Skip to main content

Life must go on....

Image
By



The 'highway' between Georgetown and Lethem
It’s hard to get going again after the passing of our colleague and friend. Since we operated as a team, we have to readjust and re-arrange. We have to move on and a replacement has to be found for the agricultural position. We just returned from our break in Europe and we find ourselves in what is called Heritage Month. The several Amerindian communities in Guyana celebrate their culture, indigenous customs and history during a month long celebration and, as we find out pretty quickly, this is not the time to start talking about the finer details of promotion, tourism trade fairs or budget issues.
Breakfast stop on the road to Iwokrama
So, together with our colleagues and friends, we immerse ourselves in the celebrations. Excellent opportunity to build relationships. One of the many nice things of these celebrations is that it’s not a commercial event (yet), more a gathering of like minded souls having a good time. Refreshing and charming in our eyes. Small-town affairs really.
Yellow Rumped casis weaving its nest at Surama Eco Lodge

We witness the local pepper pot cooking competition, arrow and bow making challenge, cassava grating and the “how to make a fire without matches in a second” contest. Other, more rowdy events, involve the paracara (the local beer, brewed from cassava, tastes like spiked coffee) drinking competition; that’s, btw,  typically the time to leave the festivities. 
All in all, it’s a good way to ease back into things but after two weeks of almost continuous celebrations, we are ready to start our training sessions with the communities again. 
Rowing in dug-outs on Grass Pond, Rewa
Having been here now for almost nine months (we write end of November 2014), we have mapped out plans to start working with the different villages, that have an interest and potential for tourism and we are raring to go into the field again.  We have now visited most of the communities several times and have gotten into training sessions with the several of the main actors quite enthusiastically.  For those with serious travel plans or just a genuine interest, follow this blog; we will report on places of interest you might be visiting in the near future.

Giant water lilies at Grass Pond in Rewa

Star fruit (or 'five-fingers' as they are known locally) ready to be picked at Surama

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Beyond the Rupununi

By
Today is a day of celebration for us;  exactly a year ago we landed in Georgetown.  We can still remember the excitement in the pits of our stomachs when we saw the advertisement, inviting interested applicants to respond to an invitation to work with local Amerindian communities in the south of Guyana.... one of the three Guianas  - the other two being French Guyana (still a part of France, so no visa necessary for Europeans, and Suriname, which the Dutch (like the British did to Guyana) happily returned to their rightful owners.  So, here we are and apart from the fact that one is not tripping over wildlife and primary forest at every step, we have certainly not been disappointed.  Waiting for the boat to Rewa Eco Lodge John Gimlette's book 'Wild Coast' brings this part of the world to vivid  and at times, shocking, life.  Since our arrival in March last year, we have visited Suriname (Paramaribo), where one can live the life of the Dutch knowing that summer re
2 comments
Read more

Spring and summer in Tajikistan

By
Spring has arrived; also in the Botanical Gardens It’s been over a month since we were last in touch……   No thanks to our Russian internet service providers on which we are so dependent.   But life trundles on here, albeit at a pace that makes us wonder what we will look like when we emerge in October from our Tajik chrysalis into the real world of stress and bits and bytes and innumerable options on the type of coffee we would like to order.   In Khorog, the choice of coffee is simple; instant – with or without sugar or milk.   That’s it!   No decisions over the fat content of the milk, no choice of sweetener and heaven forbid that you can decide on the roast of the bean, its origin or the depth of the froth on the drink.   So, THANK YOU to our friends for maintaining our Western stress levels.   We happily raise our coffee cups to you every morning when we brew our choice of ‘Seattle’s Best, Douwe Egbers, Lavazza, Illy, Peet’s (still on its way we hear but we look forward to it;
3 comments
Read more

Boom-boxes, Birds and Bush-masters

By
 Memories go back to  Tajikistan; here an Afghan trader at one of the border markets Our memories drift back to October 2010, Dushanbe, the Prospekt Medical Clinic at Rudaki Avenue, the boulevard that dissects the capital of Tajikistan......... .................As part of the VSO-CUSO in-country training programs, new arriving volunteers have to meet with the staff of an always private local hospital to understand, what living in a new environment means and what bacteria, viruses and rabid dogs are on the loose and will visit the ignorant new-comers (unfortunately with alarming frequency). In Dushanbe we meet with the (German) Herr Dr. Andreas Hencko, an interesting, quirky and fascinating character. The older volunteers, quite unceremoniously, refer to him as Dr. Death. In a mere 20 minutes he manages to scare the bejeezus out of us hardy volunteers, with stories about the use of un-boiled or untreated water (filter first, boil twice), meat bought at the local mark
4 comments
Read more