Daily life in SVG

I am only writing this because my mother will not leave me alone about this stupid blog. The first thing she always says is "how's your blog", even though before tonight there hasn't been a posting in over a year. So mom I hope this blog makes your day, month and year because there might not be another.

I have recently moved to another village named Georgetown and although it is larger than my previous village I find myself a lot more bored. Besides the other Peace Corps volunteers in Georgetown I do not know anyone so that makes my days seem very long and boring. Now that I live in Georgetown I have to take a van to and from school, this cost about $16 a week which doesn't seem like a lot of money but adds up over the month. Once I am at school I spend the first hour or so opening and running the library. Around 10:30 I start to tutor kids on a one on one basis, depending on the day of the week the tutoring sessions can last all day or finish by 1:00pm. If I finish tutoring before the school day is over I may help other teachers do various things like copy papers or write tests. Once school is over I take a van home where I usually go to the grocery store and get dinner for the night which usually includes chicken and rice. Once I get home I start to cook then I eat then I may watch a movie, read, browse the internet or go out somewhere. I am usually in bed my 12:00am and up by 7:00am to do it all over again.

The house among other things

This is the first post in a couple of months and a lot has happened. For one I’m in my own place, which at first disgusted me with its duct taped ceilings that provide a home for bats that like to run around at night and spiders the size of a fist scurrying around the walls. But after several lonely days and nights my house has become my refuge, my place to relax and escape the stares from the other villagers. My house is a place where I can think about what it is I am doing here and what I want to accomplish. Since mid October I have working as a tutor at Sandy Bay Primary School, I have been working to teach kids how to read. Like anything teaching is a craft that has to be learned and I am still in the infant stages of that process. Thankfully every day I gain a little more confidence and maybe when these two years are up I may actually consider myself a good teacher. Most of the kids that I teach think that they can’t read although they know all the sounds of the alphabet but when it’s time to but those sounds together to make words they hit a brick wall. I can see that the most challenging aspect of my assignment is figuring out a way to break through that wall, so far I haven’t figured it out yet.

The village that live in is very beautiful , it has about 2,000 people and it sits on in the northern winward part of the island. If you imagine that your left hand is a map of the island and you hold it up with your palm facing you my village is located at the tip of your ring finger. The capital is located in the middle of your palm at the bottom. The people in my village are very nice and friendly most of them greet everyone they see and most of them stare at me when I walk around, I think it’s going to be a while before the stares stop. While the stares are annoying the first lesson that I have learned here is that people are the same everywhere. It doesn’t matter if you’re an American or a Vincentian, people are people and when you boil it down most of them want the same things out of life. They want to be happy and they want to be able to take care of themselves and their families. While Americans have more resources to accomplish the basics in life some Vincentians are forced to do things that they may not want. In my previous post I spoke about the situation with the banana farming and how this region was being forced out of the market. Because of this many farmers have turned to ganja cultivation. From my observations I think marijuana is St. Vincent’s largest export, marijuana is everywhere on this island. I recently went to a concert and everyone was smoking marijuana (except for me of course) there was so much smoke in the air that you could see it even though it was dark outside. So I guess when I comes to marijuana and St. Vincent it’s like the American military and gays, don’t ask and don’t tell.

