Back at it...

So, it has been a while since my last post. I have successfully finished a semester in Graduate School with the University of Pittsburgh School of Engineering. I have to say that it has been tough! The transition from Peace Corps and living in MY hills with MY people has not been that easy. Although I know that education is key to having an impact, I am going through 'immediate satisfaction withdrawal'. I love the word USEFUL. I just miss that. I miss feeling wholly useful on a daily basis. But I am slowly and painfully getting through the transition, now much less painfully than four months ago!

Anyways, one good thing about the withdrawal is that I constantly am looking for eye-opening and worthwhile experiences. Last semester I spoke at the first University of Pittsburgh TEDx event, organized by a friend and fellow student at Pitt. My talk was titled In search of a good use of our time: The struggle of a privileged generation. I told my personal story of world discovery, realization that science and engineering was such a small part of the problem-solving process, and my frustrations in trying to fit into the educational molds laid out by universities. It was great, and it reminded me of why I came back to school. I am not here to become a world class scientist, nor a world-class policy maker or even a development expert. I am here to get a little bit of it all and hopefully find at the intersection some hints towards what Sustainability really entails.

With that in mind I spent much of last semester, and this semester so far, applying for international experiences and opportunities along those lines. And I have had luck! I was selected as a student delegate of a course here at Pitt called Global Engineering Technology. Part of the course is participation in an international conference called INNOVATE 2010. The conference is held for 5 days in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam and 5 days in Taipei, Taiwan. It is a collaboration of the University of Pittsburgh, the University of Tulsa, and Rice University, and delegates from around six other national and international universities will be attending. The themes are globalization and the interplay of technology, outsourcing, and international competition. The course has been a weekly web-cast connecting the students here at Pitt with those of Tulsa and Rice. It is an interesting way to bring diverse backgrounds together and learn about the world. So in about two weeks I will be headed off to Vietnam and then soon after to Taiwan. I am excited!

I also spent a lot of time last semester looking for funding opportunities for international research for this coming summer. I found a summer study abroad scholarship, designed my own independent research project, got department approval and course credit, and finally turned in the hulking beast of an application this January. Guess what-I won! My research project titled Success in implementation of clean energy and water projects was awarded the Mcgunagle Memorial Award, the largest award offered by the Nationality Rooms program at Pitt! I was surprised and flattered, not to mention pumped(come on, lets be honest, I am more pumped than anything else)! So this summer starting in mid May I will be visiting three NGOs to learn about their successes and failures in attempting rural electrification projects and potable water provision projects. The three main stops will be Blue Energy, the municpality of Waslala, and AIDG(the Appropriate Infrastructure Development Group). The first two are in Nicaragua and the last stop is in Guatemala. I will also spend a week up at El Porvenir visiting the coffee cooperative for whom I helped implement a water pumping system. I am excited to go back to a place I spent so much time thinking about and finally SPEAK to them! Last time I was there I didn't speak any Spanish. It should be very cool.

So that is my life right now. In between the INNOVATE conference and the summer research I will be taking the PhD qualifying exams in my department: Sustainability and Green Design. It is going to be a crazy spring and summer, but I am glad it will be worthwhile! Even though it was and still sometimes is hard to be back, my desire to be useful is what has pushed me to seek out all of these opportunities, and for that I have Peace Corps to thank! Even though it has made this re-introduction to the states like a dip in an ice bath I guess I can be very grateful that it has kept me focused on WHY I came back to school and WHAT I want to get out of it. Like my Uncle John once told me-there are only three real questions. What do you got? What do you want? And how are you gonna get it? I am still working on all of them, but I think I am heading in the right direction...

The people who can make me cry...

