Amoeba

As I’ve mentioned in the past, serving as a Peace Corps Volunteer is full of its ups and downs. So far, my low points have lasted for only a few days at a time, perhaps a week, or more frequently I’ve had severe highs and lows within the same day. But inevitably, there comes a time when you just hit a big low. It’s normal. January was my first big low point.

A number of factors played into this past month being difficult, but it sort of reached a climax (or whatever the opposite of a climax is) this past week when I was hospitalized for Amoebiasis. Yes, you read that correctly, amoeba. Cool, right?

About a month after I moved out to my village (around September), I started complaining about stomach pains. My doctors diagnosed gastritis and tried a variety of antacids and the like, and my symptoms generally went away for a short time, but always reappeared, so we tried a different medication. My Nohno and Pahpa gave me a local medicine that also seemed to help a bit. I’ve also been getting periodic stomach massages from my Nohno which definitely made me feel a little better. Additionally, my life has also been plagued by irregular bowel movements (brace yourself, this is about to get a little graphic)—days of diarrhea followed by days of constipation—occurring cyclically. And then there’s my weight loss (it has finally leveled off, with a total loss of 30 lbs).

Now, obviously, looking back it seems absurd that we never considered that I might have a parasite. But really, you must think about what life is like for an American living in a developing country. It’s rough on your body. Living conditions, sanitation, and access to clean drinking water is all very limited. You’re eating strange foods, living in a new climate and environment 24/7. Volunteers get sick. It’s just a fact of life. None of my symptoms by themselves caused us any alarm. We weren’t alarmed, that is, until last Wednesday when I was suddenly overcome with fever and unable to hold food or water in my stomach.

At that point I was taken to the hospital and given an IV to get me rehydrated. During the several lab tests that were run, it was discovered that not only did I have Amoebiasis, but the count of parasites in my system was so high that it indicated that I’d had an amoeba for quite some time. Say, maybe 4 months. I guess my body decided it finally had enough.

Amoebiasis comes from fecal-oral contamination. In the US, people usually get amoebas either from being simply unhygienic or from eating food prepared by unclean hands. Here, those are definitely still possible causes, but due to the sheer volume of my infection, the likely cause is contaminated water. I had been drinking the water in my village because it is piped from a large tank with some sort of filtration system, and was deemed “clean” by trusted members of my community. Plus, the last Volunteer who lived with my family is reported to have drunk the water, so I decided it seemed harmless enough. Clearly, I was mistaken.

So I stayed in the hospital for two nights, being pumped full of drugs, and then was released into the care of one of my Peace Corps doctors and have been staying at the Peace Corps sick bay for the last two nights. Today I’m finally able to head back to my village (armed with large jugs of purified water, no less)! I’m ready to get back into the swing of things, but I definitely have to take it easy for a while. The amoeba is not yet eradicated, and I have plenty of pills to continue taking. I have to return to the hospital in one week to have more tests run to check my progress. It’s all very exciting.

My stay in the hospital really wasn’t all that bad. I was so weak for the first day that I sleep pretty much nonstop, but then on the second day I was more alert and able to chat with my roommates (four Pohnpeian women and their assorted family members). Everyone was so kind to me and concerned, and the women sent their children all around to bring me things that I needed. When I finally left the hospital, they all wished me well and I was actually oddly sad to leave their company.

I had plenty of my own visitors, though. One of my Peace Corps doctors came several times each day, bringing me snacks and keeping me company. Another member of the staff, sort of a mother-figure showed up unexpectedly with lots of beverages and helped me to call relevant parties to update them on my recovery. One of my cousins came one his way to and from college each day to check on me and my sister Ioren spent the night in her car so she could be close by if I needed her. Turns out I did need her, because showering with an IV in is not a one-person job. Especially not bucket showering with an IV. That was interesting, let me tell you. I felt like a child, being bathed and clothed by someone, and letting her comb and braid my hair, but I am immensely grateful.

