The Tragic Tale of Deysi

So I guess in the Peace Corps, you can never really know what it is that will challenge you. I certainly never expected that my main problems (so far) would be caused by a little cat.

I should premise by saying that I have always been a big animal lover, more so than the other members of my family. But my mom and other sister have asthma and have always been allergic to cats and most dogs. As a little girl, I went through a “kitten phase”, when I just didn’t think I could live without having a kitten. Well, somehow I survived. In college, when I was finally on my own, I resisted the very strong temptation to get a cat or a dog because I knew afterwards I would want to travel, and maybe do the Peace Corps. After graduation, I moved to Boston and did two years of AmeriCorps... no pets possible there (and I was still thinking about PC). Then all that resistance to temptation finally paid off as I, of course, finally DID apply to the Peace Corps.

But when I got to Guatemala, I realized that lots of volunteers get pets here. My little “apartment” in the family complex was obviously not dog-friendly. But when some volunteers sent out an e-mail advertising obscenely adorable kittens that their cat just had, I thought, “Why not?” If there was a tiny voice in my head that said, “You have asthma now, that’s why not,” I ignored it. I assured myself that I was NOT allergic to cats because I had lived with a roommate for a year that had 2 cats, so why would I be allergic to cats now?

So I replied to the e-mail and made the very long trip to these volunteers’ site in San Marcos with my cardboard box. Then I made the very long trip back (5 hours in all), with a very upset kitten scratching at the cardboard box and meowing the whole time. She spent the entire first day in her new home under the bed. But slowly she began venturing out and would let me pet her and soon enough, I was her best pal. I called her “Deysi” because I had a couple students named that and liked the Guatemalan spelling. She’d follow me around and was the perfect combination of cuddly and playful (in my opinion). She of course had some annoying habits (like tearing up the curtains and jumping in the big fake plant pot and getting dirt everywhere), but overall I felt a lot less lonely with her around. I found that I didn’t want to leave home as much (to visit Xela or other volunteers), and was content hanging out, baking or reading, with her for company. I planned on getting a cat carrier and taking her with me after the Peace Corps, wherever I should go. I figured if she could handle 5 hours in a camioneta in a cardboard box, she could handle whatever else might come our way. She was my first pet.

But of course the tale doesn’t end there, cuz then it wouldn’t be “tragic”. At first, I seemed fine health-wise, just a little sniffly. But I didn’t think anything of it because I’m always getting colds and the rainy season had just started. The sniffles didn’t go away, and I had a night of bad asthma attacks, but I continued to blame the rain. And I decided to kick her out of my room at night, just in case. I also thought about asking the nurses to put me on allergy meds. I figured whatever happened, I could manage it with medication. She didn’t seem to be making me very sick, and I thought allergy pills would take care of the sniffles.

But I’m new to asthma (I was diagnosed in February) and didn’t know much about how it works. My mom explained to me later that a person with asthma can push themselves over the edge, can over-expose themselves to an allergen and become even more sensitive and allergic. Apparently, I hit a point where I became very allergic to Deysi.

One night I woke up at 3 a.m. with my ears ringing. I slowly realized that I was very short of breath-- having an asthma attack. It wasn’t the first time I’ve awoken to attacks at night, but usually a puff or two of the inhaler and I’m fine. This time was different. I puffed on the inhaler, but my breaths continued to get only shorter and shorter. I developed a painful pressure in my chest. I sat in the dark, so tired but unable to sleep, listened to my gasping breaths, wondering if at any moment they would just stop completely. I puffed again and again on the inhaler. It didn’t help at all. Finally at 5 a.m., frightened, I called the Peace Corps on-duty nurse. She told me I needed to get to the hospital. I woke my host brother who has a car, but while he was getting ready, slowing my breathing returned to normal. The nurse still thought I should get to Xela and see the doctor as soon as possible. In the hospital they put me on a nebulizer and took a bunch of tests. I stayed for the day, reading in bed, until the results were in and they let me go with a prescription for allergy pills. I knew I would have to give up my cat.

The next night the attacks started at 11 p.m. I woke up my host family and asked to stay in their part of the house, in a spare bedroom, to be away from all the cat hair, hoping that would help. The attacks did not cease, and an hour later I called the nurse again. She suggested a hot shower, and after taking a long, blissfully hot shower, my breathing normalized again and I went to bed. Unfortunately, the attacks started again soon after. They weren’t as severe as the previous night, and I was able to snatch bits of uncomfortable sleep in between. But that was the worst night of my Peace Corps experience. I cried a lot, which I am certain did not help the attacks, sad about my cat, scared, and very physically uncomfortable. I knew I could not live like this. My host family had cats, and I wondered, even if I got rid of my cat, would this continue? My host family is such a bit part of my life here, and in this community, where people do not visit each other’s houses casually, your family is your social network. I wasn’t sure I’d be willing to move, or even find a place without allergens. I thought, if this continues, I am going home. I’m done here. The attacks didn’t stop until 7 a.m.

The next day, one the nurse’s orders, I started the process of scouring my house. I avoided Deysi and eventually brought her downstairs, which made us both very miserable. She was very upset to be apart from me, and hid all day, terrified of the host family’s dog and cats and all the new people around. I dusted and scrubbed walls and tore off curtains and blankets and the clothes that hang in my hallway-- everything that she had touched. I didn’t have asthma attacks, but I had an ache in my chest that hurt every time I breathed. I wrote an e-mail on my computer advertising a free cat, to send out to volunteers. I caught the afternoon bus into Xela to wash the mountain of laundry. In Xela, I called the nurse again, worried about the chest pain and the tightness in my throat, scared that I would just have another rough night. She listened, and called the doctor who agreed to see me. They gave me the nebulizer, which is like a breath of the sweetest and freshest air you’ve ever tasted (to an asthmatic, anyway), and decided to let me stay the night. It was bliss, which is a strange thing to say of a night in the hospital. I had regular doses of the nebulizer, an oxygenated room, and I could sleep the night without fear.

