After the hunt comes the meal

From Len – November 10^th:  Yesterday we feasted on the armadillo that Rudy and I caught on Saturday.  I brought some spices, brown rice, frozen chicken, and the butchered half armadillo to Rudy’s sister, Charlotte, along with some huge cooking pots from the clinic.  She smoked the armadillo for a while before adding it to an East Indian curry stew.  She cooked over an open hearth while copying the armadillo recipe (though I doubt that she actually used a written recipe) for a chicken version of it. 

At around 5:30 the four students, and 10 Hillside staff and volunteers gathered.  Rudy and I regaled them with stories of bravery in the face of determined burrowing creatures.  I presented my fellow intrepid hunter with a framed picture of the two of us happily clutching our prey in the jungle.  And then we went into Abby’s House (the Hillside student dormitory) for our feast.



Armadillo stew downstage center.  Chicken stew upstage left



Betty, our senior volunteer nurse, offered a prayer that included thanks for “our mighty hunters”.  This mighty hunter cannot recall ever being so aptly described in the context of prayer.  And then we ate. And…. the armadillo stew tasted fabulous.  Really.  Honest.  It was great.  To be perfectly frank, I expected it to be not so good.  The most I was hoping for was edible, with an expectation of tough and tasteless (if I was lucky).  Though, if that was the case I was going to still act as if it was amazing.  But, and Sue and everyone there will attest to this, it was truly one of the most tasty meats we’ve ever eaten.  I’m not sure if it was Charlotte’s cooking, or its freshness, or the intrinsic taste of armadillo, but it was delicious.   Only two people at the meal had ever had armadillo before and all but the sole vegetarian were impressed.  Also notable was that based on the consumption I saw that a large armadillo could easily feed around 20 people one meal, or if you wanted to stretch it out by thinning the stew it could feed a family of four for well over a week.

For dessert, we had ice cream and fruit salad.  As you can see from the picture, the fruit salad was a form of armadillo that even our vegetarian was able to enjoy.  It was a wonderful day and it leads me to want to go back into the bush to bag myself another meal or several of my new favorite meat.



Two themes on "A Fruit Salad". Anyone want to guess who prepared these?



Len teaches inverse functions on a Friday and goes armadillo hunting on a Saturday

From Len - I apologize for not updating this blog in over a month.  It is not because nothing has been going on.  Rather it is because too much has been going on.  Sue and my lives are extremely full and very fulfilling.  Our lives are centered around Hillside- both the clinic and the institution.  I’ll leave details for another blog entry, but it is fair to say that together, Sue and I feel we are having impacts on many dimensions.  Part of the reason for my long absence of blogging is how engaged I’ve become around here (and also when I went back to the USA for 12 days).  So I thought I’d just restart by sharing some high lights of the last few days.

Friday, November 5^th:  I spent the morning and early afternoon at Hillside doing student scheduling work and then helping our network consultant (Chris Lopez – a great guy) connect an external hard drive and our copier to a printer/server that I smuggled back from the US (hidden inside a game box).  Then at 3:00 I rushed out of the clinic and drove to the local high school (TCC) where I have been volunteering.  Friday afternoons have become my favorite form of school-based volunteer work here in Belize.  One teacher has a homeroom of several fourth-formers (our 12^th graders) who are in danger of failing Maths (the British system puts an “s” on Math).  A few of her students had worked with me in an earlier volunteer extra-help setting and they asked the teacher to contact me.  As a result, I have started to come every Friday at 3:15 which is after school ends to teach a class to struggling seniors who have opted to stay after school and try to improve in Maths. 

I am amazed that these kids have been willing to do this, and they have been really great.  Yesterday was the second week that I have done this and it was the closest to a real classroom experience I’ve had here in Belize (the rest of the time has been tutoring one-on-one or in groups).  While I had no idea what I’d be doing until I got there, I found out what they are working on and dove right in.  They had just started a unit on functions and they wanted to learn about function format (i.e.  f(x) = 3x +3)  and about inverse functions.  It was a fabulous 60 minute class for the 11 students that were there.  We talked about radios, lights, and meat grinders as examples of real world functions with inputs, outputs, and instructions.  We then took the real world analogies and used them to bridge over to the abstract concept of mathematical functions.  We did problems together and then we did “sticky pad problems” whereby I handed out medium size PostIt notes for them to put their answers on and then they stuck them on the board and we saw how the class did as a whole (20 out of 22 the first time and then 22 out of 22 the second).  

In the beginning of the class I asked them to take out paper, because they’d only learn if they did the problems.  However most of them did not have paper.  Only one of them had the textbook.  At least they all had something to write with.  My guess is this is not just disorganization, but a real lack of either money or easy access to a store that will sell paper.  I just happened to have a set of 12 small composition books (featuring 12 different famous Belizeans on the covers– who knew there were so many?) and ended up giving out 11 of them. 

