Out on the Town

So this past weekend I went out in Coch with my counterpart, Vivian, and a bunch of her friends. All in all, I had a really fun time and it was my first experience in going out with Bolivians instead of in a horde of volunteers. And a night it was indeed (I didn’t get back to the hostel until a little after 5 am when Pat was sound asleep in our room until I started creaking around on the wood floor). Highlights included my indulgence in street meat x 2 (as previously was my pattern in Rochester) and an ice cream bar…not to mention a few beers and random other beverages. And let me tell ya, it was a burger with all the fixings and a hot dog with all the fixings (which around here means corn and sauerkraut along with mayo, ketchup, etc.). We attended a birthday party of one of Vivian’s friends that sure was popular (he must have had a few hundred people at his house) followed by a bit of dancing and drinking at a local bar popular with ex-pats and tourists and then we proceeded to hang out on the Prado (the main strip with all the touristy restaurants and bars) with a few of her friends and their bottle of rum and 2L of Coke. We then returned to the house where the birthday party was to witness the most drunk people sitting around in their stupors and then danced a bit over there. One of the best moments had to be around 4 am when I was dancing with one of Vivian’s friends (of course in Bolivian line style) and was going to put my purse down on a chair and he was like, no no I’ll hold it. And that’s what he proceeded to do…wear my lovely mauve and brown purse over his shoulder while we danced. Who says chivalry is dead?

Come Travel With Me!

So I’ve heard from Kelley about her future visit in October to Bolivia and I know it’s also in the works for Mom and Helen…but here’s a few travel destinations that I’d be up for that are in South America if you come when I have enough days to get away from Bolivia so I can entice more visitors…

Brazil – Ouro Prêto (via Rio)

Columbia – Cartagena (and possibly Bogotá on the way)

Bolivia – Salar de Uyuni (and Potosí on the way to see another volunteer), Tupiza, Lake Titicaca / Isla del Sol / Copacabana (I believe this trip is claimed by my mom)

Peru – Cuzco/Machu Picchu (4 day Inca Trail hike) (most likely claimed by Helen)

Argentina – Buenos Aires

Let me know what you’re up for so I can start planning…also, I’m always down for just hanging out in my site and Coch and the surrounding area if your main objective is just to spend some quality time with me and my homies in Tarata…

You Know You Need a Lock on Your Bathroom When…

You walk into the bathroom that has supposedly been designated as solely yours to find a strange unknown man peeing in it that neglected to close the door while he was using it. Yes, that happened to me today and I’m putting a lock on the outside of my door tomorrow. My host family occasionally has people over for parties or other gatherings and they recently cooked up a batch of chicha and turned the house into a chicharria (basically place where they serve the fermented alcoholic corn drink) yesterday to serve it up to the local population. This resulted in several tables been set up around the front of the house where the family lives and my bathroom is located as well…and the result is that the visitors (many inebriated) end up using my bathroom and making it all yucky and apparently even when you’re in someone else’s house it isn’t necessary custom around here to shut yourself in there to indicate the next person walking in should knock. So I just happened to wander in as I was running off to English class, to my surprise, with a guy in the middle of the action. Needless to say, I think I gave him a bit of the deer-in-headlights look before I realized I should probably be turning around and walking (correction: running) away. So I’m going to put a lock on my bathroom to avoid this along with the case of the dirty bathroom. Granted, my host family is pretty good about cleaning up after one of these events in my bathroom…but there’s always an icky feeling when you don’t know who used your bathroom and the fact that 1) they don’t supply toilet paper in there, 2) there is no soap to wash your hands either…so the whole place just has a contaminated feeling afterwards. Not to mention that Pat said she saw someone peeing in the shower (while the toilet was unoccupied) during one of those events as well…well wonders never cease. They did say I could put one of those padlocks right on the door frame so that’s what one of my goals is for tomorrow.

