The significance of a ringing bell

Though the SALT program has many objectives, the heart of the program lies in voluntary service. My fellow SALTers (who are now far-flung across the world) are engaging in a wide variety of interesting projects ranging from teaching English to elementary students in Amman, Jordan to advising Ten Thousand Villages ceramicists in Siem Reap, Cambodia to working with an agricultural project in Lesoto. 

I am working at a not-for-profit called INESIN (Instituto de Estudios e Investigación Intercultural).  INESIN was founded almost 15 years ago (we´ll be celebrating our 15 year anniversary in May with three full days of festivities!) in response to incredible tension between Catholics and Protestants, a significant influx of Guatemalan refugees, the Zapatista uprising, NAFTA’s passage and a horrific massacre in Acteal, Chiapas.  A group of Chiapans founded INESIN in response to this complex mix of difficult situations, and building ecumenical relationships was (and has been ever since) the guiding principle of this organization. 

Today the work of INESIN has spread to three different areas.  The first (and arguably most central work) is in theology and spirituality.  INESIN does much capacity-building and it seems like every week there is a different workshop taking place on topics ranging from pastoral accompaniment in situations of family violence, to indigenous theology and positive conflict transformation.  INESIN also has a strengthening communities project.  Three workers (including a three-year MCCer) accompany almost 150 families in seven rural communities as they cultivate organic vegetable gardens.   Our facility consists of three offices, a library, conference room, kitchen, two dorm-style bedrooms to host delegations, a dining hall and experimental garden all ringing a central courtyard.

I am working most closely with the institutional advancement team, though I have the great luck of plugging in with all three lines of work. Since I have been working here less than three weeks, I´ve yet to get a very clear sense of all I´ll be doing, but from all appearances it will be a wide variety of tasks such as translating newsletter, updating a quite outdated website, depositing checks in the bank downtown, assisting with basic accounting, serving as the contact person for INESIN´s English-speaking counterparts In the U.S., working in the library, attending workshops, teaching English and answering the phone.  This last task is perhaps my least favorite. I really dislike talking to strangers on the phone and doing it in Spanish is even worse.  Adding to my discomfort is the fact that our phone seems to function at ¼ the normal volume (and that´s being generous).  Every time the phone rings I take a deep breath, trudge across the office and pray that the person on the other end has a loud voice, talks slowly and enunciates clearly.

Though I´m enjoying the substance and variety of my work, I feel so lucky to be working with the staff. To describe a few of my coworkers: there´s Martín who is our director, but is also the first person anyone goes to with a question about the photocopier.  I´ve yet to see him with anything but a big smile on his mustachioed face. Natán, the administrator (and my direct supervisor), dresses as sharp as a tack and calls me “princess.”   Abi gives amazing hugs and is a really stellar listener.  Mariana, a volunteer from Switzerland, lives in intentional community and loves to play Settlers of Catan. Sandra started smoking a cigar to chase howling cats of the office roof one night at 2 am as we awaited the arrival of a peace caravan.  Unfortunately, I don´t have the space to present a description of all of my coworkers, but I´m really impressed with them all.  Whereas my host family seems quite traditional, my coworkers seem quite alternative.  They are the first people I´ve encountered in Mexico to use gender-inclusive language, they are quite in-tune with the social reality of this country and they are truly dedicated to the creation of peace and justice. I’m lucky to know them

We work from 9-2 every day, though I quickly learned that if I arrive at 9 am, I am likely to be the first person here.  My favorite part of the work day is the coffee break we take every morning. When the bell across the courtyard rings, we all gather in the kitchen, squeeze around the table and partake of coffee, fruit and sweet bread as we chat about topics ranging from Michael Jackson´s death to indigenous funeral rites to story-telling and analysis of Chiapas´ governor.  And we laugh. A lot. One day last week as the coffee bell rang, Natán started chuckling from across the office.  I asked him why and still laughing he told me that in Mexico, a ringing bell typically announces trash pick-up.  I joined him in his laughter and we promptly answered the bell´s call.

When in Chiapas: advice from a six-year old boy

Several disclaimers before I begin yet another enthralling blog post:

• On the lack of photos in recent blog posts— I have the misfortune of owning a camera with a unique memory card that is compatible with very few computers, making uploading photos ever-so-difficult. In Cuernavaca, I bought a card reader and it promptly broke after a week. So, until I bite the bullet and shell out the requisite pesos to purchase another, you´ll have to do your best to imagine my surroundings.

