Settlement Day 2012 - NGC Health Fair

Steve and I are so thrilled to be busy this November with many of the activities of Settlement Day. Last year,  we attended some of the events - Miss Garifuna Pageant, traditional dance performances, youth presentations, the Re-enactment, and the parade - but only as a tourist would experience them. This year we are in the thick of things.

Felicia Nunez
She is "Fel" to some, "Nen" to others

Back in August, we wrote about our meeting with the National Garifuna Council. The meeting served as a brainstorming session to create ideas and recruit volunteers for a long line-up of events in November leading up to the 19th, Settlement Day. Steve and I agreed to organize a health fair for them. Other than some broad guidelines as to which days would be appropriate, and a promise that we could use that same meeting place as the venue, we had a blank slate to create the fair.

We didn't do much before we left for our vacation in the U.S. Because a commitment from the Polyclinic was foremost in our minds as key to the success of the health fair, Steve got them locked in. I talked with one of the POWA women, and they also agreed to participate. So - we had a start, both of them based on who we worked with. YAY! We had a chat with our NGC liason, Ms. Felicia Nunez, about what issues we needed answers to. She promised to carry those concerns to the NGC at their next meeting while we were in the States.

Phyllis Cayetano
Ms. Caye

Then we visited family and friends and forgot all about it for two fun-filled weeks. (STILL miss you all SO MUCH!)

Once we returned, we had about a week and a half to pull it all together. I was right in my element. I love organizing events, especially tending to all the details. Ms. Nen had gone to Surinam (!) for a leadership and women's rights conference, so we worked directly with Ms. Phyllis Cayetano, the chairman of the Dangriga NGC. She is a mover and a shaker, has been an activist in the community for years.

On Wednesday before the fair, we joined Ms. Caye and two other men in charge of other activities at the studios of Hamalali Radio. Steve and I each had a chance to talk about the health fair and invite people to "come on out" to our event.

With Ms. Caye.
The two guys in the foreground are DJs for the station. The one
on the right is named Rugged.

We thought you might enjoy hearing Mr. Francis Marin speak. He is the principal of the ANRI High School (Agricultural emphasis high school). In this clip, he is talking about the three "hats" that he wears.

Everybody got a sticker

The rest of the week was taken up with making signs and banners, stickers, handouts, 200 small bags of popcorn to give the kids, running around to some of the different participants and several schools to make sure all those ducks were lined up. I also went back to the radio station to get several hours worth of Garifuna music to play on my big Block Rocker. Steve managed the logistics for the tables and chairs, and liaised with some of the other participants. Of course, Steve and I were also WORKING at our own tables at the fair, too. So that meant pulling that stuff together, too.

The day arrives! We were up early (we always get up early), with all our materials ready, and Ms. Caye picked us up in her husband's pickup truck.

Setup was fun!

Deluxe decorations for the outdoor tent

Steve figured out how to  hang the sign so it wouldn't
"bust up" from the wind

Mr. Roy Cayetano helped us haul stuff

We had a surprise visit from TWO carloads of Peace Corps staff. They arrived just at start time and stayed about an hour. That really gave us a boost!

Denise Diaz

Nina Hernandez, Country Director

Ellen, PCV from Belize City, came to help us. She joined up with me at our Healthy Lifestyle table.

Ellen

Once we got under way, we had a few adults and LOTS of school kids.

Steve explains Incaparina to kids from
Epworth Methodist Primary School

Kids from Gulisi Community School at one of the booths

Nurse Laverne, from the Polyclinic, demonstrates how to
take someone's blood pressure to students from
Sacred Heart Primary School

Ellen came up with a fun game for all the kids. It was a relay race with two teams competing. Players run up to a judge and answer a true/false question about exercise. If they get it right, they run back right away and tag the next person in line to run. If they get it wrong, they have to spin around 3 times (or so) before they can run back. Here's a little sample.

Here are just a couple more pictures. We had a great time, and got home very tired but feeling satisfied with the event.

