Youth Camp

I am helping with Youth Camp at VOJN/Cumbermere School. The first day I supervised the boys crafts and we worked on yarn poodles. The girls worked on coasters. I took advantage of the situation to ask the boys what grade they were in and how they felt about school. The resounding response was "I like to learn. I like all subjects. As long as I feel challenged." I can understand that sentiment. I like to feel challenged too. Another craft the girls like to work on is "beauty parlor" on Sheri's hair. If you've ever met a little Caribbean girl you will soon find out they like to plait hair. If you hold still long enough they will begin to make you a hairstyle and soon there will be 4 or 5 little girls swarming your head each grasping a section while the nearby boys look on blankly or complain about the flyaways. I understand that it's not every day an adult, especially a "white lady" comes through allowing her hair to be experimented on so I try to hold still and keep from complaining as they tug this way and that. They ask me why my hair feels so weird or what I did to it to make it so fine, straight and silky. My hair is pretty far from silky at this point after a year of intense sun, salt water and no trim. "I guess I was just born with funny hair." I say.

Fruit Festival

I help Marie Mason, the Director of the Craft House, sell some of her soaps and crafts at the Fruit Festival in Charlestown. There were a lot of interesting agriculture booths and different varieties of fruits (especially mangoes as they are in season) to look at. One man had a mountain of bananas, the Taiwanese farmers had a beautiful display of corn, cherry tomatoes, pineapples and mangoes and many people were selling delicious homemade fruit drinks and foods. I finally got to try "Conkie" which is a sort of dense sweet potato and coconut pudding steamed in a banana leaf (sort of like a tamale) that is traditionally served on Easter Sunday and some conch soup ("Conks water" as it is known here). Next to us a few tables down was one of our teacher "students" (from the craft seminars) that was selling her jewelry and her student's sewn projects. It was a fun day with lots of new and familiar faces.

Also a big thank you to Greg for the photos!

Making it work

Living in the Caribbean forces you to be resourceful. I started out making jewelry with anything I could find. My first bracelet was a string of lentils and black-eyed peas! Eventually I worked my way up to all the treasures of the island: sandbox seeds, jumbie beads, Job's Tears, etc. enhanced with glass beads that my guests would send or bring to me. Recently my mom came to visit and brought me some new goggles (mine snapped in half 4 months ago) and encouraged me to use them also as safety goggles for my drilling. Seen here is my extremely cluttered workspace as I drill a sandbox seed for a keychain for Brother Ivano as he is leaving the island to continue his path to priesthood.

Disturbing incident of the day

I started to notice a bad smell coming from the general area of the laundry room/bathroom. Of course noxious smells are often associated with such areas so I wrote it off. However, when I was doing my laundry yesterday I shrunk back in horror when I finally saw the culprit: Two rather large lizards had gotten themselves stuck on my fly paper and were busy decomposing! I was utterly disturbed and horrified at the grotesque dead "gargoyles" framing my back door and couldn't act on it right away. When I had to use the restroom I tried not to look. When I brushed my teeth that night I had to carry my toothbrush into the farthest room and I actually ran past them. Today in the light of day I finally took them down and got my photographs and threw the spectacle away. Now perhaps I can rest a little easier.
There is something about being in the Peace Corps that just entails frightening and unexpected surprises. Last week I got a new towel out of my closet and after my shower, started to towel myself off. I noticed there was some lint on the towel so I gave it a hearty shake and a large, quarter-sized hairy brown spider rolled dazedly onto the floor! I'm afraid to ask what is next?

Craft Seminars

I have been assisting the Director of the Craft House in evening craft sessions. At this time we are teaching jewelry and coconut craft to teachers who can then teach their students. The reception has been wonderful and the ladies really enjoy it! I am blown away by the beautiful creations they come up with and impressed with the eagerness to try new things (drilling seeds, sawing Sandbox seeds, varnishing, etc.) So many people have expressed interest in the jewelry I create so it's nice to be able to pass that on.

Cush-cush

On Tuesday the boat from Dominica brings farmers with their produce all the way across the Caribbean to Nevis. They usually have copious bananas, oranges, grapefruits, some pineapples, cocoa sticks in jars, piles of ginger, yams and other starchy staples. This Tuesday I saw some toady-skinned tubers that I mistook for dasheen, yams or cassava (I'm still not sure how to identify these particular starchy, bland ground provisions.) It was a yam variety called "Cush-Cush." The man said they were "finer" than regular yams so I bought two of them. I have heard of them in natural medicine books so I was excited to taste them. Today I pulled one out of the fridge and peeled it. The thick brown skin gave way to dark purple, extremely slimy flesh. When I say slimy, I mean it took about five minutes under running water to rinse off my hands! I boiled them until they were soft and they reduced the water into thick syrup. They smelled and tasted slightly like bacon and eggs! I immediately fell in love with the soft, melty texture and smoky flavor. I will definitely be buying some cush-cush yams next time I shop from the Dominica farmers! Shown here in the raw and cooked variety with my favorite snack-sized bananas and some rice and peas (pigeon peas). I am eating native!

Creation

Here is some of the jewelry created with the local materials from earlier blog entries; Jumbie beads, Job's tears, Knuckle Seeds (Nickernuts), shells, pigeon peas and shak-shaks.

Preparing

Using the dremel to drill jumbie beads, shak-shaks and shells. The shak-shak makes a nice incense holder!

*note that jumbie beads are extremely poisonous if ground up/chewed and digested, shell dust is also reportedly harmful. Please use proper precaution and care when drilling and working with natural materials, especially if you don't know what it is!

**Note #2: A local friend of mine says that people grind up jumbie beads and use them like coffee to make themselves better when they are sick. Now I am confused. Form your own conclusions...

Hunting-Gathering

West Indian Mahogany seed pod, Knuckle Seeds (also known as Knickernuts) inside their pods, beach finds (unknown seed pods-look like polished apple seeds), diving for shells, beach combing, Shak-Shaks from the Flamboyant Tree, Sandbox tree, jumbie beads, attempting to gather coconuts

Some sights of Fountain

Olive always carries her matchet (pronounced "match-it" here in the Caribbean.) An interesting shape carved by a bug I assume. The pink leaves/flowers blanket the island! The Fountain/Mt Lily Community Club sign pointing to the main road.

Candlelight Vigil

On February 11, one of the bus drivers was killed in an accident. The news swept over the village like a black cloud. It was an emotional week. We had an emergency Rising Stars meeting (the brother of the driver is a committed member of the club) and a candlelight vigil was planned. I wanted to honor him in some way, although I didn't know him very well it hit me hard because his brother is dear to my heart. I painted some containers to put candles in, and even though it didn't work out because of extremely strong winds, it was nice to do something. I went to the funeral, stared straight ahead and willed myself to be stoic as I watched his brothers walk by, his friends, neighbors, family, coworkers, and then his coffin. I came home and cried. I cried for the loss of Perry, for his family, for his brothers (both of which I know), and I cried because of some amazing people I have met here. I don't know how to put it into words, but there are some people that just touch you and they will never know how much. It all came out with my tears.

just a day in the life

Today I was out hanging my laundry and playing with the kids and Aymani was pretending to take pictures, imitating me (I take pictures of EVERYTHING). I occasionally let Quetta take a few photos and she snapped a great one of us. I also discovered that the mosquito net makes a fabulous clothing dryer!