Sunday, November 17, 2013

Bored to Death

             We all face this issue some time in our lives. It’s a dreadful thing that can hit us out of nowhere. Sometimes it makes us make terrible decisions. Sometimes it pushes us to do things we never thought we’d do. Sometimes it makes us watch shows all day eating nothing but strawberry flavored sour belt candy (terrible decisions…). Boredom.
               
          In the initial PC interview most, if not all, get asked something along the lines of: “During your service there will be long periods of time where you might not have anything to do; how would you deal with boredom?” I was prepared for this question and I had a long list of things that I could do running through my head. “I don’t think there is any reason to ever be bored. There are so many things that could keep me occupied if I didn’t have anything to work on. I could read, call a friend, go for a walk, meet new people, meditate, exercise, write, crochet, plant a garden, watch a movie, work on future projects…” How could anyone get so bored that they needed a plan? How could this even be a question? How idealistic you were, pre-PC Autumn.
               
          Boredom has seeped into my bones lately. It’s not that I don’t have anything to do. I’ve forced some structure in my life and I have things to do most days and I’ve been walking and running a lot more. If you know me then you’d know I used to hate running, but now I’m running up the mountain once or twice a week (ok, it’s more around the mountain at a slight incline, but still). Sometimes I run through that old list that I came up with long ago and end with throwing my arms out with a “ughhh… but I don’t wanna do any of that!” and then end up laying on the ground staring at the wall, wallowing in my crushing boredom. I’m trying not to complain too much, but a bored person loves to complain, am I right? TV is boring, reading is boring, talking to people is boring, living in the country is boring, traveling is boring, sunshine is boring, beaches are boring, food is boring. Boredom is cruel and sucks the fun out of things I once enjoyed.  

 I try to remind myself that this boredom isn’t permanent and to try my best to shake it off. That all these things that I listed aren’t boring at all and that I’m just in a funk that I’ve gotten out of before and can get out of again. My boredom is a privileged boredom. My time is still my own and although I am limited in what I can do right now I still have choices in how I want to direct things. There are plenty of wonderful things out there to see and do and plenty of interesting people to meet.


I wrote this blog post to fill in some of the space that the boredom created. I think it worked a bit.           

Monday, September 2, 2013

Jah Rastafari!

Last week I met Jeremiah and Empress Mel at a park down the road from the hotel. Empress Mel was
 celebrating her Earthday (Birthday) and Jeremiah was just relaxing. We talked a long while about Rastafarilivity and about the prejudices against them by the larger Jamaican community. Rastafarilivity is both a way of life (eating healthy food, keeping hair natural/in dredlocks, black pride, positive speech...) and a religion. It is based on Judeo-Christian beliefs and they believe that the Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie I was the second coming of the messiah and it's also a black power movement where they believe Africa is their true home and hope to return. Here's a website with some more Rasta info. Jeremiah and Empress Mel invited me to their Sabbath celebration  in the community of Middleton in the beautiful Blue Mountains.
So here we go:








When the main road ended we had to walk down a dirt path and then climbed up the steep steps laid into the side of the hill. By the time we got to the top we were drenched in sweat.
Here is the view of the Blue Mountains from the hike up.



Reaching the top. Along the way we passed houses, coffee trees and the breeze would blow by the smell of banana trees.

When we got there we were asked to wrap our heads and cover our shoulders and asked not to enter if we were menstruating.


Shrine to Haile Selassie I

Jeremiah and 3 young boys reading from the bible in front of the flame and the drums that are used during the drumming and chanting afterwards.

It turned out that Sharon and Empress Mel had a mutual friend. Sharon isn't normally rocking purple sequined hats; it was to cover her head while inside.

Empress Mel invited us back and if anyone is interested in knowing more about the Rastafarian movement and Rasta culture/religon this is a great place to visit. They love to share what they believe in and whether you believe in their movement or not it is a really interesting part of the culture and a peaceful and beautiful place to visit. 