Nella (from POWA) and Ms. Nen talking about herbs and
natural medicine

Aidra came to see us, too. Here she is with Ellen at our
Lifestyle table. In the foreground you can see the nutrition
basket I made to help illustrate examples of a healthy diet.

And . . . winding down.

A New Family Member!

Steve and I are thrilled to welcome our new grandbaby into the world - from Belize! He joined us on Wednesday, October 3. He's a big boy - 8 pounds 5 ounces, and 21 inches. His mom, Stephanie, is doing fine and will make the BEST MOM! Dad, Jeff, is bouncing with pride and love - and performing his diaper-changing duties well.

Here are a few pictures of Burke Francis Nieman.

Soon after his birth

Dad and son

Isn't he pretty?

Grandfather and Burke. I love his little face.

We think he has red hair!

Tar Heel born

OK, I'll stop with the pictures. I cannot WAIT to get to the States next Saturday. Burke is calling!

NOTHING else happened this week.

Well, in the background of our lives there were a couple of things. 

• Steve went to Trio to do a cooking demonstration with Incaparina. He and his work partner made tortillas and porridge for the moms and kids in the village. They wanted to promote and educate people about the benefits of using Incaparina to give the kids enough good nutrition. The tortillas didn't go over too well (Hmmm, the place was filled with women who make tortillas every day. They KNOW how to make a good tortilla.), but the porridge was a big hit. Everybody came back for seconds.

Meeting place in Trio

Steve's work partner, Tylon Tillett

• International artist Ingrid Cayetano (Her website) taught our group of GLOW girls. Most of her art is done with needlework on different fabrics, called thread painting (I think?). What a trooper! She walked in on about 13 squirmy girls. We had planned for 8 or 9.

Learn patience!

Work together and share

Take pride, have strong self-esteem

Have FUN!!

A Dance Item and a Disappointment in Orange Walk

Last week began what seems like a month-long holiday. Monday was St. George's Day and Tuesday was Carnival Day. Wednesday Dangriga had the Talent Showcase, and on Friday the primary schools held their big rah-rah rally!

Our Garifuna Glow Girls wanted to perform for the Talent Showcase on Wednesday. We didn't have much notice - about 5 days - so we had to keep things simple. The girls were already familiar with several dance routines, taken from music videos, so they made the decision to pull something together from that.

I volunteered to have the girls practice at my house. About 9 girls showed up on Sunday afternoon. More than an hour was spent selecting music and trying to download it. The songs they wanted were NOT available from anywhere online, and they wouldn't believe that it couldn't be found.

"No, Miss. Right there on YouTube."

"Yes, girls, it's on YouTube, but that's a video, not music. I can't find only the song to download." And I tried some of those so-called YouTube downloaders, but none worked. I guess Google has found a way to disable them.

Steve helped me record it from YouTube played through the computer speakers, so the quality was AWFUL. Girls didn't care.

As the girls left on that first day, they all agreed to come back the next day at 1:00, and I followed with my usual, "And don't be late."

When 1:00 o'clock rolled around Monday morning (St. George's Day, remember? So there was no school.), and no one arrived I wasn't surprised. One girl showed up at 1:15 and she had a good reason for being late. Aliyah is one of the "good ones," usually punctual, quick to volunteer, very polite. By 1:30 we had 4 girls here, but we waited some more before practicing. The de facto leader still wasn't there, and we felt like she knew the routine the best. (I certainly didn't know it.) They finally started rehearsing and we broke up about 3:00.

As I walked out with the girls, we saw four other club members strolling up the street toward the house. I kindly but firmly told them that practice was over and that I was very disappointed in their lateness, that it showed disrespect for their club mates and for me.

I don't know any other way to put this. Few girls here have been taught social skills. The four girls just stood there gawking, speechless. So I gave them the words to use. "The nice thing to say would be, 'I'm sorry, Miss Cathy. I messed up and I won't do it again.'" Those poor girls could still not get a single syllable out of their mouth, just stood there. Some looked down at their feet, another gave a half smile, and got a little tear (of embarrassment?). Another turned on her heel and just walked away. I waited a few moments, never got anything from the latecomers, and walked away with the other girls. As we walked away, I told them that last rehearsal was the next day after school.

