9/8/14
Things have been complicated, lately.
In order to prepare for the arrival of a new group of
volunteers, PC put out the call for applications for people to be “Resource
Volunteers.” These people will teach
different sections of the Pre-Service Training curriculum to the PCTs. I did not want to do this, as it would mean
at least two extra weeks away from site and I wasn’t particularly interested in
many of the subjects. In addition, the
person in charge that I had talked with about my GAD (Gender and Development)
committee assured me that GAD would be instrumental in the Gender trainings of
PST, thus, I would get to teach something that I liked, get to meet the new
group, but without having to do through the rigomroll of being a Resource
Volunteer. Or so I though.
Several weeks ago, I called the PC staff member in charge of
training to discuss the GAD committee’s place in PST. He claimed to know nothing about it and said
that the only way that I could teach during PST was as a Resource
Volunteer. I felt completely
betrayed. After all the trouble that PC
had put me through with GAD-little money, no recognition for weeks (because
some staff members had some “reservations” about some of our members-such
obvious favoritism among the staff that it makes me sick), NOW we don’t even
get to perform one of our main functions?
So, with no other option, I, at the last minute, applied to be a
Resource Volunteer. I thought that,
since I was obviously the most qualified candidate to teach PCTs about Gender
and Development (it was the subject of my Master’s Thesis, after all…), I would
at least get to discuss gender as a Resource Volunteer.
But, ohhhhh, how I underestimated the ridiculous,
embarrassing unprofessionalism and favoritism of PC Nepal. Because I’m on some sort of shit list (bad
attitude, the wrong friends), I was denied even this position. Five of us (all
extremely well qualified), three of whom are well known members of the “shit
list squad” were denied places, out of 24 applicants-could it be more
obvious?! PC tried to say that they
picked the most qualified candidates, that it was all about availability, blah
blah blah-but we know the real reason, and any lingering trust in the
professionalism and justness of the PC Nepal staff is gone. As if it’s not hard enough here, so many of
us feel completely on our own, knowing that PC staff can’t be trusted to
support us, help us or even believe us.
The week after the Resource Volunteer bombshell dropped was
rough. I felt betrayed, angry,
frustrated and finally resigned. I will
do what I came to Nepal to do, I will support my friends, and I will make the
GAD committee as great as I possibly can, but I won’t play any more of PC
Nepal’s games. I won’t.
To make matters worse, I was planning on going on a mini
in-country vacation to Pokhara, at the end of that terrible week. This, of course, was too good to be
true. PC decided to re-schedule an
emergency evacuation drill, meaning that I got to sit at site and brood and
sweat for another week. Last Friday we
finally had the drill. Every volunteer
in Dang had to make our way to our warden’s house. Three of us got there within two hours of the
call. Our fourth within three
hours. The last member, fuming and
spewing negativity, as always, reached our warden’s house after nearly 5 hours,
a package from the post office in tow.
Ridiculous. We spent the rest of
the afternoon going through our emergency supplies, discussing evacuation
procedures, etc. That evening we drank
and laughed in our hotel room. A PC staff member of course, yelled us at the
next day. This is getting really
old. First of all, Nepali hotels are
always empty, we knew that we weren’t disturbing anyone. Second, any PC staff member that gets mad at
volunteers for blowing off steam clearly hasn’t spent a single day at a real
site; clearly doesn’t know what it’s like to be cooped up, to feel like you’re
going mad.
Saturday began my vacation, finally. Day one: Tulsipur to Butwal in the PC
vehicle, a nice break from the horrible Nepali buses, and a luxurious,
expensive night in one of the nicest hotels in Nepal-hot shower, room service,
HBO. Day two: Butwal to Pokhara-economics podcasts the whole way. Evening of Day two to Day Five: lots of good
“American” food, Internet at an expensive café, flirting with Spanish soldiers,
catching up with friends, sleeping late.
It was a nice trip, although tainted rather melancholy by the emotional
difficulties of one of the friends that I was visiting.
Day five saw me on a bus towards the south, towards
“home.” In the second hour on the bus,
through some bizarre accident, the seat in front of me cut a huge chunk out of
the top of my right pinky toe. It was
horrible-searing pain, blood everywhere, trying not to think about how dirty
everything on these buses are. To make
matters worse, the only thing that the asshole that had moved the seat and cut
me could say was “why was your foot there?” (as if there is so much leg room
that my foot could be anywhere else?!) and, only one single person on the bus
tried to help me. I McGuivered myself a
bandage with a napkin from my purse and a piece of yarn and sat, furiously
trembling, for the next 5 ½ hours on the bus.
The next day, I just
barely made it to Tulsipur in time for the bus to my site, when I discovered
that it hadn’t come in from the village, at all, because the road was
flooded-just me luck! Thankfully, a very
kind man from the village next to mine was arranging a taxi all the way to the
village, and got me a seat in the front of it (meaning that there were only
three of us on the bench seat, not 5, like in the back). No matter how wonderful the vacation, the
trip back to site is so agonizing, that I’m always very relieved to see my tan
house with the water buffalo out front, to hear Danny whining to get to
me.
Yesterday, I went to Ben’s site in Shreeghaun and we did a
trial run of my proposed hand-washing trainings. He taught two classes about the Why, When and
How’s of hand washing and I taught them how to build a hand-washing station,
like the one that we built in Pipal Danda.
Ben’s part went well, although there was very little participation, but
mine went embarrassingly badly. First,
it was close to impossible to teach and facilitate the building with nearly 100
kids gathered round-so many children made me panicky. Secondly, I had forgotten a last minute, very
necessary modification that we’d made to the design, in Pipal Danda. So, the first attempt at construction was a failure. I had to call my fellow Pipal Dandian to
remind me what we had changed. At that
point, I just finished building it myself, and it turned out well, I think (or
as well as can be expected from someone who has no construction skills. I can barley even build a pillow fort!). The kids very enthusiastically tried it
out. I hope that it holds up and that it
increases the number of kids washing their hands with soap-any reduction in the
amount of diarrheal diseases in Nepal would be an improvement.
Today is a rainy, lazy day.
Tomorrow is a holiday, so I’ll probably be lazy then, too. I have four days this week to make some
headway on my hand-washing project for my area.
On Friday I have to leave again for Kathmandu. I managed to finagle to have our first
official GAD meeting in Kathmandu, at the same time the other “permanent”
committees are meeting. I’ll be there
from Saturday night to Tuesday morning.
My return will mark a period of prolonged site dwelling and, hopefully,
lots of work progress. The next break in
site is Thanksgiving.
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