Why Peace Corps Won’t Let Volunteers Have Babies While Serving (written 11/7/10)

This is my friend Isa:

She is adorable. She is 29 years old and barely taller than 5 foot. I stumbled upon her house on a random walk through the village to meet people when we first moved here. She has three beautiful daughters and lives next to her mother-in-law. I liked them both right away. They live in a quiet, shady area on the edge of the village that makes a peaceful get-a-way but still makes me feel like I am putting in the time and effort to integrate. Isa keeps a clean, cute little Saramaccan house (the same style as mine). She also seems to enjoy her children which I do not see in every household.

Something else that stood out about Isa was that she was about 6 ½ months pregnant when I first met here. She is very thin and so was all belly. Last week I was sewing at her house and she told me that her due date was that very day but the baby had not come. Ever since then I have checked on her every couple of days and asked other people if she was still pregnant. A few months ago she went to see a doctor in Paramaribo and they were debating whether she should stay in the city to have the baby or go back to our village and give birth at the poli clinic with a nurse. They sent her back. I was glad I got to hang out with her the past couple of months but I was nervous. I know nurses and mid-wives have brought children into this world by the hundreds but what if something went wrong?

So, yesterday I am making lunch for Ryan and I when our neighbor comes over and tells me that Isa is at the policlinic but something is wrong and they are going to air-vac her to the city. We just discovered last week that if there is an emergency out here that the patient is taken on a boat up the river 1 hour to another village where they have a landing strip so a plane can meet him/her and fly to Paramaribo (who pays for this?!). I rushed over to the poli to see her before she left. At least…that was my intention. Somehow about an hour later, I ended up in the boat with Isa, her mother-in-law and the policlinic nurse heading upriver. The father was down river working.

As we are in the boat fighting the rapids up river and I stare at my friend’s back wondering how bad her labor pains are, I think about pregnant women in the U.S. – about the preferential treatment they are given during pregnancy and the comfortable, clean hospitals they have for delivery. The contrast is dumbfounding.

When we finally arrived, the visiting doctor from Cuba (the same one who looked at my ear months ago) examined her. They decided she would have the baby there and not go to the city so they induced her. The room she was in was so hot (obviously no air conditioning). No one offered her ice chips or anything. I sat in there with her awhile having no idea what was culturally appropriate to say and not say.

After a couple of hours the nurse from my poli said we were heading back, so I left Isa with her mother-in-law. The best part? As I was leaving she told me she would see me back in our village tomorrow. Tomorrow?!

This morning I stopped by the poli before church and asked the nurse for news. She told me that Isa had the baby at 9pm last night. A little boy, as predicted. Around 1pm today Isa’s 3 daughters came running up to our house to tell us that Isa and the baby had arrived. Yep, back down the rapids- a woman who just gave birth and her 1 day old child. Completely normal.

Here is the cutie patootie- Julius Darwin. I think Julius is a family name and Darwin is after the Cuban doctor who delivered him.

Here are the proud big sisters.

Coming Home (written 10/17/10)

Today Ryan and I came back to our village for the first time in about a month. Yes, I know we live in a hut in the jungle and I dislike using a pee pot and HATE all the dirt everywhere but I enjoy making and having a home. I have tried to make our little hut into a comforting, relaxing and organized environment. It was just good to come back to OUR space where we have OUR things that make us comfortable and OUR food to cook as we wish.

That said, let's talk about yet another difference between my life in the states and my life in the jungle. If I had left my apartment in the states for a month and then returned, perhaps I would have been annoyed that I left some things on the nice carpeted floor or I forgot to clean out the huge refrigerator and needed to throw some things away. Maybe the TV stand and side table would have been a little dusty.

Upon returning to our hut, we were actually happy that things were not as bad as we thought. Ryan only killed one tarantula that was living in the outhouse along with some wasps while I and one of my friends swept off every counter and the floors numerous times. Dirt and other wonderful jungle residue was EVERYWHERE. Ryan opens our little freezer thinking some things may be bad and finds everything covered in mold. My friend then tells me that our village ran out of oil to run the generator (at night) almost the entire time we were gone. “Yeah!” for missing not having power. “Boo!” for not being here to open the freezer while it defrosted from no electricity. On top of that, a really pretty tree that bloomed yellow flowers next to our house had fallen over right next to our door. After all that, a quick sweep of the wash house and the latrine and things are looking much better. Our “yard” is a mess, though. Tomorrow I will be raking up all the fallen leaves to make our dirt clean and “pretty” because that is what a good Saramaccan woman does. I also plan to get up on the early side and head to the river to wash dishes and some clothes.

On a different note, we are in the middle of the big dry season here in Suriname and that is much more evident in the interior than it was in the city. The bus ride out here was one big dust bowl with the foliage on both sides of the dirt road covered in a thick red-brown layer. We did not think it was possible but it is substantially hotter now than when we were here a month ago and no more air conditioning like we enjoyed in the city. The plants and trees are drying out so all the Saramaccans are able to clear and burn the brush for the year so they can plant when the rainy season starts again so the village just looks more bare. I already told one of my Saramaccan friends how Ryan and I learned a different way to farm without burning the land and we would be trying it out. We'll see how it goes.