|
|
|
Jennifer Logan
Masters Student in Environmental Pollution Control
It is quite difficult for me to
briefly summarize what I’ve learned from my experience in Belize. In my
short stay in Punta Negra
I was exposed to different visions of life, ways of life, cultures, and
concerns, to name a few. At first I wanted to dig in the soil, sample
the water and collect the bugs to research an ecological assessment—I
wanted the earth to tell me. After discussing village
life/concerns/wants with a few fishermen and women in
PN,
my research goals slowly changed. I became more interested in how the
townspeople felt about the threat of development as well as how they
used their natural resources. How would development impact their
freshwater, fishing industry, wildlife? They welcome tourism, but refuse
big development that would destroy their resources. They rely heavily on
their natural resources and use them wisely—plant trees after Iris,
don’t over-fish, etc. The women want to get a group together and would
like to open a cabana and guide tourists in fishing and snorkeling. I
also found it interesting how the concerns and wants of the women and
men differed in both PN
and MR. Though never stating it I didn’t think there would be such a
divide between the men and the women in the village.
In my earlier thoughts on “visions of
MR”
I presumed there would be more familiarity between generations. I found
the PN
community to be the contrary. The women noted the laziness of the
children while the older men said the same of the younger fishermen. The
generations were still close (they lived together), but values and ideas
of old were scarce to stay with the new.
As for coming to better understand my team mates, I cannot say enough
how you can learn about and connect with other people during interesting
times.
I will end my reflective summary with an interesting insight from
Alicia:
“Sometimes you learn stuff that you don’t realize you learn.” |
|
