1. Life goes at a different pace here – slower, calmer. Here, I very rarely feel rushed or stressed or pressed for time. It’s the pura vida mindset that Ticos use to infiltrate their lives and their way of being; it’s that everything-is-okay, no-worries sort of mindset that has really become part of me.

2. Here, we are not responsible for our actions – God is. Everything here is “Si Dios quiere” (If  God Wills.) It’s funny how the answer to everything is, Si Dios quiere to phrases such as: “See you tomorrow”; “Let’s have a meeting next Monday at 4 p.m.”; “I’m flying to Panama tomorrow.”  Si Dios quiere is always the right answer.

3. Hot water is a commodity, so you really grow to appreciate it.

4. I have over a hundred avocados ripening on three trees 50 feet from my back door.

5. The typical greeting when passing in the street is not, hola, but adios, which literally means “to God.”

6. How I can walk down the street and say hi to someone sitting out front of their house, and before I know it I will be inside drinking cafecito and eating bizcocho – mere strangers five minutes earlier.

7. I am getting more physical and mental rest here than ever before, not to mention, probably adding 10 years on to my life.

8. Horseback riding is a common form of transportation.  No one looks twice at the man and his horse trotting down the highway.

9. I love how coffee here brings you to stop and slow down, not grab and go. I love how afternoon cafecito is a time come together and converse. I love how most places don’t have “to-go” cups. I love how coffees are small here. I love how the coffee culture here, where it is grown and cultivated and valued, is the exact opposite of what it is in the United States.

10. I love how here you can spend an entire day on the sofa reading, while the rain tap, tap, taps on the tin roof, for six months, and not feel guilty. I love that.

Thank you, Costa Rica, for being you.

Rebecca Stumpf is currently a Peace Corps volunteer in Copey de Dota, Costa Rica. To read more about her experiences and see more of her photography, check out her website and photography blog. For some delicious recipes, check out her food blog.

I talk about Guatemalan culture and history, and tell stories about my life and the people I’ve met here. And I talk about the projects and what they are doing for the people they benefit.

I love the buying, selling and the talking about what I see and feel in Guatemala; so in many ways it’s no effort, except for hauling around the full suitcases, through airports, taxis, bus and train stations.

I’ve done small benefits at house parties and church service social hours, and last year we threw a big benefit dinner in conjunction with the students in the high school Spanish classes — good food, first class service and live music to boot. From this dinner and the sales, we were able to buy a photocopier for the office of the school – a huge boon to the teachers, who had been copying work for the students by hand.

My last visit home we did an art show at a local restaurant– with paintings by the painters I work with in APMF — as well as two house parties, a church social, a booth at a fair, and a sale at a bilingual preschool Mother’s Day event. My goal was to get enough donations to build a climbing structure for the preschool classrooms in the barren yard next to the classrooms and the director’s office. And joyfully, we met that goal.

It seems as though the consistency of my appearances in my hometown, the feedback and thank you letters I write to donors, and my ongoing work in these two projects in Guatemala has had some effect. After this visit to the States, one person who has helped considerably with the benefits is offering to make APMF a project of the NGO she’s connected with, which also helps in Belize and Haiti. This will enable us to have official status, give tax deductions for larger donations, and perhaps to receive funding from other organizations. This is very important for us as it would cost us nearly $1000 to do this for ourselves in Guatemala.

Then another friend has offered to push forward a “Friends of…” group in our hometown, to help us raise money more consistently, and encourage sponsorships for the kids in our program.

I am really excited about both these steps forward, which can only allow us to give better services to our client families in San Pedro and the children of the San Pablo preschool.

So I guess my message is, stick with it. Consistency and duration pay off.

Miranda Pope is currently living in San Pedro La Laguna, Guatemala and is volunteering with Pedagogia Basica, Estamos Listos, and Ayudame Escribir Mi Futuro. For more on her experiences, check out her blog. For more on fundraising, read “Organizing Fundraisers at Home and Abroad” by Kim Friedland; “How to Fundraise With No Funds” by Andrea Vogler; and “Need Some Cash? Top 10 Ways to Fundraise” by Laurie Norton.

