As American as…

Brett and I live next door to an old lady named Olivia. Whenever we leave the house, she sees us, because for most of the day she sits on a stoop across the street. She beckons us to come over. Sometimes it's just to say hello, but usually she also wants to know:

1. Have we eaten breakfast/lunch/dinner (depending on the time of day)?
2. Are we about to go dancing to find pequenas (girlfriends)? If not, why not?
3. Are we interested in buying this lovely eggplant/lettuce/whatever?

Yesterday it was #3 — her friend had a bunch of fresh apples from the orchard. Except I'm not exactly sure they came from the orchard, since they look just like the apples I used to buy on Santiago (the main island). Probably they're from Spain or something like that. But I bought a bag of them anyway, because I wanted to make a pie.

Not too bad, eh? Especially for my first time making crust. That said, the taste was only about 80% as good as the gold standard (my mother's pie crust). It was flaky, but not flaky enough. Pie experts, do I need more butter or flour or something else?

Shamless solicitation for care packages

Some of you have asked about sending me care packages. Specifically, you've asked what I want. Well, there are two things I clearly lack here:

• real, grade A dark amber maple syrup
• spices

I will always be happy to receive either of those things, except if you buy spices in a supermarket. Supermarket spices are way too expensive. Don't buy me supermarket spices. Unfortunately, I can't easily tell you a good place to buy good spices at a good price, but I know they exist. For example, I think there's a store called "World Cost Plus Markets" or something like that exists in certain cities and sells many exotic foods cheaply… you can, for example, buy half a pound of curry powder for 88 cents or something ridiculous like that. And Costco might have some good offerings. And Emmanuelle (or anyone else living in a city), I know you can go to an outdoor farmer's market and get spices cheaply there.

I don't think [dark] chocolate will survive the trip, but somebody should probably try just to make sure ;-). And things like gummy candy travel just fine. Or if you have a book you think I should read or a movie you think I'd like, sure, send it on over! I also have way too few photos, especially of family. Beyond that… I dunno. Make something up. Write "hello" on the back of a receipt. I'll still smile. :-D

Transition to Service

A lot has changed in the past week: my status, my job, and in more ways than one, my location.

For one thing, I got sworn in last Saturday. I am no longer a trainee — I am officially a Peace Corps Volunteer. Huzzah! There was a nice ceremony with speeches by the U.S. Ambassador and local political notables. All of us spruced up real nicely — dresses, long-sleeved shirts, ties, a few suits — and then proceeded to drench ourselves in sweat. I was one of four people chosen by my peers to talk to the press (in Creole), and despite my gross state, I had every intention of fulfilling my obligation… but evidently I left the auditorium too quickly and missed the microphones. Oops! It's just as well, though, because I was able to save half a [moist, delicious, perfect] chocolate-chip cookie for one of the other [more responsible] interviewees.

After that we went to Praia, and I spent the next two nights in a hotel waiting for a Monday flight to São Nicolau. And what a glorious two nights they were! Air conditioning! CNN! My first hot shower since I left Boston! Best of all, we had nothing to do. Nothing to learn, no forms to fill out, no people to meet. I woke up late, went to a cafe, and ate a huge piece of chocolate cake as I watched chairs flying across the patio outside (a very windy rainstorm was just rolling in). During the day, we swam in the pool at the U.S. Embassy. At night, we had schwarma, which is something like a cross between gyros and California burritos. All in all, a delightfully lazy Sunday with me and my swear-in buddies.