In other more pleasant news, after English class today I ended up stopping by Nelly’s house (the 24 year old girl that works at the pharmacy in the hospital here that I danced in San Severino with and is probably my best friend in town) and I hung out with her fam and played cards with her and her little brothers and browsed through her mom’s Avon catalog while enjoying a nice mug of arroz con leche and chatting with her father (half in English because he spent a few years in the U.S.) about all sorts of things. My favorite moment had to be when we were playing cards and it was her little bro Rudy’s turn and their mom, Catalina (who is awesome by the way), was teasing him with an insult “cerebro de pollo.” That means “brain of chicken” which I think is a pretty awesome insult. I’ll have to try using that the next time when I see someone doing something stupid. The insults during the card games reminded me of one of my happy places though. I think everyone has those “happy places” like in Happy Gilmore where you’re like…aww…at that moment in time everything is pretty much perfect. It reminded me of last Chinese New Year’s when I was in Taipei and at my dad’s childhood friends’ house and they were playing mahjong and my favoritest person EVER (Kenny’s mom – haha, you know you love her too Helen) was throwing the insults around in Mandarin like it was nobody’s business. Haha, she’s so charismatic and animated. Love it. I like hearing the slang though since you don’t normally learn it in language classes (other than “shang tu xia xie”…Steph – was that in the lesson where someone ate something bad and then went swimming and had some gastrointestinal distress?)…such as in mahjong…”xia che” can be literally translated as “getting off the car” but in mahjong it means when you’ve given up hope of winning so you just try to block (bloqueo! ah, Bolivia, side story that one time when I first got here I meant to say that you need to wear “bloqueador” or sunscreen but instead I used the word bloqueo which refers to the frequent demonstrations that they put on by blocking the roads in protest) the other people from winning. Then I recall other taunting about being on fire and this and that. Anyways, it was good times…my happy place! No fair, I don’t get to go to Taiwan and experience it again this year…but Helen, definitely if you get the chance to hang out with Dad and the Lu Gang childhood friends as they’re playing mahjong, go for it. And if you’re lucky you’ll get some AYBORTEH too! It’s America’s time. Haha. Sorry, completely irrelevant inside joke. You would laugh too if you say the word “ayborteh” on the back of someone’s jacket.

Speaking of Chinese…unfortunately for me, after hearing about the fact that there was a Chinese woman that lives in Tarata (I wanted to go wander around where she lives and stalk her so maybe if I saw her I could start conversation so I could practice my Mandarin), I started poking around and from what I’ve heard she doesn’t come out of her house…like ever…so I’m at a loss and probably will not just randomly run into her on the street.

And Mom, I need to let you know that I already promised Nelly’s family that you’ll cook them a Chinese meal (what does that mean nowadays anyways…some kind of stir fry with soy sauce?) when you come to visit. They’re waiting for you.

Bug Update

In other news, I think the recent cold spell (raining everyday in the past week) has slowed down the flies that have been zipping around my house. I’ve pretty much extinguished the population, killing around 20 flies with my special fly-killing piece of cardboard in the past two days. I’m not sure in the U.S. if flies bleed, but they sure do here. I’m still in the bad habit of going around stomping on bugs and leaving them lying around on the floor for a couple of days until I get around to sweeping them up as well.

