The Store

My Host Mom's Store

Both of my host parents work, but neither of them have regular, full time jobs, so my host mom supplements their income by selling items from the house. This little “store” may look simple – it is nothing more than a bookcase full of little household items – but provides a crucial source of income. Many of our neighbors don’t have the cash on hand, the time, or the desire to take a boat into the city to buy large quantities of their daily goods. With the nearest store in town a five minute walk from our house, my host mom started going to the market and buying diapers, laundry detergent, juice mix and other items and selling them from the house to the neighbors for a small markup. In my own case, it’s just a heck of a lot easier to buy a small bag of detergent from the store on laundry day than buying a big bag in the city and lugging it back to town when my backpack is already full of things I can’t get here in town (olive oil, vegetables, etc). Not only does the math work out, but it helps me experience some of the minor nuances of life on an island, which is worth at least a few hundred pesos that I would otherwise save by buying in bulk in the city every few weeks. 

The Store

On many mornings my host parents might be working or helping a family member in our town or in the city running errands; if I’m home alone – often planning classes, reading, or washing laundry – I’m usually keeping an eye on the store and tending to the neighbors that drop by to make a purchase. [Note: There is no obligation on my part to do this. My host mom has told me that if I am busy, I can close the front door so as to not be bothered, a practice I do occasionally. Often it’s not much of an inconvenience for me to get up and sell a diaper or two, though, so I usually attend to anyone that drops by.] Here are a few observations I have made on the “store.”

Candy is King

When the front door opens in the morning, neighborhood kids don’t skip a beat in come in to buy “confite,” or candy. I fear that some of the neighborhood kids don’t get much of a breakfast every morning, so their parents give them a few coins to come and buy candy. If it is early in the morning, say 7 or 8 am, my host mom usually sends the child away without any candy, saying it’s too early for candy and they should come back later in the morning after they eat breakfast. The store sells two kinds: Bianchi, a chewy caramel with a soft chocolate center, and ChocoManí, a hard, chocolate flavored candy with little bits of peanut. While both of these candies have their own groups of fans, Bianchi is easily the big seller. Both of them sell for 50 pesos per piece, so whenever a child gets a 50 or 100 peso coin, he or she usually wastes no time in looking to exchange it for a piece or two of candy.

Candy isn’t always a single purchase, but often a supplementary purchase. If someone comes and buys a 300 peso bag of Clorox bleach, for example, it is not uncommon for them to pay with 400 pesos and ask for two candies instead of the change. This can also be the reward for children running errands for their parents, a la, “Go to the store and get me X; you can buy candy with the change.”

Other items that we sell a lot of are diapers (for different sizes), sugar (in two different sized bags), laundry detergent, and medicine.

Know Your Brand

Often customers come in and request an item not by what it is, but by a brand name. In the U.S., the brand name Kleenex is often used to refer to the general item of a tissue. Here at my site, several other brand names are used to indicate a certain item, even if they don’t actually match the specific brand name. A Gilette for example is a disposable razor blade used locally to cut hair. Balance is deodorant, although I have only ever seen Speed Stick brand deodorant in the store.

The heavy reliance of brand names can be quite confusing for me and a bit frustrating for customers when I am left in charge of the store. A young woman recently stopped by to buy a woman’s sanitary napkin and referred to the product using a brand name I was not familiar with and didn’t match the brand name of the actual item in our store. She expected that I would know exactly what she needed and started to lose her patience when I had to repeatedly ask her exactly what she was looking for. Sometimes it’s best for me to just have the person point at the item they need; this is particularly useful for little kids who come in and can’t correctly pronounce the words in Spanish of what they are looking for. (It took me a few tries to figure out that one little neighbor was looking for sugar, azúcar, but could only say atuta).

Bottom shelf: Four different sizes of diapers

Can I Get Some Credit?