But the point is, I was well taken care of. It was definitely very comforting. I have never been hospitalized before, so I was a little nervous about what would happen, especially in a foreign country so far from friends and family, but silly me. I forgot that I have friends and family here in Pohnpei who love and care about me. Duh.

Now, I just have a bunch of pills to take, some of which are quite large. (If you’ve forgotten, I learned to swallow pills here in the Peace Corps, so I’m still not very good at it yet). I spoke to my mom a few weeks ago and I told her about trying unsuccessfully to swallow some huge antibiotics I was taking for a sinus infection (again, January was not my favorite month), and she reassured me that it just takes practice. Well, that may be true, but as I have recently learned, what it really takes is the right motivation. When I go to swallow one of my monster pills, a little voice inside my head just starts screaming “CHRISTY, YOU HAVE A PARASITE LIVING INSIDE OF YOU! YOU WILL SWALLOW THIS PILL! SWALLOW IT NOW! DO IT!” And you know what? It works.

So, the good news is that I am on the road to recovery. All of the crap I had been putting up with for the past few months that I thought was just part of the job will actually go away, which is VERY exciting. Plus, let’s be honest, I kind of feel like a badass.

This whole experience has put a lot of things in perspective for me and has actually helped pull me out of the January funk.

I mean, hey, shit happens. Sometimes you get an amoeba.

Stay well,

Christy

Laundry is Revealing

My biggest accomplishment to date, the one I’m most proud of and that gives me the greatest joy, is this: I have finally figured out the laundry. I know, this seems like an insignificant detail in the grand scheme of my life here, but believe me, it’s a big deal. Anyone who has ever lived or worked in a developing country can attest to this—clean clothes make all the difference. And I in my ignorance had been living the past five and a half months or so in complacent acceptance of my dingy attire.

Hindsight is 20/20, but looking back I feel sort of foolish about it all and I think my rational reveals some bias I unconsciously still held about life in the developing world. It also explains why I didn’t see any reasons to bring “nice” clothes or jewelry here. I had this idea that my life would be filthy and void of any dignity or reason to present myself as clean and put together. Even typing that makes me feel ashamed, but it was true nonetheless. And I think most Americans, having never lived amongst people in a developing country, would join me in that bias. But what I have learned shows that the exact opposite is true. The people here recognize that they live in a less than clean environment, and they fight actively to combat that. They may not have much, but they live with great dignity.

My family takes great care to regularly scrub the orange dirt from their flip flops. Everyone wipes their feet before entering a home. No child goes to school or church without their hair being combed. At the end of each day the men and boys gather around and wash that day’s dust and grime off of the family cars. The floor in the house is perpetually being swept, scrubbed, and washed. And laundry is being done constantly.  This last fact is what finally clued me in that I was missing something.

I had been doing laundry every two weeks or so (whenever my underwear ran out), and in that span of time, I would probably wear and re-wear clothes twice or more. At the time that didn’t seem like much of an issue, as I felt like I pretty much reeked anyway, with the permanent layer of sweat on every surface of my body. And sure, I had enough clothes that I could have worn something new each day, but that would just mean more clothes to wash (and as you’ve learned, washing clothes is actually a great deal of work), and it all just didn’t seem worth it.

But then one day, as I was pulling on a shirt that smelled a little less than pleasant, I thought to myself I would never have worn dirty clothes in America. And I sort of stopped dead in my tracks. How utterly pompous of me to put the life I have here in Pohnpei below the life I left in America. To allow myself to settle into an unacceptable level of cleanliness, and just tack it up to well, I am living in a developing country. Yes, the two worlds are completely different, but neither is better or worse than the other. How can I sit here as a representative of my country and as an agent of peace and friendship (it’s part of our mission, look it up), and yet still regard my current setting as below me and not worthy of my care and attention? I have to admit, I was pretty embarrassed.

Since then I’ve humbled myself even further, and asked for help with my laundry. (Even when I had washed my clothes before they still sort of smelled and I figured I wasn’t doing it right.) So my Nohno Carly (my aunt) happily squatted with me on the cement and showed me how much soap to use, which clothes need to be soaked first, the best scrubbing techniques, how to use the paddle to beat my clothes (which clothes need to be beaten vs. washed in the machine), the right number of clothing items that should be washed in the machine at one time, how to properly rinse the soap suds out of the clothing, and most importantly, how to clean up my workspace before and after I have used it.

