A different Almirante

I walked into the building because I said I would be back and wanted to keep my promise. The dank air inside reeked of mold and piss and filled my lungs with its death. I soon became of aware of the regrets my mind was making a list of as I started to talk with the man standing in front of me. I didn't have time to back out of this one. I was the only one here and I had promised to come back. The lit sign in front declaring that a cyber cafe resided within this space lied. Only one computer and it was occupied by this basement dwellers' kids. No music. Not a sound. Just a loud interior decoration screaming that things were lively here once. Nice leather couches, large speakers, a big screen television and excellent art. Overload. Where was I. This can't be Almirante. The smell was familiar but the décor was foreign. Outside lay endless amounts of dilapidated buildings and trash. This was different, and once my senses settled down I felt good.

I had come to Almirante to wash all of my clothes at the lavanderia because always smelling like river is not always great. It took 5 hours taking me to the basement “cyber cafe” across the street. If you haven't read my other blog posts about Almirante, imagine Hati before the quake and more jobs from our friends at Chaquita Banana. The inside of the place I had stepped inside of took me by surprise. It was strangely nice and familiar at the same time. That was when I got to talking to its owner and operator whom spoke gwadi gwadi, english, and spanish. We spoke in spanglish. Come to find out, he was married to an American, was in the U.S. Army for ten years as a Heli Medic, moved back, and now is a medic for big dangerous projects here. What? As more time passed talking to this man, the more I understood this was a person with a story to tell. We didn't get into his stories. We mostly talked about why I was here and the people I hope to help. We both agreed it was the right thing to do and he made me a milk shake.

Time passed and I felt at home. People walked in the door. All aftrotilian. And all extremely agreeable and good mannered. I liked it. This was nice and I found a new place to understand a new culture just 40 minutes from my house. The milkshake was excellent and I watched CNN on the TV for hours until my clothes were done. I walked outside with a new understanding of Almirante and noticed how nice everyone really was to each other here. Here in a place where better life options are running dangerously low. I picked up my 50 pounds of clothes and got a taxi home. I know where to go next time I want to wash my clothes and get a good shake. I long for the musk of that dark basement, a good cheap milkshake, and friendly conversation on a black leather couch.

Other notes: I was struck at how great the art was in this place. Huge hand carved heads, paintings, miniature ships made of delicate wood, and other stranger small trinkets. I found out from the owner that a local older man makes the things and charges almost nothing for them. He just likes to create the art. He is also considered “crazy” by the locals because he will wonder around and talk to himself. The art blew me away to say the least and it is safe to say that these pieces would sell for much more than he was selling them for. Apparently people have come in and tried to buy the pieces and the owner has refused. He buys everything the guy brings usually for about 9 dollars a piece. Someone offered to buy one of the large wood sculptures of a native women for 250 bucks.

Food

I keep asking stupid questions. They are stupid because I should know the answer to them by now. Every time I ask why someone doesn't have something or why they don't do something the answer is “there is no money”. I know there isn't any money here I just forget. I have been living in this community for 3 months now and I still ask this stupid trivial question. Why don't you buy medicine for your dad? “No money”. Why aren't you guys playing volleyball today? “No ball”. Who has the ball? “Its Gone”. Can you buy another one? “Ya if we had money”. Shit. The world really does revolve around money. Well sorta.

These people don't absolutely need a constant source of income to live. They are lucky. They have land with roots and bananas growing in them. I know because it's been what I've been eating for a week straight now. I could have bought some more beans and eggs for the family, but like them I have no money. Not until stipend day that is on the 21rst. Back to the people; They are much more lucky than the poor living in the cities and towns here. When the money runs out there bad things happen. Here, you don't get the medicine you need and there are no luxuries like a new volleyball. It doesn't absolutely mean death unless you really need that medicine at which point the clinic will let you put it on charge.

