Yeah Packages!

So I should start by saying thank you for the care packages and letters so far! It is a little strange but for some reason no matter when they are sent that all arrive at the Peace Corps office on the same day. I have no idea how I am going to carry that all back to our house on my bike. Seriously you all have no idea how nice it is to get mail, that being said though we know sending packages is very very expensive so please don't feel pressured to do it often, except maybe our parents:) Also we should be set on bug spray and post it notes for awhile so thanks for that! If you want to send something and don't want to go broke the letters and cards make our day there is just something special about getting mail, we will be sending things soon I will explain our upcoming schedule in a sec. If you still need ideas for care packages things we could always use are food treats, toiletries, and clothes. I know clothes are hard to buy for other people but we go through them fast here and they are very expensive in Belize. It is always hot so think about that when buying clothes. Also, I have already ruined 3-4 white shirts with pit stains, dust, and other random things. Cisco just ripped is nice khakis jumping a fence to get to the Chiney store quicker, and I bleached a new polo to destruction. Also shoes will not last long on these rocks and dirt because we walk and bike everywhere. If you want more info. on clothes let us know and we will provide it otherwise again just thanks for everything thus far I was grinning from ear to ear today opening things!

So these are the last weeks of training, yeah!!! For the last 10 days we have been living with a new host family in Belmopan, our new home, and working with our counterparts. The counterparts are the people that help us know what the hell we are doing at our projects, but they are not our employers because we are volunteers. I say that because when I went into my school there had been some misunderstandings and I was being introduced as the new music teacher and expected to work a normal school day which is not what a PCV is supposed to do. Teaching here isn't entirely sustainable b/c when we finish the help ends there. So I had to have an awkward conversation right way to recommunicate exprectations and now I think we are sort of on the same track. I will be writing lesson plans and curriculum for the teachers, demonstating lessons, then evaluating them as they teach the same lessons. Also, I will be directing a summer expressive art's camp for 5-10 year olds, co directing a marching band this summer, starting a school choir, starting a recorder choir (God help me), and learning how to assemble 7 violins and teaching them to the students that are interested. Also, (yes there's more) they want me to help on the high school if possible, which I'm not doing until I have gotten a handle on things at the primary school. In addition, I would like to help with girl guides(girl scouts sort of) in the community and with Cisco's center on conflict resolution. I won't go in to much about Cisco's program because he is super excited and I will let him share it with you, but his counterpart is very nice and he has already gotten very involved. He has also helped with the chess club twice and plans to attend the literacy program next week.

To continue with our schedule next week we are back in the smelly, moldy, Garden City Hotel to finish our last week of training called bridge to service. By the way the hotel is like 100 yards from our host families house but we still have to stay there because we are at the mercy of the government's rules. After bridge to service on May 28th we get sworn in at the governor general's house and it is a very special and formal ceremony. Even better after that is over we play a futbol games new volunteers against old ones. Cisco is heading up our team and frankly under his leadership I think we are going to kick booty. Even better after our victory we will be going to the U.S. Ambassador's house where his wife cooks us a huge celebratory meal and everyone says it is the party of the year. And last but not least after consuming large quantities of alcohol with the ambassador we consume more with all of the PCV's in Belize and have a big dance party. To any students that are reading this of course I will only be participating in the dancing and abstaining from the alcohol or having one responsible glass of wine and quitting after that. When we are officially sworn in as volunteers our schedule literally says "off to your sites and good luck". Then we are on our own. Exciting stuff.

Other things we are doing... I have started yoga once a week at the peace corps office. Marla, the wife of Bryan, the super cool guy that gives us the session on development, is the instructor (that was a lot of commas). My first class was so great she lights insense, turns off the lights, and puts on the soothing music and walks us through yoga flow (i forget the other name for it buy I will find out). We did it for like an hour and a half and I was sweating like a pig. At one point my hands were sweating so bad that if I had to hold downward facing dog for one second longer they would have renamed the move, falling on her face bruised up kathryn. Tonight and tomorrow I will be judging the festival of the arts musical category for all the primary schools in Belmopan, this should be very interesting.  This weekend we are meeting a guy to check out a potential future house. Everyone tells how great this place is, and it is furnished, and the rest if pretty reasonable. Even more exciting for me it is in a village called San Martin that is close to where we work but not directly in the city and it is primarily Spanish speaking.

So we have definitely had our ups and downs, especially me because I was disappointed with our site and my job initially, but we are working on getting the right attitude and diving in head first.  This experience so far has been nothing and everything I thought it would be, it is very hard to explain. We are learning so much and we look forward to keeping you are part of the experience. Love you all and miss you!

