Journals
Thursday,Sep 29 2005, 08:20:27 PMnew journal posting as of 29th of september 2005
Friday September 23rd 2005 7:05 AM
Well I finally posted some pics up on my website. I got a few updates on the ag game from my dad so I hope that that went well. This weekend is going to be a chill weekend of studying and going to the soccer game on Sunday here in town. I think that it should be pretty fun. Other than that we are about one month through of our three months training that we are going to do. It looked like Houston is being evacuated right now as everyone flees the town. I guess it is typical public reaction, speculating right now, one horrible incident then everyone way over reacts for about the next six months. I hope that everyone is safe and all of that. As far as a description of Cochabamba and Quillocollo. Cochabamba is fairly modern and similar to Guadalajara mexico, other than the fact that there are bolivian influences. There are unsafe areas of town, nice areas, and some nice restaurants and everything. Quillocollo, which is closer to us and the 2nd largest town in the state, could be a town anywhere in the developing world from Thailand, to south Africa, to mexico, to Egypt. I am not really a fan of it because that is all it is. A town where people come to by and sell things and nothing else. I hope that you all enjoyed the pics and I am sorry if my grammar is really messed up. The keyboards here are difficult to operate as Bolivian males play lots of computer games here and act like the harder they hit the keyboard the more affective they will be at playing the game. It is really funny to see. Geoff
Sunday 18th of September 2005 about 8 rum and cokes into the night but who is counting
So it is or was my now 9 year old brothers birthday today and who would have thought that a dollar ten cent bottle of rum could mix with Pepsi so well. Today was yet again an awesome day. Friday night in Totora was great camping and playing with fire. Pictures to come . . . I left marquina this Sunday morning at about 8 30 with 4 other volunteers, one of which met a 24 year old med student that studies in the city at this bar. Her name is Lorena. Well she invited us to go to the country club style pool\resort area with about 100 of her fellow female med students and about 110 make med students because they are on there spring break this week and this was the kickoff. Well we chilled, swam, got in the steam room, spit a little bit of game, I schooled them all in B-Ball, and now the most interesting part of the day. They asked us if we, me and 3 other male pc volunteers, would like to be the judges in the best rear end (politically correct term) Bolivian Bikini competition between the female med students. Hello . . . it was awesome and not just because of the event. They also wear the Brazilian style bikini here, thong or semi thong like bikini. One of the highlights of my trip so far. Imagine me, Geoff, the gringo bikini inspector of 5 Bolivian med students. Wow and this in my 3rd weekend here. Now only some 100 plus weeks to go, if it keeps going like this who knows what I might have to tell yall six months from now.
The Birthday is great check the pics out and cuidate.
“Live life like you want to And feel the mountain coolness on your face, Make this last and feel like forever What we call this human race.” (My own for once) G
“So are you walking home?” (ash) my reply “No Jeeves has my Bentley running out front” HA Ha Ha Ha ha . . . . . . .
Sat 17th of September 2005 1:35 pm
The last few days have been really interesting. On Thursday night 2 of us were paired with a city family that lives in Cochabamba to get a taste of what the life of the people in the city is typically like. Talk about a totally different world that they live in compared to where we are staying. I ate with the Associate director of the Ag program here and his wife along with another volunteer. He worked for the U.N. before he worked with the P.C. and has had many adventures throughout Latin America. His wife cooked us a great dinner of Cordon- Bleau, mashed potatoes, avocado salad and tomatoes, Ice cream and other great things that I have not had in a while. Honestly I didn’t really want to leave his house. After dinner we finished our bottles, plural, or Chilean wine while our host, Pepe, played piano as if he was Mozart himself. On Friday we left marquina to do our first technical weekend. We went and visited a volunteer’s site about 4 hours and 60 miles from here Cochabamba in a town called Totora about 5000 people. It was great. We got there at about 5 pm and Vanessa and I were somehow separated from the group. Low and behold we came across a bull fight at the town’s athletic field. I am sure some of you have heard me talk about my love of the bullfights in Madrid. Well it was not like this, this was more like drunk Bolivian men taunting and running from a pissed off bull. Closer to what I think the running of the bulls must be like. Well we got there and the first thing that I did was hop the fence and join the Bolivians in taunting and running from the pissed off bull. I love it. It was totally awesome. The trip here was a little tough on a bumpy windy road, some unpaved. The town is really pretty though and very colonial. (see pics)
Wed 14th of September 2005 6:50 am
About to go to the training center in town. So this morning I am kind of hating Incan genetics. This morning was about the 100th time that I hit my head on the 5’6’’ door frames.
