The Bee Sting (July 8th, 2014)

This afternoon, after coloring and playing with kids for an hour and a half, I was relaxing in my room, when my host sister knocked on my door, asking if I had any cream for bee stings.  For who, I asked.  For Alin, the boy across the street.  No I didn’t have any cream, but I did have some aloe vera that I bought for sunburns, maybe that would help. 

So together we walked across the street and up the mud lane to the neighbor’s house.  Nicoll had told me that Alin was swollen from the sting, but swollen doesn’t even begin to describe what he was.  I could barely recognize him.  His hand, where he’d been stung, was a swollen fist, his eyes were swollen to slits, his ears looked like a toddler had tried to model them out of play-doh, and he was crying in short breaths.  I asked where he’d been stung and he said only his hand.  Which made me slightly more concerned that his face looked like it had taken the brunt of the attack.  Was he having trouble breathing?  Yes, he nodded.  His brothers were sitting on either side of him, and his mom walked into the room. 

“I think you need to take him to the health post,” I said, “he’s having an allergic reaction.”

“Ah si,” she said, with no sign of understanding that this wasn’t really a suggestion.

“I think you should take him now so they can give him a shot.”

“Si, si,” with still no movement seen.

“I’ll go with you.  We should leave now.”  And with that I picked Alin up and we started to walk to the health post.

Everyone we past asked who I was carrying.  People who had known him since birth couldn’t recognize him past the swelling.  As I carried him, because I figured he should save his breathing for less strenuous activities, I called the doctor.  No answer.  I called the head of the health post, he was in Huaraz.  I called the midwife, no answer.  I called the nurse and finally someone answered.  She was at the health post and I warned her that I was bringing a kid who was having an allergic reaction to a bee sting. 

We got to the health post and with a Peruvian display of hurry (meaning not as fast as I wanted them to be, but still faster than they normally are) they got the shot ready.  At this point it was still just me and Alin, as his mother had gone to get her insurance card and wasn’t there yet.  She arrived just as we were getting Alin on his belly to inject him in his butt.  She held his legs, I held his shoulders, and we were all shocked to see the hives covering his backside. 

Once the shot was given, the sense of urgency left the room.  The first thing she said to him was, “I told you not to go play in the park! You shouldn’t have disobeyed me!”  For the next twenty minutes various people stood around him discussing what had happened.  Blame was placed on Alin, on his brothers, on his mother.  Never maliciously, more simply as a way to discuss what had happened.  I’m the only one who placed the blame squarely on the bees. 

I really hated Perú right then.  Because if I had been five and been stung by a bee, stung so badly that I had to get a shot to stop the reaction, I would have been on my mother’s lap.  She would have held me and told me it was going to be all right.  She would have stroked my hair.  I would have been in a hospital or clinic that had a room for children, and there would have been blankets and water for me.  There were none for him.  The nurse and/or doctor would have explained to my parents what had happened.  They would have explained that, if you’re allergic, bee stings get more dangerous each time you’re stung.  I would have been given an epipen and my parents taught how to use it.  He was given none.  He probably won’t ever get one, because his family is poor, and it’ll cost money.  Money that his father uses to buy beer.  Beer that he drinks until he’s drunk.  So drunk that he beats his wife and threatens to burn the house down. 

My life is very different from his.  It was when I was his age, and it will be when he’s my age now.  After the shot was given, and we were all standing around, one of the nurse techs said, “Keisi was more scared than he was,” and his mother said “you care about him a lot.”  I couldn’t say this in Spanish and probably wouldn’t have, but what I wanted to say was, “Yes, I was probably the most scared out of anyone, and that’s wrong.  Everyone should have been scared that a five-year-old was having trouble breathing.  You should all be scared, as health professionals and as people, that his mother’s first reaction was to put cold water on his face and not take to the health post.  And yes I care about Alin.  But I would have done the exact same thing for any child here in Huantar.  Not because I know them all, or even like them all, but because he needed my help and I could give it.  Screw you all.”

I think with time, Alin’s swelling would have gone down without the shot.  It had been about twenty minutes since the sting when I got there, probably half an hour before he got the shot.  But next time it might not, and hopefully next time, and there will be a next time, his family knows to take him to the health post.  I hope they do, for everyone’s sake.

Besos.

How to Kill A Rooster

Conversation with a neighboring volunteer.

“The rooster wakes me up every morning at five.  It needs to die.”

“So tell your family to kill it.”