This is dragging on too long, but I guess I'm trying to get across the basic frustration I live with on a daily basis. I did call the girls' mothers to tell them that their daughters had let us down and that I was disappointed in them. I also emphasized how each girl was special and that I thought they were special (which is true!). Each mother said she would talk with her daughter.

The next day - 4 girls showed up and practiced. Here's a sample:

The little girl in pink in the front row is the only one who came to all 3 rehearsals.

There's more, but I'm tired of writing about it. Short version, to get this whole show on the road, I  -

• Called Town Council
• Called Police Department
• Called 4 principals
• Called Central Education Center
• Helped the girls settle on what to wear and where to meet and when

I had to leave for Orange Walk the next day (see next section), so Aidra was taking over to make sure they did what they needed to do for the Wednesday performance. In the end, two girls showed up and one refused to dance. No dance item for the Garifuna Glow Girls. Sigh.

But they do look cute, don't you think?

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Several weeks ago, Peace Corps Volunteer Natalie Macias invited me to come to Orange Walk Town to teach a Zumba class to a small women's group. I agreed and looked forward to seeing a part of Belize that was new to me. 

It's a L-O-O-O-N-G bus ride, close to 6 hours I decided to take my big speaker - my Block Rocker - so we'd have good sounds for the class. It weighs a little over 20 pounds, but it's got wheels and good handles. It's manageable. I just have to be careful to make sure nobody "thief" it.

So I rode up on Wednesday morning. Natalie met me and we had lunch at a cool restaurant (air conditioned), and did some power shopping at A&R (sort of like Target). Natalie has a great house, a sweet fun dog, and a nice music collection. On Wednesday night, we met another PCV, Barbara Levy, and had shrimp ceviche and Belikin Beer at a fun spot. The only thing they sell at the restaurant is shrimp ceviche (except when conch is in season; then they also have conch ceviche). And I saw something that I never would have believed. Mennonite men sitting around drinking beer. They weren't even eating, just drinking. Natalie said there's a group of "very progressive" Mennonites in the OW area.

Thursday morning, we went early to the library, where the Zumba class was to be held. Natalie said the women's group was small, usually about seven, but a very enthusiastic and outspoken group. They meet once a week and have a different speaker or program each week. They had been looking forward to this fun class and even joked about what they would wear. The librarian texted everybody at 9:00 to remind them about the session. Class was to start at 10:00.

You guessed it - nobody came. By 10:50, I was disgusted and ready to pack up. One of the women walked in with her two kids. "Where's everybody?" The librarian "railed up" on her, but of course it fell on deaf ears. She said, "Well, I couldn't come because I had family court." She kept talking about family court. I asked her how it went in family court and she said, "Well, I didn't have it because I never called them back." Not quite sure what that was all about.

So I showered and got back on the bus. On the Belize to Belmopan leg of the ride, I had an interesting conversation with some guys who were ranting about how Peace Corps was trying to teach children in Belize to be homosexuals and that the anus is a sexual organ. They were getting pretty excited about it. I decided to speak up, identify myself, and set the record straight. They were referring to the HFLE curriculum, of course, which has been in the news a lot lately (see this link: HFLE PAGE LISTINGS and brief descriptions of issues). By the end of the conversation, I think five people believed me, and the last guy wasn't going to change his mind no matter what. It was fun and cordial, and I think the people appreciated hearing a reasonable dissenting view.

***********************************

So that's about it for me. Here's a picture of the journals that the Garifuna Glow Girls made. They are writing in them a little each week - about their name, their strengths and weaknesses, goals - topics like that. Some of the girls are enthusiastic, and some do bare minimum - just like school!

