Day of the Dead

Halloween has started gaining a little steam in South America, but not nearly enough steam for candy corn to be readily available here. The much more traditional celebration here is of the Day of the Dead. Last night our language school had an interactive cultural event, where some of the students researched and presented about the customs associated with the holiday that runs from tomorrow at noon till Monday at noon. We had a model table replete with Andean traditional foods, flowers, and decorations. And learned all about the reasoning behind the practices, such as the children who go from house to house to pray for the lost loved ones in exchange for payment in candy or bread, similar to trick-or-treating. To bring a little bit of home to the occasion, I made pumpkin bars.

On a much more serious, and very sadly ironic note, one of the street kids that some of my friends from the language school works with, killed himself yesterday. He was the second suicide from this group in 10 days, and the 4th untimely death in as many months. To support my friends, I attended the teenager's funeral. Near the entrance of the cemetery there was a platform to lay the coffin on in front of this huge Jesus statue, and a Catholic Bolivian woman who will pray for the deceased for a small price. The caskets are not buried underground but housed in large walls. When we reached his site, ~20 of his friends from the streets, a few other missionaries, and his alcoholic mother who has apparently not cared about him, or for him, in years, gathered to honor him with words, prayers and pan flute music. It was touching and heartbreaking to see these teenagers so hardened by glue-sniffing and living under the bridge, so tender in their loss.

I pray that his mother and his girlfriend can find peace and not guilt through this pain. And I pray that God will continue to use this as an opportunity for the missionaries to love on these kids.

Soy Confusa

Before you Spanish hotshots start sending me emails about the incorrect use of the verb "ser" in the title, let me explain the sarcasm; that being confused has basically become a permanent state of being for me. After last week's post about converting units (by the way I just installed a conversion widget on my computer's dashboard right above my weather ticker in Celsius,) I was asked at church on Sunday if I like basketball, which lead to a whole new realm of confusion.

Have you ever prayed for something and upon receiving the answer, questioned your sanity in asking for it in the first place? I was starting to notice that my Bolivian friends were more superficial than I wanted. Since I've been in Cochabamba, I've been attending a Bolivian church where I am the only gringa. But other than that I usually have someone else around who speaks English. So, I'd asked God for more opportunities to be immersed to the degree that usually terrifies me, and when I agreed to play basketball with an all Bolivian "professional"* women's team, I started to regret my request.

People tried to reassure me that there really aren't very many words used in sports, so I'd be fine. I was not very convinced, and for once I was right. For the past ~15 years (since this picture was taken) I've only played the kind of pick-up basketball where chaos is the norm. So, last night, at my first practice with this team, I was surprised by how many craters there were in the cement court, how well these short girls played, how much my jump-shot has suffered in the last decade, and mostly by the fact that they ran plays!!

As far as I can tell there are no play books or marker boards for X's and O's, but our team seems to have at least 11 offensive plays that I'm going to need to learn in SPANISH! Does anybody know how to translate "a pick," the dictionary doesn't seem to have basketball concepts. For an hour and half I had that deer-in-headlights adrenaline rush that comes with being completely out of one's comfort zone, but in a somewhat enjoyable way.

In the midst of this chronic mild panic attack, I thank God for the chance to build new relationships and to be stretched a little further...

I am a bow on Your hands, Lord.

Draw me lest I rot.

Do not overdraw me, Lord, I shall break.

Overdraw me Lord, and who cares if I break?

-a prayer by Kikos Kazantzakis

*"professional" basketball here does not imply getting paid, for all I know it may mean that I have to pay them.

Lost in Conversion

One would have expected that translating would take up a large part of my brain power after moving to another continent and beginning language school. But one adjustment I did not anticipate was the extent of the other conversions that would be required of me.

Fahrenheit to Celsius -Accepting that I’m going to have to get used to the new systems, I switched my computer’s weather ticker to Centigrade. So, now, instead of being able to prepare for a temperature, I basically have no idea how hot or cold it will be except in relation to how hot or cold it was the day before. Fortunately, It’s pretty much always ~75F here.

