Friends & RPCVs of Guyana is a non-profit, service based organization dedicated to supporting education, health, social, economic, and environmental programs in Guyana through a network of RPCVs, Guyanese nationals, Guyanese-Americans, and all others concerned and interested in the Guyanese Community.

(via timesonline.co.uk)

Before I discovered Guyana, flying over jungle countries used to depress the hell out of me. It’s always fine while you’re actually on the ground, tunnelling among the lush green caverns of the forest floor.

Down there, you can never experience more than the explosion of life, the sensory overload, which is evident within a few metres of you.

Watching a giant morpho butterfly flitting in the dappled sunlight like an electric-blue handkerchief; being hosed down with wee by a churlish howler monkey; happening across a tiny frog carrying its tadpoles to a bijou pond in a treetop flower… these countless small miracles wrap you up in the wonder of the jungle, and it’s easy to convince yourself that everything is well with the world.

Get yourself up in a flying machine, though, and it’s a different story. Now, you can see the wider truth – that some of the most famous and important jungle reserves in the world are actually smaller than an average-sized city.

Their dwindling islands of forest are surrounded by fields, plantations or burnt and barren land, and logging roads penetrate deep into their recesses. Guyana is very different from that, however. A nation the size of Great Britain, its rainforest remains 85% untouched, and you can fly for several hours and see no roads at all, only rivers, glaring up like serpentine mirrors as the sun flashes across them.

Forest, forest, forest, in every direction, and not a sign of the country’s 750,000 people – because they mostly live in and around the drowsy coastal capital of Georgetown.

I’ve spent nearly two years of my life in rainforests, including time on every continent that has them, but I’ve never experienced one so benign as this – so free from plants that want to rip your clothes off, bugs that want to eat you and tropical diseases that make you spend your entire stay hovering over a long-drop toilet.

That said, I did get bitten by a vampire bat, stung by a bullet ant and shocked by a 200-volt electric eel. But it was still heaven.

…Continue

Steve Backshall’s programme Expedition Guyana will air on BBC1 and Discovery this spring

Travel brief: Guyana is best tackled using a tour operator. Responsible Travel (01273 600030, www.responsibletravel.com) has a 14-day tour from £3,345pp, including flights from Gatwick to Georgetown with BA and Caribbean Airlines, via Barbados or Trinidad and Tobago, and internal transfers. Or try Audley Travel (www.audleytravel.com), Andean Trails (0131 467 7086, www.andeantrails.co.uk), or Veloso Tours (020 8762 0616, www.veloso.com). For more information, contact the Latin American Travel Association (www.lata.org).

(via guyanachronicle.com)

Infrastructural works on the more than $2B, spanking new and state-of-the-art Linden Hospital complex have already been completed, and with some 80% of the hi-tech equipment and facilities already installed, the Government is likely to commission the hospital very soon.

When contacted yesterday, Executive Director of the Health Sector Development Unit (HSDU) Mr. Keith Burrowes, under whose Unit the responsibility lies in ensuring that the infrastructural works at the Hospital are completed, said the hospital will be commissioned “very soon”.

“Infrastructural works on the modern Linden Hospital are completed. We’re now in the process of installing the equipment…and about 80% of this phase has already been completed,” Mr. Burrowes told the Chronicle.

He is very optimistic the new Linden Hospital might be commissioned before September, bringing with it a tremendous improvement in health and medical services to Region Ten and nearby villages.

Burrowes disclosed that the hospital (infrastructural works) has been completed at a cost of some $1.8B, and after the installation of the state-of-the-art equipment, the cost will certainly be more than $2B.

The construction of the new facility is part of a wider national health sector reform programme being aggressively pursued by the ruling People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) administration.

The multi-billion-dollar project is intended to replace the Mackenzie Hospital structure which has been in existence for several decades. The growing population and the complex health requirements of the Region have outgrown the capacity of the facility, hence the new structure.

The Linden Hospital will feature an operating theatre, intensive care unit, paediatric services, laboratory, blood bank, gynaecology ward and obstetrics department, among others.

Burrowes is confident the new Linden Hospital will deliver a vastly improved and much more efficient service to the people and residents in that community.

He said one of the notable features at the new hospital will be the advanced (modern) routine maintenance system which will be of significant help to the management of the hospital in ensuring that the expensive equipment are properly maintained to reduce the ‘down-time’.

The Health Ministry will also be working with the hospital to ensure adequate training for the staff in the use of the equipment. Chronicle’s photographer Mr. Adrian Narine took these photos (as shown on the page) of the new Linden Hospital during a visit to the complex earlier this week.

Hi everyone!

We also want to remind you of our Facebook Causes page, please check it out and join when you get a chance –

http://apps.facebook.com/causes/85337?m=3124eff7

We use both our Fan Page and Causes page because of the great, but different, tools they both have.