How Quickly We Forget…

Lots of things. This Saturday I will have been in Bolivia for 4 months exactly and sometimes it surprises me how quickly I just dropped pretty much everything of my former life when I set foot in Bolivia. I realized the other day that I still haven’t asked about my car yet…haven’t checked up on Mommy and Daddy to see if they’ve been taking care of my baby in its first Rochester winter and if they got around to changing the license plates on it (and I totally forgot to leave the address for them to send my CT plates back to the DMV there…I’ll be expecting a nice property tax bill next spring in the mail if that’s the case). Sometimes when I’m getting dressed in the morning I also think about random articles of clothing that are packed away somewhere in my room in Rochester…I left behind at least 90% of my clothing and I wonder when I get back if it will still fit me and if I’ll even want to wear it. I don’t run here at all either…maybe once every two weeks if I get motivated to do it and it doesn’t happen to be raining that day. I always tell myself I really should get back in the habit of exercising…but around here it just doesn’t seem to be a priority for me. I guess running wasn’t all that important to me (I think I did it more so I could eat whatever I wanted without feeling guilty rather than as something that was actually an addiction). Around here my measure of whether or not I need to exercise is if my clothes still fit (and they do, although I could be getting fatter and they would still fit because drip drying clothes allows them to expand enormously). Then there are other things that I know if I were in the U.S. I’d definitely be up to date on such as the current pop and hip hop songs that are overplayed on the radio (Z100 of course) and certain TV shows like Grey’s Anatomy and Ugly Betty…but around here I’ve almost forgotten about the importance of keeping up-to-date on American pop culture. Anyone want to give me an update? In Bolivia holidays don’t feel like holidays either…I attribute that to the difference in weather. Semi-cold right now but no snow…so that means no Christmas or New Year’s in my mind. Thanksgiving and most of December have passed in a blink of an eye and the fact that it’s less than a week until Christmas has caught me off guard. My counterpart was asking me about what I do in the U.S. for New Year’s…and I was thinking back to last year’s Christmas and New Year’s. I remember for Christmas being at home and getting my plane ticket to Taiwan in a box…and Dad opening up a box of chocolates and looking like a little kid. And then when I was remembering New Year’s, I remembered the amazing awesomeness (but what other people would consider lame-ness) of it…cooking dinner with Steph and Evie in my place…then watching Little Miss Sunshine and someone falling asleep…and waking up in time to turn on the radio (due to lack of television) to hear the countdown…and then at approximately 12:01 am, snuggling into bed with Evie while Steph hunkered down on the couch and then receiving two drunken phone calls…one that I didn’t answer, and one from Burt. And I remember wanting to open the bottle of champagne in the fridge for New Year’s but then I knew Evie and Steph wouldn’t be much help in drinking it so I resisted.

I wonder when I go back to the U.S. if it will be as easy to fall back into the routine of life there as it was to transition into life here. Not that it has been a piece of cake to adjust to Bolivia, but PC definitely lets you adjust in phases and you pretty much get accustomed to things before you realize you are used to them. It’s like how my landlord keeps on telling me they’re going to put in certain improvements on my house…most recently putting an outside light that I can turn on and off from inside my house (kind of like a porch light) and I realize that I’ve just gotten used to bringing my flashlight with me whenever I leave my house after dark or when I’m going to get back after dark. There are things I already think will be noticeably different when I get back to the U.S. These include the expectation to shower daily (or at least every other day), the overwhelming convenience of not having to go outside to get to the bathroom, running water in your house (my current dishwashing apparatus is two plastic bins and 2L Coke bottles filled with water…I got the system down), washer and dryer for laundry (?!), and having a sofa to sit on. I also sometimes get nervous that I’m going to forget certain skills that are important to remember…namely driving a car, the minimal Mandarin that I know, and using Excel (hey, you can’t get a job today without knowing how to use Excel). I would also say that I’m afraid of forgetting how to type and use a computer at the rapid speeds that I’m known for that I developed as a scheduler, but then again, I type enough blog entries to maintain that…as for operating several applications at once on your computer, I’ll definitely need to brush up on that at the end of these two years.

My hair is growing out after 4 months of no haircut and, surprisingly, so far I like it. I haven’t had long hair since high school and I think this is my time to experiment with it. It makes me feel more feminine and although I’ve never been one to be vain or care about appearances too much (I am notorious for buying dressy clothes and high heels but stowing them away in my closet without wearing them once), around here I have enough free time that I enjoy general upkeep of appearances such as painting my nails or plucking my eyebrows. I haven’t gone as far as to wear dressy clothes yet (not that I really brought any with me) but that’s due to the fact that whatever I wear gets dusty or muddy the second I walk outside of my house so “no vale la pena” (it’s not worth it). I might be doing a little bit of clothes shopping while I’m here though since in my chats with my counterpart (who is a very stylish and trendy dresser) she has admitted that she has a tendency to spend all her disposable income on clothes. Plus I’m headed with her to the market where she’s showing me where you can buy makeup and accessories. Oy. Besides my changing physical appearance of longer hair, getting pleasantly plump (or fat and beautiful as Anna calls it), and losing any muscle I thought I may have come to Bolivia with, I sometimes wonder if I’ve changed in any other ways and I just don’t notice it. Every PC volunteer arrives with some crazy idealist notions (at least in their subconscious) about how they’re going to save the world (that’s the helping people part) and more personally find themselves and their path in life and become a better person and I can’t say I’m any different from that. But I don’t think I’ve detected any significant changes in my mentality since I’ve arrived here. Before you arrive in country, you send an “aspiration statement” that answers a few questions to the administration here and I was just reading what I wrote for one of the answers to the questions and thought I’d post it to remind myself of what the heck I was thinking…

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E: How you think Peace Corps service will influence your personal and professional aspirations after your service ends.

