Work

I figured it was about time I described to all the onlookers exactly what it is I am doing here in Guyana (workwise).
So here it is for your viewing pleasure.

For the previous 2 months I have been working in Guyana on two different but related projects. The first of which is to interview Amerindian women in Georgetown (the capital) and Region 1 (a rural region). The purpose of the interview is to evaluate three different themes.
The first thems surrounds the challenges and opportuntiies to Amerindian women who want to participate in the workforce at any capacity: as entrepreneurs, nurses, teachers, or simply as employees of a business.
The second theme looks at women's groups (a staple of poor country culture) and what some of the challenges are for these groups, as lately many have been sputtering and losing members.
The final theme looks at the additional burden women who want to work but must also look after the household. This theme certainly relates to the first two themes.
What I have discovered in the process of my interviews is that women are constrained by many factors. Probably the larges one is the lack of opportunities for women, especially in the rural areas where more Amerindians are found. Many of the men here are not supportive and believe the women should be at home taking care of the household and the children. Those who try and fight them men will be beaten. Many of the men also believe the women will go off and meet other men and thus jealousy plays a large role. Educating the men is a vital process in the solutions we are looking at as is explaining to women their rights.
The women's groups here tend to be structured like co-ops where all the women just split whatever profits are made. We do not believe this is a successful structure as it does not provide any incentive to work hard and makes people frustrated when there is not a lot of profit coming in, which is often. We are working on structuring the groups more like a business where salaries are paid and profits are split like dividends quarterly. We are also looking at starting nurseries where women with children can drop their kids off for the day so they can work.
My other role, which I am currently doing for the next month or so, is to work directly with a women's group in Region 9 (another rual area) as they are in a financial crisis. Helping Hands is a peanut and cashew business but both prodicts are going to be in shortage this year and thus next year does not look promising. We are working on a cassava and farine business to complement the other two as they work countercyclical to the weather needed for peanuts and cashews and will work as a profitable safety net.
At the same time, I am expected to teach them some important characteristics of successful businesses and businesswomen. The biggest issues here are a lack of financial skills and confidence of personality to go around marketing their products. Some secondary problems are transportation and negotiating skills. However, we are working hard to improve on these issues and I hope to put the group in a position to be successful going forward before I leave.

Anyways for those that asked there is a snapshot.

Take care

A Night out in Lethem

After saying goodbye to the little cousin of the family we are staying with, whose name is Enron (he was introduced to us as "Enron...like the company") we made our way to the Brazilian Restaurant and Bar for some dinner and some drinks. We were joined by a peace corps girl, two guys who run a trip called Bushmasters, where they take a dozen people into the bush for 10 days, train them to hunt and live on their own, and then leave them with nothing and tell them to survive for 2-3 days, and a couple locals. At the end of dinner and drinks we were handed our bill, written in pen, with what we ate, the amount, and the label of "2 White People" (I assume that's how she remembered). We then went across to an outdoor Karaoke Bar, where the transvestite "Roger" (who was a man dressed as a woman), serenaded us, quite well in fact, to many songs sung by women such as Celine Dion. This was followed by a trip to the Disco where we danced and drank rum. The dancing consists of pairing off and doing some interesting grinding moves.
Quite the evening.

That's all for now.

Lethem

ss and a frSo after a few quick days in back in Georgetown we were off to the very south of Guyana to a town called Lethem. My boss, his friend and our big boss (along with Nadine and I) drove overnight (starting at midnight) to Lethem, which is about an 11 hour drive. We left in the middle of the night so we could hit the 6am ferry. After this exhausting, bumpy trip we arrived. Now Lethem, which looks like the Wild West and Texas mixed together is much different than Mabaruma. It's like a large savannah with huge mountains in the backdrop. Again the scenery is real nice. We all went out for some drinks and the local hangout before my boss got up and drove all the way back the next day. Nadine and I have our first house in this whole adventure with full kitchen (though the fridge took quite the scrubbing and cleaning to be working in our estimation). We bought a hammock for the front porch which is amazing!
My job here is to help this woman's group, Helping Hands, out of their current financial crisis. It will be a large challenge as the climate this year, along with their financial education, does not work in their favour. Nadine has some organized colleagues here in Lethem, more so than in Mabaruma, so she seems to be quite busy.
We bought a bike to get a round and it has broken twice in the first two days (you can imagine how happy that makes me). First day the pedal and the tire broke on my way to work and than this morning the new tire had a puncture. Some random "helped" me find a repair shop and after an hour and a half I finally got to work.

