This is a guide for my family and friends about my life as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Cape Verde, Africa. I teach English as foreign language to high school students in Boa Vista, Cape Verde. Also as a disclaimer, the comments expressed here are solely of the author and do not represent the United States Peace Corps, the American Government, or any other governing body.

Tuesday, October 23, 2007

So let's be honest here. I am nearly 25 years old and I have developed a large zit on the right side of my chin, just below my mouth. And it's large. One of the largest I've had in a while. Having surpassed puberty a while ago, I don't generally get many outbreaks, or random huge zits; but the combination of hormones in my body, oil on my face, and stress in my life combined to form a nice little red lump on my chin. Now, you're probably asking yourself why on earth I would go through all the trouble of describing something so ugly and repulsive. The answer is this: every time I see someone I know, the zit is the first thing that's pointed out to me. Friends, students, boyfriend, even people I have just met feel it their place in life to inform me at that moment that I have a huge zit on my chin and make a face. Of course there is nothing I can do to get rid of it any faster, I just have to wait for the thing to simply go away. But that doesn't stop my boyfriend from looking at me every day and asking, "How's the zit today?" It's fine, thank you; a little cranky, but otherwise in a fairly good mood, I'm glad you asked. I have daily reminders that this thing is there, as if I actually didn't see it this morning when I looked in the mirror.

Although, the idea of a mirror is an interesting thing to talk about. Cape Verdians on the whole tend to be fairly conceited. They love taking pictures of themselves (by themselves in the photo), putting this solitary photos as backgrounds on their computers, on their Hi5 pages, and having entire photo shoots with just them, one person, in the photo. I tend to shy away from pictures, especially ones where it's just me in them, and they can't understand this. But there is a remarkably surprising lack of mirrors anywhere. In public restrooms, houses, purses, etc. Anywhere you would expect there to be a mirror, there isn't. In America, houses and public restrooms are filled with mirrors; they're even simply used as a decoration. Here there are hardly any, and none in public restrooms. Maybe that's why my zit was pointed out to me so many times: people really didn't know if I'd seen myself yet today.

So back to the zit. Last night, I went out to dinner with my friend Paolo (who I believe I've mentioned before), and he introduced me to two friends of his, a CEO of a construction company here in Boa Vista named Luis, and a woman, whose name I honestly cannot remember (thanks daddy). The four of us sat in a dark lounge for a little while and when dinner was up we moved to our dinner table over which had slightly more light. Luis looks at me and exclaims (translated) "Oh my look at that zit there. Is that because you're in love?" Um, what? There are two major things wrong with that entire statement: 1. I met you about 20 minutes ago. I'm glad you feel comfortable enough with me to not only comment on the condition of my pores, but also my love life. And 2. You're right. Love, like chocolate, causes zits. Since then three other people have made the comment about zit/love connection, and I just cannot figure that out. Anyway, so until luck blesses me (although, ironically, I just broke the mirror that was in my house last week), I have to endure the ridiculous scrutinizing of my zit, and of course in correlation, my love life.

Friday, October 19, 2007

It's nice being comfortable in your own skin. To be able to live your life without ever worrying that you're stepping on someones toes, or saying the wrong thing, or making a complete fool out of yourself. Today I had a feeling of complete contentment as I finished my classes. I have Friday afternoons completely free and I plan on making tacos for dinner :). I was in Praia at the beginning of the week and managed to buy salsa and guacamole (not that I like guacamole, but that really isn't the point). Ground beef has once again made an appearance at the local grocery stores, so tacos for dinner it is! Take that Chipotle!

While the tacos are broiling away in my house, there is absolutely no one on the island of Boa Vista at the moment. There is an obvious lack of tourists, restaurants and hotels are still closed, and the shame of it is, our famous brand new international airport is supposedly officially open. No one's flying out of it though. Last weekend and 747 came into the island just for a test run and it was such a big deal. Many important government people were there as well as locals who just wanted to see the big plane land. It went off without a hitch, so we're all still a little confused as to why this brand new fancy airport isn't bringing the tourists in by the truckload. It's a shame, really, and as much as tourism has it's ups and downs for a community, I think at this point, this island could really use a little foreign money. Tourism is this islands main source of economy and I believe that in a few years, this will be the most visited island by tourists. We will surpass Sal as the main destination, now having one of only three international airports (although, granted 3 international airports for a country the size of Rhode Island is quite a few) and more beach square footage than any other island, I think this place will just boom.

In other news, school is going really well, I do little lesson planning these days because I'm teaching the same levels and classes that I did last year, so I just stay with the same lessons. Although, I think the water gods are angry with Leland and I as we managed to flood our entire apartment last night. The water came back on very lightly, and we left the shower head in the barrel to fill up. Well we had cooked such a delicious dinner of BBQ chicken wings that we completely forgot about the barrel on the bathroom. Next thing we know, the bathroom, hallway and my bedroom are all flooded. What a waste!!! Not to mention, a lot of my books were lined up on my floor, so they are currently sunbathing on my balcony. Anyway, there was no lasting damage, and next time I don't think we'll be so careless. The water issues never cease. Sometimes, they lessen slightly, but never cease. Oh well. Thus is life.

