Say Hello To My Little Friend...

We just discovered recently that we have another uninvited guest (besides the rats) staying in our back guest room that decided to make it his night time homestead.  Above is a photo of Ted, he is our possum friend that is cutting down on our rat population at the Thompson home.  I'm finding out that he doesn't like flashlights shining in his eyes and well he pretty much is blind in any kind of light.  So he's not a lot of fun to be around during the daytime or when the lights are on and he's got quite a temper when you try to push him out with a broom.  Unfortunately for Ted, he has worn out his welcome and I am going to have to evict him this week and prevent him from reentering with some expanding spray foam and some tough 1/4 inch screen to seal him out.  More on the Ted saga in another post...

Nate (and Michelle)           

Yep…Finally, One of My First Posts to Our Blog

So let me first start off by thanking my wife Michelle for her dedication to keeping family and friends updated by consistently writing on our blog over the past year and a half.  Without her, this blog would pretty much be blank till now if it weren’t for her.  So she’s been inspiring me to start regularly writing my thoughts and experiences to our blog for the remainder of our service.  So hopefully what I’m about to write (and in future blog posts) won’t be too repetitive to our millions of blog followers around the world.  :)     

Let’s start off at the beginning/core reason why we decided to put our careers in the U.S.  on hold while they were just gaining traction… to put it simply, we both felt unfulfilled in our careers sitting in a cubicle behind a desk and we wanted to see what else life had to offer while we were still young.  We wanted to actively serve our country, take all the volunteering that we’ve done over the years to the next level, and travel the world.  

So why Peace Corps and not some other nonprofit group?
 

A Sunset beside St. Peter Church in
Punta Gorda Town, Belize

Besides the respectable reputation and long track record Peace Corps has, the major selling point we both were attracted to is the sustainability in development work that Peace Corps emphasizes to us as volunteers.  So instead of just going into a country to give handouts and/or simply doing the work for the community members and then just pack up and leave them, we are encouraged to become members of the community and trained in ways to help community members figure out for themselves what their needs are and then with our expertise, education, and knowledge, we train them how to maintain the project/work that they’re working on.  Instead of just “giving the man a fish” like many other nonprofit organizations do, Peace Corps Volunteers “teach the man how to fish” so the work is sustainable and the host country nationals can continue the work themselves after we go back home to the U.S..  This isn’t to say that all nonprofits or even mission groups that serve abroad are ineffective in development work, I’m mainly pointing out the differences and what attracted Michelle and I to serving in Peace Corps.  In a future blog entry that I’ll be posting, I will be discussing why I think various nonprofit and mission groups are so beneficial and needed in developing countries throughout the world, more so now than ever. 

      

So what has been keeping us busy over the past year and a half?

Michelle with some children at her school
working on her World Map Project.

Michelle has been working diligently with her primary project at a local school to help create a new school library and train fellow teachers how to maintain the library, develop after school programs, she started and coordinated a peer support counseling group for all the Peace Corps Volunteers in Belize (over 100 of us PCVs!), and she works with a committee called VAC that addresses the needs of Volunteers in our region of Belize.  She’s also run several summer camps for children, she helped coordinate a camp GLOW (Girls Leading Our World) for girls, coordinated a World Map project at her school, and she also spends a good deal of her free time supporting the Belize Special Olympics football (soccer) team.  I’m really proud of all the good work that she’s done thus far and all the children’s lives that she’s had a positive impact on!

CacaoFest 2011 - TCGA

My primary project is to work with a Co-op called TCGA (Toledo Cacao Growers Association - http://tcgabelize.com ).   Most recently, over the past month and a half, I have been working with my organization in developing and designing their website, implementing a CMS (Content Management System) and have been training my coworkers how to work with the CMS for their new website so they can maintain, change, create new content, and edit the website themselves.  I found it important that TCGA have a website to promote and position themselves for other buyers if their main cacao buyer should ever pull out and cease buying from them.  Not to mention, having a website is great for marketing, promoting the Cacao industry in Belize, and creating a ‘brand awareness’ of the high quality of TCGA’s cacao beans (click here to learn more about Cacao and what it is) for the Central American region.  In addition to website maintenance I’ve also been teaching our administrator how to use Photoshop (a photo editing program) for use with their website and brochures so they will be self-sufficient for when I leave.   Lastly, I’ve been advising my coworkers ways to market their organization more efficiently, general business techniques, creation and maintenance of multimedia training presentations for farmers, and database creation/management so they can track all of the Cacao production for their member farmers in Belize. 

