Happy New Year!

My boys after we picked up trash from the field
Grade six with their nature art
My dad and Randolph
Nature art-ing

Jerome's artwork

A view from Ottleys. My kids shows me a trail that goes all the way up the mountain which I never knew about
Zach and I made a magnificent hole on the beach. Tourists actually asked to take pictures of it when we were finished.
Hiking up Ottley's trail
A couple of ladies at J'ouvert
My EC 78 crew!
you gotta get painted
Christmas breakfast at the church I attend
I had a week-long camp for my 5th graders during the break. They're watching the movie "Up". (thanks, mom!)
This is Jah Cure, a Jamaican artist who came to perform in St. Kitts. We tracked him down after the concert and hung out with him for a bit
Kim getting me situated at J'ouvert
J'ouvert Joy!
The volunteers. I'm not really sure why I couldn't turn and face the camera, but look at that sun coming up!
Morning time
Friends and volunteers at Thanksgiving. My dad is chatting with his new friend, David.
Playing games at Thanksgiving
Socializing at Thanksgiving

(As always, the pictures can be enlarged if you click on them. Sorry they are all weirdly ordered, I’m not really sure how to organize them)




Whew!

Hello to everybody and happy, happy New Year! I hope everyone’s holidays were full of warmth and togetherness. I miss my friends and family from home so very much and I can’t believe it’s only nine months until I’m home for good! I’m trying to live in the moment, but the anticipation of being surrounded by the truly familiar cannot help but occasionally bubble up to the surface and create tiny bursts of excitement.

As far as my life here, things have been quite well. I go through unpredictable bouts of loving it here and not being able to imagine myself anywhere else, or being induced into an agoraphobic state, unable to go outside and face the sweltering heat or the roller coaster traffic. Loneliness sometimes overcomes me and creates a self-perpetuating cycle of avoiding people because I’m sad, and being sad because I’m avoiding people. However, regardless of whatever listless state I’m in, leaving the house to go to the school almost always rewards itself. The kids effortlessly and unintentionally lift my spirits and remind me quickly why I endure the homesickness, heat, and island fever.

The after-school program is going quite well. My fifth graders have written a play that we intend to have ready to perform by May. I am so incredibly proud of them for what they have created. All I asked them to do was focus on issues that are creating negativity in St. Kitts and Nevis and they came up with four different topics that will be performed as short acts in the play. Their ideas were:

-A kid moves to St. Kitts (from Alaska, mind you) and gets bullied and feels very alone, so he decides to join a gang. The gang members pressure him to commit a crime and he decides to not do it, so the gang members come after him and make it very difficult for him to leave the gang.

-Two girls fight over a new boy at school and allow him to ruin their friendship. The teacher has to intervene and mend their friendship back together

-A woman who is HIV positive shows up for her first day at work and everyone is really rude to her. She hears a group of people talking about her in the next room and saying how scared they are of getting HIV and how they don’t want to touch her desk. She calls her brother and cries about how hard it is to be discriminated against and how ignorant they are to think they can contract the virus through casual contact. (In true, dramatic fashion) the woman dies and the co-workers are sad they never got to apologize so they go to her brother’s house and become friends.

-The fourth act is going to be on littering and the kids want to exhibit their artistic side, so we’re going to use materials that would otherwise be trash and create a visual lesson on how garbage and littering affects St. Kitts and Nevis.

I am pretty sure that writing the play is the easiest part, since it involves the kids sitting down and just verbally expunging their bounty of imaginative thoughts, and I tremble at the thought of organizing these kids and keeping them focused on memorizing lines, overcoming stage fright, building a set, making costumes, etc. Even just typing that made my palms sweaty. I’m really hoping I can get some of the other teachers to help me, but they usually rush home right after school to retrieve their own children and take care of their homes. We shall see..

Grade six has gravitated away from theater and I’m finding that hands-on activities keep them more occupied and pacified. Our projects are based on building things out of natural or recycled resources. I think I already briefly touched on this plan, but so far we have made nature art by going out and gathering only things found in nature like flowers, seeds, leaves, and sand, to paste on colored paper and make art. They loved it and were way more enthusiastic about this project than I ever expected. We are now working on making kites out of recycled materials. In the sugar cane fields there are these really tall grass-like rods that are perfect for drying and using as the frame for a kite. Last week we went walking and picked a ton of them and this week we plan to use those and cut up used plastic bags and make kites. Luckily I have one of the teachers helping me with this project because I honestly have never even flown a kite let alone made one from scratch.