Saturday, August 10, 2013

Gyal, mi luv yuh fat pumpum

Living and working in a rural community creates a very blurred line between work ethics and social fun. The common topic here constantly, every day, anywhere, all the time is sex. I used to get uncomfortable but now I just get annoyed or bored and make up stories about mind dicks and ovary goddesses. I don’t really know where I’m going with those, but they usually change the subject (for a while) because the other person gets frustrated with my stupid tangents about just wanting to dance. We are supposed to integrate and being a part of these conversations would be a great way to connect with people, but there is a little voice in my soul that wants me to stand up on my soapbox and preach about the unity of men and women and love and compassion and respect, that just won’t let me.  That voice usually doesn’t come out here because: one, I would just be called uptight and two (more importantly), that voice is usually accompanied by a more emotionally charged voice that wants to yell at men to quit being so disgusting and disrespectful to women and that talking about my pussy makes me want to punch you and spit in your face and not fuck you. See… that voice gets pretty worked up so I really try to find a balance.

Outside of the schools I work with a lot of men. The older men haven’t been toooo much of a problem, but I certainly have had to set boundaries with the younger men. I now have a bubble. No, you may not poke my belly. No, you may not grab my waist. No, you may absolutely not grab my ass. Yes, there is a time limit to how long my hand is in yours. I’m really trying to find a balance between being firm and not being a hardass that no one wants to talk to. Between having a fun or serious conversation and avoiding being uncomfortably solicited. Between being respected and being accepted.

Talking about sex doesn’t bother me. Get a group of PCVs together and most likely the conversation is going to be about food, sex or shits. What bothers me is how sex is talked about in this male dominated world and how so often I can be made to feel like a piece of whitey meat. Let me step on that soapbox to preach to the choir for a moment: I am a woman, I am a human being and I deserve respect and if you cannot provide that for me then I will still provide that for me. You are a person and you deserve respect and if you have trouble accepting it then you will have trouble giving it to others.

Bam! Thank you. I love you all.


P.S. I respect all you professional Jamaican women out there that have to put up with this stuff constantly and do it with your heads held high. 

Thursday, August 8, 2013

A Fair is a Fair

Sunday through Tuesday was the annual Denbigh Agriculture show. It's a hot, dusty, smelly 3 day fair where each Parish shows off its talents and compete (for I'm not sure exactly what), government organizations show off what they can offer, value added products and arts and crafts are sold, and food... lots and lots of food (I'd rather not tell you how many smoothies I had). A bunch of the volunteers got together to help out JOAM (Jamaica Organic Agriculture Movement) by putting on a children's village where they could do activities and learn about the environment. Luckily we were placed in a shady spot so it wasn't waaaay too hot, but we all still ended up with a layer of grime on us by the end of each day. And even luckier, we were right by the sugar factory so when we weren't getting whiffs of the gully it would smell like warm sugar. Here are some highlights:
Creating "Barry Banana" to explain compost




How long does it take to break down?


Creative reuse

Plant, animal and insect painting

Adults joined in too



Value added product from the Portland parish





















Big ups to everyone who put in lots of work to make things go smooth and many, many thanks to the Shagoury's (if any of you happen to read this) for hosting us.

      P.S. Megan and I (and my smoothie) made it in the local newspaper.


Wednesday, July 10, 2013

Seeking Stories

Living in a different country has put me in an almost constant uncomfortable and awkward state. I have learned to embrace these moments and do things that a friend of mine coined were my “social experiments.” Looking at the situation as a third person, just letting whatever comes to my mind flow out, greeting every person I pass (this is a good one when there is a big mixture of cultures), let myself get as awkward as I can get or see how the next person reacts if I just don’t lose eye contact (very different reactions doing this in Jamaica vs. doing this in America).These are things I’d never done in America and have adapted out of my discomfort (and growing self-confidence? growing boredom? growing “not giving a shit” ?  –refer back to ‘Everybody Seems to Think I’m Lazy’). My favorite is a mixture of making a new (usually) one time friend and going with the flow. Sometimes this turns out alright, but sometimes I end up on amazing adventures or listening to an extraordinary life story. This last one was my experience today.