The next day I avoided Deysi again and contacted a volunteer that had agreed to cat-sit and made arrangements to drop her off the next day. The morning of the drop-off, I let myself pet her again, thinking it might be my last day with her, and took her on my lap on the camioneta, even though by now contact with her immediately gave me a headache and the sniffles. I was sad, but also relieved, knowing how miserable the last couple of days had been for the both of us. And I was lucky. On my way back, a volunteer called responding to the e-mail. She’d take her in a couple of weeks.

I was also lucky in the sense that that week was the All-Volunteer Conference, a professional development conference and 4th of July Party, the only time all year that all the volunteers in the country get together. I arrived a day early to visit a breathing specialist in the Capital, and finally I felt like I was talking to someone that really understood my condition and had some real answers for me. He gave me new medications, explained all that I didn’t understand, and even gave me something to take in an emergency and a tool to gauge my breathing. And the next few days of socializing and fun and being with my American friends was exactly what I needed to move on from all that had happened. And I only had a couple asthma attacks.

Last Saturday, a week later, was the last step of the Deysi saga. I picked her up at the cat-sitter’s house and took her on a camioneta for 3 hours on my lap, where she was terrified and meowed frantically and tried to hide under my arms. But when she finally got to her new home, she relaxed immediately and seemed content. And I know that the volunteer that took her will be a great owner. I am so fortunate that it all resolved itself so well. The house is very quiet, I am alone again, and when I think of her and that horrible week, it gives me a pang. But at least I finally had my cat, if only for a little while.

With Fresh Eyes

On April 30, I reached the landmark, “One Year in Country.” It was surreal to think that an entire year had passed here, and I began to vividly recall my first days in Guatemala, and how uncertain and alone I had felt. Even stranger was learning of the arrival of the next group for our program. We´re no longer “the New Kids” in Youth Development. Now there was another group of 15 at the training center, receiving the same classes we had, faced with the same uncertainties, nervous about the site they´d be placed in.

Then the decision was made that they would be coming to my department for Field Based Training (when the trainees go for a week to another part of the country to experience the work they´d be doing “in the field”) , and me and the three other volunteers that live here would be leading them through it.

We decided to put on a training for teachers from all over the department in the cabecera (departmental capital) for one of the days they would be here, and that was the first time I met the new “New Kids.” Me and the two other volunteers that had organized the training were a nervous wreck. It was quite an undertaking. We had taken information from a book about teaching methods (in English), translated it to Spanish and tried to create activities around it to make for an interesting training. Eighty teachers would be coming. And the training itself would consist of attempting to impart a lot of complicated information about learning objectives, use of class-time and giving effective tests. The three of us were certain we would get flustered and lost in the material and unable to explain it well.

The trainees were surely also nervous, because they would be leading some of the activities as well, but seemed to contain it well. We all sat down for lunch together, and me and my two coworkers attempted to read through our facilitator notes, as well as answer many questions about what it´s like to be a volunteer and get to know everyone, while scarfing down lunch. Too soon it was time to go and set up.

The teachers shocked us by arriving on time (10-30 minutes late is the norm). I was in charge of one room of forty teachers, with some of the trainees to lead their activities, and the two other volunteers took the other room with the other half of teachers and trainees. Unexpectedly, as soon as I got into the flow of what I was saying, I didn´t have any problem getting through the considerable content. There were no flustered moments of fumbling through explanations and losing my place, just occasional pauses to check the notes. The teachers seemed interested and asked many questions and participated. The trainees led the wrap-up activity (the “learning cycle”) and the three hour training was quickly over.

I felt good about it, but what made my ego really swell was the over-the-top praise from the trainees. They loved the way I explained things, they couldn´t believe my Spanish, they thought I had great methods for encouraging participation, they loved the content of the training. I am sure the other two volunteers got similar praise, and I tried to explain over and over that this is what happens eventually after spending a year living and working in a Guatemalan community-- you learn how to explain things in a Guatemalan fashion, you learn the tricks to get participation, you learn the local language. You know instinctively what will be understood and what will not. I assured them all they would get there, and I have no doubt they will. All the same, seeing it through their eyes also helped me really understand and appreciate how far I´ve come. I vividly recalled my first lessons and the teacher workshop we were made to do during training. My voice was shaky, my hands trembling, I would get visibly flustered and blush when I was unable to find the right words to explain. It felt good to see the progress I´ve made, that I can now stand before 40 unknown teachers from rural Guatemala and explain teaching strategies without missing a beat.

Two days later, Thursday, the trainees were scheduled to come to my site. The teacher training took place on Tuesday, and the following day I experienced a frustrating afternoon in my big institute, one of those inevitable days when you begin to doubt the worth of what you are doing and the possibility of any real change.

That afternoon I had planned to give a part of the same training to my own teachers in my big institute. The training went well in the sense that I felt I delivered it well, but the contrast in how the teachers reacted was, in my mind, significant. No one asked a question, there were no comments. The teachers participated well in the activity where they had to practice writing learning objectives, but then were reluctant to come up to present. At the end, even the comments of thanks for giving the training were a little discouraging. One teacher, someone that always manages to somehow anger me to the core, told me in a very patronizing tone (that he always uses with me), “These ideas are all very nice and interesting, but the thing that we lack is TIME. To really implement all of these strategies, we would need more TIME. And there is no TIME. When we would do all of this?” My blood boiled. No TIME to write learning objectives? No TIME to plan effective tests and assignments? The training was about how to do things that you already (presumably) do more effectively, such as write objectives, give assignments and give tests. His complaint of lack of time was as good as a confession that he was one of those many teachers that stroll into the classroom and flip open the text book to try to kill the period. I didn´t trust myself to respond diplomatically, so I said nothing. Overall, the feeling I got from the teachers was a mild interest and a general recognition that yes, ideally those methods should be used, but no real intention to use them or make any changes.

