Christmas Already

I have to say, it seems so strange to see Christmas trees for sale in the front of most of the shops and then decorations inside. It makes me laugh as I walk by in my skirt and polo. There are already lights on the palm trees in town and Christmas music blaring from the radios. All these reminders of the holiday to come and I wasn't sure how I would take having Christmas without snow, but one night while walking to church I realized I may have a comparable substitute. The field was absolutely full of lightning bugs!! I have never seen so many. Miss Louisa noticed me admiring the beauty and commented with, "You see all the Christmas lights?" I smiled and said, "There are so many!" She responded, "It's because it's almost Christmas, Miss Amy, that's why." So this year I may not wake up to glistening snow, but if I wait until dark I will see a glittering field.
I've also received my first Christmas package. Emily you are really on top of things. And don't worry, I'll keep the wrapped gifts for the 25th.

Thanksgiving

I spent Thanksgiving this year with my new Peace Corps Belize Family at the lovely George Price Center in Belmopan! Since there were 80+ people attending, we split up the food responsibilities by district. Those of us in Toledo were responsible for potatoes, bread, and appetizers. This took some preparation the night before and a day of cooking. I was on the last shift before the meal so got to help with finishing the products. I put my deviled egg filling and sliced bread arranging skills to work. I also learned how to make corn fritters. It was nice to have time in the kitchen and I enjoyed working with the other PCV's on a project, no matter how small it was, together. Wait! This was not a small project. My goodness, it was quite the production. Feeding 80+ people! Plus the tables were beautifully decorated and we all had a chance to express our gratitude on a poster. I wish I would have remembered to bring my turkey hands from Cora and Conner. They would have been a beautiful addition. Megan and I decided to write "Ma sa li wa!" Which in K'ekchi means, "this food is nice." The floor was also open for anyone who would like to verbally give thanks. I couldn't keep from smiling as I continued to look around the conference room as we all enjoyed our Thanksgiving meal together. This is a new tradition in Belize, only the second annual, but I'm sure it's one that will stay for years to come. Hope you all had a very blessed Thanksgiving!! Gobble Gobble!

Children's Day

November 20th marked Children's Day, which is a day to celebrate the rights of child, so instead of sitting in classes we had a day of fun and games!! Oh how I love Belize! We met at the school for a quick assembly, which I enjoyed because I always like singing the Belizean National Anthem, "Land of the free by the Carib Sea our manhood we pledge to thy liberty..." Wow! I could almost keep going and write the whole thing, but it's pretty long, maybe I'll wait for a time I can post a video of the kids singing it. Anyways, after the assembly, we went to the field and started the races. First was the sack race, followed by the marble and spoon, then onto the three-legged race and needle and thread. All the supplies for the games were brought by the students. Some were assigned to bring the sacks, others the spoons. We also had an egg toss and football game before lunch. After lunch it was time for volleyball. The students were split into three houses "Toucan" "Jaguar" and "The Mighty Scorpion." The winners of each race added points to the score, but when I asked later how the winning team was awarded, this was indeed a silly question. "We're just the winners Miss Amy." During the day we had music playing and Kool-Aid to drink, it was so great and I can't wait until next year. It made think a day at the field would be a good summer, or even Christmas break activity, though. I'm sure I would just have to tell a few kids and the word would get around the village.

Who needs an oven

One day I came home from school to Miss Louisa kneading bread, yes bread. For all of you who know me well, you know how much I love bread and if you think of how many tortillas I've been eating lately and how long it has been since I've had fresh baked bread you can almost understand how excited I was. One thing that had me confused though was knowing we had no gas for our oven, so how on earth were we going to bake bread. As usual, I kept the question to myself and instead offered to help. We went through a few rounds of taking turns kneading, Miss Louisa, Martha, and I and the bread was then soft enough. I decided to give in and asked, "Did you get gas for the oven," thinking she must have without me realizing. The response was no, I'll cook it in the fire hearth. What? You can do that? I was intrigued, but sadly had a meeting to go to and missed out on the baking process. I came home to beautifully baked rolls, still warm, and very delicious.
Luckily, I was home the next time baking was on the daily agenda. It was Edwardo's 18th birthday and I had bought a cake mix in town so we could bake him a birthday cake. I wasn't sure what kind to get, but for some reason I am always craving chocolate so went for Devil's food. This became a joke in the Mas household, them making fun of me for bringing home the devil's cake (I did find out it was Miss Louisa's favorite though, so we'll be having it again in March). Over my lunch break we mixed up the batter and I was still trying to wrap my mind around baking in the fire hearth. I thought rolls were probably a little easier, but a cake?!? I put all trust in Louisa as she told me to put the batter in a large pot which she then put in an even larger one. Since I'm not very good at describing things, I'm glad I took pictures.
Now I know how to bake on a fire hearth and that anything is possible!