Walking Home

I walked the path that leads to Solomon's house where I'm staying. With each stomp of my boot squishing fresh mud from each side, I walked slowly as to not get any on my pants. This was of course a loosing battle as the slippery earth found its way onto my body regardless. I walked by the kids playing soccer on the cement pad. The pad looking like it was a future project from years ago never coming to fruition and the kids wearing clothes that you would throw away. Bare feet. Shoes for goals. They asked me to play and I politely declined citing a foot injury bystanders called my name. “Chiro Mutari” over and over again until I wave and even then not stopping the call for my attention. I now know what is like to be famous with camera men trying to get you to wave or look their way. It's fun sometimes, but other times you want them to go away.

As I turned the corner I noticed the women that was previously at my house chatting up my host mom standing in the stream with a net made of natural materials. Her 5 kids huddled around her. This stream is one I cross every day and is more like a trickle than anything. It has been raining though the small stream I know and love turned into a raging stream only a couple days ago making my walk a little more difficult and slightly more wet. The stream was back to its trickle now and so the women stood with her net. I asked what she was doing and she answered “fishing”. Fishing? There is no way fish can live in that little thing. She proved me wrong and brought up a fish about 3 inches long. I asked if she was going to put the fish in a tank or a pond to grow. She kept a straight face and said that it was to eat. It was dinner is what she was telling me. There is no time to grow fish when your hungry I guess. There are small fish farms here but it seems that they are not too popular as the many animals here take the fish.

She had two very small fish in her basket and it didn't look like she would be getting many more. The kids stood and watched and I made a remark somewhere along the lines of “Wow that's great, good luck”. I looked back as I squished mud between the bottom of my boots and wondered if there was any embarrassment involved in what she was doing until I came to the conclusion that everyone here is hurting for food and money and no one would look down on the taking of the sardine sized fish for dinner. Food is food.....

Child Care in the 3rd World is Sink or Swim Baby

I was sitting in the hammock in main room of the hut/house staring into oblivion when I realized it was now 2011. It just doesn't seem the same when your in a place where times seems to stop. It at least doesn't seem to matter all that much. The main topic of the days are rain and because its usually raining the days seem to blend.

I'm sitting at an extension of the stove which is made of wood and seats three people. Only the guys eat here and after Adriana makes the meal she sits on the floor in the dark and eats out of a large bowl with her hands. Always. She always eats after she has served everyone else too. She has pain in her arm but nothing to fix it with. She says she works too much and I believe her. She, as all the other women who don't have female children over the age of 11 must do all the days work solo. Old enough to wash clothes and cook? Your doing it. Not only are there no questions asked when these things are mandated, but there is no fuss. This is the way it has always been and will be for some time. The women work harder here than anyone. If they are not peeling green plantains while sitting on the floor with a machete, they are hand scrubbing large amounts clothes ether in the river or at the spicket.

There is a large contrast between the way kids grow up here. This is to be expected considering the isolation and lack of education these people have endured for so long. On a normal day I watch 2 year olds roaming the street with no shoes on. Sometimes they are following a family member that is not paying attention. I see the 14 month old being left alone in a room so full of danger that any parent from the States would scream child abuse if they saw it. I constantly ask if they think its a good idea for the same 14 month old to be sucking on pieces of plastic while no one is watching her. “She won't eat it. Its not food” I'm told. I accept this and move on, keeping one peeled for sudden choking and trying to remember the Heimlich maneuver for kids. Melvin, the 4 year old can be found with a rusty machete chopping things in the yard. Sometimes he has pants on. He drinks coffee because his mother gives it to him. I put my two cents in and was met by blank stares. What do I know. Maybe rusty machetes and coffee are just quick learning devices for very young children.