Then, after the director spoke a while about other matters, I brought up the point of the garden I have been planning with the girls´ group since December. I had been given the back-and-forth for a while now from the director about the plans for it. The girls and I had already presented our vision to the teachers and they had expressed their approval and encouragement. This time I just wanted to get the go-ahead from the teachers about the design the girls had come up with. They want a square in the center of the school´s courtyard. The teachers immediately began to protest. They were worried about the lack of space, even when I assured them I had measured the space. The director and others began to suggest other designs, even when I said I hoped to honor the girls´ vision as much as possible. The same patronizing teacher said, “I understand what you´re trying to do with the girls, with this garden, and it is all very nice. But the thing we don´t have is SPACE. There is no SPACE. What about the MOTORCYCLES? What about the BICYCLES? There is no SPACE! We might have to reject the garden because there is no SPACE!” Then I did get a little angry. “We considered the bicycles and motorcycles. It´s not like we didn´t think of that, and we measured the space.” Some other teachers, probably recognizing that things were getting a bit heated, hurriedly suggested we go look at the courtyard. Standing in the middle of it, the director and teachers agreed, “Oh yes, a square shape in the middle will work fine, just make the measurements a little smaller.” I was relieved, but still a little angry that the garden had come to close to being taken away from us. Also, in the same meeting it was announced that the next two weeks of class would be canceled because of the pig virus and the mid-year vacations (which no one told me about). I was extremely frustrated to hear that such a big chunk of teaching time I was counting on just got chopped off. And what would I do for the next two weeks? (Can´t go anywhere without taking vacation time that I don´t have.)

After such a frustrating and discouraging afternoon, I wondered how on earth I would be positive and encouraging to a group of 15 trainees that would be looking to me to learn about what it´s really like to be a volunteer. Nonetheless, I spent my morning frantically cleaning my apartment and made coffee cake and tried to do everything to make a good impression. When they arrived, it was a bit bizarre even for me, to see so many Americans gathered together in my rural, Indigenous hometown (I´ve been here so long I´ve stopped seeing myself as much of an outsider, just another piece of the town´s fabric). So I can´t imagine what the townspeople must have felt. It was a gorgeous sunny afternoon and we gathered in the town square where I spoke a bit about work with a big institute and some of the girls from my group came by and shyly answered questions about the camp and the garden project. Then we all headed to the institute.

I split them up into the various classrooms, where they were to lead their first activity with Guatemalan youth. I could see that many of them looked nervous, which was also funny to me now that this is something I do every day (although I know I was equally nervous for my first lesson). I paired up with one the trainees, who is fluent in Spanish and also was a teacher in the US, so it was a real pleasure working with her. And the activity was fun and entertaining. When we regrouped, all the volunteers were smiling and seemed pleased by how it went. We headed over to my house where everyone was impressed by my king-sized bed and great views of the village and mountains and spent some time just chatting. Everyone kept commenting on the beauty of my site and how great my living situation is. Of course, they still haven´t seen much to compare it to, but all the same, I took great pleasure in seeing my site the way did, as well as my service. “It´s a good life,” I heard myself saying a few times, and it made me more aware of how true that is, despite of all the challenges. It is a good life.

A Funeral

One day one of the girls in my girls´ group mentioned to me that the father of another of the girls, and my neighbor, was gravely ill. I had noticed that for the past couple of months, when I talked to him his voice was incredibly raspy and soft, and he had told me that he was having lung problems. I had baked a batch of cookies for the girls´ group meeting, but not many girls showed up, so I brought half the batch across the street to give to the family. Unexpectedly, they ushered me in to visit him. I had noticed that people had been in and out of the house all day, and it confirmed my suspicion that they were coming to visit him and the family. He lay on a bed in the back room, his wife-- one of the kindest ladies I know-- in a chair beside him. A few other people were also visiting. They spoke for a awhile in K´iche´ and I couldn´t understand what they were saying. But as they left, the people would pat his arm and tell him “patience.” They was also a bowl beside the bed for people to give a bit of money. (I didn´t think to bring money, just cookies, which seemed rather silly as I was sitting there.) His wife explained that it was very difficult for him to talk, and yesterday he had been even worse, his whole body in pain. She said that today he was a little better, that just his arm was hurting, and they were hopeful he was getting better. I wasn´t sure what to say to him as I left, so I repeated that about patience, and said that I hoped little by little he would be getting better, and told them I would pray for him.

Then I left for a few days to go to our In Service Training at the Peace Corps center. After that, I made a long journey up to San Marcos to pick up my new kitten from some other volunteers. I finally got back (holding a box containing a meowing and terrified kitten) late on a Sunday. I noticed that quite a few people were in the house across the street and there was an ambulance there, and I wondered if he had already passed away. I let out the kitty and arranged her things and unpacked. But as I was crossing my patio, I heard wails suddenly coming from the neighbors´ house, and I recognized the voice of my student. I knew then that he had died. As if on cue, it began to rain.

I noticed the crowd continue to grow next door, so finally I put on some decent clothes and went over. As soon as I arrived, one of his daughters greeted me, then burst into tears. I found myself holding her, awkwardly saying something about how he was now in peace. I was then taken to the same room where I had visited him, where he now lay covered by a blanket. Some of his other distraught family members were there, to whom I also tried to make my awkward attempts at consolation. I then went out into the main room, and I was surprised by how many people from the community were there. Children were running around playing, most of the adults were sitting and talking in the plastic chairs that had been set out, and I saw some women preparing a large quantity of food in a pot in the back. Many of the family members and relatives left to retrieve the casket in a larger town. When they returned, a procession of crying and distraught family members went to his room, followed by the casket. He was transferred into it, then carried to the next room, which is normally their book store but had been cleared out and filled with rows of chairs. Eventually I escaped, exhausted from my travels and wanting to be with my new cat.

