Progress

This place is truly beautiful. As I run at 5 AM (or 0500 hours, here) the sun rises and reflects its pale orange glow off clouds high in the distance. My thoughts return to the other day when those same clouds flashed with crackling lightning, but too far away to be heard. To the right, as I climb the largest hill near our town, fog floats over the jungle calmly sitting over a creek that cuts through the darkened foliage. I take a deep breath of the moist morning air and think back on my own progress since the PDM conference…

After returning from the conference I felt rested and a little fearful that the project goals talked about would come to naught. That all the well-laid plans my counterpart and I made during the week would come up short. I was wrong.

The first thing that got off the ground was moving tons of books to schools that haven’t had new books in long while. I think I mentioned these classrooms full of books in an earlier post, some time around June. Anyway, since then I have been lobbying to get them moved, but I hadn’t had the clout to make it happen “just now.” However, during the week that my counterpart and I were away, the Secondary School Education Officer (who ranks behind the Regional Educational Officer (R.Ed.O.), who is in charge of all the region’s schools) had an epiphany. She had been visiting schools for the 6-year program (the transition program for the remedial students entering secondary school) and was appalled that there were no texts for these struggling adolescents. She remembered us mentioning these classrooms filled with books and sprung into action. She mobilized many of the handymen from several of the region’s schools (a work force of about 15 plus 5 of us from the Department of Education) and decided on a day within the week of our return to clean that place out.


















The day arrived and the workforce decided to start with classroom that had the most books. We pulled out all of the books, separating them by schools. We didn’t have a list or anything; rather we just tried to distribute these books as evenly as possible to every institution (Nursery, Primary, and Secondary). It was a task. Some of these books seemed to have been in this room since 2007 or 8 maybe even as far back as 2006, before many of our staff worked in our office. The piles grew and grew, but then there was snag…

Working hard separating the books

Some of these books have been here so long, we had not idea what they were.

The first piles

…. The sun rises almost too quickly this close to the equator, but the land is bathed in saffron, sun-rising light as I go up and down, hills coming and going; gravity taking hold, helping, and then fighting; increasing resistance. Up and down, like a roller coaster, like my experience...my thoughts return to last week.

The region is in possession of a large truck, similar to a u-haul truck (the smallest version), which is used to distribute Juice and Biscuits to all the schools and also distribute books when we get them. However, on this particular day, at this particular time the driver of that truck, and there is only one, was taken ill. We had these piles of books, but no transportation to move them.

Almost all of the books on the lawn

Again, our secondary officer sprang into action. She called schools individually and asked them to get there own transportation; to hire a truck or go in with another school to get both their books. The piles receded, but the amount was still overwhelming. I wanted all the books to be moved in one day, but that wasn’t going to happen so we decided to clean out the now empty classroom and then organize the books by school. So when they come to get their books, they can just grab a hand trolley and roll them out to their transportation. It all became quite organized. I even labeled all the boxes to make sure every school got their fair share.

After the organization.

The day ended and although it was not a complete victory, it was a victory all the same. Recently, one of the heads of the more remote schools up the Demerara, a head I promised books to so many months ago, saw her stack and burst into tears. She was ecstatic and couldn’t believe the amount of books we set aside for her. When she comes into town next week she will carry them away. My chest swelled knowing that my actions had given someone so much joy. It reaffirmed my commitment to the Peace Corps and my projects…

…My legs hurt a little, but the ground levels off and the end of the “road” comes into view. If I keep running, I’d get to Georgetown up this main highway. However, I’m 3.5 miles away from my starting point, and now I need to go back. I turn. It is almost fully light now. The crisp air begins to flee as the heat of day fills the void left behind. Future endeavors dance before my eyes. I peruse projects and possibilities (in no particular order) as my feet stamp a steady tattoo upon the uneven pavement…

Every month, Head Mistresses and Masters come to Linden to attend a standing meeting. While they are there, I will do “Tim’s Tip of the Day” and explain one practical literacy strategy that they can take back to their schools and implement.

HM Meeting

Every month, teachers from every school come to a cluster meeting (by grade for primary schools and by department in secondary schools). My counterpart and I will teach these teachers different literacy strategies that they will take back to their schools and teach to other teachers during professional development sessions.

Go to different schools and co-facilitate Professional Development sessions after school with teachers and also perform classroom demonstrations of the strategy/techniques I taught them during PD.


