Selfishness on Crowded Buses

This happens almost every day; you see the bus coming toward you and you can tell by the way that people are standing in both of the doors that it’s standing-room-only. You sigh and brace yourself for the pressing, the squeezing, and the discomfort. You step up and, shifting your backpack to one shoulder to slide between people easier, you worm your way in. You look through the tangle of heads and hands and see, there in the middle of the bus, blessed space. The problem is that two overweight people are pressed together blocking your path. Why won’t the people in the middle move closer together? Can’t they see that you’re just trying to get somewhere and that everyone else is suffering because of their selfishness? What the hell???

There and Back Again: A Volunteer’s Tale

My first visit back to the states in 16 months went off without a hitch and I’m currently working on settling back into my life here in Nicaragua. It was two weeks filled with family, food, holidays, dates with Amanda, and fun. I spent about half of my time with family and half with Amanda and her family and got to do New year’s with both Amanda and my family. Unfortunately I didn’t get much opportunity to connect with many friends, partly because of my busy schedule and partly because I didn’t have a cell phone to call them up. That, and now most of my friends are scattered across the country and world. Highlights from my trip include: Cutting and decorating the Christmas tree, Christmas dinner, seeing my friend Sara, breakfast with mom, a cabin trip with Tyler and Jon, time at the same cabin with Amanda, New Year’s eve dinner and games with friends and family, and meeting Amanda’s coworkers and students in New Prague, MN.

The men cutting down a Christmas tree

Mom and I at the Christmas tree farm

Sara and I, friends through high school, college, and beyond. Too many memories to count...

Bros at the cabin

Expert firewoman at the cabin

Amazing New Year's dinner

Happy New Year!!!

Welcoming the new year together

I had prepared myself for significant culture shock after having been gone for so long, but I didn’t really have any trouble re-adjusting for the brief time I was home. I did feel a bit like I was on the outside looking in at this country of concrete, bricks, metal, and electricity, but it wasn’t alienating as much as it was fascinating and confusing. I constantly found myself wondering, “How did we get all the money and resources to build all of this?” Having lived in towns with scant electricity, unpaved roads, houses made from corrugated metal roofs and wooden boards, and cars signifying extreme wealth, it was overwhelming to see such development everywhere. What does it all mean? I think that I was searching for some kind of narrative or story that I could apply to make sense of the vast differences, but there is no easy explanation. The roots are complex and deep and probably have to do with a huge head-start in terms of accumulation of resources, development of a productive economy, political and economic stability, almost no large-scale destruction in the past 150 years, and huge reserves of natural resources to draw upon. Nicaragua, meanwhile, was a colony for over a hundred years, which limited its growth, and then suffered periodic wars for the next hundred years. Dictators robbed the people of resources that could have been invested in infrastructure and education, hurricanes and earthquakes took their toll on the small country, and the natural resources do not compare to those of the US. Add to that the foreign interventions, the crippling civil war in the 1970s and 80s, the more difficult climate, and a culture and society influenced by all these experiences and the differences make more sense.

In addition to culture shock on my way into the US, I was preparing myself for a difficult re-entry to Nicaragua. I knew apart from saying goodbye to loved ones again that I’d be leaving the comforts of a developed country like indoor toilets, hot water, huge amounts of delicious and varied food, highways, climate control, cars, movie theaters, couches, rugs, nice mattresses, I could go on. Yet when I arrived back in country I slipped easily into Spanish, welcomed the warm weather, and felt almost at home on the crowded ex-school buses that took me home. The word home is always a tricky one once we leave it for college, and in some ways home will always be where I grew up, but in another sense it means wherever you’ve become accustomed to living, wherever you feel most comfortable, and wherever you understand and fit in best. In that sense, Nicaragua feels much more like home than I expected, and it has been a very rewarding and pleasant re-entry. My friends threw me a welcome-home party and the masses of tourists and short-term volunteers here increase my sense of belonging to the community here. I am extremely lucky to feel so happy and comfortable visiting the US and then to have such a happy and comfortable re-entry into the country where I’ll spend my next 11 months. I miss home, but at least I feel at home here too.