For my high school program, STYLE, my persistence has yielded a slight success, yet I am still hesitant to feel completely re-assured. A guidance counselor from the school called me last week and explained that she understood I was having a lot of difficulty gaining momentum with STYLE and that she has been wanting to start a boys and girl club, so why don’t we just umbrella that project under STYLE and work together. GENIUS! This is the exact ingredient for a potentially sustainable project that I was hoping and waiting for. To have a guidance counselor approach me instead of the other way around is more important than I ever could have understood. She is now a willfully invested partner in this endeavor, instead of me begging her to become enthusiastic towards something that I alone conjured up. She also has the instant credibility of being a born and raised Kittitian, a guidance counselor, and she has already formed acquaintance with many of the parents we will be in communication with. Even things as simple as having a school printer, phone, and contacts lists make a world of a difference in the expediency of this project. Now, I have a group of two high school counselors and Charles who works for the Ministry of Education and was with me from the inception of STYLE. We met last week and outlined the projects we would like to complete by May which include: beautifying the school by adding flowers, classroom decorations (the walls are completely bare and covered in graffiti which creates a very uninspired learning environment), creating a new mural to paint on the main wall of the school, finishing painting the basketball court, and having a song-writing competition that focuses on non-violence. All of these projects will be completed by the selected students as community service and we will reward them with field trips, social gatherings, and beach trips.

As far as my non-work related life, I have been soaking up the last Carnival experience for my Peace Corps service. Carnival season is a time that people all over the island look forward to, even if they are steadfast Christians who refuse to partake in the jammin'. While some may not agree with they partying,nthe laid-back attitude and essence of celebration and relaxation seeps into the atmosphere making everyone a little less stressed. Work slows down to a crawl while the pulse in Basseterre is revved up and energized. Rarely is there a reason to be hanging around in town after dark, but during Carnival season everyone comes out dressed in their finest. Street corners are lined with people selling cook-up, barbecued chicken, and other local favorites, the music is blaring so loudly you can feel it pulsating in your chest, and the streets are too congested to even attempt to drive through because the party has the right of way during Carnival.

J’ouvert was another memorable success yet again. There was a jungle theme this year and although the turn out wasn’t what I remembered from last year, we made the best of it and jammed ‘til the sun came up. I know I explained the premise of J’ouvert last year, but I cannot say it enough that this is the most coveted, anticipated, and celebrated event for me and my fellow volunteers, and really, for most of St. Kitts. The pictures will explain the message that I cannot portray through words.


I hope everyone has a wonderful 2010. We are entering a new decade and I am humbled by the intrepidness of time. Let’s live every moment to its fullest and bask in the joy of the presence, because tomorrow is here before you know it.

Much love and paz,
Alisa

More than halfway there!

Picture descriptions (These were mostly stolen from Kelsey because my camera is inoperative):
1. Titanic pose! yes, we proudly spent 20$ on this tacky souvenir. Pay note of the magnet with the late great Fuzzy's picture above it.
2. Pose again
3. Our lovely friend Albertus who was responsible for the prank below
4. On the night before Halloween we told Albertus we would be leaving the next day and we wanted him to make us a special towel animal for the occasion. He said he could do a big one but he didn't want to frighten us. We told him we love being scared and not to worry, so that night we came home kind of late and opened our door to find all the lights off but the TV on and THIS GUY sitting there staring at us. we both screamed and i quickly shut the door while kelsey ran screaming to the other end of the hall. We miss Albertus
5. Our bus ride in Dominica
6. A village in Dominica
7. A terrible view of St. Thomas in our bus on the way to K-Mart!
8. Drinking fresh Dominican water
9. Me and Kelsey at Trafalgar Falls
10. Trying not to fall in the falls
11. Me and Kelsey with a view of Roseau in the background
12. Walking to the not-so-close village to catch a bus
13. Dominica: The land of rivers
14. Trying to assess the situation

