Monday, April 25, 2011

Cave and Sinkhole Exploring

Two weeks ago I went cave exploring with a group of local guides. Although there were times when I was certain I was going to slip on the mud and lose my grip and fall down holes, I got to go into some really awesome caves. One was down a fairly steep slanted wall that dropped down onto a level chamber probably the length of two football fields, at the end of which was a lake that went deep and probably connected to another room on the other side. There were bats and cave crabs and those creepy cave arachnids. We also saw deep and scary sinkholes. The ecotourism committee hopes to soon put in a better trail to get there. It was one of my coolest Peace Corps moments thus far, hands down.
1. Crazy cave arachnids (this one dead)












2. The cave entrance, looking up


















3. Some of the endless examples of interesting stalagtite formations
















4. An immense sinkhole. Fall in and you won't make it out.


















5. A cool tree on the way to the caves.

Monday, April 18, 2011

Building Trails in the Cloud Forest

For those of you out there who are keeping score at home, my last blog post was about how schools were closed for more than a month because of a teachers’ strike. So, I basically spent the entire post explaining (okay, call it complaining) why I haven’t been able to do part of the work I wanted to in my town because of things that were way out of my hands. (And hopefully those roaring political storms have calmed for a bit and I can soon restart work at the school). But I found it unfair that I didn’t talk at all about the work that I have been doing in the past couple months: so here it is, four brief overviews of solid projects that have been happening around here:
1. Database system at the coffee co-operative


2. Total trail system make-over in the cloud forest


3. Construction finished on community center


4. New project: improve health center



1. Database system at coffee co-operative


In February I teamed up with a fellow business volunteer, Carrie Purdue, UVA grad and good friend, to design a new database system for my coffee co-operative (see picture of us on a hike in a national park outside of Teguz). The administration was looking for a way to digitalize their receipts, to get up-to-date inventory reports, and to be able to track the production and credit trends of coffee farmers who sell to the co-operative over time. So Carrie shared some of her extensive Excel know-how and we sat down and put together a new program that, I’d like to think, is very simple and intuitive to use but that will hopefully be a helpful tool for decision-making.


Up to this point, we’ve been finishing up this coffee harvest using both the old, inflexible and stale database, and the new one, as they’ve been getting used to the new processes. The dream is that this new system will make it easier to manage the co-op in general, using information and technology to be more successful.



2. Total trail system make-over in the cloud forest


Alicia, the PCV who’s working with me on developing ecotourism, got one of her former co-workers in the Seattle park service to come down to Honduras for a month to help us work on our trails. His name is Jack and he’s got years of expertise designing and maintaining trails in the Seattle area.


We held a trail building workshop for fellow PCVs and for their counterparts, as well as members of our communities, a couple weekends ago. About 25 people showed up, which for us, felt like a great turnout. In the training, Jack talked about the three main components of trail building: the grade (or slope/inclination) of paths, water drainage, and the “tread” (or path). Many of the current trails in my town are used by workers and by pack animals getting to and from coffee farms and are basically straight up the sides of hills. That’s not ideal for tourists, however, because it’s a lot more tiring to walk, and when it rains, the paths basically become muddy creeks.


So during the weekend-long training and since then, we’ve been building “switchbacks,” which are zig-zag paths that wind up the side of hills to avoid the steep straight-up paths, and “water bars,” which are rudimentary drain canals perpendicular to the trails. We also have been working on taking out roots and widening the path wherever possible. In the picture here, one team is working on installing a rock-step bridge across the river (which only has water in it during the rainy season). It has been frustrating work sometimes, logistically speaking, but it’s a lot of fun being out in the woods. We saw a coral snake and have heard quetzals and howler monkeys. I think the trails will end up great and hopefully will be a boon for our marketing efforts.



3. Community Center


One of the first things that I did in my site last summer was meet with the Patronato, the local town council, every week. It was a good way to meet the leaders in my town and to see what sort of initiatives were big. Well, instead of big development initiatives like business training or children’s nutrition programs etc, they had prioritized the construction of a community center. The idea was to have a place to hold town meetings, weddings, wakes, political events and, of course, dances. This is the perfect example of balancing the community’s desires with our own ideas and plans as volunteers: although I didn’t think it was priority number one, they asked me to help out, so I said yes. We made a work plan, vetted a foreman and wrote the budget to be presented to the municipality.


Anyway, the good news is that construction was finished in February and they held the inauguration dance for Valentine’s Day. I admit that there was a certain sense of accomplishment upon seeing it finished, though a new building doesn't necessarily mean "development." I will post pictures one of these days. Also, I think helping community members on this project gave me a leg up in terms of their trusting me in the future. Now with my foot in the door, hopefully, it will be easier to work on new project (see number 4 below).



