I wish you a Central American

 

My partner and I lived in Honduras and Nicaragua for almost five years doing Cuso International development work in the 2010s. I concluded very quickly that if ever there was an apocalypse, I’d want to go through it with a small-town Central American at my side.

I’m feeling that more than ever in these eye-opening days of global reckoning.

Time and again during the period we lived there, I saw people in those countries come through with a quick fix for whatever unexpected weird thing had just happened. It was an ingenuity borne of centuries of certainty that nobody was coming to fix their problems.

They stepped up with little hesitation to help random strangers with their problems, too, because they knew a time would come soon enough when they’d need strangers to step up for them. It’s not just a nice thing to do down there, it’s smart and strategic. You need to be ready for anything, and living in a permanent state of pay-it-forward.

One day, the car we were in broke down on a quiet road past Leon, Nicaragua. Within 15 minutes, we were repaired and on our way after two strangers on a motorcycle pulled up and began scrounging up scraps of this and that from the roadside, and then used them to do something inexplicable but effective to the car engine to get it running again.

Such anecdotes are coming to mind more often these days as events play out around the world to remind me that nobody’s really got our backs.

How must the citizens of Israel feel to realize that their much-touted security systems were easily compromised? How do Libyans feel about all those decades of government ignoring dam maintenance? What do Americans make of the hard lessons first from Hurricane Katrina, and more recently in the Maui wildfires – that their emergency preparedness systems are in no way prepared?

How do we feel here in Canada, where successive governments were so wrongly presumed to be managing the work of making sure we’d always have enough housing? They weren’t even counting the number of new Canadians right.

How come we can’t access basic medical care anymore? How are 13,000 British Columbians dead from toxic-drug overdoses in the last seven years and we’re still bickering about public drug use?  How can governments be allowed to “step back” on fossil fuel use and the development of greener alternatives after the entire planet just spent a horrifying year seeing where climate change is taking us?

If I’d been born a small-town Honduran, I suspect I’d have known better than to believe that the big things of life were being taken care of by government. Honduras has no social safety net, minimal public health care, lousy schools, and wages so low that most people need two jobs and a side hustle just to get by. It’s a country where you learn early to take care of your own business.

But I was born a comparatively privileged Boomer in a peaceful, liberal democracy with a social and legal commitment to human rights and a better life for all. I just always figured everything was going to be OK, at least in Canada.

Ah, but there’s far less Canada in Canada these days. Free trade ties us to some of the world’s most fraught countries. With minor exceptions, we don’t make our own clothing, household goods, vehicles or parts. Ninety per cent of our medicines are made with ingredients imported from China or India.

We’re dependent on other countries’ supply chains, food production, human resources. When their wildfires burn, we breathe the smoke. When their people don’t come to fill our workforce, it’s our services that suffer. We're frighteningly dependent, yet still so blissfully unaware of that reality. 

For better and worse, the world has tied its fortunes together through intricate trade deals and border-crossing corporate entities outside the management of any government. No war, climate disaster, or economic collapse anywhere on Earth is far enough away to avoid a direct impact everywhere else.

And even though virtually everything tripping us up these days requires a long-term plan to fix, there is no long-term plan for any of it. Even when some government starts on a plan, it rarely lasts beyond the four-year election cycles that doom progress on the complex issues of the modern world.

This is the world we live in now. This is the world my grandkids will have to find their way through. If I hear that they ran away in search of cheap land where they could grow a simple diet, generate their own electricity and count on a handful of good neighbours who knew how to fix things, I will understand completely and cheer them on.

Develop your inner Honduran, kids. Things are going to get rough.

Letter from Copan: The COVID crisis in Honduras

Casita Copan kids making puzzles during my 2016 visit

My partner and I lived and worked in Central America for the better part of five years, and I visited many development projects in Honduras and Nicaragua as part of our work with Cuso International in those years. But few projects have stuck with me like Casita Copan, in our old home town of Copan Ruinas, Honduras.

Started by a young American woman, Emily Monroe, Casita Copan began as a way of helping abandoned children in Emily's adopted home of Copan Ruinas. I've watched her lead that marvelous project for seven years now, and see it as a gold standard for addressing poverty and need not just for children removed from their families, but to prevent child abandonment. There's nothing like it in the country - or in Canada, for that matter.

As you can imagine, the spectre of COVID-19 is terrifying in a country like Honduras. BC has half the population of Honduras but more than seven times the number of ventilators in our hospitals: 732 compared to a paltry 102, and all but 12 of those 102 in private hospitals where poor people can't seek care. Because of the dire shortage of equipment, the country is on restrictive shelter-in-place rules enforced by police and the military. People aren't allowed to leave their homes.

This letter I've just received from Emily - who continues to live in Copan with her husband and young son - is a startling reminder of situations in low-income countries that have virtually no ability to deal with a pandemic. If you can, please send a donation her way. Money isn't going to get Casita Copan out of this pandemic, but it will help get things back on track more quickly when restrictions lift.

The sawdust alfombras depicting Easter

scenes that normally decorate Copan Ruinas

streets at this time of year.

***

First, I would like to send my very best to you and your loved ones during this difficult time, especially those who are working on the front lines, risking their lives to protect the most vulnerable. I wanted to share with you what is happening here in Honduras and at Casita Copán, as we face the unprecedented challenge of navigating a global pandemic.

I’m writing this from Copán Ruinas, Honduras, my home for the last ten years. This week is Semana Santa, “Holy Week,” traditionally a culturally rich time that draws tourists from around Honduras and the world to our little town. It’s the hottest time of the year, and in other years, we’d be taking the kids for a picnic by the river to cool off and share watermelon. Then we’d go into town to see the alfombras, brightly colored “carpets” of dyed sawdust painstakingly arranged by local artisans to create stunning designs in celebration of the holidays. 

