Fin de Semana

The weekend was pretty bland. I had stomach problems pretty much every day- we’ve come to the conclusion that its because our water level is really low and there’s built up sediment on the bottom of our barrel. I’m going to guess that no amount of boiling and filtering can get out all of the bad stuff found in the water. We’re still waiting for more water to come, we’ve been waiting about a week for city water. Our tank still has water but we were told not to drink water that comes from our tank. So we will wait. Our neighbor came over to help us figure out if our water was turned off (we had a little flooding problem the previous week from too much water coming and had to turn off the water) and he said it was on. So now we are still waiting for more water.

Saturday night we were invited to dinner at the place where the Americans are staying. The woman who runs the place is really nice and we’re going to be teaching English to one of her employees. Anyways, back to dinner. It was amazing. They made crustini topped with green olives, onions, and olive oil. Then the pasta course was gnocchi with a pesto sauce and then they brought out goat and potatoes. It was delicious.

Sunday was the usual beach day. It was actually overcast on Sunday and not too hot so I took a nice little nap on the beach. We were going to play poker at night but it got late so we sat around and chatted and ate our buy-ins(homemade coffee ice cream for me and my roommate, powdered doughnuts and cheese-its from the Americans) instead of actually playing.

Travel Problems

The Americans gave me a lift to Calheta for our meeting on Monday. I went down to meet them at one of the Italian restaurants and sat with them while they finished their 3-course meal of lasagna, skewers with green pepper, onion, meat and sausage, and French fries. We got in the truck around 3 to head over and I was warned that the truck had broken down on their way back for lunch earlier. We drove a total of about 100 yards before the truck broke down again. It started smelling bad and then smoking- the Americans said the radiator was broken or something. Anyways, so we stood on the street for a few minutes and a nice guy with a truck said that he’d come back in a few minutes and take me to Calheta. Before he returned I got a ride from the other half of the American group- their boss and inspectors came by in another truck and delivered me to my destination. Really, getting anywhere here is an adventure. I’m looking forward to getting my Peace Corps issued bicycle so that I can get around the island more easily.

Women’s Group Meeting- 10.09.06 4:00 pm

We had the first women’s group meeting on Monday. I was under the impression that the group had already been established and doing activities and wanted me to help them better organize, etc but during the meeting I realized that this was the first time they all sat down together to formally talk about their group. Despite my confusion and lack of speaking ability (more about that later), I think the meeting overall went pretty well. My counterpart explained who I was, my training with Peace Corps and our counterpart conference and then had me talk about what I am going to do with them and the group. There was a lot of confusion and need for clarification about what they will be doing and I explained to them that I am here to help them with the group and that it is up to them to decide what sort of activities they want to do and what they think are the most important things they want to learn and do. I said that I am only here for 2 years and I just arrived in Maio and they have lived here for their entire lives and will remain here after I leave so it is important that they run the shots on the group and I am here for support and help in teaching for finding people to come in and teach how to do things. By the end of the meeting, I think they decided to meet again next week and each of them will bring 2 or 3 friends to make the group bigger (there were about 10 women total that showed up) along with ideas of what they want to learn and the priorities. From what I gathered, a lot of them want to learn language (English and French) as well as computers.

After the meeting I talked with my counterpart and another women in the group about projects that they want to see happen. The woman from the group is one of the women who makes the amazing woven bags and she said that she would like to have a workshop or training session so that all of the women in Calheta who are interested can also learn to make the bags. This way they can increase the amount of bags made, teach the women a new skill, and provide another form of income in a country where work is hard to find. I told her that I would bring a sample project proposal when I return to Calheta so that she can use it as a basis for writing up one for her project. I also want to help her advertise the bags. I’m going to take pictures of the bags, the women making them, and send them out to help advertise. Eventually, after we learn computers, I hope that the women can set up a website to advertise their bags and information about what they do. I’m also going to try to contact 10,000 Villages and a few other places that may be able to help advertise them.

I learned that the focus on learning language directly correlates to the tourism build up in Maio. I’m not exactly sure how the tourism will come to Maio but the government of Cape Verde is investing a lot in building up tourism and Calheta would probably be one of the places tourists would come visit when they are in Maio because of the bags and because there are a few Germans, Italians, and people from the UK who are building homes and resort like places for tourists. The beaches in Calheta are also nice and apparently the waves are calmer than they are in Vila. Regardless, pretty much all of the women want to learn English and French because they are “the most common international languages” and they want to be able to interact with tourists. So, I might be teaching English to the women and looking for someone to teach French.

