Nayely

I know I said Edwin was my favorite person ever - and he still is - but he has grown up a lot in the last two years. Next month he will turn fifteen, and he has moved on from bracelets and cookies to smart phones. He has stopped asking me everything under the sun because I have been replaced by a small screen and an internet package; now he comes with a sheepish expression and a list of apps to download. I can't really complain since most of my days are also spent on the internet, but he's not the cute little brother who wants to do everything with me anymore. That being said, Nayely has more than made up for Edwin growing up. She's twelve now, finally big enough to stand a fair chance in her daily sibling battles with Edwin, and constantly looking for fun. This means many things, but most recently has manifested in baking adventures, invented games, and facebook. The facebook is annoying - it's like no one here learned facebook etiquette and they friend the entire world, like every single picture, post leering comments on photos, and pass on those middle school chain letters with the hearts and the inspirational messages. I absolutely cannot tag her in anything because I get ten thousand likes from unknown adult men who mysteriously are friends with her, and although I purged her friend list once, I know she keeps adding more strangers like it's a friendship contest. The baking and games, however, are usually a blast. We still play Phase 10 and Go Fish a bit and everyone loves ninja (though it's dangerous to be near Edwin - he has gotten strong and plays with no mercy), but we also make up games like when one player closes their eyes and the other has to direct them to a goal without touching them, or inevitable tickle fights. I'm not one for excessive physical contact, but one way I know I'm integrated into the family is that Nayely and I share a hammock for the express purpose of trying to tickle each other out of it (I like this game because I usually win, being about three times as big as she is and using every pound of my cookie weight to my advantage).

This is about right - Edwin has the "I'm over it" expression down pat

Just playing games after dinner

As with most everyone I love here, it makes me a little sad to think about her future, or Edwin's. She doesn't want to study past ninth grade and has no intention of finding a trade. She's practicing her tortilla-making skills, wrangling calves, helping me out with the garden, and enjoying being a kid. That's all great and this family is lovely and supportive, but aspirations are essentially non-existent. I glad she's not getting pressured into marriage - one sister lives in the states, is married and has two kids, but the other two live here with me, at home and single. None of the five boys have girlfriends, as far as I can tell, and their dad just left a few weeks ago on the trek to the US after just three years back in El Salvador with his family. At this point more of the family's in the states than here, which is insane to me. I have very serious doubts as to whether the rest of the family will stay in El Salvador, especially now that the two youngest just got their passports and my host mom has a ten-year visa. I also can't say that I wouldn't be thrilled if Nayely and Edwin went to high school in the states - it certainly would be a better education than they would be getting in this town.

I just want her to have dreams. Maybe it's just that she's young, but when I was twelve I thought there would be nothing better than to be as amazing as Eleanor Roosevelt. I didn't want to be her, just like I didn't want to be Marie Curie or Sally Ride, but they were just so cool and inspirational. I wasn't really all that keen on being bullied for being "ugly," dying of aplastic anemia from exposure to too much radiation, or going into space. None of that made them any less cool to me, though. To be honest, if I could have chosen to switch lives with someone, I would have stepped into a fantasy book and never looked back. I would have been Tamora Pierce's Daine or Tris or Buri. Or Hermione, of course. Sorry, the fantasy books got me distracted again. I wish I could instill a love of learning and a passion to change the world in Nayely. I don't wish she had grown up elsewhere - this is where our paths crossed and this rural life is beautiful in many ways, but I do think that the school system is doing a gigantic disservice to this country by not adequately teaching students. I don't know if our two years of contact will make any difference in her life, but by God, if I could send her to college and see her succeed, I would do it in a heartbeat.

This is the hard part about volunteering, and about preparing to leave. I volunteer because there are so many beautiful and amazing people out in the hidden places of the world, but I as I leave them I just hope that I have shared as much with them as they have with me, that I have created a tiny crack through which they can peer out at a different future if they choose. And I hope so much that they do choose that. It's so easy for me to pack up and leave. My passport opens the whole world to me, and my education does the same. All of those years of ease and opportunities, and all of those to come are worthwhile only if I use them wisely. I'm not saying that I want to make myself miserable and destitute; what I want is to expand the benefits of my opportunities as far as they can reach, and not in the condescending way of "converting the heathens" or gifting something unnecessary, but with something more like planting a seed. I like the seed metaphor a lot because planting a seed requires me to know what's in the soil - has it been contaminated? is there water nearby? is there sun? -  and to have something to plant. It also requires care and attention from the other, because I won't be there to see the seed either grow into a tree or wither and die. I hope like crazy that some of my community members make something of their lives, whatever that may be. Sometimes Peace Corps feels like a shout into the unfeeling void, but there has never been a moment when I didn't love and believe in what it means to be in Peace Corps.