Instead, we are inside, respecting the government’s mandatory shelter-in-place order, now in week four.

It was necessary for Honduras to take strict preventative measures in response to COVID-19 because the country’s healthcare system is the weakest in the region. The public hospital system for the entire country only has 12 ventilators; the private hospitals report approximately another 90. Because of the high rate of poverty, many people in Honduras suffer from preexisting conditions caused by poor nutrition and are particularly vulnerable. Weak infrastructure also means that many affected will be unable to access the care they need, especially those in rural communities like ours.

Here in Copán, we are currently in the eye of the storm. Safe for now, but preparing and waiting for what’s to come. We had to close our Children’s Center, the major source of food, education, recreation, and community for our children and families. We are still sending out packets of food since the majority of our moms are unable to work because of the government restrictions. While all of the kids in our Children’s Center are safe at home with their families, they are still lacking the daily support, education, and loving care that our center provides.

Here in Copán, we are not allowed to go out for a walk. Adults have one day a week (assigned by the last digit of our identification number) where we are allowed to go to the grocery store or pharmacy. Temperatures right now are in the 90s, and the majority of our Casita Copan Children’s Center families live in cramped one-room homes, often with only one bed for everyone. Mothers are unable to work because nearly all businesses are closed and movement is restricted, and if they don’t work, they don’t get paid. If you are caught outside past 6 pm, you can be arrested and forced to spend the night in jail. Rates of domestic violence have always been high in this area, and I am afraid of what the anxiety caused by this situation will provoke.

The children in our foster care program are safe and will still receive food, shelter, love, medical care, educational programs, and attention just as before, even if the routine is a bit different. So far, all of our staff are still receiving their full paycheck and benefits, though their daily responsibilities have changed due to the crisis. We will continue to do everything in our power to provide the maximum number of services possible to our children and families during this time. We don’t know what the future will hold, but we anticipate a serious blow to our local economy that will affect many families, businesses, and organizations. While this crisis will force us to make tough decisions, we will continue to uphold the values that Casita Copán was founded on – solidarity, transparency, responsibility, discipline, respect, and love.

Thank you for taking the time to read about what is going on here in Honduras. I truly hope that you and your loved ones are safe. Please reach out if you would like to hear more details about what is going on. We are busy but happy to get in touch when we can!!

One positive thing I can say that has emerged from this crisis is the realization of how interconnected we truly are. We are all in this together and we truly thank you for your support and compassion during this unprecedented time.

In solidarity,
Emily

Flying over Fish City: The Movie

Apart from the sunshine, heat, nice people and good food down here in Honduras, where we are vacationing until March 10, I am mad for the snorkelling.

Utila is a small, rustic island (think Hornby Island, if you're from BC) on the Caribbean coast. It's the remarkably less touristy sister island to Roatan, and one of my favourite places in the world for chilling out for a few weeks in the dead of winter and letting go of all those dark thoughts that can plague a person who thinks too much in times like these.

Here's a few scenes from the underwater world that I captured while snorkelling three beaches around the island in the last couple of days. The standard trade winds have died right off at the moment - a mixed blessing, because it makes doing underwater videos a little easier, but it also makes things way hotter above the surface, with a bigger chance that bugs are going to bite you.

Join me for a flight over Fish City.

Utila and I: A Love Story

Downtown Utila

What is it about this place that makes me love it? It’s not particularly pretty, and in a few places it’s kind of smelly. There are even hellish sand flies at certain times of day that will motivate you to douse yourself with Deet before even considering hanging out at one especially bad beach. (I’m dabbing cortisone cream on several blistering bites at this very moment.)

Yet from the first time I set foot on Utila, Honduras in December 2012, I loved it. We’re now here for a whole month, giving me the luxury of time to reflect on what appeals to me about this small chunk of rock and mangrove swamp floating in the Caribbean. It’s my third visit here and the longest yet, and I’m still very much in Utila’s sway.

Definitely that big old Mesoamerican Reef that runs right past Utila is Charm No. 1 for me. Snorkelling is my favourite sport, if you can call it sport when you float around like a Macy’s parade balloon gazing at the glorious world of fishes below.

To be able to just pop on your water shoes and start swimming toward a vibrant reef in a warm, clear sea is a luxury that few other getaways can offer. One of my favourite entry points is a homely little bit of rough shore known as Airport Beach, with nary a palm tree or stretch of white sand in sight.

But swim out maybe 40 metres and suddenly you’re in a stunning seascape of coral ridges and peaks, with fish of every colour, shape and size going about their business below. Just beyond the ridge is a dramatic dropoff into blue infinity, and I hold out the hope that one day a whale shark will pass by.

Spiny-tailed iguana, found only on Utila

A short bicycle ride up the road (renting a rusty, poorly maintained mountain bike to is an essential part of the Utila experience) is Coral View and Blue Bayou, a whole other snorkelling experience that begins as soon as you make your way down a couple of steps into shallow waters where a small barracuda is routinely hanging about in search of the tiny fish under the dock.

Swim out barely any distance at all and once again you’re on the line between coral ridge and deep-sea dropoff. There, you might see schools of much larger barracuda, a ray scudding by on the sea floor, a big puffer fish looking up at you with a sour and skeptical face.

So yes, the snorkelling on Utila is a big, big part of its charm for me. But it’s also got this on-land vibe that appeals to me – one of real people going about a real life, happy enough for some tourists to keep the economy flowing but not yet so hooked on what are still fairly scant tourist dollars to make too much of the visitors. (The idea of a holiday in Honduras still seems to scare the hell out of many travellers.)