Two months since my last blog, and I unfortunately have very little to report on. I’ve been waiting to update this thing in hopes that something new will happen or I will have some exciting miracle at work that will send me rushing to my computer to report the good news. That is far from the case, and I’m going through a dismal pessimistic plateau of frustration, homesickness, and stagnation at work. At this time last year I was going through a similar period, but it was more connected to being in my own place and trying to figure out what I’m doing here, and this year the tiredness is a byproduct of a year of learning what it is really like to work here.
I love St. Kitts and I don’t want to portray the wrong idea when I sometimes go on a negative rant. I have to pick my words very carefully because I am speaking to people whose maybe only perception of St. Kitts stems from what I live to tell on this blog. The experience of a Peace Corps volunteer living in the countryside is a polar opposite to what a travel blog might tell. I recently went on a cruise with another volunteer, Kelsey, which was quite an experience. We wanted to find a way to travel to the different islands in an economical way. Flights to other islands can be as high as $250 US and we figured taking a cruise that cost $450 which included food and “entertainment” would be the best way to see the Eastern Caribbean. I have always hated the idea of cruises and while I had an amazing time with Kelsey and savored every minute of endless food, we found ourselves unable to get into the cruise life and mentality.
First of all, the idea of spending 8 hours in a country left us feeling unfulfilled, at best. I can now understand why people respond with “You’re so luck you’re going to get a two year vacation in the Caribbean” when I tell them I’m serving in St. Kitts. Most people disembark the ship and take a taxi straight to the beach or wherever they have planned their island excursion. Because Kelsey and I were on a bit of a budget, we had to use local transportation which does not take you to the gorgeous white sand beaches. In St. Thomas we took the local bus to K-Mart to stock up on cleaning supplies and toiletries because they’re incredibly expensive in St. Kitts. It was so humorous to share stories with our dinner table because they would tell us about the sea turtles, the snorkeling, and the sail boats, and we would tell them about the local bus system, how excited we were to see street lights, or the side streets in the capital city that sold fake leather booty-shorts. The couple we had dinner with every night, Dave and Jessica, were incredibly sweet and fun to hang out with, but our experiences were just so incredibly different, even though Kelsey and I were also on a vacation. One day in Antigua, Dave and Jessica decided to walk to the beach instead of taking a taxi. The trip was longer than expected, and they fond themselves in a local village much like where we live. They were so amazed to see that people live in shacks and there are goats, chickens, and cows wandering around uncontained. This was normalcy to us and I was so surprised that people don’t realize that outside of the resorts there is actual poverty in these places and local people don’t live in timeshares and drink daiquiris all day.
Dominica was by far my favorite island and I would love to travel back one day. It is so unique to the Caribbean and I found myself loving the change of scenery. Going on a trip to the Caribbean when you’ve been living in the Caribbean doesn’t really feel like traveling, so we were both very excited to be in a place that felt unfamiliar and new. Dominica is called the Nature Island, and with good reason. The mountains are so obstructing that they make you wonder what is on the other side. In St. Kitts we just have one tall peak and a few large hills which were dwarfed by the size of Dominica’s cascading mountains. We walked around the capital city of Roseau for a while and came across the Peace Corps office which was a home away from home. The woman working there told us how to catch a bus up to Trafalgar Falls. I was so amazed that a bus ride for one US dollar could take us to such a beautiful place, but it makes sense considering everywhere in Dominica is a natural oasis. After hanging out in the falls for a while Kelsey and I realized we should head back to catch a bus. On the way down the very steep hill, Kelsey fell in a way I can only describe as James Brown doing the splits, which necessitated a pause and several minutes of laughter. I saw out of my peripheral vision a bus driving off but figured there would be another one shortly. WRONG. A man standing close to where the bus left said we’d have to walk to the next village. “No problem!” we thought and decided to walk, taking our sweet time and admiring the scenery and one particularly defensive crab on the side of the road. After about 30 minutes and no village in sight I started feeling a little bit anxious, and then a taxi came by full of people from our ship and the taxi man asked if we were heading to the cruise ship. We told him yes but we were walking to catch a bus to which he laughed and sped off. That was catalyst that sent me into a panic.
