Illness...Again
Originally Written March 29, 2010
Dear Readers,
It seems like these past few months I have been traveling a lot. I don’t know if that is actually true, but maybe it’s because I feel inclined to go to my regional capital more since it’s rainy and cloudy at site. But this past week was also travel-filled. I went down to a site a few hours outside of Lima to help a fellow volunteer with a project called “Builders Beyond Borders” which is made of groups of high school students who travel to developing parts of the world during their Spring Break and help with construction for a week. In the case Mark, this Peace Corps volunteer I was helping, the project was installing or repairing pipe so more houses could have running water. There didn’t seem to be any shortage of help with forty-some high school students, plus their adult leaders, and several Peace Corps volunteers who showed up, not to mention a few people from the town who lent a helping hand.
Although I was prepared to dig, and did fill in for a couple of people on occasion, I ended up being the photographer for the week, for both the B3 (as it’s called among the group members and PCVs) and the Peace Corps. I still haven’t looked at all of the 1300+ photos I took over the course of that week, but I think some of them are among the best shots I’ve ever gotten so far. One of the adult supervisors for the B3 kids was himself a professional photography, who proved to be both a good source of advice and a good supporter when I had doubts about some of what I was doing. He reminded me that photography is an important way to get a message out there.
For me personally, it was a fun week because I got to see Mark’s site, which I thought was beautiful, even though it’s almost as different from where I live as it possible: My site is teeming with plants and the color green, and rains for months out of the year, whereas his is also mountainous, like mine, but a completely dry and dusty desert. I also got the impression the food was pretty good where he lived. At least twice I asked Mark and someone else who lived in the area if the food we got every day was pretty representative of the everyday food people got, and they said it was. If that’s true, then I can see why people are more fond of Peruvian food than I am.
At 7 AM One morning as I was finishing breakfast Patrick called me to tell me about a storm that struck the area where we live. He said my town was hit the hardest and went on to explain that the torrential rain someone knocked the water system offline, lightning had struck a tower and knocked out electricity in our towns, and a landslide finally cut off transportation a good distance from my town. He said in fact, that he had been walking since 2 AM and had yet to see a car that could give him a lift. I told him that I think God doesn’t want people living in the mountains, and Patrick said that apparently some people in the Peace Corps have more authority then God. I guess that’s as good as explanation as any.
After arriving back in Piura I packed up and prepared the hard walk back up to site. However, I got sick and after feeling faint after walking down four flights of stairs with my backpack and a heavy bag of supplies back to site, I decided that I was in no shape to walk back to site from where the landside struck. So I went back to bed and ended up sleeping another five hours. At noon I woke up dehydrated but after rallying the energy to go buy some liquids and a roll to eat I felt better. However, the bouts of dizziness and feverish brain shakes that stuck with me all day confirmed that staying at the hostel for another 24 hours was a wise decision.
The next day after more rest and some medicine I was finally able to leave. Much to my surprise and delight the landslide that Patrick had described was not stopping the truck from getting back to my site. However, we got stuck twice and for all the time it took to get the truck back on track I probably could have made back faster on foot. Still, I was happy to wait and not have to carry everything.
Patrick had told me that the water system and the electricity had been repaired. It’s true about the water system, although right now for another reason the water is off again and the only person who has the key to open the box to fix it is out of town. The electricity, however, is spottier than a leopard. In some houses in La Rinconada it’s strong, but in others, including where I live, it flickers on and off. I try to avoid using my computer at moments when it’s flickering, and I think it’s already ruined my less-than-year-old computer battery, which irritated me until I remembered that I’m not the first person to lose something valuable through circumstance in the Peace Corps.
Today I finished the book “Three Cups of Tea” about a fellow named Greg Mortenson who has been building schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan for children for over a decade. His love and dedication to his work humbled me as a volunteer. I know that could never come close to achieving something like that. But the other thing is I’m not sure if that’s what I want to do with my life. In fact, I’m almost positive it’s not. Right after I finished that book, I picked up “The Soloist” and read about people who have started up shelters for the mentally ill. Again I felt guilty that I don’t have a real service-work drive in me. It’s something I’ve struggled with a lot in the Peace Corps. I hadn’t done much service work to begin before joining, and it hasn’t felt like my calling in the time since I’ve sworn in as a volunteer. This has been very hard for me to understand and come to terms with. I haven’t felt like I’ve worked hard enough, but lots of times I don’t feel the motivation either. People have said time and again that for your service, do what you are passionate about, but I don’t know if I can do what I’m passionate about through my work in the Peace Corps. I’m not passionate about teaching or health or construction, although I’ve helped with all of that so far in the Peace Corps.
At the same time, I feel nervous about where I’m going next: into the unknown. I know I won’t be doing a third year because I feel that two will be plenty for me, but I’m not planning on going to grad school yet because the only thing I thought I might want to follow up on in grad school, linguistics, I’ve decided not to worry about because it’s not that route I want to take.
When I think rationally, I know I’m still helping people, and that just because I have no big projects planned, that’s fine. I think my personality and interests about what I want out of life are fine, if perhaps a bit unconventional. But I’ve had a hard time squaring that with what I’ve feel like someone in the Peace Corps should do. I’m trying not to waste any more energy worry about that, but it’s hard to do sometimes.