Getting to Utila generally starts with a flight into San Pedro Sula, Honduras’s biggest city and its commercial centre. Up until recently, San Pedro was known as the world’s most dangerous city for the staggering amount of murders that go on there, but now it’s slipped to No. 3, below Caracas, Venezuela and Acapulco, Mexico. Yay, San Pedro!

Rich people have the best houses, don't they?

At any rate, don’t let that little detail put you off. The violence in Honduras is almost exclusively violence between Hondurans, and a very purposeful violence visited upon those who are: 1. In the cocaine import/export business; 2. In a gang, or living in a profoundly poor barrio in a big city controlled by gangs; or 3. Involved in other criminal activities that sooner or later are going to get you killed by either your competitors, police, or the angry family of a victim that knows better than to rely on the country’s hopeless justice system to settle scores.

Besides, you’re only going to be passing through San Pedro. The airport is perfectly nice, and from there you can hop a bus, hire a private shuttle, or grab a flight to La Ceiba and be gone – bound for a region that feels different enough from mainland Honduras to be its own country. Once in La Ceiba, there’s a twice-daily catamaran ferry to Utila that takes about an hour. (Advice: Bring anti-nausea drugs just in case, or squeeze your eyes shut for the trip like I tend to do.)

Utila has a seriously multicultural history – one that blends European pirates and settlers, descendants of African slaves, and Spanish-speaking mainlanders. In modern times, these settlers have blended into a population of white people speaking their own Creole language - though a traveller will mostly hear it only when walking past groups of locals talking to each other - mainland Hondurans speaking Spanish, and black people speaking Creole, English, Garifuna and Spanish.

The other night we cycled past three elderly white women hanging over their balcony to chat with another elderly woman in a golf cart, that being a main mode of transportation on Utila. We could hear bits of English in their speech, but nothing we could make out. Had we stopped to ask directions, however, they’d have answered in perfectly clear English.

Speaking of directions, no worries that you’re going to get lost on Utila. There’s one main road that’s maybe eight kilometres from end to end, and no more than a handful of looping or dead-end side roads. Transportation is via golf cart, motorcycle, quad, bicycle or on foot. Whatever mode you choose, expect to make way for all those other forms of transport as everyone weaves and dodges along a narrow and poorly maintained road that is a pastiche of cement, interlocking brick, rock, mud and enormous puddles from that morning’s rain.

I think that’s another reason I love Utila and Honduras. Coming from such a rule-bound and regulated land as Greater Victoria, it’s exhilarating to experience freedom once in a while.

International hotel chains have given Utila a miss, but accommodation in every price range is available, or high-end vacation home rentals if that suits you. We rented one of those in 2012 when my son’s family joined us for a week at Christmas, but this time have opted for an affordable $450 US/month apartment at a small hotel. Electricity is on top of that, and will add significantly to the cost if you’re using air-conditioning. For me, a good ceiling fan suffices.

Public beach at Utila, on a "tropical monsoon" kind of day

While I don’t imagine anyone comes to Utila just for the food, the grilled fish at RJ’s is definitely going to be part of our regular diet while here, and was the first thing that one of my grandsons asked about after we arrived for this latest visit. There’s no competing with the vast cultural banquet available to us every day in Canada, so best to prepare for much simpler, basic fare here on the island. But RJs and an ample supply of Honduran bananas keep me happy.

I don’t even like bananas in Canada, but discovered when we were living here for two-plus years that that’s only because I hadn’t eaten a real one before – picked fresh from a tree when actually ripe, available in a dozen different varieties, subtle flavours, firmer textures. It pleased me to no end to stumble upon a small market here that sells manzanas, the small, fat bananas grown on Utila and named for their apple flavour.

And finally, there’s the climate. Officially, Utila has a “tropical monsoon” climate, and a daily downpour certainly appears to be the norm at this time of year. But that keeps the vegetation green and the temperature at a comfortable 25-27 C most days, just right for sitting in a chaise lounge with a good book and a homemade rum drink in between snorkels. (Bottle of Bacardi: $13. Bottle of cheap but palatable vodka: $8. Honduran beer: $1 a can.)

The nightly view from where we're staying.

Oh, and the sunsets. Whatever tropical-monsoon kind of day it’s been, evenings are almost always clear enough to deliver a gorgeous finale. These days, it’s a ritual to head up to a little overlook at our hotel around 5:15 p.m. and spend the next half an hour bathed in tones of orange and pink, thinking: This place.

What would we hear if we listened?

Garifuna woman in Honduras prepares yucca bread, a staple of the Garifuna diet.

My Cuso International volunteer credentials have earned me the opportunity to present at a University of Victoria student symposium this Friday put on by the Centre for Global Studies. Here's what I'm going to be talking about. I thought I'd be able to post a link to the blogs that presenters have written in advance of the symposium, but they appear to be available only to those with a UVic sign-on. So you'll have to make do with mine alone, cut and pasted here.

***

The desire to help women in distant lands is a wonderful thing. We’re still a long way from gender equality here in Canada, but we’re living the dream compared to many countries around the world. Our sisters in less privileged parts of the globe could definitely use a little transnational solidarity.

But after five years of working with Cuso International in Honduras and Nicaragua, I saw that there are right ways of expressing our solidarity, and wrong ways. Even on the issues that women around the world can generally agree on – eliminating domestic violence, equal pay for work of equal value, addressing societal and cultural factors that leave women so much more vulnerable to poverty – the most fundamental first step is to ensure women with lived experience are guiding every process, program and policy intended to help them.

