Water Balloons & Shaving Cream

Hola! I hope things are well in the northern hemisphere--things are moving along here. My Spanish, or rather my Castellano, is improving (or so I like to tell myself), and I am continuing to soak up the culture here in Bolivia. I just got back from a raging fiesta in Oruro, where Carnaval was taking place. For some twenty odd hours there is a parade that marches all around the city. You can buy a ticket for 80 bolivianos, which is about $11.50, and that allows you to sit in the bleachers to watch the parade go by. You can choose to sit there until dawn the next day, which I’m pretty sure some people actually do--with the occasional bathroom break of course, or, like the tourists we are, you can walk around the city intermittently. This one plaza led us up a landing where you could see the entire town up until the mountains that surrounded it.

Best investments of the day:

1) Poncho - For the entire day I was covered in water-balloon remnants and shaving cream. At one point during we were grabbing a late lunch where they weren’t serving any vegetarian food, so I ran out quickly to buy some cheap pastries from a stand not twenty meters away from the restaurant. I considered putting my poncho back on but thought I’d be ok for just a few minutes. I stepped outside the door and “splat!” water-ballon to the back, and “smack!” shaving cream to the face. Oh well, así es la vida (that’s life). While paying for my pastries a small boy came up to me, arm raised and balloon in hand. I looked him dead in the eye with my hand out, and said, “por favor.” He lowered his arm, smiled, and gently placed one of his water-balloons in my hand like a good little boy as I said, “Gracias.” Needless to say I had some vengeance on my way back to my friends.

2) Sneakers - By nighttime the streets were soaked and covered with trash: pieces of balloon rubber, dismantled ponchos, beer cans, chicken bones, and sorry to say- vomit. Bleh!

3) Sunscreen - Apparently when you’re closer to the sun you burn more easily... go figure. I used some of what the Canadian brought, but the places I missed--yikes!

The official (national) holiday of Carnaval was these past two days, which means no work, but a lot more water and shaving cream. There has been an infantry of kids stationed just outside the entrance of my building, making my exit strategy rather difficult. From my balcony I’ve seen trucks full of people go by with huge buckets full of water balloons and what looked like turbo nurf guns. The best has been seeing full out battles take place between the truck people and the neighborhood kids. I can’t even tell you how tempted I was to fill up a bucket of my own and just dump it on them, but fears of causing permanent damage from seven stories up inhibited my great deluge.

We are starting up a Saturday program for arts and sports in the community of Ushpa-Ushpa. I will be helping to oversee the theatre and art classes, but I also have the task of marketing the program to developing countries in order to raise sustainable funds. If any of you have suggestions of who I can contact or advice on how to begin this venture please let me know. I haven’t done large-scale fundraising before, but I guess I have to start somewhere!

Please continue to pray for me, and let me know how I can do the same for you. I love the emails! And oh yes--add me on skype! I am “callieham”, a bit abstract, I know.

Ciao,

Callie

ps- In case you were wondering, the ice has melted. I now receive many a warm hola’s from Sebastian each day.

Here

Feb. 8, 2010

I made it to Bolivia! After all of the planning and packing, the questioning of whether or not this was really what I wanted to do or not, and after having to say my many farewells, I am finally here and completely at peace that it was the right thing to do. That’s not to say, however, that there weren’t a few bumps along the way. For instance, during my 7 hour layover in La Paz, which I don’t know if I’ve ever been anywhere with such thin air before, I fell asleep at a table cradling my carry-on. When I woke up my water bottle had come open and allowed water to soak my attire precisely as if I had peed my pants. I had a pair of jeans in my bag, so I changed and dried my clothes under the dryer in the bathroom. Once I finally made it to Cochabamba my living arrangements had changed, so for the first night I stay with the woman I had been corresponding with prior to arriving. First thing I did when she brought me to her home was take a shower... or try to. I’m pretty sure I didn’t receive any directions other than turn the knob, so that’s what I did. The shower head made some sizzling sounds, burst into flames, and wilted. Uh...? Right. So I’m standing there in all my glory, naked, yelling, “Fumas! Fumas!” which apparently is not the word for smoke nor fire. Nicola walked in, looked at the shower, shrugged her shoulders and said, “Tenemos un otro,” or “We have another.”

I was feeling pretty burdened the first day as you can probably guess, missing my friends and family and destroying bathroom utilities and all, but it has gotten a lot better. I have really only been here a few days now, but I feel like it’s been at least a month. The other volunteers, one Canadian and three Germans, have already become my dear friends and have made the adjustment quite easy, although I wouldn’t mind if we spoke English every now and then since I know that everyone CAN. They’re right to try and make us all speak Spanish so that we can learn faster, but the Germans still break into their language sometimes, and when they do I try to talk to the Canadian freakishly fast so they can’t understand me either. This weekend we played a strange type of indoor volleyball called wally, went dancing, played pool (or taca taca), saw the botanical gardens, and went out to a couple of bars, including one called K-ooz, where you play yatzee on the table.

Carnaval is coming up, which is the Bolivian version of Fat Tuesday in New Orleans. It is tradition for guys to throw water balloons at girls in the weeks prior to the holiday, which is flat out dumb. The first time I got hit was on a super hot day in the middle of the Concha, a ginormous market near el centro, and it felt amazing. But since then I’ve been the victim of numerous drive-bys and ended up drenched. How do they ever expect to get girlfriends?

I moved in with a host family from Peru and it is fantastic. I have an incredible view from my room, and there is a market just below the building where I can buy groceries. Jessica, my host sister, is my age and fantastic, and we also have a talking pet parrot named Sebastian. He hasn’t really taken to me yet (I’m getting the silent treatment), but I know he’ll warm up.

As for why I am here: my Spanish is not exactly up to par, so this first month is going to be packed with one-on-one Spanish lessons. For now I am helping out at the guardería, or nursery, and also helping to build and organize la biblioteca, or library. Meanwhile I am deciding on what projects besides microfinance I want to be involved in/initiate once my Spanish gets better. I believe I’ll be heavily involved in outreach and finding ways to market Proyecto Horizonte’s mission to other places. As far as I can tell I’ll have my hands in a little bit of everything, which is perfect as it will give be insight into all aspects of this type of development.

Thank you all for your prayers and support; you have really come through for me. God has really blessed me in all of this and I am psyched to see where he leads me next. Please continue to pray for my safety and for me to use my time wisely. I can already tell it’s going to fly by, and I really want to make it count.

Besos,

Callie