Sweet Home Chicago

I made it back safely to my parents' house outside of Chicago last night.  I'll be in the States, mostly in the Chicago area, until January 8th.  Happy holidays to all.

Elections, Part 2

 My own election day, like much of the country, was relatively uneventful.  I joined a friend as she accompanied her grandfather to the polls (she herself chose not to vote).  The process in Concepcion starts by visiting what might be considered a sign-in table, which was positioned at the side of the street in front of a house.  There, a volunteer confirms that your name is on the registration list and hands you your ballots.  You walk down a short way to the school (where all voting occurs) and enter one of about three possible voting rooms.  In that room, a second group of volunteers checks your name of their list, indicating you have now presented yourself and cast a ballot, and then you walk over to a small shielded table to make your selections.  Once complete, you drop each ballot in its respective box and, presto, civic duty exercised.  I chatted with the volunteers about their roles and the process, and also talked for a bit with a former mayor of Concepcion.  The ballots cast in town are counted by hand at the end of the day and the totals are called in to someone at the municipal level.  The physical ballots, I was told, are sent to the capital and where the results are verified and made official.

Two general observations:

1)  On election day, a Sunday, the center of Concepcion was remarkably quiet and relatively empty.  There were people milling around near the school where the polls were, but it did not seem like a regular Sunday.  I had heard from friends and colleagues that many people were frightened by the elections and the political turmoil in general, and that they would just close their doors and stay inside all day.  We have definitely encountered some pretty nervous people while out gathering census data.  Walking around town on election day, I did get a sense of general unease.  According to friends in Santa Lucia, however, people there were out in the streets having a good time.  I don't have a good explanation for this difference.

2)  Driving in San Pedro Sula and seeing political ads around, I noticed that there seemed to be a major focus on face-shots of the politicians.  I have to admit that seeing billboards that were essentially gigantic heads of the candidates was a bit unsettling.  But I didn't put it all together until I saw the ballots.  In each race, the voter receives a ballot (roughly 11 in by 4 in) with passport-style photographs of each candidate, and demonstrates his or her selection by placing an "X" underneath the head of the chosen candidate.  Naturally, the parties make their advertising correspond as closely as possible to the voting process.  

Elections, Part 1

The national election in Honduras was held yesterday, and it appears that the new president is Porfirio "Pepe" Lobo from the National Party.  This isn't much of a surprise; pretty much all of the people I've talked to expected Pepe to win, and he had been leading the Liberal Party candidate, Elvin Santos, by large margins in recent polls.  Currently, La Prensa gives Pepe 57% of the vote to Elvin's 33% (as a note, people here do tend to call their politicians by their first names).  Additionally, ousted president Mel Zelaya, from the Liberal Party, called for his supporters to boycott the election.  So, more important questions concerning the legitimacy of the election and its (in)ability to move the country beyond the political crisis surrounding the coup will be debated in the upcoming days and weeks as voter turnout and null vote (blank ballots submitted in protest) numbers are refined and contested.

Gregory Weeks, a political science professor and UNC Charlotte, provides a summary of the political situation and preview of the election here.

Today's NY Times article is here.

Time Away

I have to apologize for the lack of posts over the last few weeks.  The combination of work and graduate school applications has kept me very busy, and I have not made time to update the blog.  I'm hoping to change this now.

New Home

About 2-1/2 weeks ago I made my permanent move from Santa Lucia to the new clinic in Concepcion.  I live in one of four bedrooms in the cottage shown in the photograph.  While the views are more expansive here than in Santa Lucia and the weather is a bit cooler, the main the health clinic in not yet open and we are without the vast majority of the infrastructure that surrounds the clinic in Santa Lucia.    I've been unable to update the blog recently because the internet signal has been spotty at best since I arrived.  The dental side of the clinic is open, staffed daily by one dentist and one assistant, but I am the only person living here full time.  I have plenty of work with the census to keep me busy and I am excited to get to know my new town.  

  

Census Update

The last two weeks have been incredibly busy with the final preparations for the census.  We spent one week in Santa Lucia training the six enumerators that will be out in the field collecting our data and then spent the following week field testing the survey instruments in four communities (Concepcion Centro, Guachipilincito, San Marcos Centro, and San Jose).  Both the training and the field testing went well; we're still tweaking minor aspects of the forms, but the bulk of our questions are working and the enumerators are capturing the information fairly well during the interviews.

Currently, I am working on the final revisions to the forms and also collaborating with the enumerators on the exploration and socialization phase of the census.  We have two main goals during this phase:  1) to gain the trust and support of community leaders in our target areas, and 2) to create maps of those target communities.  We began by holding a general community meeting at the new clinic in Concepcion last Sunday.  About 30 people attended and the event went smoothly.  The enumerators and I have been having follow-up meetings with the key people in Concepcion this week:  the vice-mayor, members of the health committee, prominent teachers, members of the water committee, health volunteers, and others.  This process is relatively informal; we generally just show up at these peoples' homes or track them down in town.  Additionally, the enumerators have started collecting gps coordinates for each structure in each community and sketching corresponding maps.  The mapping process enables us to personally introduce a large percentage of the population to our work, and these lists of houses and maps will be used when the enumerators return to implement the census questionnaires.

USA 3, Honduras 2

Last weekend eight of us made the long trip to San Pedro Sula to attend a world cup qualifying match between the United States and Honduras.  We arrived outside of the stadium at about 2:00 pm for a 8:00 pm match; the black market for tickets is so bad in Honduras that large numbers of people are routinely unable to get into the stadium.  We waded through a fair amount of disorder for about 3 hours before finally entering the stadium.  The energy and excitement of the crowd was unbelievable and something I had not felt before.  Honduras had plenty of chances to take hold of the match, including a penalty kick in the last minutes that would have made it 3-3, but in the end the US prevailed.  The following week, with US v. Costa Rica ending in a draw, Honduras qualified for the World Cup for the first time since 1982 by beating El Salvador.  The following day was a national holiday.