One of the most common mistakes we make is to presume that women in other lands and cultures want exactly what Canadian women want, and that the issues we have tackled in our own land are automatically the same issues they would pick for themselves.

But they’re not us. They’ve grown up with different cultural norms, in different kinds of families, with different values. They’re not looking to turn their backs on the life they have, nor to have women from countries like Canada sweep in with pity in their eyes and a plan to “make things right.”

Yes, they appreciate the support of wealthier countries to improve what they know needs improving. But they’re the experts of their own lives. Approaches that presume to know what another population wants are not just patronizing, insulting and doomed to fail, they deny the tremendous strengths and strategies women in other countries have already developed to get by in an unequal world.

A small example from Nicaragua: International initiatives aimed at encouraging subsistence farmers to commercialize, rather than grow just enough to feed their families. It’s a great goal on paper as a means for getting more impoverished Nicaraguans into the paid economy, but let’s take a look at that concept from a rural smallhold farmer’s perspective.

First, that farmer is already putting in a very long day. She gets up sometimes as early as 3:30 a.m. to start making the tortillas that fuel her big family, and crawls into bed exhausted sometime after 10 p.m. She tends to the farm animals and the plot of land, cooks at least two or three meals over the course of the day – from scratch, because a subsistence farmer isn’t buying packaged goods – and does household chores without the benefit of a washer/dryer or dishwasher, or even running water or electricity in some cases.

She almost certainly has no vehicle at her disposal, or money to buy gas even if she did. She probably lives in a very small community along a very bad piece of road – that’s where land is affordable, after all. She’s accustomed to hitching rides in the back of a more well-heeled neighbour’s truck when she needs to get somewhere, but the neighbours aren’t often going to be travelling to the larger centres where the big markets are in the exact window of time when the woman would need to arrive and depart, let alone have room for her and her produce.

It’s also difficult, if not downright impossible, for her to be away from the family home for long periods of time. The family counts on her to prepare their meals, and both they and the community count on her to be the unpaid caregiver for aging parents, grandchildren, children with physical or mental disabilities, or sick neighbours or relatives in need. In a land without daycare, old-age homes, or any kind of social supports, you’ve got to be available to help others so that they’ll be there for you when the time comes.

So while the international aid community may have the best of intentions in wanting to launch this woman into the paid economy for her own good, she isn’t interested. All she sees is more work added to a jam-packed day, and impossible logistics.

Nor would she ever be able to earn much even if she could overcome the challenges. Without the greenhouses, fertilizers and irrigation systems available to large commercial producers, she can’t grow the kind of flawless produce that picky consumers in Nicaragua and abroad demand. And with climate change dramatically affecting the predictability of Nicaragua’s rainy season, she can’t promise the kind of consistent quantity and delivery of product that the stores and markets demand.

She also can’t get a loan to help her get started with commercialization. You need equity to get a loan, and in all likelihood this woman isn’t named on the title of the land she and her husband farm. That problem is partly cultural, because traditionally, only men are listed on title in Nicaragua, and partly systemic in a country that has no functional land-title registry.

What kind of development effort might actually improve this woman’s life? A project to build her a higher pila – a big sink – so she could wash clothes and dishes without stooping. Support to build an efficient cooking stove with a chimney, sparing her family constant respiratory problems from smoke inhalation and reducing the time that the woman spends scavenging for firewood every day. The development of water sources and distribution systems so her family could install drip irrigation and grow produce year-round. A decent and accessible education for her children to prepare them for better-paid work.

When we start with the premise that women are the experts of their own lives, we find ways to help that make sense. It’s the wisdom of women on the ground in countries of less privilege that brings the concepts of solidarity to life in meaningful and effective ways.

Cranky in Paradise: How life in a fairly perfect place makes us angry

     I felt a quick flash of annoyance during a swim this past weekend at Thetis Lake when a group of young people on a raft of floaties cranked up their music a little too much. I then felt an immediate and sobering flash of alarm that a bunch of mild-mannered young people having a little fun in the sun had annoyed me.

     Could it be that Cranky Capital Regionite Syndrome is already upon me, a mere three months after arriving back on the Island? Please say it ain’t so.

     That pervasive air of easy annoyability that has always characterized CCRS in the region has been wonderful to get away from these last four and a half years in Central America. I thought I’d put it away forever at this point, but now I see that it has just been lying in wait for me back on the Island.

     It’s all got me thinking hard about what that cultural state of annoyance is really about. Why is it that I never got jangled by all the unpredictable happenings of daily life in Central America –noise, smells, traffic, gaping holes in the sidewalk, garbage, a constant sense that any crazy thing could happen at any moment – yet I come back here and find myself bugged by minor stuff?

     I’m not alone. I see motorists yelling out the window at each other over perceived infractions that not only didn’t cause an accident, but probably wouldn’t have even if imagined through to their low-impact conclusion. I see genuine fear in dog owners’ eyes when their unleashed dogs come bounding toward me and their owners brace for yet another tight-lipped lecture about leash laws and controlling your animal.

     What is it about this place? Why does it feel like we're looking for reasons to be angry at someone for something? My sense of it is that we have expectations of how our perfect day will go, and any breach in the plan feels like a personal affront. We’ve come to believe that with enough regulation, rule and law, citizens can be guaranteed a day where nothing untoward happens to them.

     Everybody’s going to drive exactly right. All bylaws will be observed. No dog poo will adhere to your shoe. The peaceful day at the lake you’re imagining will proceed exactly as you had hoped, and never mind that all the other people sharing the rocks with you have arrived at the same lake on the same day with completely different expectations of how the day will go.