Adios,
Kathryn

Bike Day!

So today is a big day for us. We've spent more money today than we have in total since we've been in country. Well, maybe not, I'm not that diligent about keeping track of our money. I'm sure I could figure it out, bu--wait, you don't want to hear me ranting! Never fear! Return to topic: We just bought brand new bicycles! In addition to the bikes themselves we also bought locks and sweet chrome fenders. Chrome fenders, you say? Are we really that concerned with appearances? Well, yes and no. Yes we're worried about appearances, at least to the extent that during the rainy season we won't want to have brown race-stripes down our backs. But we'll still be the nerds wearing helmets since Peace Corps vehemently implores volunteers to wear them. And don't worry, we picked ours up already so we don't have to ride home without them.

Also, I've been in the George Price Center for Peace and Development three days in a row now. I cannot tell you how incredible this place is. Not only does it have a computer lab with free high-speed internet, but it also has air-conditioning and a library geared specifically towards peace, development, and Belize. IN-credible. I'm also learning more and more about my program by the day. Apparently it has already been piloted in some area schools, and there is also a curriculum already made. So mostly my job will be making the contacts with other groups and organizations around the country, teach them the mechanics of the program, and letting them implement them with schools, groups, etc... Still a daunting task, but very, very doable.

Kathryn's situation is a little more tenuous. While her project is being sponsored by the Governor General, her focus seems to be on one school specifically. They really want her to teach classes herself, but realistically it's a much more sustainable and worthwhile endeavor for her to teach other teachers in the music basics. She has a lot of resources, though. They have donated recorders, donated steel drums, and even donated string instruments! In fact, it's unfortunate that she has those string instruments because they aren't even assembled and will have to be sent to Guatemala for that before they can even be used! Not to mention she isn't a string specialist, but I'm sure she'll learn. She's really excited about the prospect of writing a curriculum guide for teaching music, though. Something that can stay here after she's gone and will allow children to learn the joy of music has to be the pinnacle of success for her assignment.

Ok insert remark here by Kathryn: Cisco is a beautiful and very diplomatic writer and has not captured my feelings about my assignment in this blog for propriety's sake. I was not expecting to teach music or even be involved with it full time so I am surprised, to say the very least. If you are interested in how I really feel jot me an email, and I can fill you in. And now back to his post...

Finally, we're now living with a new host family in Belmopan. There is the Guatemalan grandfather who doesn't speak English, the mother who runs a small restaurant (think on the scale of a place in a mall food court), a son, a daughter, and a live-in maid. We live in the downstairs portion in the room next to the grandfather, but everyone else lives upstairs. We have tons of space, and they've been wonderful thus far. Even so, we're missing Succotz and our two other families.

Okay, this will be finally, I promise! I'm reading a book lent to me from Brian Dwyer, one of the Peace Corps staff who went to another PA Christian school (I can't remember which one) and served in the PC in El Salvador, entitled Oscar Romero: The Violence of Love. It's a collection of sermon & writing excerpts from Oscar Romero, former Archbishop of San Salvador, El Salvador. If you don't know who he is, Wikipedia him and be in awe. I'll close this time with a little humdinger he said seven years to-the-day before I was born:

"Even when they call us mad,
when they call us subversives and communists
and all the epithets they put on us,
we know that we only preach
the subversive witness of the Beatitudes,
which have turned everything upside down
to proclaim blessed the poor,
blessed the thirsting for justice,
blessed the suffering.
May 11, 1978


Peace,
Cisco

And the Drumroll Please...

It is without further ado that I would like to announce our Peace Corps placement. This will be where we live and our job assignments for the mext two years. Are you nervous? Do you have any expectations? Do you think we're working with schools, youth groups, or something else? Are we up north, down south, or somewhere else? Would you like to venture a guess???















WE ARE LIVING IN BELMOPAN! If you guessed it, it's probably because it's the capital city and I'm not sure how many cities people in the states would know about! We've already been in the capital a good bit and won't be "roughing it" in the traditional sense. Most things are available here, and we're pretty much in the center of the country. We have one of the biggest bus stations and are also in town with the Peace Corps office. I'm incredibly excited. But the best is yet to come.

My job is with the George Price Center for Peace and Development, and my primary assignment is helping to develop a conflict resolution cirriculum that can be used in classrooms as well as a cirriculum for teachers to assist them in teaching conflict resolution. The project will be piloted in the Belmopan schools with the hope of then integrating it country-wide. Wow. So now it's your turn to point me towards people and places that can assist me in finding material to learn more about conflict resolution. I'm still jittery from learning all of this. I think I've always been interested in this sort of thing, but now it's going to be necessary to learn more. So like I said, who knows about this stuff?

