This is full war

"This is full war" Well, what Yousif really means to say every time he says that is "this is field work!" That, and "that road is bad" are his two English sentences. The latter is a sign of trouble ahead, while "field work" to him might as well be "full war" and is equivalent to a really tough situation. Wednesday we were off at 9 am to visit another partner. We stopped at 10 for a mid-morning lunch (egyptian beans with oil and onions, accompanied by liver.... the good bread would save me from hunger and hold me over until our dinner at 7). We reached the partners by 12 and had some tea and coffee at the "market" before heading to their "office". The tree wasn't doing a good job at protecting us from the first rain drops so we moved into an empty brick building (room) near the "market". A long discussion and we were out of there by 2. "We'll be back by 4! When it's raining it's better" exclaimed David. I guess you could argue that a slight rain made the mud a little smoother and easier to slide on and harder to get stuck in, but this was a serious tropical downpour. Anyone who has spent time in the tropics during the rainy season will know what that's like, but try driving down a river of mud with that rain coming down. The rain had just started as we were getting into the car and we were hoping to make it past the worst part of the "road" before the rain got worse, but just in case we gave a ride to a Save the Children guy hoping he could help us push if needed. I was sitting in the back on one of the benches and everyone started fastening their seat belts... who knew we even had any! Who wears seat belts in the bush unless they are afraid of crashing into bushes? Time to find and tighten my own. The notoriously "crazy part" of the "road" was our enemy. Once we passed it we'd be fine the rest of the way. The ordeal lasted 5 minutes. I held my camera tight in my right hand the whole way trying to capture this rare film of true full war. It was almost like riding on ice. The car goes wherever it wants, into the fields, back on track, back into the corn fields, this time almost pulling a 180. Can't go forward. A super-quick change of gear and we reverse out and back ahead. You can't take your foot off the gas or it's all over, can't push on the break, just have to keep going. Yousif's wild arm movements rally-style and the windshield wipers are just not fast enough. James in the front seats decides to wipe the windshield with a cloth, but as he bounces from one side to the other the only thing stopping him from ending up on Yousif's lap is the always-reliable seat belt. Around minute two we skid past a woman who is standing in a field to our right... we could have hit her, but no time to think about that, especially Yousif can't afford to look back. An F1-style chicane ahead and Yousif's arms are looking like a baker's wrist movement while whipping. We barely miss one tree to our left, hit another one that is lying to our right, but there's no stopping. Looks like we're stuck, the car is struggling, but we make it out. We are into the 4th minute and the "road" is now looking more like a river and water is flying off the wheels on all sides. We must be reaching the end, almost there, but suddenly we hit another ditch. Again I lose control of my right arm securing the camera, but I've held firm and haven't dropped it. The wheels are spinning, it's not looking good. We know that sound all too well. We're officially stuck. Time to take a shower. Shirts off, roll up the jeans, sandals off, and we're out into the mud. It wouldn't be until the next day that we'd realize how many thorns got into our feet. The first thing to do is to try to push and so we did. "Everyone, one, two, three".... The back wheels were stuck in a ditch that had essentially become a stream and was not going to make things easy. We tried with the jack lifting the back wheels, pushing forward, then everyone running to the front of the vehicle and pushing back. The rain never stopped. Gather branches and throw them under the tires, maybe that will help the wheels catch. Yet another try backwards and wait, it's going... we got it out! We rejoice and Yousif walks ahead to figure out how to pass this tricky spot. We move out of the way and let him do his magic, but as he tries to go around the side the ditch prevails once again and this time catches the front tires. Back we go to our pushing routine. Branches to fill the ditch, but the mud just sucks it all in. We got the Land Rover out once again, but pushed it back a little too far and got it stuck in the bushes. Another simple push and it was out again, but the ditch was not going to let