Dust, UNICEF and ever more ponderings

Here in el Cauca, if you’re travelling somewhere for 8 hours, it’s probably about 100km away. The road will be dusty, the potholes deep and the corners sharp. But the views will be spectacular, and the people so pleased to see you. For the past three days I’ve been visiting countryside towns with Paulo, from the campaign, and Sandra, from UNICEF (who is from Medellín). She is head of the project they have with the campaign developing Mine Risk Education in the 5 highest risk departments in Colombia and was in Popayán all this week to check on progress and move things along. We went to three municipality capitals where they have started, or are about to start, training 30 teachers in MRE and integrating it into the curriculum. But this is no mean feat.

Arriving in San Sebastián at lunchtime after 6 hours of mostly unsurfaced road, we looked like we’d been rolled in breadcrumbs ready for the frier. The wind was strong and the temperature cool, so the natural water shower, although welcome, made me gasp. First we went to meet some recently trained teachers, who although shy at first, were all very keen to bring about change. Equally the head of education for the area, who we met later, was very willing to plan for MRE in the coming year. And this was the case the following day and the next. Motivated local leaders, keen campaign coordinators, willing teachers. But I do wonder how long this will continue when Sandra isn’t there asking questions. I mean I’m sure they want to reduce numbers of accidents and I hope they can see the value of education (personally I think it might be the most important thing) but it just seemed so difficult to get a meeting with them, to get concrete answers, and, most cynically, to find motivation when there’s no extra pay. I don’t know what it is about local teachers and leaders in developing countries, but I noticed it in Africa as well: an affinity for doing the bare minimum. Maybe it’s their gross underpayment, or their low status as a profession (which in itself needs addressing), or maybe it’s that, as women, when they get home they still have to wash the clothes, feed the children and clean the house, but it does mean that education in country schools is not to the highest standard. This is a massive generalisation and I would just like to say that this won’t be true across the developing world, it’s just my experience. Of British teachers compared to Colombian and Ugandan ones. All of them work hard, but their focusses are slightly different.

It was definitely interesting visiting the townships. They looked like typical South America; men on horses in hats and ponchos, children playing in the street with dogs, isolated houses with flowers galore, markets of fruit and vegetables and old women selling sweets. In La Sierra there was a beer festival, with tents and kegs and everything. And I was taken to visit the weekly fruit market, where I discovered even more varieties I’d never seen before. We had to go through the meat section to get there though, and oh the smell. There were cows’ heads, upside down on tables, cut in half, jaws off. Cows’ tails hanging from bars next to ears, and pigs’ trotters being chopped with axes. A chip flew off and hit my shirt, and I wondered if I should in fact be a vegetarian given my disgust. Sorry if you are one, reader, and you just had to get through that bit. Done now.

On the return journey the jeep broke down. The ‘bomba de gasolina’ wasn’t pumping petrol into the engine apparently, which could have been due to dirty petrol bought on the roadside. Luckily, being a Scout, Paulo had various tools, and the driver had a few too, so they set about fixing it while Sandra and I acknowledged our weakness and went to take some photos as the sun got closer to the mountain peaks, casting shadows over the valley. Which in itself was a problem because as well as not being allowed to use public transport, UNICEF workers aren’t supposed to travel after dark. We were an hour and a half from our planned overnight stop, and they worked quickly. And they fixed it and we were off. It got dark and we could see small fires across the mountainside, clearing crops, or started by pyromaniacs, one can only speculate. And we passed no-one. It was a little eery.

I had a great time with Sandra and Paulo. They are full of stories, full of laughter and I enjoyed all the banter! We shared a bottle of rum one night, some beers the next, and got to know each other. And it’s been a great 2 weeks for my Spanish here in the south. I haven’t spoken English to a native speaker at all and I actually do feel a bit more fluent. Although I do have random slips, like the other day when someone said ‘Qué hora tienes?’ and I said ´Half past four’ which was bizarre. And there’s also something weird in the way I keep forgetting this is their mother tongue, they don’t have to think at all when they speak. This is the grammar structure that is natural to them, and Chomsky comes to mind. There are times when I don’t have to think either, but only for short comments and I do wish I could speak faster, like the babble that I can now understand from Colombians. A few people have told me I speak very clearly, which is nice, but equally, I don’t know what they’re comparing me to. When people seem impressed by my Spanish I can never take it seriously because I still use incorrect structures, I still form unnatural phrases and there are still so so many words I don’t know! But I do get my meaning across. What I would love is to be able to hear myself from the point of view of a native speaker, then I would know what I have to do.