      I guess with the bar set that high, we’re bound to end up cranky when life gets in the way of our elevated expectations for our day. Evidence of our pissed-offedness is everywhere: We shake our fists; bristle at our neighbour’s poor boulevard management; rap loudly on the hoods of cars stopped too close to a crosswalk; make angry phone calls to whatever regulatory body we think should be doing something.

     In countries like Honduras and Nicaragua, where my spouse and I have been doing long-term volunteer stints with Cuso International, there’s so little regulation that all bets of a perfect day are completely off. You don’t even bother thinking that way. You just step out the door and try to stay prepared for what might happen next. I’m not suggesting a war-zone scene or anything truly dangerous, just an environment that laughs at anyone’s expectations of a managed experience.

     The Victoria experience imagines that through regulation and law, we can control the environment to create a pleasant space for all, where unpleasant surprises are kept to a minimum. I think of it as a very European way of doing things. (I particularly appreciate such an ordered culture whenever I go bike-riding, an activity so risky in Central America that I wouldn’t dream of doing it there.)

     In Central America, it’s the environment that’s in control. You enter it knowing that you are about to have whatever experience it’s delivering that day, and that your wish to have a managed experience is neither here nor there.

     You’re going to walk past speakers so loud and distorted they’ll make your ears hurt. You’re going to step in garbage. You’re going to enter every crosswalk knowing it represents nothing more than white lines painted on pavement. You just have to hope that everything turns out OK, but there’s no saying that it will. (Guess that’s why religion is popular in such cultures.)

     And so you relax, genuinely relax, because you know there’s nothing you can do about any of it. Far from feeling hopeless, it feels freeing. You let go of every expectation and just go where the day takes you. A dozen things happen on your daily walk to work that would annoy the hell out of you back in Victoria, but you carry on without a flinch.

     I’m not saying that their way is better than ours. I do like that cars stop for me here in Victoria, and that green space is everywhere. I like not seeing garbage in the street. I like not having to dodge motorcycles driving down the sidewalk, or eye up every building I walk past for the possibility of a rusty metal pole sticking out of it at head height. I like knowing that if I wanted to, I could buy a small house on a quiet street with no fear that a five-storey, all-night disco might open next door in the following month.

    That probably means I’m not yet a full-on libertarian. But please, please, save me from CCRS. I don’t want to be that boring old lady railing against noisy kids at the lake and unleashed dogs on my street. I pledge here and now to stand on guard against any creeping sense of entitlement, to reject the (admittedly alluring) notion that the world ought to mould itself to my needs. Yes, my body is living in Victoria right now, but I will fight to keep my spirit Central American.

     Party on, gentle Thetis teens.

On the inescapable privilege of privilege

   

Having worked in poor countries for most of the last four years, there’s a lot about The Guardian’s Secret Aid Worker feature that’s really resonating with me.

    Of course, I continue to attach the most value to pieces that bravely carry the writer’s name, because few things keep you more honest as a writer than putting your stuff out there with your name attached, for all the world to see. But sometimes it’s anonymous or nothing, so I’m cutting some slack to the unidentified writers producing pieces for Secret Aid Worker.

    I’m not exactly an aid worker in my current role of doing communications work for Central American NGOs on behalf of Cuso International. My work experience in Honduras and now Nicaragua has not been that different than it was in Canada, except for much lower pay and a dramatically different work culture. But both home and abroad, I do my work for aid organizations, whether it’s in aid of sex workers back in Canada, or women farmers scratching out a marginal living on tiny plots of land, as it is here in Nicaragua.

    At any rate, the moral dilemmas and ethical conflicts that the aid workers tend to write about in the Guardian feature strike a chord with me. Two recent pieces in particular caught my eye, one about how quickly a person’s idealism to help people in poor countries ends up corrupted by life as a privileged ex-pat; and the other a counterpoint noting that expecting foreign aid workers to “live like monks” is hardly a solution either.

    The Cuso stipend I receive in Nicaragua feels like more or less the going rate for a Nicaraguan communications consultant working in the country. I get the equivalent of about $1,600 CAD a month, which includes up to $585 a month for housing. (Cuso rates vary from country to country and town to town, depending on the cost of living of where a person is placed.)

    You’re working as a professional when you do a Cuso position, and getting a liveable stipend for the work you do is probably important for recruitment and retention. But at the same time, you take a Cuso position because you want to help, not for the money. I think Cuso does a good job of establishing a stipend level that keeps things real for volunteers while also ensuring their safety and comfort.

    But just because I’m paid like a middle-class Nicaraguan doesn’t mean anything else about my experience is the same as theirs. Even if I worked for free, I’d still be privileged just by dint of being born a Canadian.

    Sure, I'm opting to take the city bus to work, and walking in the heat and the dust to Managua’s sprawling public markets with just as much of a desire as any Nicaraguan to score a good price on tomatoes, cucumbers and limes. I’m not going to the pricey restaurants where the rich Nicaraguans eat any more often than my low-paid co-workers.

    But small stuff aside, my life isn’t even remotely comparable to the experience of an average Nicaraguan. (For starters, minimum wage here is less than $500 CAD, and a whole lot of people make nowhere near that much.) However long I might live in Central America, I will never be able to declare that I know how life feels for an average Nicaraguan any more than a comfortable Canadian who spends a night on the street pretending to be homeless knows about how real homelessness feels.

