Today will be our 1 month anniversary here at our site Tortuguero. Although we have not officially begun any projects our time here has flown by. At this exact moment Tony and I are laughing at how back in the US at our former jobs with kids we worried about rainy days because we had to know what to do with the kids and knew that having them inside just made them a wee bit rowdy, now here in Tortuguero a rainy day means not knowing when your clothes will dry!! It can take up to a week during rainy season to dry clothes, especially when all you clothes in hanging inside your house!! Enjoy the pic below which shows this situation exactly.
So let me update you all on our 1st month activities. First of all let me start by saying that in the first 3 months of living at our site we must put all our attention to becoming integrated and writing a C.A.T. (Community Analysis Tool). The CAT is similar to an ethnography an Anthropologist would write about a community, but the CAT is a much smaller and condensed version. Having my degree in Anthropology I was quite excited about this process. I had read ethnologies and had gotten some outline in my classes as to how to carry one out and I had heard my professors in class talk about the work they had done, which was all fascinating to me. I really romanized the idea to say the least, but the reality of the process is another. You have to be part of a community before you jump in and ask about “community issues” which may or may not be sensitive topics. And we are Peace Corps Volunteers which brings another side to our research. We are here to assist the community in moving forward towards a more sustainable environment, one in which they community itself will be able to identify what they need and where they can look for the resources to help them. To complete this task it is very important for us to fully integrate with the people of Tortuguero. And this has proven to be a difficult task.
Peace Corps names a person in the community to be your counterpart. This person attends a workshop with you before you and your counterpart go to your site together. Where the counterpart takes you around town introduces you to everyone, especially community leaders and professionals. The workshop last 3 days and is really amazing, unfortunately for Tony and I neither of our counterparts showed up. So while the other volunteers had someone they already knew in the community which would take them there and show them the way, Tony and I had to do it on our own. Granted now that I have met my counterpart I don’t know if having them there would have made a difference, but the intention would have been nice. Also when we come to our site we are assigned a host family, the host family is also in charge of introducing you to community members and showing you around town. On this end we have also been let down.
So the process of fitting in to a community and becoming integrated has been tricky. We walk around town introduce ourselves and some people are interested and others are not. So this first month we have been walking around introducing ourselves, attended meetings with the school teachers in which we came up with many projects to do and trying not to be seen as a tourist but as community members. At times Tony and I joke we are in the Twilight Zone, on one hand we have this amazing site the beach and jungle at our fingertips but on the other hand we walk through town and greet people we have previously introduced ourselves to and they just stare at us with a piercing blank stare, after a couple of nights this became so eerie we just had to call it the Twilight Zone. Quite creepy it is. For the most part people are interested in what we will do for the community, which shows an interest on their part to better their community, but when they find out we don’t have web page management skills they cease to care. I should explain to you all that being a tourist town having a web page is quite the thing here. Everyone wants one but does not want to maintain it and we being the volunteers should be able to help them with that, since the previous volunteers created a website and still manage it from the US to them the web page is what will better the community. It is an individual need not a collective need. So when we converse with people in town our conversations begin excitely with people being happy we are here but when they find out we are not here with web page skills their interest and the conversation dies.
When we have these rough days, which are not everyday, we walk on the beach take in the beautiful jungle which is right up against it and let the waves take away our worries and concerns for that moment in time. And in essence return refreshed and anew, ready to continue our journey, knowing that these uncomfortable situations to shall pass as we become a part of this community. We have included some pics of the town enjoy!!!
So let me update you all on our 1st month activities. First of all let me start by saying that in the first 3 months of living at our site we must put all our attention to becoming integrated and writing a C.A.T. (Community Analysis Tool). The CAT is similar to an ethnography an Anthropologist would write about a community, but the CAT is a much smaller and condensed version. Having my degree in Anthropology I was quite excited about this process. I had read ethnologies and had gotten some outline in my classes as to how to carry one out and I had heard my professors in class talk about the work they had done, which was all fascinating to me. I really romanized the idea to say the least, but the reality of the process is another. You have to be part of a community before you jump in and ask about “community issues” which may or may not be sensitive topics. And we are Peace Corps Volunteers which brings another side to our research. We are here to assist the community in moving forward towards a more sustainable environment, one in which they community itself will be able to identify what they need and where they can look for the resources to help them. To complete this task it is very important for us to fully integrate with the people of Tortuguero. And this has proven to be a difficult task.
Peace Corps names a person in the community to be your counterpart. This person attends a workshop with you before you and your counterpart go to your site together. Where the counterpart takes you around town introduces you to everyone, especially community leaders and professionals. The workshop last 3 days and is really amazing, unfortunately for Tony and I neither of our counterparts showed up. So while the other volunteers had someone they already knew in the community which would take them there and show them the way, Tony and I had to do it on our own. Granted now that I have met my counterpart I don’t know if having them there would have made a difference, but the intention would have been nice. Also when we come to our site we are assigned a host family, the host family is also in charge of introducing you to community members and showing you around town. On this end we have also been let down.
So the process of fitting in to a community and becoming integrated has been tricky. We walk around town introduce ourselves and some people are interested and others are not. So this first month we have been walking around introducing ourselves, attended meetings with the school teachers in which we came up with many projects to do and trying not to be seen as a tourist but as community members. At times Tony and I joke we are in the Twilight Zone, on one hand we have this amazing site the beach and jungle at our fingertips but on the other hand we walk through town and greet people we have previously introduced ourselves to and they just stare at us with a piercing blank stare, after a couple of nights this became so eerie we just had to call it the Twilight Zone. Quite creepy it is. For the most part people are interested in what we will do for the community, which shows an interest on their part to better their community, but when they find out we don’t have web page management skills they cease to care. I should explain to you all that being a tourist town having a web page is quite the thing here. Everyone wants one but does not want to maintain it and we being the volunteers should be able to help them with that, since the previous volunteers created a website and still manage it from the US to them the web page is what will better the community. It is an individual need not a collective need. So when we converse with people in town our conversations begin excitely with people being happy we are here but when they find out we are not here with web page skills their interest and the conversation dies.
When we have these rough days, which are not everyday, we walk on the beach take in the beautiful jungle which is right up against it and let the waves take away our worries and concerns for that moment in time. And in essence return refreshed and anew, ready to continue our journey, knowing that these uncomfortable situations to shall pass as we become a part of this community. We have included some pics of the town enjoy!!!
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