Right I’m going to stop there and add some things to Cultural Learnings. Even though I still haven’t mentioned the storytellers, the University fiesta, the Scout fundraising party, the Scouts’ teaching sessions, problems with being a zona roja, the capacitación for Puracé municipality, my excitement at my veeery long journey back to Bogotá… There’s always more to say. But this is enough. Enough now. (Hi sis).

Baths, networking and life lessons

Something that stands out about Colombians in my eyes is how friendly they are. And how willinging to share their time with me. This also means that if I am by myself I am unlikely to be that way for long, since it appears that lonliness is something Colombians fear. And thus my introverted nature suffers somewhat. But this is not something to complain about, rather to hope that I too can learn to be more naturally welcoming. Anyway the reason I bring this up is because being in Popayán has been a series of introductions and invitations.

Last week, Paulo and I went to meet two people, called Clara and Julian, from Patoral Social, another NGO working with mine victims and funded by the German Catholic church. They told me all about what they do, which is similar to the Campaign (CCCM)but involves more direct victim assistance. We went for a gaseosa (fizzy drink) in a nearby cafe and there we met Maira, the Campaign Coordinator for one of the municipalities, who needed to talk to Paulo about a recent victim. She was about 25 I think, as were the 2 Pastoral Social people. In fact everyone in this business seems to be under 35/40, I don’t know what happens after that age..! Anyway (sorry this is turning into a bit of a long story!) the next day I was in town waiting for the Religious Art museum to open (more on that later) so I went to the Juan Valdez café, and there was Clara having a break from work with some of her friends from uni who all work nearby. So we chatted (well they chatted and I added the odd comment) for a while and it was nice. Then yesterday I was in there again and one of Clara’s friends came in with his laptop and came and sat with me and we chatted. He is a music producer and is organising a music festival/competiton that starts next week and runs for the following three. And he asked me if I wanted to sing in it! Alas, I will be back in Bogotá then, but that would have been pretty cool! And all becuase he’s a friend of a friend of a friend. And while we were there 3 or 4 different people came to meet with him, (one of whom owns one of the bars in my guidebook!) so I am getting to be a pro at explaining why I’m here!

But that wasn’t the only product of networking. Maira, who we met to have a gaseosa, phoned Paulo on Friday to see if I wanted to go to the volcanic thermal baths with her on Sunday. Which I did! So we took a colectivo to Coconoco where her family live and her dad drove us to the baths, about half an hour away on an unsurfaced road. The air was suprisingly cold considering how little I’d thought we’d climbed on the way from Popayán, but the water was lovely. There were 2 pools, fed from the volcano, and a water slide too. And no lifeguards, cos who really cares about health and safety anyway. It was full of families from nearby towns, with hundreds of children running around, and I thought how very similar people are across the world, despite everything that separates us.

Last week Miriam took me to visit her school. It’s on the outskirts of Popayán and is fed by a nearby vereda which is home to lots of displaced families. Cauca (the department) has the second highest rate of landmine accidents in Colombia and therefore there is a medium to high guerrilla threat in certain municipalities. So these people come with nothing, and have very little idea of what the future holds. There are not many high ambitions. You know it’s funny, on the news you see refugees in Africa and the Middle East and flooded cities in Indonesia and earthquakes and ruined lives and of course I always think, ‘gosh how awful for them’ or similar, but at the same time there’s something in me that thinks ‘they’re used to it’ and so dismisses it as more of the same news. But how can you be ‘used’ to earthquakes? To flooding? To moving around fleeing for your life? As if you’re expecting it, as if you know ‘this is the type of thing that happens to me, not to someone else’. And why has it taken me so long to realise this?

