A Bug’s Life

Yesterday, Max and I were riding the bus back to La Ceiba, when I noticed a bug stuck between the two panes of glass of our school bus window. It was a beautiful bug, about an inch long, with hues of green, blue and yellow. Since I was sitting on the window side, it was really close to my shoulder and I could see how it desperately struggled to free itself. Max and I stared at it for a while, admiring its beauty; none of us had ever seen anything like it. We wondered how it got there and commented how difficult it’ll be to climb up the glass to be free; perhaps even impossible.

After a while of staring and ignoring the bug, I started feeling guilty for not doing anything to help it. Its desperation to get out was making me anxious. I would ignore it, but it was so close to me I could see it on my peripheral vision; ignoring was not an option. I wondered what could I do for about 3 seconds and concluded that if I put the window up there wouldn’t be a double pane anymore and the bug could fly free. But these are really old buses and the windows are usually so difficult to close. I just didn’t feel like standing up and making the effort, so I asked Max if he would do it. He looked at it, but it was too difficult to do with me on the way, we would both have to stand up, exchange seats and close the window. Too much work to help a bug and, without a word, we both agreed it was best to ignore it.

But the bug kept desperately trying, its quick movements in my plain view. I couldn’t take it any longer, something needed to be done or it would drive me insane. I started pulling the window up (without standing up, of course, I didn’t feel like it). When Max noticed what I was doing he added his hands to help, and between the two of us we gathered enough strength to pull the window up, the bug, now holding on to the glass with all its mighty strength, was being pulled up with it… up … up … up … until the edges of the two glasses met and the bug got crushed with the rubber strips that kept water from getting into the bus.

Max and I looked at each other, perplexed. If only we’d realized that the rubber wouldn’t allow the bug to fly out that way. Perhaps it would have been better to let the bug find its own way out; perhaps he would have given up trying to get out, eaten the dead spider next to him and lived the rest of his life (perhaps another day?) happy with his current circumstances. At least the bug wasn’t bugging me anymore.

Thinking about this bug latter reminded us of development/foreign aid. Those of us that grow up in wealthy countries are attracted to the developing world the same way Max and I were attracted to that bug. We enjoy the beautiful hues of green, blue and yellow of their mountains and their sky, we like to raft their rivers, and photograph their people. When we see the struggle in these places we try to ignore it, it seems too difficult to change anything, or we just don’t feel like it. But when the problems get so annoying to us that action is imperative, we send our foreign aid organizations. With perhaps the best intentions hundreds, if not thousands, of organizations flood the country, look at their problems for the equivalent of three seconds and come up with what they think it’s the best solution. The results… we see them here in Honduras everyday. The bug was crushed after all. But at least our consciences feel better.

A Day at the Office

Max and I just got back from a day of work and we are both so exhausted. It has been a good day, very productive, but nothing particularly special, just a typical day at work. I thought you might like to know a little more about a typical day for us.

It is Sunday morning and we are really sleepy from going to bed late last night. We had some friends over for music and drinks and ended up going to bed latter than anticipated (roommates are out of town and we have to take advantage of that!). I guess the piña coladas and the conversation were too good to stop early. So at 7:00am, when the alarm goes off I just turn it off (I decided to skip the snooze today). I know that I wanted to wake up early to have time to make breakfast, but I’d rather spend the extra hour sleeping. Max is so deeply asleep that he doesn’t notice. The meeting in Nueva Armenia is not till 10:30am and we don’t need to leave La Ceiba until 9:30am.

At 9:00am I am woken up by a cell phone ringing. I look at it and it’s our friend Anthony who’s going to pick us up and take us to Nueva Armenia. Shit, we overslept!! I hand Max the cell phone (I am still in no condition to talk to anybody) and run out of bed to shower. I bet Tony is going to be here any time now, but Max hangs up and says he’s going to be here at 9:30 or 9:45. Good, I have enough time to shower!!