The next morning, Brett S, Nelson, Brett B, and I (the São Nicolau crew) woke up at 5:30 to catch an 8am flight on TACV, Cape Verde's national airline. TACV is interesting. Here are some reasons why:

• they cancel/delay flights if there aren't enough passengers. This happens in the U.S. too, but evidently it's pretty routine here (several of our peers got pushed back a day).
• this isn't exactly a TACV issue, but airports on various islands can be closed for weeks at a time. The one on Fogo was closed for a while and reopened just a day before swear-in, depriving several new volunteers of what would have otherwise been a very memorable 7-hour boat ride (and possibly a much longer wait for the boat to actually leave).
• the checked baggage weight limit is 20 kilograms, or about 45 pounds. Not that different from the U.S., except that it is only a weight limit (not a bag-count limit), and you pay for each extra kilo. In other words, if you had five bags and they were all 3kg, you'd be fine (which is kind of nice). But most of us were closer to 55kg — in other words, 35kg over limit, which costs 7,000 escudos (about a hundred bucks). We gave them a bit of sob story about being poor volunteers, and we got our overage knocked down to 20kg per capita (4,600 escudos). Still double our PC allowance for excess baggage charges, but not bad! Unfortunately…
• We couldn't pay the charges (or, in turn, get our boarding passes) before our 8:00 departure time, because you can only make payments in the ticketing office, and that doesn't open until 8:00. Thankfully, our flight ran late, so we had time. In fact, I think TACV is the kind of airline that just keeps waiting until all the passengers show up on the runway. So, possibly, it ran late because we had to pay for our baggage. Now distill that down to a principle: a passenger can guarantee that an 8:00 flight will be delayed merely by showing up with overweight baggage. Crazy, huh? Unless, of course, TACV just decides not to charge you, which is also possible. We think that one of our friends on a 6:30 flight got away free for that very reason, and we subsequently talked about scheduling future flights in a way designed specifically to avoid baggage fees…

Anyway, that's TACV. The lovable rascal.

At least they got us to São Nicolau, and I couldn't be happier. This island is gorgeous. We saw absolutely no sign of human habitation before the plane crossed over the airport fence. There wasn't much to be fenced in, either: a landing strip on a high, grassy plain nestled between two mountain ranges, with a terminal building smaller than most train stations. A long, lonely road led over rolling green hills into the quaint alpine-esque villa of Ribeira Brava. We continued along the island's one main road, hugging the coast as we made our way around the cloud-steeped peak of Monte Gordo. On the far side, we climbed it, cruising through the fertile valley of Fajã and then wending back and forth on ivy-lined switchback roads to get to the top.

On the other side, it was a different world again: drier, browner, rockier. By the time I got to Tarrafal — the beach-town that is currently my home — I could hardly believe that we were on the same island. But that's how it is: the moisture rises up from the ocean on the north side, and it is trapped there by the peak of Monte Gordo. Here in the southwest, it's like a desert. The houses in town are painted in bright colors, and the cobblestone streets are scantily shaded by palms or the occasional acacia tree. It gets hot, and in the heat of the day, the only thing moving is the breeze (or me, if I'm rushing around trying to get our water turned on). Which, to be fair, has a certain charm. I like this lazy, slow feeling. I like that people are relaxed here. Everyone is happy to talk to us (me and my roommate, Brett Beach), even if only to ask whether we have girlfriends yet. And the youth center where I'm supposed to work is nice and new; the people on the staff seem full of energy and understanding. From what they told me, it sounds like I'd be free to pursue my own projects and do what I feel is important, when I feel like doing it.

But I'm not working there, and I won't be living here.

Much as it breaks my heart to leave Brett (who has so far been an amazingly good roommate), there is an even better opportunity for me elsewhere on São Nicolau. Just a few days before swear-in, Aguido (the man who's kind of, sort of, a little bit like my boss… he runs the PC/Cape Verde small business program, of which I am a part) told me that a community group in Fajã had been asking for a PC volunteer for a while and had only just recently found suitable housing. Obviously, he said, it was too late to move straight there, but he asked me to check it out and see whether I liked it. Fajã, as I mentioned, is a lush green fertile valley… through the use of drip irrigation and other improved agricultural techniques, they're trying to turn it into the breadbasket of São Nicolau. To do that, however, they need to convince farmers that drip irrigation is worth the startup costs, and then they need to help those farmers secure financing. Jobless youth in the community also need guidance: they need AIDS/HIV education, English lessons… they need a place to congregate, and something fruitful to do there. And who better to lead the way to all that good stuff than a savvy Westerner like me? (so they think, anyway)