St. Vincent

The long awaited entry has finally arrived. I have been in St. Vincent and the Grenadines for a little over a week now and my first impression is that the island is beautiful. I drive up and down the Windward side of the island which is the Atlantic Ocean side and the views are amazing. The only thing that gets me to turn my eyes from the ocean is observing the poverty within the island. Through my first week here I have come to the conclusion that the common thread that links poverty throughout the world is people of color. It seems like the people here have been forgotten, either by their government or by international aid programs or by both. While the poverty is glaring the capacity for growth and development is just as apparent. Vincentians are hard working nice people; they just need an industry that will allow them to support themselves and their family. A little over a decade ago St. Vincent produced 3% of the world’s bananas and the citizens were able to survive. Unfortunately they were fazed out of the banana market by Dole and Chiquita who shared 97% of the market but were not happy and wanted St. Vincent’s tiny 3%. So now the people are struggling and that’s where I came in, to try and provide some type of community and youth development from the ground up.
Personally these first few days have been harder than I initially anticipated. I have adopted one day at a time as my personal motto, hopefully concentrating on just completing one day will allow the days to role by until I get better adjusted. The family I am staying with has been very friendly and has helped to lift my spirits on several occasions. The family has eight members the mother named Purnell who keeps the house clean and every well feed. The Father, St. Elbert Walters who is a banana farmer, school principal and preacher, he keeps everyone well disciplined and during our many conversations has enlightened me about local and international politics. The two daughters Grace and Joy are both in the medical field, Grace is a nurse and Joy is in medical school in Cuba. The son Wes is in secondary school, which is the equivalent to high school in states, he is the strong silent type but he is starting to open up and talk to me more and more. The older son Wendall is a recent graduate from a University in Mexico with a degree in Anthropology, he has been my unofficial guide this past week, teaching the bus routes and introducing me to people around the community. The grandson Will who is Grace’s son is around 15 or 16 and he is going through the adolescent stage where is too cool for everything. Finally there is the nephew named chemmey, I can’t really understand much he says because his accent is very thick but I did get him to give me a hair cut a couple of days ago.
The hardest part about my stay here has been the riding the bus for an hour and half one way into town. The bus here is not at all like a bus back in the states, they are the size of a wolkswagon mini bus, the kind the hippies used to drive pack in the 60’s and 70’s. They have two people working the bus, the driver and the conductor. The driver is self explanatory and the conductor is in charge of collecting the money and squeezing as many people as possible into the tiny 4 rows of seats. Once everyone is packed into the bus the driver turns up the soco music, which is a mix between reggae and hip hop, and proceeds to drive like a bat out of hell. The drivers here are either highly skilled or completely crazy; I haven’t figured it out yet. Once I pull myself out of the loaded missile and reach town I have to sit through 8 hours of Peace Corps training which covers topics ranging from cultural differences, community development, safety and security and working with schools. Some of it is interesting and helpful and some of it makes me want to jump out of window, but it’s only temporary and it’s almost half over.
Through this first week and half I have developed a nemesis and his name is Striker. He is the dominant male in the family’s pack of dogs, all and all they have 6 dogs which include 3 puppies, 1 mother and 2 full grown male. Striker has prompted an attack on me once and has come close once before, luckily the second time I was able to use my ninja like quickness to out run them, but it was close. Throughout the day Striker stalks the families 3 acres daring anyone to come into his domain, I’ve seen him attack other people and dogs. Somehow I have to figure out a way to get him to be friendly with me, I don’t know how I’m going to do it but I have to figure it out. All and all my experience in St. Vincent has been good and I look forward to getting to work and try to better my community.

Hairoun

The original inhabitants of St. Vincent’s, the Caribs called the island Hairoun which means the land of the blessed. St. Vincent became known as it is known today on January 22 1498 when Christopher Columbus first saw the island, this was the day of a Spanish Martyr named St. Vincent, and so Columbus thought it only right to name the island for the Martyr. The Caribs were believed to have been on the island almost a hundred years before Columbus “discovered” (how you discover a place when people already live there is beyond me, but that’s another post), the island. These people were known to be hunter gathers and relied heavily on marine resources as well as the land to help them to survive. They were also known as fierce warriors and were able to fight off colonization long after other islands were colonized. The next inhabitants of St. Vincent’s were Africans who were on board a Dutch slave ship that sunk. The survivors of the ship wreck found their way to St. Vincent’s and over the next several years the two cultures co mingled and formed two sub cultures, the Black Caribs and the Yellow Caribs. The Yellow Caribs occupied the Leeward side of the island while the Black Caribs occupied the Winward side of the island. Over the next two years I will be living on the Winward side of the island with the ancestors of the Black Caribs. As my time in St. Vincent begins I look forward to learning more history and participating in the cultural exchange that is the Peace Corps.

Finally

After two 5am wake ups, two cramped flights and an hour and a half bus ride I finally made it to my destination in St. Lucia. The retreat where we are staying has a very beautiful panoramic view of the Caribbean Sea that looks like something from a movie. When I first arrived I stood outside and looked in amazement and thanked God for this opportunity. The day we arrived everyone was tired from travelling and Peace Corps took it easy on us and did not have any training sessions scheduled, we were able to relax and prepare for the next day. Today we had orientation; we talked about our aspirations and concerns, safety and security and health issues. We were also given our work assignments and our locations; I will be living in Sandy Bay, St. Vincent and working at Sandy Bay Government Primary School. My job description is to assist with programs geared towards the enhancement of the literacy, numeracy and remedial reading skills of the students. To assist staff to enhance their critical thinking skills to be able to impart this to the students, assist with library development; assist with information technology training for students and teachers and to assist with the development of after school activities such as sports, music and arts. On Monday I will be traveling to Sandy Bay, St. Vincent and moving in with a host family for seven weeks. I look forward to getting to St. Vincent and getting to work.

My thoughts

As I move into the next chapter of my life I find myself nervous about the unknown.  On one hand I am happy and excited about having the chance to live and work in the caribbean while on the other hand I don't want to leave my friends and family.  I know that at this point in my life the peace corps is the best option for me, hopefully this experience will open doors and allow me see the world.  These are just a few of my thoughts, I'll post again in a few.