I really wanted to share this man’s certain story and I started and deleted what I wrote because it’s not mine to tell and I could never share it the same way he did. All I can share is my story of hearing his story. It was one of those stories that could be made into a novel, become a part of Oprah’s book club then become a movie based on the book based on a true story and then everyone would read and question if it was real. Seriously.

Jamaica runs on route taxis that go from point A to point B and it can take several taxis and buses to get anywhere. I was at one transfer point and walked around to find an ATM to get cash for the rest of the trip. I passed what I was looking for and a man on a ledge, that I had overlooked, called out “miss, a wah yuh look for?” There it was; I had to just turn my head. I went in, got just a little cash and when I walked out I laughed with the man on the ledge about how I had missed what I was looking for because I was looking in the other direction. He had a slight Canadian accent, he had a cast and crutches and he was dressed in ragged clothing. He asked me if I could buy him something to eat (normally I don’t give out money or buy things, but I won’t go off on a tangent) and there was something about how he held himself that I felt no pity for him, despite how he looked, and I agreed to buy him something. He seemed very honest, very self-aware, very un-self-pitying, again, despite the way he looked. He told me that an accident forced him to pee through a catheter and that he was writing a book about his life. I agreed to buy him lunch if he would tell me about his book and his life story.  

He was born in Jamaica, taken to Canada as a child, got into drug trafficking then scamming and made lots and lots of money. His best friend and girl fell in love so they ratted him out and he got sent to prison and deported. He had boats and money in Jamaica and would go scuba diving and spear fishing. His oxygen tank went out at 110 feet and by the time he got to the surface, to the hospital and into a decompression chamber he had lost the use of his legs. Several years went by before he could walk and several of his organs never recovered. He now lives day by day and doesn’t know where his next meal will come from or how he will get fare to make it to the hospital to change his catheter every other week. Just recently he got hit by a car and broke his leg and when he went to follow up on the report it turned out that the man had paid off the police to get rid of the report. His life now is getting that injustice cleared, going to the hospital and living at the beach.

He neither bragged about what he had had nor pitied what his life had become. He just accepted it as it is. He told me how had been begging money at a gas station and a white man noticed his slight Canadian accent and asked where he was from and then recognized him. He was the officer that had arrested him for scamming. The man on the ledge laughed. He laughed so hard at this incredible coincidence and said that he had no ill feelings towards that man because he was just doing his job and that he respected him for that because he deserved it and because of his own experiences with corrupt police in his own country.

I believe his story and even if it is all made up it doesn’t matter because it’s a good story. Years ago he’d probably have been a horrible person to meet, but now he has something more to share than money and material things. A fistful of humbleness punched him in the face and now he has an amazing story to share and he shares it in such a real way. If anyone sees this man in or around Discovery Bay I suggest talking to him. 

Confrontation

I hate confrontation. I’ve never been comfortable with it and my first reaction is always to tear up, no matter if I started the conversation or the other person did. It’s really annoying, honestly, and it does nothing for my argument. In the past I would try to avoid these situations as much as possible, pretend nothing was wrong so I wouldn’t have to face that embarrassing moment of crying in front of a friend (or worse, a stranger/co-worker/acquaintance). You feel sorry for a little girl crying and maybe even want to hug her. When you see a 26 year old young woman crying it’s just uncomfortable.

Oh, boy have there been a lot of tears. You want practice in confrontation and standing up for yourself; join the Peace Corps. If you are not sure of yourself; do NOT join the Peace Corps. What keeps me grounded some days is telling myself “it’s only 2 years and after you’ll have the freedom to do what you want.” I don’t mean work by this, I have a pretty awesome job with the most freedom I will probably ever have with a job. What I mean is the way that I live. Peace Corps watches me, my host family watches me, my entire community watches me. For the most part it is comforting to have that security, but sometimes I just want to scream and leave and climb a tree and hide and breathe. “I’m an adult,” I keep telling people. Keep telling myself.

