Back from Central America

All in all it was a great success.  Despite my initial fears of us wandering aimlessly, the ol' advisor pulled through- well as best he can.  Logistics are never going to be his speciality, but it was not as big a cf as it could have been.  And to quote a brilliant anthropologist I know, "it looks good on the vita."

women gathering water at the town pump

We arrived to Copan (after 16 hours of travel) to a city without electricity.  The confusion of getting everyone from the bus stop to the hotels was the only time I had to use my mother voice with Prof. Magoo.  He was about to leave his bags either in the street, or for me to carry.  The next day we had a meeting with the local indigenous group and asked what they needed from us- publicity and a website were their priority.  The rest of this first week was spent visiting different groups working in the area.  Some successful (a couple manning a medical clinic) some not as much (the local ro@tary club and several water projects come to mind).  We also met with the Peace Corps working there.  Not sure how she's doing- she seems to be spending a lot of time hobnobbing with the local elite.

Caribbean Beaches

The weekend saw our group go to the North Coast.  We loaded our group of 15 into a 14 passenger van and set off to the airport where we picked up Prof. Magoo's girlfriend, making the remaining 2 hours quite cozy indeed.  Tela was a little sketchy--strip clubs and discos on the beach.  But I had my own room with AC so I did not care.  Saturday we went to a national park located on a nearby island.  The beauty was only made better by the fact that there were 7 inches of snow on the ground at home.



Our final week in Copan was filled with working on our projects.  I worked as translated and animadora for the anthro/business group.  We made ads for two communities, created tags to attach to indigenous-made crafts, and made 2 websites.  As part of my role as translator I took some of the group members out to photograph a couple of projects that the indigenous organization were particularly proud of.  One was an experimental farming center.

goat project- maybe the best picture of goats ever taken?!?

The group dynamic left a little to be desired as one of the business students felt the need to throw a couple of tantrums. No really, throwing things, pouty pants tantrums. But in the end everything turned out ok. All in all it was a pretty sweet GTA gig.

me and a 17 year old parrot at the local bird sanctuary

Now I am back in the land of snow.  We got 6 inches on Wednesday.  I miss the sun, but not really that much togetherness.