de patwa chat

Sorry it has been a little while since we've updated. This has been a crazy busy week packed with lessons plans, assignments, and presentations....buuuttttt, it's now Friday night, and we are currently enjoying our beautiful view on the veranda while sipping on our respective drinks (a bottle of Guinness and coconut rum with juice).

Anyway, we thought we might address a little more of Patwa, and culture in general.
First of all, we are extremely fortunate to have Joan Andrea Hutchinson as our Language and Cross Culture Coordinator. She is a national icon here in Jamaica, and she heads up teaching us Patwa and helps us to adjust to the many cultural differences between Jamaica and the US. Joan meets with us on a regular basis, and originally we had no idea that she was famous here in Jamaica. We've since realized her notoriety here, and feel lucky to be on a first name basis with her. We've mentioned her name in many differing circles throughout Jamaica, and without fail, people seem to know who she is. She is a champion for Jamaican culture, and is a well-known journalist, story-teller, actress, teacher, motivational speaker, producer, and writer. Here I am with one of her books:

Secondly, we wanted to make sure to get a disclaimer out of the way. Jamaican language and culture tends to be a little more brazen and upfront that what is generally experienced in the States. Please bare with us, as our American English will undoubtedly change over the next couple of years. I'm sure we'll misspell things from time to time, as Patwa and English are so alike, yet so different. We've already experienced "brain farts" when we've struggled to recall common English words, even though we speak English the majority of the time. It's like our brain is on overload and hits a glitch from processing so much differing language/accents/slang/etc. all the time.

Also, you might find us saying things, or making references to someone that wouldn't exactly be considered politically correct. There's really no such thing as political correctness here in Jamaica, unless it is to mock Americans. People are commonly called whitie, fatty, ugly, big nose, slow, big bumpa, and so on. If you can't sing, or dance, or cook, or...whatever, people will tell you. If you do something stupid, no one will hesitate to laugh at you, but largely because they expect you to laugh at yourself too.

Anyway, those politically correct lines are probably going to blur more and more in our minds as we become accustomed to the norms here. However, please let us know if we ever push it too far.

Aside from all that, let's go over a few common Jamaican language idiosyncrasies.
Probably one of the most noticeable differences is the lack of the 'h' sound. Everything is pronounced everyting; throw is trow; house is ouse; overhead is over-ead; and so on.
We started cracking up the other day when some of the 12-14 year old girls started singing us one of their favorite Michael Jackson song: "Triller" -dance moves and all.

The ironic thing is that Jamaicans do add the 'h' sound when we don't. Hour is pronounced hour (with the 'h' sound) and so is herb. Not only this, but they also tend to overcompensate for the apparent lack of 'hhhhhh' sound by adding it in places where it doesn't belong at all. 'Eggs becomes 'Heggs', or 'all of you' becomes 'hall of you'.

There are also some common phrases that mean the exact opposite than their literal translation:
~'jus roun de corna' could be anywhere from 200 yards to 2 miles, or even further
~'likkle more' essentially means 'see you later' as in whenever
~and the ever-so-popular 'soon come', which can directly be translated to 'eventually'.

out and about

#1: HAPPY BIRTHDAY JILL!! (She turns 21 today.)

#2: A big shout out to Cousin Jacquie and Meg Helmer (and family)! We received JQ's letter and Meg's PACKAGE! this past Tuesday. It made our day, possibly our week. Meg, in my opinion, salmon strips (not to mention chocolate) is probably the best thing you could send us. I had to really draw on some inner strength not to eat all of the salmon strips while Matt ran to the store to get some laundry detergent.

#3: Some new pics...A couple weekends ago a small group of us checked out the Bob Marley Museum, a national landmark for a national hero. We enjoyed our time there, especially considering we were able to get the resident rate -which is 1/4 the cost. Instead of paying $20(US)/person, we only paid about $5. How'd we do it? Matt spoke with the ticket lady, explaining the situation. Only half of us had our temporary PC ID on us. This ID literally consists of a homemade picture hand-stapled to a business card bearing the PC office address. It looks like something made in a little kid's clubhouse. But she bought it, or more likely didn't care, so we're all $15 richer, which is a heck of a lot these days. Plus, we really are (sort of) residents now.