On Poverty and Generosity

It feels cliché to say that the Nicaraguans I have encountered have been extremely generous and warm people. I and many fellow Peace Corps volunteers often comment on how Nicaraguans would likely not be as welcomed in the US as we feel here. Since moving into my own house I have been lent dishes, furniture, and small appliances and and I am constantly invited to eat with other families or simply given food outright. At first this kind of generosity made me uncomfortable because I was unable to reciprocate and didn’t know what the cultural and social expectations were of me. With time I have become more comfortable and have found ways to give to others and return favors. Still, this outpouring of support from people who live in dirt-floor homes, cannot afford even a bicycle, and work long, hard days in the fields to bring home rice and beans is an overwhelming experience and it causes many volunteers to declare the US a selfish country and the Nicaraguans as a morally superior culture. I can understand the impulse to feel this kind of adoration for the generosity of poor societies, but a book I read in a class on developmental economics has made me wonder if perhaps the comparison is more complex than it seems. The book is titled ‘The Moral Economy of the Peasant,’ and it suggests a functional reason for generosity. If a rural and poor group is generous and redistributes its resources, it will be more likely to survive bad harvests and other supply shocks. Thus, people are not generous because they are more altruistic, they are generous because if they give when they have a surplus then they can receive when they have a shortfall. Necessity breeds generosity in groups with few resources.

Volunteer Experiences Culture, Doubts Objective Reality

I had heard about purísimas, but I had only the vaguest idea of what they consisted of. In general I knew that they’re religious-inspired events put on by families where people sing and pray and then pass out food, candy, and drinks. I imagined it to be a kind of hybrid between a prayer session and Halloween, and I wasn’t far off. When the opportunity presented itself, I joined my friend Enoe (pronounced ‘en-o-a’) and her little brother-in-law Marvin and walked down the road toward the purísima. As we approached we saw a group of about 60 people spilling into the street; some were children seemingly cuing up in semi-organized lines and the rest were mothers and little ones gathering around the entrance to a house. We met up with Ruth, another friend, and took up positions near the perimeter to people-watch, waving and nodding to familiar faces. My friend Herty belongs to one of the families that was hosting the event, so he was wandering around and helping prepare. Soon some of the women near the front of the group began singing a song about mother Mary and everyone joined in. It was a short song, mostly for the children, but clearly part of an unspoken deal: sing and you’ll get treats. As the singing began there was a powerful blast from not far away that made me recoil suddenly, though I seemed to be the only one not prepared for it. Someone was tossing powerful firecrackers into the road above and below the crowd during the song. I would see a smoking canister sail through the air and then hear and feel a CRACK that felt like artillery landing in our midst. I began mentally preparing for the possibility of a misfire heading into the crowd and wondered if I’d be able to grab it quickly enough to toss it out before it blew up in my face. I calculated that the chances were high that I would lose a hand in the process, so I’m glad it didn’t come to that. Shortly after the singing and explosions stopped the children surged forward and I saw adults carrying plastic bins and pails over their heads passing out plastic bags filled with fruit juices. A sea of people of all ages, but especially children, began calling out to the goody-carriers to give them one of whatever they were carrying. The carriers were like mother birds surrounded by chirping chicks clamoring for food. More distributors of goods came out from the house with all kinds of things in their baskets, from cooked corn on the cob to sugarcane to rice pudding in bags to sweet lemons to gift bags with chips and candies and all manner of colored bags of juice. The shouting and pressing up to the distributors to grab at the stuff before they ran out took on a force of its own and led to a barely controlled mass of grabbing, pushing, tugging, and stumbling people. I stared in wonder at the clamor and insistence of adults and children alike. Old women were tapping and grabbing at the water-balloon-bags of juices and children pouted and punched each other when they didn’t get a coveted treat.

Killing Ants with Dance and Climbing Conception

The last few weeks have been unusual because the school year is stuttering to a stop and there was a patron saint festival in a nearby city. The festival went on for a couple of weeks, but I went with the family of a friend of mine to see the big day of celebration on November 17th. San Diego is the patron saint of Altagracia on Ometepe Island and they celebrate by having mass in the church and then carrying a statue of the saint in the middle of a procession around the whole town.

