We had our site announcements last Thursday and I will be living in Chokwe in the province of Gaza for the next two years of my life. I will be working for John Hopkins University Communication Program (PACTO). I am so excited!!! In two weeks I finish training and I will officially be a Peace Corps Volunteer. YAYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :)
Tuesday, July 24, 2012
Visit to the Curandeiro
I visited a curandeiro (a healer
who practice traditional medicine) generally; people would reach out to a
curandeiro to get treated. The curandeiro can (supposedly) cure people with
plants but also can see the future.
See, this is how it works. The
curandeiro has a bag filled with shells and coins, he spits in the bag, the
‘patient’ needs to blow on it and the container of the bag is thrown on the
floor. This is how the curandeiro can see what kind of ‘disease’ the patient
has. And offer to get rid of the disease through various practices such as
combining natural plants but it can go to using scalpels and then I don’t know
how it goes. So at the end, how to do in the case of a person who is HIV
positive? How can a curandeiro see if the patient is HIV positive?
How can he/she help cure the
patient with plants if he contracted HIV?
I realize how complicated
cultures/tradition interferes with modern medicine…
Usually, there is a curandeiro in
each town, and as a health volunteer, how can I manage working with a
curandeiro to incite people to go straight to the hospital, get tested and get
medicine. Curandeiros can transmit HIV with their practices in which they use
scalpels and where rituals are asked to pass the blood from one to another as a
ritual path. After several training on traditional medicines and talk. I do
believe that it is important to educate curandeiros first since there are the
first demanded by the community and educate them to practice safe manners when
curing patients and incite patient to see a doctor if the patient does not feel
or look well after being treated with traditional medicine.
Short visit to Mocuba, Zambezia
4 volunteers and I flew to the
province of Zambezia to visit a current volunteer. This visit is called Shadow
Visit. It is way for trainees to see what life like for real! Redeena and I
were sent to visit Tanya Riddle in Mocuba. From Maputo we landed to Quelimane.
We had to stay one night over to another volunteer since it was late at night.
Then early the next day, we hopped in a chapa to Mocuba.
I posted a photo of myself in a
chapa and I did not explain it is. It is a way of transportation here in
Mozambique. It is a minivan. A chapa won’t move anywhere until it is completely
full. So sometimes you get to wait at the chapa station for 2 hours until it’s
full and you go. It is totally uncomfortable, dangerous and long. It’s perfect
for short people but people like me with long legs it is uncomfortable. Also I
would say that you need to have good knees and be flexible. It can be very
frustrating because the conductor would blast his songs, you might sit by the
speaker throughout the whole journey (which can take up hours depending on
where you are), it’s incredibly hot, so of course you will encounter people
with severe BO and you have your bag in your lap. It is a great way to travel
cheap in Mozambique. You can catch them anywhere in the street. There is no bus
station. You just hop in and hop off but you definitely need to be open minded
and ready to go to experience a chapa.
So back my short visit, after two
hours, we arrived in Mocuba. Tanya
leaves in this nice compound with her organization. It is a faith-based organization. Tanya
educates orphans; she runs a theater group that does skits about HIV AIDS and
malaria. We assisted a meeting where professors were recapulating what they
learned about Malaria and how can they reach to the community door to door and
incite people how to put mosquito nets and its importance and the different
practices to avoid getting malaria and so on. It was interesting. Tanya also
showed us her wells projects in which she was able to get funding. So in the
next couple weeks, the community will be able to access water in their
community and not go to further public wells in which generally the water is
dirty and contaminated. I think it was such a great project to see. Two
volunteers are supposed to go to Mocuba because Tanya is finishing her service
in a couple of months. I think that this place is very secure. It is a compound
watched by two guards and there are more than 10 dogs there. (Side note:
Mozambicans are terrified of dogs) I felt very secure there although a part of
me would rather be living within the community and not in a compound close off.
But I enjoyed my visit. I thought Tanya is doing a wonderful work with the
kids. I was very admirative and inspired. So I come back full of excitement
because soon I will be living it somewhere and do my workshops on HIV/AIDS.
From Mocuba, Redeena and I took a
chapa back to Quelimane and the flew to Maputo and stayed there overnight. I
spent a nice full day in Maputo with Lisa. We walked around the city, shopped
then met up with other volunteers to go to the Chinese store. I love my Chinese
people! The only places that look like a wall mart are owned by Chinese people
and you can find ANYTHING you want! It
is heaven there! The funny thing is that literally everything is imported from
China. I know that because I was able to find the exact same shower gel I used
when I was in Xiamen for a month. It was nice little day of shopping and seeing
the capital and the same day came back to Namaacha with 5 kinds of cheese that
I brought in Maputo. I was in Heaven. J
My permagarden
I decided to do a permagarden at
my host family house. I asked permission to my host family to use some space in
her garden and she was glad to let me do it. Sabrian,Colin and Lis helped me to
do it along with the training facilitator Paula and Lucio. In two hours or so,
we made this great machamba and planted tomatoes, onions, sweet potatoes,
pineapples trees, a lychee tree and some
peanuts as well.
