Exotic Place or Exotic Guy?

        When thinking about exotic places I used to forget what makes the place exotic for me and how will the environment accept me. For 28^th September was planned visit of some projects around west and south Guadalcanal. We were supposed to go to the eastern part of the island passing Guadalcanal on western side to Veramogho, visiting various projects on our way back. As the infrastructure at Solomon Islands is very poor, there are no roads and ways how to get to the places by car when travelling on the islands, we had to take a boat. On Wednesday we all (myself, Unity – Planning Officer, Collin – Local Advisor and Ronald – International Advisor for Guadalcanal Province) arrived to the port. The boat was waiting for us, ready to be loaded. Our excitement got soon very cold shower as the engine didn’t start up. And so we returned to the beach/port waiting if some of the local guys will discover his technical skills. Ronald thought it must be the flooded spark plug and kept repeating it. Whatever it was it was already 10 am and so the sea would be too rough to go and we had to postpone the trip for the next day.

              On Thursday I woke up once again at 5 am in order to be ready to go. When we arrived to the port the boat wasn’t there yet. After the previous experience I justifiably felt slightly concerned. Unity explained me that she managed to get another engine and so everything should be fine. It was double surprising for me when I’ve noticed the boat is coming, but the guys are paddling instead of using some proper horse power. The engine didn’t work again. The déjà vu appeared to be true. After two hours of waiting it turned out the problem is in spark plug, as Ronald said the day before. The situation where driver and fisherman is at the same time mechanic who is supposed to fix engines simply doesn’t look like to bring any benefit to anybody and my trust in this engine decreased rapidly.




FINALLY ON OUR WAY 

We left Honiara around 8:30 am, heading to our first stop at Tangarare, where is located one of the PGSP projects; community high school. We arrived at lunch time. Many kids there are blond, even though they are all black, which looks pretty bizarre.  The school looked fine, dormitories for girls and boys from vicinity were in place. What caught my eye was local library. Or what was left of it. I couldn’t resist and I had to ask why it ”used to be” a library. It turned out that most of the books disappeared after the ethnic tensions and so the library is not in use anymore – obviously, without books it’s complicated to maintain a library.

WHO IS THE EXOTIC ONE HERE?

                 From Tangarare we continued on our way straight to Veramogho where we were supposed to spend our night. In my naive hope that we will enjoy our boat ride for maximum I asked our driver whether is the southern part of the island called Weather Coast because there is nice weather. They started to laugh and soon I understood why. On our way we met many people fishing on their traditional canoe and beautiful places we couldn’t really enjoy because of the rough sea. Until now I try to understand how they keep balance on that small wooden canoe. After several hours of jumping on the waves we finally arrived to Veramogho (around 6pm). Local community was waiting for us and as soon as our boat touched the ground they grabbed our staff and piece by piece was taken to the village.

 

Soon I realized who is the exotic one at this exotic place as all the kids were just staring at me or even crying when I got closer; they probably haven’t met many white people in their life before, if any. And as I felt their curious looks and I’ve heard somebody shouting “white man arrived”, I just followed our hosts to their village. Lovely huts and good atmosphere with friendly people made me feel very nice. I decided to go for a walk to the beach before it gets dark and so they told one guy from the village to make me a company. Soon we were not alone. Kids from the village were joining us one after the other, touching my skin, holding my hands, giggling and running around. At the end of our walk I had whole kindergarten of more than 10 kids with me. On our way back they started to laugh and so I asked my company guy why. “There were two kids who ran away after seeing you”, answered the guy with calm voice.

The next day we checked the project in Veramogho. Even though there wasn’t much to check as the community just didn’t do what was required from them. They were supposed to build staff house and to lower the expenses they were given necessary resources to cut timber trees and produce the wood locally instead of buying it from logging company and transporting it to the village. Idea it was nice, but the plan missed the lack of mobilizing capacity from within the community. Nothing was build, timber trees still standing, gas provided was partly utilized and cement was stored in a hut at the coast and will not be probably possible to use it anymore. Their main income is mostly based on copra (dried meat, or kernel, of the coconut) they sell to Honiara (boat comes every month to pick it up) from where is exported further, transformed into oil or used as feed for livestock.

Our stay was over and so we left Veramogho. On our way back to Honiara we were visiting different projects financed by PGSP and Guadalcanal Province. Closer we got to the northern side of the island the more advanced the facilities seemed to be. In one village they had very similar task as Veramogho: cut the timber trees locally. The only difference was they actually managed to do all the job and the school there was nearly build. The difference between those people was so obvious. Guys had haircuts, earrings, in front of the school very nice football pitch. The influence of civilized world was much more obvious. Nevertheless something was in my eyes missing. The friendly atmosphere was gone, people looked scary and obviously they know what and how to do in order to get more money from the budget.