Assist NCERD (in G-town) and educational consultants in establishing Literacy Committees within schools in Region 10. A literacy committee consists of several teachers who have a passion for literacy. Every month/week they will meet and think of activities that will promote literacy throughout the school, their community, and at home. These activities can vary from PD sessions to fun, engaging writing activities to monthly school themes/activities based around literacy. Anything, to promote and get kids and parents excited about literacy.


Finish my teaching manual, edit and revise it after input from my officers, classroom teachers, and former colleagues. Get it published with some sort of NGO/Grant money and hand it out to teachers to use. And then hold PD sessions on the techniques within the booklet. Moreover, once it is written and published the teachers coming to Cluster Meetings and HM meetings will be able to take one home and use it as a resource for their own in-house PD sessions.

Some resources for the Teacher's Manual

Assist with the 6-year transitional program, training teachers in practical “teach-niques” and strategies. Visiting their classrooms, observing their teaching and then conferencing with them. I also want to co-facilitate workshop for them and then go to their classes and perform classroom demonstrations to show them how successful the “teach-niques” could be.


Get approval and backing from Officers, HMs, teachers, parents, and students in order to re-open a teacher/student resource center. Get some money to fix it up. But this is still a distant memory…We still need to meet with REdO for his feedback….

The largest hill is behind me. The slightly inclined highway that leads to my street stretches before me. The heat is oppressive and its only 0615 hours. The day before me will be hot and probably rain in the afternoon for a small spell. But I feel good. I feel like things are coming together and it may not be perfect, but small victories await. My legs burn, and sweat drips from my face and back. My house comes into view It’s work. It’s all work. But it’s also progress…

-T

Another Birthday for my Libra Family!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, PHIL!!

Isn’t it crazy how age sneaks up? I’m not that much younger than you, you know! But age is only a number and doesn’t define who we are or how we act. Keep it real, yo. I love you, brother, and wish you to have a happy and celebratory day from South America!

-T

Still have no idea what you're doing, Phil, but it looks hard. Happy Birthday!

Rasta Kitty has Kittens!

Rasta, our adorable stray Guyanese kitten that we adopted about 4 months ago when we found her on the side of the road, got pregnant! We had plans to get her fixed as soon as she was big enough but the little hussy ran off and got herself preggo before we could get her to the vet! So, for 9 weeks we had a lazy, pregnant kitten lounging around our apartment. Well, last Thursday (on our 8 month anniversary of being in Guyana) Rasta delivered her kittens!

Tim says the represents the end of Rasta's innocence. She is no longer playing with her blue ball because she is too pregnant, instead she sprawls by her birthing box and awaits her fate....

    

Tim and I were just about to make dinner when we noticed Rasta pacing back and forth and going in and out of her litter box. We noticed a white, gooey glob in the box and immediately got online to figure out what it was. After browsing the amazing annals of the internet we learned that it was her mucus plug and Rasta was about to give birth. Now, in anticipation of this event, I had placed “nests”, specifically cardboard boxes filled with newspaper, all around the house so Rasta could choose where she wanted to birth her babies. Instead we saw her meander over to the bottom shelf of our homemade bookcase where we keep our clothes. As we hustled to remove our clothes and put down material that we wouldn’t mind messing up Sara noticed that there was something strange about Rasta, she was meowing and panting and purring all at the same time.

“Is she having her babies?” I asked. “Um, yeah…” Sara replied. And as I turned around I saw a black, sticky mass hanging half way out of Rasta. The kitten was breached and Rasta couldn’t get her baby out. She was freaking out, clawing at me, meowing, turning in circles and dragging her baby, still halfway inside her, around the room. At this point, I started to freak out too. “Should I pull it out?!?” I squeaked, panicked. Tim flew to the computer to see if it was okay for a human to assist a car in labor, after all cats have been doing this forever without us, right? Well, I didn’t want to wait for him to find the answer so I gently eased the kitten the rest of the way into this world. As I laid it on the floor, Sara and I were pretty sure it was dead. Tim ran back into our room, “Is it dead?” he asked. But Rasta knew what to do. She licked the baby clean of the sticky mucus and it began to squeak and twitch. She then quickly gnawed off the umbilical cord with her teeth and delivered the placenta and ate it. She picked up kitten Numero Uno by the scruff of its neck, carried it into the birthing nest in our bookshelf and proceeded to have two more babies over the span of the next two hours. The next two kittens, Numero Dos and Runt (the smallest little dude ever) came out easily and quickly.