Today we also went on a little trek to the Blue Mountains.
*I must say it's a real blessing to be married to Matt when it comes to travel (okay, and maybe for other reasons too). He's more or less become our personal little tour guide when we've been traveling with our small group of friends these last couple of weekends. He usually does most of the necessary research prior to departure (contacting the local PCVs to find out the local Jamaican fares compared to the 'tourist fares' that everyone will try to charge us, figuring out what trails are close, what's open, etc.), somehow fitting all those necessary essentials (sunscreen, water, rain-jackets, maps, etc.) in my little purse/bag, and he's even been known to whip out a little hand-drawn map on a scrap piece of paper to make sure we're heading in the right direction. He's got a great balance of being prepared, while at the same time being extremely flexible as things change or don't go as planned....now if we could just work out all those other "Matt" kinks. Just kidding :).

Anyway, Blue Mountains. We had an EXCELLENT day today. Blue Mountain coffee is widely considered to be one of the best in the world. And believe it or not, the only coffee that we've had thus far in Jamaica has all been instant. That's right. Instant coffee. You know, the kind that you just stir into your hot water? Yeah, tell me about it. You might be asking, "Why, if Jamaica has some of the world's best coffee, would everyone be drinking instant?" Excellent question, one that we are just beginning to understand ourselves. Firstly, Blue Mountain coffee costs on average $30 (US)/pound. Most Jamaicans can't, nor won't pay that. Bringing us to the second point, Jamaica's not exactly a coffee culture either. And thus, due to foreign demand, and more importantly foreigners' willingness to pay that much, Jamaicans are content to drink their Mountain Peak Instant Coffee.

Okay, so back to our day. Matt tracked down Dorothy Twyman, the owner of Old Tavern Coffee Estate. Dorothy and her late husband have been growing coffee on their 100 acre estate for many years. Their estate coffee is considered by some to be the best of the best of Blue Mountain coffee. Now, if Blue Mountain Coffee is considered to be some of the best in the world, and Old Tavern Coffee is considered to be the best of the best of Blue Mountain coffee, one could argue that we drank the best coffee in the world today. Plus, Dorothy herself let us sample and taste which coffee beans we wanted, and then subsequently brewed the freshly ground beans into a pot that she shared (along with conversation) with just the six of us. So what does that mean if the grower of the best coffee in the world prepares for you your own individual cup of coffee? It means we felt pretty special. Thus, we spent the first part of our day enjoying (the best) coffee (in the world) and biscuits in Dorothy's quaint little cottage in the high country of the Blue Mountains.

To top things off, within an hour of leaving Dorothy's, we ran into Joe Weber, a program planner for Catholic Relief Services. He is stationed in the Caribbean, and has spent significant time in St. Lucia, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, and Jamaica as of late. It looks like he'll be spending more time in Jamaica soon, and so it was great to meet him, as he is involved with much of the same kind of work in which PC is involved in. Largely due to this similarity, and the type of people that are drawn to international community development/social justice/etc. we found an instant connection in Joe. Not to mention, that Joe had a CAR. Woohoo! That's right! All 7 of us piled into Joe's RAV4 and we were able to get a ride all the way back to our home in Stony Hill without having to worry about getting robbed blind on the taxi fare, being hassled on the street by ductas (This is the bus driver's side-kick. The more people he gets on the bus, the more $ they both make. More on these interesting and eccentric people later...), endlessly waiting for our minibus to fill up, or constantly checking the time to make sure you're going to make it back before dark. Maybe in most developed countries transportation timetables are followed pretty strictly, but here... well, we're on Jamaican time. Those timetables are an estimate at best; arrivals and departures are completely dictated by any given number of unpredictable variables. One of our PC staff members, a full-blooded Jamaican, referenced this cultural difference, when in the States she was baffled arriving at 9:02, and the bus, scheduled to leave at 9:00, left without her.

practice makes perfect

Before anything else, we wanted to let you know that we changed our blog settings, so that anyone can comment on our blog –not just registered users. So feel free to say hi!