English Class

Four days each week a few of the Americans here in Santa Lucia run an english class for interested community members.  In practice, the regular participants tend to be in their twenties and either work for Shoulder to Shoulder or know someone that does.  The formality of the class varies; on some days we go through chapters of a textbook an other days we just chat.  Despite the photograph, the class is quite fun for everyone involved and a pleasant diversion from my regular work.  

Work, Work, Work

Shoulder to Shoulder is a private non-profit organization based in the United States that works in tandem with a Honduran sister organization, Hombro a Hombro. In the organization's own words, they strive "to develop educational and health programs to help poor, rural communities in Honduras achieve sustainable development and improve the overall health and well being of residents." Shoulder to Shoulder has been present in Santa Lucia and surrounding communities in the department of Intibuca for almost twenty years. In practice, the majority of the work here revolves around running one "major" health/dental clinic and managing a growing network of smaller health centers. Outside of the health arena, the organization also runs several additional interventions: an after-school/library program, a scholarship program for local students, a nutrition program targeting young children, a girls empowerment/entrepreneurship program, a water filter project, and a stove ventilation project. Moreover, one central component of the organization's mission is to expose young doctors to international public health work, so they maintain partnerships with several medical schools and groups of students routinely come down for two week service trips.

A little over a year ago, Shoulder to Shoulder was approached by the Honduran government and asked whether they would be interested in overseeing the health care services in this area of Intibuca. So, under a formal government contract, Shoulder to Shoulder now has the responsibility for managing and improving a decentralized network of local health centers, running its own major clinic in Santa Lucia, and is opening a second major clinic in Concepcion early in the new year. As I learn more about the decentralized system and have the chance to visit some of the small health centers I'll be able to provide a clearer picture of healthcare in this part of Honduras.

The existence of the government contract is the primary reason I currently have a job here. Under that contract, Shoulder to Shoulder is required to conduct a full household census of the main catchment area for its new clinic in Concepcion, comprising the municipalities of Concepcion and San Marcos de la Sierra. With oversight from the national director, I will be implementing and managing that census. The main study plan for the census was developed with input from researchers at the University of Cincinnati before I arrived. Posts have been slow this last week because I spent a good deal of time revising the survey instruments and study protocols and preparing for our upcoming training. I have heard varying and unreliable population estimates for our target area - one of the main reasons we are doing a census - but conservatively we expect between 12,000 and 25,000 people. We are slated to start the census on November 2nd and expect to have staff out in field for about 6 months; we begin training those enumerators on Monday and will be field testing the instruments the following week.

Political Turmoil

The last few days have been quite newsworthy here in Honduras.  I wasn't planning on jumping into the politics so quickly as I am still trying to wrap my head around the situation, but recent events compel me to say a few things.

As a very short and crude summary:  (1) about three months ago the President of Honduras, Manuel Zelaya, was expelled from the country by the military on orders from the Supreme Court stemming from his efforts to hold a public consultation asking citizens if they supported moves to change the constitution, (2) the speaker of the Congress, Roberto Micheletti, became the interim President, (3) elections are currently set for November 29, (4) last Monday, Sept 21st, Zelaya clandestinely returned to Tegucigalpa (the capital) and is currently staying within the Brazilian embassy.

I flew into San Pedro Sula (the other major city in Honduras) on Sept 19th.  We drove around the city running a few errands before making our way to Santa Lucia where one of the two Shoulder to Shoulder clinics is located.  Everything was normal then, just folks going about their daily business.  Since Zelaya's return, however, there have been demonstrations, arrests, and some violence in both Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula; several nationwide curfews; diplomats prevented from entering the country; two news outlets shut down, one TV station and one radio station; and a decree curtailing several constitutionally protected rights, namely freedoms of travel, public congregation, and expression.

The town of Santa Lucia in the department of Intibuca is about 6-8 hours from either Tegucigapla or San Pedro Sula along some pretty rough roads.  To be honest, aside from conversations during meals, I have seen no noticeable signs of any turmoil or anything even remotely out of the ordinary here.  There is virtually no military presence in this area and people seem relatively unfazed.  So, for anyone worrying, I feel both safe and secure currently.   

For additional information, you can take a look through this sampling of recent stories:

Ousted president Zelaya Returns to Honduras

Honduras Bars Diplomats as Political Crisis Grows

Honduras Shuts Down Media Outlets, Then Relents

US to Honduras: End emergency decree now

Pressure Mounts on Honduras to End Coup Crisis

Honduras 'may restore liberties'

Welcome

The current primary purpose of this blog is for me to efficiently communicate and keep in touch with family and friends.  I recently accepted a job working for a NGO named Shoulder to Shoulder in rural western Honduras.  I'll likely be living abroad for just under a year and this should be a good way to keep those I care about abreast of the goings on in my life.

Beyond that primary purpose, I hope that the public nature of blogging will help me to intentionally integrate an aspect of reflection into this experience.  My life has changed dramatically and I would like to engage with and share all of the important thoughts and feelings I will have over the next year.  Those that know me best may be somewhat surprised by this, but that should be an incentive to post frequently and intelligently.

Finally, once I settle in and learn more about the people, culture, history, politics, and economics of Honduras, this may also become a forum for me to share more formal observations on living and working in this country.  I tend to be quite careful in reaching any conclusions, so it may be a while before I have anything to say on these points.  For now, please read, comment, and enjoy.