Collin wanted to make it to Honiara by Friday because Saturday is Sabath for Seventh-day Adventists. Unfortunately for him we didn’t make it and had to spend the night in Tangarare. On our way we caught rainbow fish, so we had something to prepare for dinner (lunch). Half of it was boiled in coconut milk, second half prepared by Ronald in Philippino way as Sushimi (so we ate raw fish). At night Celestyn, our driver, decided to go to catch some more fish. It was beautiful sky full of stars and I wanted to see how does he wants to catch it so I decided to go with him.  Simple fishing line on hairspray (as a handle) with crab on it was supposed to do the trick – but definitely not in my hands as I realized soon.

The next day in the morning I could hear nervous Collin walking around as his Sabath has already started and so he wanted to be in church as soon as possible. When I left my room I could see him sitting infront of our hut, backpack on his back, ready to go. That was the signal to go back to our boat, back to Honiara. City which now seems to me like a very advanced place on earth in comparison with what I could see on the rest of the island.

Sweet and Bitter Cocoa Taste of Chocolate

  When reading about main exports of Solomon Islands I realized how much I need a vocabulary. Actually even vocabulary doesn’t help much if you come from Europe, or other country with different climate, as most of the exports here are either exotic crops or raw materials. Leaving aside raw materials from logging and mining activities, we can therefore find among main export commodities such items as copra (dried meat, or kernel, of the coconut; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copra), kava (The roots of the plant are used to produce a drink with sedative and anesthetic properties; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kava) and cocoa (kakao). About 85 percent of the population lives in rural areas and practices subsistence agriculture (Information taken from Guadalcanal official provincial development plan), whereas who would try to look for some decent manufacturing sector would probably have to accept the fact that in this sector are Solomon Islands very underdeveloped (Work force (202,500; 2009): Agriculture--75%. Industry and commerce--5%. Services--20%. – US Department of State webpage).

   This Tuesday was for Guadalcanal province very special day as the Executive Director of UNCDF David Morrison paid us a visit here. After short presentation there was planned a visit of New Tenabuti village, where we could witness official opening of newly build clinic. Local community prepared program, speech and lunch. Short, but very interesting visit of the inner land helped me to get to understand logistic problems the local government has to face to. Infrastructure in the area is very poor and without proper car (meaning land cruiser or something bigger) it’s not possible to get anywhere.

  It’s all what one would expect and absolutely normal in country like this so let’s just get back to the cocoa topic. Cocoa is one of the main export crops at Solomon Islands. The other part of the coin is that as they export cocoa, the import of products made from cocoa, such as chocolate, are so expensive that local people can’t afford it.  When I asked my colleague Ronald about chocolate his answer was more than clear: “I’ve never bought it here. It’s kind of scarce resource and it’s so expensive so only expats can afford it. I’ve seen they sell chocolate here in Plaza, but I don’t remember what the price was”. So it looks like there is no chocolate till December for me. I think it’s another model example how it looks like when a country export is based on corps, maybe raw materials (under control of foreign companies) and economy is based on diminishing return activities (where SI obviously have comparative advantage, which so far doesn’t help islanders to enjoy chocolate bar).

   
   On our way from the clinic to the village was Mr. Morrison and the others advised to go there by car. As I was told it was only 200 meters away so I decided to walk there together with some locals. On our way I noticed this weird looking trees and it’s fruit I’ve never seen before. What a surprise when I realized it’s actually cocoa, one of the main export crops of Solomon Islands. When my friends from the village noticed my increased interest in this fruit they decided to show me one ripened, yellow cocoa. Under the shell there are seeds covered with white plaque. With the words “It’s like a lolly”, I was encouraged to put one of those to my mouth. My surprise was even bigger in that moment as I could taste very sweet/sour taste I would never expect from cocoa. Maybe it’s just my limited imagination, but I always imagined cocoa as coffee and now I could see it’s totally different.


  While enjoying my new candy we finally arrived to the village, at the same time as the rest of the delegation with cars. At the lunch we could drink coconut milk. I noticed one of the guys is eating the coconut meat. It was young coconut with thin coconut shell, so it was possible to break it without problems in hands. I expected coconut meat with coconut taste I’m used to from European shops, but surprisingly this taste was quite different. When you expect to eat something, but at the end it tastes differently, it’s always quiet surprising. One day I thought I have some kind of dry pineapple, but no, it was casava and it had taste very close to potatoes. Similar it was in this coconut case; very soft meat with taste sweater and fresher than what anybody would expect, just not like coconut.

   My European way of thinking and imagining products and situations I know, are here quiet different and many times even when I think I know what I will experience the outcome is quite different. The parallel line can be drawn when thinking about local Economy, administration and attitude of people.

Fingers Crossed "Bonitos"

   One week at MPGIS went very fast and I could finally visit the building of Guadalcanal provincial government, where I will spend most of my time here. My colleagues from PGSP are Collin Bentley (Local) and Ronald Amigo (Philippines). Step by step I get to know everybody from the provincial ministry and try to absorb as much information as possible, as fast as possible by reading some materials about Guadalcanal and it's economy, policies and resources. Aspect of Island developing country can be seen at every corner, but to get to know the real mentality of the people it's good to get to the work environment. In the office, I share with my colleagues, is very small window which is not possible to open. Air condition stopped to work on Monday morning. It started to run again on Thursday afternoon, when somebody managed to pay the gas so we got the power back. At the moment I can enjoy the luxury of cool air again, but for how long? 