us win, and back they went, the front tires, right into the ditch with no way out. If there had been young men walking by we might have asked for their help for another big push, but the only passer-byers were women and children or old men with walking sticks. Just our luck. We had spent more than 2 and a half hours in the rain, it would take my fingers hours to return to normal as the tips were wrinkled from the excess water. We eventually gave up and decided to walk to the town we knew was not too far (maybe a half hour "footing", if that) to get help in the form of a tractor, which would be able to pull our vehicle out. Well, we discovered on the way to the town that between the vehicle and town were 2 impossible hurdles. One kilometer or so down the road, just when we had assumed it was all clear, the road turned into a river. How? Well, whenever rain falls in this spot, two rivers form and flow across the road only a couple hundred yards of road between them; but the rain had been so heavy that the first river had flooded the area between the two rivers and the "road" had served as a nice new river bed. We crossed the first river, which was not flowing too quickly and wasn't too deep, just up to the waist. "When you walk in sand you need to drag your feet" was the advice Charles gave me as we crossed. We were already drenched so when it came to jumping into a river waist-high to get across, we didn't think twice about it. We then walked through the water of the river that had formed along the road, with water only reaching our thighs, until we reached the second river. A few hours earlier this river had been completely dry, only a bed of sand, but now it was a fierce flow of water, ideal for rafting. We were led by David - the fearless one, having walked for days during the war to escape "the enemy", and having crossed the Nile with crocodiles and snakes ready to attack. However, I was a little skeptical of his experience with rapids given the fact that the Nile is generally quite calm, but we were determined to get to the town. Dragging our feet in the sand we moved through the water keeping our arms out as David kept warning James, "don't look down". James was the shortest amongst us and was definitely the most concerned (a Kenyan, not a Sudanese) as the water was high well past his waist, but holding Charles's hand he made it across. The Save the Children guy offered us shelter at their compound next to the market. We were ready for food, but needed to find a tractor. By 9 we were all lying on mattresses ready to sleep, with the vehicle safely in the compound, having been dragged back by a beastly tractor that somehow had made it across the rivers and through the mud without being washed away. Our clothes were soaked, so we borrowed random clothes that were lying around the rooms we were staying in, and looked like a bunch of clowns the next morning as we went to the market to have tea. I was wearing florescent green sweat-pants that only came up to just below my knee, while David was wearing a bright blue jump suit. Charles had gotten himself a pair of Chinese shorts at the market and James refused to go barefoot like the rest of us and had picked up pinkish purple sandals a couple sizes too small. We sat there taking tea seated under a tree as the woman filled the glasses with way too much sugar and brought us some biscuits from another shop nearby. Ok, we're done, David turned to the woman, "how much do we owe you?" She looked at him with a shy smile and said "I don't know". We proceeded to figure out the bill for her. Total of 6 pounds (50 cents US) per person. We handed her a 10 and she reached into her pocket. She knew we had given her too much, but she wasn't sure how many of which bills to give us in change. We helped her choose four 1-pound notes and bid her farewell. Money is a huge headache here because there are 3 currencies: new pounds, old pounds, and dinar. The only difference between them is the number of zeros, (1 new pound = 100 dinar = 1000 old pounds) so you can imagine the confusion. And to add to the difficulty there is number illiteracy. Some people are not aware that the comma should only be placed every three digits. I even saw someone write 1,000,500 only to find out later that he meant one thousand five hundred. Makes sense I guess. I have seen people bargain and argue to only find out that they were talking about different numbers and different currencies. Upon realizing it they smile and go back to trying to agree on a currency and a figure. If the French and Italians are still talking in Francs and Lira years after the introduction of the Euro I'm not sure what will happen here.