 

Cacao Tree in Green Creek, Toledo, Belize

My secondary projects over the last year and a half:  P.E. teacher for one of the local schools, helping to fix computers for local schools, the creation of a website for Peace Corps Belize ( http://pcbelize.com ), the creation of a web forum for all Peace Corps Volunteers and Staff in Belize to communicate with each other more effectively, and lastly I’m currently working on developing an Interactive Language Training computer program to help current and future Peace Corps Volunteers learn the 4 main local languages in Belize (much like a Rosetta Stone Language Learning Program). 

 

More important than the physical work is all of the interesting, beautiful, non-spoken experiences and all the bonds and friendships that we’ve made with our Belizean family and friends during these past 2 years.  There’s no way to put into words using clever adjectives and poetic phrases to properly explain and communicate these beautiful experiences that will eternally live within Michelle and I.  The majority of Belizeans that we’ve had the pleasure to get to know are very intelligent, warm hearted, humorous, and beautiful people who respect the United States, its many cultures, and its people.  Most surprisingly is the high regard Belizeans give and how they show support for our current president Barrack Obama, whether you agree with his politics or not.  I’ve heard time and again from Belizeans how inspired and proud they are that most of the U.S. can get past the race of a man and vote for him based on his character and what he/she ‘brings to the table’, and not just the color of his skin.  I couldn’t even tell you how many Barrack Obama t-shirts I’ve seen Belizeans wearing while traveling throughout the country.  Seeing and hearing these types of positive reflections about the United States while in another country makes me so proud to be an American, more than I’ve ever been in my life.  I know not all of our family and friends who are reading this may not have voted for the man or even agree with his politics (I myself don’t agree with everything this administration is doing), but it’s amazing the 180 degree turn (or maybe only 90 degree turn? :) ) our country’s perception has positively undergone over the past 3 years.  I’m not trying to push any of my political or world views on anyone with what I’m saying here, it’s just nice to hear such positive words spoken about the U.S. while you’re so far away from home.

Well that’s about it for now.  My next blog post will focus on showing everyone (I’ll post with some pictures) how we live our daily lives and how most things we take for granted in the U.S. are not always so easy here in Belize.  Don’t get me wrong, both of us are not suffering (except for the extreme heat here In Belize :) ) and we’re not living in mud huts and eating bugs or anything like that, our life here is just different and slightly not as easy in many ways.  We’re not asking anyone back home to feel sorry for us, since this is what we signed up for and it’s all really not that bad when you look at the BIG picture.  Before I keep going any further, I’ll save the rest of my spiel for a future post to our blog.  :)

    

Lastly, Michelle and I are quickly approaching the end of our term here in Peace Corps Belize… only 8 months left until we come home to family and friends and start writing the next chapter of our life! 

Stay tuned for more…

Love to all,

Nate (and Michelle)              

Here comes the bats!

Greeting everyone,

It is a beautiful Saturday morning here in Belize. This morning actually has a refreshing breeze. It reminds me of home. Something to do with how the sun reflects in the shadows and the nice breeze that makes you feel like it’s not going to be a hot day (but you know it will be because its Belize). I am also appreciating that it’s not a rainy morning. I am not sure if you know this or not, but where Nate and I live, we have the most rain in Belize. Every night we get these huge thunderstorms. Some time they are so fierce, that Nate and I can’t sleep (especially with our zinc roof and no insulation.) I love hearing the rain daily, and as long as I am not caught in it, we get along just fine. Oh, and everyone has been wondering about the hurricane season. It hasn’t affected us yet….knock on some wood.

Two more delightful stories. First, we have bats!!!! One night, when we were asleep, Nate heard a noise. He looked at the group and saw a bat. We weren’t sure what to do, so we went back to bed (2am is 2am). We figured with the mosquito net, we would be fine. At 4am, Nate woke up to the bat on the mosquito net. Almost right above me. Haha. It was so comical, I am still giggling as I think about it. Anyways, as a team, we grabbed a towel and caught the bat and brought it outside. We were excited. The next night, we heard the same thing and with practice, we were able to do it even faster! They call the bats here “Rat Bats”. What an experience.

