Sunday, April 27, 2008

Campaign Season

Well, campaign season in Cape Verde has officially started and while Peace Corps Volunteers are restricted from politics, it is interesting to observe from afar. I live on one of the main roads in my town which is also the second largest on the island so there is a lot of movement. Since yesterday there have been cars going down the road blasting music and making announcements. Today's announcement was that at 6, there will be an assembly which of course is practically in front of my house. I took back roads to avoid the crowd as I came home from batuk practice. Anyways, the party that is doing their assembly today is playing music loudly and yelling into the microphone as people are playing with flags that they handed out and occasionally cheering. Children are arguing over who gets to play with the flag that one of them managed to get hold of. If elections were this exciting in America...

Oh, now everyone is yelling Viva. More on this later...

Saturday, April 26, 2008

Yesterday I had one of those "never going to forget" moments. I was on my way to one of our clean ups and ran into one of the women who informed me of a silent march in Vila in memory of the kid that was murdered. So this took precedent over the cleanup and I got ready for the march instead. Most of the time Cape Verdians are very chatty people and if you've ever tried to teach a class or work with a group of people, you'd know how hard to get them to be quiet long enough to explain yourself or to let someone put in their opinion. Anyways, we piled into a few cars around 5 and head up to the school where the kid's classmates carried posters saying "Manu, even though you are dead, we will never forget you" and various slogans about the dangers of violence. Everyone was dressed in white shirts and jeans and we marched in complete silence from the school, down the hill, winding in and out each road of Vila until we reached the main road, then back up the opposite side of town until we reached the school again. It was such a moving march, complete silence from every participant. When we arrived at the school, we formed a circle and Manu's teacher made a short speech. One of the classmates presented her with a photo of Manu. Afterwards people cried, this beautiful sad sound coming from the mouths of people most affected. It almost sounds like a song, crying out "pamodi, pamodi, pamoidi" (why, why, why) and "n sta tchora pa bo" (I am crying for you). Sad and depressing but at the same time an incredibly beautiful moment. The entire ride back from Vila was in silence, people reflecting on what had just happened.

Sunday, April 20, 2008

This week has been kind of depressing. On Thursday a kid from my town was murdered at the high school. This is the first murder like this that has ever happened on Maio so it makes the shock factor even higher. I didn't know him too well but I had talked to him once about helping him learn to market his crafts. He made jewelry out of coconut shells, in particular earrings and necklaces in the shape of flip flops. Apparently the event had to to with "thug issues." From all the talk in town, the kid was nice and always laughed it off when this group of boys tried to start something. There was a group of 5 of them that showed up at the school that night (or so the story goes) and one guy stabbed him in the neck and and he was dead less than 30 minutes later. It's really sad and makes me worry about the direction Maio is going.

I got a call from Mike today with more potentially bad news. He got a letter saying he may be called back to active military duty. I feel like he just got out and now they are talking about pulling him back. I really don't want him to go back to Iraq or Afghanistan. He's almost done with undergrad and has a plan for himself. And I am selfish and don't want him to be taken away from me for another year after we've been apart for 2 already.

So I'm sitting in my room sulking and avoiding the world at the moment. I guess drowning myself in work will at least keep me distracted for the moment..Sorry I'm in such a bad mood.

Monday, April 14, 2008

April showers..oh wait theres no rain here

Sorry it has been so long since I've written. Things have been a little crazy here. Our accounting workshop went really well, to the point where the women wanted the leader to do another weeks worth of talks. That all led up to our festa for the elderly for Cape Verdian women's day which went off really well. We made food and had traditional music and people were dancing. That same day was the cuchido for our big festa so there was corn pounding all afternoon and partying at night.

We are currently planning a trip to Fogo to meet with Sarah's women's group. We had thought to do it at the end of April but time and money constraints have postponed it and now it is scheduled for May. I'm really excited about this trip, although I don't know if I will go on it, but the women are really excited and I think it will give them a big motivation factor to continue their work. Since it is costly and money is difficult, we are doing a bunch of fund raising activities. Saturday we had an afternoon tea which went fantastically. We sold tickets ahead of time and made tea, coffee, and snacks. I was completely exhausted afterwards but it went really well.

Transport is again a big problem. The boat that usually comes to Maio sunk in the ocean coming to Praia from Fogo so we are down a boat. Lately one boat has been coming a week and I saw the little boat today but I don't know if its on a schedule. The airport is still being worked on- 9 months later- and it should be ready "soon."

I was in a car accident last week. I'm fine but it scared me. Some part of the steering wheel broke and the driver lost control of the car. We went over a barrier in the middle of the road then into the rocky nothingness area where we stopped. Luckily no one was hurt.

In good news, we now have diet coke and ground beef in Maio. This is a big step up in the food world. I mean we have Cadbury chocolate bars so it was only a matter of time.

Saturday night I played in a women's soccer game in Calheta and we won 1-0. After the game was my friend Neya's 31st birthday party. I spent most of the time playing with the kids and taking pictures. They (she and her sisters) just got electricity in their house and were really excited to be able to put music and lights for the party.

I started teaching computers to the literacy program and today I start teaching a fisherman's association. I didn't really want to teach more computers but I think its important for these specific groups so its a go.

Thats about it right now. COS conference is coming up next month. Its hard to believe our Peace Corps service is coming to a close. I'll try to post more in the next few weeks.