Community contributions

"First of all I would like to pass my greeting to you in the name of almight father amen." That's one way you could start your next job application. It didn't work for the guy who applied for the job here, but you might have better luck if your future boss is a product of good refugee-camp Christian missionaries. But my guess is that nobody is reading this blog for tips on how to get a job, but rather to find out what Sudan is like and what a fool like me could possibly be doing here, so let's get back to daily life in Sudan. Without boring you with the details of the IRC (International Rescue Committee's) program here, let me just tell you that this story is about our partners, which are civil society organizations (CSOs) in this county. As you'll see, when it comes to planning on visiting them or conducting trainings it's not about what we'll do, it's about what we can do. Here is what the journeys are like...
It's Friday around 11 and Charles says, "we're going to drop off the Longan partners at this market... just here" raising his arm and indicating the other side of the hill to the East. "Great," I said "I'll come too so we can pass by Save the Children on the way back and drop this letter off". The way was pretty dry and as we drove up and down the rocky hills, then through "roads" with corn fields on either side we suddenly reached a road block. A small log has been placed waist-high across the road held up on two Y-shaped sticks. A tukul (the name of the houses around here) is off 100 yards to the right, so we honk the horn figuring someone will come out. Does he want us to pay a tax for passing through his land? Does he want to warn us that there are land mines ahead? The truth is, we'll never know why, because nobody came out and we just removed the trunk, drove through, and then put the trunk back in its place; close the door behind you, right? An hour and a half after we had left the office we stopped. There was no longer a "road" ahead, but just a river of mud. I turned to Charles and said, "that's it". Not in the form of a question, but more to indicate the fact that we had passed "that hill" long ago and I didn't care which market he was referring to, it was time to head back. The driver, Yousif, got out to check out the terrain ahead, but the three members of the CSO who we had taken, were delighted to have gotten this far. Where were we? We hadn't seen a tukul or a goat (only guinea fowl) for 20 minutes at least and it didn't look like there was anyone around for miles. The sun was beating down on our heads and there wasn't a chance of finding a bit of shade, but the three passengers got out of the vehicle and prepared for the five hour journey on foot back home with the two women carrying on their heads bags of goods they had purchased at the market (not the one we never got to). Turns out we had passed the market already, but given the good road conditions Yousif had decided to take them further. Bags and jerry cans filled with 20 liters of water (that's 20 kg) is not all you'll see women carrying on their heads. Tables? fine. Sand in buckets? sure. But the most shocking for me has been seeing a woman carry on her head 1) a baby in a straw basket (Moses-style), 2) stones! or maybe I should say rocks, and 3) a trunk. Yes, a tree trunk a few meters long! This leads me to journey number 2.
It was Monday afternoon a little after 2:30 and one of our partners was supposed to be trained in basic farming practices, but the trainer was called by some government officials and was not able to go. We only found out about this in the afternoon, so we were going to tell our partner CSO that there would be no training (they probably would have figured that out already) and that the trainer would be free any day before the 30th. Off we went. Another pretty dry day, so we were safe. On the way we saw a man carrying a rifle, or maybe it was a Kalashnikov, (you can tell I'm not a war veteran nor a hunter) with two animals hanging from the tip of the weapon. "Are those rabbits?" They kinda looked like squirrels too, but I was way off: "wild animals without a tail" David said. Not sure if that is the official latin or greek name, but one thing is for sure, they were going to be the man' dinner: Cena in latin. The road turned into a rocky trail. It didn't look like a vehicle had ever been down this creek-like passage between the hills. James, the Kenyan guy who was also making the trip for the first time (as was I) was quite worried about land mines, but David reassured him that "this area was not affected by the enemy". Yousif kept driving. After a little while James asked, "David, did you come here?" "Once, during the dry season". Why was James asking? Well, not only was there no sign of a vehicle having ever passed there, but we were making our way following what were clearly trails meant for people and maybe bicycles, and after we almost got stuck between two trees and pulling a U-turn I too was wondering if Yousif had any idea where he was going. In Kenya they have the Rhyno Charge where land cruisers are supposed to complete an impossible course through fields, ditches, trees, and rocking terrains. We were essentially on the Sudanese rhyno charge. My mom probably would have wanted to stop and ask for directions at this point, but since there was no one around, that wasn't exactly an option. Finally David said, "I think I recognize this place". What was he talking about? All these short trees and ditches looked the same. The hills around the clearing looked just as far in all directions no matter how far we drove. Then David turns with conviction and goes "they were waiting under that tree... maybe they went". The tree he was pointing to was a little larger than the others around, but how in the world did we find it? We didn't stop at the tree, but drove another 100 meters. David's time to play tour guide. "The office is somewhere there" he said pointing in the direction of.. well, nothing really, just some more trees. "That's the community contribution", he continued. He could tell James and I looked puzzled, so he clarified, "those stones". They had been collected and brought to this area to be used as building materials. But what about the community? "They are not around, when we used to come, when they'd see a vehicle they'd come running". So nobody running meant nobody around. "The house of the project manager is over that hill". Turns out the location of the "office" was chosen as a central location, but it took people hours to get there. Ok, nobody around, back in the vehicle, time to drive back. But as we drove past THE tree we heard voices coming from the small hill on the right. A man was coming running! He must have been at least 50, more like 60, but he was sprinting regardless. We slowed to a halt as he approached and he shook hands with all of us through the open windows seemingly not out of breath. He was going to be our messenger.

honey and strawberries

Am now in a grimy beach town which is trying to be a tourist destination, but failing miserably. La Ceiba is its name. The weather is agreeable though and the local food tasty and cheap, which is all I really require. There is even 100 channels on the tv to go through, which I am finding to be seductive. For those of you who didnt' get the latest update, disfrutes...