• On the format of yet-to-come blogs—You may have been wondering about my oh-so-clever blog title. I have been in Mexico for over a month and have been blogging for even longer. However, I´ve yet to mention Chiapas.  Why? Because (as I´m sure you´ve deduced, intelligent reader) I wasn´t in Chiapas. But now I am! I arrived in San Cristóbal de las Casas (located in the Mexican state of Chiapas) on Thursday 8 September and am ready to start sharing the heart of my adventure. My plan is to write one topic or story every week in the hopes that you´ll eventually start to form a picture of my life here.

I´ll begin with my family. For the next 10 months, I´ll be living in the neighborhood 14 de septiembre with Liliana, Gabriel, Eduardo and Betty. Liliana is 36, a big talker, and a stay-at-home mom who studied accounting.  She does 98% of our food preparation and occasionally works as an in-home seamstress.  Liliana loves playing all types of games, but especially tetris on the TV. She is impressively good. Gabriel is also 36 and teaches law at a local university. He has taught Spanish classes to foreign students for 16 years and is not afraid to correct me. I love it! He jokes around with me a lot and has dubbed me Kelciana. He is a self-proclaimed soccer addict and claims that it´s his only vice. Betty is technically Liliana´s grandmother, but raised her like a daughter after the death of Liliana´s mother when she was less than two. Eduardo (aka Lalo) is my adorable 6-year old brother who´s in first grade. As we´re both only children, we´ve adopted each other as siblings despite the 16-year age gap. Lalo loves playing soccer and after kicking the ball around the park across the street from our house last weekend, we both returned sufficiently muddy and sweaty. When I arrived about a week and a half ago, an unnamed white poodle was also a part of the family. However (much to Lalo´s chagrin), the dog was given to a family friend after Liliana decided she couldn´t handle a pet.  Liliana and Gabriel placated Lalo with the promise of one hour of Xbox time at a local internet café. Upon returning from his glorious hour of Xbox, Lalo proceeded to educate me on the ways of the world.  Our conversation proceeded as follows:

Lalo: Do you have a boyfriend?

Kelly: Yep

Lalo: You should break up with him.

Kelly: Why?

Lalo: So Santa will bring you an Xbox.

Kelly: Why do I need to break up with my boyfriend to receive an Xbox from Santa?

Lalo: Because Santa won´t bring you presents if you have a boyfriend.  My mom told me so.

Kelly: oooooooooooooooooooh. I´ll have to think about that for a little bit before I make me decision. (At this point I was struggling to keep a straight face. Several hours later, Lalo approached me in all seriousness with the solution to my Xbox dilemma:

Lalo: OR you could break up with your boyfriend for the month of December and then start dating him again!

This exchange has become a running joke in our family and Lalo continues to impart his 6-year old wisdom upon me daily, expounding on subjects ranging from infectious diseases to the relative volume of each member of the family´s snoring.

Our house is small (by U.S. standard) but comfortable.  There are three bedrooms, one bathroom, a small kitchen, a dining/living room and a courtyard to dry laundry.  I´m occupying Lalo´s bedroom, and he´s now sharing a room with abuelita Betty. My bedroom décor consists of two Winnie the Pooh stuffed animals and an ABC poster on the back of the door.  I´ve been searching tirelessly for sticky tack to attach my photos and decorations to the wall, but to no avail.

All-in-all, I couldn´t have asked for a better living situation.  The family is warm and welcoming, without being overbearing. They love playing cards and have a standing date with friends every Saturday which I highly enjoy.  My biggest complaint is that they won´t let me go around in socks or bare feet.  To pacify them, I begrudgingly bought a pair of knock-off Crocs to wear around the house. And though I hate to admit it, they´re growing on me…

Mexico City: the good, the bad and the ugly

Good: On Friday 2 September, I returned to Mexico City for a second round of orientation.  In some ways, it felt like coming home.  I could get myself to and from a select number of locations within the city including the office where I was staying, the homes of the two MCC families in the city, the local lavandería (laundry service), a tianguis (mobile market), the nearest fruit and veggie store and the city´s plant nursery which had lots of beautiful walking trails.  I had learned when it was safe to go out by myself and how to unlock the door to Marion and Ricardo´s apartment (only after locking them inside and subsequently fetching the locksmith who luckily worked right down the street).

This sense of competence, the chance to reconnect with MCCers and the fact that returning to D.F. brought me one step closer to my final destination all made me quite excited to enter this megalopolis once again.  I was in Mexico City until Thursday 8 September and filled my time with more sight-seeing, a highlight of which was viewing the massive and impressive Diego Rivera murals in the Palacio Nacional and visiting Frida Kahlo´s home and studio in Coyoacán.  Additionally, I learned how to fill out my monthly expense report (sounds tedious, but I actually enjoy the technicality of working with spreadsheets and money) and spent time playing with Marion and Ricardo´s daughters.  I spy, tag and hide and go seek were favorites. 