Matt and I have been assigned to a practicum site to work at for the rest of our time here in Stony Hill. For the most part, our training sessions tend to take place 8-5ish M-F, with the weekends being time to spend with our host families. Half of that training time tends to lend more towards an interactive classroom, while the other half of the time is actually working at our practicum site.
I have been working at a place called ‘Homestead’. Homestead is a gated girl’s facility which largely consists of girls who are on remand, meaning they are awaiting a court date. Some of the girls there are wards of the State, and have been removed –or have removed themselves- from their natural home. The girls range in age from 12-18 yrs old.
Matt has been working at a place called the SOS Village (Save Our Souls). SOS is a Swiss based organization with something like 100 other facilities functioning around the developing world. They function basically as orphanages. SOS attempts to recreate a family atmosphere by having the children live in houses with a house mother. These house mothers act just as any natural mother would. They register their kids for classes, cook dinner, do laundry, take them shopping, etc. Matt has been working with both the “Aunties”, as they are affectionately called, and the children. This particular village has about 120 children.

black and white

All of the PCTs, including ourselves, just spent the last couple of days shadowing currently serving PCVs. We traveled to their site to see them “live and in action”. Matt and I shadowed a PCV couple, Tony and Marie. Tony and Marie have been here for almost two years and will be completing their PC service in August. They are Youth Sector PCVs working on literacy in the parish of St. Thomas. FYI: Jamaica has parishes instead of states, although they are probably more like counties since Jamaica is roughly the size of Connecticut.



Marie and Tony are some of the most successful PCVs currently on island, and it was such a blessing to spend some quality time with them. Not only this, but it was wonderful to get out and about on our own, to see more intimately what we might be doing. Tony and Marie’s placement is in the Jamaican “bush”, and hence a unique experience for us, considering that we’ve spent all of our time thus far in Kingston, or the surrounding suburbs. Tony and Marie are Black Americans and so when they brought each of us to their respective schools (I went with Marie, and Matt with Tony), we might as well have been aliens. St. Thomas is one of the poorest parishes in Jamaica, and as a result not very many white tourists penetrate into these Bush towns. Even adults venture to their windows to peer out at the fair-skinned anomaly walking down the street. Many of the kids will constantly try to touch our skin and hair, sometimes even staring at their own hand after we have shook hands with them. Marie introduced me to a 2nd grade girl yesterday saying, “Hi Shoshana, this is my friend Julie.” Shoshana’s immediate response? One word: “White.” To which Marie said, “Good eye!” And I, “Wow, you know your colors!” The kids stared at us when we walked into each classroom, eyes bugging out of their heads while giving a slow and shocked wave. They see white people on TV all the time, but live and in the flesh, that’s something else. As Marie put it, ‘You’re definitely a novelty to them.’

White skin comes with many different stereotypes in Jamaica, probably the most prevalent being “money”. To kids, we come from the world of Hannah Montana, video game systems, and Toys R Us. These young ones are usually altruistic in their wonder. They simply know that we look different and come from a far away world, somewhat of a fantasy in their minds.

Of course this “rich” stereotype holds true with adults as well. I won’t get into the stir we sometimes cause walking through Kingston when vendors, taxi drivers, beggars, and unfortunately tiefs (pickpockets) flock to us. Along with this comes what people here refer to as a “skin tax” –when those same vendors, drivers, etc. jack up the price because of your skin tone. (This can even be the case with lighter-skinned Jamaicans, referred to as “brownins.”) Normally, Matt and I would be considered rich by Jamaican standards. But, just a reminder to all, we are in the PC. Which, as we constantly have to inform those hassling us means, “No money…. Me no tourist. Me a teacha. Ya a elp di pickney. Me live ya. Dis me yard too.” Which brings up another thing, Jamaicans seem to have the utmost respect for teachers. Once they know that you’re a teacher, here to help the children (“pickney”), everything changes. You’re now theirs to protect.

