The Second World

Though I am not the author of this, I thought some parts of it were well-related to some aspects of Guatemala- namely in the bigger cities, such as Xela, Antigua, and Guatemala City, but even better related to Hungary.

The Second World

The defining characteristic of a Second World country is the non-absorbent napkin. From Moscow to Valparaiso, if your café napkin is a square of waxed paper that takes grease from your lips and spreads it to the rest of your face, you can be certain of encountering the whole constellation of other traits common to those industrialized countries where people make less than $20,000 a year (specifically: clean but strong-tasting running water, the Ford Fiesta or its local equivalent, new trains on old tracks, pavement as on ongoing process rather than an accomplished fact, metal buckets on dirty ropes, dogs of uncertain provenance, merchants hosing down their section of sidewalk, manhole covers left open, sixty-eight satellite dishes on one roof, cheap plastic washing machines that fit in a bathtub, paper currency that rapidly gets filthy, a complete absence of vending machines, streets that don't drain, iron fences around suburban homes, good but watery beer, kiosks fulls of cheap plastic toys, sidewalks with little square lakes where tiles are missing, affordable cigarettes, escalators with wooden steps, the cinder block as the unit of construction, toilet attendants who sell grey toilet paper by the square and receive tips in a little plate, train stations and theatres with fifty glass doors but only one of them open, rectangular buses that belch black smoke, elevators with little inner doors that have to be closed by hand, the complete inability to ever make change).

Canadian Ballet

Living in Latin America, for what is now my twentieth month, has allowed me to grow quite a nice, thick layer of skin to ignore comments, and even at times unwelcomed gestures (a firm drive-by glut-groping was my initiation during the second week of training for, what I would later discover, would soon expand to other parts of my body).

It has frustrated and disgusted me the way men treat women- as mere objects that just happen to cook, clean, wash and bear and care for child after child (including the husbands themselves)- and God forbid they open their mouths and express some sort of formed opinion after putting up with ridiculous behavior or bad news bears! Oy vey.

Anywho... for quite some time now I have flirted with the thought of having the roles reversed- that is, what if it were the women who degraded men in both a verbally and physically derogatory manner?

And of all places, in Guatemala?

"Ha, impossible!" you laugh to yourself.

Oh, but I beg to differ.

This morning I left my site at 8:30am (with one hour notification!) to Antigua to attend the swear-in ceremony of the latest training group at Ambassador McFarland's house in Guatemala City (the brownies that are served after the ceremony are to die for which is the real reason I traveled seven hours in an uncomfortable bus).

After switching buses in Xela and getting as comfortable as a 5'10" woman can get in a school bus from 1983 (read: knees up to my chin), I popped in my earphones and start jamming to- what else? 80s classics.

Unfortunately that was under-toned by five rowdy 16-22 year-old girls, who were just plain obnoxious. I though I had escaped them after transferring buses, yet again, the Antigua-direct from Chimaltenango, but they had followed me up on the bus and sat directly in front of me, continuing with their wildly boisterous behavior, peeving off not only me, but the neighboring passengers as well.

And it was not until the ayudante, the dude who collects the fare, came around that my opinion on these girls changed. Completely.

After collecting the money from the back of the bus, where we were seated, he turns around to head back to the front of the bus and the ring leader, bleached blonde hair pulled back into a tight pony-tail, with layers upon layers of make-up caked onto what looked like her face and g-string hanging out of her pants, lifts up her hand and gives a good crackling slap onto his bum.

"Dale, papi, dale!" shouts her friend sitting next to me.

He slithered back up to the front of the bus, tail between his legs; horrified, humiliated, dumbstruck.

Uncomfortable.

The next time he came to the back to collect the fare of new people who came on the bus, he made sure to back up a few steps before turning around.

The humane part in me felt sorry for him- for a hot second.

I suppose it would be unfair in assuming that this guy should be categorized with the majority of men I have met in this country, but let's not kid ourselves either: he probably had it coming to him.

And it was so awesome to witness.

It's funny how people can dish it, but when it is handed right back at them- even in small portions- they run away like frightened 5-year-olds.

"Qué rico te ves!" - these girls kept at it like it was their job.

And it was when and where these girls got off that I quickly realized that it probably was their job- as Canadian ballet dancers. (For those of you who are unfamiliar with this term, please find the official definition here.)

Nevertheless, they made my day.

Dentistry For All

For the past 15 years, my town has had the privilege of hosting a group of mainly Canadian (with the odd American) dental mission, Dentistry For All (DFA), based out of Calgary, Alberta for two weeks, with an in-town clinic in the center of town, and a second satellite clinic that moves to a different village each day.

It started off 15 years ago with a single dentist, Dr. Dennis Bedard, who came to just pull teeth (which, according to all the dentists I have spoken to, is not nearly as hard as the saying would make one think), and it has turned into a five-week tour of Guatemala- the main focus being my town, where the dentists stay for two weeks, and the rest of the sites (in the departments of Sacatepéquez, Guatemala and El Petén) get one-week visits.

This, being my second year translating with the group, I can truly say that this organization is phenomenal. Hands down. No questions asked. I mean, dentistry put aside (no offense guys), they would still be #1 in my book for one sole reason: they are the reason why my ladies have had such a success with their kippahs- for a good number of the dentists are Jewish, and when they found out there was a kick-ass amazing artisan group in town, they asked my indigenous Mayan ladies if they would be up to the challenge of crocheting Judaica products- namely, kippahs?

And of course the answer was ax!, or yes in Mam. And truthfully speaking (or writing, I should say- errr, write), it has made me a bit verklempt, as the ladies are one of just two groups in Guatemala (that I know of) that produce and sell their kippahs online to an international market.

Not too shabby, if I do say so myself.

Anywho, back to the dentists... all in all, about 20 dentists, oral surgeons, assistants, hygienists, sterilizers and techies came to town for the two weeks- some of them returning for their umpteenth time, while it was a first-time visit for many of them. The procedures they offer range from simple, such as general cleanings, fillings and extractions, to more complicated- we're talking root canals and wisdom teeth extractions.

As I mentioned in last year's post about the dentists, they have imposed a Q5 (~ 0.63 USD) charge per procedure up to Q20 (even if more than four procedures are done), so that the service will be valued, since Q20 per person can be quite a bit of money for many of the families here in town. The money then goes back to he host organization, AMMID, the local NGO I work with, and it is used for additional projects.

The time, effort and work everyone has put in to make this work year after year, both in Canada and in Guatemala, is incredible. Peace Corps /Guatemala started a (silly) new policy that does not allow PCVs to translate for groups, and I quite honestly was pretty bummed that I was not going to be able to work with DFA this year, but thankfully because of timing, we were given an exception. (FYI- after quite a bit of uproar from the volunteer community, as well as a six-way Skype conference call between the Volunteer Advocacy Council and Peace Corps / Guatemala management, we came to the conclusion that this kind of work is actually pretty legit for all parties involved- however an official decision is yet to be announced).

If you would like to learn more about DFA, or if you are in Canada and would like to buy some awesomely beautiful artisan products that my ladies make, visit either link below (they only ship within Canada).

http://www.dentistryforall.org/

http://www.dentistryforall.secure2cart.com/products.html

Packing up after the last day. This photo does no justice to the amount of work, hauling, unpacking, organizing, repacking and more hauling of hockey bags full of dental equipment and medicines. You guys rock.