These past two days have flown by. We have homework every night ; it kind of reminds me of college. My language class remains hard but doable, as long as I continually study. We are starting to delve into what CYD (Community, youth development) work entails, and I really am digging it. We have a project starting this week where we and another classmate will find a counterpart, and develop a questionnaire to assess needs of youth within the community. I will be working with Shane since he is the closest PCV to my house (in the sticks). He also has a little sister that meets the age requirement and is able to speak a bit of English. We received the assignment today in class and have already written a questionnaire and interviewed Nikki and her friend. There are still some rough patches of the assessment but it is a good start.
Life here is so different. I feel like I repeat that every time that I write but it is so true. For instance, American’s adopt pets and love and care for them. The people here view dogs and cats (for the most part) as expendable. Hasha (yard) dogs are specifically used to herd cattle and protect the family. You do not really pet them because they are dirty and if you do they tend to nibble at you because they were never trained to show affection appropriately. Stray dogs, like Cheech and Chong (two dogs that seem to have adopted us at school) are usually seen as nuisances and people throw rocks at them to keep them at bay. A volunteer friend of mine came home from the river on Sunday to find two of her hasha puppies dead in the yard. There was no mourning from the mother, and as quickly as they died, they were gone the next day. Animals are kept for a purpose here, and not for love and companionship. For instance, cattle. Cows, sheep, goats, horses are all utilized for everyday life, and at some point, a herd animal will be killed for meat. There is a ritual that goes with taking an animal’s life as well. While I have yet to see a goat or sheep being slaughtered, I plan on taking part in the practice at some point.
Another difference is the trash that seems to be in various places. My home stay father is an environmental officer and while he feels that trash is a big problem, I don’t know how far that concern stretches around the Soum. He told me during a problem solving/assessment exercise that I had to administer this weekend that while there is a garbage dump within the community, people do not use it. They will throw bottles in the forest. I have seen this firsthand when I go on my hikes. In some places, broken shards of glass litter fields. I found it interesting that this concern seemed to be shared by one of the girls we interviewed today. Perhaps someone will be placed at this Soum and if enough concern is expressed something can be done.
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