The next day at my big institute, the teachers discussed what to do to honor him and console the family since he had been a big supporter of the institute. We decided to go over there late that afternoon, rather than go to the entire funeral the next day. As soon as we arrived, we were each given a plate of food. We ate, then some of the teachers entered into the room where he lay (which was filled with people simply sitting in the plastic chairs) to pay their respects. I stayed after the teachers left to help pass out plates of food to the people that were coming for a couple of hours, before leaving. As I was crossing to my house, two of his little granddaughters (and my good friends) literally ran into me, crying. (I am guessing they had just visited him lying there). I sat there in the street and held them for a while, caressing their hair until they calmed down.

The next day was the day of the actual funeral. I made a decision, which I´m not sure was the correct one or the choice a Guatemalan in my community would have made, and I don´t think my host family approved. But when it comes down to it, I am still an American with American values. Tuesdays I teach all day in another community, I didn´t cancel my classes to go to the funeral (or the parent meeting I had scheduled). I am frustrated as it is by how little time I get to teach because of how often classes are canceled for other events and how much I have to leave because of Peace Corps activities. So I went to work.

The funeral was scheduled for 2 p.m., but when I got back after 5 p.m., my house was locked up and I knew it was still going on. I waited at the neighbors´ house, where I figured people would be returning after the burial. Sure enough, little by little the people began to arrive, the later ones drenched by the fierce downpour that had started. The family members when they entered seemed surprisingly calm and relaxed, and I hoped the burial and church service had been somehow cathartic for them. Again, everyone was given plates of food. As soon as I could get away from the lady that was chatting with me, I went to help again, this time washing dishes. I washed for a couple of hours, then was invited to sit for a while with the family. I sat beside the wife with a group of other older ladies, who were chatting solemnly in K´iche´. One of the younger ones started teasing me about finding a husband here and started pointing out available men and telling me which of the older ladies would be my mother-in-law. The wife told me that he had asked to eat one of my cookies as he lay there (although I´m sure it hadn´t tasted good to him in that state, and again I felt a bit embarrassed by the inappropriateness of the gift). They gave me some bread and tamalitos to thank me for helping out (although I´d only washed dishes). After a while, as more and more people were filtering out, I made my leave, and for the first time was able to speak to the girl from my group. She was sitting with her siblings and cousins and seemed relaxed and was laughing (though I´m sure of course she is still in a lot of pain). I blessed her and left.

There is no longer a crowd next door, but they haven´t opened the bookstore, and there is still a white bow above the door. Of course the death of a husband, father, grandfather and active community member, who is only 55 years old, is a tragedy however you look at it. (especially because I suspect that his life would have been prolonged if not saved by adequate medical care). Nonetheless, for me it was a special experience, participating in his remembrance. I´m not sure I have ever felt so much like a true member of this community, someone who has her ties and connections and people that she cares about, and someone who has a natural place here. It didn´t feel weird or fake to be helping out with the other women and men, and they accepted my help without question (I feel that when I was new in the community, they wouldn´t have allowed me to help).

It also showed me a different side of this community to see what happens in the case of a death. There is certainly a way of thinking about it that is very distinct from the US. In the US, people tend to keep a distance from those in mourning, leaving them to their immediate family and closest friends, quietly giving food and flowers and cards and money, respecting their need for privacy and time to grieve. Here, however, the people come in flocks to show their support. The more people present, the more love and support is shown. And the family in grieving mobilizes immediately to receive them, with places to sit and food to eat and an opportunity to say farewell to the deceased. (In this case, the immediate family members were spared a lot of the work by other relatives and friends, but I don´t know if that is always true.) Privacy is not seen as a necessity for anyone, and the grieving takes place openly and publicly and without shame. It´s as if everyone is close family, and there is no need to hide all the messiness and confusion and pain, because we all have our moments sometime.

I´m not saying this way is right and the American way wrong, or vice versa. Personally, I think I would prefer privacy and the company of close friends and family in my moments of grieving. But that is the way of the culture where I was raised. And I do admit, this way also has a certain beauty to it.

Boxing for Jesus

Me on Tajamulco, with Guatemala´s volcanic range behind me.

Many of my Peace Corps friends decided to”aprovechar” (take advantage of) Holy Week, or Semana Santa, in Guatemala to get out and see more of the country. But I´d heard the crowds were crazy and was also a bit low on funds (and vacation days), so I decided to spend most of the week in my town.

For the first weekend of the vacation, a group of us made it up to San Marcos to hike Central America´s largest volcano, Tajamulco, and camp there for the night. I was very excited since I hadn´t been backpacking or camping since moving to Guatemala (and it´s something I do a lot of in the summers in Montana), but also a bit nervous since I had done little very exercise since being diagnosed with asthma.

The hike was definitely challenging, but everyone went at their own pace, and we all made it up well before dark to set up camp. (We didn´t go all the way up to the summit that day; we had decided to get up at 4 a..m. and hike to the summit for the sunrise.) We had a fun night, sitting around our large campfire and roasting marshmallows. And somehow at 4 a.m. we all managed to wake up and get out of our warm sleeping bags into the bitter cold and windy dark morning. We all got there before the sun was up, though by the time we were on top the sky was turning a dusky rose and there was an orange line on the horizon. The view was spectacular. We could see almost the entire volcanic chain to the southeast (the volcano above Xela that I can see from my town and the three that ring the lake, among others). To the southwest, we could see where the mountains sharply drop off into the flat plains that stretch to the sea (upon which the mammoth shadow of the volcano was cast). To the north we could see the endless chain of mountains below us to Mexico. Directly east, I thought I could pick out the mountain ridge that shoulders my town. And slowly the sun rose and filled all of Guatemala below us with its light.