$.33/pound strawberries was the highlight last week. I was in a small town (15,000) called Comalapa, about 2 hours away from Guatemala City at about 4500 feet. The town was 99% indigenous less me and a hand full of missionaries that occupied the only hotel in town. The hotel was brilliant as I upgraded from $5/night to $8/night with my own bathroom with real hot water (not a suicide shower) and a tv, which allowed me to watch more soccer. Decent sheets and a real mattress was the proverbial icing on the cake. I ate most of my meals in the center of town, about two blocks down. There, everyday gathered a small little market and during breakfast and dinner hours food venders. Breakfast was usually half a cup of hot milk with the other half being hot chocolate and then a couple of sweet breads to dunk in the mixture. Dinner consisted of Guatemalan taco which is a variation of the Mexican variety, but a little larger and for some reason they like to season their meat with soy sauce.

Tuesdays, Fridays, and Sundays are their market days and I caught the best one, a Tuesday. About two football fields were packed with people who brought something to sell from the typical fruit and vegetable stand (but laid out on a tarp on the ground) to the chili lady to the medicinal herb/bark man with all kinds of exotic looking remedies. Everyone is a capitalist here, trading and selling something.

I visited the town for three days while evaluating a Trickle Up partner. The NGO, named ASOGUADI, is a small outfit of only about 5 people, which recently had its main project reduced because its larger partner, SHARE, lost its USAID funding. Lots of acronyms. They are doing some great work with women's weaving cooperatives, some farmers trying to take advantage of the new free trade agreement. A highlight was being ferried around one morning on the back of a dirt bike. Can't say it was very comfortable and found it quite the work out for my groin muscles as I had them constantly tensed so I wouldn't fall off the back of the motor bike as we went up hills. I think it would've been better if I was driving. It didn't help either that it was a day with "gastro intestinal" issues. The doctor told me to lay off the dairy products, which I finally did and seemed to solve the problem.

The other highlight was visiting a honey business that ASOGUADI was supporting. This included me being decked out in a bee keeper's outfit. We visited the bees which of course weren't too excited about us breaking into their house. I was informed that the bees were actually being very calm as there wasn't any honey as it was the off season. When there is honey, they go crazy and fly directly into your face. There were three legit bee suits between the five of us. The other two honey entrepreneurs wore extra pants, a sweat shirt or wind breaker, and make shift masks made from grain sacks and some plastic mesh as their viewing window. All of the bees swirling around you is a bit discerning, but after a while it becomes normal. They supposedly can smell you and if they recognize you, refrain from stinging you.

My last day with ASOGUADI, I went to a business training being held by a local NGO being funded by Oxfam Holland. The training was decent, but in typical manner dominated by one or two more outspoken attendees. All of the attendees work as leaders of their agriculture associations or cooperatives and are trying to learn how to play the export game now that the free trade agreement is in place. There is definitely plenty of help being offered to them, but you have many of the members of the organizations that don't want to change how they farm or make the necessary investments, thus they aren't taking advantage of the new market. At the training, they showed a cartoon based on the book "Who Moved My Cheese", but in Spanish of course. It did a great job of getting across the message that they have to change the way they do business or will be left behind and miss the benefits that are coming to the country from the new business. Now the just have to sell the 50 members of their own organizations on it.

Friday I crossed into Honduras. Honduras reminds me of Panama. The food is similar with stewed meats, rice, and fried plantains. Tomorrow the roads are to be blocked as the locals are very happy with the mining countries. Supposedly they don't pay taxes and are contaminating water supplies, which is producing large amount of deformities amongst newborns. US companies aren't to blame though, it's the Canadians who are running the culpable mines. Hondurans are very hospitable and laid back. We went to a carnival on Sunday night. Typical carnival with rides, carnival games, a couple of bars, carnival food, and plenty of families and little kids. For $.05/game, I played foosball against some Honduran kids. A game included 5 balls and a slanted table, which gave a distinct advantage to one side.

