Cultural Exchange

Wa guh dung??
Wanted to share some cultural exchange highlights with ya'll...

Greetings: Jamaicans are ALLLL about their greetings, and if you don't follow suit, you are seen as disrespectful. Everyone you see on the street during your morning/afternoon/or evening routine must be  acknowledged. In the U.S. its a little bit different. We, myself included, will sometimes go out of our way to avoid people until we get that first cup of coffee or have our morning workout. That doesn't fly here. If you pass someone in the street, you look up, and give them the appropriate patois greeting. In the U.S. we spend more time on departures. It has been a fun change of pace.

The evening ritual: EVERY NIGHT most of the town comes out to their front porch, or "verandah", and just hangs out. Some people choose to people watch and others venture out to the street for a walk. As a result, everybody knows, or knows of, everybody else. Evening walks are the way everybody checks in with everybody else to ensure that all is truly good in the hood. Back at home, we would never take the time for this. Most households are playing dance hall, reggae, pop, hip hop, or church music very loudly... this will last into the night. Im sad to say, I have no idea the names of our neighbors back in Angwin... except for Sean. Again, that wouldnt fly here.

The movies: Alex and I went into kingston a couple nights ago to see transformers 3 in 3D. The movie began with the audience standing together and singing the national anthem. AWESOME. This is one of the many displays of patriotism I've seen here.  Jamaican theaters still have intermission midway through the movie so patrons can use the restroom, get more snacks etc... Another cool thing is that Jamaicans treat the movies more like a sporting event. There was a lot of screaming and yelling for the good guys, and many boooooo!'s for the bad guys. It was a lot of fun.

Something else ive been wanting to share (has nothing to do with cultural exchange). Our trainee group is incredibly diverse. The age range is 22 to 77! John and Wanda Eddy are our representatives from the high end of that scale and are serving as some inspiration to the rest of the group. They are just as energetic and "with it" as anybody else here. They kinda remind me of grandpa in a way.
Anyway, their story is funny. The peace corps thing was John's idea and he had originally planned to apply and join on his own. The way I understand it Wanda was just fine with the idea. She liked the thought of having a peaceful clean house for a couple years while John went off to the Peace Corps because he was getting "bored with retirement"... Turns out, the Peace Corps wouldnt let him do it alone so Wanda rose to the occasion.
It was the first day in Miami when everyone was meeting each other for the first time. The facilitators had a name game set up for us and it came time to meet the Eddys. John stood up first and gave a little bit of his background and so on and so forth, then came Wanda's turn. She got up and said in her Arkansas accent "Hi, I'm Wanda, and we have lost our mind". The whole place busted up. They are a tough couple.

In other news, training is going well. I continue to be impressed with how organized and professional everything is. The patois language is tough but every day i get a little bit better. Chances are good I will use it a lot in my probable rural placement so I'm really working at it. I will give you guys a more detailed explanation of what I'm up to in my next blog.