The day began like any other. We planned to meet at 11 a.m. to walk up the mountain. Naturally, people did not begin arriving until two hours later. By 2 p.m., we finally made it to our destination. The Peruvians who had accompanied us immediately began to construct our cooking furnaces. Like any friendly gathering, a competition began based on which team could build the best huatia. There was no real winner as everyone became more fascinated with the endless amounts of Inca Kola, perhaps the soda with the most sugar in the world.

Adam putting the finishing touches on the huatia.

No meal here in Peru is complete without a side of potatoes. Peruvians are absolute magicians when it comes to cooking any sort of papas and the huatia event was no different. After about 45 minutes, we all sat down together to eat our potatoes and trucha. The trout was seasoned perfectly; anything tastes better with a little bit of dirt.

We followed the meal with an event that would make third grade boys in gym class pee themselves with excitement. The game was called mata gente, which translates to “kill people.” Simply put, the game consists of two circles with one team on the outside and the other team forming an inner ring. The teams were divided in the fairest way imaginable, boys vs. girls. Imagine the second circle being only five feet behind the first and having a dodgeball to peg at the opposing team. That is mata gente. I think without much extrapolation, it’s easy to guess which team won. By the end of it, the women were on the sideline nursing their injuries. It was very Lord of the Flies-esque to see how quickly the men degenerated into absolute animals. Like I said, a third grade boy would have drooled at the chance to peg his crush with a dodgeball.

The event ended with the sunset. After taking in one last view of the valley, we packed up our belongings and left. The women hobbled home and we men patted ourselves on the back for our victory. Easily enough, we left our stoves right where they were to be used for the next afternoon huatia event.

Jonah Brill is currently volunteering as a Field Researcher with Arariwa in Cusco, Peru.

The theme of this week-long event is called “Right to the City: Uniting the Divided City.” The idea is that every individual is entitled to access the same cultural, economic, environmental, and civic liberties as everyone else. By discussing the future of the urban world, Right to the City can provide a starting point for the construction of a new paradigm in which development does not repeat the same mistakes or provide the same worthlessness illusions of previous models.

This week, I will take you inside the WUF and relate some of the dialogues with representatives, thematic roundtables, as well as networking and training events. I am particularly excited to discuss and network with global experts in urban and environmental policy and design and housing management. I am such a nerd.

Today’s events began as I stood in line for almost two hours while 21,000 people registered for the event, receiving a bag, program, and free metro pass to be used throughout the week. Once inside the WUF, I was able to join one full session titled “Slum Improvement, a Development Opportunity” where heads of international corporations, academics, as well as favela entrepreneurs and residents gathered in the same room. So cool!

The resulting dialogue was great, but I can’t help but feeling frustrated. The panel talked about the problems with slum upgrading, of which there are many, and they decided that simply writing policy is not sufficient. In order to implement slum upgrading and urbanization processes, there must be capacity building and participation by the slum residents. I could not agree more! However, I am simultaneously discouraged that although everyone was in agreement about the need for dialogue, communication, and exercising the right to voice opinions, this luxury is not always offered as an option.

Ultimately, the question becomes, how can we encourage participation in the process of upgrading, sharing information, and modernizing slums in a sustainable fashion?

Jamie Worms is currently a volunteer for Catalytic Communities in Rio de Janeiro. For more about life in Brazil, check out her other posts.

Here is a synopsis of my Carnaval experience in Bolivia.

The Friday before Carnaval, I was working on Pro Mujer’s borrower verification (an entrepreneur audit we do for all Kiva partners) and it was obligatory to dress up in costume. Here I am in one of the Pro Mujer classrooms with the group Qantati, dressed as a pepina, a sort of clown, the character with the most spirit at Carnaval in La Paz.