It was amazing to watch! All three of us (Tony was in G/Town writing the Peace Corps Guyana newspaper, the Gaff) had lost track of time, forgotten to eat dinner, and were amazed that three and a half hours had passed with us sitting on the floor enraptured by the miracle of birth taking place.

Now the babies are four days old and all are healthy little squeakers. They are blind and deaf and completely rely on Rasta for everything. Now that she has gotten the hang of it, she is a great mom. She decided to move her babies from where she gave birth (to throw predators off her trail, I guess) to a little cubby under the counters in our kitchen. One by one she gently bit them on their scruffs and toted them to the cubby where they are presently sleeping. Rasta nurses them, licks them clean and snuggles them. In between all those tasks, she leaves the nest and takes naps on her own. All new moms need breaks from babies, don’t they?

Since cats can get pregnant almost immediately after they give birth, we are keeping Rasta inside so she can’t get herself into trouble with the tom cats in the neighborhood. She is not happy about her house arrest but oh well, it is for her own good. She will be nursing the kittens for the next 4-6 weeks and then we will help wean them, get them eating kitten food. Then we are going to get the whole family spayed/neutered! It costs about $40 US per cat but we are trying to be responsible here and don’t want to contribute to the already sadly un-spayed/neutered population of household pets in Guyana. Ideally, we are going to adopt the kittens off to other Peace Corps Volunteers. We will keep you posted on the status of these little guys along the way.

Overall, it was a crazy experience and I am stoked to have more little bundles of love around the house to snuggle and play with. Enjoy the pictures! 

A blurry picture of me, sitting by our bookshelf. Rasta is behind the pink bandanna, giving birth to Numero Dos. I just pulled a kitten out of Rasta so I am a little freaked out...

Runt being born. Numero Dos is off to the side, Numero Uno is nursing and Rasta is SO over having babies!

Cutting the cord with her teeth

Rasta moved her litter to the cubby in the kitchen. Numero Dos fell out. LOL!

The whole kitty family

Numero Dos

Runt

Numero Uno

Yep, we do actually ‘work’ in Peace Corps

In Peace Corps there is a very loose definition of ‘work’. We Volunteers are responsible for ‘building capacity’. Ahh, capacity building, that well loved, and well hated term used amongst development workers around the world…Basically, it means teaching people anything that will help them tackle their own social problems and address their own needs. As PCVs, in order to do capacity building, we first have to integrate into our communities. I mean, would you listen to a stranger coming into your home bossing you around? Probably not. But you might listen to advice a neighbor has to give you, especially if you have seen that neighbor volunteering at a local school, or helping whitewash a fence or something like that. We have spent the last 6 months in our community getting to know people, asking questions, developing a rapport and gaining the trust and respect of our colleagues and friends. Integrating is an ongoing project, of course, and is one huge part of our Peace Corps service. This being true, it does make hard at times to define ‘work’ because ‘work’ can be sitting and talking to the shop owner about his kids, being seen strolling through the market or at a cricket game, visiting friends at home or in their churches or even working in our garden. These things say to our community, “Hi I am here to stay for a while, I am one of you (even though I may not look like it) and I care about you, want to get to know you and work with you.”

Any PCV can tell you that during their service they sometimes felt like they were not “doing” anything, because this ‘integration’ part of capacity building often doesn’t feel like work. Tim and I constantly have to remind our selves that it is indeed a crucial part of our job. However, at the end of last month, Peace Corps Guyana HQ held a conference for all of Guy 22 to discuss the details of the work that actually feels like work, the nitty-gritty Project Design and Management (hence the name of the workshop: PDM).

We attended PDM, held at a swanky hotel for Guyana standards (hot running water, air conditioning and cable TV which we appreciated very, very much!), with our Guyanese counterparts. We each got to select a person with whom we work who will help us champion our projects and causes. I went with the Medex of my health centre and Tim took the Literacy Advisor from the department of Education in Region 10. Both these ladies have been essential in welcoming us into our workplaces and working with us to determine what sort of projects we should be working on. We all went into PDM with some ideas of where to take the next 18 months of our Peace Corps service and came out of PDM with some concrete plans of action. So, without further ado, I present to you my project plans:

1. Start a Health Club at the secondary school down the road from my health centre. Work with the teacher in charge who ran the club last year, to educate youth on many health aspects; sex education (I say Self education here in Guyana so I don’t turn people off), diet and nutrition, self esteem, decision making and more. I am excited to kick this off this week and get back in the classroom working with young people!
2. Work with the many already existing youth groups in the area to improve collaboration and coordination of services so that we can ultimately increase the number of youth who are accessing the health services that are available. There is an awesome NGO and also a group funded by the UNFPA and the Guyana Ministry of Health Youth Friendly Clinics (that I have been working with for a while now) all sort of doing their own things. My goal is to be a bridge between then groups so we can work together towards our shared goal. We held a meeting last week and already made good progress. The groups worked together to start planning an outreach booth at the upcoming Fair and a youth forum funded and organized by all three organizations.
3. Promote Youth Friendly Services by way of mass media. There is a television program funded by the regional government that is not being used to reach out to a large portion of the community so Sara and I, on request of the Regional Health Officer, have written some episodes to promote health among the youth and also that are accessible to the general populace. We are aiming to air our first episode in November.
4. Bring the Guyana Red Cross “Be Safe” Program into Region 10. This is an awesome program that teaches young children (under 9 years of age) about how to protect and respect their bodies and prevent domestic violence and sexual abuse in their lives. I have been working with the coordinator of the Guyana Red Cross and she and I hope to train 22 teachers and nurses to go into the schools in my community and carry out this program. We are planning to host the training in early December.
5. Continue promoting relevant health issues to the patients of the health centre. I am planning to continue giving health talks to the Elderly Club that meets at the clinic monthly and work with them to build their knowledge about chronic disease prevention and care. I also plan on bringing some of the information on healthy dietary practices that I have organized into a Guyanese context, to the mothers who come in to the Infant/Child clinic.

By doing all five of these things, I will be building capacity at all levels of the community; among the youth, adults and elderly both in and out of the clinic. I know I have a lot on my plate. It is actually a little scary just thinking about all I want to do and how little time I have to not only implement these projects but also find a way to make them sustainable before my service is over. Yeesh…

I think I will let Tim post his own blog about the projects he has in the works. Stay tuned! 

"WORK" that feels like work:

Discussing project plans and offering to assist in schools at a region-wide Head Teacher's Meeting

Me, giving a talk on balanced diets for children to a PTA meeting with astounding attendance

Working with students at the Youth Friendly Health Centre to design a poster on contraceptives

Teaching drama to students at the UNFPA funded youth group. Go collaboration!

 Also "WORK" although it doesn't always feel like it:

Drinking Sunny-D (no joke) with a fancy dinner at an awards ceremony for high achieving students

Mr. Barrow (Tim's self-proclaimed Guyanese godfather) invited us to the award ceremony he sponsors for stellar students

Watching the World Cup at a restaurant/bar = integration

Playing with a coworkers son at a water park/picnic

Doing laundry (this feels like work, but just housework) doubles as community integration too

HAPPY 10-10-10 @ 10 am!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MOM!!

Hello all, happy 10-10-10! We’re still working on our progress and kitten post ☺ but I wanted to take the time to not only post on this awesome date, but also wish mi madre a happy 25th birthday…I didn’t do so well in math; I will let her tell you her age if she wants to share it. Anyway, hope all is well and make this day a special one.

 That's Phil. His birthday is coming up a few days too. I am sure mom loves this pic :)

Barbershop White Gurl

Tony getting a cut at the "Barbershop"

One of the best investments we made coming out here was a set of hair clippers. Since I’ve been in Guyana I’ve paid for only one hair cut and this was done only during training when the clippers almost caught fire. Since then, though, I’ve been going to “Barber Shop White Gurl” aka Chelsea.

During training

Every couple weeks or so I sit on our porch overlooking the front of our house, while Chelsea clips away my hair with a #4 (Don’t act like you don’t remember the numbers, guys!) Every so often people, primarily men, stop and stare from the shop across the way. They shout things like, “Hey barbershop white gurl, can you cut mine next?” or they grab their dreadlocks and say “When’s my turn, babes?” We ignore it for the most part and eventually they move on and she finishes the trim.

Sitting in the chair, I think about why it’s such a big deal to sit on my porch and get my hair cut. I mean, why don’t more people do it? It saves money, right? However, walking around town and thinking about my barbershop experience on the Essequibo Coast, I realize that it’s part of the culture. Men go to the shop to have a gaff or 4, thus it’s a social exercise and activity. They talk as men talk  (for it is well known that men, in general, gossip more than women) and get their hair cut. So, of course, we’re a spectacle; not only am I a blinding white slab of skin (for I don’t usually wear a shirt), but I’m also not doing justice to the man’s barbershop code.

Granted I could way off, but it’s fun to think about.

Much love,

T & C

Before the first Barbershop Experience. CRAZY HAIR!