Trying to sum it all up...

Tuesday, January 23, 2007

I think at some point here my life retired and regressed, and is now in a backward stage of motion. Whatever I possessed and considered to be the slow yet sure accumulation of wisdom - the fragile threads of life that hold together common thought and an overall panorama of being - is now narrowing into a slender wedge of sky carved out of a previously inexhaustible expanse of freedom. For whatever reason, I have taken to juvenile traits that I didn’t dare attempt even during my infantile years when I was too busy trying to be an adult to acquiesce to adolescent behavior. The explanations for this are out there somewhere, tiny petals of reason that dance about in shadowy gusts of winds and evade my willful grasp…

For now, I am left wondering why my blood quickens and tiny sparks of exhilaration pulse through my body during the monotonous moments of day. The barren plateau of afternoon, when cobblestone streets are silent and hens are left alone to explore beneath benches and children’s deserted toys, a giddiness arises beneath layers of boredom, lethargy or unease. At times like these, laughter bubbles up from a fountain and I find myself fashioning my hair in a sideways ‘80s ponytail, hiking up the legs of my jeans and jump roping while singing Michael Jackson’s “Billy Jean is not my lover” from my short wave radio (yes, I have pictures).

I take risks, too. Risks I don’t think I would ever have taken in the cushiony slumber of the States. Like when I was in a cove on the beach the other night, dancing in the waves and sprinting above the reflection of moonlight in the sand. I taunted the ocean, ran boldly into frothy whiteness where the crashing power of the sea connects firmly with the steadfast strength of land. I shrieked and sang and raced and played along the shadows and illumination that only night provides, everything bathed in a blanket of black clasped together with metallic white - the shrouded sky, the glitter of stars, the churning sea, and the light in my eyes.

Pace has been slowed, as well. My sense of awe increases when faced with the sheer authority of this rock in the middle of the ocean. Walking along the foreboding mountain of gray sand, my feet sank into the steep descent of Cha das Calderas, a community where people who have defied government orders live within the crater of Fogo’s active volcano. The landscape is daunting – dunes of ash spread out like a Dali painting – a bit twisted but nonetheless haunting in its beauty and stillness. I stared at my outstretched fingers, once again childlike, as my friend and I dropped to the ground to feel the warmth of magma radiating from cracks of volcanic rock. We crouched low to the surface as the sun set and admired as squiggly waves of heat swarmed like flies from the earth and dissipated into a darkening sky.

I find myself juggling an intense desire to once again climb trees like I did in Costa Rica; sail on a boat with only an hour’s darkness in the north of Sweden; stroll through the icy frost of Kyoto’s Japanese gardens; go off-roading in my Jeep through the cracked ravines of Palm Desert; dance in the waterfalls of Monteverde’s cloud forest reserve; roast marshmallows by campfire on the beach of San Onofre; play hide-and-go-seek with orphans I lived with in Brazil; drink a pint in an Oxford pub; white water raft down a river in Northern California; swim with manatees in the lazy swamps of Florida with my childhood friend who has since passed away; sit on a bench with my travel buddy and admire the Alps of Switzerland; get lost in the canals and eat bad spaghetti in Venice; build houses with volunteers in Mexico; collect hermit crabs beneath a hammock near the red and white striped lighthouse on Abaco Island; collect hemp bracelets and run for my life from a scary tattoo artist in the bohemian beach town of Canoa Quebrada; eat waffles from a vending machine in Belgium just to say I’d eaten them there; visit the Ann Frank house and be shocked by pornographic postcards in the “coffee shops” of Amsterdam; take a tip from the locals and sneak in through the back exit of the Louvre in Paris; hike to castles tucked into the mist and green cliffs of southern Germany; pound corn into a fine flour to make cous cous; stand in front of sixty beady eyes and prompt Cape Verdean teenagers to form their first English words; take a morning run in the dark and watch the longest trail of a shooting star I have ever seen disappear from my sight as the sun begins to flood light over the crater of the volcano behind my house … In this way I have regressed. I am slowly sinking back into the depths of my mind to live there, and crouch like a guest in the corners of pleasant memories.

The truth is that I don’t know how to end this journal entry. Possibly because I have been describing what has already happened in my life and am attempting to conclude that which has not yet matured, fully blossomed, or existed in full. So I will leave these words and the significance to be derived in whatever ways are favorable to the reader (if you have, indeed, read this far). The novel of my life has not ended; in fact, another section has just begun. But for now, the chapter has reached its final page and will remain open only in the sense that it may be relived through the eyes of someone who can relate.