Its different. Its to be expected. There is very little education and the programs the government has implemented usually don't leave the paper they written on. For example, the mother in my first host family is part of a program where she meets with a group of new mothers and shows them a book that explains proper ways of parenting and nutrition. She can't read that well and routinely contradicts the book. The information goes no where when the person giving it to you can't understand it. But its a start. These people have nothing. That is true. They do have their farms and they are more than thankful for that. They are lucky to have them and they know it. In the reservation, not so far away, there is much less hope. Most of the forest is gone, there is close to no education, and people do not own their own land like they do here. Never the less, watching kids grow up here is painful. It's like watching a hockey game. You know that eventually the puck is going to go into the net and you don't want to look away, but it rarely happens and it's only when your not fully paying attention that it does happen and you didn't see it. I hear stories about bad things happening to kids here. They are swept down river never to be seen again, they get high fevers and can never hear again (the 18 year old next door), or they cut themselves badly with a machete and don't let the wound heal properly. Or they get cuts, bumps, bruises, worms in their stomach, and scrapes on their faces and they grow up and they are tough.

Its not the worst thing. I sometimes feel that parents are way over protective in the States. If you have the small falls, cuts, bruises, and sicknesses, then what is going to happen when go directly to a big fall, cut, or sickness? It's gonna be worse. And if you don't find out for yourself, chances are your doomed to a life of calling up your mom to see if you can take two asprin at once for a headache. The learning curve is just steep here and survival of the fittest couldn't be more true.

Notes:

-Day 3 of the building the bike grinder did not go well. We tried three different ways of turning the grinder and they all didn't work. We will try two more ways in the next couple days.

-I keep spending all of my monthly living allowance way before the next one comes. This is good because it forces it me to live like the locals, but bad because it forces me to live like the locals.

-Spanish is getting better. I had an entire conversation with the Pastor today about how the government in America is trying to fix the economy and that the past government messed it up pretty bad due to close ties with banks. He understood this but thought it was a different story. His “brothers” in Tennessee (conservative pastors) are constantly feeding him right wing bullshit straight from fox news so I like to set the facts straight sometimes. The conversations are never conformational, he just usually says something like “It's the coldest it has ever been in America right now so there can't be such thing as global warming”, to which I usually answer with “So I'm not sure where you heard that from (Tennessee Tea Baggers), but its been scientificly proven that the world is getting hotter and it's because of us”. He actually usually stops there and thinks about it for a little bit and eventually agrees with me. Can't wait til I meet his friends from the states.

-I'm currently working on a grant from a private donor for 5k. If it goes through I think we will have enough to build a computer lab here with internet and a printer. I would like to build a library, but in this day and age I hate to say it, but I think a computer lab would be more useful. There would have to be a no movie or game policy and I would teach classes on how to use everything. Literally starting with “this is a computer, you have to plug it in for it to work”.

-I'm moving into my new house soon and have already built my bamboo shower. Even though it is held together with pink twine, it still looks pretty good. Next step is to inclose the inside with black plastic material the neighbors don't loose all respect for me when I take a shower. The water is cold here.

-My health is still OK. I can eat more which is good and moving into my own place with help with that. I've gained some of my weight back and doing exercises and eating out of my hidden jar of peanut butter is definitely helping. I'm hoping to be back up to my pre-peace corps weight by the end of next month barring I don't swallow some river water and get dysentery again.

-The old man who lives with us and almost died is on new medication. The medications are actually pretty cheap but the doctor prescribed a supplement called spirulina that cost 40 bucks for a one month supply. Apparently this stuff is good for diabetics but they don't have that kind of money. That is almost half the money for food a month in one bottle. I checked, and this stuff can be bought in the states for 10 bucks. So for those of you visiting me, make sure to pack a couple bottles. They will save a lot of money...

Cacao Tour?

I'm tired. The kind of tired you are when you feel like your head is going to explode. Most of this tiredness is from staining to figure out the meaning of ever word of Spanish everyone has been saying for the last 4 hours. It's the kind of tired you feel when you just want to rub your head and knock it until the right meaning for the right word comes into your head like it had fallen out. I'm so tired of speaking and listening to Spanish that I've started getting lazy and putting English words in between. Tired.