Tony shows up as expected, with his friend that is visiting from the States. I am almost ready and Max goes downstairs to let them in. I just need to print the roll list for today’s meeting. Max asks Tony is we can drive by the central park to buy some baleadas. He knows I can not function without breakfast. Tony agrees and off we go.

The baleadas at the park are the best in town. It is such a shame that they are only there Saturday night and Sunday mornings. From a distance I can see the small stand with its blue tarp roof and the usual Sunday crowd standing around it. Recently a guy that sells freshly squeezed OJ stands next to the baleadas. Perfect!! We’ll have something to wash them down with. The pots are sizzling with melted manteca (lard) and frying meat. It smells so good, but I always skip the meat and go for the egg and beans with chismol (salsa like mix of green pepper, tomato, and onion), don’t want to risk getting sick from the meat. Ana, the lady at the baleada stand, greets us and asked Max and I about “the muchacha that was here with you last time”. We have to think hard to remember who was with us last time and remember that it was our roommate. We tell Ana the muchacha is in Guanaja today but we’re sure she misses the baleadas. Between the four of us we buy 11 baleadas to go and head back to the car. It is a beatuful and hot day and the guys let me sit in front of the pickup with Tony while they sit back in the truck’s bed. I am a little jealous they’ll get to enjoy the view better than I will, but the cushioned seat wins my heart over. Oh well, I’ve done the pick-up thing a million times.

Once in Armenia we are greeted by the kids and the people we know. Aaaanthony!! They shout. Lynnette, take my photo!! (We don’t have the camera today with us but they all love to have their photo taken). Max, look how big my muscles are getting!! The boys really like playing with Max.

Some of the women in the ice-selling group are already waiting for us. They want our help to solve some disputes. Tony and his friend go off to meet with the fisherman, they are working on fixing some engines to take tourists on their boats, and Max and I meet with the women. They are all friendly and polite with us and with each other, but quickly I notice there’s tension between them. I ask them to tell me what’s been going on. I don’t really like the dependency they have on me anytime they have an issue. We worked on a reglamento (regulation) for the group at the beginning of the year and they should be using that to solve their disputes, not calling me to tell them what to do. Plus I think the ones that really have interest in working should buy the freezers from the rest and form a real business, not this cooperative stuff. But the group was formed already when I got there and I might as well try to help them succeed. I quickly find out that most of the problem is miscommunication. They haven’t been talking to each other and were questioning what some of them were doing with the money and the freezers. They start talking about possibly dividing up into two smaller groups (there’s two freezers and seven people in the group). I know exactly what to say to entice them to work together. I suggest since they don’t want to work together we can sell the freezers to the two separate groups. That way they can have two smaller groups in business and they wouldn’t have to respond to each other. The price would be comfortable and there would be payment plans. Since the freezers were donated to the community we can use the money from the sale for the scholarship fund, to benefit some of the young kids in town. That way we can dissolve the cooperative, have them invest in capital the way real businesses do, and help the kids in the process. I thought the idea was brilliant, but they didn’t like it. As soon as they heard they might have to buy the freezers they quickly came up with solutions to their problems and compromises to avoid the same situations. They even promised they are going to meet next week to review the regulation to freshen up their minds. Oh well, not exactly the kind of resolution I was expecting, but a resolution nonetheless. I know in about six months they will be calling me again with another problem.

After the meeting is dismissed, Max and I have about 1 hour till the next meeting. This will be the last group meeting for the cooking group before the tourists from England arrive and there’s a lot in the agenda. We have to talk about the final numbers of tourists, about our aggregated costs and expected income. Also, we need to clarify that only the people that show up to work will get paid, not because they’ve been going to the meetings there’s going to be payment. I think it is so crazy that we have been working six months for this event. These visitors will have no idea how much work was put into the night they spend in the community. I am glad I’ve been a part of it and I can understand what’s been going on behind the scenes. Anyway, Max and I use the spare hour to get some water and organize the materials for the meeting. We also keep peeking in at the Mexico vs. Iran World Cup game on the TV that most people in town are watching or listening to. (Mexico ends up winning 3-1.)