Wednesday, January 24, 2007

As I was asking home from work a friend of mine coaxed me into the shaded darkness of her home and proudly announced the birth of a young woman’s baby.
“Oh! You are already back from the hospital?” I asked naively in Kriolu.
“The hospital?” The woman laughed as her giant slanted eyes opened wide and her missing teeth smiled back at me in an amused grin. “She had the baby right here on the floor! I delivered it!”
“You delivered it yourself!?” I asked, again naively.
“Claro! (clearly)” she said. “You just catch the baby, cut the birth cord, wash him off and set him on the bed.”
Well, of course, I thought. Simple as that. It turns out this woman who had delivered the baby has five children. She birthed each of them on her own.
“You just crouch down like this,” she explained, crouching to the floor in what apparently was a birthing position. “Then you put your hands out, push real hard and catch ‘em!”
“Doesn’t it hurt??” I exclaimed in genuine horror (I happen to see birth as the most miraculous thing a woman is capable of, but all miracles aside - I would never wish the excruciating pain upon myself. I’ll make a good aunt one day).
“No, it doesn’t hurt much,” she stated, waving the comment away, spacing her feet firmly apart on the floor and placing her hands indignantly on her hips in pride. “Doesn’t hurt at all.”
Well … claro.

Thursday, January 25, 2007

The class summary today was the verb “to live.” I asked my students who had family living on other countries.

They all raised their hands.


Sunday, January 28, 2007

The one thing I had heard about Cape Verde after I got my Peace Corps invitation in the mail was that the country is of transient nature. Since there is a lack of jobs on the island of Fogo, many fathers, sons, mothers and children leave their country of natural birth and seek futures in other countries like Portugal, Brazil and America. The money they make there they send to their families back home. Others go to places like America in order to receive education and still others go to reunite with loved ones. I believe this fact alone affects more aspects of life here in Ponta Verde than any other factor.

I knew all this even before I stepped on the plane to come to Cape Verde, but what I did not know was that this fact would affect me so deeply. Since I have arrived (which was about five months ago) a good number of my community members have left for America. One was a young man with a family, who left to work in Boston for three years. Another is one of my roommate’s students, who will go to live with the mother she has been separated from since she was a small child. The fact that my male friend has a five year old daughter who has not seen her mother since birth (because she moved to the U.S. five years ago) is something that has always hit me hard – the closeness of the families here is separated my miles of distance. I have been able to relate on some level, since I left my family and friends behind seven months ago in order to live in another country away from home; yet, I recognize that leaving your life on your own free will as a result of options is entirely different than being forced to leave for a lack thereof.

Today one of the best friends I have in the community told me she will be leaving to live in America by the end of February. She is someone I feel I can be myself with – a person who regularly invites me over to play Cape Verdean music, dance and write down the lyrics for me to understand. She is always the life of the party, the person who is most open and willing to put herself out in front of people and be unique without trying. In a community where I was desperately searching for somewhere to fit in, she provided that space for me. When she told me she was leaving, my eyes focused on a group of white pigeons that landed and spread out behind her in the quintal. Some were clustered together, others flew away. The unity and separateness of the moment compelled me and despite my happiness for her and her future, I had to look away through a vision of tears.

Boas Festas

Monday, January 8, 2007

In Cape Verde the stretch of ferias (vacation) that marks the holiday season is defined in the phrase “Boas Festas,” which (so my female friends in Ponta Verde tell me) more or less translates into “Women, enjoy the parties and socially acceptable behavior while it lasts because it won’t return until next year.” The last few weeks have been a blur of social events amidst a normally calm community. The young girls who are forced to stay inside all day to wash, clean up after and cook threw down their hair scarves, brooms and laundry to exit the daily domestic grind wearing bizofa (hot) outfits. For days before the festas took place, women were walking around the streets with heads full of rollers. Excitement and anticipation was thick in the air as both the single young men and women of the community prepared to arranga (“arrange”) a namorado (boyfriend) or namorada (girlfriend). More than a few people asked me who I had my eye on and the subject of having a better half for the New Year was the talk of the town. When I told the members of the community that I was not interested in arranging anyone, their eyes widened in disbelief as they asked incredulously, “But who is going to keep you warm during the cold season?!” They’re serious.

And so in a whirlwind of house gatherings, dancing Zuki and Funana, weddings and late night mass services (yes, I attend the Catholic church here, which is the only community meeting center in Ponta Verde) I ended the year of 2006 and have now stepped onto the platform of a new year – one I will always remember to have lived in Cape Verde.

My New Year’s resolutions:

1) Remember to wash clothes at least once a week instead of being lazy and waiting until there are none left, which without fail results in a four-hour cram session with the washboard. Side effect: sore back and bleeding knuckles for days.

2) Learn not to stub and deeply cut my left toe on cobblestone, which has now, to tribute my grace as an individual, occurred three times.

3) Get over my fear of Cape Verdean dogs.

4) Realize that Super Bock beer tastes exactly like water and I should just save my money.

5) Limit my consumption of canned tuna to six days a week.