“I’ve hinted at it, but they aren’t biting.”

“Tell them you’re anemic and need to eat meat.”

“I don’t want to actually eat the rooster.  I need it to die another way.  Do you think poison would work?”

“I don’t know.  I think the cats or dogs would be more likely to eat it.”

“Well, what other way is there?”

“Does your house have a second story?”

“Yeah.”

“Stand on the balcony and wait until the rooster walks underneath and then drop something on him.”

“That could work.”

“It would totally work.”

Besos!

Simulacro de Sismo (Earthquake Drill) (May 30th, 2014)

During an earthquake drill in the US yo cower under the tables and desks and then file out into lines onto a field.

In Peru, you dress up like wounded victims and doctors and pretend to save lives.

For once, Peru wins.

Besos!

Portrait of me

This is how my host sister Nicoll sees me:

You can tell it’s me by the height.  I rather enjoy that she sees it as being all in my legs.  And I especially like my curled-up toes. 

Wish Me Some Serious Luck (May 26th, 2014)

So Monday came and went, and so too it seems have my hopes for getting money to help pay for the Pasos Adelante classes.  Monday morning I walked into the municipality full of hope.  Into the treasury I walked, confident that having spoken to the alcalde, I would be getting my money, no problem.

“Ah, pero señorita, no tengo los papeles necesarios.  Tienes que hablar con el gerente.”

--[Ah, but miss, I don’t have the necessary papers.  You have to talk to the gerente.]

Hmmm, why wasn’t I told last Wednesday that I had to talk to the gerente?

So I walk over to the gerente’s office and wait in line.  As I wait, the alcalde’s secretary walks by and tells me that she has to pass on the Thursday meeting’s notes to the gerente along with my original solicitud before I can talk to him.  Okay, I guess I’ll wait. After about five minutes, she passes him the papers and I walk in.  He happily greets, asks how I am, everything ever so pleasant. Yes, yes, we just have to type up the budget request into the proper format and then we’ll give that to the treasurer.  Return in the afternoon.

Oh the misgivings I had as I walked out of that office.  Being constantly told to come back later is not reassuring.  But who knows, maybe this really is just how it works.

No.  The way it works is that it doesn’t work.  The way it works is that Kassel is told when she returns to the municipality that, “Lo siento señorita, pero tengo malas noticias.” That’s right, he has bad news.  Turns out, there’s no money.  He begins to explain the process of the annual budget and the monthly subsidies from the national government and the restraints, constrictions, and challenges that the municipality faces.  Yeah, that’s great, possibly even true.  But over two months ago, I was promised money.  I acted upon that assumption.  I bought supplies with my own money assuming that I would be reimbursed later.  So, sir, I fully sympathize with your problems, but unfortunately I now have my own. 

In the end, I was told that in about a month there may be money.  But something in my gut tells me that next month I will be told to come back tomorrow, or later that afternoon, that there will be a certain essential document missing, and that well, you see miss, these things just happen.

But before I give up all hope and become the town’s local anarchist, I’m going to pester.  I’m going to ask for advice from the more influential people.  I’m going to smile and laugh.  I’m going to become a fixture at the municipality, because guess what?  I’m here for another eighteen months and I quite literally have nothing better to do than get that money.  Wish me luck. 

Besos!

Wish Me Luck--An Introduction to Negotiating Local Politics in Another Culture and Language (May 21st, 2014)

Yesterday, the previous volunteer Nicole called my host family to check in and say hi.  Afterward, my host mom reported that during the course of the conversation Nicole asked, “Has the alcalde [mayor] made Keisi cry yet?”

And with that question ringing in my ears I headed to the municipality to try to get some money.

About a month ago, before I started my Pasos Adelante classes I had submitted an oficio to the municipality.  I explained what Pasos was and asked for financial support for materials, trips, shirts, and snacks.  After speaking to the alcalde, he agreed to the sum, asking if I could wait until May to receive it.  Since I didn’t plan on starting Pasos until the last week of April, this seemed reasonable.  I got a document, signed by him, to this purpose, and I happily headed out, knowing that I had proof.

Fast forward a month, and I am buying supplies with my own funds and getting ready to start planning more activities with costs I’m not willing to front.  I walk to the municipality and head to the treasury. The secretary/treasurer and I exchange pleasantries, at which point I bring up my purpose for being here—the money I was promised.  She listens and then explains that she has no knowledge of this.  A fairly reasonable statement given the level of communication generally experienced in Perú.  She says I need to talk to the alcalde again, despite my signed document.  Okay then, he’s here, might as well, why fight it even if I think it’s slightly silly? So off I go to wait in line. 