I met the Association (the community group that requested me) and walked around Fajã on Wednesday. And as it so happens, I love it. Beyond being beautiful, it's also a smaller community than Tarrafal, so it should be easier to meet everyone and feel like I've been integrated… to make close friends. That, in turn, should make it easier to accomplish stuff, and what I'm accomplishing will be more interesting anyway (In Tarrafal, I would have been primarily teaching computer classes, which gives my students access to skilled jobs, which eventually increases wealth and therefore increases the ability of local people to buy the [imported] things they need. In Fajã, I'll be helping to increase agricultural output, which increases wealth now — within a matter of months, anyway —— and decreases dependency on imported food.)

The best part, however, might be the house. Here in Tarrafal, our house is on a street corner. It's connected to another house, across from another house, etc. We have access to a huge, very nice rooftop space, but from where we actually spend most of our time (i.e., inside the house) there are no good views: it's either the street or the cement "kintal" that is our back yard.

The house in Fajã… well, it needs some work. It's what travel brochures might call "classic" or "rustic" Cape Verdian living. No insulation (you look up and see roof tiles), no sinks, no shower. Surprisingly, it does have electric lights, a fridge, and a gas stove… but the house is otherwise little more than shelter. That's what makes it so great: it's simple. And the setting is unbelievable: it's by itself on acres and acres of farmland, all of which is currently occupied by corn but which will be mine to use as I see fit. In the middle of a sloping valley with the peak of Monte Gordo rising up behind me and a gleaming swath of ocean visible below, I will be able to grow my own food and [possibly] raise my own chickens. Henry David Thoreau would be proud. Oh, and the air there! It feels so good just to breathe it!

So in two weeks-ish, I'm going there. I have to wait because the Association is going to spruce it up (new/added doors, windows, screens, sinks, showerhead, toilet, flooring). After that — after all this interminable waiting — the next two years of my life finally really truly begin.

ET and other unexplained Peace Corps phenomena

Hey, friend.

You haven't been asking questions, but all the same, I feel like I haven't explained this whole Peace Corps thing too well. You know that it's an agency of the U.S. government. You know that they've sent me abroad to Cape Verde, which is in AFRICA (for some reason it really amuses me a lot that you write that in all-caps when you address letters to me). You know that I'm a Volunteer… that I'm here to help people.

But what, you wonder, am I actually doing?

Some background: for most of my life I knew nothing about the Peace Corps. Subconsciously, I think I assumed that it was part of the military. When I found out —oh so long ago — that my friend Gwen was considering the Peace Corps, I actually looked it up on the Internet and found out that it's an independent government agency dedicated to community service. Much better! So I attended an info session at my college, where — coincidence of coincidences, in retrospect — I met a returned Volunteer who had served in Cape Verde. After procrastinating for about a year, I submitted my application online. A few months later, they interviewed me in New York City. I said I wanted to work with youth. They said I was good with computers. I said I wanted to help the environment. They said I was good with computers.

A month later, they nominated me to teach computers to youth "somewhere in Africa." Fair enough. I can still do environment stuff on the side. So I jumped through medical clearance hoops for the next three months (thank goodness I had health insurance). Despite some dire concerns about my very mild cat allergies, they passed me and invited me to Cape Verde. My initial reaction was "sweeeet! paradise!" After that, "but will I really feel like I'm doing Peace Corps if I live right next to the ocean?"

After that, "sweeeet! paradise!" one more time.

I quit my wonderful job with RecycleBank in Philadelphia, moved home to North Carolina for six weeks, and then — on July 14, 2008 — began the Peace Corps.

It's a two -year commitment. Except that it's not exactly two years, and it's not exactly a commitment. The initial 2-3 month training period (called Pre-Service Training, or PST) is in addition to two years of service, so you actually stay abroad for closer to 27 months. And since this isn't the military, you aren't legally bound to stay if you change your mind. They'll even pay for your plane ticket home. But of course, they do everything they can to convince you to stay, because it's their money and their reputation on the line.

