Name: Jason Rosen GUY Group: GUY 3 Guyana Site: Bartica, Georgetown Type of Volunteer: Urban Youth Development, Prison Reform and supporting the Guyana Olympic Association
What have you been up to since you finished Peace Corps? Well, its been almost 11 years since my COS, and in that time I basically have been working in the area of physical security. About 6 ½ years ago my son Joshua was born so fatherhood is something that I love. I also learned to play and appreciate rugby and have become a Washington Capitals fan. I am also the Alumni Coordinator for Boise State University here in DC.
What do you miss most about Guyana and your Peace Corps experience? I miss the people that I became close with particularly my host mom, Joyce. I also miss my comrades at the Guyana Prison Service, particularly Dale, the Director of Prisons. I miss some of the PC Guyana staff, Kitty, Claudius, Angie, Valerie, Nurse Jean.
How did your experience in Guyana affect your post-Peace Corps experience? It gave me a great appreciation and affection for the Guyanese and Caribbean culture. So when I have come back to the states, I seek out Guyanese organizations, people, and events. It also gives me some bragging rights that I lived in Bartica to the Guyanese…
Describe a challenge you worked to overcome while in PC Guyana. My original assignment in Bartica kind of busted, so I got a new one training prison officers for the Guyana Prison Service at Mazzaruni Prison, and then later in G/T at the Headquarters.
In 5 words, describe your Peace Corps experience. Very High and Very Low
What is your favorite Peace Corps Guyana memory? Being able to judge boxing matches at Thirst Park. Taking a SIMAP trip into the interior. Meeting Desmond Hoyte. Anytime I got to Lethem.
What was the hardest part of readjusting to post-Peace Corps life? Not turning the channel on the TV every time a commercial comes on. Remembering how to go grocery shopping at Safeway. Discovering new technological advancements.
Which lessons from Peace Corps have you applied in your post-Peace Corps jobs/life? Understanding (REALLY) what are needs and what are wants.
What advice would you give a future or current Peace Corps Volunteer (Guyana or otherwise)? The same advice that Kitty told us, if it is good enough for the Guyanese, than its good enough for you. Don’t become a Rumski! Don’t think you have to have some “American network support group” When hell breaks loose, it’s the Guyanese that are going to have to take care of you. Make sure you go to Lethem and Bartica.
Would you do Peace Corps again? Where, when and why? If the circumstances every allowed me to, I definitely would. If I couldn’t go back to Guyana, I would want to go to another Caribbean country or maybe Samoa or Namibia.
Are you a Guyana RPCV who would like to be featured in our RPCV Highlight? Email me at kringer@guyfrog.org.
Check out this totally awesome organization that is dedicated to connecting the world through music, by providing resources to musicians and their communities. Playing For Change created a documentary film series and are hosting a benefit concert soon. Their “Stand By Me” film show street performers all over the world performing this famous song. Proceeds from such films and benefit show go to projects, like building schools. They also have a great website with more videos.
I came across a great website one day for the Rupununi Learners. The organization is made up of two non-profit organizations – the Rupununi Learners Incorporated (RLI) and Rupununi Learners Foundation (RLF). RLI is a registered non-profit in Guyana, founded in 2007 and RLF is a registered non-profit in the USA that started in 2001. Together, these organizations come together to collaborate on environmental conservation, wildlife research, education, economic development and cultural preservation efforts in the southern region of Guyana.
Check out their great website, http://www.rupununilearners.org, to learn more about these two organizations and the wonderful programs they offer!
Birding Adventures Host, James Currie (Photo: Birding Adventures)
The U.S.-based television shows, Birding Adventures and Reel Adventures, recently aired five episodes that were filmed in Guyana in October, 2008.
Three of the shows were on bird watching, while two were on sport fishing, the Guyana Sustainable Tourism Initiative (GSTI), which facilitated the productions, announced yesterday.
Showing on FoxSports Net and ComCast in the southeastern United States, the premiere of Birding Adventures aired to nearly 50,000 households. With multiple timeslots, both shows have the potential of reaching a combined 11 million households.
The GSTI is collaboration between the Guyana Tourism Authority and the United states Agency for International Development.
“If you’re looking for a country to go and visit and literally be left with your jaw dropped in amazement of what this world looked like hundreds of years ago because they have conserved it and kept it in its natural beauty, look at Guyana,” the host of the sport fishing, Robert Arrington said.
“The people here – their food, their culture, their land – it’s100 percent unbelievable. This is the definition of a real adventure,” he added…
Click here,to read the complete Kaieteur News article.
I first met Otisha, a tall Afro-Guyanese transvestite prostitute in 2003 when I reported on HIV and Aids in Guyana and Barbados.