Hiding and climbing a tree isn’t a very adult thing to do and doesn’t solve anything if there is a problem. I’ve had to stand up for myself many times since I’ve gotten to Jamaica. Jamaica, yuh nah easy. From the moment we got to Jamaica they told us that Jamaica is a land of extroverts. Over and over in training we heard that and were encouraged to be loud and extroverted to be able to fit in. That doesn’t come easily to a quiet introvert like me. I thought about it (for a brief moment), that I could change who I was now that I was in a new country surrounded by no one who knows my past. That brief moment passed and I remembered that I liked how I was and that if I tried to be any other way that it would be insincere and I wouldn’t be happy. Of course, quiet-introvertness (apparently not an actual word) can be easily viewed as being uninterested, unenthusiastic, anti-social, rude… It can also be viewed as a weakness, but it’s not and I’m coming to see its strength more and more.

You are tested constantly in the Peace Corps and in a country like Jamaica where there aren’t as many physical tests there are more emotional and mental tests. Jamaica has a very high early termination rate (everything is an acronym in PC, so this is known as ETing) and it’s because it’s hard in a different way than not understanding the language very well or constantly have stomach problems due to parasites. Being in Jamaica, and possibly being in PC anywhere else, you either form tough skin or you fall apart. During a community meeting I got up in front of everyone to discuss the progress of the project that a few other community members and I had been working on and the discussion quickly turned to why didn’t I help them with planning a party, why didn’t I tell them sooner that I was going on vacation, why hadn’t I told them about the project sooner (although I was telling them about it then and had mentioned it several times…but we don’t have to get into that). I quickly answered every question as tactfully as I could despite all the negative comments and ended the meeting with my head held high and my insides knotted with anger, frustration and embarrassment. Old Autumn would have broken down and cried in front of a room full of people, but new tough-skinned Autumn kept her cool…until she got to her room and cried… just a little.


The Peace Corps and Jamaica has changed me in subtle and significant ways. I still cry at inappropriate times, but I take those moments to make my skin a little tougher and my heart a little more compassionate... or so I tell myself. 

Saturday, May 11, 2013

California here I come!


I’ll soon reach California so I have been thinking about the things I want to do, people I want to see, things I want to buy and the foods I want to eat. Who wants to help me do these things?!
·   Hug and kiss and squeeze my nephew
·   Hug and kiss and squeeze my sis and mama
·   Hug and kiss and squeeze all my tias/tios, cousins, friends and anyone else that gets in the way
·   Eat LOTS of homemade Mexican food
·   Good beer! (nothing bad to say about Red Stripe, but it’s no creamy dark beer from the tap)
·   Cheeeeeeesseeee (I have everything bad to say about the cheese)
·   Night beach (don’t even try to take me to day beach)
·   Hiking in the mountains
·   Joshua tree
·   Thrift stores
·   Swapmeet
·   Bakers
·   DANCING!
·   Thai/Vietnamese/Korean food
·   Strawberries
·   Nail polish
·   Make up
·   In-n-out
·   Loooooong hot showers
·   Salad
·   Museums
·   Hair cut
·   Tortas
·   Food trucks
·   Elote man
·   Washing machine
·   It’s-It
·   Mexican restaurants
·   Bar with good music
·   Stocking up on chocolate/coffee/spices/snacks
·   Dodger game
·   Family get together
·   Pan dulce
·   GRE prep book
·   Replace earphones


I fly into Oakland and then go to SoCal and I’ll hopefully have my old phone with my American number so I can be contacted easy. If anyone can get discounts on anything and wants to help me out then I’d love you so much. I’m a poor PCV on a super tight budget. 

Tuesday, May 7, 2013

The death of an animal


In America we have pet shops, pet grooming, doggie daycare and so many pet products to spoil your parrot more than you’d spoil your child. We have an obsession with giving our pets human characteristics, baby talking to them, dressing them up in sweater vests and carrying them while we go shopping. We’d spend thousands of dollars if we found out our cat had a tumor and then spend years force feeding it medicine and changing its diaper. Does this seem normal to you? Well, go visit a developing country and be prepared to bawl your eyes out.