Tristan
Dear Readers,
It seems like these past few months I have been traveling a lot. I don’t know if that is actually true, but maybe it’s because I feel inclined to go to my regional capital more since it’s rainy and cloudy at site. But this past week was also travel-filled. I went down to a site a few hours outside of Lima to help a fellow volunteer with a project called “Builders Beyond Borders” which is made of groups of high school students who travel to developing parts of the world during their Spring Break and help with construction for a week. In the case Mark, this Peace Corps volunteer I was helping, the project was installing or repairing pipe so more houses could have running water. There didn’t seem to be any shortage of help with forty-some high school students, plus their adult leaders, and several Peace Corps volunteers who showed up, not to mention a few people from the town who lent a helping hand.
Although I was prepared to dig, and did fill in for a couple of people on occasion, I ended up being the photographer for the week, for both the B3 (as it’s called among the group members and PCVs) and the Peace Corps. I still haven’t looked at all of the 1300+ photos I took over the course of that week, but I think some of them are among the best shots I’ve ever gotten so far. One of the adult supervisors for the B3 kids was himself a professional photography, who proved to be both a good source of advice and a good supporter when I had doubts about some of what I was doing. He reminded me that photography is an important way to get a message out there.
For me personally, it was a fun week because I got to see Mark’s site, which I thought was beautiful, even though it’s almost as different from where I live as it possible: My site is teeming with plants and the color green, and rains for months out of the year, whereas his is also mountainous, like mine, but a completely dry and dusty desert. I also got the impression the food was pretty good where he lived. At least twice I asked Mark and someone else who lived in the area if the food we got every day was pretty representative of the everyday food people got, and they said it was. If that’s true, then I can see why people are more fond of Peruvian food than I am.
At 7 AM One morning as I was finishing breakfast Patrick called me to tell me about a storm that struck the area where we live. He said my town was hit the hardest and went on to explain that the torrential rain someone knocked the water system offline, lightning had struck a tower and knocked out electricity in our towns, and a landslide finally cut off transportation a good distance from my town. He said in fact, that he had been walking since 2 AM and had yet to see a car that could give him a lift. I told him that I think God doesn’t want people living in the mountains, and Patrick said that apparently some people in the Peace Corps have more authority then God. I guess that’s as good as explanation as any.
After arriving back in Piura I packed up and prepared the hard walk back up to site. However, I got sick and after feeling faint after walking down four flights of stairs with my backpack and a heavy bag of supplies back to site, I decided that I was in no shape to walk back to site from where the landside struck. So I went back to bed and ended up sleeping another five hours. At noon I woke up dehydrated but after rallying the energy to go buy some liquids and a roll to eat I felt better. However, the bouts of dizziness and feverish brain shakes that stuck with me all day confirmed that staying at the hostel for another 24 hours was a wise decision.
The next day after more rest and some medicine I was finally able to leave. Much to my surprise and delight the landslide that Patrick had described was not stopping the truck from getting back to my site. However, we got stuck twice and for all the time it took to get the truck back on track I probably could have made back faster on foot. Still, I was happy to wait and not have to carry everything.
Patrick had told me that the water system and the electricity had been repaired. It’s true about the water system, although right now for another reason the water is off again and the only person who has the key to open the box to fix it is out of town. The electricity, however, is spottier than a leopard. In some houses in La Rinconada it’s strong, but in others, including where I live, it flickers on and off. I try to avoid using my computer at moments when it’s flickering, and I think it’s already ruined my less-than-year-old computer battery, which irritated me until I remembered that I’m not the first person to lose something valuable through circumstance in the Peace Corps.
Today I finished the book “Three Cups of Tea” about a fellow named Greg Mortenson who has been building schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan for children for over a decade. His love and dedication to his work humbled me as a volunteer. I know that could never come close to achieving something like that. But the other thing is I’m not sure if that’s what I want to do with my life. In fact, I’m almost positive it’s not. Right after I finished that book, I picked up “The Soloist” and read about people who have started up shelters for the mentally ill. Again I felt guilty that I don’t have a real service-work drive in me. It’s something I’ve struggled with a lot in the Peace Corps. I hadn’t done much service work to begin before joining, and it hasn’t felt like my calling in the time since I’ve sworn in as a volunteer. This has been very hard for me to understand and come to terms with. I haven’t felt like I’ve worked hard enough, but lots of times I don’t feel the motivation either. People have said time and again that for your service, do what you are passionate about, but I don’t know if I can do what I’m passionate about through my work in the Peace Corps. I’m not passionate about teaching or health or construction, although I’ve helped with all of that so far in the Peace Corps.
At the same time, I feel nervous about where I’m going next: into the unknown. I know I won’t be doing a third year because I feel that two will be plenty for me, but I’m not planning on going to grad school yet because the only thing I thought I might want to follow up on in grad school, linguistics, I’ve decided not to worry about because it’s not that route I want to take.
When I think rationally, I know I’m still helping people, and that just because I have no big projects planned, that’s fine. I think my personality and interests about what I want out of life are fine, if perhaps a bit unconventional. But I’ve had a hard time squaring that with what I’ve feel like someone in the Peace Corps should do. I’m trying not to waste any more energy worry about that, but it’s hard to do sometimes.
Tristan
posted by Tristan | 7:00 PM
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