I did not know what upset I had caused.

I went to school (like normal) and when I got there the door was locked and I waited with the errant alumnos who were late (like normal) until someone let us in. “Gracias…” and we shuffled in like tin soldiers except more like erect globs of human. I was not late, for any future employers who may be reading this, the principal knows that I can’t get there by 1pm sharp because I work in the mornings too. Whereas school here is only half-day, like 7:30am-12pm or 1:25-6:20pm, so the teachers don’t have other jobs (that is not to say they aren’t working). But I work in other sectors of the community and can’t make and eat lunch and be at the school in one hour. But he still locks the door to impress punctuality on the students and in the course of impressing punctuality I get locked out. Meh, it’s only closed about half of the time when I arrive.

On this particular Wednesday in February I was still settling into my class schedule (school year starts in January in Guatemala) and I couldn’t remember which class I was going to first.. So I plugged my trusty USB into one of the desktops in the computer lab (no internet connection, don’t get excited) and opened my schedule. Profe Ronaldo (you know, the one who was my first work partner and brought me to site and disappeared and is now magically back in my life this year) said “Jo” pronounced (hhho from the back of the throat, K’iche’ for let’s go) and I expulsared the USB from the machine and we walked to primero básico. I gave my charla to the limited attention of the alumnos, reminding the students to bring the notebooks assigned to them for my class because some of them forgot. “Tuesdays and Wednesdays..” I repeated. “I am here Tuesdays and Wednesdays..” There were 40 of them at the time, 40 obstreporous 6th graders. Just imagine it and try not to run from wherever you are. I finished the charla, rolled up the rotafolio, erased the board and went back to the computer lab because I realized I had left my USB.

STAY CALM ONLY ALL OF MY LIFE IS ON THAT THING.

I’ve lost one before and it never reappeared. In the campo USBs are hot commodities, expensive, something you keep track of, write your name on and keep on your keyring.

Who needs USBs these days? Isn’t everything on the cloud? Let’s be clear, I live in the clouds sometimes to the point that I can’t see the house next door to mine but The Cloud, the singular, powerful one, has yet to descend or ascend over Santa Clara. So my USB the shade of ketchup with the light brown thread tied through the loophole has been a reliable conduit of information through my service. Even when it gets viruses from whichever public computer I am on or I leave it with the librarians on accident, it always finds its way back into my arms. And it was gone.

My second move is to find Ronaldo The Reappearing: “Hey,” interrupting Primero básico to ask: “Did you happen to see that USB? Didn’t I take it from the computer before we left for Primero?” and he said: “I haven’t seen it, why don’t you check with Tono?” So I go back downstairs to the principal’s office/computer lab and say: “Hey… Profe Tono. Have you happened to see a red USB? I think I left it in this computer.” His response: “No I haven’t seen it.” So I look through my bags (again) cuz of course I checked through all my things before I started my search in the first place. Nada que ver.

Cool cool.

So I scale the steps to Segundo Básico to Profe Miguel: “Profe Mek, disculpe la molestia pero no sé si por casualidad vio a mi extraíble abajo?” “No I haven’t seen it Natalie. You should check with the others because I haven’t seen it.”

Cool Cool. Class just ended and the bell rang. The bell, mind you, is a doorbell attached to exposed wires in the doorway of the principle’s office that the teachers press when it’s time. It’s not on a schedule or system apart from whichever fingertip is pressing it. And I still haven’t figured out who is responsible for what times because they all seem to press it at different times. But eventually it gets pressed sometime around the intended time. One thing that confuses me is that people don’t really have doorbells for their homes in the campo, you either knock or say “Aye María” implying that the woman in the house is on-call for your happenstance arrival and that her name is María. This doorbell is a school bell. Some people have doorbells if they have big houses, but my host family doesn’t have a doorbell and half the time people simply walk in your house and they ask “Who’s there?”

