June 10 was a interesting day at school. The students only had a half day and at lunch time they watched a movie (if they could fork up the $2). The day was hectic though. Some students didn't bother to show up as well as some teachers which left me with the slack to pull. I was asked to help out Mrs. Parke in the downstairs classrooms (grades 1, 2, 3) because two of the teachers were missing. As much as I love hanging out with kids, I wasn't prepared to entertain a bunch of 2nd graders followed by whichever other students didn't pay for to watch the movie. I had them play some games because that's what I remember doing in 2nd grade. I split them up into two teams, Team Grapes and Team Strawberries, they chose the names haha. I showed them pictures of animals and they had to spell them out for me. Everything was fine until we hit pictures of animals that these kids had never seen before, which happened to be half the animal kingdom. So once that game fell through we did some coloring. I had to yell at a group of kids for the first time that day which was a strange feeling. The kids wouldn't stop throwing bouncy balls everywhere, especially at a girl who has a learning disability which made me furious. After school, I hiked to the PC office to turn in my vacation form for the Rigot wedding and pick up some snazzy new PC polos. There was also a package slip in my box so I headed off to the post office asap. I had 20 minutes before they closed so I had to do some speed walking, and at 3:40 in the afternoon that's a recipe for sweaty clothes. The sweat caused all the marking on the package to rub off on me while I was walking downtown to the bus terminal. I looked like a wet, purple marked wreck. Nothing a Carib couldn't fix though.
That weekend, 11th-12th, I spent the day working on the property with my trusty new cutlass. Our land was pretty overgrown and since I live on the ground level I took it upon myself to fix this situation. I spent a couple hours cutting the grass and weeds and it was actually pretty fun. At one point, I was taking a break and the ladies above me brought me down part of a roti (similar to a burrito), some pineapple juice and a slice of cake! Lorice said she wished she had a camera to document my work because I looked like a real Grenadian. I'm trying.
June 13th was, of course, Whit Monday!! I don't know how y'all celebrate Whit Monday, but it's similar to the Jewish Passover here. On the eve of Whit Monday, families place a line of white sugar outside their homes to please Whitney Houston when she passes over every home. If they fail to leave the offering, home owners are forced to watch an impromptu live Whitney Houston concert that is so emotionally powerful that they are left in a vegetative state until the next year's Whit Monday. Adults spend all day watching Soul Train while kids celebrate the holiday by reenacting The Bodyguard. It's a joyous festival for all. Actually, I have no idea what Whit Monday is, but it was an excuse to visit the beach for the first time in 2 months.
So, remember that time I got locked out of my apartment? Well I didn't learn my lesson, apparently. The Thursday after Whit Monday, I came home from soccer practice, set my stuff inside and then walked outside on my patio. I hang up all my gear after training because it's dirty and sweaty. Makes sense, right? What didn't make sense was habitually locking the door behind me when I stepped outside to take my gear off. I was standing there, butt naked outside my apartment, locked out, keys are inside on my table. What the hell was I going to do? The spare key I was given last time is also inside on my table. Greeeeattt. After standing there, in the dark, still naked, I had to formulate a plan. I through some of my sweaty clothes back on, at least the shorts, and walked upstairs to see if my land lady had any extra keys because I did it again. She didn't find it funny this time, neither did I, I was starving, needed a shower, and I reeeally did not want to sleep outside again, naked. I tried all her other spare keys to no avail. The reality of the situation sunk it a little more. I knew there was only one option, I had to break into my own apartment. Amidst a junk pile next to my apartment I found a thin, 10 foot long pvc pipe with some wire sticking out the end. I fashioned the wire into a hook, pulled the screen off my window, and stuck the pole through the burglar bars like a fishing pole. At first, I tried to use the pole to unlock the window on the adjacent wall because it was next to a door I could reach in and unlock. That was proving to be difficult, instead, I attempted to use the pole to fish for my keys off the table. After 15 slow, agonizing minutes, just longing for dinner and clothes, I successfully fished my keys out the window! I was so happy and proud of what I had just accomplished, I had just broken into my own apartment in 20 minutes! Wait... If I can do it, someone else can too. That's not good. I keep everything far from the windows when I'm gone now.
This past weekend was pretty enjoyable, minus the rain. It's been raining here every day for the past 2 weeks or so. The rain is only on and off, but it decides to pour when you are enjoying the day. Instead of going to my school on Friday I worked at NaDMA. We had an open house in Grenville where we handed our brochures and disaster preparedness information with some of our stakeholders like Digicel, Lime, the Ministry of Health, and the Red Cross. It was a fairly successful event, but a storm rolled in from the see and we closed up shop around 2pm. Saturday had a similar rain situation. It was Mackenzie's birthday (another volunteer), so we all gathered at Grand Anse beach to have a burrito party and enjoy the sun. It was a really fun time and it's not that often that we get to see all of each other in the same place. Unfortunately, the rain came in the afternoon and wouldn't leave until later that night, but we all had fun anyways.
In the meantime, I'm busy at work planning and developing these youth community groups NaDMA wants me to be responsible for. It's a bit frustrating because it seems like NaDMA wants me for something different for what I am here to do as a PCV. Basically, they want me to organize and develop this program all on my own, present it to them, and then conduct the training sessions on disasters for the youths. The problem is that I'm not exactly here to do solo work because that doesn't practice sustainability. And my main goal here isn't to just teach people about disasters, I'm here to do youth development and train things like life skills, IT skills, against HIV/AIDS discrimination etc. It sounds to me like they just needed someone to do some extra legwork and they don't have to pay me. So I'm busy working on a plan that focuses more on sustainability and training other things besides disaster preparedness. I don't think it should be hard, I just hope they get a better understanding of my role here and accept whatever proposal I give them or else I might have to focus on a secondary project elsewhere.
Today, June 23, is Corpus Christi. Another holiday celebrated down here where, traditionally, it was a day for planting in the fields. I didn't do any planting, rather I'm trying to last as long as I can on this last bit of food before going to buy more groceries. I've been trying to save cash for my trip home for the wedding. Also, I don't want to leave a bunch of food in my fridge while I'm gone. Meals have been either spaghetti or beans for the past week in an attempt to cut corners and time my grocery buying right. Delicious! But tomorrow I get to splurge at the grocery store and then it's the weekend again and 2 weeks till I visit home/friends!!
Until next time!
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