An Update Before I Celebrate the Holidays

I appreciate friends who have noted the lack of updates since August and asked "what's happening?" The short answer is quite a bit has happened over the last few months in Belize and the following gives a recap.

I believe that last update I ended my recounting my "flying adventure", the trip on the small local plane to Placencia followed by a weekend visit to Hopkins Village to visit my friend and fellow Peace Corps colleague. Just a few short weeks following that visit a received a strange phone call followed by news that my friend had died. The death of someone you care about is always upsetting, but it was a exacerbated by a series of circumstances. I received a telephone call on my cell phone on a Monday, while at NAVCO. My friend's number was saved in my phone and her name popped up when the phone rang. However, the voice that responded when I said "Hi Bertie" was male. I ultimately extracted from the caller that he had found the phone on the beach in Hopkins and I urged him to return the phone to the school where my friend volunteered. The next day, around noon, I received a call from another volunteer at around noon advising that she had been instructed by the Peace Corps to call all of the volunteers in the Cayo District to notify them that a Peace Corps volunteer had died and that there had been some reports on the news. When I asked her for details, she said that she had none (not even what exactly might have been broadcast on the radio) but the Peace Corps was instructing us not to talk with anyone. A couple of hours later, I received a call from a Peace Corps staff member advising me that the volunteer who had died was in fact my friend Bertie, that the nurse and security officer at Peace Corps had gone to Hopkins to investigate and had preliminarily determined that the death was natural causes and that the Peace Corps had picked up another friend/volunteer from the nearby village of Seine Bight who was being driven to Belmopan and had asked to stay at my house. I was not able to get any further details from Peace Corps at that time. My friend from Seine Bight arrived a bit later. She had heard from a call from one of her acquaintances in her village that the radio reported that a Peace Corps volunteer in Hopkins had been found dead that morning in her house possibly sexually assaulted and murdered. The Peace Corps had provided her with no further information other than they believed she had died of natural causes but an autopsy would be performed on Wednesday. They had also advised her that it was believed that Bertie had died on Friday night or Saturday morning, but her body had not been discovered until Tuesday morning when the school reported that she had not arrived for work. Needless to say my friend Mary and I agonized until Friday, when the Peace Corps scheduled a meeting to disclose the results of the autopsy. We imagined all manner of horrible scenarios and the limited facts that we had about the scene - only that the police had to break down her door and that she was found partially clothed. We were very saddened but relieved finally on Friday to receive an account of the autopsy results along with impressions and evidence collected at the scene that reinforced the autopsy conclusion that death was due to natural causes, possibly an aneurysm or stroke. There was a lovely Memorial Service held in Hopkins weeks after the death in which the library which Bertie had worked to establish was renamed in her honor. Bertie's daughter has indicated that she may visit Belize around April of next year and I am hopeful that I will get the opportunity to meet her. Bertie talked quite a bit about her daughter and was close to her.

The last few months have not been consumed by bad news. My sister from Mississippi came for a short visit during this period and we had a great time. I had been a little concerned because my sister is not one to like "roughing it". She is a travel agent by trade and has visited many parts of the world. Pat was a trouper. She stayed at my little house and slept on a mattress on the floor. We had some great talks because we had not seen each other in quite a while. We had a fun dinner with one of my friends in San Ignacio. And, we went zip-lining. For the uninitiated, zip lining is an activity where you climb up onto a platform built around a tree in the bush/jungle. The platform is one of several placed at intervals in the jungle with each platform connected by cable wires. You are strapped into a light harness and "zip" from platform to platform along the cable wires. It is a bit like playing monkey in the tree tops and it was great fun. At the end, the operators lower you down via a pulley system.

The zip-lining is the only adventure to report during this time period. In terms of weather, Belize has had quite a bit of rain over this period. The bad news is that the rain caused more flooding in several areas which has caused bridge outages, livestock and crop damage and homes partially or nearly totally under water in a few areas. I went out one day with a couple of the board members to look over some of the damage. We drove up to a point in the roadway where the water had covered the roadway and canoed a short way out to a Belize coast guard boat (along with several people from government agencies). We climbed aboard the boat via a ladder propped in the water and did a tour of some areas in which only a few roof tops and tree tops were visible and stopped to walk thru a village on higher ground that was running out of food and water because it was cut off due to the surrounding water. The waters have receded and the rain has abated somewhat. The good news is that the weather has gotten cooler than I have ever before experienced in Belize over the last 3-4 weeks, I actually sleep under a blanket sometimes (rather than giving thought to whether I will run the fan). It is often cool in the morning until about 10 (often requiring a long sleeve shirt and sometimes even a light sweater) and tends to cool off again around 5 or so when the sun starts setting. The days frequently warm back up to the 80s (better than the 90s and low 100s that were were experiencing) and there have been a vew wonderful days where it is has stayed somewhat cool all day long.

In September, NAVCO where I generally spend 3-4 days a week, had its Annual General Meeting and elected a new Board President. The government of Belize has initiated a Decentralization Program whereby it is conducting studies and holding workshops to address to addres "strenghthening" local government. Basically, the focus is to look at what governmental powers can be shared with local governments. The Caribbean organization of countries is also addressing decentralization. The good news is these initiatives fit in rather well with the review and potential updating of laws which I have been helping the Board undertake. I am continuing to talk to various people about organizational structures, laws and regulations and I was allowed to participate in a 2 day Decentralization Workshop that was held in Belize City at the end of November.

Now, I am getting ready to make a trip back to Chicago for the holidays. This will be my first trip back to the States since arriving in Belize in June of 2007 and I am very excited to see my home town again. It is also exciting going back to the hometown of our President elect who will hopefully help to lead us through these tough economic times. Finally, I am even looking forward to cold weather and perhaps a bit of snow. So, I am signing off for now. Warm holiday wishes to all who read this blog. More updates in the New Year.