    If there were bugs in my bed, a sickness in my household, a crisis with one of my parents’ health, I could do something about it in an instant. If I hated my boss, I could quit. If I needed a holiday, I could pay for it. If I had to jump on a plane to anywhere in the world to help a family member out of a jam, I’ve got a gold-standard passport that nobody would question, and the credit card and line of credit to make it happen even if my savings weren't adequate.

    If life went sideways on me in Nicaragua, I could pack it all up tomorrow and come running home, to the land of public health insurance, pensions, and subsidized care and bug-free housing. It’s like that line from Pulp’s song Common People – “when you’re laid in bed at night watching roaches climb the wall, you could call your dad and he’d stop it all.”

    And there’s the dilemma. I’m innately privileged, with a comfortable Plan B. Yet if I’m here wanting to be helpful to impoverished Nicaraguans, I absolutely have to check my privilege at the door and consciously consider everything as if I were a struggling Nicaraguan with no safety net. Which I’m not.

     I try to remind myself of that every day, because it really matters. Otherwise, you risk being one of those awful people who forget how privileged their world view is and get petulant when the locals don’t see things the same way they do. Otherwise, you become one of those annoying development types who grows sour from years of disappointments and ends up living like just another rich person enjoying the perks of abundant cheap labour. (Check out "The Reductive Seduction of Other People's Problems" to understand more about why good people go sour.)

     I’ve visited some terrific international development projects. But I’ve also seen a lot that feel foisted on the locals because countries with money to spend presume that what worked in their land will work in others. There’s a certain flavour-of-the-month quality to much of the world’s development work, and much time, energy and hope is wasted trying to force square pegs through round holes.

     Ultimately, a country finds its own path toward change. Economic opportunity, revolution and protest, responsible government, guaranteed rights and a healthy justice system – that’s where real change comes from. Foreigners can play integral parts on all those fronts, but their contributions are most successful when they take their signals from those who live in the country.

     Aid works when it’s based on strategies that call on those with privilege not to come to other countries to implement their own ideas, but to walk alongside people who are already bringing about change in those countries and require help to get there. They need us; people of privilege not only hold the purse strings, but can recognize and develop opportunities that countries enmeshed in poverty don’t yet see.

    So yes, a person from a wealthy country who lives and works in a poor country is privileged. But that’s just how it is.  We can’t pretend to know how it feels to be poor and without a Plan B. I think the best we can do is keep that fact top of mind, and strive to follow rather than lead. 

Thanks for supporting our work in Central America with a donation to Cuso International. Here's our fundraising site. 

Casita Copan: The home of Mami Zoila

Casita Copan Home for Abandoned Children

Background and Project Outline

December 2015

The goal:

 Raise $15,000 to cover 12 months of maintenance costs (approx $1,200 per month) at one of the three family-style homes that Casita Copan operates for abandoned children in Copan Ruinas, Honduras. This particular project will focus on the home of Zoila, who has made a commitment to be the permanent foster mom of five children ages 6 to 11 – Maria, Jesus, Estrella, Alex and Rosario – and live at the casita with them until the youngest one turns 18. While Zoila was offered two days’ a week off, she has chosen to work full-time, 7 days a week – just like any other mom. Her own mother, Juana, is a foster mom at one of the other casitas.

Facts on the Casitas:

• The three homes opened in July 2014 and cost about $15,000 a year to maintain, roughly $1,200 a month, which includes rent, utilities, maintenance, food, water, medicine, salary for Casita mom, school fees, and weekly visits with a psychologist.· Two of the casitas have four children living in the home, and one has five. 
• There were a number of sibling groupings living at the former orphanage Angelitos Felices (closed down in July 2014 by the Honduran government); these children continue to live together in the same casitas. 
• Each casita has a permanent foster mom who lives at the home and participates in all the activities that any mom might do for her children. 
• The children are in their casitas on weekdays from 4 pm, Saturdays from 1 pm, and all day Sunday. On weekdays they go to school and then to Casita Copan (the main center) for tuoring, special activities, etc. This approach gives staff a chance to check how they are, address medical needs, ensure sessions with our psychologist, etc. The Casita model blends the best aspects of permanent foster care with the oversight of a children's home. 

Specifics on the casita run by "Mami Zoila"

The foster mom:

Zoila is from Nueva Esperanza, a small rural community on the outskirts of Copan Ruinas. A middle child in a family of 6 children, Zoila always helped out at home by taking care of her siblings and later her nieces and nephews. Though she loves children, she never wanted to get married because (in her words) she "didn't want to work for a man." She started working at Casita Copan in 2012 and the kids immediately bonded to her because of her calm, affectionate nature and her infectious smile.

When the Casitas opened in July 2014, she was the first person the organization asked to be a Casita mom - a serious commitment since she was asked to care for the kids in her care until they turn 18. (A 13-year commitment in this case, as the youngest child in Zoila’s casita was 5 when the home opened last year). It goes without saying that the kids love her dearly and all call her "mamá." Side note: She is the daughter of another Casita mom, Juana.

The home:

Zoila’s casita is a bright, happy place. The walls are decorated with pictures the kids have drawn, and diplomas and certificates from school. All of the kids help out with the household chores and as soon as they get home, they wash their clothes and help Zoila fold the laundry. Some play with blocks on the floor while others go into their bedrooms to relax while they wait for dinner. The children are usually in bed by 8 p.m. On Saturdays and Sundays, they like to get out the puzzles or coloring books and play on the patio, watch movies, go to church, or take a trip to the Mayan ruins.