I am now a student. I am not a Peace Corps volunteer any longer. I am a student in graduate school, and a TA that has lots of homework to grade, tutorials to prepare, and organization to do just to make sure I get enough sleep every night. It is Friday at 9 PM and I have a lot to do so I am still in school and I am grading homeworks. Who interrupts my work, making me take off my headphones injecting classical music and hopefully concentration into my brain? Chulo, the owner of the colmado from Agua Larga! I recognize his number immediately and answer by saying Chulo! He responds half laughing, half trying to be serious, "Oh, you know me?!" I can picture his face smiling and making it hard for him to talk, like a little kid with a lollipop. He has this slippery-slope of a face. When he is serious, most of the time, his face is just flat and when he talks his lips barely move. He is quiet, reserved, and respected. When he smiles he gets this smile that goes from ear to ear and his lips don't know how to cope so any attempt at speaking fails miserably. So anyway, the connection is bad and i have to ask him to repeat himself many times, and then the call drops. I figure thats it because i know how much international calls cost and how expensive this is for them. But he calls back! I answer and the call drops. I try calling him and get his voicemail about 4 times. Then he calls back again-same result-drops. He calls back a fourth time! And I pick up and it stays! He asks me how I am doing and how the states are treating me. I get a warm feeling. He tells me that the school that was promised to the community and was set to be built next to my family’s home is almost done-just missing the roof! I get emotional. He tells me my host dad has almost finished his new house right next to the community center we built together. I’m holding back tears. He says that the new Peace Corps volunteer in the community two hours past theirs, that I helped to identify as lacking water, has just arrived. I start crying. He says that he came through on a motorcycle on the way up to the community. When I was there the only way up was to ride a horse or walk for about 2.5 hours back my village! He says the mayor came through, has fixed the roads enough to get cars all the way into the next village! I am just stunned, jaw on the floor. He says they are getting a new school built as well and that it is almost done! I just can't believe it. So much good news and so quickly. Then we get into my question and answer session. I ask him about things, then he puts his wife on, Pelua, and we go back and forth for a little bit. She tells me that the (writing this right now my face just flipped out and my emotions make me stop typing for a minute) little kid next door, that i watched grow up from 2 to 4, who used to always yell my name, that he always asks where I am and when I am coming back. It’s just too much. These people have given me such unconditional love and I just can't take it. I love them. The absolute unfairness of the ease with which I left them back in their mountains and now take the bus to school, swipe a card to enter my office, and spend their monthly income in one night with friends is just too much. I feel unworthy. I didn't do anything special to deserve all this besides being born in Connecticut and not the Dominican Republic. I don't deserve all this. Pelua tells me that her spanish class that she gives every day in the community center has shrunk from 10 to 5 students, but that they are the ones who want to achieve something so she is happy working with them. She then says that she can't talk forever, but that even though we are now far apart from each other that I will always be close to them. She tells me that it is just like this one popular batchata song. "Uno quiere pa' que no quiera..." It’s a song that I actually never really could translate but its message is happy, based in finding the highs in the lows of life, and about finding meaning in things that deceive us. I just laugh and tell her “yea”, sinking right back into my Peace Corps tactics of just playing along sometimes. (On a side note I was just interrupted by loud booms and went outside the engineering building to watch one of the best fireworks displays I have ever seen. Is it Chinese new years or something?) But anyway, these people have connected with me on a level I think I will understand more and more every time I talk to them, as the days and years go by. Who knows when I will go back, but I know that the second I see them, the tough Roberto they knew who led daily work brigades of mountain men will be bawling like a little girl. My life has been blessed by their presence.

The transition...

It has been a while since my last entry and for good reason. I have moved back to the USA! I closed my term of service on August 20th, after my group’s close of service (COS) conference, and flew back to the motherland. It was a pretty rough transition I have to say.

The last couple of days in my site were almost like a funeral of sorts. People kept stopping by to ‘pay their respects’, asking me if I was really going, and then telling me to have a great trip and popping off. Then there were the people that were really close to me. They just stopped by and stayed a while. The awkwardness of the whole thing is what I miss the most. They are just there to spend time with you. No TV, no radio, nothing but two plastic chairs and a messy house I was trying to clean up. One of my favorite guys, a Haitian from the other side of the river, kept telling me he didn’t think I was really going to leave. He jokingly said, “I am not going to bid you farewell, because then maybe you won’t leave.” On the Saturday before I was to leave site Sunday we had our last water committee meeting. I didn’t plan anything, didn’t expect much from it, and just showed up. I wanted to see if the collapse would start immediately, or not. They completely surprised me with a whole agenda, a plan for having new elections to fill some of the empty spots in the directive, and a detailed sheet outlining all of the expenses that had been paid out from the water committee since July 2007! I was floored. The president, treasurer, secretary, and my host-dad had gotten together and worked out all the expenses with the owner of the colmado. They had heard that people were saying they were stealing funds, and wanted to address it clearly. Everything was accounted for, down to the blocks of ice bought for juice when Builders Beyond Borders was here. When they were done they quietly passed the turn to speak off to me, knowing that it would probably be my last chance at a water committee meeting in Agua Larga. I thought for a little bit, told them how impressed I was and then tried to get a couple words out explaining how grateful I was to have been…that was it. My throat closed up, my cheeks started to spasm, and I looked down trying to compose myself. The next half hour was the best and worst time of my service. Everyone from my host-dad to the water committee president to the beneficiaries at the meeting were in tears sputtering whatever thanks they could to me before they couldn’t talk anymore. I just sat with my head down accepting all of this love for the last time, and in many ways, the first time. Seeing these tough guys that work in the hills with machetes most days balling was really hard. And it didn’t stop.