It’s not uncommon for someone to come by and request an item on credit. Fiar is the verb meaning more or less “to give something on credit” and I hear the word several times each day. When someone asks for something on credit, we keep track of what the person owes on a small piece of paper; if the request happens when it is just me in the house, I make a point to tell my host mother about it so that nothing falls through the cracks. Sometimes the person requesting an item actually has the money at his or her disposal, but it’s just easier to run up a small tab over the course of a day or two and pay it off later in the week rather than having a transaction for each individual purchase. Other times the person doesn’t have the money and says they will pay us later. Over time I have learned of a few individuals in the neighborhood who aren’t always the most reliable in paying back what they owe, so I tell these people that I am more than happy to sell them what they need but can’t give them items on credit for the time being.

Second shelf: Hair gel, razors, candles, toothpaste and much more!

Mind Your Manners

A lack of formality here on the coast can sometimes translate into some rude little children. It’s not uncommon for a four or five year old child to walk into the house and say “Give me X.” Most of the time these children haven’t been taught manners as we would expect in the United States, so can come off as quite demanding even if that is not their intention. I use these instances to teach the tiny customers about how to use small, magical words like “please” and “thank you.” Some of them have started to pick up on these practices and now ask politely when they see that I am in the house. Others need a small reminder such as “I would be very glad to help you, but what else do you say when you ask someone for something?”

Some of the older neighborhood children are usually my students at school, so I greet them in English or reinforce these manners using the English words. A few of these students tend to be very shy and avoid any speaking in class, so this lets me encourage them in a less stressful environment.

Third and fourth shelves: Food supplies and household goods

From One Generation to the Next

The store, humble as it may be, has its origins down the street, about a block away from the school where my host mom’s parents live and have sold items for probably a decade or more. In the front of the house is a glass case from which Adela, my host mom’s mother, sells Variedades, a hodgepodge of items ranging from scholastic basics (notebooks, paper, pens) to gift bags (the popular local alternative to wrapping gifts) and sandals in children’s sizes. Other than the beginning of the school year, I imagine the variedades case accounts for a small amount of income from random purchases, say, when your local gringo needs computer paper to print handouts for an English class. The real money is made around the side of the house, where the family sells beer, soda, snacks, and other consumables in the afternoon and evening.

A more recent addition to the store in my house has been a steel bowl of oranges. Neighborhood kids come in and buy an orange for $100, $150, or $200 pesos, depending on the size of the fruit. Coins from the sale of oranges go into a new plastic container overseen by my eight year old host sister; my host mom has been using the oranges to teach her saving and spending habits.

Top of the bookcase: Maximizing space and keeping candy out of reach of the children

Plans

Over the past few months the store has experienced a surge in demand – both in terms of quantity requested of current items sold and for items not sold from the store. In addition to the oranges for my host sister, they have added tiny bags of vinegar, fresh breads, cookies, garlic, and other items. With shelf space nearly exhausted, my host mom has mentioned the possibility of some minor renovation to the house – building a small room off of the front patio – to create a proper store and be able to sell both more items as well as directly into the street rather than having everyone come into the house when they need anything. She has crunched some numbers on the cost of construction, but the number is higher than feasible for now.

There you go!

A Nice Little Garden

Starting a garden behind my house was a great idea: Fresh vegetables ready for the picking when I wanted them rather than having to plan to catch a boat into the city to buy them at the market or store. Chili peppers – with real spice, a difficult thing to find here – to kick things up a notch, including even my host mom’s afternoon soups. Basil by the handful for salads and omelets. The possibility of planting mint, flowers, and even a few local types of fruit. It was going to be amazing and I would eat like a king.

That is, before over three months without a single rain drop. 

All dried up...

And it was going to be such a lovely plant!

All that's left is this resilient sprig of oregano.

“¡¡La lú!! ¡¡La lú!!”

“Before the light came, life here was miserable.” – Carlos, a neighbor and good friend.

