Be The Change

In the event that any of you dear souls out there reading this would like to send us a Christmas card, we’d love to hear from you!  This is a photo from Thanksgiving–to celebrate we really splurged and went to one of the few (the only?) pizza joints in this part of the country.  Pizza and Pepsi–what a feast.

It’s hard to wrap our heads around the holiday season but we’d love to have a reminder or two by post.  Here’s our address for the time being.

James and Shaylyn Garrett – Trainees

c/o Peace Corps Jordan

P.O. Box 354

Amman 11118 JORDAN

This morning the travel alarm clock and its annoying buzz woke us at 5:30, and James braved the icy desert air to switch on the water heater in hopes of starting the day with a warm shower. As the sun grew stronger in the sky the now-familiar bells of our neighbors’ goats clanged and their young shepherd—a boy maybe 10 years of age—whistled through his fingers, calling them back from their breakfast of grazing on the sparse greenery that has cropped up among the stony and colorless landscape. I peeked out the window and caught a glimpse of him hoisting his backpack up onto his shoulder as he heads off to school. This week has brought rain, which nourishes the olive groves found outside each cinder-block home, but thwarts the efforts of dutiful wives who hang rows of colorful laundry out to dry on the long wires spanning roofs and yards.

We’ve finally begun sleeping through the call to prayer that rings out before dawn, but with four mosques in our village of 5,000 people, the later calls are hard to miss. I’ve come to appreciate them and their invitations—“Come to prayer, come to success. God is great.” God is great indeed.

While waiting for the bus to come to take us to the University for training, we heard a knock at the door and opened it to see the little orphaned lamb that has become our regular visitor, along with his shepherd, Omar, under whose knees the little lamb huddles in the cold. Omar is about 19 years old, and is a kind, simple person whose warmth we felt almost from the first day we met him. Mainly occupied with keeping the sheep and the goats, Omar recently bought a new wardrobe with the money earned from selling part of the flock to faithful families who sacrificed an animal to commemorate the Muslim holiday of Eid. Omar is off to the army in just ten days—the vast majority of village young men leave school after tenth grade and head to the military as perhaps their only option for gainful employment. We will miss Omar dearly—as will his mother, Umm Shaker, and his little brother, Momon and, of course, his little lamb.

Breakfast this morning was sparse: Arabic cheese—which is, in my opinion, an undeserved euphamism for rotten yogurt ☺—olive oil, and zatar, a delicious mix of dry spices into which we dip our oiled bread. Our host father prides himself on the tea he makes—usually unbearably strong and characteristically sweet—but we drink it ritually to start the day.

Because of the cold weather (called “berrrt” in Arabic!) most people sleep long hours, tucked in under piles of blankets so heavy it’s nearly impossible to stir beneath them. The past week has brought the appearance of “sobas,” small gas heaters that get turned up to the maximum and fill the air with a noxious, soporific smell that seems to lull us into a meditative state. The orange glow of the mantle reflects off our already-red cheeks as we huddle around the floor cushions, visiting. The temperature outside can’t be colder than fifty degrees, but because of the straight brick-and-mortar construction of the houses, fifty degrees outside means fifty degrees inside. It can be grueling to live a full twenty degrees below room temperature during the greater part of the day. Mercifully, the noonday sun heats up nicely, and I make sure to pause outside to defrost as often as possible. Living in these houses makes the comfort of American life stand out in high relief, and I admire our host family’s resilience. Their parents endured this weather while living in tents, and still further into the desert with its extremes of hot and cold.

Our Arabic is progressing, we never lack for conversation, and the joy in people’s faces as we attempt to communicate and nod along through the bulk of what they say in response is beyond compare. The training period is intense, for sure, but our focus is clear, and the number of tasks we have to juggle is slim compared to a day’s work in the States. I have often been struck in these several weeks by thoughts of what my life would be like were I in America. I find myself wondering what my worries would be—what my obligations? There is a calm to the day to day experience of being a world apart from those things, and I hope it never leaves me so long as that distance remains.

We’ve been living in this Bedouin village for nearly two months now, and have finally found ourselves sufficiently ingratiated to be receiving enough dinner invitations to last us another two. “Stay—drink tea,” is the common refrain as we try to move on to the neighbor or the sister or the “ibin am-mi” who has invited us as well. We’ve assembled our favorite characters, and see them as often as our schedule permits:

There is Umm Salaa, our host father’s mother. She is an authentic Bedouin woman, born in a tent, where she lived out her childhood. She married at sixteen, and her dowry was neither gold nor money, but a proper house in which to raise eight children, the first generation of her family to know a life apart from the roaming impermanence of her own. Umm Sala is a strong, wily, and animated woman, whose face bears the bluish-grey tattoos common among Bedouin women of her generation. Illiterate and largely unaware of what lies outside her own experience, she is nonetheless content—laughing much, and directing her family’s affairs shrewdly and with careful attention to cultural norms. She loves for me to take photos of her—especially of her holding the coffee urn, a symbol of her hospitality, a characteristic valued here above all else—except perhaps for piety.

