Ants in my cereal

Before being assigned to my post, as I waited all those endless “in-between” months, I read a few books by RPCVs (Returned Peace Corps Volunteers) about their service. One was about the very first group of PCVs to be sent to the Philippines back in the early ‘60’s, the Peace Corps’ main focus then. And wow do I feel lucky to be a PCV in the 21^st century. The author talked about, among other things:
-the tedious voyage across the Pacific just trying to get to post

-the various fungi that grew on various parts of their bodies after months of scorching heat and torrential tropical storms

-how the main roads became roaring rivers during the rainy season that they had to perilously fjord in their Jeeps in order to get to site

-large bugs and reptiles

-and how there was no mail and no phones—well, actually, in that regard it’s kind of similar to my town here, I suppose

Needless to say, they were a different kind of volunteer back then; I don’t know if I could have handled it. Life without Internet is hard enough, heh.

Anyway, I hadn’t really remembered that book until just the other day, when one passage came back to me in particular: it was about the three universal mental stages volunteers went through in their two years in the Philippines. And how by watching a volunteer eat, you could tell which stage they were in.

If, upon finding insects in their food, the volunteer pushed their bowl away in disgust and stopped eating, they were undoubtedly a new recruit. If, upon finding insects in their food, they meticulously picked out every bug then continued eating, they were probably around halfway into service. But if the volunteer, upon finding insects in their food, kept right on eating without giving it a second thought, it was clear that they’d been in the Philippines for a long time (too long?).

The other day, halfway through a bowl of cereal (precious Honey Nut Cheerios that I’d brought back from the States and thus relished and ate only on special mornings), I realized that dozens of little tiny blackish-reddish ants had apparently invaded the box and were now floating in my milk…

I kept eating.

PS—I also nearly ate a moth by accident the other night. Won’t go into details, but suffice it to say that it wasn’t pleasant for either of us.

An unusual evangelical sermon on a bus

I was sitting on the already-packed and hot bus in Santa Barbara waiting for the driver to finish lunch (or whatever) to take us home. Amid the ten-year olds coming and going selling Coca Cola and deep-fried plantains stepped on board a well-dressed thirty-something year old man. He had on a tie and a man bag on the shoulder. And, unusually, he started to preach.

Let me clarify. If you happened to have read my last post about riding buses in Honduras, you already know that it’s not entirely unusual for people to get onto buses and start preaching, praying, speaking in tongues, generally proselytizing, incoherently yelling, blabbering, and/or spitting. Usually they’re spitting, I guess. And the common themes of their brief and fiery sermons are one or several of the following:

1) IT’S THE END OF THE WORLDDDDDD!!!!!!!!!!

2) Don’t follow in the footsteps of those greedy sinners in countries like the United States [read: it’s God’s will for you to be poor and Americans are evil]*

3) Muslims, gays, women who wear pants and the like are doomed to eternity in Hell.

*the ironic part is that most of these preachers belong to various Pentacostal denominations based out of the “sinful and greedy” United States and thus receive their paychecks straight from churchgoers in the US… for me, the irony is that, listening to some of these guys, it’s as if I’m back in the Bible Belt again

Needless to say, these common bus sermons (and “sermons” may be a little bit generous here) don’t usually end up making me hop up out of my seat and run to the nearest Evangelical church. Some people listening, though, shout out halleluiahs and amens, some give the preachers cash, nobody seems as put off by it as I am, but generally people are kinda indifferent.

Anyway, this particular fellow in Santa Barbara who started preaching was nothing like what I’ve become used to: He was quiet, well spoken, seemingly quite educated and open-minded, and, most surprising, wasn’t radical in anyway except for his lack of radicalism. He talked about how we all have sinned and how we should seek God in our own way, not to be pressured or fooled by judgmental denominations that are “wolves dressed as sheep.” It was a nice, simple message that I felt okay with.

Then, he closed his Bible and pulled out a couple new toothbrushes from his bag and asked who was interested in “buying quality toothbrushes for the low, low price of 2 for L10.” Alas…