Day 154

June 12, 2012

Community Analysis

I had my Community Analysis Meeting!!! The Community Analysis Meeting is the culmination of the first three months of a volunteer's service. In the first three months, volunteers are not suppose to start projects or really do any 'work'. We are, instead, suppose to get to know the area, work on gaining the trust of the town folk and figuring out what the community needs and what the folk would be willing to work on. Many volunteers go to site that do not have projects going--so these three months and this meeting are an opportunity to figure out what the rest of the two years will be spent doing. 

My day started off with a lot of rain, of course! My boss showed up at 9am, and we headed down to my new house (yay!) to chat about how I've been doing and what to expect for the rest of the day. My boss let me know that, since I'm in a site that hasn't had a volunteer in a long time, his expectations of making noticeable progress in the community are low. He thinks that most of my work in the first year will be in organizing people, getting people used to scheduling and going to meetings and planning, this kind of stuff. He was warning me that I shouldn't judge my success by how many projects I have going or how many people show up to my meetings. That being said, my community blew him away...

My meeting started at 2pm, and everyone showed up on time. We still didn't start till 30mins later because my boss just couldn't believe that everyone would show up on time. All of the environmental volunteers showed up along with 25 other community members and ANAM (Panama's EPA) representatives. And, on top of having a full house, people participated in the discussion and all of the comments/ideas dealt with an environmental need of the community. I have to say, my community made me very proud that day. 

Projects we discussed:

1) Improving the quality of water in one of the town aqueducts,

2) Starting an Iguana (endangered species in Panama) project,

3) Continue work on our organic coffee project,

4) Town trash clean up and education about trash management,

5) Environmental workshops in the school with Peace Corps and ANAM,

6) Recycling project.

Now, all that's left to do is get started! 

A couple of pictures from my presentation:

Downtown Loma Bonita

Rainy Season--Winter

Dry Season--Summer