Giving Light

Feb 12

After countless days of driving rain the sky took a deep breath and dissolved into scattered billows glued to the mountain sides. Now, from my rooftop at the heart of the pueblo, I can see all the way down the valley’s throat, following the waters that poured out of the sierra winter and collected in the Rio Chalaco towards their delivery in the west, where summer burns on. The sun reminds me of the recent lazy days spent near coast, in our capitol city, where the heat cancels all plans and replaces them with music videos in the quad room with the guys and Kerri, some laughs, and the occasional breeze of an oscillating fan. By night though it’s all we can do to stay inside and reasonably sober. Craving something cool and refreshing we turn to that sweet golden beverage we deprive ourselves of at site—until the last consequences, as they say; until morning’s apple pastries and coffee ease us back into humid reality. I can only do a couple days of this, and then I begin to miss the shades of grey over my peaceful island surrounded by an ocean of mud. Maybe that’s why the weather hasn’t affected my mood as I expected it to, because I’ve begun to internalize and accept the vast tranquility of Chalaco, if for nothing else but lack of another option. Like swallowing unfamiliar food to not to go hungry, gulping down my anxiety or nervousness; opening my eyes and stuffing the world into my brain because I was getting bored of the visions I’d make when they were closed.

Feb 13

I swear that the operation of an alarm clock is beyond my capabilities sometimes, or that every now and then my body acts independently of my mind for its own good. I woke up dreading the long muddy hike ahead of me out to the recently seceded annex of Portachuelo, an upstream neighboring casarío called Lucumos (cleverly named so after the large green fruit with a kinda-nasty chalky interior that grows in abundance there). I was informed weeks earlier of a meeting in Lucumos that I should attend, which through rough translation I gathered was going to be about water rights with Portachuelo, since sharing the same water system with their ex hasn’t been working out. I would have called in sick if it wasn’t for the promising sunlight bathing the covers of my bed, or for the document I was asked to deliver to Chemo, my counterpart at the health post there. Or maybe my body just knew what was best and pulled me outside.

The meeting was originally at 9, and I left with enough time to be only 15 minutes late, that is, booking it through perfect hiking conditions. But given that we’re in the throes of winter and the trail is puro barro—a boot deep thick soup of clay and horse shit that sucks your feet down to its earthen core and resists surrender—I arrived swimming in sweat at 10 and was immediately notified by some random that Chemo had postponed the meeting until noon, after the Evangelical service. I was a bit irritated that I had rushed out there for nothing and went to find Chemo and verify this news. Turns out he’s a man of the word, and when I found him at the temple I was forced inside to attend mass, where I flipped absently through the Bible that was thrust into my hands trying to find unrelated verses on jumbled subjects, which were read aloud as a whole, taking turns between the male and female side of the aisle. There was music, too. Small groups of churchgoers would stand with their back to the alter and sing to the crowd while a man with a keyboard struck notes indiscriminately over a free-form tempo, sometimes even after the singers returned to their seats, as if he was just curious to see what sounds would come out. I got a kick out of this at first, but realized I could better pass the time emptying the pool of sweat in my rain boots and drying my socks, so I dipped out to the school and chilled in the sun, thinking of nothing much at all.

After mass was over I got the chance to clarify with Chemo what the meeting was on, and that’s when I found out that the meeting was about me and Peace Corps, that I was to give a presentation on my role as a volunteer so that I could ask for permission to do a community diagnostic of Lucumos. It was a presentation I’d given three times so far, but not since a month earlier when I resolved to limit the number of casaríos I’d lead on with promise of my assistance. It was like one of those bad dreams where you arrive at class and are handed a mid-term that you totally forgot to study for. Blindsided and exhausted from the hike, I stumbled my way through what I could recall from my speech, filling in the gaps with sloppy improv and inventing grammar rules along the way, trying to maintain composure as some women suppressed their laughter in the corner. Despite botching the presentation, the dozen community members that attended welcomed me to come do a diagnostic; a historical offering for a volunteer in the region according to Chemo, one which I reluctantly accepted making clear that I couldn’t do anything till May or June. Truth was that I was embarrassed by my Spanish skills and also stressed by the commitments I was involuntarily making, both recurring anxieties in my life.

I got home feeling down on myself and frustrated with what laid ahead of me, but after a shower and a spontaneous nap, something flipped. Out of nowhere, everything that happened didn’t matter anymore. I wouldn’t even be back there for another 3 months, and it’s not like I compromised the two projects I’m all about right now, the latrine project I’ll be starting up soon in Chimulque and the municipality’s waste management project that I’m helping out with. I was hit with a sudden sense of belonging and familiarity back in Chalaco that assured me things would turn out ok. I also remembered that falling down is an important, too, and kinda funny in retrospect. Eh, just take it easy homes, and every now and then think of what Ben “Gets Shit Done” Dean said about 100 pennies.

Feb 18

Some pretty gnarly stuff goes on in our backyard—the weekly chicken massacres, impatient male and female bus passengers peeing freely rather than waiting for the bathroom, topless campo women breastfeeding their kids, animal parts hanging from hooks, and our zombie dog drinking from an unflushed toilet and then staring blankly at a wall for hours—but the childbirth that happened today takes the cake. I was lucky enough to have arrived from Chimulque just after the mother and her newborn had been escorted to the health center located only a couple of blocks away, but her blood sat right where she did, next to the chicken killzone, soaking slowly into the dirt. Supposedly she didn’t want to go to a doctor because she didn’t qualify for government provided health insurance on account of not having any kids.

I also missed the public lashings the Ronda gave to the guy accused of stealing a television from the school in Bolognesi. There was no trial, just whips on the bottom of the feet with a branch of Lanche, and then delivery to the police in Chalaco, who stripped him naked and gave him a punch. At least the Ronda let him go before taking him around to each one of the 43 casaríos to publicly hit his feet with Lanche as they had originally planned.

Feb 20

A couple gross follies I’ve committed recently: stepping into a bowl of chicken blood sitting on the floor of a dark kitchen, and the next day hitting my head on a low hanging pig’s leg in the same kitchen, even after ample warning that I’d do just that.