I initiated this project because
I want to gain more experience on permagarden because I intend to do my own at
my site. I thought it would be a good idea to re do one while I am in training
and have the facilitator around if I have any questions. So yes! It was a
success. I also taught my host family what was the system of permagardening. Unfortunately
I would be present to see the results of my garden but at least I was able to
practice how to do it again. I think it is so funny that I am doing a
permagarden. I would have never thought I would get interested in gardening to
be honest. Oh well there is a first time for everything J
Sunday, June 24, 2012
Saturday, June 23, 2012
Photos in Namaacha
Friday, June 22, 2012
Permagarden
Today, we started our permagarden learning. One of the main
reason I am learning Permagarden is to incite people to use the same technique
to grow their vegetables. It also very encouraged for the HIV/AIDS population
to have a permagarden since medicinal plants and vegetables are accessible
right in their garden. Once they will see me making my own permagarden, they
might wonder what the hell I am doing but months later (if I am doing this
right) my garden will be more fructuous than anybody else. So this technique
should attract people to do the same thing and I will be able to show them how
to. So today, we learned how to make an effective compost pile. This compost
pile takes 3 months to decompose. Since we are not going to be there in 3
months, we learned another way to prepare the soil ready for planting.
The whole day we
digged and double digged on the soil. It felt great to be on my knees and work
on it!!! We also installed swales to
control the water in case of erosion and created berms (walls). After all that, we planted lemongrass, sweet
potatoes. On the side, I took home some aloe Vera root. I am going to water it every
day and plant it once I get to my site. I am going to create some great facial
masks with that ;)
Thursday, June 21, 2012
Sessions of the day 6/21/2012
Today, I had interesting sessions. We had a session on
gastro-intro diseases, so basically it translates to mainly Diarrhea. It is the
most common disease that PC volunteers throughout the world experience. I have
to admit to myself that it will happen to me.
Of course, I am totally not looking for it but to be honest I would
rather it happens when I am in training than at my site. The silly reason is
because, I am taking cared by my host family and at site I will by myself. But oh
well….it is what it is. The doctor who conducted the session handed us an
interesting chart called the ‘Bristol Stool Chart’. If I cannot upload it on
this blog, please Google it. If by misfortune, we end being sick, the first
contact with PC medical office is through the phone. So we basically have to be
very detailed on how we are feeling, and what ‘things’ looks like. This chart
breaks down the stools in different type from type 1 to 7….and trust me I do
not want to be in type 7. lol
After the medical session, Carl, our country director
conducted his session on the MBTI test that we took last week. So he came today
to give us the results. The MBTI test (Meyers-Briggs Type Indicator) is simply
a personality test. It is commonly used in busineses and organizations to see
what people’s personality are and how we can be a successful organization or
business or other with the different personalities. It has many other purpose
as well.
So here are my results, and people who knows me can tell if this personality is wrong. I do think that
the results match exactly who I am really in life.
The results are: ENFP
(Extroverted-iNtuition-Feeling-Perceiving): Warmly enthusiastic and imaginative. See life as full of possibilities.
Make connections between events and information very quickly, and confidently
proceed based on the patterns they see. Want a lot of affirmation from others,
and readily give appreciation and support. Spontaneous and flexible, often rely
on their ability to improvise and their verbal fluency. ENFP are people
oriented, creative, they seek harmony-Life of Party-More starts than finishes.
ENFP are the most optimistic.
So yes…I totally agree on everything. If anyone has comments
on that or want to add more on the personality test please comment and share J
Basically, this test gives a great idea of what kind of
person you are and how you can match with others who have the same kind of
personality AND those who are totally different from you. You can make your
work more effective by filling what’s lacking. So I am glad I took this test
even though I know who I am. I encourage people to take it.
Then later, today I was introduced to ‘Permagarden’, I have a
few broad information on it. It looks like I am going to produce my own crops.
PC is teaching us these skills, for us but also in the intention that Mozambicans
can adopt a healthy, economical way to produce and eat food.
So I am very exactly about this project. Tomorrow we will
learn how to do compost and all that good stuff. I will keep you all updated.
Boa Tarde :)
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