Electric power, fueled by a gas source, began illuminating the city across the bay from my community near the end of the 19^th century, replacing the alligator-oil torches that previously provided light during the hours between intervals of daylight. In the first half of the 20^th century the township where I live housed a government medical facility; this facility had a large generator and provided its government buildings as well as a few houses with electrical power. When the facility was closed down around 1950, the island – in the shadow of the lights across the bay – was again enveloped in darkness, broken only by the whirring of gas-powered generators owned by some of the houses and stores. In the dark, neighbors, friends, and family were recognized by a particular gait or an individual outline reflected by moonlight.

Some local and national planning and prodding finally resulted in putting in an underwater electric cable, lighting up the island in 1998 with raucous celebrations among the local populations. (In a community where festivities and parties are regular activities in a normal week, it must have been quite the event.)

1998! I find that figure mind boggling, even for a country like Colombia. Like many other Americans of my generation, I grew up watching tv regularly, listening to music on the local radio stations, and playing games on early generation Macintosh computers. My host “parents”, not too much older than me (hence the quotes), have spent more than half their lives living without electricity. Elderly neighbors, having lived the bulk of their lives in relative quiet, now suffer through late nights from speakers blaring the latest champeta or vallenato music out in the streets with no regard for others’ sleeping needs.

"Sopa de fideos" - Noodle soup, as a friend called it.

Although there is electricity here on the island, it is by no means as reliable or well-planned as it in the city. Power lines, supported by home-made wooden poles, are spliced to provide electricity to newer houses, over time resulting in a precarious jumble of wires – “noodle soup” in the words of one of my students.  It is not uncommon for power to go out for no apparent reason. And when it goes out, there’s no way to tell if it will be out for 20 minutes or several days. Seasonal winds during December and January, whipping up sand, might knock over a pole and cut power. During the hot, wet seasons of the year, rain downpours frequently cut out electricity, resulting in room temperature beverages with no ice and stagnant, sweat-drenched nights when the fan blades can’t spin. (On such nights my host family often takes the mattresses from their room and sleeps on the floor of the living room with all doors and windows open, grateful for any slight breeze that momentarily passes through and stirs the thick air in the room.) Other times, with nothing to indicate any potential issues with transmitting electricity, the power will simply go out or go so low that it can only weakly power the light above the front door and nothing else. Candles and flashlights provide basic illumination and smoldering egg cartons or coils of Katori repellant keep the mosquitoes away. Night classes are cancelled since teaching in the dark isn’t much of an option.

Power lines

They're growing!

 Frustrated with the irregularity of electricity and the discomfort that can come from a few days without refrigeration, the breeze of fans, cold beverages, and the warm hum of the television, some of the better-off households have bought gas-powered generators to use during the nights when the power goes out. With gas costing around US$5.75 per gallon ($10.000 Colombian pesos) and a gallon powering a small generator for 6-7 hours, sometimes you just don’t have the cash to fill the tank. 

C'mon baby! Let's power up the fridge and get the fans cranking!

Food gets taken out of the fridge and placed in a Styrofoam cooler with any ice you have available at the moment and then cooked using the gas-powered stove, for those who can afford the cost of the gas-tanks. Otherwise dinner is cooked in the backyard, set on rocks or bricks and heated with firewood, smoke wafting through town. Or, if it’s raining and you can’t cook in the backyard, that might be a meal you’re missing that day. Instead of the cold, fresh-blended fruit juice standard with dinner, you get hot, sugary juice from a packet or walk down the street looking for a kind neighbor or family member that has a generator going and will let you plug in your blender for a minute or two. Beer – if it’s a weekend and the power has been out for a few days – is cooled on blocks of ice shipped in from the city, covered in saw dust for insulation and packed in bags to make the trip.

The return of power is almost always a joyous occasion. The kids in my neighborhood seem to be the ones that always notice first, that a tv comes back on or a lightpost has a bulb glowing. (“¡¡La lú!! ¡¡La lú!!” / “The light! The light!” they yell.) Lights come back on, candles snuffed out, televisions turned on, food put back in the fridge. Through the return of the noise, you can almost perceive a collective sigh, a breath of relief that the power is back on, mixed with the anxiety of wondering when it will go out next, and counting your blessings that – at least tonight – you might have some ice-cold juice with your dinner.