Miles to Kilometers - From running in road races I can remember that a 10k is 6.2 miles, 5k is 3.1 etc., but this week when I started car shopping, trying to keep mileage and kilometerage straight in my head was quite a task.

Pounds to Kilograms - Cooking has been a challenge as well. Fortunately, my rent includes meals, so someone is generally cooking for me, but on the few occasions when I've tried to bake I've had to adapt every recipe. So far I haven't had huge success. Plus, the altitude somehow causes baked goods to have little holes in them.

Dollars to Bolivianos - The exchange rate has been about 1:7 since I’ve been here, I wish now I’d learned my multiples of 7 a little better in 3rd grade. The really nice thing about these mental olympics is that I’ve been Christmas shopping, and where usually I would have been acutely aware of every penny I was spending, it’s been much easier to ignore the prices, since converting them isn't second nature.

Feet to Meters - This week alone I’ve struggled to try to explain how tall someone was, what elevation a town was at, and the distance of the swim in a race. I think the other party thinks the man I was describing is a giant, and my swim was a breeze.

Gallons to Liters - Recently, I was trying to figure out if gas was cheap here, but between gallons to liters and bolivianos to dollars, I gave up.

Time, of course, is measured in the same units, but you’d never guess it by the lack of concern for it that people here often show.

After a frustrating week with all of this math, this veterinarian’s sign reminded me of why I’m so grateful for my profession amongst all these unknowns. In English it reads, “We speak the same language as your pet.” This is why you can often find me conversing with perros whether in the office or in the street.

Huellas (Tracks)

This week I started volunteering at one of the highest quality veterinary hospitals here in Cochabamba. They see mostly dogs and some cats, and do many surgeries and procedures very similarly to what I'm used to in The States. The lack of legal liability here seems like it would be a blessing, but the owner of the practice blames this as the cause of why Bolivian vets aren't "rich" like vets from the U.S. Because there are no laws ensuring good practices, anyone can hang up their shingle and bring down the whole profession. I'm not sure what the intricacies behind the economic discrepancies entail, most likely a combination of quality of care, income of the owners, accountability by the law, and a different level of human-animal bond, but the differences are stark. For a common procedure that this hospital performs because others in the area will not, they charge ~$80. At my last U.S. practice we charged ~$1500, nearly 20x as much!

The idea my professors had in mind when suggesting I spend some time at a local vet was for me to have some practical experience in Spanish in an area that's especially practical for me. Unfortunately, the practice owner knows English and embraces the opportunity to brush up on his skills. Yesterday, he vented his opinion on NGO's here and how corrupt they are. He ranted about people coming from other countries with money from their organization, living in mansions, driving $50,000 vehicles, and claiming to "help" the poor. After, quite a long monologue he abruptly stopped and asked, "Oh, are you from an NGO?" "Um, yeah, but keep going, this is interesting."

I look forward to more opportunities to hear his uncensored views on gringos, missionaries, politics, etc. And, it looks like he might also give me the opportunity to start chipping away at the overwhelming pet overpopulation problem here, with God all things are possible...

Much Needed Niño-Time

It's easy to forget the big picture when your days are consumed with language acquisition. Without an occasional reminder of who you've come to serve it's hard to stay motivated to work so hard to be able to communicate. Since my last post, as I passed the 1-month in Bolivia milestone, God saw that I was nearing the end of my ability to stay focused, and has blessed me with three opportunities this week to hug on (or get climbed on by) orphans.

There are many many orphanages here and almost as many styles. Some have very nice facilities, but a very poor ratio of caretakers to kids. Others, such as the one I visited on Saturday, are family style with two parents and 12 children. The niños in some are clean and healthy, more often sniffling and coughing. Sometimes they call me Tia (aunt), sometimes Mama. But no matter what their history of abuse or neglect, or their current disadvantaged circumstances they're always eager for attention, and always ticklish! An hour or two of lovin' on these little balls of energy is enough to add new phrases to my need-to-learn-how-to-say-in-Spanish list, like "be nice" and "let go," and just enough to leave me eager to master Spanish so I can spend all my time serving Bolivians like these.