The second story, and something I think I am boasting about….is that we have an avocado tree and a lime tree. Its avocado season, so they are growing. They call avocados “pears” here. They are supposed to drop once they are ripe, but Nate and I got so excited that we picked two big pears from the tree and had guacamole yesterday! Awesome!

Besides the lovely rain storms, Nate and I are doing well. Nate began teaching his co-worker how to manage the website. It’s a process and takes a lot of time, but she is a natural, and we are confident in her ability to run the website once Nate leaves. I am not sure if I mentioned this but Nate has been helping to increase advertisement of TCGA, especially with tourism. He is the most dedicated volunteer. I am so proud of him.

My school ended with a bang. I can’t remember the last time I got so exhausted. Thankfully all the clubs ended successfully. We had a chess tournament, where three of my kids went. One of them won an award for winning a few games successfully and another won an award for sportsmanship. My girls club ended with a pool party. Most of the girls never went to a pool before and they loved it. Besides that, we began to paint the library (where I spend most of my time as a librarian). We successfully has 12 kids paint the world map. I will eventually put pictures up on the blog but it was exciting! We also began to paint bookshelves and the ABCs on the wall. My goal is to have the library painted and a kid friendly space before I leave!!! Oh, and my Special Olympics boys came back from Greece. They won BRONZE in football (soccer). The boys were ages 12-16 and they played boys in the age group 16-21. They came in 3^rd in 35 teams. I was so proud!!!

That’s it for now. We have nothing planned this weekend except to relax a little before working on Monday.

We miss everyone and hope to hear from you guys soon.

Love,

Michelle (and Nate)

And the good times keep on coming!

Well hello there friends and family,

I know that I wrote a blog recently on our reflection of one year, but I haven't discussed how things are going in our daily experiences. We have reached the one year mark....YAY! Things are really picking up for Nate and I.

Nate has several projects right now. He is extremely busy at his site placement. The organization that he works for is involved in Cocoa. Every year, Toledo District in Belize has a "Cocoa Festival". Friday is Wine and Chocolate Night. Yep, you guessed it, we (PCVs) volunteer for Wine and Chocolate. Its a great event to meet community members. Saturday is a day long event at the local park where they celebrate life, and especially Cocoa. Finally Sunday, the festival will then go to one of the villages to celebrate there. Nate is busy helping his organization with making a cool T-Shirt logo for the festival. He is also finishing TCGAs website. Busy guy. Besides his site placement, he is working to have the new PC forum up and running for the new volunteers. Thats right, the new volunteers are here. They are in their beginning process of CBT. Community Based Training. Thats when they get to live with a host family. Oh the good old days.

Speaking of Volunteers, Nate has been hosting 2 volunteers this weekend. Basically this means that 2 new volunteers came to PG to stay at our house. Nate had a BBQ at our house (he invited all the volunteers in PG...and their visitors) on Saturday. On Sunday they went to cave in a neighboring village. Today he took the volunteers to his site, but they also went to San Jose to visit Cocoa farms. Tomorrow they leave. All in all, an action pack but educational experience. 2 points for Nate.

Now as Nate took on these volunteers, I had training in BMP that I couldnt get out of. Friday I came up to headquarters to do a training for all of the new volunteers on Mental Health with our Nurse . Saturday I had Special Olympics Training and then Sunday through Wednesday we start the training for Peace Corps Belize's first Peer to Peer support group. I have to admit, I am kind of excited because I started this baby! I am excited to participate and train the volunteers in this initiative. It has been a lot of work, but definitely worth it.

Besides VSV (Volunteer Supporting Volunteers), I have been extremely busy with Belize's Special Olympics team. Team Belize. We have been getting ready for them to go to the world games. Lets face it, me and soccer...not so much, but I am great at being a soccer mom. Even better at catching balls. haha.

School is going well. A little over a month to go before school ends. We are going to paint a gigantic World Map on the library wall. Me and paint...now thats a funny thought.

Well, that sums up our work thus far.

Fun fact of the day....it doesnt matter how many rats you catch, it never end. They keep coming back.