This morning, while I was drinking my coffee, I overheard my host dad telling my host mom that he found the brown dog dead. The brown mawga dog that just had puppies? She tried jumping over the fence but her chain was too short and she hanged herself. What a way to go. It does make me sad. I’ve never been much of a dog person and I can’t say I’d spend thousands on pet surgery, but I do want to give her human characteristics and so I think about the loneliness, fear and regret she must have felt during those few moments between jumping and losing consciousness. I often reflect on things with other PC friends and one friend asked me if I thought she did it on purpose. Could a dog plan her own suicide? I couldn’t go that far. I don’t want to believe that she was so aware of her suffering that she figured a way out.

 In Jamaica, dogs are not often treated as family but more as alarm systems. Feeling empathy for a dog isn’t the norm. Coming from bi-racial family I can understand both sides. My Mexican mother (who spent most of her youth on el rancho) never let us keep pets inside (while she was looking) and when she speaks of my dog back home she talks about him as a dog, doing silly dog things. My American father encouraged us to sneak the pets inside and will talk about my dog as if he were another person in our family with a quirky personality. In a lot of cultures pets are viewed as tools rather than family and a dog’s loyalty makes them great to guard things. When you don’t have a disposable income you don’t want another mouth to feed, so if a dog didn’t have a purpose then why would you have it? I’m not sure where I fit in. A dog is not a human, but it does obviously express simple emotions.  

I’m trying to find an ending to this post, but I don’t know what my point is here. I’m just reflecting on the nameless, brown, mawga dog and wanted her remembered. 

Thursday, April 25, 2013

Everybody seems to think I'm lazy...


“Everybody seems to think I’m lazy, I don’t mind to think they’re crazy, running everywhere at such a speed, till they find there’s no need.” Wise words from The Beatles.

The day that I graduated from high school my older sister handed me our house phone so that her friend (who I never did like) could congratulate me. He said congrats and good luck and then said “welcome to the ‘real’ world.” I didn’t like it. I didn’t accept it. His words upset me and I don’t know if it was the words, the way he said it or the fact that I never did like or trust him. I decided that I didn’t have to worry about it quite yet because I wasn’t entering that “real” world for at least another 4-5 years since I was going to start college. I’ve since graduated from college, worked odd jobs for a bit and then flew to Jamaica to serve in the U.S. Peace Corps. My world is real. It may not be “real” the way that he had meant it, but I don’t think it would have been a good fit for me.

Jamaica and Peace Corps has allowed me to form relationships on a very real and honest level because I have had lots of time to become very real and honest with myself. Who am I? What do I want to do? Who do I want to be around? How can I truly be helpful and happy? This is as real as my life has ever been.  My facebook pictures may make it seem like my life is a party, but hard times call for fierce dancing (na so?). My (seeming) idleness may make it seem like I’m lazy, but my next step is being planned. Life doesn't have to be constant movement and it doesn't have to be so serious all the time.

But, anyway, I think my point here is that everyone has their own version of “reality” and how life should be lived and sometimes some people really want you to conform to their version and can’t and don’t want to even try to understand your version.  It can be really frustrating for them. I am a very quiet and introverted person and I try to say and do things with intention and so it can be a really slow process. I have now realized how extremely frustrating that can be for those who are not like that. I used to internalize other’s frustrations and get upset (and I mean breaking down and bawling on the floor upset-PC friends know what I’m talking about here) until I started to realize that I didn't have to and it has since made my life sooo much easier. “Here, these are your frustrations, you keep them.”  Basically, I've been practicing a lot of “not giving a shit.” Ok, that sounds harsh, but I like the way it sounds because it’s actually not that blunt or easy. I do give a shit, but certainly not about everything.