The whole exchange was sort of wonderful, because the language barrier prevented her from being able to simply dictate instructions. Instead, she had to demonstrate and wash the clothes with me, and we got to spend some quality time laughing and getting wet and soapy. The process, when done correctly, takes about twice as long as my previous attempts, but it is completely worth it. I am so grateful to Carly for taking the time, because as it turns out, having clean clothes makes everything in my life better. Wearing smelly, dirty clothes was something I had wrongly convinced myself was a necessity, but now each day I get to pull on a clean, fresh outfit. And it seems like such a little thing, but it really improves the quality of my daily life, and in turn, my happiness as a whole.

The other part of the equation that I was missing, was the frequency in which one must wash their clothes. If you wait until you need to wash clothes, it’s already too late. Because inevitably, that day it will rain, and you’ll be faced with a morning without clean underwear (not that this has happened to me…). Instead you have to stay on top of things, washing clothes in regular intervals. I wash my clothes once a week (usually on Wednesdays, if you’re curious), and I wash my towel and any other linens on Saturdays. In addition, any time I’m just sitting around on a sunny day and no one is currently washing their clothes I take the opportunity to wash whatever I have in my laundry basket at the time, no matter how few the items are. What this boils down to is I am doing laundry every two or three days, just like a Pohnpeian.

I rather enjoy the process. It gives me something to do, and a chance to focus my attention on some physical labor. I think it’s good for me. It’s sort of like in the States, when I would spend my showers contemplating life and sorting out my problems, now that’s what I do while I’m beating soap into my T-shirts. It’s oddly relaxing. And obviously, the best benefit is that I always have clean clothes. Praise the Lord.

And the cherry on top of my ice cream sundae of happiness (I wish I hadn’t said that, now I want ice cream) is that I made my first substantial purchase here in Pohnpei. I bought a folding clothes-drying rack. (The kind that lies flat until you pull it open, then it reveals sections of bars from which to hang wet items.) This is the kind of thing I had in my apartment or dorm since I was 18, but I had avoiding succumbing to my Western ways. Instead, I dealt with the frustrations of rain-soaked laundry, and mildew stench. But no more! And because it is an imported item (no duh), it was very expensive. A rack that might have cost $10 or $15 in America cost me $53 here. Luckily, I caught it during the Christmas sale, so it was only $40, but still an ungodly price. I had to really want it. And I did, really want it. (I get paid a living stipend, but I spend exactly $0 when I stay in my village, which is basically all the time, so I have a large chunk of change saved up).  And as pathetic as it sounds, the clothes rack has made me happier than I ever thought possible.

Not only can I now hang my underwear inside (avoiding the embarrassment of watching my brothers duck underneath them hanging on the line), but I can save my clothes from a moldy fate when the rain comes. And get this, I hang my towel on it daily, which means it actually dries in between my morning and evening showers, and it no longer smells of filth. It is a miracle.

Basically, the point of all of these ramblings is this: in this crazy life that I’ve chosen, with the unbearable heat, monotonous food, bugs and lizards in my bed, and perpetual diarrhea, sometimes it just takes something small to make everything okay. That something small is clean clothes. This simple availability that I had taken for granted in America, but now is a direct precursor to my overall wellbeing and happiness. Who would have thought?

Stay clean.

--Christy

The Christmas Pageant

One of my favorite stories my dad told my sister and I growing up was the story of him in his church’s Christmas pageant. I’m a little fuzzy on the details, but I know he had won the roll of Joseph, playing opposite of a girl he had a crush on as Mary. Every school boy’s dream. He remembers vividly spending what seemed like an eternity just sitting while the Christmas story was being narrated, starring into the manger at a light bulb they had rigged up to represent the baby Jesus. My sister also was in some type of Christmas pageant when she was in preschool.  I have seen the video my dad recorded, and in fact, it’s one of our family’s favorite home movies. It features little Kay, the angel, picking her nose. Priceless. But to my knowledge, I have never participated in or seen children perform a Christmas pageant.