The organization I am evaluating here at the moment is partnering Trickle Up seed capital with cows from Heifer International. I have heard much about Heifer as they have an office in Ellensburg and they are my mother's favorite xmas gift now. This was the first time I have run across one of their projects though. People received pregnant cows, which they then passed on the birthed calf to someone else and kept the cow. Everyone still has their cow 2-years later and either drinks the 5-7 liters of milk the cow produces or sells it to others in the community. The Trickle Up funds are being used as rotating credits which some groups have used either to invest in more cows or their crops such as corn or beans. Corn prices in Honduras have almost doubled from last year's prices. Thank you ethanol and the lobbying skills of the Iowan corn farmers. This produces a dilemma for many poorer countries though as it pushes up prices for the urban poor and population (tortilla prices), but is a bounty for the rural poor who are the poor farmers that produce it.

Now it is off to the North coast of Honduras to the town of Tela. This is supposedly the Cancun of Honduras. I will be writing some of the evaluations there before heading to La Ceiba to do more evaluations and profiles on projects with the local afro-antillian community or Garifuna people. I am looking forward to eating some decent and cheap sea food. Need to gain back the 10 pounds I lost while in Guatemala.

The bush and the one-armed pilot

"We'll be done in less than an hour... we don't beat the bush around". That's nice, I thought, at least the bush doesn't suffer.
"The bush" is an term you hear daily around these parts, usually used to refer to the area outside of "towns" or settlements. If you didn't leave the country during the war, that means you were "in the bush" and after the war, came "out of the bush". Now, if your vehicle gets stuck you can spend the night "in the bush"; the same "bush" where the Arab herders hang out. Sorry, all of you guys in DC must hear enough about the Bush, so I'll move on.
Life is highlighted by the adventures you have, but more than anything, by the cast of characters on these adventures. I met Abraham: the only member of his family who caught the last train out of South Sudan before the war broke out, made his way to Egypt, and eventually ended up in Raleigh, North Carolina, only to return this summer to his home town to help build schools. His life is in his adoptive home, but his life is devoted to his motherland. There is Andrew, who after escaping to Uganda, made his way to Australia with his family, and while his brothers and sisters are successful doctors and lawyers Down Under, and his father is in South Africa training SPLA pilots, he has chosen to return to his home. Why? Well, he's not a fan of the "white collar" life. But he's not thinking about settling here for good. Few are. For now peace is just temporary. So sounds like people aren't coming back. But then I meet Jacob. He tells me that now everyone is on their way back. Life abroad has not been easy for the Sudanese people; families have suffered, it has been difficult to adapt, "the Sudanese people never aspired to leave their country" but were forced to do so. Apparently many professionals have not been able to find jobs--the Indian lawyer driving your DC cab last night could probably tell you about that. But what about Andrew's brothers who are practicing law and medicine over in Melbourne? As always there are those who make it and those who don't.
But remember, some, many actually, never left... the guys in the bush. A guy just came into our office crawling on all fours. He's a finance officer for one of the local community organization. A smart guy, but can no longer walk. He doesn't really have a wheelchair, but even if he did it wouldn't help on these "roads". Maybe crutches would help, but actually they would get caught in the muddy ground... If only we had roads... By the way, I have also discovered that the lack of roads is the reason for no glass! You can't transport glass windows or glass anything on these roads, so there is no glass anywhere. Stood by the side of a vehicle this morning and used its rear-view mirror to shave.
I'm back at my site, but I wasn't able to catch a flight back here on Tuesday because I was the only one who wanted to fly to Kauda so they canceled the flight. However yesterday I managed to get on a plane...it was me, another passenger, the pilot and the first officer. As we were taking off I noticed the pilot was only using her left arm and kept her right arm in a bent position as if she had it in a sling, only without a sling. Turns out she had had a motorcycle accident. I didn't catch her name, but she'll forever be known to me as "the one-armed pilot". They call the planes up here "matatus", which is also the name given to the little mini-vans that drive people around Nairobi like taxis and compete with the public buses. For all of your French and Spanish speakers the name "matatus" should be as disconcerting as it is to me. Sounds like "mata" "tout", or in other words, "kill" "everything"... or everyone in our case. They real reason the flights are compared to the Nairobi vehicles is that they stop and go, stop and go. We landed after 20 minutes, took off, landed after 5! Took off again; were supposed to land after another 15, but as we came in for our landing the one-armed pilot saw that the landing strip was flooded and decided to reach over her right arm with her left and push the plane back up. So now the 3 guys who we were supposed to be dropped off at the flooded place got to choose where they wanted to go. What a treat. They were given a choice of five places, but the one they chose was quickly scratched by a radio communication. Kinda like a menu at a restaurant in a developing country; at the end, they had no choice, they were going to be dropped off in Rumbek, but not after dropping me off first.