4. Health Center


To finish up, I’ve been meeting with a group of people in my town who wanted to "do a project." Alicia is building a library in her town, using one of the PC grants available to volunteers, so people in my town wanted "something" too. So we met for a couple hours a week for a month and a half in order to analyze the needs/problems of the community and then brainstorm possible solutions. What ranked as the highest need for the community according to my committee was working on the Health Center. Although it wasn't my first choice of projects, the cool thing about service in the PC is that we can respond directly to the desires of our communities. Thus, we are going to be looking at physical expansions, new equipment and getting a doctor. Although this doesn’t specifically have to do with my business project, it may be a good side project.


I must admit that I am highly concerned with sustainability. I.e. we could spend a lot of time and money on fixing the building and getting new equipment, but if the management of the Health Center doesn't improve, it may all be wasted, having little positive impact on the community. For me, the ideal would be to work on fixing the root causes of poor health: lack of education and lack of income generating activities for families. Will continue updating on this…

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Honduras Teachers' Strike

I’m going to try to be careful about how I express myself on this topic, given that Peace Corps volunteers aren’t really supposed to publish opinions on political matters in their host country. Remember that these are my words, not the American government’s… But I am left frustrated by the continuing political clash between the Honduran government and the national teachers’ syndicate. Their 5 ½ week strike has just ended, but there are threats of an immediate repeat.

The teachers claim that corrupt government officials robbed the better part of their pensions fund amidst the confusion and chaos of 2009’s political crisis and that no one has yet been held accountable. [But then again, the teachers went on strike for that last year too.] The union also claims that the government is secretly scheming to privatize the entire education system of Honduras, which would, they claim, end the education of hundreds of thousands of children whose parents couldn’t afford to pay tuition. Privatization would also, not to mention, undoubtedly affect their salaries. So, for these reasons, and possibly more, the teachers’ union went on strike for more than a month, essentially shutting down blocks and blocks of Tegucigalpa in sometimes violent protests, and in effect making a mess of my plans to work in the schools this year.

It doesn’t help the delicate situation that the vast majority unionized teachers belong to “La Resistencia” (The Resistance), the political party of Mel Zelaya, the deposed president who was replaced by current president Pepe Lobo. It also doesn’t help that lame-duck presidents in past have conceded perhaps more than the government could really afford to the constantly fighting union: There is a strict one-term term limit on the presidency and increasing spending on education looks good to international aid organizations like the IMF and World Bank (that often tack on policy stipulations to their loan offers), not to mention is good for the public image of their party.

I agree that unions are helpful to put a check on capitalism that naturally pushes down wages and quality of working conditions as enterprises seek to expand profits. Indeed certain universal workers’ rights should be respected. But a balance should exist. In a country where the government struggles to collect even the slimmest portion of taxes owed to it by its citizens and that has been running on a decade-long deficit supported only by international aid organizations, the teachers have it pretty well. Too well?

You’d think it would make sense to invest in new schools, new classrooms, general repairs, new desks and chairs, chalkboards, useful books, training for teachers etc etc. But teachers’ salaries eat up a very high percentage of the entire education budget (some pundits claim more than 90%!). Plus, they don’t have to pay income taxes, hold lifelong jobs, get bonus pay if they work in rural communities (still the majority in Honduras), only have to have a high school diploma to be able to teach, and only teach half-days (a good part of which, kids are playing futbolito at recess). The principal of my school has one of the nicest houses in town with two stories and a garden. All this and teachers still found it necessary to be on strike for a month.

And what an ugly month it was in terms of resolving disagreements: riots and tear-gas in the streets of Tegucigalpa, one teacher died, several were jailed, both sides almost comically called the others’ bad names, and all the while, kids across the country simply lost all those days of potential learning. And trust me: at least the kids in my town need to study a whole lot more to be on par with children in the rest of the world in even the most basic of things like elementary reading and writing and mathematics, not to mention more complex things like science or history or just general critical thinking skills. Working in the fields or in the home instead of going to school is a problem when classes are actually being held-- and when they're not, there's no choice.

People in my town easily agreed with the teachers that the national government has been openly corrupt in the past and that little or nothing has been done to stop it. Politicians, after all, can afford to put their kids in private schools that aren’t affected by the strikes. And they would probably have been willing to fight alongside teachers for fairer rights or more education spending. But, parents were generally disgruntled at the teachers because, needless to say, they wanted to see their children going to classes. They called for other ways to fight for their rights, alternatives that wouldn’t harm kids’ education.

Then, all of a sudden, teachers started giving classes again. It seems to me that nothing actually happened to end the strike. It all feels immature and out-of-the-blue to me and certainly with no easy solution. Things seem to have gotten way out of hand over something that, in my opinion, is trivial in the grand scheme of things and simply misses the point. Both sides are to be to blame and the whole system has gotten all messed up. For me, I’m most definitely left on the sideline of this thing, with fingers crossed that people will just cool it for a while and get on with classes.

More blog posts will happen soon, I promise. In the meantime, have a happy Holy Week!