After a little over 24 hours in Philadelphia, a bus ride to JFK, 6 hours waiting for my flight (spent at an Irish pub with plenty of beer and a burger and fries as my last meal in America), we finally landed right outside the capital of Georgetown in Guyana. Since no one from Peace Corps was flying with us, we had to get through immigration and customs by ourselves. This seemingly wasn’t that hard, however once 30 some of us got off the plane on the tarmac and walked into the immigration line, a real puzzled looking immigration officer approached us and wanted to know what we were doing (it was VERY clear that we were out of place being the only white people at the airport, I had a good laugh). We explained that we were with the US Peace Corps, to which she inquired how long we’d be staying in country. When we said a little over 2 years she was even more thrown off replying that she could only permit us entry for 3 months, so we told her we’d work with the US Embassy to extend our visas. Once we got our bags and walked out of the gate a group of currently serving Peace Corps Volunteers and Staff was cheering as we walked out. I’ll never forget what they said. I had expected them to say, “Welcome to Guyana.” But instead, “Welcome to the rainy season!” It was pouring POURING rain. And we had to carry all our luggage out in the rain to a truck they brought for us. It has been raining hard at some point every day since I arrived in country, which I must say I really enjoy waking up in the morning and listening to the rain fall on my family’s tin roof.
Want to know what I’ve been up to? To a certain extent I feel like I’m in college again and am in the process of joining another fraternity. After the airport they took us to a local resort (think really old Wisconsin Dells hotel/resort), where I spent the next four days. This was pretty similar to rush week. In addition to more get-to-know-you games we had training sessions all throughout the day from safety (how to ride public transportation (busses and boats), riding bicycles (including a written and ridding test), safety in and around the home and country, a swim and kayak test), how the PC functions, the roles of all the staff members, some culture classes, medical (basic water sanitation, how to stay healthy in country, getting additional vaccines and malaria meds), along with other sessions all to prepare us for our Community Based Training sites where we’ll be living with a host family, attend additional training sessions, and working at a health clinic all in the same community. After the four days we found out where we would be living (which community we would be in for the next 3 months) and which family we would have. This was really similar to bid day, where everything was really secret and a lot of buildup to finding out who our family was.
Now I’m pretty much in Peace Corps Pledge. My schedule is extremely regimented as I have training from 8 to 5 Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, and half day on Saturday. Tuesday and Thursdays are spent mostly at the health clinic. When I’m not at the health clinic those days, I’m either visiting the local primary school (observing or giving health presentations) or back at the training site with more training lessons. The training lessons are like going to school, in fact that’s what my family refers to it as. They pack my lunch every day and “send me off to school.” They build off of what was covered during the sessions spent at Splashmins (the resort the first four days) as well as additional lessons. The training areas are broken down into segments: tech, core, language & culture, and medical. The tech sessions is where all the health volunteers learn about all the health specific topics like breastfeeding, communicable and non-communicable diseases, global health, how the Ministry of Health is set up, sanitation, nutrition, hygiene, etc. The education volunteers similarly are in sessions related to their sector. In core sessions this is where we learn topics such as how PC defines what a sustainable project is, how develop a lesson plan and objectives, assessment tools, etc. Language & culture is where we have our creolese lessons, learn more about food, music, cricket (pretty much the only sport), history, etc. And the medical sessions cover additional topics like malaria, how to sanitize water safely, how to prevent/treat diarrhea, as well as other safety & security topics. Not having been in school for a bit definitely took some getting used to sitting in class for extended hours.
In the health clinic I’m helping out with routine tasks like the intake process of infant and child clinic where I measure and weigh the babies and children, help organize the medical files of the children, help out with the outtake interviews where I chart the child’s growth progress based on their weight and height and make assessments based on their respective charts. For example if the child is overweight or underweight I advise on altering the child’s diet or how much they’re eating. I also interview the parents (mostly mothers) on what the child is eating if they’re getting enough of all the food groups (I have their charts to guide us). Weighing and measuring is a pretty simple task to do, but interviewing the parents and making assessments based off of what I think is best was pretty much thrust upon me with limited training. However, basic American health education does wonders for me in helping to advise parents on their children (i.e. “if your child is overweight, instead of eating junk food, maybe eat off of the half a dozen fruit trees growing in your yard,” or “your child is underweight, they should be incorporating more staples and protein in their diet in addition to continued breastfeeding”) as American elementary health education is far greater than what is known in Guyana. Any other problems the child may have (rash, continued cough, bumps, etc.) I refer to the nurse or doctor to look at as well as all vaccines they’d need. In addition to the intake and outtake process of the infant and child clinics I observe the medical staff with all other medical problems and dressings they take care of. Tomorrow I’ll be doing a special outreach with the medical staff. I’ll be traveling by boat upriver to communities who are more remote that do not have access to a health clinic to administer vaccines and see any medical problems in the community.
When I’m not in training or the health clinic I’m spending time with my family from cooking dinner, going to the market, washing clothes by hand, walking around the community, attending a funeral, spending time at home with extended family, or helping build the addition to the house. I really don’t have any free time for the most part or any days to sleep in as the only day I have off (Sunday) we get up early to go the market. There’s always something going on. The mornings start early with all the roosters crowing before sunrise and the nights end late by the time dinner is over and cleaned up time spent hanging out and bucket bathing at night, then it starts all over again.
All of this is just in preparation for making it through the 3 month pledge program, or should I say Pre Service Training where I’ll eventually find out what house I’ll be in, or what family I’ll be living with and where in the country I’ll be sent to. If I make it through, then I’ll be sworn in as an official Volunteer for the United States Peace Corps on July 3rd and move out to site on the fourth.
I hope this tides you over for now, I’ll be sure to write more blog posts, but please feel free to comment with any other questions you may have or anything you want to know so I can include it in the following posts.
