Mud. (Friday)

Yesterday was the first day when I felt real frustration of being here. Since it’s an ongoing project, there’s not always someone to stop and explain to me what I should necessarily be doing. In some ways this is great because there’s not so much oversight that I feel like someone is breathing down my neck, but at the same time, it’s hard to always know what to do or if what I am doing is even right. All four days this week I’ve been working up on the site, mostly digging. Although I definitely started to build up some strength, digging for 4 days in a row can get REALLY old REALLY fast. We’ve been working on a trench behind the “main” building (I’m still kinda confused as to what everything is called because I’m still waiting for a decent tour of the site). The trench is necessary because the wall behind the building collapsed during the storm last week. So basically it’s a pit of mud that needed to be dug out so that we could put up a nylon tarp over the back of the building. The only problem is that at the end of every day we would get the trench to where it needed to be, then come back the next morning after the evening rains and see that half the wall had collapsed into the trench again! So literally the same thing, over and over again. I hate that trench. Needless to say, doing the same thing over and over again was frustrating, and to add to that I’m still struggling to understand the Guatemalan workers at the site. And with very few volunteers actually on site that day, I wanted nothing more than to be done and in my bed. I made it through though and had some delicious gringas (burrito-esque) and pastels in town. When we came back all I wanted to do was sleep, but the rain was SO LOUD on the tin roof that I literally couldn’t hear myself speaking to my roommate, Lani. Not to mention, there’s a minor leak above my bed, so some water dripping at the foot of my bed. I ALMOST managed to sleep a full night without waking up. SO CLOSE.

Today we went back out to the site around 7:00 and the trench was finally ready for “cobbing.”

Cobbing 101

Step 1: Mix mass amounts of mud with clay and pine needles to make a consistency that resembles “thick cake batter”

Step 2: Get into the trench with a bucket of cob, ball the mud into your hand and throw it at the tire wall so that it sticks.

Step 3: Repeat until the entire wall is covered.

Needless to say, I was covered in mud from head to toe. And as if we weren’t lucky enough this week, there was a HUGE rainstorm in the middle of the afternoon that not only filled the trench with more mud, but made cobbing that much more intense! We did finish though, put the nylon up and called it a day. Despite the grossness of being covered in crusty mud, it is really fascinating stuff. When it is fully saturated, it almost becomes like quicksand; it just sucks you in! And it shifts around like it should be viscous, but it’s cohesive enough that it doesn’t flow! So strange.

Tonight we are having a despidida for two of the volunteers who have been here for a while and are leaving in the next few days. My roommate was only here for a week and left today so it’s gonna be sad and quiet tonight! Tomorrow we are going to watch the US v. UK game, which should be a treat. That’s all for now. Still working on figuring out how to upload photos...