my first charla

My first Charla:

So I am working with two puestos de salud in my area with 3 other peace corps volunteers. Last week we went and followed the health promoters to some houses and watched them give a charla to the family. Overall It went pretty well. This week it was our turn to give the charla, in Spanish, to a family that didn’t know we were coming. Everything seems to be a surprise here in Guatemala. You never actually ever know what’s going to happen. Anyway, we split into two groups and I was with Emily, 6 female health promoters, the nurse, our Spanish teacher and our main boss from the peace corps! We were getting graded today! Yikes. We were so nervous! I was really nervous because I had prepared a charla about breast feeding but in this town we weren’t going to a house that had a little baby so I had to come up with another charla! (Im giving the breast feeding one tomorrow though…)
We were given a CD with charla ideas on it. I chose to do my charla on why preventative health is important and what preventative health is. I think that’s the first step. We went to a small house with 2 kids, a dad and a mother who was a Spanish teacher. These houses were all chosen by the head nurse meaning they were not practicing good hygiene….They all shared a bedroom that was very messy but they weren’t living in the worst of worst conditions. I introduced myself and said I was there to support the work of the health promoters. Then we played hot potato as an Ice breaker and I think it worked really well, it was fun. Guatemalans love to laugh and have fun.
The charla was a story of 4 workers in a factory, their boss, and a nurse. I had them all volunteer for roles.The point was to see who had more money by the weekend. I went through a story one by one about how worker number 1 didn’t cover a puddle of standing water outside his house and so he got cholorea. He had to pay the nurse his salary and couldn’t go to work for the rest of the day. The next person didn’t kill the rats in his house and his wife got sick and he had to spend his money on medication…etc…there was one worker how had listened to the chralas of the health promoters and practiced good hygiene. He was the only one that ended up with the most money. Then I had a poster with different pictures of easy ways to start good habits. Washing your hands, covering your dishes from the flies, boiling your water before you drink it, washing your dishes and your vegetables before eating. (I only came up with the second half of the charla…) But I think it went really well and due to the story almost everyone got to participate and I had fake money to give to everyone etc. It was super fun.
We were supposed to go back to the same houses that we had been to with the health promoters the week before but turns out they were all mad! They felt judged and ostracized. I guess one of the health promoters said hello to a woman on the street and she wouldn’t say hello back….which is a very big deal here! I can see why they were mad though. We showed up unexpected and began cleaning their house. That’s very straight forward for this culture.
I also want to add that I had a hard time writing all this! My English is getting worse and I cant remember how to normally say things. Also don’t pay attention to my grammar because its all out the window now! Haha There are some explanations for things that just simply don’t translate into English! Hahah Its very weird. But It was nice after my charla the head nurse came up to me and said I did a really good job. She said my Spanish was very good but I did still need a bit of tweeking….which I totally agree but it was a very nice compliment. Overall it was a great experience and I think Emily and I both received good grades! Emily did a charla, to a second family, on the importance of washing your hands and the proper way to do it. Also, afterwards we received koolaid and cookies from the health promoters. They are a group of loud, independent, fun, educated women. Their energy and laughter is contagious. In two weeks we have to give a charla to the health promoters and 100 high school kids about Aids. AHHHH- I hope we are allowed to talk about sex! Vamos a ver!