The rainy season (August to October-ish) is in full force. For me it’s not enjoyable, with thousands of flies in the house; everything damp, chilly, molding; not running much, staying in the house. Flies have an affinity for landing on one’s face, particularly the lips. Their cold, wet bodies scampering along every exposed centimeter of flesh never fails to disgust and annoy. Thankfully when the lights (candles) go out, they ascend to the ceiling and stay until morning.
My house like all others is a concrete box, whose benefits are price and ease/speed of construction. They’re cold in winter (it gets below 0º C, or 32 º F for you Americans and Brits ), leak, don’t hold paint well, take long to dry, and use imported cement and sand stolen from CV’s beaches and volcanoes. Doors and shutters (glass windows are a distinct luxury) are normally wooden, swelling in the rainy season making them difficult to open and close. In the dry season they shrink, making it easy for dust, vermin, bugs, and disreputable people to enter. With all that swelling and shrinking they don’t last long either.
Despite the negatives, the rainy season is essential. Whenever I get sick of the rains, I remind myself of the 100,000+ Cape Verdeans who starved to death during droughts during the World Wars. Consider that CV’s population today of around 500,000. The fantastically terrible colonial masters, the Portuguese, let this mass starvation happen. These famines are sometimes referred to as, “the times we ate dogs.” The international community saved Cape Verde from similar disaster several times after independence.
Every colonial power was dastardly, but Portugal ranks up there with the worst. At least the French and British left infrastructure and decent schools. Portugal left nothing but the misery it cultivated during its rule. There’s much underlying animosity for the Portuguese, who come to work and play. They’re described often as “atrevida,” or “cheeky, bold, insolent.” You see it in the way some visitors behave, how they treat the place and people, looking down on it. I’ve been told Americans are highly attuned to these things: we’re extremely politically correct. I have many Portuguese friends and haven’t experienced mistreatment, though a Cape Verdean acquaintance said of course, because America is better off than Portugal, but it’s different for CV and her people. They look up to America and down on CV, Angola, Guinea-Bissau, and Moçambique.
I’d like to visit Portugal. It’s also often called “atrasado,” or “late.” I admit taking pleasure in an international development book from the 70s describing it as part of the Third World. It’s a country with a proud, but ancient history. Younger Portuguese, born after colonialism, who seem well-educated, modern, and fun, must come to terms with this. The days of Portuguese dominance in exploration, naval power, and colonialism are long gone. The youth understand this, but perhaps don’t know how to move forward. Many seem sheepish or apologetic when taking about the past and present, and unconfident or worried about the future.
It never fails to surprise me of CV’s smallness. The last time I went to Praia, some other PCVs and I went to a discoteca, where we hung out with one of CV’s newest and biggest rap stars. He was a student of one of them at UniCV. It’s no wonder recently when there was a Celine Dion video on someone asked if I knew her and the people in the video. I identify my state, Michigan, as where “that white rapper, Eminem,” is from. “Do you know him? Akon? Chris Brown?” Otherwise Kriolu pronunciation leads people to believe I’m Mexican. This breeds more confusion when I tell how cold it is, how much snow we have. “I thought Mexico was hot?”
Anyway that’s about it. Thanks for reading. Stay dry!
19 September 2009
Chã sta sabi
Things are going well in Chã. I enjoyed helping with Pre-Service Training in Assomada, Santiago, but it was nice to get back to site. Our new group of trainees (soon to be PCVs) is incredibly well-educated, motivated, and excited to get started. I too learned from sitting in on sessions, and gained inspiration from them. I have high hopes for them, especially since the new PCVs in Small Enterprise Development have excellent placements, with strong organizations, in positions to use their expertise to help CV.
Every time I leave Santiago I appreciate it more, sometimes feeling pangs of regret for not staying. It’s so big compared to Fogo, with more diversity, a more African cultural vibe, hikes, beaches, a great group of PCVs, so many resources and advantages. Fogo’s got the volcano, but more or less that’s it.
Santiago is nice because you can live in an entirely rural and isolated village, but in an hour or two get to Praia, the “big” city. Living in such a small country as CV can make a city of 150,000 like Praia seem like a bustling metropolis, with every possible resource. Indeed it bustles, but doesn’t stretch far. That makes it nice, though. It’s manageable. When I was in Ghana it took an hour or two to get across smoky, dusty, crowded, 2 million people Accra. I loved every minute of it, though. When in Praia I can walk anywhere I need to go (during the day).
I’m working on several projects. I’m putting my business degree to work helping determine the cost to make grappa/bagaceira, a liquor from fermented and distilled grape skins. Later I may tackle liqueurs (pomegranate, peach, fig) and wines. Getting one relatively complete costing model will make the other products easier. It’s a strange PC experience, working at a winery. Nothing about this experience has been what I expected. But the winery has made an incredible impact on the community, with just about everyone benefitting from increased grape prices, winery jobs, and tourism.
The second project is improving the school, which I wrote about last time. Since I live in the community and my boss in São Filipe, I’m getting estimates, finding people to volunteer, raising awareness, and writing the proposal. He’ll use his contacts and communications to get financing. If all goes well we can get it done before school begins. We’ll focus on making the bathrooms function, shoring up the rainwater catchment tank, paint, and windows/doors, in that order.
Otherwise there are little things. I hope to get materials to give a training on waitressing/hospitality for a local restaurant. I need to get an English class going, hopefully with materials which require no curriculum development by me. When the park builds its jam factory I’ll surely have work, provided it happens in the next year.
Anyway, I’m starting to bore myself, so it must be 10x worse for you. Thanks for reading.
Every time I leave Santiago I appreciate it more, sometimes feeling pangs of regret for not staying. It’s so big compared to Fogo, with more diversity, a more African cultural vibe, hikes, beaches, a great group of PCVs, so many resources and advantages. Fogo’s got the volcano, but more or less that’s it.
Santiago is nice because you can live in an entirely rural and isolated village, but in an hour or two get to Praia, the “big” city. Living in such a small country as CV can make a city of 150,000 like Praia seem like a bustling metropolis, with every possible resource. Indeed it bustles, but doesn’t stretch far. That makes it nice, though. It’s manageable. When I was in Ghana it took an hour or two to get across smoky, dusty, crowded, 2 million people Accra. I loved every minute of it, though. When in Praia I can walk anywhere I need to go (during the day).
I’m working on several projects. I’m putting my business degree to work helping determine the cost to make grappa/bagaceira, a liquor from fermented and distilled grape skins. Later I may tackle liqueurs (pomegranate, peach, fig) and wines. Getting one relatively complete costing model will make the other products easier. It’s a strange PC experience, working at a winery. Nothing about this experience has been what I expected. But the winery has made an incredible impact on the community, with just about everyone benefitting from increased grape prices, winery jobs, and tourism.
The second project is improving the school, which I wrote about last time. Since I live in the community and my boss in São Filipe, I’m getting estimates, finding people to volunteer, raising awareness, and writing the proposal. He’ll use his contacts and communications to get financing. If all goes well we can get it done before school begins. We’ll focus on making the bathrooms function, shoring up the rainwater catchment tank, paint, and windows/doors, in that order.
Otherwise there are little things. I hope to get materials to give a training on waitressing/hospitality for a local restaurant. I need to get an English class going, hopefully with materials which require no curriculum development by me. When the park builds its jam factory I’ll surely have work, provided it happens in the next year.
Anyway, I’m starting to bore myself, so it must be 10x worse for you. Thanks for reading.
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