6) Kill a pig (or at least a chicken)…not because I’m morbid, but because it’s a daily occurrence here and darn it, if my tiny 7th grade female students can do it, so can I (humph).

7) Avoid parasites, skin diseases, ringworm, etc.

8) Take the time to enjoy the beauty of this place and the undeniable strength of its people.

9) Get over the fact that I am in the church choir (we’re pretty awful).

10) Keep enjoying those sunsets that set over the neighboring island of Brava in the evenings as I lean back against the wall of my front porch.

11) Come to terms with the fact that I can no longer congratulate myself (and feministic ideals) for being “domestically challenged” and have fully transcended into the realm of the “domestically inclined.”

12) Continuation of community work and carrying out of future development plans (this may or may not be interesting to read but it will give you an idea of what I’ve been up to):

-Teaching
7th and 8th grade English
6th grade English prep classes (Fridays)
Tutoring/teaching adults

-Jardim - Volunteering at kindergarten, assisting monitorias (Wednesdays)

-Soccer Games for students at polivalentes in Galinheiro and Sao Lorenco (Saturdays)

-Family Visits (families of students) in neighboring zones

-Coordination meetings at the liceo in Sao Felipe (Mondays)

-Choral Practice (Tuesdays)

-World Map Project (determine location, project for jovens?)

-Sala de Informatica/Computer Lab
weekly hours
classes?
Computer skills assistance

-Trash Pick Up (clean up ribeiras in Ponta Verde)

-English Club
after-school optional tutoring
activities
films

-Educational Community Activities
Speakers about HIV/AIDS, drug abuse, alcoholism, women’s rights, pregnancy,
general health, hygiene, sanitation, etc.

-Women’s Group (contact women with Co-operativa in villa)

-Cultural Tourism Draws
promote local musical acts (traditional artists from Cha)
speakers to share history, culture of Fogo
traditional dances taught by elders (group from S. Felipe)

-Youth Group
community projects – trash pickup, speakers, historical exchange, sharing culture,
music, etc. with elders
field trips to Cha das Calderas


Tuesday, January 16, 2007

I think for every Kriolu word that is finally beginning to stick in my mind and flow naturally from my mouth, an English word drops off the platform of memory and is irrevocably lost. I speak a strange mixture of Kringlish with my roommate and the words that I cannot grasp in my foreign tongue I replace masterfully with sobres, kenyas and talvezes. Which on one hand is exciting. I am learning a language, integrating, and things are getting easier for me. Yet my former mode of expression has dropped to the level of a fourth grader and I fear for the journalistic endeavors that await my ten-year-old mind once I reenter the world of writing.

I suppose it is a rather small price to pay. After all, two years of stumbling through the grammatical points of both English and Kriolu will pale in comparison to the rest of the sixty-something years I would hope to have ahead to relearn all that I was able to express in my elementary days. Yes, the language will go away, and then it will come back. But for now speaking is like fishing. You have to find the right bait, the right hook, and the right time to drop it into the abyss. You throw it out there, wait an awkward moment or two and hope someone bites hard enough to catch the significance. (I assure you, I have many lost attempts that are probably still floating somewhere among the surface of the Atlantic, never fully grasped by another being and wholly lacking in translatable worth.)

Language has its ups and downs – its misconceptions and its frustrations for me. I prefer culture - that vague, beautiful, colorful and entirely effecting construction of reality as we see it. Our view of the world, our place in it and our meaning. Yet never have two things been as intricately woven, symbiotic and simultaneously effacing as a combined and constructed perspective of life (culture) and the method by which it is expressed (language).

I have discovered a beautiful union in the project of another volunteer on the island of Fogo. In order to teach Cape Verdean-Americans about the culture they never knew, she went into the fora (country) of the island and began interviewing older members of the villages in order to learn fundo (deep) Kriolu and expressions that are no longer popular among the Boston jersey-wearing, hip hop video-loving youth of Cape Verde. She compiled the Kriolu into notebooks and sent them to interested Americans whose ties to Cape Verde are through their parents. The miraculous outcome was that she learned traditional Kriolu, older villagers were able to share about their past, Cape Verdean-Americans were enlightened, and you are able to read it on the all-encompassing universe that is the Internet.

Enjoy (and for those who are fluent in Kriolu: desculpe sobre nha lingua y si e ka tudo certo … n sa ta aprendi):

~Ma ora ki mi odja abo ta parsi mas es mundo de mi ku bo.

When I look at you, it appears that all that exists in the world is me with you.

~Kenha ki subi mas alto mas baixo el ta kai.

Whoever goes further up has further down to fall.

~Entre spinho ta nasi um rosa.

Within the bone is born a rose.

~Quel ki bu fazi de noite pal manha ta monstra.

What you do at night in the morning will come to light.

~Conberso na hora e sabi na boka.

Conversation at the right time is good in the mouth.