Well, alert the presses, because I saw my very first Christmas pageant on Christmas Eve and it was probably the most amazing thing ever. When you live in a small community and have a big family, it adds up to you pretty much being related to every child you encounter. So I had the privilege of watching all my little nephews, nieces, and cousins perform at our church that night. As the program started, I began taking pictures, thinking to myself that family and friends back home would enjoy seeing the play too, but as the night progressed, I admit that I forgot all about my life back in the States. I was frantically taking pictures and recording videos, moving around the room to get good shots, without any thought to who might later view them. I simply had to capture those moments for me. I was so overwhelmed with happiness and pride, pure familial pride, watching my family members up on stage that I couldn’t contain myself.

It was your typical Christmas pageant, with children forgetting their lines, coming onstage at the completely wrong times, costumes falling off, little boys fighting onstage during the songs, and tired little ones yawning in the background of every scene. It was basically perfect. And I got to experience several of those warm fuzzy moments when a small child forgets what they’re supposed to do, and instead waves at you from the stage. My heart nearly exploded. And when it was finally over, and the children all dispersed from the stage, one of my cousins Disha, ran right over and threw her arms around me. It was all I could have asked for.

Here are a few photos for you to enjoy:

Here’s some of my littlest cousins bashfully reciting their lines about the story of Christmas. (L to R Jesse, Hope, Layvin, and Disha, and yes Hope is an angel)

The angel of the Lord appearing to the shepherds (notice their open hands, indicating their immense fear) while Mary sits in the background. (The shepherds are my cousins L to R: Ivan, Villazone, and Logan)

Singing (back row L to R: cousins Marlon and Seiji, front L to R: cousins Layvin, Disha, and niece Annyan).

More singing, much later in the program, note the children not paying attention. (Starting in the back L to R: Jay, John, Disha, Annyan, Jesse, Layvin, and Hope.)

 My cousin Disha and I after the show. I was so proud of her!

I hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas, filled with just as much joy and happiness that I experienced that night.

--Christy

Christmas with my Students

The Christmas festivities in my community pretty much revolved around the Christmas party at school. The day before the party, we all came to school to decorate. Our materials were a few sheets of construction paper, lots of white printer paper, scissors, and several staplers. So my eighth grader girls and I spent several hours listening to music while we cut and stapled strips of paper into colorful chains, created huge dangling paper mobiles, and made small paper ornaments for the tree. I taught them how to make paper snowflakes and that amazed them to no end. We were set.

The students then began hanging our decorations around the classroom using the staplers—stapling to the walls, ceiling, around the chalkboard, on the window frames, everywhere. And when our tree arrived (the boys had been out with my co-teacher Waltin procuring the perfect specimen), everyone began draping and stapling (yes, stapling) more decorations onto the tree. It was beautiful.

(The tree decorations are my snowflakes, a lone pink balloon, a few sticky bows, and the small paper ornaments the students made. I especially like the one that says “MERRY”. The students ran out of paper before they could make “CHRISTMAS”, but we decided to put it on the tree anyway.)

We had such a fun time setting up for the party!

Then the next day everyone came to school for the party. We feasted on cake and cookies and chips and exchanged our Secret Santa gifts. It turns out my Secret Santa was one of my favorite students named Donny. He’s incredibly funny and intelligent, but also incredibly talkative. Consequently, he was one of the first students I learned the name of; because I had to immediately begin telling him to be quiet. But he’s a big sweetheart, and I was so touched by my gift of two beautiful skirts that I had to embarrass him by taking a photo with him. The student I drew, Baiona seemed really excited by her gifts (girl stuff: soaps and lotions, hair clips, earrings, and an assortment of candy). I even got a surprise gift from one of my sixth graders named Selidaka. She ran up to me and put a foam flower in my ear, handed me a rolled decorative mat filled with more flowers and ran away. It was adorable. I chased after her to thank her and to get her to take a picture with me.

