Kwitubtä

I didn’t have a long list of expectations for my community - I hoped it would be small, indigenous, and have aqueduct work to be done. And I hoped it would be challenging. Not that there are “easy” communities in the Peace Corps, but I hoped that my community would have aspects that would be challenging to me personally. And let me say that Cerro Gallina (Kwitubtä in Ngäbere) did not disappoint! The week was a roller coaster, my thoughts ranged from “this is the coolest place ever” to “how in the world am I going to survive here” but if I made it through five nights I can survive two years, right?!? Really, I just need to get through the first three months, which will undoubtedly be difficult as I’ll be living with my host family and my primary goal will be building a relationship with my community. My host fam can speak Spanish, but they pretty much only speak Ngäbere with each other. To be honest, I felt like a circus freak the whole week. I hardly got a word out of my 16 and 21-year old host brother and sister, who both have children already, even after purposely making fun of myself to try to get them to laugh. They did laugh AT me several times- when I attempted to pilar and rice went flying everywhere, when my Spanish made no sense, even when I said my thank you’s and goodbyes before leaving. My goodbye was met with blank stares and no replies, but as soon as I turned and walked about 10 feet they burst out laughing. Nothing against them - I would’t know how to connect with a culturally clueless, clumsy, freakishly pale-skinned girl either if I were in their shoes!! Luckily my 8 and 10-year old host sibs were awesome, and they’ve already asked me how to say a bunch of phrases in English. I love that age group - ideas are already forming in my head for kids’ English book club, environmental club, music club...

The first volunteer in my site, John Michael, left the community for good on Saturday. He took me pasearing on Wednesday, Thursday we had his despedida party, and Friday I paseared with my host brother. I met a lot of the community, was offered too much overly sugared coffee and cacao, learned a *little* bit about the current state of things - water systems, family feuds, agriculture, religion... The women, in general, are incredibly quiet, while the men are more talkative. John Michael is basically fluent in Ngäbere, and it was so impressive. People kept telling me how fast he learned it...hint hint...looks like I will be working my butt off trying to learn this language in the first couple months, because it is clear that there are some community members who won't truly accept me until I do. I was named Bei (pronounce it like a middle school girl might say "my bae") and drank > 4 cups of cacao to rid me of chogali (demons). I saw the ojos de agua - there are at least five of them amongst the four neighborhoods, no large-scale aqueduct system, huge issues with drought during the January-April dry season, not many latrines, basically: a lot of potential WASH work!

A favorite of mine:

“Don’t judge someone until you’ve walked a mile in their shoes. That way, when you judge them, you’re a mile away. And you have their shoes.” :)

In Peace Corps terms, this metaphorical mile is our two years here. I saw a lot of things in my community in five short days that disturbed me, things I couldn't make any sense of, but I know that with time, with the confianza we will build, I will hopefully be able to get to the roots of these behaviors and understand. I really think that this is why everyone in our world seems to hate each other - because we don't spend the time learning about other cultures. Even studying, visiting for a week or two is not really going to make you understand. Growing up I never imagined I'd get the chance to live hombro a hombro with an indigenous group I had never heard of. As wild as Peace Corps is, it is really the coolest job.

I have much more I’d like to say here, but I’ve got two whole years to write about Cerro Gallina. Three weeks from today, I'll be living there!

Until next time, 

Bei Kwitubu <3