Day 6 – September 3, 2016
Last night, I had a long phone call home. As I thought of the people I love and the moments and memories that would be sacrificed with them during my time here, I felt the weight of the Peace Corps commitment manifest itself in tears for the first time since my Alabama good-byes. Realistically, I know that graduating from college and choosing any path would bring about these same feelings, but, to me at least, these feelings seem amplified when you’re an ocean away.
Despite a more emotional night, this morning, I woke up ready to meet my host family. I know engaging in community will be the remedy for this heartache so I planned to channel my efforts into this outlet.
We boarded the bus pretty early in the morning, and my fellow trainee and I were cramming all of the Portuguese that would fit into our brains. Honestly, my friend and I were studying like we were in the hallway outside of the classroom 10 minutes before the exam and a different classmate informed us that the test was on both chapter 6 and 7 though we had only prepared for chapter 6. However, it was a bit difficult to concentrate when we had another trainee informing us of certain scallion techniques J. Overall, I think the bus ride was a fun bonding moment.
We arrived in the village and were greeted by a harmonious song from the overlaid voices of our host families. (Sorry that I didn’t have my recorder out Viny and Venu.) I really wished that I could understand the words, but I accepted that the unknowing probably allowed me to appreciate the feeling behind the song a bit more. At the end of the song, they unrolled a piece of paper in their hands with the name of their trainee on it. I found an 18 year old boy holding my name. He introduced himself as Helder (but all of our family called him Mandito) and he was my host brother.
He walked me back to our house where I met the rest of my family: My mom, dad, 2 sisters, niece and 2 cousins. We chatted on the veranda in the best Portuguese I could speak for a little while before lunch. I’m not going to lie it was a pretty awkward first encounter. I was forced to pantomime some things that I thought I would be able to put into words. I felt embarrassed by my lack of ability to communicate, but, I sincerely hoped that my host family would understand that I was just a bit nervous and confused. I hope they saw that I wanted to get to know them more and ask many more questions; I was just unsteady with this new language. Most importantly, I hoped they understood how grateful I was that they were being so generous, hospitable, and inclusive of me even though I couldn’t effectively express myself. By the end of three months, hopefully, I’ll be able to translate my initial feelings from today and read them to them so they understand how happy I am to be a member of their (our) new family.
P.S. I took my first bucket shower today. It was an experience. I hope I get more efficient at it.
MOZ likely to sunburn 