July 9th, 2006- Where to begin...

Things that I am still struggling to figure out:

 Spanish- and to think I have been learning it for ten years.
 How my host mom gets my clothes cleaner by scrubbing them with her hands for a few minutes, as opposed to using a washing machine. Question to ponder: do washing machines actually work?
 Why when I am only making $2 a day, I insist on spending it on chocolate or Inca Kola, which tastes like fermented toothpaste.
 Why no one drinks plain water here, and why Peruvians make fun of me for
keeping hydrated with a water bottle.
 Why we only eat potatoes upon potatoes upon potatoes when Peru seems to
have the most diverse fruit and vegetable selection I’ve ever witnessed. If they are not exporting these things, what use do they go towards?
 Why I am only fully experiencing two emotions/states of being: hunger and
exhaustion.
 How this new fruit we discovered looks like snot but tastes really delicious. Is it passion fruit, or a greenish relative of the pomegranate? Who knows!
 Why people here blast music and participate in marching bands right outside of my window at 5am (regularly, even on week nights).
 Why my host sister lets the babies play on cement stairs unsupervised.
 Why, when we all smell something a little funky, that it is invariably me, who has stepped in dogshit.

The curse

The other day our medical director gave us quite the comprehensive presentation on diarrhea, and a day later, it seems that half of us have it worse than anyone can imagine. Did he curse us by overinforming us, or is this just what life as a Peace Corps volunteer is all about? Here, there is no such thing as normal diarrhea, it only really exists in an acute form. Statistics collected over the last few years indicate that volunteers serving in my region have a 122% chance of contracting acute diarrhea. That number is so large that my brain was having trouble processing it, until, of course, I got it (acute diarrhea, not the concept). In the states, bowel movements are considered a private entity, but here, they are a hot conversation topic, so excuse me for being what some people in the states might consider crude and inappropriate. In order to get a clear picture of what my experience here is like, though, it is necessary for me to write about this at least once. And believe me you, hearing about it is nowhere near as painful as experiencing it. If you are wondering what the difference between acute and regular diarrhea is, here is the one difference that I noticed. When you have regular diarrhea, it really sucks, but you can at least envision how good life will be when it’s over. With acute diarrhea, you don’t have the energy or optimism to even value life, and death feels like a more comfortable and appealing option. I know that I have a slight knack for exaggeration, but this is no embellishment.

So…how exactly can this acute form be prevented? There are a few ways. One is to wash your hands a lot. This seems simple enough, but soap in public bathrooms is hit or miss (by that, I mean just miss), and nobody really emphasizes hand washing before cooking or after using the restroom. Do you know how we think it is such a big deal when we are in a public bathroom in the states, and from the stall, we hear someone leave the bathroom without washing their hands? If you are anything like me, you run out of the bathroom to get a good look at the dirty culprit, and then proceed to tell whoever you are with that it is simply despicable how many people fail to wash their hands after bathroom usage, such as the person you just witnessed doing so in the bathroom. Well, if I were to run to my friends after each time I encountered that circumstance here in Peru, there would be no time left to discuss anything else. We learned in training that hand washing reduces the risk of diarrhea by 40%. If I were wealthy, I would put a large chunk of my savings towards having that fact advertised all around Peru, if not just to keep Peace Corps volunteers from getting sick. Another way of preventing diarrhea is to not consume tap water or anything that has touched it. That, for us, is impossible to monitor since our host families are cooking for us. To reduce your risk further, we were advised not to eat food off the street (from street vendors, not literally off the road). One kid in my group got really ill because he insisted on eating ceviche (raw fish) from the street, when we were specifically told not to since we are not near the coast. I fooled myself into thinking that if I was just really careful about eating food outside the house, that I would be fine. So naïve I am. Thank goodness Cipro is included in our medical kits.