Mayra, new this year, is pura coqueta always wearing traje with brillante and shiny teal eyeshadow. She makes me look less put together because I do not wear shiny eyeshadow or wash my hair every day or don high-heels because I’m already a giant at 5’7” and have a tendency to trip in flat shoes. “Seño Mayra, any chance you’ve seen my red little USB?” No I haven’t seen it. Where did you last see it? Are you sure that Profe Tono doesn’t have it? He was last down there.” “Yes I’m sure, I asked him.” “And you’ve checked all your bags.” “Yes I’ve checked them twice.” And bless Mayra the Shiny Angel who goes through all of my bags for me for the third time. Because that’s what shiny high-heeled mom angels do, they check a third time. Nada que ver.

Tono is still in the office and he says: “I haven’t seen it. I got on the computer after you and it wasn’t there.” Tono has a way of whispering words that would be helpful if spoken at normal volume. He’s a musician and a singer, he plays the saxophone. Breath control and strength is a part of playing the saxophone, right? Well, my last name is almost Saxophone and I can’t hear Tono. He begins to change for PE, to which he was assigned to teach this year, by the computers in the office. Have you seen a teacher drop trow in a middle school office?

It’s now recess and the teachers begin to gather in the office. Miguel comes in with his usual: Natalia. He always yells my name. I swear I can hear him lecturing when I’m in the States. If he and Tono met in the middle it would be an auditory match in heaven. What profe Miguel says next makes me realize something I had no idea about, I’ve been sending a message I didn’t know I was sending: “Natalie, I swear to you that as God as my witness I did not take your USB.”

Shoot.

I know that a USB (of 8 GB) is a valuable piece of property. I think a USB of that size goes for about Q80 which is 11 bucks in dollars. 80 quetzales can get you a dinner out for two in a nice restaurant or eight pairs of sweatpants in a PACA pile or 65 fresh mangos or five and a half packs of 100 assorted balloons.

I paid nothing for this USB, I received it at the end of a Peace Corps training. But it’s the only one I’ve got. And because of that, it has everything on it that I hold documentarily dear. The manuals, my class schedules, monthly reports.. “Natalie even if you’re bajo el reloj you have gotta look after your things. You can’t leave your stuff hanging around or it will disappear..”

A Pause for My Take On Terms:

It took me a while to learn the weights of liar and stealer in this country. In my culture (the States) we don’t throw the word liar around. Phrases like: put your money where your mouth is, say what you mean and mean what you say and your word is worth it’s weight in gold (did I piece that last one together?) are all proof positive that we put a high value on someone’s word. Your word is your currency. However we paint the word “stealing” with broad strokes: “Hey can I steal a bit of your cream for my coffee?” “I’m gonna steal your pen for a minute.” We’re being facetious, we’re gonna give it back. Well, I made a joke at the youth camp in December that three people stole the community toilet paper because we started out with four roles at 9am and it was 1pm and there was one role left. The room nearly went silent and in 5 minutes all the roles appeared. Of course I was joking, it was toilet paper, but I think accusing people of stealing here is like accusing them of being a liar in The States.

Anyway, when someone calls me Mentirosa here I get defensive: “NO!” And I explain why I am not mentirosa. En cambio when I started asking around for my USB, what they heard was: “Someone stole my USB” because before you now it, the 5 staff of the school were all concerned about my red USB and Profe Mek was saying: “Natalia, only Dios sabe va pero se le juro que yo estaba con tercero cuando lo desapareció..” And then I started trying to scoop the beans back into the can: “Listen, Profe, I’m not accusing anyone of stealing the USB I just think I may have dropped it or left it and wonder if anyone knows where it might be..”

And students stream into the office “Con permiso” they repeats like lemmings as they pass the threshold. “Que le paso, Seño Natalia?” I explain that my USB is missing. “Ohhh” they express lament and run outside because they are jóvenes.

Mayra the Shiny and Ronaldo the Disappearing converse back and forth about the asunto: “Could it have been Tono?”

FINGERS POINTED.