Now I know you all think no one could top your summer adventures, but have I got an amazing story to tell you....

This summer I decided I really needed a change of pace; I needed to get myself away from the 1700 block of Mass. Ave. and out into the fresh air of the rest of the world, so I pulled out the old inflatable globe, gave it a couple of spins and took off to the first place my finger landed.....

So now instead of taking the metro everyday the 45 minute commute from Maryland to Dupont Circle.....I am getting off at Farragut North. That's right. My little inflatable globe knew that the one thing I was missing out on in this world was spending the summer in a windowless DC highrise office-building (any benefit to it be a highrise being negated by the fact that it's windowless).

But not to get too sarcastic, I am enjoying a relatively peaceful summer in the city. Juanito's job at the sandwich shop keeps him busy and is actively motivating him to find another job.... My job as an intern at Pact International is also keeping me busy, but I'm happy to say I think I'm doing meaningful work and they're really taking me seriously as a capable person in this field. My co-workers are really friendly people, and they have felt very open to griping to me about the downsides of working at headquarters.

And while my weekends are not filled with trips to the ocean or the mountains, or the source of the Nile, Juanito and I have been heading out on our bikes to other exotic locales like College Park and Silver Spring, and hosting famed violinist Mahatma Hernandez (brother to Juan Hernandez) during his 5-state musical tour (ok, sorry, sarcasm snuck in again).

In all seriousness, I miss you all. DC is not the same without all you I-Dev-ers in it. So enjoy your travels and the chance to do some great field work, and keep sending your stories; I enjoy the vicarious globetrotting.

Take care,

Kim

the edit version

Ite, some of you I think already received this. It has been edited for more crass coommentary as my sponsor is on the email list. Gotta love when our development money is going to cut down forest next to a national park to make cattle pasture, yep. I am tired of hippies too. they are all over the place here, hanging out, and talking about stuff they know nothing about. a little long, but worth it. Good luck getting to that wedding Jon and getting back...


Last week I spent on the Rio Dulce, and literally spent a good half of my time on it boating around. The Rio Dulce is a river that exits into the Caribbean and is at the moment half salt water/half fresh water. Rich Guatemalans have bought up most of the “river” front, but you still have the occasional hold out, so you have large mansions next to shacks which look like they ready to fall off their stilts and into the river at any moment. The area is mostly populated by indigenous of Mayan ancestry and reminded me of Panama; hot, rainy, and sweaty. While there, I visited three communities where Trickle Up (for whom I am interning, www.trickleup.org) has projects with the organization, Ak’Tenamit. Ak’Tenamit (AT) is interesting as it is almost all composed of indigenous workers and is currently run by a 23-year old. AT was started by a Gringo 25-years ago and has since grown substantially. It now runs a vocational school (where the 23-year old graduated from) for 370 students and has a multi-year and million dollar contracts to provide health services for the ministry of health and community organization development funded by the Danes. They are new to the Trickle Up program, so there was plenty of work to do.