It may or may not be intentional, but part of the pressure to stay lies in the fact that they talk about Early Termination (ET) as if it were some sort of disease or social malady. Consider the following:

Let me tell you a little story: there once was a girl named Suzie who always treated her mother nicely, always did her homework, and always took a bath at the end of the day after her soccer games. But when Suzie moved to a new school, she decided to quit soccer. Without healthy friends to guide her way, she began to hang out with the wrong sort of people — girls that liked to park in cars with boys, and girls that smoked. They said school was a waste of time. Pretty soon, Suzie listened to them and dropped out. Now Suzie lives in her parents' basement.

Sounds like a public service announcement from 1956, right? Well, just change a few key words and phrases, and you'll hear the way our trainers talk about ET:

Let me tell you a little story: there once was a Volunteer named Chase who always cooperated with his counterpart, always did what he was asked, and always took a bath at the end of the day after his soccer games. But midway through his service, a new Volunteer named Mau moved in with Chase. Mau was the wrong sort of person — the kind that joins Peace Corps just to party, and complains that grassroots development is a waste of time. Pretty soon, Chase became so disillusioned that he ETed. Now Chase lives in his mom's lakefront basement.

Okay, so it's not exactly like that (my mom's still working on the lakefront basement). But ET is definitely one of the biggest elephants in the room. It doesn't help that for the past few years, the ET rate among Volunteers in Cape Verde has been a little higher than the global average. People get scared. People make guesses. Heck, I made guesses. But we were all wrong! We've lost just two people (an amazing, wonderful married couple with — sadly — a medical issue). Everybody else not only stayed but — as of today — graduated from training. All of us will swear in as Volunteers on Saturday. From what I hear, 100% is kind of rare, so I'm proud of us. Hopefully everyone will take this as a sign that they have the strength to persevere and we'll buck the trend of our predecessors. For all I care, that ET elephant can just go back to the savannah where he belongs. We're here to stay. For [to do] good.

But I'm getting ahead of myself! Back to the beginning…

It all starts with something called "Staging," which lasts for two days and happens in a U.S. city (usually Washington, D.C., but it can vary for logistical reasons; Boston has direct flights to Cape Verde, so my Staging was in Boston). Peace Corps flies you to Staging and puts you in a hotel room there. It is at Staging that you meet your training group — the people who will be your peers, your allies, and your best friends during Pre-Service Training (PST). My training group had 29 (now 27) people, and Peace Corps/Cape Verde does a PST every summer, which creates a staggered rotation (about half the Volunteers leave/get replaced every year). Other countries do it differently depending on their needs; because Cape Verde is so small, we have the fewest Volunteers of any country in Africa. Training groups at other posts usually have closer to 50 Trainees and "intakes" (as they're called) can happen more than once a year.

Anyway, after Staging (which touches on safety, cultural sensitivity, and logistics), you fly to your country. That's when PST officially begins.

Again, this varies by country ("post," in PC lingo), but we spent our first three days doing orientation in a dormitory in the capital city of Praia. It was mostly medical/culture/safety training, but it also gave us the first fragments of the local language. Which was important, because after that we moved straight to home-stay families in an array of communities surrounding a smaller city called Assomada. This is what Peace Corps calls Community-Based Training (CBT); you come to a central point (in our case, Assomada) once a week for technical sessions on health/teaching/whatever, and you spend the rest of the time learning the language by living with a local family in a smaller town. They place 2-6 trainees and one Language-Culture Facilitator (LCF) in each town. The LCF gives formal language lessons all day long, four days a week. You are always learning. And it is exhausting.

But like I said, it's over. I'm going to my site on Monday — to my new home on São Nicolau.