Kathryn will be working with Our Lady of Guadelupe Primary School. Apparently the school is literally withing walking distance from my site. Her job will entail helping integrate music in schools--everything from primary to secondary schools, choirs to bands to string-classes. It's been mandated, I think, by the Governor General, the Queen of England's representative here in Belize (Queen is technically the head of state; but like England, she holds no real political powers.) We have heard the Governor General specifically request a Peace Corps Volunteer to help him with this project.

I'm really surprised that we're both working on such over-arching projects. I'm a bit overwhelmed, but soooooo excited. Alright, I need to stop this. I just used the "so" with mutiple o's. I must be ranting. I hope all is well at home. Please tell me what you're thinking and feeling! And thanks for everyone being so communicative. I think I'm hearing from most of you more than I would at home.

Peace,
Cisco

Hola amigas y familia

So this is a big week. On Friday we find out where we will be living for the next two years and what our primary projects will be. That also means that our training will be over soon and we will be on our own. Well not really on our own, we live with a new host family in our new town for a least another month then we can start looking for our own place. We will miss Succotz and our host family. We have been spoiled, our family is so kind and so good at cooking. I feel like I really have become close to my host mom Marisol and her mother and son in the last few weeks, I don't want to leave them. I will also miss our beautiful village, with its gorgeous river, friendly people, and running water (most of the time).

In the last week like Cisco I have finished a presentation in front of 18 volunteers entirely in Spanish, a community service project which I will talk more about soon, a presentation in front of my peer group, and this Sunday I do a presentation in front of the youth band I am working with. Also, on Saturday morning we will be throwing a goodbye fiesta for our host families. It has been a busy and slightly stressful two weeks. The stress here is very different, even when I am busy I still have time to take naps, and read for hours each day. So far I am not disliking the slower lifestyle, I have already read 8 books. Which by the way are a great thing to send as long as you don't want them back. Any kind really we have enough time to try them all. So, this community service event was a learning experience. Cisco, Roma, Elsa, and myself the four peace corps volunteers in our town organized a trash pick up day in our village with the two youth groups we are working with. We had to do it at 2 because that is when they usually meet and is most convenient. Of course, that was during the hottest part of the day and we walked around picking up trash for 2 and a half hours in the 98 degree sun. Also, keeping the kids working and motivated was no small task, and of course none of them remembered to bring bags and gloves. It was not an easy day but I would call it a successful one. We collected around 30 bags of trash and the kids more tired but I think proud of themselves. Also, planning events like this with other people that you still don't know very well is very challenging and a learning experience in a of itself.

On a completely different note I want to keep sharing things specific to Belize because I want all of you to be a part of our learning experience.

The youth unemployment rate is 21 %
65% of the population is under 30 years of age
The HIV rate is 2.8-3.4% of the population
In 2008 20% of people with HIV/AIDS were between 15-24 years old
More than 50% of teachers are untrained
From 1990 to 2004 the literacy rate went from 89% to 75%
According to The Economist Pocket Book Belize is the murder capital of the world, Belizeans don't believe this to be true, neither do I.
Domestic violence and sexual abuse are serious problems with the women and children in Belize, I don't have statistics on this yet but I can assure you the stats are terrible.

This information isn't to paint a negative picture of Belize it is just reality. There are lots of things that need to be fixed, that's why we're here! That's why PCV's are placed here instead of Iceland (one of the top developed countries in the world)

Also some food for thought. One session we have each Friday is Development with Bryan, it is our favorite session of the week and we always look forward to it. Development can be defined loosely as aims to meet human needs while preserving the environment so that these needs can be met not only in the present, but also for future generations. This is exactly what we are being called to address as volunteers so each week we discuss the reasons we became volunteers and ways to help with sustainable development. One question I thought was especially interesting and I would be interested in your thoughts is
"Should a soccer mom in the US care about the living conditions for kids in one of the most impoverished villages in Belize, why or why not? Please feel free to share and if you want to share with us but not everybody just put that in your post and we will read it but not post it. Please be honest about your answer we heard some good arguments for both sides and I am curious about how people in the states feel.

Well one more unrelated thing, I want to wish all my Western High School graduates CONGRATULATIONS! I am not sure what day ya'll graduate but I know it happened or happens soon and I miss you all and am so proud of you. Please email me about where you are going, what your major is, and who your living with everything, I want to keep up with you. Thanks so much to those of you that have sent messages and emails I love hearing from you. And CONGRATULATIONS to all the teachers that made it through another year your almost done:)

Until we meet again, adios mis amigos,
Kathryn