We also talked about going to see some of the women’s groups in Santiago to show the women how other organizations run and how to set themselves up to function as an official entity. It’s still really early, we just had the first meeting, but the women seem really motivated and excited to start doing projects. I would love to eventually have a large conference for small women’s groups to come together, share ideas, and have skills workshops on things like micro-credit, using computers, and language. I feel really positively about this group and I really hope that they continue to be motivated and can get a lot done while I am here and after I leave.

The rollercoaster of emotions

No mail for me today- we went to the post office this morning and my roommate received her cookbook and about 15 Newsweeks from Peace Corps but mine haven’t come in yet. We took laundry over to the lady who does our laundry. Its about 5 USD for a load of laundry and a load here is pretty much as much as we can fit into a basin so the two of us get 2 weeks of clothes washed for about $2.50 a piece. That’s much cheaper than washing them in the coin machines in the states. I’m excited to have clean clothes again, I think I sweat through them at an abnormally fast pace, go figure. So the day started out great and I was on a high from my meeting yesterday. Then things went a little downhill.

I got to work at the CEJ and was told that I needed to learn Kriolu better because someone thought I didn’t understand what she was saying. I did understand what she said but she wasn’t very clear in what she was asking me to do. The way some words translate in Kriolu are very unspecific- for example, people sometimes refer to things as “that thing” instead of saying specifically the name of the object or like what happened today, saying “its below” when what is meant is “its on the bottom shelf of the cabinet in my office.” Words also have double meanings. The word “txeu” means both “enough” and “too much.” So sometimes it can be confusing. Anyways, it was a low blow being told I need to learn better. I know I need to improve on my language but having it directly spat in my face kinda shot me down.

10.20.06

So I guess there’s a lot to update you all on now. The past few weeks have been interesting to say the least. The Internet at the CEJ has been down—they originally said it was because there was a problem with the connection, then they said they hadn’t paid the bill (which is pretty common here), and then Telecom came to look at the computers and the latest news is that we need a new phone line. So who knows when it will return. The electricity has also been having some serious problems. Our nights this week have been pretty restless since every time the electricity oges out, the generator for all of the phones in Maio is conveniently located right outside my window and as you can imagine, its pretty loud. Between that and the lack of air flow in my room, its been hard to get a good night’s sleep.

Don’t forget to teach others how to fish…

Last Saturday I went to a town called Borreio (around the south of the island) to see how the girls group in their town functions. I’m now going to be helping their group in preparation for their municipal holiday in December and help with other activities. For the holiday (which is about 2 or 3 weeks long), they’ll have soccer tournaments, show films on HIV/AIDS, have a big party for the town, and arrange other activities. They want me to teach basic computers to the group so I’m now going to be going there every Saturday and Sunday to teach computers. This should be an adventure. I went to the center where the classes will be held on Monday with the CEJ to take inventory of what they actually have. It turns out that 2 of the 4 computers actually work (one of them only has a monitor) and they both are on different operating systems (Windows 97 and 98). I read in an old Newsweek (which I finally received from Peace Corps on Wednesday) that Microsoft now will not help with any problems on their system that are less current than XP so I’m ready for these computers to crash and burn on me. Add 20+ students to the mix and one teacher who has never really taught computers and you get one heck of an experience.

The group also wanted me to help design a t-shirt, get the t-shirts, and help them secure school supplies. I had to explain to them that Peace Corps does not give out money to groups- we are not a donation fund, and I certainly did not have money to buy them all t-shirts. With that being said, I went home and made a design on my trusty computer using all the possible skill I have in creating an image using the draw function in Microsoft Word to find out the next day that they have an emblem that they would like to use in addition. I learned my lesson that day. After scanning the emblem into the computer and being asked to take this hand drawn emblem and replicate it with my fine art skills, I wasted about 4 hours being frustrated with my handy dandy “draw function” in MS Word when they had me take my original design and paste it on top of the hand drawn emblem. I felt like all the work I had done trying to replicate the original drawing had been wasted but I learned my lesson. I will never again try to make something for someone and will instead guide them through it until it is what they are trying to make. I felt taken advantage of and I did not like it one bit. It definitely put a spoiler on the day but I’m not going to let it get to me.

