Weeks 54 – 57: Monday, September 2, 2024 – Sunday, September 29, 2024

Hey everyone,

Apologies for taking such a long hiatus from writing this month. 

I was going to write a couple of weeks ago—in fact I had pretty much written the whole piece—but things got a little hectic, and I never got the chance to revise and send you all what I had meant to send. 

September has been quite an interesting month. 

I started this month off by taking a trip to Querétaro where I gave a presentation with the Peer Support Network (PSN) at the new volunteer cohort's pre-service training (PST). We introduced ourselves and the PSN, ran a few activities to break the ice with the new cohort, and ended the session by giving the trainees a chance to reflect on their fears, hopes, and goals for their service. Everyone I met in the group seems super kind and down to earth. I also got to know the new trainees who will be coming to the Sierra Gorda in a few months after they finish PST, and I’m very much looking forward to having more peers geographically close to me (at least relatively). It was great getting to meet the volunteers so early on in the process of their service. We as the PSN got the chance to know who the new volunteers are and, in turn, the new volunteers were given the chance to meet a group of volunteers who have now been in country for one or two years and whom they can reach out to.

I enjoyed being in Querétaro with my friends and as always I enjoyed having a few days in the city to eat yummy food and have access to the amenities and activities the city provides. I even got a massage, which was very relaxing and helpful for de-stressing. I’m trying to find ways to keep myself as relaxed as possible and just go with the flow, no matter how things end up.

After spending a few days in the city, I went back to Neblinas and started laying the groundwork for my cistern project. With the committee I formed a few weeks before, we made decisions about how we wanted to organize the project, how we would involve the community, and who would be in charge of actually building the cisterns. We decided that we would hold a community-wide meeting to inform people of the project and our plan and then we would go house-to-house in the community collecting a contribution from each family to be able to pay an assistant to work with the main construction worker. 

For a little bit of context, Peace Corps grant projects are funded 75% by either USAID or the WWF (mine happens to be funded by USAID). The other 25% is required to be funded by the community. Now, the community doesn't have to contribute with money. They can contribute with supplies, with labor, by bringing food to the workers, etc. 

In Neblinas, however, the committee made the decision that we would more easily reach our contribution quota if we asked people to give us money for the project. In my original plan, I had thought about asking different community members to volunteer their time to help build the cisterns, but I took a cue from my committee and we decided that it would be better to ask people to give a little bit of money to pay for one person to help build the cisterns. The thinking is that perhaps the project will be completed more quickly and efficiently if individuals are paid for—instead of volunteering—their time. 

To my pleasant surprise, as I've walked through the community with my committee members, people have actually been willing to give us money, and we are on our way to collecting the amount that we have set out to collect. The rest of the community contribution will likely be fulfilled by the school purchasing various supplies for classroom activities and perhaps for starting a school garden as well as by the parents of the students bringing food to the workers and even by having the students work a few hours a week on the cisterns to speed up the construction process. 

Going around the community has also given me the opportunity to get to know more people and see the houses that people live in. While Neblinas seems like a very small town (and by all means it is) there are a surprising number of houses in the community. And certainly a significant number of houses that I have yet to visit and people that I have yet to interact with—even after living here for almost an entire year. 

Generally, I'm feeling good about how things are moving forward with my grant project. I started teaching climate science classes to the high schoolers a few weeks ago, which has been fun and engaging, and the hope is that we will start building the cisterns by mid-October, pending approval by the municipal government and the school district.

So that's my update on how work things are going.

On the personal side, a couple of weeks ago, I took a trip to Tilaco and Jalpan with Margarita to visit her daughter Diana and her family and to celebrate the baptism of a granddaughter of one of Margarita's sisters. 

Everything was going great that weekend. I spent time with the family in Tilaco on Friday night and Saturday. On Sunday we made our way into Jalpan to go to the mass at the beautiful mission Jalpan and celebrate the baptism. Afterwards, there was a lunch for the family to celebrate and things were going well, but after eating, Margarita started to feel unwell. I'll spare you the details, but long story short, Margarita was taken to the hospital and was kept there for a long while to ensure that she was stable enough to be released. 