The honest answer to this question is that I don’t know how it will influence me personally or professionally but I have some hopes for how it will change me. One of my key motivations for joining the Peace Corps is to learn more about myself and discover what my passions are in life, both personally and professionally. Prior to joining the Peace Corps, I worked for 3 years at an investment bank in various roles in operations dealing with energy and credit derivatives. Although I feel like I still have unrealized potential in the financial services industry, I also feel that I am missing out on the other 99.99% of the world and I wanted to explore what else was out there. Keeping that in mind, my goal throughout my service is to remain open to where my heart and mind want to go following my service. Although sometimes I question my reasoning for joining because of the valuable years that I am giving up in building my career within my established network, ultimately, I know my service will open new doors for me and either lead me in a new direction, or make me stronger in my conviction that my previous role is a long-term career path. As for new directions, in an ideal world I would go to graduate school following my service, either for my MBA or international relations, and find a way to reconcile my background in business and my service in the Peace Corps into a new and worthwhile career path in the non-profit or public sectors.

Beyond my professional aspirations, personally, I am excited to realize one of my dreams of learning a language fluently which will allow me opportunities to work internationally, to be a part of an organization that changes people lives for the better, to challenge myself in the many ways that only Peace Corps does, to meet others that are like-minded, to inspire people that I know in the U.S., and of course to make my family, especially my mother, proud of what I am doing for myself and others. I hope to fulfill my desire to become very familiar with a non-American culture because during the time I studied abroad, I did not get to spend much time in any one particular place and have never lived abroad for more than two months in a row during my lifetime. I’d like to learn more about the outdoors and nature and learn about things I would never learn in the U.S. (llamas and Quechua?) and live in a way that I would never live if I didn’t join the Peace Corps.

I know that my time in the Peace Corps will be the most challenging thing that I have encountered so far in my life, both professionally and personally, but I believe I am ready to take on that challenge because the richly unique experience I will gain far outweighs the difficulties I may face. Of all my personal and professional aspirations, my greatest is the hope that the experience will change me for the better, and my greatest fear is that it won’t change me at all.

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I like the last sentence of that…because although some of the other rantings of what I’m going to do when all is said and done have fallen by the wayside, I still believe in that sentence that I want this experience to change the person that I am, but my fear (more than the nerves I had before I even set foot in Bolivia) is still that I’m going to finish this and say, now could someone explain to me what that was all for?

Working Hard (on PC goals 2 and 3)

Yeah, those are the goals about the cultural exchange…sharing American culture with your host country and learning about Bolivian culture and sharing it with the Americans (my mode of communication is through this blog). Anyways, Pat and I have been having some busy social schedules lately although we haven’t accomplished too much in work. Yesterday I went into work to chat with my counterpart Vivian (unfortunately we didn’t accomplish the task we had planned on doing but we did some gossiping and planned on when I would go out in the city with her and her friends - *note my counterpart is a 25 year old very stylish fun-loving Bolivian woman)…afterwards I headed over to a children’s birthday party. Nicole was turning 7 years old (she’s one of the grandkids in the family) and Pat and I were invited. Not to mention that this past Monday we also went to a 2 year old’s birthday party (Emilio’s daughter – he’s one of our English students) and Pat’s birthday was on Thursday so I cooked her dinner and baked a cake that we shared with the family at my house and in her English class. Ahhh! Too many birthdays! Then today Pat and I went with Maria (one of our new friends that lives down the street from Pat that actually just came back from the U.S. about a month ago after living and working there for 3 years) to a mass for one of her old colleague’s (when she used to work in the school here in Tarata) father that had passed away last year. Let me tell ya, it is not just a mass, it is a social event. We went to the church here, followed by paying our respects at the cemetery, followed by a social gathering outside of the cemetery (chicha, empanadas, and wine included), and in a grand finale went over to the woman’s house for dinner (massive massive plates of noodles, chicken, chuños, veggies, potatoes, sauce, oh man). But no, the day is not complete without coming back to your own house to attend a matrimonial party…apparently the family I am living with has a good setup for parties so they apparently rented out the place for a matrimonial party complete with thumping band (my tin roof is vibrating from the bass as I type) and numerous guests (some which find it appropriate to pee randomly in the yard that separates my house from the main house where the party is being held). So Pat and I have definitely gotten into the swing of things and filled up our social calendars…graduations, birthday parties galore, and matrimonial parties. Good thing it’s acceptable in Bolivia to bring along random people (aka Pat and I) that clearly don’t look like they belong there. Pat, Maria and I were chatting about the reaction you would get in the U.S. if you brought along a random friend to a mass for your dead father. Haha, probably not so acceptable in the U.S…more like, who are you and why are you here rather than willing acceptance, kisses on the cheeks and offerings of chicha.