Una pepina auditora

On Saturday of Carnaval, I went with another Kiva Fellow, Adam Kemmis Betty (KF10, ProMujer), and a couple other friends to Oruro, which is renowned for the biggest carnaval in Bolivia. It was unbelievable. The costumes of the dancers in the parade were phenomenal. We got hit with water balloons and water guns and fired back with foam. We ate the typical dish from Oruro, charquekan, which is deep fried dried llama, for lunch in the parade stands in the main plaza of Oruro.  It was a blast!

Carnaval in Oruro

On Sunday, we returned from Oruro in the afternoon. Adam and I decided to see what Carnaval was like in La Paz. I dressed up in my pepino costume and we headed off. Two boys attacked me with water balloons down the back of my costume on the way over to the parade on the Prado (the main avenue in La Paz) and I got drenched. Other Paceños dressed like pepinos carried sausages (beads covered by material shaped like a sausage) with which they hit random people as they walk through the streets.  Ouch!   I met Adam in the center of the action and we bought a beer at one of the make-shift anticucho and beverage stands that were set up on both sides of the Prado. Even though I was dressed up and Adam wasn’t, Adam the Gringo (see Dan Malin’s “G-word” post) got attacked by Paceños sitting in the bleachers on both sides of the Prado. His face was completely covered by foam that he could barely see.

We had Monday and Tuesday off from work so we decided to go for a two-day hike near La Paz. As we walked though small towns such as Huni and Palca, the locals we passed—who were hanging out outside their homes after their cha’lla, an annual Carnaval-time blessing done to honor Pachamama mother earth that involves spraying beer, serpientes (streamers) and confetti—invited us to share their cerveza (beer).  We were also ambushed by a boy wearing a Scream character costume blocking the middle of the road and pummeled with water balloons. I should have brought my can of foam.

Wednesday is Ash Wednesday and Carnaval should technically be over. BUT, the next Sunday, Carnaval in La Paz continues. At the end of the festivities, there will be a ceremony to bury the pepino to signal the end of carnaval. A mourning parade brings the pepino to the La Paz cementary in Tejar while the party continues. Pepinos, chutas and cholitas continue to dance down the streets. During next year’s carnaval, the pepino is exhumed and the festivities begin again.

Although Oruro is the biggest Carnaval in Bolivia, there are also wonderful authentic carnaval celebrations in Tarija and Cochabamba (Corso de Corsos). I asked other La Vida Idealist bloggers for their Carnaval stories.

• If you haven’t read Rob Packer’s Carnaval entry, check it out here.
• Dan Malin just sent me an incredible video that he shot of himself with a bunch of kids throwing water balloons at a bus. Carneval in Ecuador just seems to be an extended version of Cabbage Night.

Please feel free to share your Carnaval stories in the comments below!

Concurrently in Guadalajara, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) hosted an invite only international conference titled “Agricultural Biotechnology in Developing Countries.” Among the movement to protect native crops, many view the FAO as an operating arm of big agriculture, in this case genetically engineered seed companies.  Now that the European market is closed to genetically engineered seeds, the Latin American market is the most attractive area for expansion.

The theme of the “Transgénicos? No, Gracias.” conference was how to protect diversity: diversity of seeds, crop planting, and culture. Scientists, anthropologists and campesinos stressed how important diversity is to our collective survival, particularly in a time of increasing contamination and climatic change.

Mesoamerica (Mexico extending to the northern portion of Central America) is the genetic home to maíz where corn varieties have been evolving for thousands of years. Many consider the prospect of genetically engineered corn a threat that extends to most aspects of life.  Every year, genetically engineered corn erases thousands of years of native corn evolution.  And that means the potential loss of many types of corn: there is blue corn, black corn, white corn, yellow corn, sweet corn, and the list goes on.  There are, in fact, between 55-60 species of corn in Mexico and it serves as the basis of food, medicine, artisan projects, and more.

