Reading: Zen & the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert Pirsig
With training almost over, I figured that I should probably elaborate a little bit more on what I will actually being doing for the next two years…
I have been placed in a small community in the coastal province of Guayas and primarily working with ACDI/VOCA, an international NGO that works specifically with cacao (cocoa) production here in Ecuador. There are seven(ish) of us that are being partnered with ACDI/VOCA and there appears that there will be a surprising amount of structure for Peace Corps projects. We all just returned from a week long training with several of the ingenieros, which was greatly beneficial considering that I have no background in cacao prior to coming here. However, I now able to prune, harvest, dry and even do a little fermenting of cacao.
For someone who cared relatively little about chocolate before leaving the states, it seems that the next two years of my life will be spent working with the first steps of creating it from cacao. Ecuador is considered to be the origin of cacao and is a considerable global producer, largely in the form of small farmers. Many farm on less then 10ha and often the trees are badly managed and poor producing, mostly due to, in my opinion, lack of an economic incentive for quality. Peace Corps and ACDI/VOCA are aiming to work with community associations to improve upon this, which is where I enter in the equation.
The community that I will be specifically working with is located on the Rio Chimbo, a lovely water source that I likely will be swimming in daily, against the best interest of my personal health. Basically, picture a small Midwestern community of about 70 people and replace all the corn with platanos/bananos. Next take all the soy fields and turn them into cacao trees and the wheat into sugar cane. You can keep the evangelicals, exchanged the Lutherans for Catholics and turn the dive bar into a cantina. Erase any notion of snow and winter, crank up the heat and humidity and welcome to my site.
Aside from the small tienda and church, I am a good thirty minutes from the nearest bus stop and actual market/store. I’m sharing the town penthouse, which is located next to my host family’s house, with a colony of bats, some frogs and a couple of fist size spiders. There’s not really running water (which makes swimming in the dirty river that much more appealing) but I don’t have any need for hot water and I do have electricity and a very wonderful but overprotect host family.
Machismo is alive and thriving in rural coastal areas. Albeit the extensive warning a preparation you are given, it doesn’t take away from the stark difference from what we take for granted in the states (and the suburbs of Quito for that matter). Something as simple as walking into town by myself or going for a run – they sent a search party out of kids out looking for me – is taboo, not because it is unsafe, but because it is strange for women to go out unaccompanied or without the permission from the my host father.
All of this has reduced me to the status of a pre-puberty boy in the eyes of most Ecuadorians (my inability to understand the aspirated coastal Spanish doesn’t help this portrayal). American women go against everything that it means to be a woman in a Latina culture. We betray our femininity by dressing like men and working like men. Many of us don’t wear make up and don’t bother with doing our hair because in our minds we’re “roughing it.” We come off as cold and frigid with our lack of physical affection and motherly instincts. We leave our families at an age that we should well be married and having children. Consequently, it is a fight against a customs where the average man finds you inferior because of your gender and the average woman views you as immature for your age.
It’s strange to think that we can sit down here as volunteers and pine for the prospect of having opposite gender friends and not have to worry about rigid gender codes while our country is cutting things such as Planned Parenthood. Apparently we’ve lost touch of what it means for women to not have access to family planning and birth control and how that affects a society. It is a basic concept that has seemingly become dispensable in the eyes of many of our law makers, but has such lasting implications…
Oh, and thanks to Wikileaks, Ecuadorian president Correa kicked the Ambassador out last week. No hard feelings towards the States, he just didn’t like her accusing the police of corruption. Needless to say, she will not be at our swearing in as officially volunteers next week.
With that I would like to take this moment to mourn the death of my ipod – here’s to the next two years of 8 hour bus rides listening to panamericano.
With training almost over, I figured that I should probably elaborate a little bit more on what I will actually being doing for the next two years…
 |
| Bananas, left. Cacao, right. |
I have been placed in a small community in the coastal province of Guayas and primarily working with ACDI/VOCA, an international NGO that works specifically with cacao (cocoa) production here in Ecuador. There are seven(ish) of us that are being partnered with ACDI/VOCA and there appears that there will be a surprising amount of structure for Peace Corps projects. We all just returned from a week long training with several of the ingenieros, which was greatly beneficial considering that I have no background in cacao prior to coming here. However, I now able to prune, harvest, dry and even do a little fermenting of cacao.
For someone who cared relatively little about chocolate before leaving the states, it seems that the next two years of my life will be spent working with the first steps of creating it from cacao. Ecuador is considered to be the origin of cacao and is a considerable global producer, largely in the form of small farmers. Many farm on less then 10ha and often the trees are badly managed and poor producing, mostly due to, in my opinion, lack of an economic incentive for quality. Peace Corps and ACDI/VOCA are aiming to work with community associations to improve upon this, which is where I enter in the equation.
The community that I will be specifically working with is located on the Rio Chimbo, a lovely water source that I likely will be swimming in daily, against the best interest of my personal health. Basically, picture a small Midwestern community of about 70 people and replace all the corn with platanos/bananos. Next take all the soy fields and turn them into cacao trees and the wheat into sugar cane. You can keep the evangelicals, exchanged the Lutherans for Catholics and turn the dive bar into a cantina. Erase any notion of snow and winter, crank up the heat and humidity and welcome to my site.
Aside from the small tienda and church, I am a good thirty minutes from the nearest bus stop and actual market/store. I’m sharing the town penthouse, which is located next to my host family’s house, with a colony of bats, some frogs and a couple of fist size spiders. There’s not really running water (which makes swimming in the dirty river that much more appealing) but I don’t have any need for hot water and I do have electricity and a very wonderful but overprotect host family.
Machismo is alive and thriving in rural coastal areas. Albeit the extensive warning a preparation you are given, it doesn’t take away from the stark difference from what we take for granted in the states (and the suburbs of Quito for that matter). Something as simple as walking into town by myself or going for a run – they sent a search party out of kids out looking for me – is taboo, not because it is unsafe, but because it is strange for women to go out unaccompanied or without the permission from the my host father.
All of this has reduced me to the status of a pre-puberty boy in the eyes of most Ecuadorians (my inability to understand the aspirated coastal Spanish doesn’t help this portrayal). American women go against everything that it means to be a woman in a Latina culture. We betray our femininity by dressing like men and working like men. Many of us don’t wear make up and don’t bother with doing our hair because in our minds we’re “roughing it.” We come off as cold and frigid with our lack of physical affection and motherly instincts. We leave our families at an age that we should well be married and having children. Consequently, it is a fight against a customs where the average man finds you inferior because of your gender and the average woman views you as immature for your age.
It’s strange to think that we can sit down here as volunteers and pine for the prospect of having opposite gender friends and not have to worry about rigid gender codes while our country is cutting things such as Planned Parenthood. Apparently we’ve lost touch of what it means for women to not have access to family planning and birth control and how that affects a society. It is a basic concept that has seemingly become dispensable in the eyes of many of our law makers, but has such lasting implications…
Oh, and thanks to Wikileaks, Ecuadorian president Correa kicked the Ambassador out last week. No hard feelings towards the States, he just didn’t like her accusing the police of corruption. Needless to say, she will not be at our swearing in as officially volunteers next week.
With that I would like to take this moment to mourn the death of my ipod – here’s to the next two years of 8 hour bus rides listening to panamericano.
I laughed a little that there was a search party of kids trying to find you. The cultural differences that you wrote about is fascinating.
ReplyDelete-eat some chocolate for me!