Three games of Sudoku later I’m called into his office and I exchange pleasantries, then pull out my “cargos” (my copies of the documentation leading to him agreeing to give me money).  Ahhh, he says, and then asks me to wait a moment as he speaks to his secretary.  After about three minutes of mildly unsuccessful eavesdropping (the clearest phrase I hear is “she asking for it now,” which was something I was already aware of), he comes back and asks if I can come back Monday. 

I say sure after a pause, because yes, I can come back Monday but…Monday I can collect the money, yes?  Yes, yes, he says.  And the secretary of the treasury will know about it…? Yes, yes, he says with a laugh. Okay, I say as I stand and shake his hand, I’m just asking because I’m new to how the municipality works.  And off I go.

So.  Wish me luck as Monday approaches, because it would just be utterly lovely if come Monday morning I walk in to a smiling treasurer, who ushers me into a seat as she happily doles out the cash.  Oh thank you so much I will gush, as she replies with, Oh, but of course.  A vastly superior situation to the one where the mayor is just stringing me along like the reneging vile term he has been called in the past, and I end up crying at home.

Besos! 

What is it exactly that I do?

It has been brought to my attention that it’s not exactly clear what I do here in Huantar, Perú.  This is due in part to the fact that until recently I too wasn’t exactly clear about what it was I was doing, and also until recently I wasn’t doing much. 

So now, let me explain some things.

The Community Health Program in Perú has two main goals.

1)      To work with mothers with children under the age of three in order to improve their knowledge and application of knowledge in the areas of nutrition, hygiene, and early childhood stimulation.  This is to be achieved by participating in a program called Viviendas Saludables (Healthy Homes), where I would visit the homes of said mothers twice a month in order to check in, talk, visit, play, and encourage healthy behaviors.

2)      To work with youth, ages twelve to seventeen, in order to encourage healthy behavior, especially in the area of sexual health, as well as to reduce the rates of teenage pregnancy and STIs in my area.  This is to be achieved by participating in a program called Pasos Adelante (Steps Forward), where I teach motivated youth about a variety of topics, such as Self-Esteem, Values, Sex and Gender, Pregnancy, Abstinence, Condoms and Other Birth Control Methods, HIV/AIDS, STIs, and others. By the end of the course, they will be PEPs (Promotores Educadores Pares, aka Peer Health Education Promoters) and able to teach Pasos and pass on their new knowledge to their peers.

 This is what I actually, officially, currently do:

1)      I teach Pasos Adelante to four times a week to twenty-five youths in the local high school.  So far we have covered Values and Self-Esteem, with Sex and Gender happening next week with the help of the obstetra (like obstetrician, but on a nurse/midwife level).  Check out some of my Pasos entries to get an idea of what the classes are like.  Punctuality is improving and I more or less keep their attention.  According to the pre-test (taken in order to measure if they actually learn anything in my classes) an astonishing number of them believe that showering after sex and the pull-out method are effective forms of birth control. 

2)      I help out at my health post, mainly through computer work, making posters for their parades, being an extra pair of hands when they go to the caserios, and by giving talks about anemia during their official trainings for teachers and health promoters.

3)      Starting Monday, twice a month I will be teaching an English/acting class to the 4^th graders of Huantar.  Their teacher approached me several times and is a wonderfully friendly and competent seeming woman.  I’m pretty excited for this actually, because every time I walk into the elementary school about twenty kids run towards me screaming Senorita Keisi, hugging me, and literally cheering when I enter the room.  It’s a good self-esteem booster, and let’s be real, I plan to take advantage of that shit as long as I can.

4)      I’m also the unofficial youth center of Huantar, providing cards, drawing material (Thanks Aunt Judy!), and computer games like PacMan to the neighborhood kids.

Here’s what I hope to soon be doing:

1)      Expanding the current trash route to include another town and to install a trash bin at the paradero (bus stop, car stop, best place to hitch-hike) at the bottom of the hill

2)      Start weekly or bi-monthly movie nights in the municipality where popcorn and kettle corn is for sale, and where the profits go towards buying things the community wants/needs (like a bookshelf for the preschool)

3)      Viviendas Saludables. 

And that about sums it up folks.

Besos!