1:29 PM Just had lunch at the training center. Pretty good but this off and on rain thing has been getting a little annoying. I am trying to decide if I want to go get a pizza and beer in Cochabamba or if I just want to go back to my house
8:40 pm
Well I am in bed now and just finished watching “el genio” or Aladdin with Jherri, my 8 year old brother. I came home at about 7:30 and decided to pass on the pizza but did grab a beer with Willie, the french-american-Mexican Volunteer that was born in Columbia, in Quillacollo the town about 20-30 minutes from here. We had a great long discussion about isolationism and human values. One of my favorite trick questions, “Are there universal rights and wrongs or is everything culturally relevant and defined”? Hmm what do you think? Because if who says that your values are any more relevant and or less formed by the society that you live or grew up in. At the same time thought just because female genital mutilation is culturally acceptable in parts of Africa does that make it right ? ? ? I would like to get some emails on what you guys think about this. Enough philosophy for now. A long day of training, shots – “like Hepatitis A not the kind like Tequila” I am starting to feel like a voodoo doll I have been shot up with so many things. I am exited about this weekend because we are visiting a business volunteer’s site in Totora, about 3 hours from here. WE are going to camp out, grill, learn, and chill with the friends that I have made so far. Check the picture of Armando, our Mexican technical advisor smoking out. I have definitely made some friends that I identify with so far. My friend Ashley would probably register as the saltiest Tri-Delt Sorority girl from t.u. that I have ever met in my life. Not to play out a bad stereotype but how many sorority girls do you know that are willing to give 2 years of there life to live without bathrooms, curling irons, showers, daddies credit cards, a nice car, and at the same time who is totally willing to enjoy the experience and even stir latrine poop around. The first one I have ever met Check the picture out of her stirring the latrine with the stick. We have to do this so that we know how if that is the type of bathroom we have in our sites. I have gotten in touch with all of my South American friends and can’t wait to see them. I also really can’t wait for some of you guys to come down here. You can totally be like P-Diddy in the club with like 30 bucks. Now time for some funny quotes of which all will remain without a name.
“I think a Chollita (typical Bolivian country woman with the braids and the whole nine yards) exploded in there.” Talking about a public bathroom
I don’t ever think I’ve seen a piece of meet that big.
“Who is still on the shit list?” (We have a pool going to see who is the last one to get diarrhea. I am still in
“You think that girl is 18? Reply – Does it really matter here”
“Have you ever gotten as much joy at throwing rocks at dogs in your life? I mean it brightens up my day”
“Huh huh huh” – my French laugh giving willie a hard time about being French
You live off the old road, wow I got asphalt, looser!
If I have to sit in the back of a Trufi again with 20 other Bolivians 5 being drunk men I am going to go crazy
Till next time.