The rest of the afternoon was spent dancing. Dancing is a really big deal here. I enjoyed watching the students having fun, and several of my students surprised me with how talented they are. And some of them even convinced me to dance with them a little bit. Some of the other teacher joined in and pretty soon we were all hysterically laughing and falling around on the dance floor. It was a great time!

Two of my favorite second graders having a blast on the dance floor.

Me and some of the eighth grade girls hanging out at the party.

Merry Christmas!

--Christy

Spring Cleaning

[There are no seasons here in Pohnpei. Pohnpeians will tell you that they can detect subtle changes in amount of rain or wind during a particular time of year, but to that I say, hogwash. It feels like July in Tampa every single day of my life.  The consequence to this (aside from the perpetual heat stroke) is that there is no way to mark the passage of time; I simply exist in the perpetual summer. Months lose their meaning, I forget holidays, and I am constantly confused about how it can possibly be December when it is 96 degrees outside.  So I decided, since I just did a huge cleaning spree, I should call it “Spring Cleaning”. Sure, it’s December, but it’s definitely not winter, so it may as well be spring. Go with it.]

There comes a time when living in a strange place that you suddenly feel the need to make the place your own. It happened during my time in my first home with my training family, about 6 weeks in. I had up to that point been living out of my suitcases and had not made any effort to make myself feel at home. One day I woke up and decided to hang up my skirts, stack my shirts on the floor in the corner, and take out some of my mementoes that I had brought from America. It marked a turning point in my adjustment, when I finally understood that I was actually staying here; that it was real. I figured I might as well get comfortable.

When I arrived at my permanent site, I almost immediately felt at home. I unpacked my belongings and put a lot of thought into where I would put everything. I skipped right ahead to making my room more homey. But the other day, on my first day of Winter Break (again, not really winter, but I don’t know what else to call it), as I lay on my bed reading, I suddenly and inexplicably had the desire to rearrange the furniture. Seriously, I know that sounds weird, but it’s something I’ve always liked to do, ever since I was a kid. I’ve always gotten a lot of joy out of a fresh change of scenery every once and a while. And, because I am my mother’s daughter, once I had the idea in my mind, I had to do it immediately.

So I spent the rest of the morning rummaging through everything in my room, reorganizing, maximizing space, purging unnecessary clutter, and then sweeping the floor (my mom always made me clean my room before I could rearrange it, so this procedure came instinctively). Then, I began dragging my furniture around. My furniture consists of a small metal-framed nightstand, a short wooden square table, a bulky easy-chair (I’m actually not at all sure how to describe this chair, except that it is almost identical to one I had in my house growing up, we called it “Sandy’s chair” after one of our dogs who liked to lay on it), and a double bed with a heavy hand-made wooden bedframe. And again, because I am my mother’s daughter, I thought it would be best to move all of these items by myself, without asking for any help whatsoever. In fact, in a very Kathleen-esque move, I closed my door while I was dragging everything around, so no one would notice and attempt to help me. Don’t ask me why, it’s just some weird matter of pride that my mother and I share.

Then, once everything was in place, I had to sweep again, as moving the bed had revealed a terrifying amount of dirt and grime. So much so, that I realized I would also need to mop. The only problem was that we don’t have a mop. The events that followed made me begin to contemplate the simple bits of technology we take for granted in America. (And yes, a mop is technology.) Because I spent the next forty-five minutes on my hands and knees, literally scrubbing my floor clean. Several family members stopped in my doorway to gawk at me cleaning. Evidently they were all very impressed. The kids especially liked when I skated around on a towel to dry the floor. And as I souvenir, I can no longer lift my right arm from the excruciating elbow and shoulder pain. Huzzah!

Anyway, long story short (well, not so short), I just completely rearranged and cleaned my room to the fullest. I’m not sure what change this marks in my development here as a Peace Corps Volunteer, but I’ll let you know when I figure it out. I do know one thing for sure though; it is definitely a good sign.

