The Bends

Merida is in the mountains, the exhaust is horrible, and I can smell waves of it coming in through my bedroom. Some other students don't think it is bad as I do and ask me if I come from a small town and I say that I live in Chicago and that this is terrible in comparison. I'm still getting used to all of the differences of food and living with a family, and trying to communicate to them in Spanish and then just to people in public as well.

Yesterday I fell in love with Venezuela. I will remark on the good after I get the bad off of my chest.

Each day is a new day, and these cheesy sayings that adults usually say is proving to be true here. Every morning I wake up and try to just truck on, take a deep breath, and tell myself that I can deal with whatever comes up. My family has been generally tolerant of my inability to really speak spanish, but it's kind of weird. Let me explain. See, my house-sister, Rosa, requested that her parents house someone from Venusa because she studies languages. She knows greek, italian, french, english, spanish, and she is quite brilliant at all of them. So, I'm here so that she can practice her English---which is good right now because my classes don't start until later on today. I've only been here a few days and really it feels like forever in both good and bad ways. I get really excited, but also extremely nervous. Buying food is a nervewracking experience, as is waking up in the morning and eating breakfast while people watch you. I feel my back curving and just down trodden, remind myself to sit up straight, even though I feel terrible.

Rosa had school early this morning and so I planned on sleeping in until 8 AM, but woke up from all of the street sounds and smell of exhaust and breakfast cooking at 6 AM. But I laid there for a while anyway and didn't get up until around 7:30, and so only the parents were around when I got up. It's very uncomfortable because the second I wake up they scramble to prepare breakfast for me and if they've already eaten they just sit there and watch me and try to talk to me. Since my Spanish is so bad, Rosa's mom tries to speak to me in English. So I'm usually a mix of talking in english and spanish. Rosa seems like she only wants to talk to me in English, which is nice to have someone to communicate with at home. At the same time, she sits me down and says, "Read this poem in spanish, I want to see what your vowels sound like." I say okay, and read the poem, and she is hard on me and I tell her that my classes have not even started yet. I'm a mix of trying not to be too emotional and understanding that she has no friends and that I have paid to be her guinea pig and friend. This was a night or so ago, and then this morning when she wasn't there when I woke up, her mom was kind of militant saying that I needed to "try" to speak Spanish. I wanted to cry. I wanted to say, "I don't know any spanish. That's why I'm fucking here. My classes start this afternoon, give me a break."

A lot of things that I read said that Venezuelans are patient with non-spanish speakers, and that they will not correct your Spanish unless you ask them to. This is my first week, I'm still so vulnerable, and I wish they would understand that and just give me a break. This morning my madre and padre just sat at the table trying to speak to me in spanish and the little english that my madre knows she would translate for me and get frustrated that she couldn't find the words in english and I said, "Lo siento. That's exactly how I feel." She would cover her face and groan when she couldn't find a word and I just say, "umnn..uhhh..i..i don't know how to say this word in spanish." And if she knew the word she would just say it to me over and over, like beating it into me, and I can't remember anything from this morning at breakfast other than the verb "sentimentir." Also, the speaking isn't slow as I had learned, but it is very fast and so many sounds that complete a word get lost and I just say, "wait, what? say it again? spell it? ohhhh, ok ok..si...." It's hard. I'm going to be here for a very long time and this is my first week. I've been trying very hard to hold it together and be positive, but I kind of just feel like weeping right now. I told mi madre at breakfast this morning that I simply do not know a lot of spanish and that I have been practicing it with my friends at school. Yelling me words is not going to help, and I feel like they're fed up with me or something. I wish that I had a room mate that could help me out like everyone else seems to have. Some people live in groups of five, and here I am, choking down ham at breakfast sweaty and wanting to just jump out the window.

I feel like I am offending them by lacking in Spanish abilities, and my lack of vocabulary is coming across as "not trying". I'm also confused because they speak to me in English and Spanish, so which is it? Are you okay with me speaking a little english until classes start or are you not? After this morning when mi madre said I had to try speaking in Spanish, before I left, I said, "gracias para desayuno" and she replies with "You're welcome." AHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!! Am I here just for Rosa's English practice or will I learn, too? I know that Rosa loves me, but I have no idea about her parents. They seem annoyed with me about my lack of language skills. Madre also seems super annoyed if I don't appear to like some food, or if I do like it and only take a small amount she says, "That's it???!? You no like?" And I think jesus christ, yes, I like it, do you want me to eat the whole can of jelly??? How do I seem to offend when I think I'm being polite? They think that I don't like anything that they make, granted some of it is really gnarly, I never make remarks or comments about their food---I only told them that the cheese made me feel sick and that I was allergic as a child and that I tend to eat more fruits and vegetables. Now when I eat they say, "Is this okay? You need to tell us what you like and don't like." Everything is very difficult. It's also super hard from living entirely by myself for a long time and then having breakfast and dinner made for me before I can even say no gracias. I wish that it wasn't part of the program for them to make us meals, but that we could have just used that money to buy local food that is balanced and nutricious and make it ourselves. I don't like people waiting on me. It makes me feel bad.

The combination of everything just makes me feel really claustrophobic. Like no matter which way I move or try to speak I'm not making someone happy or doing the right thing or liking the right things. It makes me not know how to react in this social space. I'm really foreign. I'm almost tempted to dye my hair brown for three months just to ease the stares walking down the street. No venezuelans have naturally red hair, and if it's dyed, it's not like this. I feel so obviously different that it's a little overwhelming and makes me feel a tad unsafe.

It's different when I talk to Rosa or hang out with my new friends from Venusa because they understand all of the awkwardness that we're all going through with being here, but most of them say that their house parents give them space and time to speak and are okay with them not knowing a lot just yet. My house family just seems a lot different from many others that I've been talking to and I kept help but have a little jealousy.

On the good note, last night was one of the best sleeps I've had since the night I arrived. I was exhausted the first night I got here and was exhausted last night as well because we spent the entire day in the mountains. We took a bus up to a certain part of the mountain making stops along the way to take pictures and see beautiful things. But then the bus stopped at a certain point and we hiked for 5-6 hours in the Andes and it was one of the most incredible experiences of my life. I will blog about that in another, with pictures, called: "The Day I Fell in Love with Venezuela."

Here's to a better day and not getting eaten alive in my first Spanish class today.