All this can be draining and frustrating at times, but understandable all the same…. Plus, it can make you feel somewhat special sometimes when walking down the street, kids stop their play time, stand up and wave exuberantly at you with big smiles, only to say “White people!!”

A Likkle Tory a Matt (A Little Story by Matt)

De udder deh me go inna di countryside. Wan pickney cum and sell me kuk-nat and mi drink deh wata. Lata me buck up pon a man. Him seh, “Maawnin, suh! Tell meh di chuch deh?” So mi seh… “Maawnin, suh! Mi sorry mi kyaa cum wid yuh cause mi oman a likkle mad today. She seh “See! Yuh clothes pan di verandah, tek dem up an lef!” Me kyaa believe it! But anyway, yuh lookin fi go deh swet weh or di blud wator di blud wat
a de chuch?” “Mi jus a ole man, an no wanna tek no fas weh dat saps mi blud, so giv a mi deh swet way please.” “Okay, okay”, mi seh, and mi giv im dem directions deh… “Fus, go dung dere, den tek yu fus lef, guh strait dung, keep pon yuh lef til yuh reach di main roat, tun lef an guh strait up, den it pon yuh rite… gully side.”

So de ole man wen pon is weh an mi pon mine, back ome. Long di way mi top a di maakit a buy a likkle food a nyam. Mi luk is all bad, fus di han-kyaat man im run all ova me toeheads, den de lady she try sell mi won deggeh-deggeh mango fo price mi know is too fat. Dem mango fi a stone dawg! Den, a knack knee, bruck-pocket, renk lady she cus me a tekin er purs. Mi say, “Mi! A respect man like misef? You be drinkin mad puss piss!?” Crazy lady! So mi lef di maakit wid nutten, and drag mi sorry bones ome to me lady, only to seh, “Mi sorry, mi sorry.”

new diggs

We are no longer living in our casa in Hellshire and have moved to our mansion in Stony Hill. Okay, so it's not really a mansion, but to a PCV it sure feels like it. We have an unbelievable view, and our room is on the fifth floor. Well, maybe it is a mansion.

This past Wednesday, G81 divided up into our sectors, Environment, Health, and Youth. The Environment and Health PCVs went to Ewarton, and all of us awesome Youth PCVs came to Stony Hill, and we will be living here until May 9.

The Hellshire community was very sad to see all of us go. Much of the community gathered to see us off as we loaded the vehicles. The streets were filled with waving neighbors, crying children, and mothers who were still offering their words of wisdom through the window even as the bus was driving off. "Be careful with this..." "Watch out for that..." "Please come back to visit..." Mama Rose made sure that we knew to call her if we had any problems with our next host family. At first she said that she would talk to them on the phone to straighten anything out, but as we got closer to our departure, this soon became, "I'll just come and get you." And then she would go on about the story she would tell the American Embassy when they came to get us, something about needing to make sure we were taken proper care of, it being her motherly duty. "These are my children. I need to watch out for my children."

Mama Rose took her "motherly duties" very seriously when it came to us, and our (host) siblings received a serious tongue-lashing if they ever put us in any danger. One night we came home 15 minutes after dark and she repeatedly asked Kaylor and Likkle P what they would do when Mama Rose was extradited to the United States for letting anything happen to us. She made sure I knew what color underwear to wear under which clothing (although I think she's overlooking our differing skin tones), and repeatedly tried to hold Matt's hand when we went to the market. Which was such a sight to see! Imagine Matt defending his maturity repeatedly to Mama Rose, "I'm a grown man Mama. I can walk by myself."

PCJ 102

In light of our previous post (explaining that how things are done in Jamaica are not necessarily how they are done in all other PC countries), we're going to start calling these little information sessions PC 102.