Anyway, the kids in the school were so full of energy and so full of questions it was amazing. I’m so glad I went. I went first to one of Miriam’s classes of 13 year olds (she teaches Spanish), and she asked me to explain to them why it’s so important to learn English (although I found it a bit difficult to make it completely relevant to them, all I could think of was TV instruction manuals) and then they wanted me to speak some English, so I told them how nice Colombia is etc, using pretty simple vocab I thought. But they had no idea what I said, and when I asked them ‘Entienden?’ (Do you understand?) they all burst out laughing. Then later I went to a class of older kids with the English teacher. They were learning how to use can, can’t, could and couldn’t, through the medium of Mariah Cary songs. The teacher wanted me to help with pronunciation, so I read out the lyrics for them to repeat (they were all very reluctant to speak!) and worried the teacher by my pronunciation of ‘can’t', since she’d learnt the American way. Then they inundated me with questions and wanted me to speak French and Arabic to them and also German, Italian… I wrote some phrases on the board for them and they all copied them down in their books! I had a great time! And on the way home, in the colectivo with Miriam, I thought how it actually wouldn’t be so bad to be a teacher. I wanted to go back to that school again and again to get them more confident, to broaden their horizons, to teach. But to teach in England, well that’s another thing all together. I don’t think I have the confidence. Teachers in England have my utmost respect.

The religious art museum was another example of the friendliness of Colombians. I went one afternoon and was the only person there. So the secuirty guard showed me round! He told me about every single painting and sculpture and it made it a lot more interesting! Because once again this museum was a little lacking in information. I mean for a museum. But it was full of 18th and 19th Century art from Quito, Bogotá and Madrid, reclaimed from the town’s churches to protect it. A pretty impressive collection. But I think this town should recreate its tagline, from the White City, to City of Churches. Because really there are like 50. The other day I went into one to take some pictures and was amazed to see a weekday afternoon mass so full. I took a few pictures, subtly, then realised it was a funeral and promptly left!

Chao for now xx

Scouts, teaching and quite an exciteable Claire

Parque Caldas, Popayan

Now I actually am in Popayán and it’s lovely! The campaign coordinator here is called Paulo and he’s great. So enthustiastic, and very inclusive, and good at his job too. Plus he has 2 adorable children! He also runs a Scout troupe, who are now getting involved with mine action as well. They’ve just started a programme of Mine Risk Education (one of the stipultaions of the Convention that government has kind of ignored) and are spreading the word. They are also sending one person to Cartagena to meet other youths involved in mine action from around the country and the world, which is a scheme funded by Mines Action Canada (which is why only one can go, although it used to be 2 and there were going to be more meetings, but I guess funding was dropped. It’s kind of hard to explain though, when someone is expecting to go to Cartagena and now they can’t because some charity decided to withdraw the money allotted to them. And actually in the Bogotá office I helped Eunice write some persuasaive (and pleading) emails to the Canadians, but it didn’t help much. Anyway, tangent over). I’m staying with the person who is going and his family, his name is Daniel, and his mother, Miriam is lovely. Her and her mother have been cooking for me the whole time I’ve been here, they are so generous!

But let’s go back to chronological order. Last week we continued to have very little to do in the office (except for one morning of phoning around the embassies in Bogotá to see who was coming to a breakfast meeting the next week, which was rather exciting actually! But in the Norwegian embassy, firstly I didn’t know how to pronounce the ambassador’s name and I though it was a man’s name but it was actually a woman’s, plus the secretary started talking to me in English. Damn my accent! And the good education system of Scandinavian countries!). So to combat this lack of activity we did some fun fun things in the evenings AND… booked flights to go the Amazon!! The Actual Amazon! Very excited! On Thursday we went for drinks with a Belgian girl Laura met when she came to Popayán, and we met a guy who she’d been in America with and his workmates, so it was a  jolly evening. The Belgian girl, Nathalie and her German housemate (both of whom speak excellent Spanish and never once went into English ) are on an awesome Master’s programme where you do one term in 3 different universities around the world, no matter your country of origin. There are no participating UK universities, but Dublin is in, plus one in most European countries… they went to Holland, Bilbao and Bogotá! Cool huh. Then on Friday evening, I found something for us to see at the theatre. (There’s not that much choice, I think there’s only about 7 things on at any one time, most of them in translation. But theatre is growing in popularity I believe, which is great. In fact at one of the forums someone suggested doing Mine Risk Education through more modern forms, like theatre!) So anyway, what I found was a new translation by a Colombian musician and producer of Oliver! She had had to have many meeting at Cameron Makintosh to get the rights and eventually Claude-Michel Schoenberg’s son approved it. It was ace. Their costumes were just right and the set was really impressive (especially considering the cheapness of the tickets!). The dancing was very similar to the film, and all the songs were very true to their originals. I could obviously follow the story, but the Spanish was understandable and it was interesting to see how they’d translated everything – they managed to squeeze a lot of syllables in to the melodies!

