Hitting the ground running

It seems I have been emphasising the social aspect of being in Guyana just a little too much. Why would I think that? Well, quite a few people have been asking me, ‘so what exactly are you doing in Guyana?’ Yes, I have been having lots of fun along the way, although I need to be careful how much time I spend with the Cuban Doctor who takes his partying seriously, but work-wise it has been pretty full on as well. During my training, they told me it is usually a bit quiet to begin with. Well, I’m still waiting for that quiet period to begin.

One of the reasons why my time here has been so busy from day one is because my arrival coincided with a Diaspora visit, in this case a Guyanese/Canadian Poet by the name of Peter Jailall. Peter has made a number of trips back to Guyana to work with schools over the years, which was clearly evident by the number of people who came up to talk with him. On this occasion, it was three of the Riverain Schools (i.e. those along the three main rivers in the area, Cuyuni, Mazaruni and Essequibo) who were to benefit: Batavia Primary School, Karrau Creek Primary School and Makouria Primary School. The team not only included Peter and myself but also three other VSO volunteers, Vern, also from Australia, Derek from the UK and Raquel from Portugal.

The program lasted three weeks and we spent almost a week with each school. For the first three days, the whole team went to the schools, while on the Friday, each school came to the Bartica Learning Resource Centre. We focussed on using the environment as a stimulus for writing. Peter used the children’s book ‘Turtle, Turtle, Watch Out’ as the basis of telling a story about a turtle visiting each school for tuning in. All the students then wrote their own version of the story. We demonstrated how to embed the writing process into your program to improve the quality of the stories. This included one-on-one conferencing. Once the turtle stories were finished, we began the process again, using the children’s experiences with animals in their local environment as the basis, some of which were incredibly funny while others were quite terrifying.

As Peter is a retired teacher, it was great to see him in action with the students. He had a great repertoire of songs, chants and poems, which he used to hook the students in immediately. His questioning technique really brought the students’ stories alive, which helped to improve the quality of the stories greatly.

The students were fantastic to work with, as they become more comfortable with us over the week and enjoyed the experience of writing freely and about their own experiences (each student will receive a copy of the book for their school, as well as multiple copies for each school, to be used as a resource. How great it is to leave behind stories written by the students for the students), and what rich experiences they have. We had numerous stories about encounters with quite dangerous animals, including snakes on boats, hunting tigers (I’m yet to work out exactly with they are referring to when they say, ‘tiger’) and feral animals in gardens.

Having been involved in a boys’ education project a few years back, I was particularly interested in the stories they told. I was strongly reminded of a point about violence in stories and how when this is discouraged, it can be to the detriment of the boys. This was very evident here as quite a number of the boys’ stories were clearly about ‘rites of passage’ and the importance of hunting, not just for survival, but also a cultural connection between the boys and the men in the communities. If we had ventured down the ‘no violence’ path, we would not only have stifled the boys (and quite a few of the girls as well), but also, missed out on some fantastic stories.

A keen aspect of the work with the students was helping them to find their own voice. It was always a bit of a struggle to begin with, as the students were quite scared of making mistakes. As they started writing, it seemed they were doing more erasing than putting pencil to paper. However, when it became clear to them that we were interested in their ideas and would not be on their cases about mistakes, the stories began to spill out rapidly. We introduced students and teachers to the idea of conferencing and how this can be used to encourage the student to take ownership of their writing and to learn about the writing process. I also took my laptop with me and teachers quickly spotted its value as a teaching and learning tool (all these schools either had, or were about to get, at least one laptop in their school).

Each school was in a spectacular location, making the environment an obvious theme for the project. For example, just to get to each school, we had to travel along the rivers by speedboat; great if the sun was shining, and a hell of an experience if it was raining.

Batavia was the furthest away, being on the edge of the rainforest. The first thing that grabbed your attention was all the boats tied up to the jetty, which is how the students used to travel to and from school (The paddles were all lined up outside the school’s main entrance). Karrau Creek, the closest of the schools, was in an Amerindian village and the significant question we were asked upon arrival was if were we missionaries. Makouria was actually in a different region (Region 3, I am based in Region 7), and involved the longest walk to get there (after getting off the boat that is). In fact, I don’t think we took the same path to the school twice, each time discovering a shorter route to the school. There were two things of note about Makouria: the first was it was a former base for the US defence force; and the second was Eddy Grant of ‘Electric Avenue’ fame, having a house on an island just opposite Makouria. It was also when returning from this school that we had the incredible experience of thousands of butterflies flying across the river. I never know they would venture so far from land.