We started speed-walking like grandparents exercising in the mall and after about 20 minutes we finally reached the village and were told a bus would be coming shortly. We sat at the local bar and had a local beer and enjoyed the local experience, but no bus came. Soon enough a taxi came with a couple who were also headed to the ship, and we got to catch the last leg of their tour as well as a free ride back to home base.
I have found that while I’ve been here I crave the things I cannot have, even if I truly don’t even want them. Excessive amounts of food, especially heavily processed food that I am not used to, leaves me feeling sick and depressed. Huge crowds of people make me tired and crabby so being in a place like the Plazas Las Americas in Puerto Rico, the largest shopping mall in the Caribbean, put me on the verge of a childish tantrum. Sometimes I encounter the panicky feeling of being stuck on a deserted island because so much in St. Kitts is brought in from the outside at incredibly expensive prices. It’s as if we’re entirely dependent on the outside and should crave that which we cannot immediately have or provide for ourselves. In reality, I have become comfortable without having 40 different restaurants to choose from or 10 different types of the same shirt. I can see why Kittitians will take vacations outside to buy what they need and return with packed suitcases to the safe haven that feels like home. We simply don’t need so many choices, places, and changes, and it only clutters and complicates our lives.
I was recently speaking with a friend, Melva, who works at Ottley’s Plantation Inn in my village, and she was telling me about her trip to Oklahoma to visit her daughter who is going to school. She said it was a very depressing trip and the only touristy things she did was see the Memorial for the Oklahoma City bombing and another memorial for a very large fire that had occurred some time ago. Then she told me her sister insisted they go to IHOP for breakfast so she apprehensively obliged. When they arrived she was met with longest line she had ever seen and asked her sister what on Earth everyone was waiting for? She thought it was a special occasion or maybe someone famous was there. Her sister just replied, “Oh, they’re just in line for breakfast. It’s always like that! IHOP is so popular.” This was something incredibly nonsensical and unusual to her. Why not just go to the store and buy eggs and cook them? I know how to cook eggs and I doubt the IHOP chef can do it any better! Why do we have to wait in a long line so someone else can cook us breakfast??
It seemed like such a normal idea to me, to wait in line at a restaurant to have someone serve you, but now I can fully understand the ridiculousness of that concept.
While I have harvested a home here and everything is becoming a normal part of my life, my current frustration is rooted in my work. Progress is moving slowly and there are new obstacles that I never could have anticipated. I am just now coming to terms with the fact that I am not going to move mountains here or make some palpable change in the lives of the people of St. Kitts, and it is quite ridiculous and self-righteous to assume so. We come here with this idea of “development”, but I don’t even know what that is or how to do it in an ethical and culturally preserving way. I feel so unnatural when I work here. I barely have a handle on the culture and I am still quite clearly an outsider. It takes at least two years to even feel comfortable here, let alone come up with ideas that can make the lives of people better. Who am I to change a place I’ve spent just a year in?
I am cherishing this experience as something that teaches me an invaluable lot of knowledge and prepares me for whatever path I will decide on in adulthood. Margo, our Country Director, was recently telling Kelsey and me about a forum she had for Peace Corps. There is a lot of criticism on what Peace Corps Volunteers actually do in their post and whether it is quantifiable or worth anything. Her perspective was focused not on what the volunteer does when they’re actually in their location, but rather the accomplishments returned volunteers achieve afterwards. I am not saying I’m going to be one of those people, but I think the value of the Peace Corps extends far beyond the two years we spend in our posts, and it is difficult even as a PCV to keep that in mind. Every day I have to reassure myself that even if my projects fail here, I will be confident that the two years were not spent in vain. If viable and sustainable change is going to happen, it needs to happen in an organic and natural fashion, not from a foreigner who has never heard of Ottleys Village in St. Kitts coming for two years, weakly assessing what they think the communities needs, and then implementing the solutions upon the locals. I’m finding it’s best to be a quiet, humble individual living with the locals rather than an assertive paternalistic “developer” telling people what’s best for them.