Once we got back, I spent a relaxing day and night with a couple friends that live in San Marcos and we got in some “paca” shopping (the second-hand clothes stores, which are phenomenal in San Pedro) where I spent way too much money. Then I made it back to my town.

I spent a few days in the house, cleaning and working on lessons. The Semana Santa activities didn´t start until Friday, which is actually the most important day of the week in Guatemala (not Easter Sunday). That morning I went for a jog and noticed little tables set up in the street with framed pictures marking the stations of the cross. Later, I was getting ready when I looked down the street and saw the procession coming. I hurried out to join it (though I missed the first few stations). At the end there was a small reenactment of the crucification of Jesus, but the young man that they tied up on a cross did start to self-consciously laugh a little, as well as some of the girls in the crowd that probably knew him, which kinda ruined the effect. In other towns in Guatemala, people work all night covering the streets with “rugs” of dyed sawdust in elaborate designs, but my town is mostly Evangelical and the procession was small, with no rugs.

Later in the day, I went with my host family to see the “boxing” in the soccer field. People had kept mentioning the “boxing” to me when they were telling me about Semana Santa, and it´s pretty much what is sounds like, though very informal boxing. Two young men are allowed into the field at a time and punch at each other until one of them falls down and then the next couple of men enter. I didn´t recognize any of the men that were fighting and lost interest rather quickly (although I was pretty entertained that this was how my town marked one of the most important religious holidays of the year.) Fortunately my host sister also lost interest quickly, so we left early. The activity of the evening had a more obviously religious theme: they showed the movie Passion of Christ with a large projector in the town square (but I stayed in).


The little girl and baby boy of my host family at the zoo.


Bumper cars with the 12-year-old nephew.


With the host family at the zoo.

My host family invited me to go with them to Xela to the zoo the next day. I rode in the back of the pickup with the little girl. The zoo was rather sad, as to be expected, with listless animals in very teeny cages. But I enjoyed spending the time with the family. We visited the carnival area as well, where I played a couple rounds of bumper cars with the 12 year old nephew. Then we had a picnic together in the open park area, where we ate fried chicken and fries and rolls. I bought everyone ice cream. I played with the baby and the two kids. It was a pretty sunny day, and it felt surprisingly nice to be with a family, doing normal family things. Then we parted ways. The family continued on to visit some hot springs, and I went to run some errands and meet up with friends. We stayed the night in Xela and went out to dinner and out dancing. And it was good to be with Americans on Easter morning, even if it was just breakfast at a hostel.

Overall, it was a nice Semana Santa. I got to stand on top of the highest point in Central America, relax at home, see the unique town activities, spend time with the family and get my groove on in Xela. Pretty good for just “laying low”.

Work Ethic

My town on market day.

Since school has started, my life here has been good, but exhausting. I am in a unique position because I have over 600 students (significantly more than the other people in my program) and teach 17 separate classes (neither of these numbers include the elementary school, where I give an English class to every grade once a week). I have very little planning time during the day because I teach so much and am also taking K'iche' classes in the mornings (most of my coworkers have a full day free to use for planning or planning other activities, but I teach 5 days a week). Much of my planning falls onto my evenings, and I often find myself working late into the night and getting up very early, preparing materials and lessons or workshops. I am also trying to maintain my Girls' Group, but that has become increasingly challenging as I have less time to devote to it, and my girls are also much busier now that school has started. I get asked to do other random projects, both from the Peace Corps and my community. One Saturday night I found myself up very late preparing a four-hour workshop about self-esteem for adult members of the Catholic Church for the next morning, that I got asked to do last-minute. (I thought a little sardonically about what my friends in the US where probably doing that Saturday night...certainly not anything like this!)

I´ve also found since being here that basic cooking and cleaning is a much bigger demand on my time than it was in the States. Making meals out of whole ingredients (turning a scoop of dry beans and a pile of vegetables into dinner), although very healthy and rewarding, is also incredibly time-consuming, and dirties a lot more dishes (which I have to haul up and down the stairs to the pila to wash). And keeping my apartment looking somewhat respectable is also a much bigger task here, especially now during the Dry Season, which could just as well be named the Dust Season. The cornfields that surrounded all the houses and buildings in my town are converted into empty dust fields after harvest time and most roads are covered with a layer up to 3 inches thick that gets billowed all around in the wind. Unfortunately, all my doors have a sizable gap between the floor which permits dust to seep in and cover everything. My bathroom also opens directly onto my patio and is covered in a fine layer of dust even just a couple days after cleaning it. (I´m not sure it will be much better, though, in the Rainy Season, or Mud Season.)

It has been a very busy life. Sometimes I feel frustrated by how busy I am because, in joining the Peace Corps, I had had a romantic vision of getting in touch with a slower pace of life, on focusing on writing poetry and other hobbies I´ve neglected, on finding a balance between work and personal life. Yet I´ve found my personal time tangled up in work in an almost similar way to how it was when I was in AmeriCorps, where I maintained a very unhealthy and very overworked lifestyle (though not quite so extreme). I am also sad by how much I am NOT able to do. I would love to work with the Woman´s Group, help community members plant tire gardens, develop a scholarship association for my middle school students, start a drama club... but when? I can barely maintain what I am doing now.