Upon reflecting on this experience, I have to say I couldn’t have had a better way to start my time here in Guyana. Hitting the ground running was great. The project gave me the opportunity to visit schools I would otherwise have had difficulty to get to (due to high fuel costs) and to gain wonderful insights into the cultures of the students and their communities. The teachers I worked with in all schools were very welcoming and keen participants in the process, but it was the students who impressed me the most. There were so many light bulb moments and I’ll never forget how gooey you felt when you were greeted with their big smiles each time you turned up at their school. It was one of those experiences that you struggle to determine who actually gained more from it, yourself or participants. To top it all off, how can you not enjoy going to work by speedboat! Yep it was a huge way to begin this experience that required lots of time and effort, but I wouldn’t want to have it any other way.

Oh, and I couldn't resist including the portrait one of the students did of me, totally unaware it was happening!

Too Dangerous!?

A friend told me about a documentary that was on television in Australia, recently, that was all about Guyana. When it came to Bartica, they didn’t venture here because they considered it to be too dangerous. Well I have been living in Bartica for about six weeks now, so let’s see what impression I have of the place.

Bartica is like many places around the world with a fascination for cows. The only difference here is that the cows are real! Yes, the animals are one of the first things that make an impression on you, especially the cows, as they roam around the town. At night you have to be very careful where you walk because you never know what you may step in. The morning after, you quite clearly see the evidence of where the cows must have been having a party the night before. I even saw a cow and a bull coming out of the outside seating area of a local store, having, well, a ‘good time’ is one way to describe it. But cows aren’t the only animals to watch out for. There are the goats, cats, donkeys and horses (but not pigs strangely enough) but it is the dogs at night you have to watch. Quite placid during the day, at night they form gangs, making sneaking home without anyone knowing next to impossible.

Then there are the cars. The volume of traffic is a recent phenomenon, I have been told, as has been the sealing of the roads. Generally things move slowly, partly thanks to the animals, but generally aren’t any real footpaths, so people walk along the edge of the road. That doesn’t stop the usual ‘young fellas’ you get anywhere, who like to speed around way too fast. At the moment, I would have to say I am losing the game of chicken as I keep getting off the road as cars approach, but slowly I am gaining more confidence to try to stay on.

And so we move on to the nightlife. At this stage, I have not been able to determine whether there are more places of worship of the religious sense, or places of worship of the ‘looking for a good time’ sense. Up along Third Street, which I have also heard referred to as ‘Stelling Street’ as it starts at the stelling, but that could be a volunteer thing – yet to determine that fact as well (Note – Stelling is the port area – I have never heard the word before and yet to find any reference to it.), seems to have a lot of action with a number of bars pumping out music, bench seating and Banks beer – 4 or 5 for a thousand dollars. We do in fact buy our beer in bulk when we go out, which usually means you have to go a few rounds to get it all even. Going out for one beer, can quickly turn into five (which I am now calling one Bartician beer!). The matter can be further complicated by someone on the other side of the bar, shouting your whole group a round (which has also happened a number of times in Georgetown). So things can quickly spiral out of control. It’s no wonder this is known as ‘party town’. You certainly know when you have arrived in Bartica!

But not everything happens at night. Your days can also be filled with music, as people in their cars, houses, and even walking along the edge of the road can have some sort of music blaring, perhaps a little too loud with some of the distortion you can hear. When it is local styles, such as Soca or Chutney (yes that is a music style, check out VSO Raquel’s blog featuring Dan as a guest blogger http://raquelvso.blogspot.com/ for the in’s and out’s of it all), it is fine, but I am struggling with the 80s power ballads and Canada has a lot to answer for, thanks to Celine Dion! (Please don’t let her die while I am here – the tributes and constant ‘turnstiling’ would just be too much!!). And the locals just love to sing at the top of their voices. It does not seem to matter who is around, or whether you can actually sing.

Finally there is the location, where the Cuyuni flows into the Mazaruni, into the Essequibo, and the river is wide here. Looking downstream you can see islands covered in lush rainforest of in the distance. It’s the river equivalent of Thailand’s coast. In fact, despite being an hour-and-a-half from the coast, by speedboat, the major way to get here, the river is actually tidal here. If I am ever having a bit of a downer, I just need to look at an island in the river to realise that I am somewhere special.

So ‘too dangerous’? I might be naïve but I aint seeing it!!