~Kenha ki ka ta obi ka ta odja. –Sonia, age 23

Those who do not hear will not see.

~Nha kretxeu mi sa ta bai, lavanta bu dispididi es ora e tristi e ta maguado, Ka bu poi ningen na nha lugar.

My love I am leaving, though to stand up and say goodbye is sad and painful, do not put anyone in my place.

~Nhos e neba detado. –Manuel, age 59

You are the fog laying down. (It is a way of saying that people are really close, good friends, or always together.)

~Bu e kor de rosa na mare de tarde. –Manuel, age 51

You are the pink color of the beach in the afternoon.

~Joia na nha vida = jewel in my life

~Nos coracao papia de nos ku lingua ki ta ultra passa tal como misterio da vida ki ta oferece. –Rhilda, age 10

Our hearts speak in a language that passes all with a mystery only life offers.


And, my favorite:

~Ta bai e triste bem e maguadu.

To go is sad, to come (return) is painful.


My friend who interviewed and compiled these traditional expressions in Kriolu explained the meaning of this quote to me in a way that touched me. The quote, which states that leaving is sad but coming back is painful, did not make sense to her (or me) without explanation. I made the common assumption that leaving was sad and that returning to the place that was left would bring happiness. Yet, an older Cape Verdean explained, “To leave is sad, but you end up returning to the place you left. When you leave to return, you are once again leaving loved ones to return from where you left.” In essence, for me, it was sad to leave my home and my loved ones in America. Yet I know I will one day return. The day I return to the States I will be leaving Cape Verde for good. That is what the old expression refers to - maguadu (pain).

Wednesday, January 17, 2007

Witnessing the death of a cow is nothing like witnessing the death of a pig. In a country where nothing is packaged and sent to the meat section of your local market, what is one day a predictable companion in your backyard the next is laid across the cement and split wide open. Your domestic friend becomes a pile of organs whose only resemblance to the cute cow with fluffy ears is evident in the form of a lifeless stare from its decapitated head. Morbid or not, the killing of an animal in Ponta Verde signals the preparation for a festa, a saints day or a celebration. For me, it represented witnessing an animal being killed for the second time.

Let me get this straight before those who remember me as the animal-loving peace advocate wonder where exactly my sanity wandered off to and why I am apparently so obsessed with the bleeding carcasses of animals. I have been speculating about this as I catch myself asking my female friends just how to snap the neck of a chicken or requesting that they please inform me before they kill their next goat so I can watch. I don’t think it is so much a twisted hobby as it is the fascination with a world in which reality exists so openly. I just received the Peace Corps Newsletter from the office in Praia and one of my friends, a fellow volunteer on a neighboring island, wrote an article about Cape Verdean funeral practices. What he mentioned about the culture was that its openness disturbed him. The barefaced black that family members wear, the mourners’ wails at the wake, the shrieking, the screaming, the open doors. In America, doors are closed, although possibly only metaphorically. Death exists, yet it exists beyond our sight, our ears, and sometimes even beyond the reaches of our minds. As an American, I have often found myself shoving that which shocks or repulses me and throwing it beneath the layer of consciousness. Yet, it is still there, whether I am willing to accept it or not.

What I am learning from Cape Verdean culture is the ability to deal with what is happening – to literally stare death in the face, and to be both close and okay with it enough to observe, analyze, and understand. In my community, people who are sometimes ostracized in other cultures - the town drunk, those with birth defects or learning disabilities, people who are mentally unstable, poor or sick – they all have a very visible role in Ponta Verde. They do not appear to be hidden or ignored. They may be often harassed or verbally differentiated (there is a man who is mute and the children often laugh at him) but they are not behind closed doors, and the pestering appears, to my foreign eyes, to be more out of familiarity than fear.

This “in-your-face” approach to living life has often caught me off guard. I am always shocked when I hear someone call another person fastento (annoying), burro (stupid), or preto (black) with disgust in their voice. What’s more, I am not sure how to feel about the fact that the more I hear it, the less and less shocked I become. I don’t know if it is a desensitizing, or rather, a rearranging of what affects me. Yet, daily being exposed to that which is socially taboo or rejected in the States is becoming as normal to me as hearing the daily beating of drums, dancing zuki, taking cup baths, eating corn three times a day or speaking Creole.

For now, I am just beginning to learn, and still far from understanding many aspects of culture here. In some ways I would call it desensitization; in others, I would say I am beginning to feel life more. But whether it is the screaming, writhing pain of a pig being killed, or the slow, silent surrender of the cow, I find myself realizing that no two experiences are alike. Each day I wake up and enter a world I don’t quite understand – I walk down the same path and it always keeps me guessing. What once happened at night or behind closed doors now takes place in the harsh revealing light of day.

Quel ki bu fazi de noite pal manha ta monstra.