This is My Everyday Life

This is my first time in the big city in two months (since just before my birthday). I have lots to catch up on but in the meantime, here are a few awesome pictures of my everyday life in my village. Enjoy!

Cassava bread, drying in the sun. I love to design the top but I have not mastered flipping them yet!

This ADORABLE little guy was brought over to my house by my 4 year old neighbor girl. He was found in the jungle and taken as a pet (not to eat!). I got to hold him- SO cute!

Some of the more established women in my village have wheelbarrows to haul all the washing to the river, instead of carrying it all on their head.

Peanuts! My neighbor laid these out to dry.

Suriname has some gorgeous vegetation!

Several women in my village and I peeled pounds and pounds of a palm fruit called Amana. It was later pounded with a mortar and pestle then boiled to make cooking oil. It's a long, labor intensive process!

Hopefully more to come later!

Mi Fujali (My Birthday)!

I always thought that for my golden birthday I would have a huge party…then I joined the Peace Corps. And due to a recent trip to the city for multiple meetings, my birthday was passed in my little hut in the jungle. And it was awesome. At 6:30am I awoke to women singing very close by. I pushed Ryan out of bed and went to the front door in my pjs to discover about 8 women from my village standing in the pre-dawn on my doorstep serenading me. It was such a cool experience. My friend Ria (who’s birthday is 2 days before mine) told all these women that it was birthday so they came to sing to me. About five songs later (ending with Happy Birthday in Saramaccan and English), I hugged and thanked each of them before they moved on to my other friend’s house, Aropa, to sing to her. Aropa and I discovered a few months back that we are twins- born on the same day in the same year, just on different continents. She, of course, is two kids ahead of me in the game of life but that’s only to be expected here.

My friend Aropa and I wearing our matching koosus.

When I got up for the day (of course I went back to sleep at 6:30am) I walked into the front room to discover a “Happy Golden Birthday” sign with a little jewelry sized box. My adorable husband bought me a gorgeous pair of earrings in the city! I promptly put them on with my pajamas and pranced to the back of the house where he was doing dishes. After that, he made me French toast for breakfast. Best. Husband. Ever.

After my fun, American birthday morning, I changed gears and my Saramaccan birthday started. In Saramaaka, if you do anything for your birthday, you are responsible for doing all the work. So, Ryan and I started baking about 4 cakes at my friend Ria’s house, then we walked to the village next to ours in the heat of the day to buy cold liters of soda and ice. By the way, we do not have electricity right now, so we waited until right before the party in hopes that our now useless freezer would act as a cooler and the drinks would still be cold. It worked! After poor Ryan wheelbarrowed all the loot back (talk about a workout), we popped lots of popcorn and employed a couple ten-year-olds to make little goody bags of popcorn and candy for all the kids. Meanwhile Ria and I cut and bagged all the cake.

The many bags of cake we bagged!

Finally, at about 6:30 (I told people to come at 4:30), about 40 kids and 10 adults are sitting in the front of my house. The adults have all the kids sing for about half an hour (church songs, of course, this is a church village). Aropa and I get many handshakes with “congratulations”. When the kids are finished singing, about 10-15 more adults show up just in time for the cake, soda, popcorn, etc. By now we are all sitting in the pitch black with only our two little oil lanterns. Most of the kids’ parents aren’t here. None of the kids have flashlights. No one is worried. Quickly after the goods are dispersed, the people disperse.

The party at in front of our house.

We are exhausted!!! It was so much work to just have popcorn, cake and soda. I was hoping to have a proper Saramaccan birthday next year with dirty rice and a dish called Bami, but I don’t know if I have the energy!

All-in-all it was an awesome, cross-cultural birthday and I am so thankful for all of my blessings. Most of all, I am thankful for my amazing husband who was such a trooper all day helping with preparations (he kept saying, “I do not want to do anything for my birthday”). J

My friend Ria holds my hand as they sing me "Happy Birthday" in English and Saramaccan.

 P.S. - When we were in the city the week before my birthday, I had a fancy birthday dinner with a few of my  girls who happened to be in town.  My friend Petronela's birthday is January 27th, one day after mine, so we celebrated together.  It was such a fun girls' night out!

Birthday girls!

Me, Erica, Petronela, and Megan.

The Tracys in Suriname

My most favorite sister Summer and her husband Jesse flew back with Ryan and I from Tobago to Suriname to get a little taste of jungle life. First, we all experienced New Years in Paramaribo. People started setting off firecrackers days before New Years with the grand finale on New Years Eve day. There were people and firecrackers everywhere- it was insane.