Piety is where Abu Salaa comes in. The patriarch of the family, he is a jolly man who cannot speak without smiling, and who usually greets us on his way either to or from the mosque. He has been to America once many years ago, perhaps for military training, as his tales of the U.S. almost always involve some merry reenactment of a parachute drill. “Jordan, Amerca: same, same,” he always says, rubbing the edges of his forefingers together in the gesture used to communicate familial relationships. “America very good,” he adds, grinning, having exercised the full extent of his English vocabulary. As good as America is, though, he insists that after two years we won’t want to leave Jordan. “Mama, Baba nooo Amerca,” he says, waving his hands back and forth like an umpire declaring us “safe” upon arrival in our new home. “Ordon!” he proclaims, pointing enthusiastically to the ground and then reaching his hand out in hopes that James will slap it emphatically, indicating his appreciation for Abu Salaa’s good humor.

“After you leave our village, will you visit us?” We must hear this question ten times a day, particularly from Umm Salaa, who seems as concerned about the answer the fifth time she asks it as she was the very first. She turns her round, chubby face toward me, her brow furrowed and her piercing eyes searching my face for a positive response. “Inshalla,” I say, “God willing,” which, as noncommittal as it seems, satisfies more than any emphatic “yes” or “definitely” ever could. “Aaay-wa!” she declares, nodding emphatically, secure now once again in the fact that we won’t forget her, that we will return to her, that this strange foreigner whom she has welcomed into her home will be more than a fleeting memory. She turns back to face her daughters across the room, her bare feet protruding from under her loose black frock, and reaches up to tighten the band of fabric tied around her forehead and ears, running her hands down the long tails that hang on either side of her face. She wears a large silver and turquoise ring on her left hand, which adds a touch of class to her otherwise austere dress. As she gestures with her dark, wrinkled, and work-worn hands, it gleams out, as simple, beautiful, and captivating as she is.

Our internet access has been extremely limited lately–perhaps 20 minutes a week! We have so much to say and so many stories to tell, but our time online is limited. Hopefully in we will be able to publish more soon, but please don’t give up on us–we’re still out here and would love to hear from you!

Well, we’ve been in Jordan for two weeks now, and with our home-stay family for just about 10 days.  We are happy and adjusting to life here as best we can with only limited Arabic.  We live with a couple 30 and 34 years old who have one little 1-year old girl.  They are sweet and generous, and insist that we sleep in their bedroom.  Apparently it’s pretty luxurious to have  bed, so we don’t say no!  They sleep on the farshas (3-inch cushions) in the visiting room.  The house is concrete and not insulated, so it feels good to go out and bake in the winter sun every once in a while.

We are staying in a dusty village of about 4,000 people close to the Syrian border and about 200 miles west of Baghdad.  The village consists of two tribes of bedouins, which is an ancient people who have wandered the desert in this region herding sheep and goats for centuries.  Mostly they have settled in houses now and most work for the army.  Because we are in a border town (just a few miles from Syria) there is an army base nearby that employs most of the men in the area.  Some people still herd goats–like our neighbors, who own about 20.  All of the women are covered, mostly with scarves and long dresses, and in the city there are even a good percentage who cover their faces and hands.  Many of the men wear long white robes (called a dish-dash) and the red checkered head scarves, but many also wear modern clothes.  Not a lot of bathing happens because they get water only once a week and have to store it in tanks on the roof.  We have been bathing every other day, which seems a little much.  As we adjust, it will probaby be less!

Every day we wake up to the sound of the morning call to prayer–echoing out from three different mosques at the same time.  That is, if the roosters don’t wake us up first! We have a simple breakfast of flatbread, yogurt, olive oil, and sometimes cheese or an egg.  We then walk up the street to another person’s house–they’ve lent us a room for our language classes, and we have a teacher for the four volunteers who live in the village.  Our teacher is a recent college grad who attended university in the United Arab Emirates.  We have learned how to introduce ourselves and describe our family relationships (very important here), and how to count and the alphabet.  We’re very excited that we’re now able to sound out words and are close to being able to read.  We now know how to greet properly–it’s hard, though, b/c there are so many different ways to greet and they all include either the word allah or salaam.  Tough to keep them straight!

We have a big lunch around 2pm, which usually consists of one of Jordan’s signature dishes–Magluba or Mansef.  Mansef is goat meat served over rice with a rich yogurt-broth ladeled over it.  It’s required that you eat Mansef with your hands!  Magluba is like Mansef only with chicken and a side salad of tomatoes, cucumbers and parsley in lemon juice.  It’s all delicious!  Sometimes we have dinner, sometimes not.  It’s mostly leftovers or some fruit or some biscuits.  The food is great, and we haven’t gotten sick yet.  We boil our water, but other than that we haven’t had to worry too much.

Other than class, we sit for hours and entertain a long stream of visitors who come to see us every day.  just when we think we’ve met them all, another sister or brother shows up.  They’re all relatives, and they like to just sit and look at us, and help us speak Arabic.  Some–like our host father–want to learn English and have us pronounce things for them over and over.  It’s a nice exchange.  The gender segregation is often stark, but lately since they’ve gotten to know us, they allow us to all sit in a room of mixed men and women.  Our host mother rarely leaves the house, however.