We even got as far as considering inverse functions.  In Wooster I would always use Dr. Suess’s story of the Sneetches to describe inverse functions (Sylvester McMonkey McBean’s Star-On and Star-Off machines are my all time favorite example of inverse functions) but I did not have my mural in my classroom to use.  Instead we used scissors and needle-and-thread as the Belizean example of inverse functions.  It went over extremely well and I’m sure the students really learned the concepts.  One unusual occurrence was when a large big-horned cow wandered past our classroom around 4:00.  It was one of the school’s cows used by the upper-classmen in the Agriculture major.  Of course we used the disruption to our advantage by quickly discussing the cow from a function perspective.

Saturday, November 6^th.  Today is my 49^th birthday.  Today I am a perfect square.  Sue and I are going out to one of the two vaguely upscale restaurants in the PG area to celebrate.  But I might have had my second-most memorable birthday ever already (my seventeenth birthday will always be in first place because that is when Sue and I had our first date).  Today I went armadillo hunting for the second time and it was the first time that we succeeded in our objective. 

I arrived at the home of my friend and co-worker, Rudy, at 7:00am. Rudy is Hillside’s head driver and community liaison.  He is an absolutely beloved member of the staff. He and his neighbor, Amir (who is in his early 20’s), and I set off with Rudy’s three hunting dogs – Bandit, Lucky, and Pinky.  The dogs are all terriers which makes them ideal armadillo hunters.  Bandit is the senior dog, though he is still not yet at the top of his game.   Bandit has been in on half a dozen or so kills, the other two had yet to be in on one.  Rudy is an extremely experienced armadillo (and gibnut and peccary and deer) hunter.  His father was a subsistence hunter and Rudy continues the tradition when he can find a free weekend.  In modern day Belize hunting is a form of recreation for men, but it is also a way to extend your budget.  Meat on the table from a hunt means more money for other items.  Amir is also an experienced hunter.  I was in the Lucky and Pinkie category.  The three of us were all in learning mode hoping to experience our first successful hunt. 

We walked for a distance through some farmland behind Rudy’s home and into the southern Belize forest.  Amir took the lead with Rudy following and me in the rear.  All three of us were using our machetes (yes, I own a machete!) to chop and widen an overgrown old path into the bush used by previous hunters.  Bandit would go far ahead of us and hunt in wider area, seeking the scent of armadillo.  The other dogs stuck close to us as we waited for Bandit to find an armadillo holed up in a burrow.  Rudy was optimistic as we kept seeing signs of recent armadillo activity.  Armadillos are nocturnal and they spend their days in burrows that they dug the night before.  The Belizean way of armadillo hunting is to find them while they sleep and then trap them at the end of their tunnel.  You then dig a hole and kill them by a machete to the head.  (I’ve since read that American armadillo hunting consists of hunting at night with flashlights and guns to kill them while they are out and about.  That’s how Brett Farve does it.) 

Sure enough, around two or so hours into the hunt, Bandit barked to alert us he had trapped an armadillo in its hole.  The saying around here is that “the jungle gives what you need”.  The three of us used our machetes to turn the trees and branches around us into plugs to keep the armadillo in its hole and into spades to help us dig to him from a different direction.  Rudy did most of the digging and was eventually able to reach into his new hole and feel the creature’s back and tail.  I reached in and could feel that he was balling up and wedging himself as deep into his hole as he could.  Amir was able to grab it by the tail, but when he tried to pull him out, the hole we had dug was too narrow.  I held on to his tail (thank goodness he was dry or he’d have slipped through my grasp easily) while the other two chopped through roots and widened the hole.  Finally Rudy and I both grabbed the tail and pulled really hard and got him out.  [Important note for those of you who might try this at home:  when pulling an armadillo out of a hole by the tail, always make sure his back is facing you.  You do not want to be greeted by his knifelike claws.]  Rudy hacked at his neck and head and sortof semi-killed him.  We then put him in a plastic bag that I threw in my backpack and we started on our way back.

Rudy, Pinky, me, and the misfortunate 12 pound armadillo

An average armadillo is 6 or 7 pounds.  Ours was a very big one (we’d later find out he was 12 lbs).  So there I was walking through the rain forest with my age-old deep purple backpack with yellow trim (the same one I’d worn around the Wooster campus for 9 years) carrying a semi-conscience armadillo.  My pack was pretty heavy because I also had 1.5 liters of water and there was the unusual sensation of hearing labored breathing from an armored yet dying woodland creature.  But I loved it.  It was just a great feeling and it was damn cool.  And I had not just been a bystander, I had hiked, chopped, pulled, and schlepped (the Belizean word for hauling) my way into being a true contributor.     

When we got back to Rudy’s home, I helped him butcher the animal.  (We both had to gave it a few more chops to the head before it transitioned to collection of meat).  Rudy took a quarter of the meat and the liver.  Amir got a quarter and the tail.  I got half of the meat, which is sitting in my freezer right now.  Sue was proud of her provider husband when I returned and even more pleased that I had not hurt myself or anyone else with my machete (except you-know-who).  The plan is for me to bring it with some colantro (like cilantro) and brown rice to Rudy’s sister, Charlotte, later this week when she’ll cook an armadillo stew dinner for everyone at Hillside.  I will also bring some chicken for her to cook as well.  Believe it or not, I’m told that not everyone wants to eat armadillo. 