Bad: However, by my second trip to Mexico City, I became increasingly disillusioned with life in a city this huge.  Though public transportation is quite good here, the average chilango (Mexico City resident) commutes more than 4 hours every day.  For this reason, very few cook their own meals.  The city is also incredibly polluted; so much so that there are restrictions on which days of the week a vehicle can operate. 

Ugly: Perhaps the biggest shadow over my time in the city was a severe (though fairly short-lived) bout of something.  Whether I picked up a virus on the metro or was just suffering Montezuma’s revenge, I may never know.  I became quite ill in the wee hours of Wednesday morning and spent all day sprawled on the office´s couch drinking Gatorade, eating Saltines and listening to James Taylor on my Ipod.  Luckily, I recovered in time to fly to Chiapas on Thursday morning and am now happily residing in my home for the next ten months. 

Though I´m already over a month into my SALT term, in some ways, I feel like the real adventure is just beginning. But more on that later...

No, it doesn´t mean cow horn

From Mon 15 August to Fri 2 September, I lived and studied Spanish in gorgeous Cuernavaca, "City of Eternal Spring," located about 85 km south of Mexico City.  

During my almost two-week stay, I had multiple inspiring encounters with nature. Because the city is built among barrancas or gullies, I often walked down a street that was completely developed on my left hand side, but on my right the land dropped off sharply, leaving me looking down into untouched forest. It was quite spectacular.  We are also in the midst of the rainy season here in Mexico, so many nights as I prepared for bed, a terrific thunderstorm raged outside. I had the fortune of staying in a room with a small covered balcony attached, and on these nights, I would drag my desk chair outside, wrap a blanket around my shoulders, listen to the rain and watch the lightning illuminate the gully behind my house.

Spanish classes were certainly a highlight (and the main purpose) of my stay in Cuernavaca. I studied at Universal for 3 or 4 hours every morning with a private tutor. Not only was this a great review of grammatical concepts that I´m not as comfortable with, my two teachers were quite impressive thinkers and had me talking about important issues such as globalization, consumerism and societal structures. Also, after my formal classes and my informal interactions with Mexicans over these two weeks, I´m beginning to get a sense of some Mexican slang. I´m working on incorporating phrases such as mandé, órale, haz de cuenta, güey, híjole and qué chido into my repertoire.

For the first time since my arrival in Mexico, I was forced to function almost exclusively in Spanish. While I was really looking forward to this, it was a big challenge. First, it made me realize how far I still have to go in my mastery of this language... definitely a bruise to my ego :) Secondly, thinking in Spanish all of the time was exhausting! On Saturday I went out with my host sister and four of her friends. As we drove back at about 1:30 am, all 6 of us jammed into a 1970s VW Beetle, Largo suddenly turned to me and said, "Kelly, all of the sudden you´re like a mute person."  I had hardly said a word the entire car ride and my response was an exasperated, "I´m too tired to think in Spanish any more." One plus side of this exhaustion is that I slept extremely well during my stay in Cuernavaca. Every night I fell asleep almost immediately as my head hit my lumpy pillow.

I had another big revelation during my time in Cuernavaca: I´ve never traveled alone before. Ok, this sounds pretty obvious, but it was something I didn´t really think about before leaving. I´ve always gone to new places with family, friends or some sort of structured program. Being solo is a completely different experience. The first few days were a real struggle. After I finished classes, it was up to me to figure out how to spend the next 12 hours of my day. I was staying with a wonderful host family which helped, but they were also quite busy with their own studies, work and social schedules. Also, during my first week there was only one other student at Universal (U.S. news coverage of Mexican affairs has really hurt tourism). So, I spent a lot of time exploring the city as my house was within walking distance of the town center, lounging by Universal´s pool, journaling and listening to music. I had many lonely moments. However, by the first weekend I was getting to know my family and neighbors more, 13 students came to Universal and I re-connected with the host family I stayed with five years ago in Cuernavaca. My time quickly filled up with socializing and sight-seeing and I left feeling quite positive about my experience.

And to conclude, a fun fact about Cuernavaca: contrary to popular belief, the name Cuernavaca does not mean cow horn (in Spanish, cuerna = horn and vaca = cow). The name is actually a hispanicized version of the Nahuatl name Cuauhnahuac, which the Spaniards could not pronounce when they arrived in Mexico.