Otisha says Aids awareness has increased in Guyana
Back then, the Caribbean had the second highest rate of infection in the world.
The prevalence among female sex workers in Guyana was 27% and 21% for men who have sex with men.
Five years later, Otisha is still a commercial sex worker and business is booming for him.
“I go with lots of clients,” said Otisha, who has himself managed to avoid contracting HIV.
When I last visited, men were paying extra money to have unprotected sex.
“You do have some men who pay that type of money to have sex but I’m not going to have unprotected sex,” said Otisha.
Raising awareness
Government support for HIV and Aids sufferers has improved dramatically in Guyana in the past five years.
“They are promoting more Aids programmes on national television and promoting the use of condoms,” said Otisha.
Education is the key to bringing down infection rates
Since the World Bank came on board in 2004 and after President George W Bush’s Aids initiative, more money has been made available to promote awareness and education.
Dr Shanti Singh, who heads the country’s national Aids programme, feels that this has had an impact on the number of cases.
“In 2003/2004 our prevalence was approximately 2.4%.
“At the end of 2006 we conducted another survey, so we estimate in Guyana, right now our prevalence is about 1.55%,” said Dr Singh.
The infection rate among female sex workers has also dropped significantly in recent years.
“There has been a lot of work going on to educate the general public – mass media campaigns, a lot of print media and education material,” added Dr Singh
Getting support
According to the National Aids Programme, about 5,000 people are now in a free treatment and care programme.
I visited a clinic where I met a young policewoman who had contracted HIV from her husband.
I don’t know how to use a condom
Isabella
“I thought I was going to die, I shut down my bank account and I made wills concerning my children,” she said.
When she first came to the clinic, she had lost all hope but the support she received changed her mind.
“I want to live, so that’s why I dress and look fancy and you can’t even tell that I have HIV,” she said.
However, one of the biggest obstacles for the Guyanese government is how to stop further infections.
HIV is still the leading cause of death among people between the ages of 20 and 49, and the infection rate among commercial sex workers and men who have sex with men remains extremely high.
Isabella, an 18-year-old orphan, had to prostitute herself to put a roof over her head.
She has been having regular unprotected sex since started working a year ago.
“I don’t know how to use a condom,” said Isabella.
She has never been tested and estimates that she has had unprotected sex with around 50 men.
Multiple partners
Barbados is renowned for being socially conservative and religious but when it comes to sex, it is a different matter.
“In the Caribbean the infection rate is 1.2% and here in Barbados it’s around 1.8%,” said Dr Carol Jacobs, who is the head of the National Aids Commission.
“We are relatively high but unless we can cut the number of new cases, we still have a big challenge on our hands,” she said.
Woman between the ages of 15 and 29 have the highest infection rates, as a result of having multiple partners as well as anal sex.
“We are just embarking on our five-year strategic plan, paying a lot of emphasis to treatment and prevention, with behaviour change and communication in particular,” said Dr Jacobs.
“It is about men in particular having multiple partners and I think the young women think if you can do it, so can we,” said Dr Jacobs.
Education
The National Aids Commission has just launched what it calls a “Champions Programme,” where they are getting artists and musicians to promote the safe sex message to young people.
The good news is that we have been able to reduce HIV/Aids mortality by over 70%
Corey Lane
However, many of the people engaging in risky sexual behaviour are the parents themselves.
Corey Lane, from the Aids commission, feels that adults think young people do not have sex.
“A lot of teachers don’t feel comfortable talking to these children about sex, they feel that they are too young to know about it,” said Mr Lane.
“We have proven in surveys that primary school children are engaging in sex as early as nine. However, the good news is that we have been able to reduce HIV/Aids mortality by over 70%.”
According to Mr Lane, Barbados has also been able to reduce the incidence of new cases as every major public place now offers testing.
Five years ago, when I reported on HIV and Aids in the Caribbean, the big issue was stigma and discrimination
Now, I’ve seen how the quality of life for people living with the disease in Guyana and Barbados has improved dramatically.
People are living longer and huge strides have been made in terms of treatment and care in less than a decade.
Sadly one thing that hasn’t changed is the infection rate, which is only surpassed by the far higher figures in sub-Saharan Africa.
Evidence has emerged that the gang controlled by Guyana’s most wanted man, Rondell ‘Fine Man’ Rawlins, consists mainly of teenage boys who fled from their homes in the village of Buxton.
Recent evidence has brought out that many of the members of the gang are no more than 17 years old. Dwayne Sancho, who was captured by the security forces on Monday in a trail near Ituni, is only 14 years old, while Otis Fiffee, called ‘Mud Up,’ who was killed during the initial raid two Fridays ago, and Robin Chung, called ‘Chung Boy’ were mere 17 and 16 years old respectively.