We miss you all. Email us if you can. Dont be a stranger!

Love,
Michelle (and Nate)

And we hit the one year mark!

Well hello family and friends,

First, wow...what a morning. It is almost 9am and I am pretty sure it is already in the 90's. The heat is back (well it has always been here) BUT, it is in full force!

I would like to start off by telling everyone how Nate and I finished our night last night and began our morning. We ended our night watching Sopranos and listening to rats moving our dishes around in the sink. We woke up this morning to finding two rats in the rat traps....we love the sticky ones...and seeing that they tried to eat all of our food. They were successful with eating the cap to the vegetable oil....Oh you better Belize it!

Now, on to more important things....like this months blog. So most of you already know, but we hit the one year mark. It came at a very difficult time for Nate and I, as we had to head home to the states for a family emergency. During the month that we were in the states, Nate and I had to face two very difficult and sad situations. We lost our beloved grandpa and our baby niece.

I would like to spend this blog reflecting our year in Belize as well our time in the states during this difficult time. First, Peace Corps rocked. They were supportive to our situation and helped to make this process as easy as possible. BIG UP for PC staff. Second, we had a great deal of time to reflect on the PC experience thus far. I told uncle Charlie that I didnt think I would ever write about it...and although it will only be a little, I will do my best.

Peace Corps in a reflection. I remember Nate and I being incredibly nervous to start this process. The great unknown of a developing country. We had heard of poverty mixed with tourist areas. What we weren't expecting was how educated and advanced this country was. I consider it a developed developing country. While being here, we see how things like bathrooms, roads, health care, food choices, etc are things we took for granted in the states, and things that we REALLY appreciate here....when we have it. Our perspectives change. How we view ourselves, others, volunteering, EVERYTHING...these all change during the first year of service. You realize your impact on the process of volunteering, and you realize the processes impact on you. Nate and I have loved this process. It changes daily. With daily struggles, there are daily successes. During this time in reflection, we are thankful for it all. Most important, we are thankful for what this beautiful and enriched culture is teaching us. We are thankful to really understand and witness the family systems of Belize. Belizeans take pride in their family (to help each other) and to always share what they have. Nate and I are still getting use to coming away from a family visit with a bag full of vegetables or meals that will last us a week. We hope to take with us these experiences and continue them in the states. I love walking throughout town and talking to almost everyone we see. Community. Its beautiful.

This leads us to the next topic. Family support. During the difficult time in the states, that is the one thing that stands out in our experience. Family love and support. During the passing of our grandpa, Nate and I got to experience love and support from both our families. I think it is how Grandpa and Grandma raised the family. To love each other and support each other. That too can be said about my family, but I will get to that later. It was great to spend time with Nate's family and we are thankful for Nate's mom and dad who supported us in that month.

I would like to share to the world....or whomever might read this how much our lives have changed from Grandpa Mike. He practically raised Nate. He raised his children. He was a wonderful husband, father, grandfather and friend. In fact, during this month, I got to meet his best friend (and practically brother) Charlie. I have never seen such a beautiful friendship than the one between them. I am honored to meet Charlie and his family, and hope to have that kind of friendship in my lifetime. 55 + years, wow! Grandpa was an amazing man. Genuine, self-actualized, a genius who was humble. He always had a smile on his face, a warm hug to give, and kind words for a stranger. He always told his family and friends how much he loved them, and fought until the very end with bravery. He was loved and respected. He was a mentor and a father figure. He taught Nate how to feel good about himself. He taught each of his children and family members how to feel good about themselves and have confidence in what they do. He would spend hours in his office in the barn reading books like physics and loved watching comical shows like Southpark. He taught his family to have morals and ethics. He will be missed more than I can express and lets face it, I am probably not even doing this unique and definitely a man in a million justice in describing him. This man was so much more.

And of course, Gracie Nicole. My beloved niece. You will not be forgotten. I pray you and grandpa are together. We were thankful to be home when this unexpected news happened. Just as in Nate's family, my family came together to support each other andmore importantly, my brother and sister-n-law. My parents and siblings talked often and supported each other even though we were all states away. We were able to come together for a brief time to share in each others company. I am thankful that my family was able to switch their plans to make sure they could meet us for a weekend. To show love and affection. I know when we have children, we will be able to give them the same love and support that our family has given to us. They will be blessed to be surrounded by love from both sides of the family.