*******************************************

Steve here. This week I traveled to the satellite clinics in Pomona and Hopkins with Mr. Tillett who is the nutrition social worker for the district. We went through all the charts of babies and children up to 5 years old to check on their growth charts. We picked out those that may be in trouble and compiled a list for home visits if they do not come in sometime soon for their routine immunizations. We have great data on how many kids are served by each clinic and how many of them are underweight and what their ages are and their genders are. 

Hopkins clinic

Nurse Martinez at Hopkins Clinic

Pomona Clinic

It was a good week for keeping in touch. I was able to video chat with my son and was able to talk to both sisters on the phone. We all look forward to getting together next month in the US.

Another Exciting Week

The last 10 days have been busy. Last Saturday we went to a workshop for community health workers from Cayo District. The purpose of the meeting was to test-teach the prenatal chapter in the women’s health module that Cathy had written. She did most of the teaching with help from one of the HECOPAB (Health Education and Community Participation Bureau) educators. The training activities seemed to go over well. We have yet to see the scores from the test we gave before and after the sessions. It will be nice to know if the training was effective. The people certainly seemed to like it. We got great feedback about language and cultural nuances that need to be changed in the manuscript.

Arlette Sheppard is at the front, asking for feedback about specific
wording in the manual.

The facility, Camalote Camp, is very nice and perfect for meetings.
From left to right, Arlette, Cathy, Rose, and Christina (Rose and
Christina are HECOPAB educators)

One group presenting

Another group presenting with Rose Anderson supervising

A second room (air conditioned!) where we worked

My work partner, Mr. Tillett has been working furiously with me on a video about child nutrition and Incaparina. The Ministry of Health He had asked him to give a presentation at a  meeting in Belmopan. He gave the presentation even though there are still improvements to be made to the video. According to what he said, it was very well received. They have asked him to finish the voice-over parts and then publish it to be widely distributed on DVD. I am proud, and very happy for him to get recognized for the good things he is doing for children in our district. It is great to be a part of that. 

Tylon Tillett working on the voice-over for the video

We are both very grateful to our friends and relatives who have enlivened our lives with care packages of goodies. Jeannie and Larry, Joyce and Holly, Toni and Stacey, Carol and Nancy, and Charlie - THANK YOU! We realize that it is expensive to send things and that you have to wait a long time for stuff to get here before you hear the delight in our voices when we offer our heartfelt thanks.

Steve's Turn to Write about Life in the Fast Lane

This has been a week full of excitement for me. At the Polyclinic staff meetings, the administrator has been asking each of the work sections to produce an educational program that can be played through the TV monitor in the waiting room. Our video for the nutrition section, which I created, is about 10 minutes long and has great music in the background. The still pictures have simulated motion with zoom or zoom and pan (Ken Burns effect). The weak link is still the narration which is done in my foreign sounding voice. It is hard to persuade a native speaker to do the voice-over, although it would clearly add credibility to the educational message. We still have time before the administrator’s deadline.

Screen shot from the movie

We seem to be well into the rainy season with really heavy rain early in the week. I was amazed to see the torrent that Stann Creek has become. It was amusing to see the birds riding chunks of debris zinging along in search of food.

  

Tylon, my work counterpart, and I went to Belmopan for three days of Peace Corps training on project design. I learned a tremendous amount of material from dreaming about making a change in some little part of human society all the way through goals, objectives, evaluation and management to writing an effective grant proposal and finding funding sources that share some common interest. We worked together on our own project and had extra help from Ms. Carmen Silva who is in charge of the grant program at the US embassy.

Me with Tylon and Carmen Silva

Helmuth Castro, on "loan" to us from Peace Corps Honduras

We also had great team-building activities. One of my favorites was a competition between two blind man’s buff teams. It was a quiz, and the various answers were taped to the wall at the other end of the room. The blind-folded team member had to find the sheet with the answer on it. The answerer of the question could see the seeker and the answers but could only give directions with hand signs to the speaker on the team who could not look at the wall or the blind-folded team member. What a great way to make learning fun!