When she was finally released around midnight, it was clear that she was going to need further care. So we took Margarita to her sister's home in Jalpan. Her daughter Diana stayed with her to keep an eye on her and to make sure that they could more easily travel to Querétaro the next morning to receive further medical care. After Margarita was settled, Moises, Citlali, Valentina, and I drove back to Tilaco to get some rest. We arrived around 3am and I don't think we woke up the next day until at least 10am. 

From what I've heard, Margarita is stable and doing well now. She had a bout of high blood pressure that caused some other complications, but in most respects she is well. She has not, however, returned to Neblinas, so things have been a bit different around the house. 

Luckily, I have a wonderful network of friends and family members in the community who all care about me and want to feed me and make sure I'm doing okay. Being on my own has also given me the chance to do a bit of cooking for myself, which I am enjoying. But it has also been very nice to know that I can go upstairs to Eugenia and Rigo's or down the hill to Flora's to share a meal and have some company. 

I'll be sure to keep you updated on things as they progress.

Today, I arrived back in Neblinas after a 5-day trip to Rio Blanco to visit my friend Sean.

Sean sent out an open invitation to volunteers to come to his community to celebrate his community's patron saint festival (fiestas patronales) and a few of us took him up on his invite. 

I got into town a couple of days before the celebrations started to spend a few more days away from site and spend some one-on-one time with Sean, who is an excellent friend.

The first couple of days, I followed Sean to his places of work—the elementary school where he teaches environmental science to fourth, fifth, and sixth graders and the plaza where he holds meetings for an environmental youth group that he started. I enjoyed getting to know his students and other community members and getting to see the dynamics of another small town in rural Mexico. 

This actually wasn't my first visit to Rio Blanco. Back in February, I spent a couple of days visiting the community before heading to Querétaro for my early in-service training. But this time, I really felt like I got to know the community and the community members, who are truly lovely. They were so welcoming and warm and they really seem to care about Sean. Not to say that the people of Neblinas aren't equally as welcoming and kind, but I just really connected with the people of Rio Blanco and it inspired me to find more ways to try to connect with the people of Neblinas as well. 

On Friday night, Aeden and Sam, two other volunteers, joined Sean and me in Rio Blanco for the festivities. On Saturday afternoon, we took a hike down to the river, and on our way up had lunch at a restaurant in the community where they serve rainbow trout that they farm locally. 

In the later afternoon, while the family was out at mass, Aeden, Sam, Sean, and I stayed back at the house and played a few games of Rummikub and a round of "song roulette" where each of us added songs to a playlist in secret and had to guess who the owner of the song was. This game was quite entertaining and joyful, if I might add. We ended the night by going to the community celebration and dancing the night away.

Early Sunday morning, Aeden and Sam left the community to head back to their site and prepare for their week of teaching. (They are both English teachers at universities in the town of Zimapan). Tired from the night before, Sean and I spent the day relaxing and spending time at the home of one of Sean's close friends in the community. We attended mass—which was special because a number of children (including one of the kids living in Sean's house) were taking their first communion—and then went back to the house to celebrate with the family.

Later in the evening, Sean and I went to the plaza to witness the "running of the bulls," which is not exactly what you think it is. Instead of live bulls, there were six wooden bulls with pyrotechnics surrounding them. As different members of the community ran with the bulls, the fireworks went off. It was terrifying and captivating at the same time. (Attached is a video in case you are curious to see what I am talking about). 

After a long weekend full of activities, Sean and I headed back to his house early and went to sleep. 

This morning, I woke up at 5:30am to take the 6am bus out of Rio Blanco and started my journey back to Neblinas. 

This month has proven to be both challenging and rewarding for me. While there are certainly good things going on, I have still found myself struggling and even questioning whether I want to finish my service. 

But, as I wrote about last time, this period of service tends to be one of the more difficult times for volunteers. My goal is to work on my grant project through the end of this year and then reassess.

I'm also hoping that October proves to be a slightly more stable month and that some of the initiatives I am thinking about implementing in the community come to fruition. 

I'll try my best to write more frequently in the coming weeks and months. 

Hoping you are all well and wishing you a wonderful rest of your week.

Love,
Ilana

I also thought I'd include a few fun photos from the past month. The rainy season has brought with it an abundance of biodiversity which has been so much fun for me to capture.