 After New Years we headed to our village. Summer and Jesse were awesome! They learned how to greet our villagers in Saramaccan and enthusiastically jumped into the Saramaccan way of life (washing dishes and clothes in the river, using the latrine and pee pot, etc). Our village loved them and gave them Saramaccan names- Waitimai and Waitipai which means good-looking daughter-in-law and good-looking son-in-law. I am sure everyone will be asking about them for months to come.

Click HERE to look at more pictures of our many colorful adventures complete with captions explaining everything. Thanks Summer and Jesse for coming to visit us! It meant so much to Ryan and I to share our crazy life with you both.

Merry Caribbean Christmas!

Cecile (Ryan's mom), Edgar (Ryan's eldest brother), Anne (Edgar's wife), Todd (Ryan's other brother), Moka (Todd's wife), Summer (my sister), Jesse (Summer's husband), Ryan and I all flew to Tobago for Christmas and it was a blast!!!

It was SO WONDERFUL to spend time with family and just relax. The beaches in Tobago are gorgeous! It was so energizing to see an ocean again. Edgar's long time friend Dave lives in Tobago with his wife and two boys and they were awesome hosts. We feasted at their home for Christmas dinner. Click HERE to see more pictures of our island adventures.

Thanks everyone for making the long trek to the Caribbean so we could see you all!

Our Little Garden!

As I am sure you know by now, getting fresh fruits and vegetables in the interior is a struggle. Contrary to what you may think, we do not have a lot of fruit trees in our village and the villagers mostly only grow starchy root vegetables (because they grow really well). We always buy a good supply the day we leave the city, but with the humidity so high and no refrigeration, not much lasts for more than a couple days. Therefore, Ryan and I planted a garden before we left for Christmas, wondering if anything would grow while we were gone. We planted watermelon, cantaloupe, cucumber, koosbanti (similar to green beans), eggplant and pumpkin.

The good news is that everything except the eggplant sprouted! Here are a few shots of everything growing.

 Koosbanti is a vine vegetable so Ryan built A-frame trellises for them to climb

He also built a dual purpose frame that serves as both a trellis for the pumpkin and a privacy wall behind our house

Cucumber plants

Ryan also turned our waiting pile into a compost pile so hopefully we'll have good compost in a few months!

Since these pics were taken, everything is growing well except it appears something is slowly killing the pumpkin. :( There is a WIDE variety of insects that could befall our little plot, so we'll see what actually comes to fruition.

No Shave November

Sorry it has been awhile since I've posted. The busyness of the holidays and not-so-great internet have made blogging challenging but I am trying to catch up!

One of our PC friends named Mark had been asking Ryan to participate in "No Shave November" since October. THEN Ryan learned that his brother Edgar was growing a mustache to raise money for charity during November. I think that sealed the deal.

Mark and Ryan

Then Ryan had the genius idea to remove the beard in stages. I am personally a fan of clean-shaved boys but it was pretty hilarious...

 Chops, mustache, soul patch and goatee

Mustache, soul patch and goatee

 Handlebar mustache and soul patch

Just the handlebar mustache.

And finally that handsome, familiar face returns!!

Cute Kids (written 11/21/10)

We have some pretty darn cute kids in our village and I managed to catch a few on camera...

 Girls standing outside our window, probably staring at us eat dinner...

Yes, that is a bottle with some fake hair attached. No, the girls in my village are not making "babies" to play "house". They are making mannequins to practice hair braiding- an essential part of this culture.

 Check out this sweet car on a string!

Seriously the cutest picture ever, right?! Leuferny (our neighbor girl) turned four in September and started school. This is her brand new school outfit that she wears everyday.

 ...and her brand new Dora the Explorer backpack!

 Ok, so really maybe I should have titled this post "Cute pics of Leuferny". Last week her grandfather came over and told me that Leuferny was in big trouble because she was out playing all day and had not got her hair braided yet. Around 8pm she shows up in my window and asks me to braid her hair. It is a big deal to have tidy braids for school, so even though I had to pack and was exhausted, I agreed. The second I started brushing her hair out the girl falls deeply asleep, not making my job any easier!

This kid. He is not posing for the camera; this is literally how he was lounging in our house.

And not more than one minute later... he's out for the count. He snored on my floor for a good hour or two.

Samiro spent a good hour shooting his little bow and arrow at imaginery animals in front of our house the other day.

This little girl's name is Nunja. She's cute but she's a handful!