Finally, to our dear friends, during this one year, we have learned the value of friendship. To not be able to talk to each frequently is hard. But to know that we can pick up right we left off and have love, support and your friendship is an amazing experience. Grandpa and Charlie had it right. 55+ years. That's how we feel about you all.

In reflection of this year, and in honor Grandpa, we are going to live life to the fullest. We are going to change some things here in Belize. Shake it up a bit!

In memory of Grandpa Mike and Gracie Nicole.

Love you all,
Michelle (and Nate)

Its that time again!

Hey family and friends!

I hope everyone had a great month of February! Nate and I have been incredibly busy. So first, let me share our experience with our home. We absolutely love it. If anyone doesn't remember, Nate and I live on the ocean. We are so happy about this. It has changed our lives so much. With the new house came new adventures! I think I have mentioned the cats, rats, bats...right? Well we also have possums, raccoons, and bugs. In the last month, we have had to deal with flying termites!!!!! I cannot express to you about what it is like to have those things coming at you. Luckily the swarm only at night time so we found out if you didn't turn on the lights, then you were fine. Imagine Nate and I not having any lights for two weeks because of them. It was funny. We ended up spraying and getting rid of them...for the time being. We also had a family of cats that decided to move in with us. Literally. They found a way to climb in our attic crawl space and every night we would hear the kitten running back in forth on our roof. Although it reminded us of Lilly, Nate and I made the decision to screen the space so that they wouldn't be able to squat at our house without paying rent! haha...jk. They now live in our yard and we are very happy about it.

We also have a very smart rat that lives at our house. Where....we do not know. But every night we hear it and we put foods up so that he wouldn't eat it. Its kind of funny except Nate spent all yesterday fixing holes in the screens throughout our house...to find that a rat ate through it last night. Poor guy. He decided he was going to triple the screens to prevent it from happening again. Besides the roaches and the increased mosquito's, we are set!


I hope you enjoyed our adventure (and for the most part it all happened in the month of Feb!)

Any who, our projects are going really well. It seems as though since our trip back from the states in December, Nate and I are on a ROLL! Nate is of course, amazing with helping out on the databases and other projects at TCGA. He is still the best PE teacher in PG. The kids love him and look forward to their weekly PE class with him. But, and this the most exciting thing ever, Nate has been working on and has finished, the first ever PC Belize website and forum for volunteers and staff. It is fabulous. I can't wait for it to become official so that everyone can see it. He has spent all of his free time working on for the last month and a half. He is meeting with the staff in the next few weeks to show them. We are all very proud and the staff can't wait for it to be up and running.

Besides Nate, I too have been incredibly busy with secondary projects. I am now helping out with Special Olympics. Its very different in Belize then the states. They boys are practicing soccer for the WORLD CUP in Greece. 8 of them get to go. Isn't that an amazing experience? I have been their support and fundraiser. Its awesome. Also, I am helping to start PC Belize first peer support group. I am incredibly excited to work along with the staff to get this implemented. We have our first meeting tomorrow!

Okay, well, I think that sums it up. Hope everyone is doing well and we miss and love you all. Don't forget to email us and keep in touch.

love,
Michelle (and Nate)

Bringing in the New Year

Howdy!

So to begin....Happy 2011. This year has started off special for Nate and I. We truly enjoyed going home for vacation. It was wonderful to see everyone. We really loved hanging out with our friends and family. Needless to say, it was difficult leaving everyone but we are definitely excited to be back.

We returned home right before New Years. We celebrated New Years with amazing friends. We ate, drank and were merry. We loved watching the fireworks from our house. It was literally 100 feet away. Amazing.

Nate has completely come back to Belize with a bang. He has basically networked all the computers to each other, as well as the printer. He has been busy doing all of these amazing things at his site. School started with a bang too. I love seeing all the kids and planning for this upcoming semester. It will be fun!

It has only been two weeks but the most fun that we experienced thus far was our New Years with our friends, having our house infested with critters, and enjoying this "cold front" that hit Belize. The weather right now is 74 degrees! YAY!

Miss you all so much,
Love,
Michelle (and Nate)