“You know he is the only one of us who doesn’t have a USB.” (The kind of thing you know when USBs are expensive). Oh gosh. I don’t want to accuse Tono, I just want him to talk an audible volume. And Mayra says: “Dios me perdona” and her shiny eyelids bat over to Tono’s backpack. Recess has ended and Tono’s whistle is blowing for PE up in the cancha. Is she gonna do what I think she is gonna do? She zips open his blue back pack and starts to rummage the items. “Underwear…” and we all chuckle (He did just change for PE) “We’re not gonna know unless we look..” she says.

FINGERS RETRACTED.

NO USB.

Miguel, once again, “Natalie I swear I didn’t take the USB.” Yes I know that Miguel! I heard you yelling math equations to tercero basico when it disappeared. He laughed. “And the three staff ask each other: “Should we predicar the students?” Ok I know that a prédica is a sermon… Sermon the students? I can put two and two together. Then Juana from Tercero says: “Seño why won’t we go ahead and ask all of the students? You know what happened with me that one time with the 10 quetzales I lost…” (you know, enough to buy one pair of sweatpants from the PACA). We searched everyone’s backpacks and we found the ten dollars.” Oh my gosh. They want to search 90 backpacks for my ketchup-colored USB. I say: I don’t think that will be necessary. It will turn up..”

And I go up to Tercero Básico. I start my charla: “Think of a daily activity… Next, determine if that activity takes care of your salud física, emocional o mental?” And who appears but Ronaldo the Reappearing. “Excuse me jóvenes.” And like with most Guatemalans, the man crafts a speech: “We have a pequeña problema…” and I listen to the man unleash a beautiful speech as if he has a presidential writing with a prompter hovering just outside the window of the classroom. I am in a state of wonder and also understanding: this is how things go in the campo. USBs disappear and you have an altar call in every classroom threatening to shake down everyone’s backpacks. I will never leave my USB again because I feel like I’ve accused a whole pueblo of murder.

“It’s not that we are accusing any of you. No, it’s not that. Last year this happened to me, my USB disappeared and I imagine that you all can remember a time that you lost something and it really caused you grief to think about the value of that item that you lost…”

At this moment I am wondering how many USBs get found in dumpsters every year in the US. Scratch that: do they get found if they aren’t searched for?

“So please take a moment to look through your bags, look around your desks and keep an eye out because this is something that’s very valuable to Natalie. Gracias y con permiso.” Perfect dismount.

I take up the lecture, thanking Profe Ronaldo. I wonder if my manner of speaking Spanish is like I’m pointing a bright flashlight in people’s eyes with my directness and lack of sculpting speech. I don’t cushion my words with fluffy phrases but Miguel has just iced over his announcement like marmalade on pancakes. I must sound like I’m beating instructions with a stick instead of imparting them.

The charla finishes and the students are asking me: “Where did you last see it?” Downstairs in la dirección. I walk downstairs and Mayra is still there. I look down where she TSA’d my bags for a third time and there, on the ground, is my USB.

USB! Do you know what trouble you caused today, you inanimate object who can be held responsible for nothing?

I pick it up and put it in it’s appropriate zipper pouch immediately and two things surge: the relief lecture (popular in Guatemala) “OK now that you’ve found what you lost you better, better, better look after your things Natalie..” my host mom a particular pro of this method. This lecture was sandwiched by whispers of “Did Tono drop it there?” At the end of the day, we tacitly agreed who stole the USB with the saxophone in the dirección (I don’t want you to miss my reference to the board game CLUE here. It’s my favorite).

So at the end of the day, perhaps there was no robber and perhaps there was a liar or perhaps my irresponsibility and clumsiness warrants the biggest regañar of all. But at the end (and in the middle) I had to laugh because.. we almost searched every backpack in the school over a piece of plastic. Goes to show you that it’s not about the object so much as the value you put on any given object.

And for the record, I don’t think Tono or anyone “stole” my USB. I think it fell and maybe someone picked it up a la “Finders Losers” and felt too much vergüenza to bring it back to me so they just dropped it on the office floor. I’m just glad the little red USB made it’s way back into my possession.