I will definitely blog as soon as things at work become more exciting. I hope everyone is doing well! Much love to everyone, I miss you all!

PaZ

End of Summer

Hello all!

Wow, I am officially a blog slacker. In my defense, it has been summer, so there has been little to do and thus little to report you all on. School is officially back in session, however the first couple of weeks are slow and I feel like I’m being pushy when I ask the teachers if there’s anything they want me to do. That’s okay though because my dad is coming next week so I could use a little more free time from work at the school.
So it is almost mid-September, officially more than a year since my arrival in St. Kitts, and I am still pretty much intact. I can’t really say at this point whether I am made wiser and stronger by life-altering epiphanies, but I can say that I am better versed in Kittitian culture, lifestyle, and workplace. After my first couple of weeks back in St. Kitts I was forced to harden back up and fight away the unpredictable bouts of homesickness and loneliness as best I could. As much as I do have valuable human interactions here, I don’t know if I’ll ever fully overcome the lonely feelings I often experience. Sometimes I am so overwhelmed by the isolation of being on such a tiny island surrounded by vast oceans stretching past the horizon. Other times I get discombobulated by the cultural differences that make it difficult to feel truly on the same page as my local friends and co workers. There is always this omnipresent voice in my subconscious monitoring my every move, making sure that I don’t act too "American", too spoiled, too naive, or give a bad face to the Peace Corps. Because this feeling is always following me, even when I’m in areas inundated with tourists (in those situations the pressure is even stronger to counter the negative images that tourists sometimes bring), I sometimes feel boxed in and disconnected in this little glass house. Maybe today is just a difficult day. I really don’t want to sound too dramatic or pitiful. I’ve been feeling quite homesick because the group that was here when we arrived is preparing to leave the island tomorrow and it’s just another wind of change and uncertainty that I’m not always prepared to face. But that’s life and it does indeed go on.
My work has been looking very optimistic as of late. Charles and I put on a summer camp for STYLE that was quite successful and exceeded my expectations. We had a girls’ week where we got to know each other, did self-esteem building exercises, and completed a community service project of re-painting the netball court. The pictures show the before and after; the paint was completely faded away so it was kind of difficult to see the lines and make them perfect, but quasi-straight lines are better than no lines! Unfortunately, the boys were not as easy to lasso in, and only one of them showed up for their week of camp. I’m not too worried about that because the school year has started and I will have better access to these kids where I will be able to pressure them and harass them until they comply.
The girls were very receptive and open to some very sensitive discussion topics and it was eye-opening for me to see how similar these teenage girls are to those in the states. A lot of them had insecurities about their bodies, sex, family life, and growing up. While there were many parallels between the teenage girls here and in the US, some of their tribulations were also very different to what I and my high school friends experienced. Many of these girls and boys act as second parents to their younger siblings, and a few of the girls would have to bring baby brothers and sisters to camp because there was nobody else there to watch them. They live with their extended families in houses that obviously don’t allow for one room per person, so most of the girls share their bedroom with sisters, aunts, grandmothers, or nieces and nephews. I was already quite aware of this cultural custom, but these girls offered a personal perspective on how small and sometimes unforgotten they may feel. They certainly have to grow up much quicker than many of the suburban youths in America.
Unfortunately, one of my tertiary projects, the recycling grant and feasibility study, has fallen through for the year. Apparently there was a document that needed to be turned in by July in order for the grant to be re-submitted and we did not send it in by the deadline. This means that they grant cannot be re-submitted until next July, when I will be winding down my service. As much as I am disappointed and frustrated by this and many other obstacles, I am sure that it is only a matter of time before St. Kitts has a recycling system of its own. This is a very small island of only 42,000 people, and it is very industrialized. Furthermore, there is a lot of pressure on the government to preserve the beauty of this island as a way to ensure the economic lifeline of tourism. I’m not saying that recycling will be here in the next year, or even ten years, but the seed has been planted with the Ministry of Sustainable Development (and Environment) and I think the work of these two volunteers will not be lost or have been done in vain.
On Monday I went to the school to say hi to my kiddies and teachers. It is quite shocking to see how much these kids grow within a few months time span. Many of my sixth graders are now much taller than me and were joking that they could easily beat me up any day at which I nervously laughed. I am so excited to start up the after school program again but I am also nervous because I am so low on ideas. I’m pretty sure I want to pursue an actual theatrical production where these kids will have a chance to raise money for themselves and make decisions on what to do with their earnings autonomously and democratically. The head teacher informed me that the government is working on having an after school program starting in October which is a huge relief for me since I’ve been so worried about the sustainability of this project. A part of me is a little sad because it is going to be an appendage of the school system, thus certain practices like prayer, whipping, and religious-based life skills will continue. I have tried to create a safe haven where the kids can play without physical punishment or proselytizing, and where they are encouraged to treat each other with respect and are forbidden to use violence against each other. The kids feel open to feel talk about anything no matter how controversial, and they are able to be honest without the fear of suffering castigation. Even though I would love for this program to be continued in the manner I see best, I think it is still a tremendously valuable addition to the school and will keep them occupied, creatively challenged, and inspired.


I will update you all when things start gaining back some momentum. I hope everyone is happy and healthy!! Congratulations to my wonderful cousin on her baby boy, Shmuel!