The crowds leaving mass to begin the procession

One Year as a Volunteer

Ambassador Callahan, my host mom, and I at my swearing-in ceremony last year

On November 22^nd, 2010 I attended the swearing-in ceremony in a fancy hotel in Managua and changed my job title from ‘Peace Corps Trainee’ to ‘Peace Corps Volunteer.’ The change felt small and mammoth at the same time and I believed in what I was swearing to do. I still do believe it. I am here to build relationships, learn about others, teach others, and support a community that lacks the resources necessary to fulfill its potential. I never had illusions that these things would be easy and I’ve had to constantly revise my internal goals and strategies to feel productive and successful. So here I am, at the halfway mark in my service. Here are some reflections about what this last year has meant: (my previous reflections on my year in Nicaragua including the three months of training can be found here)

Just for Fun

The Cloud

“The interesting thing about cloud computing is that we’ve redefined cloud computing to include everything that we already do. I can’t think of anything that isn’t cloud computing with all of these announcements.”

Larry Ellison CEO – Oracle Corporation, 2008

Are you tired of living your life tied down to reality? Do you forget dates, miss TV shows, get sick, or wish you could show your friends the most recent sequence of pictures of your newborn burping? Then you need to enter the world of cloud computing. All you need is a fast internet connection and you can do anything that people with high-end computers can do, which is everything worth doing. Need to share those photos? Do it on the cloud! We are so secure that you can’t delete the pictures even if you want to. Want to watch 72 hours straight of Lost? The cloud has you covered. Want to collaborate on calendars, documents, crossword puzzles, or trash-talking? Doing things in person is going out of style fast, so do it on the cloud. You can interact and counteract in real time with anyone in the world without the hassle of moving. Farm on the cloud, sing on the cloud, cry on the cloud. Everyone and no one will hear you. Rising healthcare costs will soon be a thing of the past. Need to visit the doctor to have a lump looked at? We can connect you to doctors in India who will have a look at it and email you a prescription in minutes (not to be confused with Chatroulette, which may also involve people asking to look at your lumps). Keep all your finances on the cloud and the cloud will file your taxes for you. You can shop on the cloud, talk on the cloud, mock on the cloud, and vote on the cloud. Politics has never been so transparently meaningless as it is when it’s done on the cloud. Occupy the cloud! Tweet, post, like, comment, and repeat. On the cloud! Dating is risky when you have to be in the same room as a potential loser, so why not do it on the cloud? Sex is messy! Do it on the cloud! (Apple has no app for that, but you can find them in the Android store) Watch your children in the adjacent room, check the puppycam in New Jersey, and order a pizza for dinner, all on the cloud. You can access the cloud from your home, your car, a public bathroom, or from any of our new partner cloud-connected airlines. Sign up now and get a five minute trial for free. It’s all you’ll need. Stop living on boring old earth and start living on the cloud today.

 

 

 

Not sure what cloud computing is?

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703961104575226194192477512.html

I’m trying out different writing styles and in this one I’m copying the style of ‘Shouts and Murmurs’ from the New Yorker. I’d love some feedback.

Smooth Elections

Everything was quiet and pleasant in my neck of the woods through the elections. President Ortega won re-election with an impressive majority. I haven’t heard any serious reports of fraud or widespread voting problems. Life goes back to normal.

My friend Herty after voting in the elections on Sunday. They mark your thumb to prevent double-voting.

House Upgrades

Here are a few pictures of some of the improvements I’ve made since uploading the youtube video tour of my place:

My lovely new latrine behind my house. It's simple yet effective. I love the green door.

Politics in Nicaragua

(Remember: the views expressed here are my own and do not reflect the position of the Peace Corps in any way, shape, or form. Okay, on to the post.)

Sunday November 6th is election day here in Nicaragua. There is a great deal of uncertainty about what this will mean for the country and for our work as English volunteers. We don’t know if school will be canceled due to political unrest afterward or if things will go on as normally scheduled. Here’s the lowdown: There are three major-party candidates; current president Daniel Ortega for the Sandinista party, ex-president Arnoldo Alemán for the Liberal Constitutionalist Party, and Fabio Gadea for the Independent Liberal Party. According to the Nicaragua Wikipedia page, citing recent Gallup polls, Ortega will have 44% of the votes, Gadea 32%, and Alemán 13%. I don’t really know the substantive differences between their policy proposals because neither of the two major newspapers make it out to my town, and even when I do track one down they are not very balanced or particularly well-reported. In this post I’ll give a brief overview of the historical context, and then describe some of the issues surrounding the current election.