 Living in a different country has made me realize how human it is for others to want you to conform. Life here is different from life back home, but there are still people that want to welcome me into the “real” world (the view of the way life should be lived) and get frustrated when I don’t accept. I want to be adaptable, but I also want to hang on to my identity, my goals, and my morals. I know I sometimes border on the line of being comfortable and confident in who I am and being a stubborn jerk. Sometimes. But honestly, I can’t conform to everyone’s “reality” because it’s simply, completely impossible. 

Saturday, February 9, 2013

Not all play


I work. I promise. My most accomplished work so far is at the primary school where my environmental club has a pretty amazing (mostly organic) garden going on. I say “mostly” organic only because the seeds aren't certified organic and the soil has never been tested (and is suspiciously amazing soil). I haven’t let anyone add synthetic fertilizer or pesticides to the garden and it is doing well. It’s not growing as fast as they are used to seeing and there are more bugs, but everything looks healthy and nice.


Here are some grade 6 planting tomatoes.
 The plants are still little, but growing strong.
Here I am teaching them how to make a natural pesticide out of onion, garlic and hot pepper. It is much cheaper to use than the costly synthetic pesticide and much safer for the environment and people (I’m hoping they will take some info back to their parents ;))
 Besides the garden, I include projects and games (and once I got them all to write a haiku about the environment-adorably inspiring). These are in the process of becoming a hanging garden that will have flowers to attract bees.
Here I have them playing a relay race where they had to separate man-made garbage (non-biodegradable) from nature made (biodegradable). I had a tough time with this game and it’s going to take a lot more work to get them out of the habit of throwing garbage on the ground. 

Saturday, February 2, 2013

America!


I went through a phase for a while (like many angst-y, rebellious adolescents) where I was angry at America. What about America? I don’t know; everything I suppose. Wars, education, prison system, food, television, socio-economic divide… I wanted to separate myself from America, Americans and be Un-American. American to me meant something specific which I didn’t like; consumer, lazy, fat, arrogant, obsessed with superficiality, un-artistic (is that a word?). Where did I get that image of America? Why was I so convinced that I was not American because I didn’t fit into that image?

I have been lucky enough to travel to different countries with friends, with family and by myself. When you are flying by yourself you tend to make “single serving friends” (Fight Club, anyone?) and while on a long flight from Senegal to South Africa a white South African man became my one time friend. We spoke a little bit about where we were coming from, where we were going, what we did, what the gaping holes were in the Earth below us (diamond mines, he said) and what he thought of Americans. “Americans are very… confident.” That was 3 and a half years ago, but it has stuck with me. Americans are confident?? Was that what he really meant? That’s not how I heard it. What I heard was “Americans are very…arrogant.” Read between the lines. When I was in India almost 7 years ago, I came across some anti-Americanism. While at a market (with my sister and our friend) we spent some time with a talkative man trying to sell us carpets (or scarves, or pants, or something) and when he asked us where we were from and we told him Mexico (it seemed like a better idea at that time to tell most people we were from Mexico) and he proceeded to talk mad crap on Americans. Na, I don’t think we bought anything from him, but it was entertaining in the least.  And once, we were traveling through a town and stopped to watch some monkeys on a wall and when we turned to leave there was a small poster plastered on the wall with G.W. Bush’s face as skull and cross bones. The writing was in Hindi so I don’t know what it was all about, but I got the gist of it. Ya… That’s not me though, I’m different, and I’m not really all that American…Right??

I’m American to the core. I realize this the more I am away from my home country and I realize more what it means to be American. Not too recently, I was at a meeting with my community group and a man asked me to share a song from my culture (you see, here in Jamaica, every meeting starts with devotional songs and prayers) and I told him that I didn’t know any (Ya, I know, there are a gagillion American folk songs and what not, I just don’t have any memorized). He proceeded to say that that was because my country had no culture and stole from other cultures. I tried to explain that America is huge and diverse and that within regions, states, and cities there are subcultures and that is what makes America so great. But he wasn’t listening and we continued to have a friendly heated argument on my culture (and lack of culture) until someone started the meeting.

