Rigo

In my community, my best friend is named Ana and she is great. She is this tiny 24 year old who has lots of spunk, likes to joke around, is very curious about the world, is an extremely hard worker, got a little bit of an attitude and well is awesome. Ana works her butt of and is a superviser in a tuna canning plant. She lives with her sister Claudia, 27 who is also wonderful. She's a bit more shy at first and more independent and a bit more rebellious i think. She has a 20 month year old baby, Gabriel who is one of the few babies I like. He's a pretty cool little guy. Also, Ana's mom and aunt live in her house.

Pretty much every night I go to their house to hang out. We talk, play with Gabriel, do errands, do some chores and then around 8 watch the telenovela "triunfo de amor"...i didn't really like telenovelas but i have to say im kinda into this one. Anyways, at night Ana's brothers usually come over too, Riego and Carlos. Carlos is more quiet and has 2 kids who are cute and we have like basic interactions. Riego on the other hand loves to talk and at first I literally didn't understand a word he would say to me. He spoke spanish with most caliche words. Ana would be like Riego stop laura don't understand and she would have to translate for me haha. He liked to tell me stories about his life (his teacher he loved, his believes on life) and lots about construction. He is a brick layer, carpenter and like did tileing. Very knowledgable and skilled in his craft especially for his age, 33. He was very friendly, funny and willing to talk and learn.

So about 2 weeks ago when I went over there Rigo was just laying in the hammack and not looking so good. His face was puffy and his skin had a yellowish tint. He went to the doctors and they told him he had anemia. Every night for about a week he just laid in the hammack not really talking much and not eating dinner either. Claudia took him to various doctors and they told him he had fluid in his lungs and problems with his kidneys. One doctor said he needed diaylsis, another natural doctor said herb medicine. He was sick, but with the medicine, his youth and his strength i just figured he'd be better in a month.

Monday after the bus charlas and soccer pratice I was walking home and Ana's aunt told me to go to Rigo's house because he wasn't doing well. I ran home changed and then went to Ana's house because I didn't know where Rigo lived. When I walked into Ana's house, a group of older women were praying and Rigo's body was lying on a cot. Rigo, the hard working, friendly, outgoing, warm, funny, young guy I knew had died.

Since monday, I have been with Ana and her family helping them cook, hand out food, go shopping and basically anything they need. Here after someone dies that night they pray, give bread and coffee to everyone and stay up the whole night. After 24 hours they bury the body. However, since Rigo died at like 5:30pm they had 2 nights of praying, food, and visitors. Ana and her family have been so strong especially since they have already lost their father and 2 sisters, all in the past 10 years or less.

I'm shocked how quickly Rigo died and how young he was. Also, that someone so young had could have such complications from their kidneys without any previous symptoms. Death is so close to life here. Also, I know I'm not the best at communicating from here sometimes but everyone at home especially my family (Dad and Beth especially you are wonderful) and friends I miss you and you all mean very much to me!

To Rigo, thank you for teaching me caliche, about yayantique, your trade and being so welcoming and friendly to me. You will be missed and very much remembered.

Buses y basura

A martian, Jesus/Campesino/Rat, Plastic Bag, Banana Peel and a Coke Can all were waiting on the side of the road to take a bus to well anywhere. Brenden, Megan, Nicole, Keri and I decided to do some bus charlas about trash and throwing trash out the bus window on Monday!

We took various buses going to Santa Rosa- Joroco- San Miguel route. Brenden and Megan would hop on the front of the bus. Brenden, the martian, didn't know what to do with his chip bag and so he decided to throw it out the bus window (common practice here) when all of a sudden a campesino ref comes up to tell him that he shouldn't litter or burn his trash. Then pops up Nicole, a "sexy" bolsa aka super selectos bag to talk about how plastics need to go in a trash can. Megan sneaks up on the bag as a rat and talks about if ya throw trash wherever rats, mosquitos, cockroaches and other lovely creatures will come with their diseases. After this encounter, the martian thinks he's got it all figured out and that all trash goes in the trash can. But it doesn't! So I, the coke can tell him about recycling cans, glass, plastic bottles and how ya can earn some $ for it too! So now we got waste and recycling...until the martian eats a bananna. This bananna happens to be Keri, the bananna peel's "rica" little sister. She explains about organic vs. inorganic trash. At the end, the martian gets what to do with trash BUT he wants to know THE TRUTH of the universe. Luckily, Jesus Cristo (aka Megan, the campesino and rat) is on the bus and says how God created the earth and humans and he didn't create it for humans to just trash it. At then end, Jesus asks for a donation of trash! And that was our trash skit!

The reactions to us were: indifference, picture taking, applauses, people trying to help us throw trash out the window, others telling us that americans don't litter, a grandma that thought we were just precious, a cobrador who thought we were pretty great and yeah!
It was hilarious and I'm going to try to put a video up of it.

Oh yeah, you are probably thinking why did we do this on the bus and why were we not kicked off. Well, I'm glad we didn't get kicked off or charged for bus fair. But here like people sell everything on the bus from God to toothbrushes. So people screaming on the bus is pretty common. We decided to take advantage of this and talk about the environment!