I got an overnight bus on Saturday to Popayán, which was uneventful. (In that I didn’t sleep much as is my wont!) Paulo met me at the bus station with Daniel and we went to Daniel’s house. That afternoon Daniel and his girlfriend took me around Popayán, showing me all the sights. It’s great to have locals show you their home town, and especially this one cos there are a lot of stories to tell! Popayán has the most important Holw Week procession in all of Colombia, so it’s a pretty Catholic place (one of the roundabouts has a statue of Jesus on the cross!). There are 8 churches in the small centre, all decorated better than any other churches I’ve been in here, and with large statues that go out on floats during the processions. All the buildings in the centre are white and it’s really pretty. Plus everyone seems to know each other, it’s like Durham!

On Monday Paulo and I went to a nearby vereda (village/hamlet) to start the Mine Risk Education (MRE) of 12 teachers, who will each train 2 more teachers, who will all teach 5 parents and 20 kids minium. Well I say nearby, it actually took 2 and a half hours to get there. We went first in a colectivo to El Tambo, the main town of the municipality (an aside – Colombia is divided into departments, which are divided into municipalities, which are divided into veredas), then we got a shared jeep with a few teachers from there. I would guess it was about 50km from Popayán altogether, and I think we were going about 20-30k most of the time, although I couldn’t tell because working milometers are  not a priority here (and the mileage of the jeep we were in was stuck on 429,063.7, for those who are interested (hi Dad)). The potholes in the road were so deep that it looked like a mountain range, or maybe the Cotswolds. But it was an interesting journey, we passed lots of country folk, out and about at 6am, plus a few workers with machetes who got a free ride from us by sitting on the roof. (No idea how they stayed on, I had to hold on most of the time to stay put!) We eventually arrived at the school, shaken like a polaroid picture, and met teachers who had come from 2 hours in the opposite direction, and those who worked in the village. It was very small, consisting of about 20 houses. I was also taken to see a foundation for children who lived far from the village, where they could stay during the week to save them having to walk 2 hours every morning and night, which was reasonably new and run by a lovely couple who had just made a video to be put on the internet to advertise for more funding. For the MRE, UNICEF had provided teaching materials, including games, pictures, flash cards… They were well thought out. And the teachers loved playing (Mine-related) Snakes and Ladders, it was so bizarre that they had never seen it before! And every time someone landed on a snake there was much groaning and gleeful laughter. I think the session went really well, and we’ll return next week to finish off. But I do find it really quite surprising how much needs telling, how much they don’t already know. Because it’s not a new problem by any means. Sure there are some new-ish developments, like the use of household objects as mines, which is the cruelest form of ‘defence’ I have heard of. I think it’s more than ‘indiscriminate’ (the accepted definition of a mine). They use dolls, footballs, radios, jerrycans… And schools say there’s no room for MRE in the timetable, which also seems a tad strange, since their final exams seem to be less significant than ours… and surely this is a matter of public health and safety?! It’s a shame the government would rather buy 2 helicopters than provide teaching materials for a hundred schools. I can imagine in England this would take the form of PSE lessons, but instead of a policeman coming to tell us what to do if we think we’re being followed, it’d be a soldier to tell us how to recognise minefields. But it’s not something that comes naturally – I mean compared to ‘Don’t talk to strangers’ for the reserved British, ‘Don’t go and investigate interesting and attractive looking objects’ doesn’t really have the same ring to it for a curious country-dwelling child.

The Scouts’ MRE programme started on Wednesday evening, aimed at other Scout leaders so that they can teach their Scouts, and then take it into schools. There was a meeting on Tuesday evening at Paulo’s house to plan, which I went along to. And I was really excited by the doors this was opening for them. And for Daniel especially, when he comes to Cartagena. Thank goodness for people like Paulo.

More on this another time, I want to go into town and not sit at this computer anymore.