Anyways that's all for now folks. Speak to you soon.

Our Last Few Days in Mabaruma

Last Friday we went to Shell Beach by speedz boat to where a group of vets had flown in from the States to basically stop the dogs from stealing all the marine turtle eggs from the beach. The beach is literally sand and some really crazy shells (don't worry mom we took some back for you). The water was really warm so we swam in there for awhile until the salt made it impossible to stay in any longer. We also tried our hand at cricket and as Nadine will attest her performance was better than mine!
We moved on to a community called Waini where we stayed over Friday night in a little room in a multi-purpose factory of the brother of the couple that was taking us around (kind of random).
Saturday night we gave a tutorial to the couple on how to use the computer. Made them promise that their first email would be to us. Guess we'll see.
Sunday we went to a community called Wauna. I actually saw a kid wearing a Brett Favre jersey with the Packers!! Made my day. We had a moment.
Monday we went to the Tiger Caves in Mabaruma. Now they failed to mention that there was no path and our guide had to find three Amerindian kids with machetes to trailblaze a path to the caves. After about an hour and a trek about as grueling as I've been through we made it. Caves were great but hard to enjoy as much after that experience.
And today we have returned to Georgetown. Just for a few days as we head to Lethem in Region 9 on Fri night/Sat morn (we leave at midnight and we get there around 11am).

Anyways that's all for now. Speak to you later.

A few interesting notes

So on Monday we went to the Hosororo Falls, which is really just a nice downhill running stream but still pretty relaxing. Than we went to the Cocoa Plantation and we were trying to go take a tour and walked into the office only to see what we believe to be the owner and her husband fooling around on the desk chair and we quickly exited the room, thought about going back, and then heard some loud thuds and at that point figured that was enough for that little trip.
We went to a village called Kumwata today and my interview went really well with some interesting answers from the ladies and it was the first time that it made me upset that I won't stay to see all the implementation of my recommendations.
Back to another sexual story in nature. So at the place we are staying there are 4 channels that are controlled by one of the guys and basically what the channel is showing is at their mercy. So last night around midnight we turn on the tube and what's on....the Playboy channel! Really no good way for them to watch porn if we can all see it.

Anyways, thought I'd share those thing with you all.
We're off to the Beach here and a couple of other river communities.
Speak to you later.

Trip to Arukamai

Today, we went to a little village within the little town we are staying in. The name of the village is Arukamai. To get there we took a 48 horse power speed boat on relatively calm waters which took about 45 minutes. The ride had some pretty spectacular views.
When you arrive, the fun begins, as basically everyone who lives there has their own tiny river bed that you have to take a dug out canoe to get to. The dug out canoes are made by the locals out of fallen trees that they use a chainsaw to create. It is pretty amazing that they can make these things.
I had a counterpart here in Region 1 that was taking me around and helping me out with the interviews as apparently my English is difficult to understand and even though I understand everything she repeats to my interviewees they still cannot always understand me. She is from Arukamai so she took me to her place which is this little cottage looking house that has a few rooms with tin roofs and a separate kitchen with husk rooks. The lifestyle is SLIGHTLY different than what we are accustomed to.
We went to the school to hold the interviews which is one room that has 9 grades split into 4 classes. Not sure how they can possibly learn there but I guess they manage.
After the interview we went to my counterparts house again for lunch and her husband (who is supportive of her working, they are not all) cooked us an amazing curry chicken lunch.
After lunch there was a huge BINGO game at the school with the grand prize being 10,000 Guyanese dollars which is about 50 Canadian. The best part was, the pieces you had to use to cover the spaces were pebbles (that you had to go pick up by the river). The third prize was 3,000 Guyanese dollars in which two people said BINGO at the same time and there was some pretty heated moments over who won the prize.
After that we returned to Mabaruma, which is the big city here in Region 1, there might be 800 people here.

Anyways that’s all for now.