It's 2a on Wednesday morning. Been up about 20 mins nursing a sinus infection. Had the bright idea to sleep with the mini-fan clipped to by bed frame blowing right in my face. I woke up in the morning regretting it. Over the past 24 hours it's definitely gotten worst. I have no complaints though. I'm sitting on the freezer, drinking my fourth cup of gatorade, hoping to put some nutrients in my body. That's what gatorade does right? Like it's better than water because it doesn't just hydrate you? I saw it on a commercial...LOL. It's nice out here. There's a soothing 'symphony orchestra' created by the steady drip of water into a bucket, the crickets, Pete's snoring hehe, and the faint sounds of rain. Every once in a while an animal chimes in. I'm not sure what it is, but it makes the same sound people make when they scratch the inside of their ears/throat, but a little smoother. It's a great time to be alone and reflect on everything I saw yesterday. It was a long, hot work day. After breakfast we went out the Chonco, which is a new community in the procress of being built where the staff at Amigos for Christ have gone to the dump and told people that, if they are willing to work, they have the opportunity for a new life. It's the same concept as Villa Catalina. There are 207 families living in Chonco. There's a school, and the people have developed their own businesses. We're digging trenches to lay pipeline so that these people can have clean running water. Right now they tie huge blue tubs to their horse-drawn carts and travel to a well to gather their water for a day. So these pipelines are a big deal for them. We're also helping to build a feeding center and repair dirt roads that have eroded due to the rain. Repairing these roads is essentially driving to arock quarry and throwing rocks onto a truck to be taken back to the hole and thrown in. For hours yesterday I shoveled dirt next to 50 year old Nicaraguan women in their flip flops and skirts. I watched as others worked along side 7 year old barefoot girls shoveled rock to be used to make material selecto. The young boys out worked me at the rock quarry. An older woman and I created a steady work pace when shoveling dirt. I dug and tossed, she dug and tossed. No words needed. Her name was Maribel. The work ethic these people have is remarkable. They're not looking for a handout, they're just looking for opportunity. The opportunity to prove themselves. The opportunity to grow and prosper.
I had a funny encounter with a young girl when I asked where the bathroom was. She took me to the place where they showered. There was a huge tub filled with green water. Mosquitoes and flies hovered over it. It was heart wrenching. I told her that I need to pee (which is one of those words you learn in school that is utterly useless because the word used to say pee is different in every country), but the girl had no idea what I was saying. So I squated and sssss'ed. She looked at me like I was an idiot. I tried to think of the word for toilet, but my mind was drawing a blank and filling it with the word for computer used in Spain, which I knew wasn't right. So I asked her where she goes when she has to sssss *as I squat*. Finally! A breakthrough LOL.
I've noticed the stares I've gotten the past few days from Nicaraguans as a result of my skin color. VERY seldom do they see African American volunteers, which doesn't surprise me. I wrote an article for The Root back in November about the low rates of African Americans involved in interational volunteering and foreing development, so when Sergio told me there would be 50 'gringos' and one other 'morena,' I wasn't surprised. A gringo is a white person in many Spanish speaking countries. I've always understood it to be a derrogatory term, but here it's just another way to describe a person. Sometimes they call me a gringa negra, which is oxymoronic in itself lol. I have several theories why this is the case everywhere I go; why I'm always the only black person, or one of very few. But I'd love to hear feedback from any young black people reading this. Now don't get me wrong, I'm well aware that African Americans volunteer abroad, but we do so at significantly lower rates than our white peers, at least that's from my experience. Even when we sent out tons of recruitment emails for young people to get involved with MODEL26 as a Campus Lead for the 2011-2012 school year, we got the largest response from the ivy league schools and small liberal arts schools. The only HBCU to even show a small amount of interest was Clark Atlanta University, where we never got a full application.
Well I'm going to try to get some shut eye. Tomorrow we'll be visiting a school and delivering school supplies...well I guess technically later today. There are a few girls from Walton High School in GA that had a bike drive at their school for the community here, so tomorrow there is a bike race as well. A small relief from manual labor that my back and arms will appreciate. I'm so excited!
D