For your viewing pleasure, I’ve included pictures of my room. Enjoy!

Happy Cleaning!

--Christy

School Pictures

Okay. Let me go ahead and appologize for the super late photos. I hate taking photos because it makes me feel like a tourist. If you were with me in Honduras with me in high school then you know that I didn't take any photos there either. Sorry. Here's what I've managed so far:

This is my path I walk to school every day. Note the electricity cable running through the jungle. This is a good picture of the strange blending of the Western world with this simple jungle community.


Two of the three buildings at my school.

The third building at my school, home to 6th-8th grade. This is where I spend most of my time.



Some of the first-graders being, well, first-graders. The second boy from the right in the collared shirt is my nephew, Syris.

Some of the older boys playing basketball durng recess. We somehow magically have this really nice basketball court tucked behind the school.

Some fifth grade girls during recess.

My seventh grade class and my coteacher, Hickperson. This is the class that most of my blood, sweat and tears go into. There are 35 students (several are missing from this picture), and they are both wonderful and exhausting.

I hope you enjoyed this small look into my life. Hopefully there will be mroe to come after the holidat season!

Hope all is well back home!

--Christy

The Amazing Disappearing Act

I have finally discovered the secret to losing weight: join the Peace Corps.

Since I’ve lived here in Pohnpei, I’ve accidentally lost almost 30 pounds. I say accidentally because I had absolutely no intention of doing so, and I was completely unaware that it was happening. You see, the skirts the women wear here have simple elastic waistbands, making it impossible to detect weight loss (or gain for that matter). It didn’t even occur to me that I might be shrinking until I went into town a few months ago and one of my doctors said, “Wow! You look good.” She made me get on the scale, and we both gawked at the numbers. The weight literally fell off.

I know what you’re thinking, and my mom already asked me. Don’t worry; I am 100% completely healthy. In fact, that’s precisely why I’ve lost the weight. You’d be surprised what eliminating processed foods from your diet can do. Sure, I eat the occasional packaged food item from a care package (with an embarrassing amount of excitment), but my daily food intake consists of fresh fish, fresh fruit or vegetables, and rice. I drink tons of water (because it’s about 1 million degrees outside), and I am constantly sweating like a crazy person (did I mention it’s roughly 1 million degrees outside?). Let alone the fact that I walk to and from school twice every day (I go home for lunch), which amounts to about an hour walk in total. All of these factors evidently lead to abundant weight loss.

And it’s still coming off. Each time I go into town (about once or twice a month) I’ve lost even more weight. My doctors and I are monitoring my BMI to ensure that I stay in a healthy range, but due to my short stature, believe it or not I’m actually still considered overweight. Go figure.

I had to have my mom send me new, smaller shirts a few months ago, and all is well now. The only time I have an issue is when I try to wear pants. This is rare though, because in my village women only wear skirts. I don’t even have any pants here at my house; I left them all in my locker in town. But occasionally when I’m in town, I want to feel like an American. I try to slip on my jeans (I know that sounds insane in this climate, but remarkably I’ve gotten used to it) and run my errands, but that’s just not possible. They will not stay up no matter what I do. In a different context, I would be very excited about this, and would happily run out and buy a new pair of smaller jeans. But here, in my life as a Peace Corps Volunteer, it’s just annoying. Half of the clothing I brought with me is now completely useless.

My family isn’t quite sure how to deal with my weight loss either. In this culture, most women are large, and fatness is considered both healthy and an indicator of being financially stable. Also in this culture, it is completely appropriate to comment on someone’s weight. My family is constantly reminding me that I was fat when I got here, but now I’m skinnier. And each day I face the same discussion at mealtime: I tell them I’m full and they require me to eat a little more, because I’m losing weight and need to get fat again. It’s just part of my daily routine. But it is to no avail, it seems, because I am continuing to shed pounds.

If only this had happened when I was in college…

So if diet and exercise is getting you down, or you’re worried about your “holiday weight”, just go live in a developing nation for two years—that’ll take care of it.

Stay well 

--Christy