Community Mapping Excercise...
We divided the men and women into two groups to draw what they found important in their community...the women drew the casas, schools, churches...the men drew farm fields and colmados. Hmmmm
Intensive Community Based Training in a remote campo with five other American campañeros (Loud merengue booming from the colmado but no lights in the casa. Bucket baths and muddy streets...). The scenario invites itself to a bit of the loca.
Mellizas, Viveres, Pajaros
Viveres
…the mountains of yucca, platano, gineo and potato that fill our plates three meals a day is beyond words. I’ve seriously dreamt about saving them up in a bucket for a day when I finally construct a vivere gun to propel starchy boiled vegetables across the charco (waterfall) above our village (I don't think that would translate as an appropriate form of cross-cultural exchange).
Pajaro
To start with, words are over-rated. In the campo, general grunts and “Awepa!” retorts are appropriate for general conversation. Hand signals cover another 40 percent. And verbal conversation generally fluctuates around the quality and type of food and the weather. Sitting together in silence is just another way to compartir (share). Another form of indirect communication, the more viveres a Doña feeds you, the more she loves you.
So onto pajaro. The original meaning of the word being a parrot, however in the campo the word takes on a life of its own (and I should note that its true across the Dominican…) A pajaro can be a derogatory name for a homosexual, a name for a tiguere (bad boy) or a saucy chica. Well, as one of the water volunteers, Gabe, sat together with his doña in relative silence, one evening, the dona suddenly retorted “que pajaro tiguere” gesturing with her lips (another characteristic Dominican gesture). Gabe was a bit bewildered. Where was the parrot in the house? And what was she pointing at? He quickly realized she was yelling at a rat. So goes it. Cockroaches, tigueres, rats, parrots, you name it, it’s a pajaro.
Mellizas.
Campo living is pretty slim pickings in the mujer department. In our little pueblo of Mancebo with about 90 inhabitants we’re working with about 2/3 male population (largely comprised of Hatain migratory workers). And since women in the campo are married off at age 16, there are really no single chicas to speak of. Needless to say, Jen and I, the two women water trainees, are hot commodities.
With that said, the story of the beautiful mellizas (twins) has been passed down the Peace Corps chain from volunteer to trainee for what’s going on more than three years now. Who is gonna get with the mellizas? For our group its been a chronic topic of conversation (although we’ve only caught glimpses of her from the back of a pick-up as we drive through the neighboring village).
We decided to start a bit of chisme with the other Peace Corps trainee groups, mailing hand-written letters about the fate of two water trainees, Duncan and Justin. Duncan, on the edge of quitting PC for good, just up and leaves Mancebo on the back of a pick-up to destination unknown…a week later he returns on a burro with a melliza. “She changed my life”. Inspired, Justin decides he needs a melliza and thus goes out to win the other mellizas heart . They quickly discover that they are dating the same melliza and decide to stick-it-out and “share” for the rest.
The chisme letter wraps up with my compañeros going to look for me in the latrine and actually finding me in the latrine. And then us rescuing Gabe after a suicide attempt with his mosquitero net (one too many viveres).
So goes the campo.
Brindis!