But then I have to remind myself, I am living in a community where people work very hard. My landlord and “host brother”, for example, maintains a very successful hardware store, teaches English to most of the students in my big Institute in the afternoon, studies at the University all day on Saturday (all of his classes are crammed in from 8-6 in one day), and is a devoted husband and son, and father of 2 (a six year old and an 8 month old), and he oversees the planting and harvesting of the corn fields that feed his family all year. His case is not unique. Almost all of the teachers at my Institutes are University students, and many of them also teach all morning in the primary school before rushing to the Institute to teach all afternoon. (I have one day a week, Tuesdays, where I teach all morning at the Primary School, starting at 8, and then go to the Institute to teach for a few hours. Those days kills me... I lose my voice, I get a terrible headache, and at 5 p.m. when I finally get home, I collapse exhausted into bed, a worthless puddle. But that is only one day a week, and technically I get off early since I don´t teach the full afternoon.)

Part of the Peace Corps experience, or the idea of it, is to live with the people of your community, and to some extent, as they live. This is certainly not followed to the letter. I get paid an amount than many people would use to sustain their entire families (and less than many whole families have to live on). I cook with exotic spices and buy yogurt and whole wheat bread from the supermarket. I also escape a lot on the weekends, vising Xela and other parts of Guatemala, eating in restaurants and sometimes staying in hotels, activities that are not an option for the vast majority of people in my community (they do go to Xela, but only for special shopping or school). Whenever I feel frustrated and tired and that this kind of workload was not what I was looking for, I have to remember how hard the people around me are working all the time. When I am sleepy-eyed and crabby on my Tuesday mornings on the bus at 7 a.m. to the elementary school, I see whole families already out tilling their fields, and they are still there on my bus back home at 4:30 p.m. If my working this hard is giving me a taste of life as a Guatemalan, then that is definitely what I signed up for. The people here work very hard for the very little that they have. For this experience to be real, I need to be willing to do my share as well.

And I am blessed to have work that I love, with people that I care deeply about. I love my students and teaching far more than I expected to. Getting them to laugh or seeing them work hard and earnestly on a project is extremely rewarding. Nothing makes me happier than an afternoon with my Girls´ Group, joking around, playing basketball and dreaming of our garden. My elementary students act as though Santa Claus was coming to give them class each time I show up. It may be a lot, but it is the only time that I will ever be a teacher in Guatemala, and I am sure when I get back to the US, I will treasure ever minute of it. I´m sure I will never say to myself, “God, I wish I hadn´t done so much!”

The Hard Part

The words “hard part” often crop up when people think about the Peace Corps, either when they´re considering doing it, when they´re in the middle of it, or when they´re reflecting back on it. I had been thinking about doing the Peace Corps about half my life, since I first learned of its existence. In more recent years, when I was more seriously debating whether to do it or not, the “hard part” was something I kept wondering about.

For a while, it seemed it would be the purely rustic conditions. I pictured myself completely alone at night, in a 5 by 5 foot wooden shack somewhere hot and tropical, where I´d have to haul my bucket of water 3 miles each day, fending off obscenely large insects. (While this is the reality for some volunteers, it certainly isn´t for me: I live with a family in a nice house, I have a large bedroom with a queen-sized bed, I have a hot shower just about every morning, I live in a cool alpine climate, with few insects... Sometimes there´s no electricity or water, but usually for no more than a day.)

Then I was very worried for my health. I knew I had a poor immune system and I imagined myself miserably sick the entire time or getting very deathly ill or ending up with an incurable parasite for life. (I did spend a couple weeks miserably sick as a result of getting asthma, but now I am able to manage it well with inhalers. Getting a serious illness or parasite continues to be a risk that I run here, but I just do what I can to prevent it and hope for the best. Still, I have not been sick ALL THE TIME, as I feared. I was worse off teaching preschool in the US last year!)

I worried about being able to maintain a healthy lifestyle. (The truth is, I eat incredibly well here. I´m cooking with more whole foods than ever before and gobbling up fresh fruits and vegetables each day. I also brave the stares and giggles and go jogging sometimes, and I have to walk 30-45 minutes to get to two of my schools.)

Then there was the whole being away from Montana and the people that I love for TWO YEARS. NOT significantly advancing my career, education, personal finances, for TWO YEARS. (Yeah, that actually is still tough. God, sometimes I can´t believe how far I still have to go! And I do get quite homesick sometimes. Yet I also can´t believe how much has already happened, how much I have seen, learned and done here, and how quickly the time is passing.)

And of course I worried about being lonely and no one liking me and being rejected and not finding a place in the community. (The truth is, I have been astounded by the incredible warmth and acceptance with which I have been received here. A chorus of children call out my name each and every time I walk down the street. The older neighbors try to talk to me in K´iche´ and laugh at my efforts; the ladies in the bookstore tease me about the boyfriend I may or may not have. I can´t leave the house without someone chatting with me. However, spending each and every evening alone at home can get a bit lonely sometimes, I´ll admit. At night, when everyone is with their families, I have a lot of time alone with my thoughts, which can be a good and bad thing. I´m certainly getting to know myself pretty well!)

Many things are hard, and many things are not so hard, and many things are extraordinarily rewarding and wonderful. But that´s not the Peace Corps, that´s life, especially when you´re doing something that significantly challenges you.

But the truly hard part of this experience, the thing that stabs at my core, more than the asthma, the homesickness, the loneliness, are the difficulties I watch the people I care about face, unable to do anything about it.


One morning in my elementary school a large man burst through the door while I was in the middle of a lesson in the third grade. All the children shrieked and ran to one side as if they knew him. I was confused. Was he someone that worked with the school? A member of the parent directive, a maintenance man? Was he here to pay a visit? Then I noticed he was drunk. He was very disheveled. He greeted the students and then came up to me asking questions that made little sense. He proudly pointed out his daughter to me, one of my students. At last the third grade teacher was able to usher him out of the room, but then I noticed his little girl began to cry. I can´t imagine how mortified she must have felt. It was surely hard enough for her to have to see him like that at home, but in front of all of her classmates? In front of the gringa teacher who comes once a week to give their special English class? My heart broke completely in that moment, as it does every time I think of her. And there is nothing I can do, besides keep giving my English class each week.