The children: 

Rosario is 11 years old. Her mother died in childbirth and Rosario's father didn't have enough money to care for her, so he entrusted her to the care of the orphanage "Angelitos Felices." He died a few years later. Living on her own at the orphanage, Rosario grew into a fiercely independent, tough, and intelligent girl. The smaller kids looked up to her and relied on her to care for them when adult supervision was scarce. Rosario loves to sing, dance, and draw and really loves to watch music videos. When she grows up, she wants to be a teacher. This isn't surprising since she still loves the role of caregiver and is always helping out the younger kids and teaching them new things. She is going to 5th grade next year. 

Alex is 10 years old and the brother of Estrella. His mother was just a teenager when she had Alex and the police removed him from her custody because of extreme malnourishment. He entered Angelitos when he was about one year old. Alex is energetic, creative, and very affectionate but still struggles with anxiety. But that doesn't stop him from trying. Right now he is very into dance and has incredible acrobatic skill - he can walk on his hands, do crazy flips, and is starting to learn some basic breakdance techniques. In the past he wasn't sent to school regularly so he is only in 3rd grade, but he is a good student and was elected class president this year. Alex is incredibly helpful to his Casita family and always make sure the others are helping out too. He's still not sure exactly what job he wants when he grows up but he wants to have enough money to build a house where he and his sister Estrella can live. 

Estrella is 7 years old and the sister of Alex. She was taken into an orphanage when she was a baby because of malnutrition and later sent to Angelitos. She is a born artist. She is inquisitive, thoughtful, creative, and already shows above age level technical skill in her drawings. Right now she's into drawing butterflies, flowers, and animals and she always draws free hand. Estrella is such a sweet and kind girl that everyone likes to be around her and she has made lots of friends at Casita Copan. She just finished first grade and is doing very well so far. When she grows up she wants to be an artist and when she is "medium sized" she wants to be a ballerina.

Maria is 6 years old and sister to Jesus. Her mother has severe epilepsy and so she was taken out of her mother's custody by the police and placed into Angelitos Felices when she was about 3 years old. Maria is a spitfire. She is bright, bossy, and has a great sense of humor. She just finished kindergarten and was one of the most advanced among her classmates. Maria loves to be around people and you will usually find her at the center of any game (although she will definitely want to be the one to go first, so watch out!) When she grows up, she wants to "plant flowers all around." 

Jesus is 9 years old and brother to Maria. When Jesus entered Casita Copan, he displayed severe behavioral and developmental issues and we were very nervous about how we would react in his new environment. While he still loves to be in his own world, he has changed dramatically. He is incredibly gifted and has a remarkable talent for puzzles and math. Even though he often escaped from his 1st grade classroom to play on the swings, he was one of the first in his class to learn to read and he earned a 88% average. Jesus has now become affectionate and respectful with adults that he cares about and trusts and is turning into a wonderful young man. His favorite thing is to make people around him laugh. At his Casita, he is relaxed and helpful. When he grows up, he wants to "fix things" although I think he may end up more interested in computers since that is currently his favorite pastime! 

Note on Alex and Estrella's birth mom: Mirna has 5 children and his pregnant with her 6th. Only one child still lives with her. She suffered severe physical and sexual abuse as a child and has struggled to maintain a steady job or income. She admits that she never cared for her kids like she wanted to and was sometimes too rough with Alex. She never had a chance to care for Estrella since she herself was malnourished when she had her and didn't have money to feed her. Mirna comes from La Entrada (an hour away by bus) once a month to visit her children now that she has permission to see them. She is shy around them but has the same sweet and helpful personality as her children. She always helps out at Casita when she can and smiles constantly, just like Estrella and Alex.

Note on Maria and Jesus's birth mom: Maria has severe epilepsy that started when she was a child. Casita Copan provides her medication but because of the severity of her condition, she still has seizures and her intellectual development was stunted by the frequency of her seizures and falls. So she often forgets to take her pills and does not maintain a healthy diet which only makes things worse. But Maria loves her children fiercely. She is the only mother that comes to visit her kids every single Wednesday and somehow always manages to bring them food and drinks. She helps them with their homework, draws with them, and always encourages them to behave well and study hard. She would like to be able to care for her children again one day, but her medical condition makes this unlikely.

Bang for your buck:

· Just 5 per cent of donations to Casita Copan go to administrative costs.

· Click here for the Casita Copan web site and more background information. (It's a registered charity in U.S. and Honduras, and Canadian charitable tax receipts are available if donors contact the organization first to arrange for how to make those donations)

· Click here to sponsor a Casita directly 

· Click here to sponsor an individual child for $30, $60 or $90 a month

Then and now: The children of Angelitos find their dreams at Casita Copan

It will soon be four years since we first met the kids living in squalor, smell and deprivation at what was then the Angelitos Felices home for abandoned children in Copan Ruinas, Honduras. 

We were on our first Cuso International placement and needed a side project for our weekend hours. Once we made our first visit to Angelitos, we knew we'd found it. Friends and family back home did so much to help us make life better for the children during our two-plus years in Honduras. 

Together we raised $30,000 for a range of projects that included new tile floors, a vastly improved water system and renovated bathrooms, clothes, school uniforms and supplies, and weekly excursions to someplace fun for the 14 children for pretty much the whole two years we were there. (The regular visits to a local pool were the highlights, and all the kids learned to swim during our time with them.)

But everything comes to an end, and in April, 2014, we had to return to Canada. One of the great joys of my life was that within weeks of our sad goodbyes to the children, the Honduran government finally stepped in and removed the kids from Angelitos. They were put into the loving arms of the fledgling Casita Copan project and Emily Monroe, a young American who had been living in Honduras for a number of years at that point and putting in enormous effort to try to get the children moved into a better situation. She had already started a day care for impoverished single moms and their children in Copan, and within weeks of the news of Angelitos' impending closure, quickly opened three "casitas" in Copan that now house these children in family-sized groups with a permanent house mom. 