One highlight was supposed to be a traditional Mayan celebration, but was more the locals getting partying. It probably didn’t help that I had the Giardhea (sp?) and had only eaten a couple of pieces of bread in three days and plenty of 7-Up. The same Giardhea hit my travel partner, but as our counterparts from AT said the community especially requested our appearance for the ceremony, we agreed to attend. We though that it would occur soon after are early evening arrival and that we would be soon off to a restful sleep, but that was not to be had. The ceremony wouldn’t start until 11ish and not finish until mid-night we were eventually informed, so we requested a place to sleep/rest before arising again for the ceremony. They set us up with hammocks in a neighboring shell of a future or past house. Unbeknownst to us, they had us set up our hammocks in what became the nursery and later the cafeteria. First as I settled to get some rest, a women set up her hammock right next to me and laid down what must have been a toothing baby because it didn’t stop crying for a good hour. That was from 9-10pm. Two small girls also decided to lay down right under my hammock, so I almost stepped on them went to exit the hammock at 11pm when I had set my alarm. The ceremony was a bust as it was just the locals sitting around a drinking with our counterparts. There was some incense burned and an older gentlemen circled the store sprinkling water and chanting a bit, but that took all of 5-minutes, during which the rest of their men continued on their mission to get drunk. After realizing I had seen the ceremony I returned to my hammock, 11:30pm. At 12:30pm I was awoken again by my now semi-drunk counterpart announcing another meal. As groggily watched, a table was brought in and bowls of chicken soup were placed on it. Once the table was full of bowls, all of the semi-drunk men grabbed a bowl and started eating, tossing the chicken bones to the ground in the normal chicken eating manner. They eventually finished their food and exited allowing me and my partner to lay down once again. That lasted all of an hour before the pigs and dogs arrived to scavenge the strewn chicken bones. Pigs rooting around are not quiet and neither one of us had the energy to chase them off, so I laid awake listening to the dogs and pigs battle for the chicken scraps for another hour. Finally, to sleep around 2am only to be awoken at 5am by my now fully drunk counterpart to rise and start hiking to catch our 6am launch, that of course arrived an hour late. That is a night that I won’t soon forget and as my travel partner stated, is why he earns comp time while in the field.

I sit here in bed with a full stomach. I ate some kind of Guatemalan “taco”, or at least that is what the lady told me it was. It looked nothing like a Mexican or US taco. It had been fried and was filled with potatoes and meat and covered with salsa, cilantro, and crumbled queso blanco. I added to that a chicken tostada and two cups of some kind of sweet warm corn drink. I only wanted one cup, but she gave me two and charged me for two, so there I was the Gringo double fisting styrofoam glasses of sweetened corn meal. In general, I am tired of the food as it mostly consists of corn tortillas and beans. I am a fan of beans, but I prefer mine with rice. Breakfast consists of eggs, beans, and tortillas. I have eaten eggs for breakfast the last two weeks. Today’s variation was ranchero, or covered in a tomato salsa. Probably my favorite variation so far. The orange juice wasn’t the fresh kind I usually get at other locations and more of the SunnyD variety, which I am not a fan of.

Since I have arrived, I feel like I have seen a good portion of the country. I started out by staying in Antigua, which is Gringo(a) central (Gringo(a) for those of you who don’t know is Central American’s name for those from the US, not to be confused with Canadians). We pass each other in the streets trying not to notice each other, but it is pretty hard when a third of the population seems to have white skin, not brown skin like the Chapines, or Guatemalans. Antigua is supposed to be a great place to learn Spanish, so there are 20 or so Spanish schools and with it being summer break, there seem to be plenty of college aged kids down to brush up on their Spanish and get some culture. Most of the culture though has been sucked out and what is left is the typical Westernized pseudo culture that permeates other formerly culturally beautiful cities or spots in Central America. Not that I don’t find using the Wifi very convenient in the Bagel Barn while munching on my pesto bagel, but with every other store front being an internet café or travel agency, the town quickly loses any originality. That was my first weekend and I returned there for another couple of days as it was where my partner wanted to stay.

I am now in the town of Coban though, a much more Guatemalan town as the weather fouler, which keeps away the Gringos. I am staying at Posada Don Pedro, which occupies a corner. I have a huge room to myself with three other beds and I think actually the whole Posada, less Don Pedro and his family which occupies one side of the building. There is a nice courtyard with the requisite fountain and where the laundry hangs. The bathroom is shared and the hot water is courtesy of the suicide shower variety water heater (attaches to the shower head and heats on the spot). The suicide shower at my hotel in Antigua actually gave me a decent electric current through the shower nob if I wanted to change the temperature or turn it off. I had to be pretty quick about it. Don Pedro is charging a whopping $5.50/night, the best deal I have found so far. The laundry service thought isn’t a deal at roughly $.70/pound. As half of my clothes are still semi-humid with sweat, I don’t feel like I am getting a deal even though they fold your laundry for you. I have searched for coin operated machines, but I guess they don’t trust guests with their own laundry.