                                     Photo: Waiting for Executive Director of UNCDF with prime minister of Guadalcanal Province and other provincial ministers.

   On Monday I could see an other aspect concerning electricity which seems to be absolutely normal here; whole city of Honiara (and probably entire Island) was out of power for most of the day. My surprised questions met with careless answers from local people who are, obviously, already used to it. At that point I realized what kind of adventure I was experiencing, without knowing it,every day at the MPGIS Anthony Saru building when I took the elevator instead of walking up the stairs. In case that such a situation would appear while you are in there, it might be long hours of darkness in small closed space.

   I think I got used to the local people and their look. In fact they are very friendly and easy going. This feeling is even enhanced by the reggae music coming from everywhere. Positive vibe makes every way on the minibus much more enjoyable and makes me smile. It looks like I don't need much; sun, island weather, sea, interesting tasks to do and reggae music, what else would one need to smile when walking on the street? Let's just hope I will not make the impression of this crazy smiling foreigner running around.

   At the moment everybody lives by the atmosphere of Pacific Games, where Solomon Islands football team got to the final. The final game is today, so fingers crossed for "Bonitos". Looking at the Guadalcanal provincial budget I start to understand why they are such a successful sportsman: from total budget of 9,021,291.00 SID, was 823,044 spent on Sports leaving behind budgets for other activities, among others as well budget for Development Planning (116,684 = almost 8 times less), Commerce & Investment (27,000) or Agriculture & Livestock (130,000). The priorities at the Guadalcanal provincial level seem to be clear to me.Olympic games are the way how to get closer to Europe as next year is London the hosting place; "Go Bonitos, go!"

First Week in Melanesia

After one week at Solomon Islands I decided to make this blog, so all the staff I consider as interesting will be written down here. I guess it is better than just screaming into facebook darkness my wild status updates. As I have a lot of friends who are not Czech and my Czech friends are mostly well educated students, I think it's only fair to make everybody happy and write in English [if somebody has some problem with this, I will be very happy to give you translation of my words here in Czech, or my long time not used Italian via email].

Now let's get back to the point.

I left Prague 23rd of August 2011 and with one day stop in Brisbane I finally managed to arrive to Honiara on August 25. Next day I was supposed to come to the Ministry of Provincial Governments and Institutional Strengthening (MPGIS) and Provincial Governance Strengthening Programme (PGSP). The fact that they were supposed to have workshop on capacity development turned out to be very useful for me as well as this way I could participate and so get to know most of the people I will be dealing with in upcoming months. What more, the workshop was concluded with the official dinner where I could shake my hand with minister of MPGIS. Who would imagine better start of my internship - I'm talking about the free food of course?

First weekend in Melanesian style I spent with Doubravka (my sister), Lada (her husband) and little Jonas (their hypercute son). This way I could experience the beauty of local beach on Saturday and wild nature of rain forest on Sunday. There I could as well see the direct impact of logging activities on the island, rich on natural resources.This week I spent at the MPGIS, where I was supposed to get to know how does the ministry functions, before I start with my duties at the Guadalcanal provincial government. So far I could see a lot of incredible facts, which pull this country behind. With it's natural resources those 500 000 people living here were supposed to be rich, enjoying the sun and money. Instead of that the reality is a lot different. Especially the story about one of the Islands [Rennel and Bellona - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rennell_and_Bellona], where because of foreign aid people forgot how to catch the fish, or make the oil from coconuts and so they wait for the plain to arrive with those commodities they need instead of doing anything. Full dependency on external factors and giving up all the agricultural, not mentioning industrial activities. One week and I've heard enough to have some broader idea about how should I address the problems and questions in my master thesis.

After one week I even got used to the fact that everybody around is black. Very weird feeling to be only white person walking on the street, or sitting in the bus. We live on the hill and so I have to go every day down to the sea side, where I take my minibus. On my way down every second person says hello, good morning, or good afternoon when I go back home later. I don't know to what extent are people here so polite and to what extent it's just the fact that I'm white and that means exotic to them. In the bus you need to do weird sound with you mouth if you want to stop which I will probably never really learn and so I just passed the stop where I wanted to leave my bus first couple of times. Now I somehow whistle, or do whatever makes them to realize that this guy maybe wants to get out. And it works...

On the street most of the people walk barefoot. Very popular here is local drug betel nut [http://www.wikihow.com/Chew-Betel-Nut-in-Papua-New-Guinea], which leaves teeth of it's users nicely brownish. Chewers of betel spit everywhere around red liquid, which looks like blood on the ground. But what I find extremely interesting was the black albino lady I met today on the street, which looks pretty awesome.

I hope somebody got to the point to actually read it till the end. For those who did congratulations, I'm proud of you. For those who didn't there wasn't probably enough pictures, so you just got back to facebook - but don't worry, I will try to do something with it and I will add some picture in the near future.