Blind Man's Buff. In the background you can see Mickie Post, one
of the PCVs trying to manhandle her opponent to win the game ;-)
Since she weighs less than 90 pounds, we felt the strategy was a gamble.

For a culture exercise we had a dance break led by Des and Gwen, who both work for the Ministry of Education. Des is also with the professional dance group we have seen perform the traditional Garifuna dances. I tried to shoot video and dance at the same time but finally gave up in favor of trying to learn to dance.

On Saturday we had a work-day in Hopkins village. Several other volunteers also gathered to paint the building at the Sandy Beach women’s co-op restaurant, which is Meghan’s main project. The ladies also taught us cooking lessons in Garifuna native dishes. Cathy pitched in to pound the boiled plantain to make hudut, to be eaten with the fish soup.

Here is Cathy mastering the mortar and pestle.
Belizeans call it the mahtah.

Ken Post and Meghan partaking of the hudut and fish stew.

We had also hoped to see Meghan’s dog Belikin who is a sister puppy to our FuWe Dog, but she was out on a walk with a neighbor, and we missed her.

Several other events were notable. One was dinner last night with the other two married couples in Peace Corps Belize. I still cannot believe that none of us took a picture. This morning our dog got a bath. It is probably the last bath she will get in the plastic tub that she has outgrown. Fortunately Breezie was there with the camera for all of us to enjoy again. 

Future baths will be outside with the water from the
rain barrels. FuWe is now 35 pounds!

Steve is Helping Underfed and Malnourished Children

Steve here:

Last week I had the opportunity to visit Red Bank village about 45 minutes south of here. I went with my work partner, Tylon, who is a social worker leading the child nutrition project for our district. We pulled up benches and plastic chairs in the shade of the health post and had a wonderful audience of about thirty mothers and at least that many children. We talked about the nutritional benefits of Incaparina for children, especially during the first two years of life. We also worked with the visiting nurse who talked to the mothers about food preparation for children after weaning.

Community Health Worker is teaching mothers about weaning to
solid food. Mothers in Belize are encouraged to use breast feeding
for at least six months after birth.

We had cookies made from Incaparina to give away at the end of the session, and they were a really big hit. The mothers were hesitant to try the cookies until they saw how popular they were with their kids. We were also able to convince the mothers that the food supplement provided by the nutrition project was a good thing, and we convinced them to accept samples to use in their cooking at home. It wasn't an automatic sell. Just as with the cookies, the moms didn't jump to take the Incaparina. So I stepped up to someone and said, "Would you like to take it home and try it?" She took it, and then others joined in. they all took one, then came back for more. "I have a sister. Maybe I could take one to her." "My neighbor could not come today, but I will take one to her." Some of the mothers took four packages. So we're confident that the program got off to a good start.

On Saturday I was invited to a work project in Hopkins village where a fellow volunteer is assisting a co-op of women to prepare the Sandy Beach Restaurant for re-opening. The women cooked a sit-down lunch for all of us. The meal tells me that the restaurant should do well.

I got to do some woodworking and use my tools! I helped one of their children attach a new brace to a broken picnic table, and I cut boards and helped the ladies put a new top on the table. One of the best parts was getting to speak Garifuna with the women who were all good and patient teachers. 

This is Cathy here with my two-cents worth:

I spent the week at my computer working on the CHW manual. If I do this a lot, that's gonna be a sure-fire way to a BIG BUTT. I make myself get up every hour or so, but it's not enough! My brain gets pretty fried. OK, I'm through with the whining.

One thing I did for fun, was create some paintings for the Sandy Beach Restaurant. They are meant to be crude, rustic looking. I used rough cut board, and put latex wall paint as a background. Then used poster paint to paint in the simple pictures.  Here are a couple. More on the way.

This one will get trimmed and put on the door
of the women's bathroom

Garifuna woman clapping

Last blog entry, I mentioned that my Zumba class is doing well. Mondays we have more than 20, and we dance outside in the school yard. Thursday nights, there are fewer so we can workout/dance inside. Ava took some pictures of our last session. They are a fun bunch - really get into it.