The first three months there will be, in some ways, the opposite of PST. Not only will I not go to any classes, but I probably won't really go to work regularly or start any projects. According to the Peace Corps, the only thing I'm supposed to do with that time is go outside and meet people.

For three months.

That probably seems like a long time to you. It seems like a very long time to most Volunteers, too. After all, most of us joined the Peace Corps because we're starry-eyed and idealistic and want to make the world a better place; it hurts us to just sit around not do anything. Even if we weren't so antsy, we're still Americans — we're used to meeting people on day one and starting work on day two. And yet Peace Corps expects us to continue twiddling our thumbs months after any other program would have let us do our work and go home.

But this is deep, deep PC philosophy, and it's what makes Peace Corps so different from just about every other international volunteer organization. We are here to help people help themselves. In fact, it's probably kind of misleading to say that I won't be doing much work for just the first three months. If I'm successful, I won't be doing much real work for the entire two years! My role is to convince Cape Verdians that the work is important, and that they can do it. If they need help, I can answer their questions — that's why I came here with technical skills. But I can't do it for them.

Well, okay, I could. But that's what other organizations do. Other organizations come to Africa to drop off food and water. Other organizations donate money to build a school, or send a consultant out for a week to set up a computer lab. But then the food gets eaten, the school's roof starts to rot, and the computers die prematurely because the locals don't know how to take care of them. And then what? Another helicopter of food? Another crate of computers?

In some minds, the answer is yes. They're poor, we're rich. They can't provide for themselves, so we provide for them. As long as there's a gap, we keep passing stuff over it.

But there are a few problems with that. First of all, it creates dependency. The poor come to expect that the rich will always give, and they stop trying to fend for themselves. Subsistence farmers, for example, stop farming. In time, the poor may cease to believe that they can fend for themselves; they become disempowered. That is especially unfortunate because most of these "needy" communities actually have immense untapped resources, either in terms of physical assets (arable land, tourist-attracting natural beauty, etc.) or human capital (i.e., people with skills — or free time to learn a skill — that aren't currently contributing). Other organizations tend to ignore these resources.

Peace Corps Volunteers find those resources. That's what the first three months are about. After that, we spend the other 21 months mobilizing those resources … in other words, getting the community to take advantage of itself. Occasionally, yes, this involves aid from outside sources. For example, maybe my community can only pay for half of that new computer lab and the UN has to pitch in for the rest. Okay. But if locals write the grant proposal, then they'll be able to do it again after I leave. And if locals set up the lab (perhaps after I've told them how to do it), they'll take ownership. They'll maintain it properly, it will last longer, and the Western dollars that other organizations toss around so freely will stretch that much further.

More importantly, by making the local people work to improve their own quality of life, we empower them. They come to understand that the dichotomy between haves and have-nots is pliable; even in areas where we haven't given them direct training or guidance, they begin to take action. At that point, the change is sustainable. It will continue, even after we leave and even if we never come back.

And boy, doesn't it make you feel so warm and fuzzy inside? :-)

By the way, I don't mean to sound self-righteous or evangelical. The Peace Corps is just one (unfortunately small) fish in a vast sea of humanitarian crusaders, all of whom have good intentions and most of whom actually do significant good. I acknowledge that. But Peace Corps is what I'm doing, so I have to understand it … and because its philosophy is so unusual, it has taken me a while to pull it apart. Any tinge of evangelism in what I've written here is merely a side effect of the fact that I like what I am finding.

And that's good!

Flashlight Assassin

If you’ve seen Wall•E, you probably remember that Wall•E’s only friend on Earth was a cockroach —the implication being that everything else died out after mountains of trash turned the planet into a toxic wasteland.

Wall•E’s second-to-last friend: quite likely, a mosquito.

Despite the fact that I’m on an island in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean that receives mere inches of rain every year, the anopheles mosquito manages to breed and thrive here. During the rainy season (July to September), the mosquitoes go to town on anyone not wearing long pants and a sweater. If that’s you and you’re white, you end up looking like you have chicken pox. And you don’t have to wonder whether other people notice: you know they do, because everyone and their sister stops in their tracks to recommend remedies or repellents.