All I Want for Christmas...

So, we have a library, with many books, but one thing we are lacking are some magazines. Newsweek was suggested by my Standard 5 and 6 teacher and I think Highlights, or some other children's magazine would be great, not only for content, but also pictures. Even old magazines would be appreciated. We also could use some educational games, like Brainquest (oh, how I remember playing Brainquest) for learning centers and early finishers. And some letter tiles, you know, from old Scrabble games. -- This is for you Mom, I know we have an old game of Upwords that hasn't been played for maybe ten years. Throw those tiles in an envelope and send them my way!-- I love you all! Thanks for all the support. Hugs, Kisses, and Noseys!

Meet (some of) the Mas Family

Louisa Mas (37yrs old, maiden name Ishim ~corn in K'ekchi) Not only does she look young for her age, she acts that way, too. She's always wanting to play Pass the Pigs or cards as we're sitting on the floor under the solar light. She was even trying to make fish faces after I showed the girls how ridiculous I looked while biting my cheeks and puckering my lips. Miss Louisa has taught me how to bake tortillas and laughs as I try to pull them off the comal. She always separates my food before adding the pepper, making me feel quite special and a little like a young child. She claims she doesn't know English very well, but I love our after dinner conversations, ocassionally about God. She also has a beautiful voice. I had seen a Bichlebal Sa' Ke'kchi (Songs in Ke'kchi) book held by people at church and I asked if she had one. Yep! She was surprised to hear me sing in Ke'kchi, but really I was just doing my best to pronounce the words if I knew the tune. Really, I just wanted to listen to her though. (Side note: knowing the tune does not help as singing in Belize you follow the person with the loudest voice, not the music)

Hillaria Mas (10yrs old, aka Darlene) At first I thought they were calling her "darling," and I liked that so much I still pretend they do. I constantly find her in the pata (guava) tree and she makes me laugh more than anything, which is good because she likes when I laugh. Lately she's been obsessed with wanting to fight me, of course I play along. She kept telling me she was going to give me a black eye to take to Belmopan as she raised her fist and squinted her eyes. She also tells me all the time she'll only speak to me in K'ekchi, from now on. Then she talk talk talks only to stop with a "don't you understand me?" look.

Ionie Mas (3yrs old) Now this girl knows how to stretch. Every morning after my stroll I take some time to stretch my limbs and every morning Ionie is right their beside me, mimicking my every move. She's the sweetest sweetheart and most of the time only talks to me to repeat what someone has told her to tell me. "Amy, go eat. Amy, pass the pigs. Amy, etc."

Little ones

Here are the 4 year olds that have pre-school in the mornings. (Three year olds come in the afternoon). Miss Max, is their teacher and she is just out of high school, not even 18 yet. This is the first year for a preschool at Santa Teresa and about 40% of the children ages three and four come. Ms Max is impressed with how much her four year olds have learned already this year. After my first visit in the classroom, I thought I would be helping with creating learning centers, but to my surprise the room was transformed already. One thing we can work on is story time. I hope we can get some big books or maybe even make some!