Transgenetic corn was first discovered in Oaxaca in 2001 and they believed the contamination came from US food aid, but it remains undetermined.  Two other sources of contamination are families based in the US sending genetically engineered seeds to Mexico and the government providing genetically engineered seeds without proper labeling. These seeds are difficult to control, identify, and contain. The looming question is, “How do you preserve this rich cultural and food diversity in the face of such an elusive opponent?”

Growing genetically modified corn was illegal in Mexico up until last year, 2009.  Now there are “experimental fields” in Sonora, Sinaloa, Chihuaha, Tamaulipas, and Jalisco.  During pollination, cross contamination is extremely high, especially with corn. Many in Mexico are understandably concerned that the experiments cannot be contained.

“Sin Maíz, No Hay Pais.”  Without corn, there is no country. Here is a short video clip of a public hearing against Monsanto held in Guadalajara.

The movement to protect genetic and cultural diversity here in Mexico is impressive and moving.  Michael Pollan writes in Omnivore’s Dilemma that many people in the US have lost cultural connections to food. I originally wrote this article for writer April Davila, who is trying to live a month without consuming Monsanto related products and is finding it very challenging to access information about the origin of food, seeds, and clothes. It is often difficult to access information about where our food comes from and what it contains.  If we had deeper cultural connections to food, perhaps we would be more motivated to understand it and protect it.

If you would like to learn more about the movement to protect corn in Mexico, visit Red en Defensa del Maíz or Sin Maíz No Hay País.  For an English website, there is also the North American based organization Vía Campesina.

I am here in Guadalajara, co-directing an organization that is creating a documentary on water issues and teaching video workshops.  You can check out what we’re up to here, follow us on Facebook, and/or check us out on Twitter.

About two hundred men, women, and children —representatives from several communities — gathered in front of City Hall with t-shirts, signs, protest songs, and elected speakers who took their turn in front of the megaphone.

Why? The City Department of Housing has officially announced that 119 entire favela communities, totaling at least 12,196 homes, will be removed by 2012. The city cites reasons of “risk” to justify their removal. According to the officials, “risk” means that these communities exist in places prone to flooding, landslides, or overall need for environmental protection.

However, not all of the communities threatened with removal are at risk. One such community is Vila Autódromo, whose only crime is existing in the very location where the city plans to build the Olympic Training and Media Centers. People do not want to go!

The argument is sound. If there is no environmental risk and if the community is safe and law abiding, the residents feel as if the city is simply cleaning up their city to make way for international tourists who are expected to flock in record numbers for the Olympic Games and World Cup. Residents feel like the city is once again trying to displace and exploit the voiceless poor because their houses aren’t pretty. Instead of helping them upgrade, the city wants them gone.

After years, and in some cases decades, of residence in these locations, where are they expected to go? One protest sign asked just that. Other signs read:

“There is so much vacant space is Rio, why displace us?”

“We’re asking for respect!”

“Say no to removal, Cariocas against social segregation!”

“Removal is a social crime!”

“We’re Rio’s chance to show that we have serious policy — Urbanization”

“Why do our news media give voice to the City and not the Community?”

Despite the peaceful and very orderly protest, City Hall closed its gates which, apparently, are always open to the public. In fact, I had walked through those very gates on my way to the protest just a few hours earlier.

In the end, a small handful of community leaders and journalists whose names were on a list were allowed past the gates of city hall to talk with the city officials. I personally hope for successful negotiations.

Jamie Worms is currently a volunteer with Catalytic Communities and Calle. To learn more about favelas and life in Rio de Janeiro, check out some of Jamie’s past posts.

As Barranquilla’s most famous daughter, Shakira once said ¡Mira, que en Barranquilla se baila así!

