Jane?

girls playing in the jungle

me and hilary.

Tarzan

the boys in playing in the jungle...

Chris and Andy.

back in the us of a for a vacation.

when did american kids get so big?

what am i doing here?

Top 5 Misconceptions about my Peace Corps Service.

5. I’m on a mission from God to convert the heathens. Evangelical Judaism, really?
4. My horrible boyfriend at home won’t marry me so I’ve runaway to hide my shame.
3. My family hates me and banished me to the rural jungle of northern Guatemala.
2. I am looking for a husband. A very popular school of thought among the young men of Chisec.
1. I’m a draft dodger hiding from the American Government.

Reading by candle light

As children my brothers had this book Fossils Tell of Long Ago. They absolutely loved it. Every night my dad would read the book out loud and my older brother Justin memorized it from beginning to end. I hated this book. I loathed sitting there listening about dead dinosaurs and mud and gross boy things. Once, I even threw the book away in hopes that I would never have to hear it again. My brother angrily collected it from the bottom of the trash can, and I still get teased about it. Despite my dislike for paleontology, I did adore reading. My grammar school friends and I used to compete over who could finish the entire American Girls series first and I spent many nights tucked under the covers with a flashlight reading about Laurel Ingles Wilder and fanaticizing about living in my own little house on the prairie. Throughout high school and college I read passionately, finishing my summer reading list long before labor day and borrowing books from my mothers extensive personal library.

The Peace Corps center here in Guatemala has its own lending library, tucked in behind the computer lab, there are shelves of books with heavily worn pages, scrawled with notes inside front covers from well wishers back in the states, I hope this inspires you to accomplish all you can I’m so proud of you, Love Mom in Ghandi’s biography, I know you didn’t read any of the books in your English 101 class, maybe you’re old enough now to appreciate the education I paid for - Dad, inside The Grapes of Wrath. One can only imagine what amorous prose has been sketched inside the pages of My Love My Viking and the various other novels in the rather large romance section. There is no official check out policy on books however its generally considered to be rude to take more than you’ll read in the next couple of weeks and stealing the entire Twilight series may result in being blacklisted by all other volunteers. The best time to go to the library is when a group of volunteers is finishing there service. Normally all the books they’ve borrowed and had mailed to them during their service end up on the shelves.

Unfortunately, I live nine hours from the training center and have yet to make it back since I moved into my site over two months ago. There used to be a Peace Corps outpost up here in Coban with medical supplies and a small library for the volunteers in the Vera Paces. Federally mandated budget cuts forced the closure of the office a year ago and all the books were returned to the training center. Thank you President Bush. That being said my site mate Chris and I both brought several books with us and have kept ourselves busy swapping copies of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance for the first half of War and Peace (the book was cut in half several years ago by volunteers who agreed it was selfish for any one person to have the entire book at once). Unofficial waiting lists are established for books and locating a copy of a certain book is as easy as sending out a mass facebook message.

I’ve done a lot of reading here in Guatemala. I’ve put up a list of the novels I’ve finished in my five months here. Without television or high speed internet reading has become both a stress reliever and an escape back into the English speaking world. If you feel inspired, send down a copy of your favorite book. It will live a long life here, passed from volunteer to volunteer and cheering us up and making us feel a little more at home when times get tough.

Tortillas

Tortillas are a way of life here in Guatemala. The exact diameter and thickness vary across the country, tortillas in more urban areas tend to be smaller and more delicate whereas the tortillas in the more mountainous regions are thicker and tougher. Tortillas vary in color depending on the type of corn used, most are white however there are also yellow and black tortillas. The taste is considerably better than any corn tortillas I have found in California. Every meal is served with a small basket of tortillas and much like French bread at an Italian restaurant in the states there are unlimited refills. Unlike in the states though, the consumption of large amounts of this carbohydrate is not frowned upon. No one will judge you for “filling up on tortillas” before your meal is served. No Atkins diet here, these men mean business. Acceptable ways of getting more tortillas at dinner include franticly waving your empty basket in the air, yelling across the room or making a rapid series of clicking noises at any passing female.

I enjoy eating tortillas. I’ve yet to get sick of them and even find myself waking with cravings for the toasty goodness. I usually only eat them once a day, and I usually eat about three of them. By Guatemalan standards I am underconsumming tortillas and therefore suffering from some sort of dietary disorder. At one of my schools the other day lunch was being served and while I was served more than enough eggs and beans, I found myself with no way to eat them, forks are rarely used out in the villages. A kindergartener quickly identified my problem: lack of tortillas. She presented me with one from the stack her mother sent her to class with. More students became concerned with my lack of tortillas and began piling tortillas on my plate. In Guatemalan society it is extremely rude to refuse any food people give you so I sat there and ate every single tortilla that was given to me. The generosity of those fifteen children will not be forgotten.