Let me out!!!

I found this not-so-little guy climbing on the inside of my window screen, looking to break free:

Fortunately I was able to get him out with a little soft prodding with a broom. He seemed happy to be back outside and shot off like a dart into the dirt, crawling under a canoe.

Back to School!

This week marked the official start of the Colombian public school year. As a second year Peace Corps Volunteer, I feel pretty good. The chaos and confusion that seems to be part and parcel of the educational system here does not faze me as it did last year when I was new and trying to figure everything out.

In my opinion, this is one of the strengths of Peace Corps. Living and working in another culture – and, within a subculture of another culture, as I often feel is my case in an Afro-Colombian community – isn’t something that can easily be done in a month or two. Understanding the flow of time and rhythm of events in a foreign land can take years. Peace Corps service is for two years and there is a common refrain that (to paraphrase) “the first year is about figuring things out; the second year is about getting things done.” This certainly reflects my feelings about my service so far. Last year I was building relationships with my co-teachers, school faculty and community members; soaking things in; trying to see where I can make an impact; getting an idea which weeks are most conducive to work and which months are utterly unproductive for anything other than festivities. So this year – though I undoubtedly still have so much more to learn about my co-teachers, students, neighbors and culture – I feel good, have an idea what is within my control, where I can poke and prod to move things along, and know what is out of my control.

Welcome to paradise

The IT classroom

So it’s year two for me. There is no class schedule, which I knew not to expect. I’ll be lucky if I get that within the next two weeks and can actually start co-planning and co-teaching with my counterpart teachers. On the first day of class last year I walked door to door with all the primary school teachers, knocking on doors to remind parents that the school year had started. This year I know that most students won’t actually show up to school for another week or so. (I can hardly blame them; with no schedule, most of the time is spent in meetings for the teachers and the students are more or less corralled into a room for the bulk of the afternoon). 

Colombian public schools are divided into two main parts: Primary (primaria) and secondary (bachillerato). Primaria includes Transition (for the little ones like my 4 year old host brother) and First through Fifth grades. Bachillerato goes from 6^th to 11^th grade when students graduate (if they make it all the way through school, that is). The only dedicated English teachers in my school teach in bachillerato so that is where I focused my efforts last year. Primaria has no dedicated English teachers – instead all teachers are expected to include an hour or two of English in their lessons each week. With most primaria teachers having no background in English, this is a critical gap in the educational system, and an area where I will be applying considerable effort this year. 

Without a class schedule and with plenty of time and energy, one of my counterparts and I have been working to develop and English curriculum for the entire institution. Before being able to work with the primary school teachers and develop some English classes for them, I want to understand first and foremost what they need to teach to their students, so it is key that we formalize the curriculum. Not only will this help for Primary school, but also help to guide my two bachillerato counterparts in better planning classes and preventing overlap between subject matter; I noticed on several occasions last year that the 7^th grade would be learning one thing with one of my teachers and the 9^th grade would be learning the same exact thing with the other teacher. Having a strong English curriculum in place for the whole school is one of the things I want to have done before I finish my service in December, so I am pleased that we are making progress in this area.

Drying out some library books

Other plans for the year that I am working on with my counterparts are: School activities with a focus on English language or American culture, such as an upcoming session on Valentine’s day; an English Club which involves taking some of the best English students out of class for an hour every other week to do fun, educational activities to motivate their learning and be exposed to English outside of standard classroom activities; and an English Song Festival where students sing songs in English for the whole school and which was easily the most exciting school event of last year. This, of course, will be in addition to the regular co-planning and co-teaching in the high school, community English classes I have at night, and other projects I am trying to get underway. It looks like it might be a busy year for me, but it feels good to be back at school ready to try to get things done. Now we just need to wait for the students to show up. Oh, and a schedule. A schedule would be nice. One thing at a time though.