At one o’clock we show up at the meeting place. It is Doña Santa’s yard and it is always nice and cool there in the shade of her coconut trees. Nobody has arrived yet and we know the meeting will start at least an hour later than agreed. People slowly arrive and we chit-chat with them… How you’ve been? How’s your baby? Is so and so coming to the meeting today? I am glad they are not commenting on how “nice and chubby” I am looking today (Garífunas like curves). At 1:45pm I start calling roll. For some reason a lot of people are missing from the meeting today. When I ask why someone is not there they all have a response. “Digna is already having birth pain and couldn’t leave the house, we can excuse her today.” “Elda didn’t come because she wanted to play baseball, that’s not a good excuse.” By 2:00pm we’re done calling roll, marking the absent and excused, and hearing the stories of why certain people didn’t show up. After this point anyone that shows up (an hour latter than the agreed time) will be marked late.

Then the meeting goes smooth. Since it is the last group meeting I make a summary of everything we’ve agreed on our bi-weekly meetings for the last six months, we discuss the composition of the final remaining groups after the people that were absent to more than three meetings have been eliminated, and what group will be cooking each week. We spend about two hours discussing these and other details and conclude the meeting. Before everyone leaves, I remind them how excited I am about this project and how great a job they are doing.

As people are getting up to leave, they are talking about the leña (firewood) that they are buying for the cooking of the dinners. Someone comments that they hope the wood is good, and that recently she’s gotten some really bad wood. “All smoke and no heat.” Doña Santa insists that this is really good wood that she’s gotten a hold of for the group. “Really nice red mangrove wood.” This shocks us, of course. We tell them that that’s awful and that the mangroves are critical to the survival of the wildlife of the area and protecting the community from storms. Other members of the group agree with us, and explain in great detail why the mangroves are a necessary part of the ecosystem. Doña Santa then explains that it’s actually mostly sea grape wood, and the mangrove wood is from dead mangrove. We’re not convinced, but there’s not much we can do anyway.

It takes us about an hour to say our goodbyes to everybody and leave. We can not leave without seeing a lot of people, or they might be offended. Some of the kids are walking with us to the car, joking and playing. I go on the front seat and the guys back on the truck bed. On our way out someone asks us for a jalón (hitch) and he also goes in back, with his bike. At least it’s only three of them and the bike, sometimes there are 5, 6 or even 7 people on the back of Tony’s truck going to La Ceiba.

We get home at 6pm or so, exhausted from all the energy we’ve put into our work, but happy. It has been, after all, a good day at work.

Got to go now, Max and I are getting hungry for dinner. We joke about how we’d love to have Risotto tonight, but agree that some white rice, beans, and a can of tuna cooked with sofrito will be great. Off to cooking!!

For Lack of a Helping Hand

Our roommate works in a school for the richest kids in town. I once visited the school and was in awe, there are nice buildings, a roofed-in basketball court, a cafeteria, internet, gardens everywhere, and all the other facilities you would find at a private school in the US. It is not only one of the most beautiful school I’ve ever seen, but also among the best education to be found in the country. Teachers like my roommate are brought from the states, all expenses paid, to teach at this school. They get paid the same salary they would at a public school in the US. The kids were all beautiful, nicely dressed, and completely bi-lingual; exactly what you would expect from the kids of bankers, business owners, and politicians, the richest people in the city. It was my first time around a group of kids in Honduras where everybody had shoes. While I stood there, taking all the images in, I wished I had gone to a school as nice as that one.

A couple of days later my roommate told me a sad story. As sad as the story is, it is a good representation of how little most (emphasis on most and not all) privileged Hondurans are willing to do to help their brothers and sisters who are not as privileged as they are, and why I decided to share it with you. In the school where she teaches, a scholarship program was implemented so that three poor kids from the city could get an education there. All the parents who have kids attending the school were asked to make a yearly contribution to pay the education expenses of these three students, and so the scholarship students were admitted, a life changing opportunity for them.