G
|
Tuesday,Sep 13 2005, 08:50:15 PMGeoff in Bolivia new
Monday Sept 12th 2005 7 am
What a beautiful morning. It rained last night and now the Andes mountains, about 2 miles to the foothills from Marquina, are covered in snow. At least the peaks are. I am going to the museum today and I am sitting in a mini van with 19 people, oh wait 20 if you count the baby. Ha ha a lot different than one soccer mom in a suburban with no one else
1 pm
We just had pizza in the city for lunch. YmmmmmWed Sept 7th 2005 8:30 pm
So I lay here in my bed, I go to bed early here and get up early. It is so much better and you feel so much more rested going to bed and rising with the sun. I think that there is something about it that makes your inner clock work better. My point is this. So today, Wednesdays are spent at the training center in Cochabamba, a ways from here, and we get shots do safety and security stuff etc . . . . So anyways last night we decided that we were going to do a big sleepover at the training center and cook food and watch movies, etc . . . Wow did we have a great change of the normal meal. Me and the French guy with the American passport, willy, made quesadillas and salsa guacamole and so forth. Talk about a great change after eating well lets give you a typical day
Breakfast
2 rolls with butter and some form of warm drinkLunch – huge bowl of chicken stock soup loaded with about ½ a pound of rice, and some form of potato, usually fried, lima beans, and a piece of super stewed beef
Dinner – half a pound of rice, fried potatoes, stewed beef, maybe an egg and an onion and tomato what they call salad
Not so bad but after 2 weeks of soup every day you are ready for a big fat hamburger, taco, steak, I totally know I am going to miss the big ny strip steak
Everyone loved my salsa and thought it was the bomb which made me happy.
I returned home last night after grabbing a beer in the nearest town with one of the other volunteers in town at about 730 to find about 500 people in the street in front of my house. Fireworks, noise making band, I wouldn´t consider it music. Pretty sweet for a few minutes . . . seriously though picture the Godfather when they have the wedding and go back to italy, almost the same to a tee except they were celebrating the Virgen of Guadalupe festival, apparently the church is there because someone saw here face on a rock about 40 years ago. I am trying to sleep right now with what sounds like the beginning of the new revolution starting right outside my window.
Tuesday,Sep 6 2005, 01:18:07 PMBolivia News
Tuesday September 5th 8:30 am
What is going on. today is more of a free day then I am used to. but more because i already wrote my 3 page spanish paper last night. We are going to go to the supermarket here in cochabamba in order to buy stuff for dinner tonight. WE are staying in the training center tonight so that we do not have to wake up at the but crack of dawn to arrive at the training center by 8 am. Write me back and I really hope that I here from you guys sooner rather than later.
GEoff
Sunday September 4th 2005 3:30 PM
Well the ags lost by a field goal last night. I can’t even begin to express how mad this makes me. I mean here I am over 2000 miles away and I want to hurt something. Maybe I should go throw rocks at rabid dogs or something. For a side note, Bolivia is definitely not a place for animal lovers to come. Animals here are for working, beating, and eating. There are so many dogs in the street that chase you at night etc that you have to learn to throw rocks at the dogs or else you have a good chance of getting bit.
This morning I woke up at 530 to help my brother milk 20+ cows on his grandparent’s farm. It was pretty cool and not very difficult because they have 2 milking machines. Oh yeah I also saw something that I have no idea what it was at first. I was herding up the cows and noticed that one of the cows had something sticking out of what I assumed was its butt at first. My anatomy knowledge of cows is very limited but on closer inspection I realized that the cow was about to give birth and what I was looking at was a hoof coming out of a very different part of the cows anatomy. Anyways I got to see the birth of the calf. I also did my first washing of clothes today since I left dallas. It was definitely the first and last time that I am going to wash my own clothes. Hand washing stinks. I am totally going to pay someone in town here to do it for me. It wouldn’t be so bad if I had a minute of free time but I really don’t.
Last thing about doing laundry here in Bolivia, well here in Bolivia they sometime use electric lines to hang up laundry to dry and these lines look similar and are similar places to the clothes lines. So, uh, yeah when you hang wet socks on the line that is going to the outdoor speakers on the patio it pretty much shocks the hell out of you. Not that I was that dumb or anything ;) . Right. So next time you come to Bolivia and hand wash your own clothes make sure you socks are fairly dry and you don’t hang them up on a live electric line.