Solomon and I created a presentation for the chocolate group about our plan for tourists. I crunched the numbers and used the research that I had gathered and created tables and pie charts explaining the whole thing. They have been talking about this for about 10 years now and this is the closest they have come to actually doing it. Part of the reason or might I say all of the reason for the quick change into “tourist” mode is for the simple reason that I've been shoving in front of their faces for the last two months. “We could do this, and this, and this is how much we will make, and later on we can build this” is my conversations most times. Not really how Community Economic Development Volunteers are supposed to start projects. Ok, so I jumped the gun a little. And after the meeting we just had I realize that most of these people are ready for such a task but a good deal are not.

There were a couple problems. The members thought that 30 bucks for the Tour, Chocolate Making Demonstration, Making Chocolate to eat, Boot rental, Lunch, transportation from the nearest city, and a packaged piece of our cacao was way to much to charge. I tried explaining that down the street they were charging 60 bucks at one point but that didn't matter. Then was the 1 hour discussion about how we shouldn't have lunch because there wont be enough room in the kitchen. The kitchen here is absolutely huge but I'm going to fight it. In fact, I didn't fight anything. I've already done too much and just planting these seeds should be enough. They are now starting to think about this a reality. This is going to happen. Solomon tells me that the people here really do have no idea about what to charge and what to do with the money. $30 is about how much they each spend on food for the family each month. They also have a couple mixed ideas about what works and how to do it. One of the big concerns was that if we had a website then people were just going to show up and what if the tour guide was in the farm working. For the record I never mentioned a website nor do I think they should have one at this point since making lunch is too big of a deal. About three people spoke and the rest just stared not knowing what the numbers meant and got even more confused when we started changing them.

The important thing is that we got a name: The Oreba Cacao Tour, and we defined a couple other things namely we will charge about $25 for everything sin lunch, and make sure we know who is coming and when the day before. Also, and I'm sorry for this everyone, but we are going to have to start out with Spanish speaking first. I've realized that creating a big tour with matching hats and English speaking tour guides and talking parrots and a gift shop is a little over the top. We are going to have to start on the most basic level possible. One farmer taking people through his farm and explaining things. (I'm still coming up with those things with their help). Solomon understands and its frustrating watching him get frustrated in front of the group when they only talk about how it probably wont work. Solomon is also the only person here that was taken aside by USAID and sent to Guatemala to check out other tours and to create a plan for one here. That was 4 years ago. He has been waiting patiently for someone to spark this up and now here we are. There is going to be a lot of discussion within the group and a lot of people not understanding what is going on but I believe with Solomon leading the group they will see where this is headed. As a couple of the group members said, “once they see the money, there will be no more questions”. And that is just it. That is why I'm here. To help them build the capacity to help themselves.

I believe that they are really close to having the capacity to help themselves. They just need a couple good ideas, some consulting, and some motivation.

On another note, there have been times lately when I will be doing something and suddenly think to myself, what the hell am I doing. Let me explain, after speaking nothing but Spanish for 3 days straight, a language I barely understand, or writing a part of the business plan, or even showering with a bucket of water while staring at a toucan, I realize that I've never been here before. And when I say, been here, I mean thought this way before. I guess I've always been the type of person to look onto others for guidance or if I wanted to learn something I took a class. I've only started to realize of late how alone I really am out here. Months will go by without talking to Peace Corps and I'm making my own agenda, schedule and working on projects that came out of my own head. Who would let me do this. I guess I've always been the type to rely somewhat on others and realizing that I'm doing all these projects and all this work solo is grounding to me. I feel a type of weight and freedom I've never felt before and it's scary and nice at the same time. If these projects fail, I will blame myself so I need to make sure they don't. And after learning a couple days ago that this will be the end of the CED program in Panama after I'm done here do to budget cuts, I feel all the more pressure to get these guys rolling. Keeping that fine line where they take ownership of the projects will be more of a challenge than anything.

Next up, I will be starting a new segment solely for the creation of the bike grinder. I realize that their might be people around the world with the same project and we will be creating a bike grinder unlike all others. I've combined a couple different plans that I have seen and we are going to try to create the entire thing out of the bikes that we have and local hard wood. This should be of particular interest for some people whom want to do the same type of project. We start on Wednesday...