Coban is in the coffee country. I haven’t seen the countryside yet, but that will be tomorrow and the next day as I will be out working or visiting the villages. The area is known as the world’s leading cardamom spice producer. Town is 80% indigenous with most of them selling food from little stall or just baskets from the sidewalks. Unfortunately, I took an extra long siesta yesterday and missed the crowning of the town senorita, which had promised to be quite the beauty pageant. Today was spent cheering on the US team in the Gold Cup final with who I think is Don Pedro. The Chapines don’t like the Mexicans and were all cheering for the US.

The week before last week was spent with my direct report at Trickle Up being introduced and touring the other projects there are. I saw some of the poorest people I have ever seen. Hurricane Stan, similar to our Katrina as I understand it (same year at least, 2005), washed their village down the mountain side. The government or some official agency decided on top of the mountain would be a good place for them, so now they live in the clouds at 8000ft. The landscape is very eerie as it is barren from them having cleared it for fire wood and to plant the milpa, or beans and corn. “Town” was set up by all the big relief agencies: CARE, Mercy Corp, World Food Program, USAID, and UNDP. It has square blocks and everyone’s house is the same, less some individuality that is now starting to creep into the buildings. Think US cookie cutter suburbia, less the McMansions and more like 10x15 block buildings where 8 people live squeezed. The people were remarkably resilient though and are making a go of it. The Trickle Up seed capital is going to be invested by the women in thread and material so they can weave the traditional blouses that they will then sell. For coming to visit they made us chicken soup. The most amusing thing was that they bought us cans of Pepsi as refreshment. A luxury to them, but the last thing I wanted to drink. Ah, American consumerism. There I am in a displaced person’s camp, one of the far and poorest corners of the earth, and Pepsi had arrived…

Finding a humorous note in their situation from some USAID tarping. I assume it was originally supposed to be used as walls for structures, but was now being used for many different things. Under the large USAID brand which was stamped every two feet on the tarp was written in English, “Donated by the American people.” Less then 10% of the population spoke Spanish and maybe .1% a couple of words of English. A great example of what I learned in one class… that the US’s motives are often grand and just, we just screw up the details and execution.

Other than getting to see a ton of different development projects, one of the coolest parts is that the people are so grateful for the help, that they usually give you a meal as that is their way of showing appreciation. As most or subsistence farmers, the food is home made and quite tasty. Some even give elaborate weavings (nothing to valuable, but still very interesting). Of course it is nice to receive things, but as I didn’t donate the money nor do any of the trainings to help them start the building, it is a little awkward.

PRM coming in handy

OK, so all of you from our PRM class last semester will laugh to know that I've been asked to help carry out an impact assessment of the microfinance institution in terms of both economic and social aspects of clients' lives. So I'm happy/sad/perplexed to say that I actually looked back at some of my notes and staff reviews. Yes, PRM may actually prove to be "practical." Yikes. In my proposal for the project (which had a frightening resemblance to a staff review), I planned for the project to take 9 weeks. This will be tricky given the fact that only 6 weeks remain of my internship. Hmmm. But there are a couple other interns that will be here longer, so I may have to entrust them with finishing the task.

This weekend, Pierre, Janine (from Bologna) and I went to a nice lake about an hour outside of Kigali, and spent the afternoon swimming. It was really nice, and even though the water was kind of dirty, it was still a fun swim. I'll leave it to Pierre to post some photos!

I think I've seen about 3 genocide memorials so far. One had preserved bodies, another had skulls and bones. The latter one was in a Catholic Church. Yeh, I think I'm done with genocide memorials for a while. I get the idea. Actually the 4th of July is a national holiday here as well as it marks "Liberation Day" which is the day the genocide ended (or at least when the Tutsi-led rebel forced took control of Kigali).

So happy 4th to you all scattered around the globe, and Jonathan, I'm sending good thoughts up north in your direction so that a plane arrives to take you to your sister's wedding!