Anyway, onto more pleasant topics…Well actually, forget about the pleasantries for the time being. This illness has put me in a pessimistic frame of mind, and I’d rather just vent for this entire entry. Last night, my family had a huge party starting at 5pm and ending at 4am for my host grandson’s first birthday and baptism. I, of course, felt like death at around 11pm, and went upstairs and collapsed. Any progress that I had formerly made with my family was wiped out by my being a “party pooper.” If I could have come downstairs, I really would have, but dancing in the fetal position did not seem feasible, so instead, I formed a tiny ball with my body and slept. Today, I awoke to my family raving about how great some of the other Peace Corps volunteers were for staying and dancing until 4:30am, asking questions such as, “Lindsay, what is the name of that friend of yours, the one we nicknamed ‘the dancing queen’,” and “what about your other friend who was the life of the party after you disappeared?” What I am trying to say is that I have been unfairly pegged as the lamest person in all of Santa Eulalia, so now on top of all of my other projects, I have to attempt to prove that I am the real dancing queen of this town (because I am), and that I am the life of the party, not whoever else they were referring to. What a mess. I have noticed that people are very judgmental in this town. We are expected to come here and be culturally sensitive, but I feel like this sensitivity is not reciprocated at all, at least not in my case with my family. It’s hard functioning under the scrutiny of other people’s judgment, especially when it is nearly impossible to explain away any misunderstandings that inevitably occur when you are living within the confines of another culture. I have never put so much energy towards something, only to have the progress be so minute, and so easy to negate. ARGHHHHH!!!!!

Additionally, I am having trouble finding outlets here, because while I am superb at comforting myself in the states, not many comforts exist here. Most times, my family does not allow me to go out because they say that the town we live in is too dangerous. This is giving me cabin fever like you wouldn’t believe. When they do agree to me going out, there is nothing really appealing to do. There are 3 discotecas, but they are only open on weekends. There are no cafes, cool areas to explore, movie theaters, book stores, NOTHING, not even restaurants really. And the saddest thing about it is that this is technically considered a city, so imagine my actual site placement! I am going to have to take up basket weaving, or something else that takes a lot of time and attention. Sometimes when I am tense I ask myself, “Why don’t you take a warm shower and relax,” but then I remember that showers have become my most dreaded activity here. The water is so icy cold that my scalp and brain can only handle about 2 minutes of shower time, meaning that I never get all of the shampoo out. Forget about conditioner when I can’t even bear rinsing the shampoo out. That’s right, major buildup. Please, please, PLEASE, if you have any suggestions about how I can relax on bad days (don’t say reading, because depressingly enough, I couldn’t fit any books into my suitcase), send them in my direction. If you want to write your creative ideas in a letter to me, below is my address…
Lindsay Buck
Suffering Lane
Hell, Peru

I’m kidding, but today was a seriously bad day. Luckily, I have found a friend (who thank my lucky stars, is my neighbor as well) named Kristen who is just as neurotic as me, and we have come up with a plan to combat our ¨Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Days¨ (What a good book that is, no? Ah...memories!). Since single days here can sometimes be difficult, we are micromanaging one day at a time, in order to not dwell too much on the fact that we will be here for more than TWO FULL YEARS. Some of our goals are to not call family on our bad days (as to avoid having them buy us one way tickets back to the states), not to consistently eat the nearby tiendas out of chocolate bars or beer, exercising daily, and planning at least 3 things per week that excite us. These goals all sound much simpler than they are, trust me. This week, we have our first trip to Lima planned, and it just so happens that Lima has a Pizza Hut, a Starbucks and….drumroll puhlease….a DUNKIN DONUTS!!!! What luck, and yes, I plan on paying each of those places a visit, along with any other eatery that strikes my fancy along the way. I hope we can catch a movie while we are there, too. I hope we don’t get “jacked up” while we are there, though. “Jacked up” is a phrase that our staff uses to encapsulate the dangers of Lima. I haven’t listened to what this means, because I am frightened enough as is. I guess we just shouldn’t wear jewels or bring our cameras, which bums me out, because I have already missed out on so many good pics because we are discouraged from bringing our cameras out too much.