An advantage of being a volunteer in a city with such an enormous and inclusive event is that you can really take part: through friends and the organization I’m working with here, I’ve been able to take part in a comparsa, a group that dances in a parade and have been given an insight into the storytelling traditions of Barranquilla’s Carnival and Colombia’s Caribbean coast. The folclor of Carnival has become one of the most fascinating and rewarding parts of carnival: the musical and story-telling traditions of the Caribbean coast permeate the festival and have their own cast of characters. Here are a couple of examples:

* In the comparsa I took part in, we were all dressed as monocuco, a masked, veiled and hooded character based on stories from colonial times of rich gentlemen disguising themselves so they could pursue women from lower classes.
* This year’s symbol of Carnival is the coyongo dance, where the participants wear enormous cones with bird’s beaks and their dance symbolizes birds being chased by a hunter: the people saw their own exploitation at the hands of the Spanish mirrored in the dance of the bird and hunter.

The part of Carnival that I’ve most enjoyed though is the letanías, groups of minstrels dressed as university professors with scripted or improvised rhymes that subvert and criticize everything in Barranquilla from political figures to individuals who just happen to be watching. The tradition began as a way for barranquilleros to let off steam. I love it for its inventiveness and because they speak a brutal and honest truth; barranquilleros regard the letanías as the true personification of the spirit of Carnival—four days when normal rules are turned on their head.

Rob Packer is currently working as a Kiva Fellow with the Fundación Mario Santo Domingo in Barranquilla, Colombia. For more on his experiences, check out his blog or follow him on Twitter.

Our final evening unfolded in near perfect Peruvian fashion. Originally, much fuss was made about preparing a proper event to commemorate the past six months. However in the end, drinks, dancing and music overcame formalities and everyone chose to focus on the celebration as opposed to the ceremony.

Now that I finally have a chance to look back, I can appropriately weigh all that has happened. I’m proud that the group of students we taught improved their cumulative knowledge of basic health, heightened their appreciation for the natural environment, and developed new skills to lead confidently within their community. Yet despite all of the documented improvements that our group was able to demonstrate, I am most proud that in an area as isolated as San Francisco, each of our kids and their families were brave and curious enough to participate in a program in the first place. Only now can I appreciate what a radical decision that really was for each of them.

The class certificates we handed out represented the culmination of MEJOR Communities’ first ever youth health pilot program. Much can be said about the hard work we have done, not to mention our in-country coordinators and organization heads back in the States. Yet the real accomplishment has been the incredible leap of faith which the community of San Francisco undertook to allow an unknown group of volunteers into their homes.

I am encouraged that this premier venture has opened up a door between a charismatic group of Peruvians and First World opportunities. Because our great group of kids chose to not only participate but also excel, MEJOR is already preparing the next wave of volunteers and projects which are soon to arrive in San Francisco.

Nós do Morro was conceptualized in 1986 as a cultural movement which strove to harvest the artistic talent of young people in Vidigal. The idea was to produce art by and for the residents of the community. Earning a sponsorship from Petrobras in 2001, a new space with the capacity for 80 seats as well as a Cultural Center was built in the Almirante Tamandaré Municipal School located at the top of Vidigal. Originally, the company was exclusively for favela residents, opening its doors to the wider public in 2004.

As the show was about to begin, the audience took to the seats scattered around the periphery of the room. We were each given a piece of cardboard to use as fans when the room got too smoky or too hot. The lights dimmed, the music started, and I was blown away!

At the end of the show, the director was asked to give a speech. He said, “See, you don’t need a lot of money to put on a show; you just need creative people.” And that is exactly what he had. The actors were extremely well rehearsed, full of energy, and had such amazing stage presence. Later, when talking with the cast, I learned that six actors were involved in making the costumes; there weren’t many props.  But everyone in the company was so professional and having a great time. The audience too was filled with laughter.

Today, Nós do Morro is world renowned and has achieved significant public recognition. The company has been awarded several prizes from Shell, Coca-Cola, the City Government of Rio de Janeiro, the United Nations (an Honorable Mention), and the Municipal Secretary of Social Assistance of Rio. Their recognition is well deserved and many of their actors go on to significant roles in theater, on TV, and in films.

I, for one, am still reeling. Bravo!