Geoff
Saturday September 3, 2005 7:30 AM
It has been a long time since I last wrote. Everything is going well here. It is hard sometime though to think about the lack of opportunity that some of the children have here. I just don’t think that even with all of my travels I have ever encountered as many poor children as I have here in Bolivia. I guess that is why I am here. In order to make things just a little bit better for the kids here.
Other news. This is really funny. We went to a high school yesterday that is a decently funded by Bolivian standard and is kind of in the outskirts of Cochabamba. Think a Buda outside of Austin type of school but much less money and almost all farming children. What a different system of education they have here. There was not much classroom discipline and many other things that are hard to describe. No books, only handouts and some chalk and a chalkboard. That is not the funny part about all of this though. So the bell rings for the passing period. Let me start over, there are basically 2 of us that are very tall and gringo looking compared to the rest of the group. Me and this other guy Jonathan. Anyways when the passing period started we were bombarded by teenage girls 14-18 who wanted our autographs and wanted us to write something in their books. I am talking totally backstreet boy style here. Swamped . . . what a strange feeling thinking that someone wanted me to sign an autograph LOL can you even imagine. We could barely make it out to the Peace Corps land cruisers that were taking us back to our houses. I totally knew I should have formed a boy band in high school. Not that my head is big about this experience or anything LOL.
Geoff
Wednesday,Aug 31 2005, 11:15:28 PMMore to come this weekend
I typed this out on a friends computer but it didn´t all come out alright. so I will be posting like 6 pages on saturday or sunday.
Tuesday august 29th 2005 9:42 pm
Today was a great day. I ate well, and was able to go to the market where I bought several things that I needed. Going to the market was cool because I was able to get some things that I wanted to buy. The public transportation system here is good because not many people can afford cars. It is interesting the way they worked everything out. As for my town they call me the Michael Jordan of Marquina, just cause I have an idea of how the game is played and am taller than all of the Bolivians. It is so interesting I bought a world map for the family that I put up in the living room. I don’t think that they really have any concept of how far it is to my home. I can’t wait to go to the internet shop this weekend to listen to the Clemson game. I really am going to be the gringo football fan here in our town. I remember when I was little that maps of the world were one of my favorite things . . .thus I am trying to give the little guy and the others some idea of what the world outside of there state here in Bolivia is like. One funny thing about this map, it was made in peru and some the shapes and sizes of the countries are about right, where the cities are located is a completely different story. For example dallas is about 150 miles northeast of fort worth. And tampa is in the interior of Florida. I mean no wonder people over here have very little idea of the outside world. Well I got my cell phone today and it should be working. I am going to ask tomorrow what you need to dial in the us to get in contact with my cell phone.
G
Monday 28 august 2005 10Pm
Wow let me tell you something. Today they fixed the machine that is electric in order to have a hot shower. I think it was the best shower that I have ever had in my life. Electricity is expensive here so I have to pay 2 bolivianos for every shower that I take. About 15 cents but it is well worth it. So you can relate this cost to the average Bolivian my family gets paid 110 bolivianos a month, about 13 bucks and this is for my rent and all of my meals. My family is so nice to me and they regard me as a son already even though I am a curiosity. So yeah today this gringito milked a cow, that’s right bridgeportians, I milked some “Livestock” (inside joke at mary lake) I am actually going to wake up at 4:30 on Thursday to go with my 22 year old brother will to milk the cows on his grandparents farm. They have 2 machines and are really advanced. After being here for a few days I am understanding the town relations. My dad is one of 8 brothers and 2 sisters and the grandparents are some of the more wealthy in the town. Thus they have there hands in everything like the committee of running water and electricity. I played basketball with about 5 other pc volunteers and many Bolivians. Strangely basketball is very popular in my town. The elevation is so high though, 8700 feet that I can barely make it up and down the court 3 times. We had are first quechua lesson today and it seems like a pretty simple language, there are no irregular verbs which is awesome. So here it goes “qheshwata parlanki” or do you speak quechua, Ari for yes manu for no. Crazy right, well we will see how this goes. I don’t think that it is going to be so tough but who knows. I will leave you with a little quote for tonight, “Everybody is just a stranger but that’s the danger of going my own way, guess it’s the price I have to pay. Still everything happens for a reason (Aaron V.) :) is no reason not to ask myself if I am living it right?”