Emily's involvement has not only changed the lives and dreams of these children, but has meant my partner Paul and I can continue supporting them and watch them growing up. Hope you enjoy this series of then-and-now photos of the children, who are all doing great. I urge you to add Casita Copan to your Christmas giving plan! 

Beautiful Belkis is 15 and a young woman with hopes and ambitions - so far from the silent, timid girl she was when we first met her. I will never forget the wonder and joy on Belkis's face as she learned how to swim during our pool trips.

Eduardo is now 16 and living with his brother Naun and two other former Angelitos boys in his great new casita run by Juana, who knew all the children from her Angelitos days. The future of Eduardo worried us because vulnerable boys are at such huge risk of being drawn into gang activity. But he's well-supported now and doing great.

Sweet Elsy is eight now and living in a casita with her two younger sisters. With a developmental disability, Elsy not surprisingly had behavioural problems at the old home, but is now a happy girl growing up in a proper family.

Alba is the daughter of one of the impoverished women with few options who typically ended up working at Angelitos in exchange for a place to stay and some food. Mom Fanny now works at Casita Copan, and her three children - Alba, 8, Juan, 5, and baby Iker - are all with her and the family is thriving. While the 3 casitas are an important part of the work that Emily's organization does, what is arguably even more important is the terrific day care program and support/training for single mothers that Casita Copan also provides.

Angie Nicole (seen in the 'before' photo with Angelitos caregiver Juana, who is now a Casita Copan house mom) was such a sick little baby when we first saw her, the youngest of three siblings all living at Angelitos. Now she's a sparkling four-year-old and lives in a beautiful, clean home with her two older sisters.

Little Zoila was one of three sisters living at Angelitos, and was significantly behind in her development when we met her. Happily, not any more! She's five now and living with sisters Elsy and Angie Nicole at one of the casitas.

Jesus is nine now, and he and his sister Maria are the other brother-sister set living in the casita with siblings Estrella and Alex (and "big sister" Rosario). Small donations make a big difference in Honduras - $100 will cover the costs of primary school for a child, and $500 provides a year of medical care and any necessary medication for 30 children.

Ah, Juan Carlos, we won't soon forget your mischievous grin - and it's clear you've still got it! He's 10 now and living in a casita with Jose Manuel and the brothers Naun and Eduardo. His nickname was "Chino" because he had a vaguely Asian look to him, and he absolutely hated that nickname. We made sure to never call him that, but I sometimes wondered if the other kids even knew what his real name was. 

Sweet Jose Manuel basically didn't walk when we met him at age three, which the Angelitos people told us was because his blind mother carried him everywhere for fear of losing track of him up until she had to give him up. True or not, I don't know. His walking did improve, although his feet always seemed to give him trouble. He was the heartbreaker at Angelitos, so often left to sit neglected in a corner, quietly crying. Now he's six and full of life, just like every child should be!

Juan is five and the brother to Alba. The two children lived at Angelitos with their mom Fanny during some of our time there. As noted in Alba's writeup, Fanny now works at Casita Copan and the family is doing much better, as you can see by Juan's smiling face! Emily did a great campaign recently based on what the kids want to be when they grow up, and Juan wants to be a policeman so he can "get the bad guys."

This photo of Maria disturbed me to no end when I took it shortly after we got involved at Angelitos, as her raggedy-tag outfit, giant shoes and the filthy appearance of the upstairs area where the kids all slept spoke volumes about the conditions at the place. But look at her now! She's six now and living in a casita with her brother Alex and others.

Naun and Alex - shown here in the 'before' photo with little Jaidy, who is now in state care elsewhere in Honduras - were a couple of our favourites, notable for their spirited cartwheels and backflips (Alex) and complete excitement over any outing (Naun). Alex took his time learning to swim during our pool outings, but slow and steady got him there, and he was so proud. Naun is now 11, and Alex is 10.

The lovely Rosario, who was always the one who I thought could be anything she wanted if she could just get out of Angelitos. She was the only true orphan of the group. And now she's an 11-year-old princess, finally in a place to be able to realize her dreams and put her significant intelligence and drive to work.

First to learn to swim, street-smart like you couldn't believe from his time as a seven-year-old living on the streets of La Entrada - Arnold must be 13 now, and has gone back to his family. I am choosing to believe he is well and happy. Here he is pictured during our time in Honduras, enjoying his new bunk bed built by a wonderful group of Louisiana men who came to Copan specifically to build beds for the kids at Angelitos. Up until then, they were mostly sleeping on filthy foam mattresses on the concrete floor, and some just slept directly on the floor. 

Fernando had gone back to his family before Angelitos closed, but ended up abandoned again. Happily, he has now been adopted by a woman who works for Children's International and is in a happy, stable home about 40 minutes away from Copan Ruinas. He's 5 now.

Jairo has gone back to his family and is living with his sister and grandmother. Casita Copan does whatever it can to help abandoned children return to their families, and when that isn't possible, it supports family visits so the kids can continue to maintain a relationship with their families.

These 3 sisters - Johana, Noelia and Janine (seen here with Angie Nicole) - were returned to their family in La Entrada very suddenly one day when we were still in Honduras. We never got a chance to say goodbye. They were from a very troubled family, but their dad regularly showed up at Angelitos to visit them and they often tried to sneak in cellphone calls to their wandering mother (Daisy, the woman who operated Angelitos, didn't like the kids to have contact with their parents). We will have to hope that they, too, are doing well. They would be 11, 16 and 17 now.