I’m quite surprised I don’t weigh 300 lbs yet and my teeth haven’t fallen out yet from my ridiculous sugar consumption. Sometimes you’re like, what…is…going…on. They definitely show that they care around here with food…and we’re not talking celery sticks and wheatgrass juice. The regular birthday party fare includes large slices of cake, served with plastic cups of jello (I’m thinking the ice cream substitute around here), and of course the beverage of choice is Pepsi…always. Then yesterday we followed up the cake and jello by beer combined with Pepsi…and a full dinner of roasted chicken with potatoes, corn on the cob, vegetables and rice. Heavy…pesado…really. I have to laugh sometimes like yesterday because I was making a HUGE effort to finish the food (it was really tasty but there’s only so much a person can eat)…and the funny part is that Pat has a tiny appetite compared to me so when I am having difficulty finishing the food I know she’s pretty much screwed (she should bring her plastic bag to shove leftovers in with her all the time…that’s what you’re supposed to do around here…like put it in a random plastic bag and say, I’m saving it for later). Then today I went for a walk with Nicole while the matrimonial party was going on and ate a popsicle! I can’t remember the last time I ate a popsicle…maybe after a soccer game in my childhood. Weird. Then I chewed a piece of bubble gum (REAL bubble gum) which I haven’t had in forever either. And then…of course I came into the house and was offered a full glass of…guess what…Pepsi…that I chugged down. At UBS I used to like to have a mid-afternoon Coke…but I think Bolivia will drive the love of soda out of me. It is difficult to think of a day that goes by where I don’t drink Pepsi or some other overly sweetened beverage in mass quantities. And forget about diet soda…people just don’t drink that crap around here. I bought a 2 liter of Coke Zero today at the tienda…figured would be nice on those hot days to have in my fridge and was chatting with Doña Sandra (my buddy that owns the store) about if people actually buy the stuff and she told me very infrequently. Actually I personally prefer regular Coke over diet or zero, but in the quantities that I already drink sugared soda in, I figured I might as well watch my svelte figure and throw some zero calorie beverages in there when I can. And as a side note, I drink whole milk here as well. Just don’t make fun of me when I come back to the U.S. a fat cow. Please.

Graduation Ceremony!

I recently attended a graduation ceremony for the alternative school run by a local NGO (kids that are over 18 that have to work so they can’t attend regular high school) with Pat at the invitation of one of our English students that was graduating. The ceremony was quite interesting and enjoyable since we got to observe Bolivian traditions in the process (such as having a parent or sibling escort you up to the stage when you get your name announced…Pat said it was like wedding/graduation ceremony in one, throwing white confetti on everyone’s head in celebration – including stuffing some into peoples’ mouths if you can get it in, and the celebratory toast with wine for the graduates on the stage).

There was some humorous moments of course…one being when one of the students in my English class got an honorary diploma and I wanted to take a picture with her and her daughter (who is also in my English class) and I poked a random guy and asked him if he could take a picture for us and he flat out refused. I just stood there with my mouth hanging open a bit at the outright rejection…then was afraid to ask anyone else lest I would be snubbed twice. But of course there’s always the random celebrity moment to make you feel a bit better about yourself and have some reassurance that not everyone hates you…as Pat and I were leaving, one of the recent graduates (who I didn’t know at all) asked to have his picture taken with me which I of course granted. At least I made someone’s day.