I love my space. I love diversity of food. I love my relationship with American friends. I love when time is respected. I love that as a woman I have a voice (and it continues to grow). I love American humor. I love California. I love Rialto. I love cheese. It’s in the differences where I see the similarities. Here in Jamaica, personal space is not always available. I’ve gotten used to taxi rides and don’t mind anymore when someone has to sit partially on my lap, but other than that I like to have space. In America, and especially in Southern California, you can find food from almost anywhere in the world, but here people take one look at whatever I cook and wrinkle their nose and probably won’t even bother to try it. I have realized how affectionate I am with my American friends, male and female. We hug, kiss, sleep in the same bed, share off each other’s plates and would never expect it to be more than what it is. Here, friendships with guys are a little trickier. I have lost count of how many guys have told me “I love you” or “I want to marry you” or things waaaaaaaay more inappropriate after I talk to them for a little bit. Time is a lot more relaxed here, even at places like schools and churches. I expect nothing to start on time and no one to show up when they say they will. Actually, kinda like the space thing, this is something that I am getting used to (I really hope it’s not something that sticks once I go back home though). American humor is the best. The end. Alright, maybe I’m completely biased, but we’ve got a good sense of humor and a lot of people here don’t get sarcasm which has caused some confusing moments.

I love Jamaica and I loved India and Madagascar and Mexico and I will love wherever I go next, but no matter what I pick up from these other countries I will forever have America ingrained in me (just like this Catholic guilt that I just can’t seem to shake no matter how long it’s been since I’ve gone to mass). I will not replace, but build on top of what I am. I love my Americanism. I am no longer ashamed of it, but am grateful for the opportunities it has given me. I still have my issues with some things in America, but as an adult I understand the reality that life isn’t fair, nothing is perfect and there must always be a constant strive for betterment and change with the times. I no longer hold such unfocused anger towards America anymore. 

Monday, January 14, 2013

Zen and the art of... Bee Keeping??


Working with bees is oddly calming.
The first time I went to an apiary was when I shadowed another volunteer while I was still a trainee (refer back to ‘Boas, Bees and Babies’) and it was on the terrifying side. Having hundreds of stingers buzzing around your body can definitely bring up your anxiety, but it didn't keep me from wanting to work with them. At our second workshop we had a hands on demonstration and a bee flew into my ear and stung me, but that still didn't keep me from wanting to work with them. When you work in an apiary you will smash some bees and you will get stung, just accept it and go on.

Currently we have 11 hives with 10 to 15 frames in each and they’re all growing strong now that flowers are blossoming. One hive lost the queen and has created a new one. One hive is super productive, and super wild and aggressive. Some hives are growing slowly. Some hives are very neat and calm.  Others are building wax beyond the frames and connecting or making clumps. They are all the same type of bee, living in the same apiary, having access to the same blossoms, but each hive body has its own personality and level of productivity.

Every week I go out there I learn more. Knowing when and where to move frames. Understanding why some cells are capped or why some are different colors. How to spot larvae that are only a few days old compared to larvae that are close to maturity.  How to tell the difference between a worker (female), a drone (male) and Queen Bee. Spotting a queen bee in a hive is like spotting Waldo in a super hard game of Where’s Waldo, but when you do and you see that she’s healthy it’s very reassuring.

Bees are very intelligent creatures and they pick up and react easily to scent and energy. It’s very important for you not to have strong body odor when you go to the apiary and it’s also very important for you to keep calm when you are around the bees. If you are frantic then the bees will pick that up as a threat and will attack you. If you are not covered then it wouldn't be surprising if they went up your nose or in your ear to terrify you. Trust me, it’s scary having a bee buzzing around inside your ear.

You can learn a lot from bees. They are fascinating creatures; so small, yet so important to the entire life web. When you are around a large amount of them they can trigger terror or create calm. Have you ever watched a bee die after it has stung you? It’s a slow and seemingly agonizing death (if a bee can feel agony). It reminds me of those samurai stories where the samurai will take his own life to protect his honor. A bee simply wants to produce more honey or produce more bees and live in harmony with life around it, but she will take her own life if it’s to protect her honor.

… a little too anthropomorphic?