I have seen similar problems in my own home: the father and grandfather of the family are both alcoholics. Once the father was drunk for an entire month, morning, afternoon and evening. His daughter, my “host sister”, disappeared one day with her 6-month-old and two-year-old daughters that I adored. I found out later she had returned to her abusive, alcoholic husband (who is also abusive to the children). The host family has been very frank with me: I will probably never see them again. If there was anything I could do to give those little girls a secure and loving home, I would do it without a second thought. But there is absolutely nothing I can do.


It reminds me of the prayer that hung in cross-stitching in our dinning room, “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.” Serenity. That is the hard part. Serenity in the face of problems that are far bigger than you, and that cut deeply those that you care about. These problems exist in the US, I know, as well as many others. Women go back to abusive husbands all over the world. Adults cause suffering in the lives of children. People hurt each other, even those that they most love. I have always known this, I have seen some of it in my lifetime, but I am not sure I have seen it so frequently and on such a scale as I have here. I consider myself fairly thick-skinned, and I think you have to be to do this job, to not fall apart every time you see someone that is hurting, someone that does not have what they need to live a healthy and productive life. I would fall apart every day. But sometime even my tough heart does break, and serenity seems a long ways from here. And that, for me, is the hard part.

Visit of the Parents

Mom and Dad at some ruins in Antigua.

As soon as I was certain I would be doing Peace Corps Guatemala, my parents began to talk about visiting me. From the get-go, their visit was something I knew would help get me through the two years, and when they finally purchased their tickets, I could talk or think about little else. I was so excited to show them this country I had grown to love and the people that I cared about and to give them a taste of my life here. And also, I´ll admit, I was excited to eat at good restaurants and stay at nicer hotels on someone else´s bill for a change.

But at the same time, I was also a bit nervous. It would be their first time out of the country (except for a couple little trips to Canada), their first time in a place where everyone does not speak English, and their first time in a developing country, where the safety and comfort standards are no where near what they are in the US. I knew they were going to be extremely out of their comfort zone, and I
wasn´t sure how they would handle it. I was more nervous for my dad. Mom kept expressing how interested she was in seeing the sites of Guatemala and learning about the culture. Dad just kept saying, “I only want to see you. That´s all I care about.” Well, whether he liked it or lot, he´d be seeing a lot more than “just me” and I wasn´t sure how he´d take it all. Also, I´ve been in Guatemala long enough to know that no trip ever, ever just goes smoothly. No amount of planning can avoid some of the inevitable bumps in the road.

Still, I decided to do the best I could. I pored over my travel guides, created a detailed jam-packed itinerary, wrote long and excruciatingly detailed e-mails about everything from Guatemalan food to Guatemalan courtesy, made endless phone calls to hotels and travel agencies to arrange our transportation (we wouldn´t be riding in many camionetas, how I usually get around), thought long and hard about which restaurants we´d be eating in (that was the fun part), and all in all tried to arrange every detail to avoid as many bumps as possible.

They arrived in Guatemala City at 5:30 am on a Saturday morning. We hopped right into a shuttle bus to Antigua. Although my dad was clearly very happy to see me, he was also clearly very uncomfortable during that bus ride, being unable to communicate directly with the driver, worried about the price, worried about getting cash from the ATM. He was obviously out of his element.

But it didn´t take them very long to get relatively comfortable. We spent a few lovely days in beautiful colonial Antigua, checking out churches and ruins and the crafts market, and sitting in the lovely Central Park, people-watching and listening to the fountain. We were also lucky enough to catch a procession passing by one evening, and sat a long time watching people of all ages in purple robes slowly passing by. (It had nothing of the solemn pomp and circumstance of the processions I saw in Spain; many “penitents” were munching on snacks and joking around. But it was still a beautiful site.)


The Central Park in Antigua

During that time, we spent a memorable day visiting my first host family. My parents, with a lot of my translating, were able to thank them for taking good care of me, and ate their first tortillas with a typical Guatemalan meal (they made my favorite dish for the occasion). The father took us out to see his plots and the crops that were in season. He gave my parents some of his special tomatoes, whose seeds were carefully passed down the generations. My dad, always great with children, managed to joke around with the two little kids, despite the language barrier. My parents had brought Easter treats and gifts for the two children. They were left speechless when they opened them (a Dora the Explorer doll for the little girl and a Spiderman action figure for the boy-- the nicest toys they have). For the duration of the trip, my parents spoke of that day as a highlight.

We also took an afternoon trip to Pastores, a small town near Antigua that is famous for its boot-makers. The entire main street is lined with little shops selling hand-made leather boots. My mom was able to find a crazy little pair of gray cowgirl boots from a delighted salesman and shoemaker. I ordered my (second) pair custom-made: some beautiful knee-high riding boots that would be ready by the end of the week.

Each busy day in Antigua ended with a Happy Hour. I think we all needed it: Mom and Dad for the culture shock they were dealing with, me from worrying every minute that they would get robbed or we´d miss our bus stop or some other little thing would go wrong (and exhausted from the translating).

After our lovely days in Antigua and the surrounding area, we took the long bus ride up to the cooler, bigger city of Xela, with an almost Gothic feel to it. We´d be based there to visit my site and schools. The first afternoon, exhausted from the trip, we just walked around Xela. We walked up to “La Democracia”, the huge local market that takes up several streets around a small park. There are whole streets filled with fruit vendors, others of burned CDs, yet others of furniture and clothes. Xela is distinct from Antigua in that it is a truly Guatemalan city. Around the central park, there are a lot of travelers and tourists, but you don´t get the feel that the whole city is geared toward catering to them (as it is in Antigua). My parents were very taken in by this enormous market where the Guatemalans in the area buy their food, clothes, entertainment, furniture, everything (there is a Super Walmart in Xela, called Hiper Paiz here, but most locals still shop in the markets).