Why I Should Not Be Allowed within a mile of a kitchen knife…
So the other night we wanted to cook dinner for the Americans because they are leaving in a few days. For this night’s feast, we procured some beef straight from the slaughtered cow, fresh vegetables from the boat, rice, and our British friend’s recipe for chocolate ice cream. We were on track until the freezer and I got in a fight. Because we lose electricity so often, the freezer will melt and then when the electricity returns, it will refreeze with all the nasty icy stuff. You’ve all seen what happens when stuff freezes and then refreezes. So anyways, in order to get the container with the ice cream in it into the freezer we needed to get rid of some of the build up. Instead of being a sane person and letting the freezer defrost (which I have been told is the correct thing to do—sorry Mike), I took a knife and started stabbing the ice in the freezer to break it up. In doing this, I hit a part of the freezer where the air is kept in that makes the freezer freeze and in turn released the air and killed the freezer. Way to go Jules. So now we are waiting for the technician to come back and take our fridge to wherever it is that they take it and repair the freezer. All of our fridge and freezer stuff is now split up between the houses of a few of our friends here.


Women’s Group update
Since the first women’s meeting, the women have met one other time, this time without me, to discuss their priorities as a group. My counterpart said that the women who were at the first meeting were very excited to be working with me and for the second meeting they all brought friends and there was a total of 22 women who showed! So they discussed their priorities which are the following:

1. To learn English (and French) to be able to communicate with tourists (apparently everyone in Maio has this vision of the entire world flooding into Maio by the thousands to visit from the way they all talk about it)
2. To learn how to do a project
3. The 8 women who make the bags want to get funding to teach more women how to use their looms and make bags.
4. To have a large meeting with other women’s groups from other islands to share ideas, etc
5. To build a hair salon and train other women to do hair (this one is really my counterparts wish because her daughter owns a salon and she has no materials for it)

So anyways, I’m going to meet with them Sunday to discuss what hours I am available to teach English and work out a regularly scheduled meeting plan. Last night, my counterpart invited my roommate, the Americans, and me to her house for lobster and drinks. The Americans passed by her house on the way to work everyday and I think she wanted some interaction with our fascinating culture. The lobster was amazing and anyone who visits me will be invited to go eat some. While we were there, we told my counterpart that we have a neighbor who’s son’s name is “praia di mar” which translates to “beach.” We always here them yelling to Praia di Mar to come for lunch or go run an errand and have been thinking there’s no way someone named their kid that. Well, the entire situation was clarified by my counterpart. Apparently, this kid was swimming in the ocean one day and almost drowned so his family now calls him “Praia di Mar” as a nickname. It’s a pretty sick joke if you ask me. It’s be like calling a cancer survivor “Cigarette.” I don’t if I’m missing something here but the whole thing is pretty strange to me.

After a candle lit lobster dinner (thanks to the electricity being off once again), we head back to Vila and hit up the British guy’s restaurant for some ice cream. Since the Americans were leaving the next day, we had to help them partake in their last share of the best ice cream on Maio. I’m really fascinated by the owner of the restaurant and his job. He and his crew dig up ships and excavate them. He showed us photos from a long time ago of a ship they found off the coast of Cape Verde which ended up belonging to the US Navy. They found old bottles that look like what you see Captain Jack Sparrow drinking from in Pirates of the Caribbean. It’s really fascinating and there’s talk of a new project for him to work on. I’d be really interested in seeing what they find.

This morning I woke up and the Americans came by to say goodbye. This was especially exciting because they left us a plethora of American treats including goldfish crackers, wheat thins, cheese its, chewy granola bars, trail mix, dried fruit, drink mix, rice crispy treats, Monopoly, Risk, Poker, horseshoes, a Frisbee, and a variety of sunscreens, bug sprays, soaps, and other odds and ends. Yes, today we were spoiled rotten- its like Christmas/Hanukkah and it was great. But it is really sad to see our friends go and we will miss them a lot.

Today must be my lucky day because after lunch, we went to check the mail and I had 3 packages from my mom, a packet of letters from my World Wise school, and a letter from one of my good friends. I was so excited. My mom’s packages included my birthday present (thanks Mom and Dad), the new Chris Thile cd (☺), shorts, and crystal light mix. It was great. And I was so excited to hear back from my school in the states. It made me really excited and I can’t wait to continue corresponding with them.

This weekend I’m finishing up plans for the first girl’s group meeting which is on Monday and preparing lesson plans for teaching English and Computers.

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