Here are the Infant 1 and 2 children. Mr. Coh is their teacher and has been teaching for six years. I loved how they started their day when I was in their classroom, with a song, of course. "Hello _____, Hello ______. It's so nice to see you again. With a 1 and a 2 and a how do you do? It's so nice to see you again." What a great way to feel you belong. I think we need to remind each other more often how it really is nice to see them. I was surprised by how they all wanted me to check their work and was glad they weren't as scared of me as the preschoolers were. We'll just say I have a few new best friends that like to draw me pictures and walk me home.
And here are the Standard 1 students. Mr. Perez is my most experienced teacher besides the principal, I believe and I can tell. He uses many great strategies and wasn't about to have me simply observe. He kept asking what I was going to do while in his classroom and wondered if I knew any phonics games we could play. The only thing I could think of off the top of my head was to sing the I like to eat apples and bananas song. This was a hit! Before we sang it though, I asked the class for the vowels and vowel sounds. When I asked what word made the long a sound, they all said, "Miss Amy!" I also started some diagnostic reading assesments with this group and will continue with the rest when I get back from Belmopan. Most of the students were reading at a pre-primer level and even the ones who read better could only comprehend the primer passage. I look forward to seeing improvements as I spend more time here.

Little Bits of Life

I love these delicious tuts (K'ekchi word for nuts). They fall of the tree and you crush them between two rocks. Hillaria loves to crack them for me. Probably because she saw how much trouble I was having on my own.

I have come to love shilling bags of water. 12 oz for 25 cents. Quite economical! (You can also get two bananas for a shilling.)


Funny how I live in Belize and still bank at Scotia.

Nephtali: "Miss Amy Miss Amy" as he comes and grabs my hands
Me: "Good morning, Nephtali! How are you?"
Nephtali: "Five years old!" everytime
Oh! My heart has been captured.


This is the puppy I have unofficially claimed as my own. His name you ask? Marshall. Given to him by Martha and Hillaria. I'm not sure why since the other puppies were named Steven Seagal, Rambo, Jackie Chan, and Van Damme. I guess that's appropriate, especially since raising dogs in a village is a survival of the fittest. I'm glad Jerry has outlasted the weaklings and is still in good company. Marshall and Steven sure do like to fight though. Oh! And the dogs don't really lift their legs to pee. Strange I would notice this, more strange I would post it, but it's so odd. They just squat down a little and go.

How do you wash your car in Belize? You drive down into the river a bit so you don't have to carry your bucket so far. I had to look twice out the window of the bus when I saw this.

I absolutely love that they make their own brooms here in Santa Teresa. It's the coolest thing ever.

One afternoon during break I was reading in the office when a swarm of girls came in. After they awkwardly looked at me for awhile I got out my pen and drew up a game of Hangman. They loved to play and I threw in a K'ekchi word (chabil, which means pretty, beautiful) to catch them off guard. That was quite some time ago now, but they still bring it up. They also like to hear me sing "I know an old lady who swallowed a fly..." And sometimes when I'm walking around the village they'll start singing as they pass me, "she swallowed a spider..."


My first Maya dress, made in school uniform colors so I can wear it to work and everyone loves when I do. "You are K'ekchi!" The PCV in another village has even been asked when she's going to get a dress like mine. I'm so excited my aunt is a seamstress. I may ask to watch her next time so I can learn and make my own.

One of the morning songs the students sing at school is "Thank you God for giving us..." Every once in awhile I'll here a student break out into song and insert "Peace Corps" when I'm around.

All these things make me smile, and then that smile bursts and I start laughing.

Loves and Hugs!

Library... before

Here are some before pictures of the library. Of course our after dreams may not reflect the actual accomplishments, but I thought it would be a good idea to show where we started.

