Monthly Archives: April 2016

Bad At Blogging

I’m sitting at my computer on the dining room table, finally blogging again. God, it feels nice to have a real keyboard under my fingers instead of my tiny iPhone screen. You’d think that I would have gotten better about blogging as soon as I had my WiFi installed and could go back to using my computer, but no, I’ve still sucked at blogging for the past month. But don’t worry, that’s all about to change. You may be asking me, “But Joiwyn, you’ve said this before. How do we know this isn’t another false promise?” Well, loyal reader, it’s changing now because I’m starting to actually feel happy and stable (both physically and mentally) for the first time in many months and I feel strongly that I will be able to actually maintain a steady routine of blogging.

See, my life has been quite the roller coaster since my eviction. I thought things would immediately become more stable once I moved to Kanye, but, boy, was I wrong. When I moved to Kanye, I was so excited for the new start. I thought my school was going to be amazing because I was going to be able to apply my educational background and passions, I thought my house was going to be amazing because all of a sudden I went from no amenities to all of them, and I thought the village was going to be great because it’s filled with more educated people and English speakers. Of course, those things are great and are affluent here, but I didn’t think about the many possible downsides of all of that.

The school is great because I finally get to apply my background to my work here, but I went from a village where I was able to make my own projects and I had tons of counterpart support to a place where my job was already prescribed to me with no thought of whether that job would actually be good for me and my counterparts have a very sink or swim hands off attitude. I was very resistant to teaching at first because I don’t see that as a sustainable job for a PCV, but that is the main expectation my school has for me. It really wasn’t until this past week that I realized how fulfilling I actually find teaching and how this gave me a great platform to help the youth. I’m not saying I want to be a teacher when I get home (maybe a college professor, but no grade school please), but I do think it is a good fit for me where I am right now. I had to drop my resistance in order for me to actually realize my full potential in this job.

My house is amazing, but I am and always have been bad about setting limits for myself. So being in a great house with WiFi and electricity, I can get really caught up in watching Netflix or YouTube videos all day. I also have the ability to freeze ice cream which is never a good thing. I’m finding that I’m reading less and eating more because I have more amenities and that’s not what I want. But that isn’t the house’s fault and this gives me a great opportunity to learn to limit myself before I come home to unlimited possibilities and opportunities to mess up my routines in the States. So I’m back to being happy about my house.

The village is great, people are very friendly and there are many shops and places to walk. Unfortunately, that friendliness very often turns into harassment. I’m not used to street harassment or catcalling because it very rarely happened to me in the States. I attribute that both to where I lived and also to the fact that I have always been overweight and unless I was being called fat, I wasn’t really addressed by strangers on the street. I’m getting used to harassment and just finding ways to cope with it, but I still find it challenging. Having shops has also been a bit challenging (along with having a fridge) because my food budget has doubled. I love having more options, but I miss having savings. We’re getting a raise though! I’m about to be getting $250 a month instead of $200! I’m learning how to plan meals better though and budget myself as well. So those are both helpful challenges. I’m figuring adult life out, you guys!

Anyway, so I’ve had all these challenges and I’ve been looking at them negatively, but that’s changing! I don’t write much when I’m feeling depressed or just down. I just don’t feel inspired when I’m not feeling great. So, since I’ve been feeling down for a while now, I haven’t written a lot. I’m not down now, though, I’m on an upswing and I feel like this is going to be a long lasting upswing. So I am recommitting to blogging. I will be writing one a week (I hope my brother also recommits to posting them, but he’s a busy guy). So you should see one a week and if you don’t, blame Nick 😉 I’m sure there isn’t a soul reading this blog that cares how often I post, but I do. So I’m going to do it! I’m going to end this one here though because it’s dark out and the mosquitoes are swarming me like my family swarms the raspberry cream jello. Lots of love from Bots!