First thing the next day was my host-mom, which triggered me again, which triggered everyone else: the colmado guy, the old guy across the street, the kids. They snapped a photo of me and those who were around, and I left my community on a motorcycle, balling.

Agua Larga with their token gringo.

And just to give me one last whirl, it rained. Then it stopped, but the damage was done. The motorcycle rounded the corner and we saw a truck that had slid off to the side on the muddy incline. We got off the motorcycle, the driver and I with all my big bags and my cat in a carrier. We then tied a rope to the front of this big truck loaded up with rocks, and proceeded to straighten it out while it spun its wheels. We went from on the road to slipping off the side about five times and then it got traction and started climbing. So now, muddy, sweaty, and much later than planned, I left my site for the last time. I stopped at a high point that overlooks my valley and snapped these two photos, one of my valley and one of my moto-guy, who had come to pick me up for over a year almost without fail.

I was no longer a Peace Corps Volunteer. And it felt terrible.

When I got to the capital I was lucky enough to have a bunch of my PC friends around up until the moment I got in my taxi that would take me away to the airport, but that made it tougher. I had a red-eye so I got in the taxi at midnight, gave everyone who was there a hug, then tried not to look at them much and got in. Then the driver started to ask me how long I had been there and what I had been doing. I told him, and then he said, “Oh wow you must have a real connection with the people.” That did it. I was sitting in the back seat with the window open and tears just started pouring, being blown aside by the wind(which I now realize was an amazing temperature). He asked a couple more questions but soon realized there was something wrong with me and it was just better to leave it be. That was just the beginning.

To perfectly cap off the irony that is Peace Corps service in the DR it took me seven hours to get from the hostel where the taxi picked me up to my parents car at JFK, one hour less than it took me to get from my community to the capital, Santo Domingo. That trip was very Dominicanly broken up into segments by me trying to get people to allow my cat on a bus, them kicking me off, and so forth. So when I arrived, saw my parents, tried to act like my head wasn’t spinning, and got in the car so quickly, it just added to the whirlwind that was the last 24 hours. They were asking me questions about this and that and I don’t remember much, but I remember sitting in the back seat feeling as if I wasn’t ready to be there. I was right back where I had left off and the last two years was some kind of dream. I had to concentrate really hard just to take it cool and try to absorb things in stride. Well, my schedule was not a great one. I was going to spend two days at home and then head off to Pittsburgh where I would begin grad school in a week! Those two days I left my home maybe twice. I was not balanced yet. The first thing I noticed waking up on my floor in my room that next day (I don’t know why, I wanted to sleep on the floor) was how quiet it was. It was sadly quiet, made me feel all alone. The first time I went to the bathroom I realized I could get a drink of water from the sink, did so, and lost it. I was balling. My face was not under my control and I had to just ride it out. Then I took my first shower. It was amazing, so much water and so warm. I was doing alright then for some reason a thought of the Haitian guy popped into my head and my face went crazy again. This happened probably about ten times in those two days in my home. Chatting with volunteers online, making a sandwich with food from the fridge, sitting on my couch. I had no control. I literally would not know when it was going to come and then my face would flip out and I had to just ride it out. It was sad, but on a weird level I was happy. I didn’t want to forget, I wanted to keep remembering. I wasn’t ready to let it all go.

So before I knew it I was packing clothes and things, supposedly everything I would need for a year in Pittsburgh-where there is snow! I haven’t seen snow since the winter of ’06-‘07. Needless to say I got very little sleep the night before leaving, and then I set off with my parents in a full car. I still didn’t really know what was happening until two days later, when they left. I was moved in with my Peace Corps buddy, which helped, but I was on my own. I did not feel at home, did not feel comfortable, and I just had to take it like I had taken my first night in my village, two years ago: with a deep breath. I knew I didn’t have to figure everything out right then. I just had to wake up the next day and things would be a little bit better…

The projects are just flooowing now.