The problem is compounded by the fact that the rainy season is also the hot season, so you can’t just close your window to keep the mosquitoes out (because then you can’t sleep). So you open your window, and they stream in, and you wake up all poxy in the morning.

When I was in Canada, I at least had the satisfaction of killing the mosquitoes that bit me. I’d start to feel the prick about halfway through their feast, and my hand would lurch forward to snuff them out — to my delight, just a little bit faster than they could skedaddle. But here in Cape Verde, the mosquitoes are either too small or too subtle to be detected by touch. If you feel something, it’s the red bump that shows up 10 long minutes after the culprit is gone.

During the night, I at least manage to protect myself pretty well with my big green Peace Corps mosquito net. But as I learned early on, it does me no good if any of the bloodsuckers have already managed to sneak their way in. So when I go to bed at night (or go to the bathroom to take a shower), I perform an inspection. I am always interested in the same two things:

1. Mosquitoes?
2. Where??!!

The best way to answer #1 is by listening. Even a single relatively small mosquito makes a distinct buzzing sound when it flies. Assuming I hear something, I whip out my trusty Mag-Lite and lie in wait for the kill.

The flashlight, however, is a problem.

Don’t get me wrong: I love my flashlight. It’s a lot brighter than the ceiling light, I can turn it on easily in bed, I can direct the beam … and it’s the only option in the bathroom in the mornings, since the electricity doesn’t come on until about 10am. But since I have no way of strapping it to my head, it uses up a hand. And how in the world am I supposed to kill a mosquito with just one free hand?

As it turns out: like a ninja!

It begins like a prison breakout. My flashlight beam scans side to side and up and down, scouring every inch of my surroundings to the find the culprit behind the buzz. It may take 5 seconds or 5 minutes, but sooner or later, the mosquito careens into view. Immediately, I lock on, following it with light wherever it goes. Silently, expectantly, my left hand reaches out. As I wait for the mosquito to wander haplessly into range, I flex my fingers into a claw. The tension makes my palm sweat; smelling that warmth — that meal — the greedy mosquito falls for my trap. And all of a sudden, it’s quiet: I’ve pounced, I’ve clenched my fist, I’ve opened it again, and I’ve smirked in satisfaction at the bloody, mangled little pile of twig-legs inside.

Take that, P. falciparum!

How do I turn this thing on?

So, I haven't been posting stuff here. Mostly it's because I don't have time or Internet access. That will change in two weeks, when I go to my site on the island of São Nicolau.

But it's also because I didn't know what this blog was for. That first [very long] post was a roundabout decompression of everything I was thinking and feeling during the first few weeks. Writing that kind of stuff is important for me personally, but for a blog, it's kind of long and tedious and hard to digest. Also, I have a better idea.

The very reason I joined the Peace Corps, I'm realizing, is that I wanted to explore who I am. That mostly means trying out a lot of new things: working with kids, teaching, cooking by instinct (instead of by measuring cup), swimming frequently, playing an instrument, etc. There's a lot of cool stuff I want to do. And I think you should know about it.

So, coming up shortly: my meeting with the President of the Camara (the Camara is the basic unit of local government here, sort of like a county), my hiking trip to a waterfall, and my thoughts on teaching computers without using computers (it's actually easier!).

As for all my thoughts and opinions and feelings... well, I'll still be happy to share some of that, but there'll be less of it on the blog. The best place for that is in letters, which I've already started exchanging with some of you. I love letters! You should see me (or any other Peace Corps Volunteer) when I get a letter. I basically jump up and down giggling like a little girl. And don't even me started on care packages... those things are worth their weight in dark chocolate.

(hint, hint ;-)

That said, I don't have an address right now while I'm waiting to go to island, but I'll announce when I do have one and will make it available to anyone who wants it. And keep sending me yours! I can always be reached (eventually, anyway) at carchase at gmail dot com.