Untitled
on Kate in Guyana (Guyana), 26/Jan/2010 12:19, 34 days ago
Back to work after a couple of days training with VSO. The first one was a call back workshop for those of us that have been in country for three or four months, with the volunteers and our local counterparts. We were looking at our expectations before we came and our experiences during this first part of our placements. The workshop came up with quite a few issues, and we gathered that many of them are recurrent issues for each group. I think VSO are nibbling away at some of these issues, but many of them are resistant to nibbling. Yesterday the workshop included some training in gender, as well as how literacy, special needs and disability volunteers could work together more closely. The idea of all this is a drip drip system, hoping that we can make small steps of improvement.I had a busy weekend with various volunteers visiting to attend the training. So there were lots of good chats - I am increasingly aware that many of the volunteers in whatever region seem to experience the same challenges/frustrations that we do. It is all part of the experience!On my Saturday morning walk in the Botanical Gardens I saw a toucan really close up, sitting in a tree - massive yellow beak, it was just hopping around looking ungainly. I also saw one of the large kingfishers again hunting along the creek. I think when you know what to look for and where to look for it, you are more likely to see it. A bit like life really....