Monday, October 08, 2007

Well, a new year, new students, and so therefore new ways to try and date the American teacher. They're finally getting creative, although of course not subtle, as nothing in this country is. I do have to say that my 8th graders just make me smile and laugh at their obvious, but oh-so-cute affection; while my 10th graders are just plain obnoxious (4 out of my 5 of my 11th graders are female and I had them last year, so I don't get any trouble from them). There is something about my 8th graders this year. I don't know if it's just a good batch, or if strategies of raising children morphed in the last year, I'm not sure. But these guys are just so into life! I have two male students in my 8A class who just give me the widest smile every time class commences. Today, as they were all filing in to the classroom, the little guy named Dener just stood right in front of my desk and had this big ol' smile plastered on his face. "Hi teacher!" he said. "HI!! Fine? Yes?!" "Yes, thank you Dener. And you?" Students filed past and tried to get by, but he fought his way to maintain his position in front of my desk with a big giant smile on his face. His height may come up to my chest. I really couldn't help but smile kindly on him and try and show him as much appreciative attention in return that I could. I expect an apple on my desk any day now.

The 10th graders, on the other hand are neither subtle nor cute. In fact, they're downright insipid bordering on contemptible. A few nights ago, after class ended three of the girls came up to me and said "Teacher, a bo é um bom pequna." Basically translated as "You are one hot babe." There was nothing I could say that would make them feel as ridiculous as they sounded to me, so I simply said "thank you ladies." A few minutes later one of the more infatuated boys came up to me and said (translated) "Teacher I have some doubts/questions about the material. Can you bring me to your house so you can help me learn better. I want to learn more." Riiiiiight I thought. Not only is it completely inappropriate (at least in my culture) for a teacher to invite an underage male student to her house, but PLEASE! You don't even have doubts on the material, you're just being ridiculous. Which is basically what I told him. Today I had those same 10th graders write an assignment in class. They were to write 5 simple sentences about themselves or someone else using adjectives and adverbs we had learned that day. For example: I am very hungry. This same cheeky boy decided to write about me and all my glorious beauty. "Nadia is very beautiful. She is extremely intelligent." (Oh yes he used my first name). I feel so honored, loved, and appreciated. It's kind of a game I'm playing with myself: see how many times I can get hit on by my students before I actually hit one of them :) Of course I'm just kidding......

Thursday, October 04, 2007

Yes, I am extremely out of touch these days. I just looked over my blog site and realized it has been nearly 2 months since I last posted. This is very bad of me, I know, and I will try and update this site more often. I am now back to a semi-normal routine and will be able to write more often. Here is what's been going on with me for the past two months:

For the first time in my life I camped on the beach. Cape Verdians don't take camping lightly, and like so many things here, they are bizarrely organized. This is a thing almost all Boa Vistans do every summer as a mark of their time off. Things generally shut down for the month of August as school's not in session and it's an extreme low month for tourism. Lot's of restaurants and shops shut down (go on feria) and even a couple of hotels close their doors while business is at an extreme low. People travel, go to the beach, camp out and basically just have a vacation for a whole month. Anyway, I was invited to go on a camping trip with a bunch of my friends. There were about 60-70 people in total on this trip. Everyone pays a certain amount to cover food and drink costs, although a lot of the food is caught on the beach. One night they caught a whole bunch of little crabs and they were put in a large spaghetti pot and we had the most delicious spaget de caranguejo. Fish was caught and grilled whole and just eaten right off the grill. And one night, they even managed to catch a sea turtle. I won't go into the details of how the captured and caught it, because it was cruel and inhumane and I wanted to set the turtle free but they caught it a long way off from where the camp site was and I couldn't get there by myself in the dark. The next day the meat was cooked into a type of curry almost and eaten with rice. I have to admit that yes, I did experiment it and while I absolutely don't approved of the eating of an endangered species, I have to admit that the meat was tasty. In the interior of the islands, they eat turtle meat a lot because one fairly good size turtle can feed many people and they're caught for almost nothing, obviously because they do fishing themselves. I tried to explain to anyone that would listen that it's against the law here, and cruel to the environment. I got the same reaction I get for a lot of things I try and change: yes we know it's bad, but there's nothing we can really do about it. But the camping in general was fun. Everyone brought tents and sleeping bags to sleep in, a generator was brought to provide lights and music for the "discoteque" in the evenings. It was an unforgettable weekend and such fun. Not that I'm now a camping convert, once a year is plenty for me.

The rest of the summer was spent for the most part in Joao Galego, where all my friends live. Since there was nothing for me to do here in Vila, I spent nearly all the time I could in the interior of the island. Not that there's that much to do there either, in fact there's even less, but at least I would be doing nothing with friends.

School meetings began at the end of September and we have now been in class for about two weeks. I spent one last day at the beach with friends and we scraped conch shells off the rocks and made a really delicious arroz com mariscos. The beach we went to was again on the east side of the island and it was one of the most beautiful beaches I've seen on these islands.

At school, I'm teaching the same grades and levels as I did last year: 8th, 10th, and 11th grades. My 8th graders this year are 100% better than my students last year and for some reason they just seem smaller. But they're just so darn cute!!! I have about 80 new names to learn which makes things interesting, but they're really good kids and they listen to me which is nice. I am happy to say that none of my classes thus far has proven itself the Spawns of Satan, and I just don't think they will. I have a better feeling about things this year, I am more comfortable in my surroundings and in my life. I have friends, boyfriend, job, and I like it here. Don't get me wrong, I still ache for Chipotle and a decent salad at least once a day, but it's not quite the same sharp longing I used to have. I am happy, even though it is 100˚ outside with 100% humidity and no air conditioning in the school or my house. But you survive and learn to ignore it. So things are going very well, far better than this time last year.

Also, I have decided to upload my photos to one place that can be accessed by the public. It's just takes way too much time for me to upload them to several different places. So I have uploaded them to my Facebook page, but they are available to view by ANYONE! So here is the link, I hope you enjoy :)

http://lfc.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2016344&l=280c1&id=54500220