Stress Makes Me Clever (A Haiku)
Each day it's clearer;
My theme for the next two years:
f-LEXI-bilidad.
Site Visits! Whoa. That pretty much sums that up. Things are going to be good- but not yet. My site is really pretty, with a (suprisingly clean) river running through it and palm trees all over (my favorite =]). The people are nice enough, although still fairly intimidating in their sheer unfamiliarity and...differentness. My counterpart is super nice, and I think she'll be a great resource in terms of support and hospitality.
As for work...I have really no idea. It's just me and my counterpart in teh (phoneless, internetless, printerless) office and in the three days I was there I spent one in a community watching a taller for men on women's rights, on ein the office listening to my counterpart argue with the man who gave the taller about everything under the sun, and the third briefly meeting members of the muni...and getting my nails done. I'm still not completely sure what it is I'll be doing hut I think once I get going it'll start to get clearer (let's hope).
As for the new living situation... I had two options to choose from, so my counterpart took me to look at them both when we got to my site on tuesday night. The first option was an apartmnet above a family's house, which would have been nice but expensive. No matter, because when we got there the family pulled out the old "Fijese Que..." (loose translation: we're about to tell you had news but Guatemalan etiquette doesn't allow us to just come out and tell you so we're going to hmm and haw a little bit but get ready because you're not gonna like it)- their son had decided to move into the apartment but they had a room I could use if I wanted (BUT, they made sure to tell me fifteen times, if I wanted to choose the other place, that would really be okay). The room was literally a cube with a broken bed crammed into it and no light. They also pointed out that there was no room for a stove (an obvious observation seeing as there wasn't even enough room for ME in the room), to which my counterpart replied that they would have to share their kitchen. Their response: "Oh, I don't think she would like that..." So, I got the message pretty clear that the other option was, really, my only option.
So, to Dona Silvia's I went. Dona Silvia is a seventy-something year old woman who lives with her husband (apparently irrelevant, as everyone calls the house Dona Silvia's) and had volunteers stay with her in the 80's. SHe remembers every thing about every one of them, including where they live now and teh names of all their children and probably, if I asked her, their favorite colors. My room is fine, but the closet is full of their belongings so it looks like I'll be living out of my suitcases for a while. It's certainly not home- and a far cry away from my Guatemalan home which I am more or less heartbroken to be leaving, but it will do.
Volunteers all say that the first 3 months of service are the hardest, and I can see that that's going to be true, but in the mean time I'm comforting myself with the knowledge that everyone else is freaking out about as much, if not more, than I am (thank God for text messaging and the simple correspondence of mutal "WTF?!" sentiments), getting excited to spend the next two years fighting for women's rights, and enjoying my last week here in San Luis with my family.
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