Halfway trough the year the parents got tired of contributing for the scholarship fund, and wanted it ended. They did not care that it was the middle of the school year and that the kids would not be admitted at any other school so late. They did not care about the shattered dreams of these three kids that for the first time in their lives were experiencing the helping hand of their brothers and sisters. They wanted their money back, no more giving it to these students. When the teachers pleaded the parents to pay at least until the end of the year, they asked the teachers to pay themselves if they cared that much. And so, it was the teachers who paid for the kids schooling till the end of the year, next semester they are back to their schools in the slums.

None of the parents cared of course; their own kids have shoes anyways…

Connecting to the World

(Note: This posting was written over a month ago, but has not been posted until now.)

Santa Maria del Carbón is one of the communities that MaderaVerde works with, and is one of the few communities where the remaining Pech Indians live. There has never been electricity or telephone service there, and hurricanes Alpha, Beta and Gamma washed away their water system, which was constructed only early last year. Like many such communities here in Honduras, they looked to the government to help them rise above their current circumstances. So, about six months ago, in somewhat of a strange move, the Honduran government decided to build a computer learning center there. Seeing the offer as better than nothing, MaderaVerde volunteered to be the parent organization for the project. This meant that they would help the community members fill out the proper paperwork, and provide planning and training a needed. Sure enough, in November, four laptops, a PC, a printer, a scanner, a digital camera, a 32” TV, a DVD player, furniture, and full network cabling arrived. All of this equipment, I might add, is top-of-the-line and brand new. Since, as I mentioned before, the community never has had electricity, they also installed seven solar panels, 21 batteries, low-power electric lights throughout the building, and other solar power equipment in order to run the machines. The hurricanes and elections temporarily postponed the final phase of the project, which is to install high-speed satellite internet. The dish is already installed, and all that remains to do is bring the router from Tegucigalpa. Also, as an unexpected bonus, the national phone company has installed a radio-based telephone in the center as well.

Since I know something about computers, MaderaVerde took me out to the community (a three hour trip in a four-wheel drive vehicle) to check out the new equipment. I helped them unpack the equipment and plug it in. They asked me hundreds of questions about what each device was for, and how to use it. I showed them that with the press of a button, they could use their scanner and printer to make photo-copies (thanks to nifty integration of Hewlett-Packard’s equipment). I explained to them that if they set the administrator password on the laptops to something new and then forget the password, then the laptop is useless, which came up because they had already done that with one machine (I’ll be re-installing Windows on my next trip). I showed them that they can use Excel to keep track of calls made on their new phone and how much each customer pays.

They also showed me what they had been up to. Their telephone was a huge success. Since it is the only one within a two hour bus ride, there was always a line to use it. The price is 3 Lempira (15 cents) per minute for national calls, and 9 Lempira (45 cents) to call the U.S., which might seem a bit steep but is not so bad for calls made through Honduras’ national phone company (a monopoly). Besides the phone, they had already put the TV and DVD player to use. They had begun screening movies that a community member had bought in the city on one of his trips, and they were charging admission. Titles include, Willow, Million Dollar Baby, Windtalkers, Doom, Zorro, a Bruce Lee flick, three Jean Claude Van Dam films, three Steven Segal films, a DVD containing 50 reggaeton videos, and my favorite: Downfall, a biopic about the final days of Hitler.

If you put all of this in perspective, within a period of three months, El Carbón has turned on their first electric light, made their first telephone call, turned on their first television set (leading to opening their first movie theatre), used their first computer, and soon will send their first email and browse their first webpage. Of course, they still drink water from and bathe in dirty streams that run through town. That aside, it will be interesting to see what happens to this previously isolated ethnic community now that they can communicate with the outside world.