The next morning we got up early to await our taxi to my town, (In the end, we arranged a taxi driver for the whole day, rather than wasting hours waiting for buses or trying to drive a rental car amongst the ruthless Guatemalan drivers.) We drove briefly through my municipal town, San Francisco el Alto, which is reported to have the biggest market in Central America, just to get a glimpse of it. Then we continued north to one of the villages that I work in to visit the elementary school where I teach English once a week. As soon as we entered the gates of the school, we were greeted by lines of elementary students applauding us. All of the classrooms were festively adorned, with “Welcome Leoti´s Parents” written on the white boards. The director and his wife (who is the director of the middle school where I teach in the afternoon) welcomed us into the office and served us tamales, one of the more special Guatemalan dishes (a large steamed dumpling made of soft rice with a chunk of meat and sauce inside). Then we visited each classroom, where many students presented us with gifts. My parents spoke a little about Montana and life in the US in general, and I had the kids sing the English songs they were learning. I knew we would get a warm reception there, but even I was a bit overwhelmed by the extent of their welcome.

When we finally got away, we at last arrived at my town. My host family was waiting for us, with lunch prepared (though by now we were all pretty stuffed). We all ate lunch together, and again many thanks and welcomes were exchanged. Gratefully, my host brother who is the English teacher at the Institute and studying English at the university, showed up, and for once I got a break from translating. I showed them my area of the house, and after resting briefly, we walked around town. There was no formal class at the Institute because they were celebrating their Anniversary, but there were sports activities going on. I was invited to play in the female teachers-versus-students basketball game, where for once I made my dad proud as the star basketball player (being a good head taller than everyone, and having had more formal basketball training, even if it was in 8th grade). If anything, everyone laughed a lot, and I´m sure it was a site for my parents, watching me play basketball on a team of women in traje and high-heeled sandals against tiny sixth grade girls. We walked around some more, meeting other familiar people in my town and attracting lots of stares from my students (and pretty much everyone... not just one gringa in town, but THREE gringos! That´s headline news). We watched a bit of a soccer game, took a bunch of pictures with my host family, and then finally headed back to Xela, exhausted.

The next morning we took off for a few blissfully relaxing days at Lake Atitlán. We stayed at a gorgeous isolated hotel, perched on a cliff overlooking the lake and its three stunning volcanoes, surrounded by lush gardens and so many delightfully little nooks to sit and relax that it´s almost troubling you won´t be able to relax in all of them. (The other two hotels we had stayed in were a bit on the shabby side for my parents... which goes to show how out-of-touch I am by American comfort standards, cuz I thought they were pretty swell! But this place, La Casa del Mundo, utterly delighted everyone,)

A piece of the view from Casa del Mundo.

Our first day, we devoted ourselves fully to relaxing, and I´ll admit it was a relief to be isolated at our lovely hotel, with English-speaking staff, where it was hard to imagine anything going wrong. The next day, after a leisurely morning, we took a boat across the lake the visit the Indigenous town of Santiago, where they were having a craft market. Mom was able to finish her gift shopping, and we found a little boy to take us up to visit “Maximón”, an iconic cigar-smoking “saint” or “Mayan holy man”, depending on who you ask (for more details on Maximón, refer to my earlier blog post about him). The kid ended up ripping us off, of course, but it was still interesting. We also passed through the town´s local market (where more regular foodstuffs and clothing were sold, rather than just crafts for tourists), which impressed my parents (I have seen many such markets already). I was very taken by how beautiful the traje is in Santiago: the blouses the women wear are hand-embroidered, featuring birds surrounded by clusters of flowers, and they use darker more subtle colors (sometimes the bright Technicolor trajes around my town are a bit overwhelming). If I ever decide to buy one, it will be from there. The next day we devoted ourselves fully once more to lounging, after going kayaking briefly with Dad. Still, it passed far too quickly. Late next morning, we checked out and got on a boat to Panajachel, where we caught our shuttle bus to Guatemala City.

The stairway that lead to my little room at Casa del Mundo.

We spent that night in another shabby little hotel. We flipped on the TV to find disconcerting national news of a plane crash of a plane on its way to our hometown (it was a group of high school kids from California on a spring-break ski trip). We took a taxi out to dinner, and found this recommended restaurant in the “Zone Viva” (“Lively Zone”) virtually empty. Guatemala City is an unsettling place that has been ravaged by gang violence. It is an enormous city; about half the country´s population lives there. It is telling that no one was out for dinner on a Sunday evening in a famous restaurant in the most “happening” zone. We were glad to get back to our hotel, and more than a little exhausted. We woke up early to get to the airport for my parents´ early flight. It was strange to say goodbye to them. I´d gotten very used to having their company here, and Guatemala seemed a little more empty without them in it.

Overall, the trip exceeded even my high-expectations. It went incredibly smoothly, and it felt like the perfect mix of touristy-comfortable and off-the-beaten-track reality, of site-seeing and just relaxing. I was so impressed by how well my parents took everything in stride, by how quickly they adjusted, and by how much they ended up loving Guatemala and its people, despite the rough edges and cultural gulfs. They were incredibly patient, kind and gracious to everyone we interacted with, and I was proud to introduce them as my parents. And they were given the kind of warm and unbelievable welcome that you can expect in Guatemala. More than anything, it was so important for me to show them a bit of my life here, no matter how small, so that when I speak of it, they have some context in which to understand. They have faces for the names, images of the places. They understand a bit of how I have been welcomed and taken in here, and also maybe a bit of how despite all that, life can still be lonely here because of the differences that you can never quite get past. Guatemala will always be a part of me, and I´m so grateful they got to see a bit of that part.