The new computer center in the local high school

Update to Builders Beyond Borders and people back at home who donated or fundraised for the "idea" i had of a computer center in the local high school. It is a reality! Over the past five months or so I have worked with an Environmental Awareness volunteer on a project to turn one classroom of the local high school into a Library/Computer Center. Over the past few weeks we have been working on construction in the classroom-reframing a division wall, building a computer bank, fixing locks, building bookshelves etc. Just two days ago I had the same company that helped with my solar projects come up and install constant electricity with a charger/inverter in the classroom. And now the room is now pretty much usable! It was amazing to me to see such a rapid change, being used to projects like my aqueduct and community center! The high school is now equipped with a library stocked with books, a couple big round tables, a couple small kids tables, some chalkboards, a world map, and a computer bank with 8 laptops that will be usable all the time thanks to the inversor! This is literally the biggest computer center around, probably within two hours travelling! The local pueblo has some internet cafes but they all have much older computers and none have as many. So my neck of the woods just got a lot cooler! Computers, internet, and all of that is popular here like it was about 10-15 years ago in the states-everyone loves it and knows it is important but very few know how to do anything with a computer. So now they have a chance. Although I am leaving, the other volunteer still has some time and is excited to try to be a librarian/tech. consultant for the next months in the library she made! Take a look at a couple pictures!

On a complete nerd level I feel really lucky to have dealt with so many diverse energy systems in this country. I put a solar panel on my house and got to live with it for the majority of my service, realizing why Renewable Energy isn't always great for everyone, especially in a rainy country with a lot of poverty. I got to design a small solar-powered community center, and then used it to drill holes in steel bars with an electric drill-previously impossibly in my community! I got to design a solar-powered water pump system and see it working, without batteries! I also got to design small solar electrification projects. I got to experiment with small 10 watt panels and tiny batteries to power one lightbulb and also got to install big 55 watt panels with a larger battery and a small inverter to send luz longer distances and power 3-5 lightbulbs. And now I got to work first-hand with the reality of most Dominican households with luz: an inversor and back-up batteries. Even though I didn't get the chance to work with Hydroelectricity in a country where so much is possible, I am really lucky to have had the opportunity to do and see so much. One thing I learned about Energy and Water in a poor country like this: it sucks, simply put. You have to go way above and beyond the effort you might spend in the US to get a service that is far from reliable. But in a country where almost nothing is reliable, it just fades into the background with all of the other development problems. At least I know that my community with have water and light, and the high school with have a very powerful attraction for students.

Misión cumplida...y entonces?

So after all of my bitching and complaining, loving my site, hating my site, leaving my site, all of that-we had the inauguration and it was great. We inaugurated the aqueduct which gives water to 47 individual tapstands, the solar powered community center which is now host to a spanish and english class multiple times a week, and the solar lightbulb project which lit up the whole road, putting lights in 40 homes. It was an amazing feeling to realize all that we have done. And we spent over a million pesos to do it! It was a great close to my service here, and the small group who really understood my struggle showed their gratitude more than I could have expected. They presented me with two plaques, sent to be engraved over 2 hours away, and after the second plaque presentation they lifted me up on their shoulders! In true Dominican style they didnt take me anywhere though, hah, they just wanted to lift me up for the pictures, then put me right back down. But it was really cool. And I definitely saw some people shedding tears. I think what hit me more than anything was when the motorcycle-taxi guy, who had helped me go back and forth between multiple hardware stores in search of materials, came up to me just balling after seeing the community center. I didn't know him very well, but he is a much more educated Dominican than the majority of my community members, who kind-of understands what Peace Corps is trying to do in poor communities. I just hugged him and he put his head into my shoulder and cried(Dominicans aren't super tall guys). That was enough for me. That made it a good day.

The rest of the day was filled with swimming in the river, frias, and bien frias. And I finally got my revenge on the chicken that has eaten my cat's food for the past year. I cut his head off with a machete and we ate it for dinner! And Llave ate its foot(the delicacy here). I sucked on the foot a little bit, and some buddies also tasted the cooked deliciousness. Then we had some late night dancing, a very late night skinny-dip in the river, and then a nude late-night return to my house. Hey, when you have just finished a nine-month long project and its pitch black outside, you gotta walk right through your village naked. I'm pretty sure it says that somewhere in the Peace Corps manual.

(Evan chomping down on the chicken foot)

And a bunch of Peace Corps buddies showed up to support me and the project. All in all it was a great day, and it feels great to be done!

So now Im tying up loose ends with other small projects, trying to take advantage of free time to go see and do some things I missed out on, and wrapping my head around the next step in my life-School!