Thanks!
Scott

Friends & RPCVs of Guyana

More older Americans are taking the plunge…to volunteer abroad! CNN recently posted an article that details the rising popularity of people over 50 participating in long and short term volunteer opportunities all over the world. Since 2007 applications for the Peace Corps from adults over 50 has increased by 44 percent and those numbers continue to grow. As one volunteer in the article stated, ” I’m getting to experience what it’s like to live in another culture, and that has a lot of value to me…This is the kind of travel that I’m interested in.”

(via peacecorpsconnect.org)

For past two years I’ve been a board member of the RPCV group Friends & RPCVs of Guyana (FROG) and as nonprofits go, it takes time to build up membership, fund raise, continue outreach and develop our programs but I’m confident that we’re progressing at a solid pace.

There’s plenty of room for FROG to grow and I’ve begun to spend more time thinking long-term about the future of our organization.

How can we make our work more sustainable?

How can we better integrate into the nonprofit community in Guyana?

How can this community effectively work together and share it’s collective resources?

Guyana is a small country but with a large number of NGOs, nonprofits, community groups, volunteers and activists operating within the country. At any one time, there are thousands of people on the ground planning, organizing, volunteering and working toward the collective goal of bettering people’s lives. Thinking of our work within this context keeps bringing me to the conclusion that we’re operating without the most basic tool, collaborative mapping.

Obviously it’s the responsibility of each organization to archive their activities and projects, successes and failures, resources on the ground, for the sake of organizational memory and building upon their work. But it’s the collective responsibility of the NGO community to share with each other what will ultimately benefit the people they’re serving.

One mapping tool that strikes me as incredibly powerful is the Google Earth Enterprise system. This system allows mapping and sharing large amounts and varying types of data sets for making better organizational decisions collaboratively.

How does this work?

Google Earth Enterprise helps organizations with imagery and other geospatial data make that information accessible and useful to all employees who need access via an intuitive, visual, and fast application. Visualize, explore and understand information on a fully interactive 3D globe or 2D browser based maps. Enable your workers to collaborate, improve decision-making, and take faster, more informed action based on geospatial information.

Using this system, organizations in Guyana will quickly learn where overlapping projects exists, where resources are lacking and where they are redundant, which villages volunteers should be sent and what they need to focus on while there. Organization can compare a wide range of data sets to draw conclusions that may have otherwise been missed. Combined with tools like FrontlineSMS, InSTEDD and Ushahidi, crisis management will be more effective. Local data sets combined with UN data, information from the World Bank and other sources will help both the NGO community and the Guyanese government with “big picture” planning and outreach.
As this system, and those like it, mature, there will continue to be success stories and wider implementation of mapping technologies. Long-term, I realize this idea may be bigger than FROGs capacity, but it’s a direction we’ll push for regardless.

Friends & RPCVs of Guyana would like to take a moment and thank J. Aramathea, art director of Deitrick & Associates and The HALO Foundation, for the volunteer work she’s done with our organization.  During her hours away from her work and volunteering with The HALO Foundation, J. Aramathea has been working on updating the FROG logo so that we can use it in a variety of ways.  The new logo can be replicated on stationary and letterheads to items as large as posters and barndoors if we needed to.

I’d also like to take a moment to highlight her work with The HALO Foundation, which recently launched The 93 cents for Flight 93 Campaign, which is dedicated to building a memorial for Flight 93 of September 11.

(via NPCA email)

Despite limited funds to work with, the House Appropriations Subcommittee for State, Foreign Operations and Related Programs today took a major step forward to provide the resources for a bigger, better and bolder Peace Corps.  In its “mark up” of programs within the International Affairs budget for Fiscal Year 2010, the subcommittee agreed to recommend a $450 Million appropriation for the Peace Corps.  This decision was announced last night on MSNBC’s Hardball with Chris Matthews by Subcommittee Chairwoman Nita Lowey.  Click here to watch the program.

Eighteen months ago, the National Peace Corps Association launched the MorePeaceCorps Campaign anticipating an opportunity but realizing that a coordinated and sustained effort was necessary, Inspired by the indefatigable spirit of Peace Corps pioneer Harris Wofford, led by the enormous energy of our Campaign Coordinator Rajeev Goyal (Nepal 01-03), supported by Donald Ross (Nigeria 65-67) and his team at M+R Associates and fueled by the countless contributions of volunteer advocates across the nation, we all went to work:  writing letters, making phone calls, hosting MorePeaceCorps House Parties, organizing constituent meetings with lawmakers, submitting letters to the editor and op/eds, taking part in a National Day of Action, marching in parades, attending rallies and much, much more..

It is very important to recognize that much more work remains, But today’s action is an historic step forward!  It is your historic step forward.  Congratulations!

(via contractoruk.com)

The father of a British IT consultant who was kidnapped in Baghdad two years ago has learnt his son may be freed within the next 48 hours.