Everyone is very kind and patient, and we try very hard to communicate, but very, very slowly!

Today is our first excursion into the “big” city, which is a real treat.  We are at an internet cafe right now and we are loving it!  Not much time left, but we wanted to let you know we’re doing just fine and other than having stressful dreams about learning Arabic, things are calm and peaceful and slow.  It’s nice.  We can’t wait to be able to speak, though, so we can get started lending a hand!

Dear Friends and Family:

As many of you already know, on October 22, 2009 we will be departing for the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, where we will serve for 27 months as Peace Corps volunteers. We don’t yet speak Arabic, but we’re learning! We are thrilled to have the opportunity to serve together, and to learn from the wonderful and warm Muslim people of the Middle East.

Since we received our placement we’ve fielded so many questions about why we joined the Peace Corps and what we’ll be doing that we decided to share a few thoughts with our friends and family before we leave. Since fall of 2006 we have lived in Boston, Massachusetts, where James has been managing a Social Psychology lab at Tufts University and Shaylyn has been working at a local non-profit called Haley House, while finishing a book project set for publication in 2010.

Life had been humming along, and a Friday night in early 2007 found us in a familiar place: sitting on the bed in our tiny apartment watching a film about violent struggle in a faraway part of the world. Though watching documentaries is one of our favorite pastimes, the suffering depicted on the screen that night wouldn’t leave our minds, and this time we were unable to simply shake our heads and go on with our lives. We felt compelled to act, and soon thereafter started the application process for Peace Corps. Two and a half years later, we are packing our bags, and hoping to find some small way to help set the world aright.

The Peace Corps traces its roots and mission to 1960, when John F. Kennedy challenged students to serve their country in the cause of peace by living and working in developing countries. In April, 2009 President Obama echoed Kennedy’s challenge when he signed the Serve America Act. “We need your service, right now, at this moment in history,” he said. “Put your shoulder up against the wheel. And if you do, I promise you, your life will be richer, our country will be stronger, and someday, years from now, you may remember it as the moment when your own story and the American story converged…and we met the challenges of our new century.” President Obama’s commitment to civic engagement has played a major role in our seeing the long application process through, and we look forward to volunteering under his administration.

Jordan is currently the only country in the Middle East region open to Peace Corps workers. The Jordanian government is a constitutional monarchy whose ruling family is interested in reaching out to the non-Arab world—if you’re not familiar with Queen Rania, you should check out her videos on YouTube! Though dedicated to educating and providing opportunities for its citizens, Jordan is facing difficulties reaching its most rural populations, and meeting the needs of the hundreds of thousands of refugees displaced by the Iraq war and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. After two months of in-country training, James will be conducting youth development programs—including things like afterschool programs and health education. Shaylyn will be teaching in a government school. We hope to aid the Jordanians in educating their rising generation and providing services to the countless families rendered homeless and helpless by war. International development programs are fraught with moral dilemmas and practical challenges, and we enter the field with our eyes wide open. Often people living in the “developed” world set out to “fix things” in other countries and end up doing more harm than good. However, its simple goal of promoting cross-cultural understanding is what attracted us most to the Peace Corps. We hope to listen and learn more than we teach, and build peace one friendship at a time.

But before heading overseas, we decided to have one more stateside adventure. In a modern take on the quintessential American road trip, we hopped in our vegetable-oil powered car, heading across the country. We’ve logged some 6,300 miles from the streets of Boston to the shores of Lake Michigan, and from to the Badlands of South Dakota to the tide pools of the Oregon coast—all for free, and all on clean, domestic, and renewable fuel.

Mahatma Gandhi, one of the greatest peacemakers the world has known, once taught, “You must be the change you wish to see in the world.” In the face of so much violence, exploitation, fear, and hatred, we must each find ways to see beyond the comfort and safety of our blessed lives, take responsibility for our impact on the world, and reach out in peace to our brothers and sisters.

We will miss you all very much, but we hope you will keep in touch! We are on Facebook, and have also finally started a blog here: romneygarretts.wordpress.com. No promises on keeping it updated, but internet access permitting, we’ll try! You can also reach us by email at shaylyn.romney@gmail.com & jamesvgarrett@gmail.com.

Let us hear from you!

Salaam, James and Shaylyn

Returned volunteers have told us that one of the most common challenges in the Peace Corps is finding funding for the materials needed to make our projects a success. Grants exist but they are small and difficult to obtain.

Can you help us put together a fund for things like textbooks, art & music supplies, and sports equipment? There’s no telling what we’ll need, but we’d love to provide some modest resources to our host villages.

If you would like to help we would so appreciate it. (Even small donations go a long way!) You can send contributions online via Paypal to shaylyn.romney@gmail.com or by mail to Shaylyn’s parents (checks made out to us, please):

Ron and Peggy Romney 1445 South Macon Street, Aurora, CO 80012