Although it’s perfectly acceptable for a woman to eat lots of tortillas it is practically a requirement for a man. I was hanging out with my site mate Chris at my house when my landlord Anibal came up to us and started chatting. Chris is a relatively tall guy; he was raised in Texas and played college football. You might call him a good old corn fed American boy. Anibal is a typical Guatemalan man, he stands about 5ft tall, with his boots on. Anibal naturally asked Chris how many tortillas he eats at dinner, the true test of character here. The conversation went something like this, translated from Q’qechi into English for y’all.

Anibal: Cristobal how many tortillas do you eat?

Chris: A lot.

Anibal: Rebecca doesn’t eat enough tortillas, maybe one or two.

Me: I usually eat three or four.

Anibal and Chris: Thats not enough.

Anibal: I eat a lot too, you want to see my kitchen I’ve got a bunch in there.

Chris: I eat ten. I’ve got a woman who brings them over to my house for me at dinnertime.

Anibal smiles in approval.

food

The Way to a Man´s Heart is Through His Stomach:
The Key to Forging Successful Professional Relationships wit Host Country Nationals in a Jungle Village.


I was raised in a home where triple chocolate cheese cake and heirloom tomato salsa made regular appearances on the dinner table. The majority of the photos of my childhood involve a freckled redhead sitting on a counter licking batter off spoons and bowls, the utensils of my mother’s culinary genius. My passion, inherited directly from said culinary genius, lies in great food. I do not consider myself a foodie, although I did spend the last several years of my life living in the gourmet ghetto of Berkeley. I would say I have more of a nostalgic attachment to homegrown ingredients and French bakeries. A good vacation was always marked by the discovery of with fresh rougala and my first words were probably Mit Schlag (German for with cream). Sadly, I have found neither rougala nor cream out here in Guatemala. My first three months in training were spent sneaking off and buying lemon pound cake at the only passable bakery in Antigua and I continue to suffer from butter deprivation. The opportunity to cook for myself for the first time presented itself almost six weeks into my time here, when I stayed with a current volunteer. I made German cucumber salad, homemade whole wheat banana pancakes and a vegetable frittata. Sheer bliss.

When searching for a house in Chisec, I had only one requirement: an oven. The house I live in is owned by a man and wife who run a Guatemalan equivalent of a taco truck. This means they have a refrigerator (rare in Chisec) and an oven (I have yet to find another in this town). I knew I’d found a home, ignoring the leaks in the ceiling and lack of hot water. Unfortunately my fantasies of challah every Friday and molten chocolate cakes were harshly interrupted when I discovered that there is no grocery store within two hours. There are a few scattered shops that sell basics like beans and eggs and tomatoes, but the days of bakers sugar and rapid rise yeast are long gone. If I want to buy most ingredients called for in my usual recipes I have to either ask my mother to mail them to me or go to the specialty grocery store nine hours away in Antigua and shell out half my monthly living stipend. Not defeated, I’ve discovered that there are several things that I can make out here with only the ingredients found in Chisec. I’ve adapted a recipe for banana bread that’s been a great hit with the two little boys I live with and I’ve managed to take the surplus of mangoes we’ve got out here, yes this is really the jungle, and the other day I made a mango and plum coffee cake with a cinnamon crumble topping. Baked goods are a currency of sort out here. The first time I opened the oven I discovered the instruction manual still taped inside; the oven had never even been opened. I made a cake for the fourth birthday of one of my host brothers and found myself invited to a party at his grandparent’s house. I taught my host mom how to make banana bread and suddenly I was presented with my very own key to the kitchen.

Realizing the power I now held I decided to make some cinnamon banana bread for first major meeting with my teachers last Thursday. Its difficult holding the attention of a dozen or so young male teachers in 105 degree heat, especially when trying to teach them about the importance of hand washing and teeth brushing, but my banana bread proved magical. I made an agenda for the meeting and included an entire twenty minutes dedicated to eating. The teachers worked diligently in order to quickly get to the snack break and afterwards they chatted away with me, laughing and telling jokes. Suddenly my role in the village has been elevated from lowly public health volunteer to maker of cakes. Who knows what they’ll do when I bring in peanut butter brownies.