Sustainable Developement Head First

For most of my life I've been the type of person that does more doing than planning. If I'm traveling to somewhere new I get the directions of a hostel without making a reservation and go from there. If the hostel is full I look for another. If they are all full, I sleep somewhere weird, hate myself for a night, and have a story to tell afterwords. That's pretty much how I look at life. It's sometimes the best way to do things because having no expectations and having success is much better than having expectations with little success. There are however times when planning is important and this is something that the Peace Corps is big on and something that I'm trying to force myself to do.

We have 2 years here in site and plenty of time to “capacity build” which is concept we were taught in training. We are trained to do complete community analysis' of the area including exercises to find out  what gender roles exist and the dynamic of the families. We are also supposed to be in our site for 3 months before we start any type of real work so we can gain the confidence and respect of the community. I waited about a month to start my work which was actually a long time for me. I can remember days that I had to tell myself not to do anything.

This has all come about due to a recent report that I have had to submit stating my progress in the community. I went through the four projects that I have started and explained them in some detail. If your not up to date with them here they are:

1.      Creating a new logo and packaging for the cacao and then creating a new marketing strategy to sell the packaged product in more and larger markets.

2.      Building a bike that will be hooked up to a grinder and will be able to grind cacao when demand is high. I've already worked to get two bike donations and a monetary donation for the project and found a guy to help build it.

3.      Starting a full scale cacao tour including tour guides, cacao making demonstrations, sloth viewing, and payment logistics. Business plan is in the works with my community counterpart and we will be presenting it on Sunday.

4.      Teaching English to the community

Besides this I have collected clothes donations, typed and printed out documents concerning statues in within the business group, contacted and worked with two non-profits, and made many connections on the island to sell the cacao. In my report I noted all these things and the response I got was pretty much to slow the hell down. Non of these projects are at all operational yet so slowing down doesn't seem like an option for me at this point. What does make sense and is what my boss has told me to do is get more people in the business group to do more of this work. This makes sense and I have now stepped back just a little. I feel like part of the problem here is that people are used to putting things off or taking a lot of time to do anything. They are also used to organizations, including the Peace Corps, coming here and not really doing much. I guess you can say I'm trying to make up for lost time and it hasn't been ill received. I've had people come up to me and tell me how happy they are that I'm here to help. In truth, I haven't done much yet. We are only beginning to see the plans for these projects but this is already more than anyone in the past has come up with.

I do have to note that the past volunteer helped bring cacao sales to the group which was a huge step. That said, I plan motivating them to take huge steps in that direction as well as others. The group has already been coached in how to deal with keeping books and after 25 years of aid organizations coming in I believe they can handle that aspect of it. They are also very organized and have clear definitions of roles and statues.

What we will be presenting this Sunday are things that I believe need to be cleared up before we even start. Things like where the money will go, who is going to get paid for what, and how much to charge.

I have put this all neatly into pie charts and graphs. Of course this is all up to them and changing numbers or even the entire plan is up to their discretion. I'm not even presenting this as it is always better for a respected member to present things of this nature. Some things that I have proposed in the plan that I hope for them to adopt are for profits to go towards building a library, trash cleanup, emergency health fund, and a reforestation project. I'm hoping for the best.

To sum it all up, I'm going faster than I should but I still believe that they and I are working within our capacity. Every time I see someone without shoes or eating only boiled roots for dinner I want to ratchet up my efforts, but I stop myself. I'm now realizing that going too fast will not only create an unmanageable workload for me, but could deter other projects like this from being started in the future. Sustainable development really is a science. You can't just walk in and say OK this is what you do now do it and here is some money see you later. As we are told in training, the people here have to take ownership of these things for the programs to work when I'm gone. Thank god they have Solomon is all I can say because without him, the group would just be another bunch of people sitting around talking. He also keeps me in check so I don't just say hey lets do it like this. I tell him and he says hey lets do it like this.

Of course there is so much more I can and need to talk about pertaining to the process of development and my work here but I figure one boring blog update like this a month is enough. Until then...