Anyway, a little more info on things PC:

-The Peace Corps was first asked to serve in Jamaica with the arrival of group 1 on June 12, 1962. JFK started PC in 1961, and thus Jamaica was one of the first countries to receive volunteers. Also, Jamaica has had volunteers consistently ever since. Some countries have had gaps in time when they didn't receive PCVs due to political conditions, safety, etc.
-Peace Corps Jamaica currently serves in three specific areas: youth development, health infrastructure, and environmental education. We are working in the youth sector, which itself is divided into 2 areas, life skills and literacy. We have found out that we will be working mostly with life skills.
-What you've been told to do "on paper" and what you actually end up doing are quite often 2 completely different things. In fact we have heard of very few PCVs (in whom we have spoken with personally) who's community work was in line with what they were originally sent to do. A PCV might be sent to a community to help with agricultural work, but finds that HIV education seems to be more crucial, and thus goes that route. Maybe a PCV was assigned to work with an eco-tourism association but because of gender issues was never taken seriously by her local counterparts, and thus ended up working with children to improve literacy. Most often PCVs are placed in a community and do their best to see where they best fit in with what is most needed in accordance to the resources available. And as said, this might not line up with the original plan. The unofficial mantra of the PC is "be flexible, be flexible, be flexible". This is very true. As a PCV, you're asked to constantly bend and move where the current might take you, and in many PC community the flowing stream changes its direction constantly, and with little warning.

Many have asked us about the standard of living in Jamaica. It is hard to say how much of the socioeconomic status continuum we've been exposed to thus far. To our understanding, not much. There is no doubt about the fact that many Jamaicans live in utter poverty and squalor, however there are also many Jamaicans that would be considered very wealthy, even by US standards. One thing we do know: the distribution of wealth between rich and poor in Jamaica is almost exactly the same as the US. Yes, the US is a much richer country overall, but how that money is distributed, the gap between the rich and the poor, is very close to that of Jamaica. Just a little food for thought.

getting trashed

It's been relatively busy the last several days... all-day tour of Kingston, Easter, football (soccer) games, etc.

Here's a few pictures that summarize some of the happenings of the last 5 days:


On a completely different note, we'll be leaving Hellshire, and thus our current host family, this coming Wednesday. Matt and I will be placed with a new host family in Stony Hill to begin our Hub-Based Training. This training will consist of more in-depth work in our specific jobs, such as job-shadowing, and site identification.

This morning us fellow PCTs got together to clean up some of the trash that is strewn all over, on the beaches, alongside the roads, on sidewalks, and so on. We wanted to do it as somewhat of a thank you to the community that we have been staying in. Granted our time this morning was much like rearranging chairs on the Titanic, as we all know that the trash we picked up today will be replaced by new trash soon enough. Nonetheless, we felt the gesture of gratitude to the Hellshire community was most important. In about 1 1/2 hours we covered about 1/2 mile, filling 40 large garbage bags.

After only being in country for 2 1/2 weeks, we could not say why trash is thrown about. Although it wouls be easy to blame the Jamaicans for such a poor habit, I am sure that much of this has to do with lack of infrastructure (i.e. trash removal services) as much as anything else. If you couldn't count on someone to come and pick up your trash on a regular basis, than what would you do with it?

To make things even more interesting, throughout the 90 minutes we were picking up the garbage, the shopkeeper was just opening her shop. She spent the entire time sweeping the sidewalk, dirt, gutters, and even the lawn while we were out there. Don't be fooled, she was not trying to outdo us. I'm sure that this is a part of her regular routine. Which makes me believe that the trash issue has nothing to do with cleanliness, self-discipline, or lack of detail in the Jamaican culture. Ohhh contraire. I recently heard a Jamaican PCV describe Jamaicans as the cleanliest, best-dressed poor people in the world. He's right. Our mom scrubs the floors daily. She cleans clothes until they sparkle and bathes twice a day. We've already told you about the pressing. And today, she informed us that we need to wash our shoes (she was referring to Matt's tennis shoes). In many ways it seems the trash issue would be an easy transition if the right means were in place...but who are we to say? We've only been here 2 1/2 weeks.