Graeme Moore shared his news after a senior member of the Shia militia group that seized his son, Peter, with his four bodyguards in 2007 was freed by the US military.

The release of Laith al-Khazali is in line with demands by the group, Asaib al-Haq, which say his freedom, and that of other rebels, would be in return for the Britons.

It is not clear whether the release of Laith was part of official or covert efforts to free the five Brits, but a friend of Peter Moore said it represented a “huge boost of hope.”

Appearing on an internet broadcast, the friend, Amber Foley, also said she was “very down” in May, when two years passed since the 32-year-old was abducted.

Her speaking out came on the same day that Graeme Moore was quoted as saying that he understands from Iraqi officials that his son could be released imminently.

“We have always been told that Peter may be the first one to be released,” he told the Independent. “I heard this afternoon that this may take place within two days.”

(via peacecorpsonline.typepad.com)

Amy Potthast writes: “The reason getting an invitation to Peace Corps becomes such a problem now is the way the nomination process works. If you aren’t familiar, it may help to know that after you apply and interview, you can get nominated to join the Peace Corps from your local recruiting office. Then your application travels to the headquarters office in Washington, D.C., where your placement officer considers whether you are a good program fit for a specific country assignment, and invites you. (In the mean time you undergo a medical and dental examination to be deemed physically fit to serve in a developing country where medical care isn’t always on par with that of the United States.) Sounds easy, right? Well the problem is that Peace Corps regional recruitment offices throughout the country race against each other once, quarterly to get all their applicants nominated through an online system—and because the number of applicants has far outnumbered the openings, within 15 minutes of opening the online process, one day every three months, the generalist slots all get taken up. If generalist positions made a small percentage of Peace Corps openings, the problem wouldn’t be so dire. But generalist positions make up about half of openings. Not only that, but the generalist contribution to Peace Corps is important. The power of the Peace Corps is that it not only provides needed technical assistance to developing countries, but it also transforms people who don’t necessary have a lot of prior international or development experience, who may otherwise never have the opportunity to live oversesas for that length of time, and to learn another language. “

Beneficiaries:

Congratulations to Philip Chan, an RPCV from Guyana, who won our hearts – and our first small grant – with his proposal to assist a small villiage in Guyana in their effort to obtain clean drinking water.  Please take a moment to read his magnificent project report below.

PROJECT REPORT FROM PHILLIP CHAN

(Slightly abridged by FROG)

Summary:

The purpose of the trip was to implement a small scale clean water project in the Amerindian village of St. Monica.  The decision to conduct this project was based on ongoing communication I had with my village since COS-ing regarding the rise in gastrointestinal complaints (vomiting and diarrhea) reported at the health post and village concerns about the increasingly polluted waters of the Pomeroon.  Prior to the trip we conducted research on applicable clean water applications, including portable filtration systems, Life Straws, water purification packets, and river bank sand filtration.  We consulted with the local Philadelphia chapter of Engineers Without Borders (regarding the river bank sand filtration method) and with Dr. Andrea Thorpe of the Miami Chapter – Rotary International.  We also invited a guest speaker, Dr. Christiaan Morssink-president of the United Nations Associations of Greater Philadelphia to come to our school and give a lecture on water security in the developing world.  Dr. Morssink had previously lived in Suriname, where he was head of the Department of Planning and Project Management in the Ministry of Health.  Ultimately, we settled on rainwater collection as the application for use in our project, primarily for three reasons:

• Turbidity and conductivity data collected by a 2006 CDC team to the Pomeroon indicated rainwater as the cleanest natural source of water in the region.
• Village leaders identified rainwater collection as the desired source for clean water in the community, and already possessed resources to support the set up of a rainwater collection system on the central village compound (including four 450 gallon rainwater tanks).
• In conjunction with Rotary International, a successful larger-scale project to set up rainwater tanks had already been conducted in the neighboring village of Kabakaburi.  Assessment plans to expand this project to St. Monica and Karawab were already underway, and our efforts would complement those of the RI team.

We arrived in Guyana on the morning of Sunday, March 22, and arrived in St. Monica the following day on Monday, March 23.  On Tuesday we traveled with the tushao to Karawab at the request of Dr. Thorpe, who wanted to collect population and resource data for expansion of Rotary’s clean water project to this community.  We were also planning on setting up a second water tank stand at the Karawab village compound, near the primary school and health post.  However, due to time limitations we were restricted to setting up a single water tank stand at the St. Monica compound.  Wednesday and Thursday were devoted to clearing the work site area and gathering materials for the stand, including 384 BMs of lumber donated from community members, representing nearly half of the necessary resources for the project.  Construction commenced on Thursday, and was completed the following afternoon.  Friday evening we had a sendoff dinner and party at the village community center.  Paiwari was shared.  I danced the Worm.

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