I know I've used this Paulo Coelho quote before, but it still resonates with me; “When we love, we always strive to become better than we are. When we strive to become better than we are, everything around us becomes better too.” I don't know if I've had much of an impact here, but I know that because I adore my host family, my cohort and others, I put in the serious effort over these two years to make change. I learned new skills specifically so that I could show Nayely and Edwin, and took an interest in gender equality and sexual health specifically because I wanted to find a way, even a tiny way, to instill confidence and make Alfonso's life better. I learned all about sewing not because I wanted to sew, but because I love the women here. Sleepaway camps were never in my plans, but I jumped at every opportunity because I adore the strong women I got to organize with. Especially now that I'm in my final days at site and I'm preparing to start another year of Peace Corps, I'm trying to take all of my experiences and all of the people I love here, to become a better human. 

Thinking of camps and camp organizers, one of my counterparts is stubbornly not getting along with the new volunteer, so I thought about how much my relationships have shaped me over the past two years. I know I'm caustic and unsympathetic a lot of the time, but I love my entire cohort and they've helped me grow up and soften around the edges a little bit. I used an antagonistic relationship during training as my example to my counterpart of how someone you didn't initially click with can become your greatest resource and best friend if you just give them a chance. It was all about realizing that I'm not the center of the universe and being reminded again and again that other perspectives and methods are just as effective as mine (and probably a lot less work, which is always a plus). Think about it  - in second grade my friend knew that if she faked her way into remedial math she would win all the beanie babies as prizes. I came to the library every single day, read like a maniac and did random secretarial tasks for the librarian and school secretary so that at the end of the year they would gift me the two lost and found beanie babies sitting on their desks. In the end we both got the beanie babies. Different methods, same results, but I'm pretty sure I was the dumb one in that situation because bullshitting is definitely a useful and effective skill in life that I should have started to develop long before I finished college. I live and I learn.

Today the chocolate cravings were too much, so I asked Nayely what kind of cookies she wanted to make. "Peanut butter...no, chocolate...no, chocolate chip..." was the wavering response. Rather than decide, we just combined all of our favorites and came up with a new favorite. Basically it's just a peanut butter cookie recipe replacing some of the flour with cocoa powder, and if there were nuts it would be so good with pecans.


Chocolate Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

2 sticks butter or margarine
1/2 cup sugar
1 cup brown sugar

2 eggs

1 ½ teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

2 teaspoons vanilla

½ teaspoon salt

1 ½ cups peanut butter

¾ cup cocoa

2 cups flour

1 cup chocolate chips
1 cup pecans (optional)

Cream butter and sugar. Add eggs. Add baking soda, baking powder, vanilla and salt and mix well. Add peanut butter. Add cocoa and flour, mixing as little as possible. Add chocolate chips. You should be able to roll the dough into balls and place on a greased cookie sheet. Bake for 8-10 minutes at 350ºF until puffy and delicious.

I'm not the only one who has grown up a lot in two years. If I'm thinking about things I love that have taught me innumerable lessons, Paprika's right up there at the top of the list.

Oh, and on a totally different note, we had a Peace Corps wedding and it was awesome!


New books read: 106
Total books: 148
Recommendations: The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern - the circus appears in the middle of the night, is open from sundown to sunup, and offers truly remarkable acts. It's also the stage upon which the two main characters demonstrate their skills in a challenge that ultimately must end with a winner and a loser. I liked it because it wasn't a typical good versus evil story, and it didn't turn into this horrible malicious demon circus, which is what I always fear after having read Full Tilt by Neal Shusterman, which is also an awesome book and nothing at all like this one.
Also, the Abhorsen trilogy by Garth Nix - The first book, Sabriel, is slow and heavy, but it's totally worth it for the other two in the series. They are fantasy books set in the Old Kingdom, following the Abhorsen, whose task it is to send the dead back into death. The world is incredibly rich and pretty dark, which makes for a good change of pace from Terry Pratchett or Dianna Wynn Jones (both of whom I also adore), and the climax is SO GOOD.