There is no doubt in my mind.
G
Sunday August 27th 2005. Sometime after lunch
Today has been a chill day so far. I walked around the pueblo with Jherri, or Jerry, the 8 year old boy. I would say that this town is based around 1 main road which is cobblestone and partially paved in some parts. I am chilling on the patio about 20 yards long and 10 wide with a tin corrugated rood the same as the house has. They have never met a gringito before so they are very inquisitive. The boy was afraid of me but after a few minutes playing basketball we were fine. He did keep telling me that he was afraid of the other granites but that I was ok . .. I think I am with a very nice family. One thing that is tough though is that they view food as a very important thing for your health. They base this more on quantity rather than quality. So I am being served huge plates that not even I can eat of rice potatoes beans and meat eggs etc . . . I have never seen a little kid put away as much food as jherri does. This poses a problem for me because it is seen as very strange if someone like me can’t eat about a pound of rice or potatoes every day.
G
Sat August 26th 2005 10:11 pm
What a day today was. Out of all of the day with the Pc I think that this has to be one of the 10 most anticipated. First off moved in with these families in the pueblo of marquina. It is about 20 miles from cochabamba or one hour in a taxi but it seems like decades away. I is towards the mountains which are in the north and looks down on the cochabamba valley. All 20 of us are living in this town so that is pretty cool. I would say the furthest person is about a 45 minute walk and the closest is about 6 minutes of walking.
I have my own room that is separate from the house in what no better way can be described than a compound ( hey Jake V. who thought I would be the first one to live on a compound) I have a hanging light bulb some shelves a chair and a little table. A lot compared to some of the other volunteers but then I am living with an upper class family of this town. My bed has a mosquito net not for mosquito’s but for this bug called a vinchuga that carries a bad disease. Most pc volunteers never even see this bug as it is very shy and only tries for people at night. My family consists of six people a 17 year old female dental hygiene student, a 22 year old male petroleum engineering student, the mother about 45 or so, the dad the same, and jerry an 8 year old boy. The father drives a trufi or scoobi doo style van or taxi and works incredibly hard. He works probably 360 days out of the year from 5 in the morning till 8 oclock at night. I only wish everyone could meet someone who has to work as hard as he does. And why is it so hard for him, just because he was born in a different part of the world. He owns a nice house by Bolivian standards has running water and electricity. By american standards however he would be living in severe poverty. It makes me want to punch some of the Colleyville brats in the face, are you kidding me, this guys works like 80 hours a week every week of the year to provide for his family and you look down your nose at a Honda civic because it isn’t cool enough, in nicer words than I want to put on the internet, forget you. And then after all of your education, money and advantages you have you piss it all away.
We have running water and a bucket flush toilet, pretty snazzy for over here
Friday August 25h 2005 1:32 pm
Things are going great here in Bolivia. For those of you who know about culture shock I am definitely in the honeymoon stage.
Thurs August 25th 2005 3:46 pm
We are at the pc training center outside of cochabamba right now and today we had are assessments of our language ability and technical skills and knowledge and kind of what we want to get out of working in Bolivia. I tested in the highest 4 of Spanish. Before we did this I was like . . .well this is not a contest . . . But in reality I am very competitive so am happy that I am only behind the guy with a masters in Spanish and 3 years in Ecuador, and the French guy that can speak 5 languages and has a Mexican mom. So I will be learning quechua and practicing improving my Spanish grammar and vocab.