A knitting adventure

Just a cow with no knitted hat

            On my third day here I was sitting down for dinner with my host dad and mom. I don’t remember exactly what we were eating but I’m sure it involved rice and potatoes. My host dad, in particularly good spirits, was recounting the days of the previous volunteer that I replaced, and what a great guy the volunteer was. Then he turned to me and said, ‘you know I really liked having a guy to hang out with but you will be a good companion to my wife so I think it will be ok.’ I wasn’t quite sure to take this as a compliment or just a fact but I laughed it off in a nervous sort of way.  The well-defined gender roles here make it hard for me to figure out where I fit in. I am served first for meals even if my host dad is not home yet my mom will serve me, but she will not eat until my host dad has been served food. This leads to many meals of me eating while she makes herself busy until my host dad comes home from the farm. I have mastered eating as slowly as possible on these days, wanting to be able to eat at the same time as everybody else. I am also not very good at volleyball and much better at soccer, but have not yet crossed that gender role line yet, and I’m incredibly slow and shelling green peas another mark against me fitting in as a female volunteer.

So in order to attempt to better understand gender roles here I figured I would try to dive in and become for female-esque in their eyes, and thus I decided to learn how to knit.  It is a common practice here, the women knit or crochet whenever they have a bit of free time or need to gossip.  We have a women’s artisan group here in town that knits from hand-spun wool, using natural plants to dye the wool. A very local, eco friendly concept, but unfortunately many of the things they are making are reported to be scratchy and still have bits of wood, or plants from whatever they were dying with. In other words the gringa is here to do a bit of quality control. The other problem is while the eco-tienda in town is selling their stuff; it is not selling very well. The eco-tienda has a focus on selling local natural products from around Amazonas and they move jams, honeys, and coffee through pretty fast, but it turns out the locals all knit and they don’t really need more sweaters. So the market isn’t great, and the products are scratchy, and the women all believe any day now there is going to be a boom in tourism, but I’m not as convinced that is going to happen. Twice the meetings have been canceled for some unknown reason, and the meetings I have made it to have seemed very unproductive, mainly just another excuse to get together and knit and gossip, but they do record what projects they are working on and there are all very talented.

            My host mom confessed that she used to be a part of the group, but then there was an important meeting in the regional capital city, and she was the only one of the group to go. She didn’t even have a title in the group, the president had no excuse for not showing up, and it became obvious that the organization of this group was far inferior to the organization of other similar groups from around the area. Then a month later there was a local cooking competition in town, and my host mom lent all of her vegetables, chickens, and food to the president of the group so that the president could enter the competition. Not as affiliated with the group just as a neighbor wanting to enter the competition. Well the president goes on and wins the whole thing with the prize being around 800 soles (275 dollars or so). This president gives nothing of the winnings to my host mom who donated all her food. Needless to say my host mom was not impressed and that was the end of her participation in ALTA (the artisan group). Its too bad because I see my host mom as a strong leader, and one that does show up for meetings and is pretty committed. Now I feel slightly awkward telling my host mom that I am off to help out ALTA, but they clearly need a little sorting out. They have also run campaigns to build awareness about a local conservation area that is under deep debate of being mined, and it is the water source for the regional capital city, so the area is pretty important.

My Host mom in floral shirt

            The point being that I was determined to learn how to knit so I could fit in with a women stereotype which I feel like at this stage will win me points, seeing as I was told my running style looked like a boys. The women told me that the next time I go to the regional capital I should buy some yarn of my favorite color and some knitting needles. And so that is exactly what I did, the woman at the store was excited for my color and picked out a very nice long metal pair of knitting needles for me that she told me would be perfect! The next meeting was cancelled as it was pouring rain, and all I could do was look out the window, tears rolling down my face, holding my untouched yarn still in its bag. Finally the next week rolled around and I get ready to leave for the meeting. As I’m walking out the door fashionable late my host mom stops me and asks if I’m going to the ALTA meeting to learn how to knit. I admit that its where I am off to, and then she questions if I’ve rolled my yarn into a ball yet, as if that was an obvious step I had to do. Well clearly I hadn’t so I go into my host mom’s room and watch a telenovela as she proceeds to wind my yarn for me at a ridiculous speeds. Once finished she wishes me luck and sends me out the door.

The teaching style here I’m not quite adapted for. Mostly they showed me what to do up close but not slowed down and then after what they feel like was a sufficient amount of time of observation they hand me the knitting needles and told me to get started. I grabbed them shakily and waved them around in what I thought was the right pattern, but by the looks on the women’s faces was clearly not, so I handed back the knitting needles to the woman helping me and she once again showed me at full speed what I should be doing. Full speed for these women is faster than a sewing machine, and to me looked like a blur of colors. Well after about three tries of this the first woman gave up teaching me and handed my hopeless cause over to another woman who is more my age. We laughed at my inabilities and she showed me over and over again what it was that she was doing. I would take back the knitting needles and determiningly will myself to be able to do it.  When I couldn’t I would proceed to stomp my feet and whine throwing a small tantrum in the middle of the room, then laugh it off, and we would go back to square one.

Rainbow at my site!

            I left the meeting more confused than when I entered and feeling like an unsuccessful woman, hoping my host mom could help me out. Upon getting back to the house my host mom first comments that I’m home early, and that the group shouldn’t end so early as she chuckles to herself. Then she inquires about my progress. I show her what I’ve got and explain that in two years it will be a small winter hat. I show her the first step of the stitch that I can do and encouragingly she says that it’s pretty good. We go back and forth for a while just as I had been doing with the other woman, but by virtue of time and effort I am starting to get the hang of it. Slowly but surely I started to get into the rhythm, and after some practice I proudly show my host mom my progress. While she did tell me I had a smart head she also looked at it and said oh ‘malo grado’ in other words not quite right. A week later I had very little progress, so my host mom decided she would take my knitting project to bed with her. I believe she realized that the next day was the meeting and I was going to return with only a messier ball of yarn. The next morning she proudly comes out and shows the beautiful rows of stitching she has done. She said she couldn’t do much because she got tired, but to me it looked like motherly love of a new female daughter!

            I have gotten the hang of it for the most part, in fact yesterday we were sitting outside on the grass doing our knitting thing and I kept showing my host mom my lines and asking if there were any malo grados. Her response was no your glasses aren’t working, you need new eyes, you’ve got the hang of it and its perfect. We knitted together through the sunset listening to the tap of our knitting needles, and the cough of a near by pig. It is an interesting feeling doing a work of what truly feels like a solely female activity and it is what you are expected to do. The men passing by when I’m knitting always comment that I am doing a good job getting used to life here. I suppose fitting in to some stereotypes is helpful, but I am still determined to break into the men’s soccer games!