Initially, Fiffee’s age was stated as 21 years old; however, when this newspaper visited Buxton yesterday during his funeral, the age on his coffin was stated as 17. His parents had given the earlier age.
There is evidence that Rawlins and other senior members of his gang had initially recruited the teenagers as look-outs while the gang was hiding out in the village of Buxton.
After they were flushed out by the security forces, some of the young men, who were already a part of the gang, went with them.
The parents of these young men, during recent interviews, indicated that their children left their homes despite several pleas for them to refrain from the criminal activities.
…
Eyewitnesses to the Bartica massacre had indicated that most of the gunmen were ‘young boys’.
But what could have led to these young men throwing their lives away to join a gang, knowing that the consequences invariably lead to certain death?
Many villagers are of the opinion that this is a result of constant Police harassment and profiling of the youths of Buxton. The young men became sympathizers with the gunmen…
Friends of a motorcycle- loving computer consultant who was kidnapped with his bodyguards as he worked in Iraq’s finance ministry 18 months ago are launching a campaign to increase pressure for the men’s release.
They say Peter Moore, 32, who took a lucrative job in Baghdad to pay off his student loan after years of Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO) on an allowance of £140 a month, is strong-willed and will not be defeated by his ordeal.
However, they fear he and the other hostages — two Jasons, Alan, a father of two from Scotland, and Alec — have been forgotten because of a virtual news blackout imposed by the government. Their full names have been withheld at the request of the Foreign Office’s advice to the families.
Moore’s friends have set up a website — www.4pete.org – which explains why they are defying the official line that publicity could jeopardise efforts to help the hostages.
“It is to be hoped that if more can be known about Pete and the ideals he represented, then pressure can be brought to bear upon those in a position to negotiate for his and his fellow captives’ release,” the site says.
It claims that the cases of Terry Waite, the Church of England envoy freed in Beirut in 1991 after four years in captivity, and Alan Johnston, the BBC journalist who was held in Gaza for four months last year, suggest that sustained campaigns can produce results.
There is also a similar internship in Nigeria. If you know of anyone who would be interested, feel free to pass along the attached Terms of Reference to them. The contact person is Esmee de Jong: dejong@unhcr.org
During the 17 years Peace Corps has had a post in Guyana, over 470 Volunteers have assisted in the areas of health, education, community development and information technology. Those 17 years span over four decades and, although many things have changed during that time, the basic mission of Peace Corps and its Volunteers remains the same. Friends and RPCVs of Guyana (FROG) would like to take a moment to thank you for committing your time and energy to the service of Guyana and its people. Your efforts have had an impact on more individuals then you realize. Thank you!
We here at FROG left Guyana with the idea that once you completed your service, the experience stays with you. We hope that you will join us on our mission to maintain our connection with fellow RPCVs, Guyana and its people. Below you will find more information about FROG and how you can join us!
Friends and RPCVs of Guyana (FROG)
In 2007, several Guyana RPCVs joined together to form a non-profit organization that connected former RPCVs with each other, with the greater development community and with new opportunities. Most importantly, we wanted to build on the work we did while Volunteers and continue helping Guyana – a country we love.
Currently, we at FROG are busy developing our infrastructure, gathering new members, fund-raising and developing a strategic plan. If you are interested in staying connected with fellow Guyana RPCVs, participating in Third Goal activities and supporting development projects, please join us! However, as a new non-profit, we are finding our way and learning as we grow. Bear with us, and please, feel free to contact us (support@guyfrog.org) with ideas, help requests, etc. That is why we’re here! Also, check out our new website at http://guyfrog.org!
How to Join
There are three easy ways to join Friends and RPCVs of Guyana!
2. Join through the National Peace Corps Association. Their membership includes a subscription to WorldView, NPCANews, and discounts on auto insurance, rental cars and more!
If you have any questions about FROG, want to keep up-to-date with FROG happenings or would like to get involved…please feel free to contact us at support@guyfrog.org and on our website at http://guyfrog.org!
Plans are underway for our second annual weekend of FROG events in New York City this July. Join FROG through one of the methods listed above to get the latest details for those events! We hope to see you in July!
Thanks for your interest in FROG. Please help us help Guyana with a kind donation. You can use any major credit card, or PayPal. Click the button below to make a difference.
You can also join others in donating to our change.org account.
FROG Newsletter
Download a copy of our latest printed newsletter. Thanks to Anita Kattakuzhy and the rest of the FROG team for putting this together. Don't forget to sign up for our email newsletter below!
Name: Jason Rosen
I don’t know how to use a condom 
