Week 2!

October 20th 2006 - end of Week 2
As you see I am way behind with my blog and I have been skipping backwards and forwards. However I hope you can make snse of it.

Week 2 of In Country Training was another interesting time starting with a visit to the Minister of Foreign Trade and International Cooperation. VSO's contracts are with this department and the newly appointed Minister in this position used to be the Minister of Education in the previous Parliament. We all put on our FORMAL attire i.e shoulders covered for the women and business shirts and long pants for the guys and were ushered to a very smart room with media present. The Minister was very pleasant, confident and clear about our role warning us not 'to appear to know everything' but to take our time and observe and work cooperatively. Obviously they have had some bad experiences with ex pats.

The new government from the recent election is the same as before, the Peoples Progressive Party/Civic (the young (38 year old) President is Bharrat Jagdeo now in his second term) which is the primarily Indo Guyanese party although there are some Afro-Guyanese members too. It was the most peaceful election ever and much publicity had been done beforehand to ensure that it was so. International money had made it a condition of contiued funding!!!. It was also the most expensive election ever with huge numbers of police around and international observers, but also a low turnout (around 68%) unfortunately. However it was a positive for the country and demonstrated that it could be done. This time there had also been a third party running which helped the democratic process - The Alliance for Change - which attempted to be race neutral.

The next day we set off by bus to Parika (one hour) and speedboat (see picture above) to Shanklands Resort for 3 days of R&R and swimming in the tea coloured Essequibo River!, relaxing in hammocks, walks in the Tropical Rain forest, great food with desserts (which Mick has been missing) and continuing VSO WORK and education.
We had American Sign Language continuation, Creolese culture and language which is spoken here. It certainly is like another language and guesswork is the only way to cope...that and nodding and smiling a lot... plus lots of laughter as we tried it. Then a long session on Monitoring and Evaluation which of course we will have to do for our placemets and the role of VSO here. Interesting though.

It was so good to get out of the city and into the country. The whole atmosphere is different and the environment, for me at least, much more pleasant and not so scary. My room was n the ground floor of Ashby House - the white buildng in the picture above.

The other picture is of one of the many houses along the river - some are holiday cabins are others are homes of the people who live there mostly Amerindians, the indigenous peoples.

The week ended with a return to Georgetown and the meeting with the British High Commissioner who has just arrived having served his previous assignement in Iraq!
All VSOs come under the umbrella of the British High Commission while in Guyana (or anywhere really . It was the same in Malawi) as the VSO Head Office is in UK. Although we were all in formal dress again he was very easy and informal and and enjoyable hour plus was spent with him getting his take on the situation here and trying to understand how the International Community is focussing its missions here.
He indicated that Gouvernance, Security and the Economy were among their priorities.
He promised us drinks and a swim in his pool if we would come back in a couple of months time to give him honest feedback about our opinions and assessment of the state of affaires from our discussions with Guyanese people with whom we meet and socalise. We all, of course, readily agreed.

Our second week ended with meeting our employers, having lunch with them, seeing our new homes and places of work and then a social overlooking the Atlantic and watching the Diwali parade about which I have already told you.