our families.  Making a life in a foreign country is never an easy decision and sometimes, due to war or persecution, it isn't a decision at all.  Leaving the good behind with the bad and creating something from scratch somewhere else means making sacrifices and learning new customs and expectations.  But, eventually, you begin to identify with that strange place and the people in it.  You begin to make a real home despite the odds.

The most ironic thing about that woman saying that thing at that moment is that I AM leaving.  After three years of working and living along side Guatemalans, after three years of occasionally deeply wishing I were back home with my family in "my country," I am actually going.  And, when all is said and done, I have learned and adopted so many things in Guatemala that I don't know if my country is the one I'm returning to or the one I am leaving.

In three years in Guatemala I have learned patience, humility, the importance of manners and details, simplicity, optimism, and community.  In essence, I have learned many of the things that most people would summarize as happiness or contentment.  I can't think of a better definition of home than the place where you learned what happiness is.  I have also seen poverty in Guatemala, and I will never idealize it.  There is much to be said for being able to fulfill your basic needs. But, for those of us who are neither poor nor rich, it is all about discovering the ways in which we are wealthy.  Guatemala has made me very wealthy indeed.

I realized, for these many reasons, that my pursuit of the goals laid out by Kennedy for the Peace Corps will not end with my service.  My understanding of serving men and women of other cultures will only deepen upon my return to the States, where men and women from around the world will teach me about their experience in a new country of their own.

Macgyver

I often joke that I somehow ended up in Posh Corps.  Some of it has to do with my location and assignment, and some of it is due to the changes that the whole world has undergone since Peace Corps was founded.  I doubt that Kennedy ever imagined that I would be able to talk to my grandmother with video via the internet from a Peace Corps post.  I try not to let technology get in the way of my service, but being able to see my family from time to time certainly changed Peace Corps.  However, sometimes these technological advances make life seem a little backwards for me.  I have two cell phones and mobile internet, but I do not always have electricity or running water.  Being connected is a given, but some of the basics here (like furniture) often require a little creativity.

After several months of living in my new apartment and waiting for a wire organizer to be made (it never was), I could no longer keep using my travel bag as a dresser.  A few milk crates, a handful of zip-ties and a broom stick later, voila.

I'm similarly proud of my kitchen counter/storage area.  The two sheets of plywood with oil paint stacked between cinder blocks is nothing special.  Thanks to a friend who gifted me one of her old cortes, it's actually attractive!  Little by little, I'm getting organized and settled.  True to family tradition, I should finish the "basement" just in time to move home.  :)

A New View

This new view is both litteral and figurative.  There have been a lot of changes in the year (wince) since I last posted.  My new view (litteral) is a breathtaking view of two volcanoes from a cozy new apartment much closer to Antigua and the Peace Corps office.  This is because, as of the end of March 2011, I am in my third year of Peace Corps service and working as a Volunteer Leader.

As a volunteer leader, I no longer spend all of my time working with one community.  Half of my time is spent working to support Peace Corps and volunteers, and the other half of my time is spent supporting a national tourism organization.  My favorite part is being able to accompany people who are on a journey very simmilar to the one I started a little over two years ago.  I still don't have it all down, but watching them and reflecting on my own experiences gives me a chance to add another layer of perspective to all the things I have experienced.

This brings me to my other new view.  All this time in Peace Corps and I'm finally in a place where I can think about what development means.  We all go through it; personal, professional, emotional, economic.  We might spend lots of time focusing on an outcome we want from our development, but it seems to me that we spend very little time thinking about the process.  I started this blog when I was applying to the Peace Corps, so the title "In Pursuit of the Peace Corps" seemed appropriate.  I started a new blog when I was accepted.  Coming back to this original site, I realize that the title still holds.  I am continually in pursuit of the Peace Corps, it's meaning for me and the communities I serve, and what it means to be a Peace Corps volunteer.  I imagine these are things I will be contemplating even long after I have become an RPCV (Returned Peace Corps Volunteer). 

My search is far from over, but I have shared a list of resources I have found helpful to the right of this blog (under Re-Humanize Development).  Feel free to send me your views or resources on development so we can discover together.

Go well, give of yourself, god(dess) bless

The Nature of Religion

I recently heard someone say, “Culture is like the water fish swim in. You don’t realize how important it is until you’re out of it.” That has certainly held true for me in the short time that I have been living in Guatemala.  The culture here is rich and many of the people are open and willing to share their homes and traditions with an interested visitor, so my experience has been enriching. However, there remain gaps in our understanding and communication because culture and cultural differences go far deeper than we are able to see. Therefore, they are often difficult to identify and even more difficult to understand let alone resolve. Perhaps for this reason, we end up using shortcuts, which too often take the form of force. This force is particularly evident where religion is involved.

I don’t claim to be an expert on religion, my own or anyone else’s. What I know is only my personal experience and the experiences that people of my own faith and others have chosen to share with me. I believe that religion is an innate and important part of our humanity and I don’t wish to criticize its existence.However, along with being an enormous asset and source of strength, religion can also be one of our most caustic weapons. With time and fervor religion and dogma begin to take on a life of their own, almost as independent and tangible as that if their creators.

Like all species, religion evolves within an ecosystem. It strikes a balance with the culture, resources, and needs in its environment. Scarce or important resources are sacred. A code of conduct reflects the needs and expectations of the culture and guides the interactions of the community. Stories and lessons of cultural identity are passed on to successive generations.

But what happens when we take this species out of the cultural context in which it developed? If done with knowledge and consciousness, it could adapt and add to the diversity of the area where it is introduced.However, when done with force, it could easily follow in the path of the cane toad in Australia or the zebra mussel in the lakes of Minnesota and become and invasive species that causes a grave imbalance and loss of important resources and heritage. Scarce water or plants that were previously sacred and treated with respect become part of a domain to be dominated and used with little discretion. Respect for elders and traditional wisdom is replaced by a value for the youth and physical ability, and causes upheaval and discontinuity within families.

Of course, the results depend on the disposition and cultural awareness of the people introducing a religion to a new area. As I said, it can be an informative and diversifying experience for everyone involved, but only if done with awareness, tolerance, and a desire from both sides to gain understanding.