School Fair Marathon

Of course with any major event, the first step is preparation. We had a follow-up meeting just days before the fair to finalize some important details. Most of the conversation was about rice and ice. Everyone was to bring 5lbs of rice and counting 10 people, that's 50lbs of rice which seemed like a lot to me. Another concern was keeping the drinks chilled. This is something I normally wouldn't think twice about, but here in Santa Teresa, it's quite the ordeal. Buying blocks of ice from another village about an hour away, washing bins to use as coolers and using a generator to power a refridgerator for the day. Mind you, THE other generator was being used for the sound system. After all the logistice were straightened out, the meeting was over. Fast forward a couple days and that brings you to another step, advertisement, only this was unplanned and on the spot. While Mr. Chub and I were driving back from Punta Gorda, we saw the radio manager of the closest kLove station. We stopped to talk and before I knew it were sitting in the studio broadcasting to kLove listeners in the area that indeed there was a school fair marathon in Santa Teresa on the 1st of November. And now to the day of the main event. First, to describe a school fair marathon. A marathon is a day long soccer tournament where teams from neighboring villages come early to register and stay and play until they lose. There was a $20 entrance fee and the top prize was $300 plus a trophy. The reason "school fair" was added you ask? So we could have Monday as a holiday. Oh Belize! And the best part, that wasn't confirmed until not even a week before. But since it was a fundraiser for the school and probably the biggest one (we ended up raising $2000) and all the teachers were working and it was a "school fair", Monday equaled a holiday. Now, how the marathon went. I was surprized to see truck full after truck full of teams show up and even a bus! I kept thinking I should have told the PC Gibnuts about the day, I wonder if they would have come. There were about 16 teams and things got a little heated when one of the Santa Teresa teams was disqualified for having a player who was registered on another team. (This is still an issue and there's some trophy drama along with it, but I hope it gets cleared up soon.) I'm not sure a marathon would be a marathon without a dispute in the rain. Did I mention it rained most of the day? Oh yes, and the games went on. The other Santa Teresa team ended up getting 2nd so one trophy and some prize money stayed in the village. I know I wish I could have helped more than I did, but they already had everything under control, maybe next time.

Visitors Visitors All Over the Place

It was so great to meet Wes and Peggy from TFABB!! I'm happy I'll be seeing more of them and was surprised how interested they were in my adjustment. Plus, they brought me candy! How great to be in a place where people are FOR me. I was way off thinking this Peace Corps experience was going to be done on my own. They were supportive of my project plan ideas and commented on my relational skills. Again, positiveness filled the air. I'm excited to finish up what I can in the library this week and move on to outcome indexes, checklists, and baseline data next week. Then onto reflecting with Mr. Chub, making sure he's the one giving me direction-it is his school- and after that... word walls, diagnostic reading assessments, learning centers, and the 6+1 traits of writing. Woot woot!
I was so excited about that I almost forgot to mention the other visitors of the day. The Roman Catholic Manager came to the school for a community meeting mostly addressing the importance of pre-school. Before the meeting we were having a conversation in the office, well, he was talking to Mr. Chub and I was listening, about some needs of the school. The National Library Service was brought up and the fact they helped with furnitures made Mr. Chub take note. There's also a possibility of librarian training if it is open to the public which I am all for. The larger meeting was in K'ekchi, but I did my best to pay attention and even wrote down a few words to ask for translation later. I need to do that more often, just carry an exercise book with me at all times and continually ask people to teach me a new word. Hey! After two years, I should have quite the vocabulary. Soon I'll be giving you a lesson.

It's Official!

Okay, so I've been a volunteer now for awhile since swearing in was on October 22, but this was my first opportunity to update my blog. And as a forewarning, from now on, posts will be sporadic and timing will be off. I'll do my best though. Okay, back to swearing in. My last week of training was in Belmopan and honestly, I did not want to leave Santa Teresa. I like my village and feel so much at home here, but I knew it was pretty important to go, so I thought I better. (Actually, I don't think I had a choice.) We did some final paperwork and of course had to practice for the ceremony so it all went well. And I must confess, even during the rehearsal I got goosebumps realizing the significance of being where I am. And of course, got a little teary eyed at the actual ceremony. Roger German gave our vote of thanks and mentioned fulfilling one of his life-long dreams and how he was sharing the moment with his new family. I would say our group is pretty close, plus it's pretty amazing there are still 40 of us here, we hope to stay just as solid. But back to living your dreams. I'm not sure I'll ever get over how neat this experience has been and I'm just getting started. I can't imagine what's to come. After the ceremony we had lunch, creating a little Maya Mopan circle. It was nice to see Miss Carmelina, Mr. Fransico, and the Cus family. We had an afternoon break when the 1st years took on the 2nd years in a game of football. We lost, but it was fun. The evening was spent at the US Embassy. Ambassador Thummalapally was very friendly and hospitable, informing us that his next job would be working for Peace Corps. It's nice to have such great support from important people.