Butchering the armadillo takes more skill than I realized.  There are 9 glands and 4 scent sacs to be found and removed

Post Hurricane Up-date

October 2, 2010

Hurricane up-date: Some of you may have seen that Hurricane Matthew was initially headed right for southern Belize. We spent most of Friday, 9/24, preparing the clinic and ourselves for a possible storm. Len and I went a little overboard, packing things up in the house and moving most of our possessions to the clinic which was built as a hurricane shelter. Luckily we do not have that much down here and the house is small. We told the students that they could not travel on the weekend due to concerns about the winds and flooding. Saturday morning dawned gray and very rainy. Saturday afternoon however was sunny and delightful, though soggy.  Len and I spent Saturday unpacking everything.  We did get 6 to 8 inches of rain Friday into Saturday and now we are very prepared in the event of another storm.

Hard to believe we have been here for 2 months already. We have seen 2 groups of students come and go. A third group arrives today and tomorrow.  We are settled in and feel like true members of Hillside, though I still find that I have not quite gotten my rhythm down in terms of teaching. Part of the reason for this is that schedules are constantly changing due to the realities of life in Belize. A bridge has flooded so we can’t get out to one of the villages for the mobile. The PG clinic calls and asks us to help out with health screenings, two days before the screenings are to be done. A holiday we thought was on a Tuesday is actually being celebrated on a Monday.  You need to be flexible down here.

The month of September has been interesting. It started with some serious tension in the town.  A brother and sister, ages 9 and 11 years, from one of the Maya villages, went missing at the beginning of the month. Here children go along the roads and villages on their own to sell food and crafts to help augment the family income.  These 2 children were selling vegetables and when they were reported missing a search was started.  Apparently, a “witch doctor” from the village told the parents that the children were being held on the property of a local crocodile rehabilitation and rehab facility. The facility is owned and run by an American couple who are research biologists. They rescue problem crocs from around Belize and keep them at their facility.  We had been to a fund raiser for their research and had run into the woman in town and had lunch with her a few days before all this. The villagers, upset about what they felt was inadequate police response to the search for the 2 children took matters into their own hands and one Sunday went to the crocodile research facility and burnt it to the ground. Luckily no one, except the crocs, was injured.  The expat community in PG was very upset and concerned.  We have since learned that this is how the Maya deal with people if they are angry with them. They will attack people or property and it is not unusual for them to burn down the houses of people they are unhappy with or jealous of.  The saddest part of the story is that the 2 children still have not been found and no one has any idea what happened to them.

We are both working hard. Len is busy as the information systems support person for the clinic as well as student scheduler and chief recruitment officer. Due to his hard work and excellent salesmanship as of now the student spots are 86% filled for 2011 (we have room for 10 students a month, all 12 months).  He has also been working at the high school doing math tutoring Wednesday afternoons. We have befriended a young woman, Kathleen, who is here for 2 years as a Jesuit volunteer, sort of a Catholic Peace Corps. She is Allie’s age, comes from the Washington DC area and is delightful. Kathleen’s job here is a teacher in the high school. She teaches 15 classes a week, each with 25 to 30 students, as well as acting as a school counselor. Needless to say she has been a little overwhelmed.  Len has been mentoring her and she stops by every so often to talk.

Len in his "office" at Hillside

Through Kathleen and Len’s work at the school we have started to have Hillside medical students go into the high school to do health education on topics such as alcohol and drug use and the mind-body connections.  There was an incident at the high school this year where a student had an “episode”, either a seizure or more likely an emotional reaction of some sort.  It was apparently very disturbing to staff and students. One of the explanations that is often given here for these types of episode is “demon possession.”  Apparently last year a student who had a similar episode was so shamed and ostracized by the event that the student committed suicide. Kathleen asked Hillside students to come into the school to talk about possible medical explanations for these types of events and to explain why such episodes might happen.  In addition, I was asked (actually I was volunteered by my husband) to give a brief, 5 to 10 minute talk in front of the whole school (800 -900 students and staff) on the same topic. It was the largest group I have ever spoken to and certainly the most unusual setting. The schools assemblies are held outside, the speakers stand on a wooden platform with a microphone and the students stand in a horseshoe around the court yard. It went fairly well, once my hands stopped shaking, and we hope that the students and staff now have at least an alternative explanation to demon possession for these types of episodes.

Assembly at Toledo Community College (TCC - actually the high school in PG)

The clinic has placed flyers in the villages and in PG advertising that there is a pediatrician at Hillside who is available to see children if parents wish. As a result I have started to see some children who are brought in by their parents because of medical and developmental concerns. Two days ago I had a mother bring in her 1 month old for a “check-up.” It was great to do a well baby exam on a healthy infant and to show the medical students a well newborn.  We also saw a 6 week old who was brought in for me to examine because of failure to thrive. This infant was well below their birth weight and I was unable to find an obvious cause. We sent the infant into the hospital for tube feedings and further evaluation and I found myself having to convince the doctor at the hospital that the infant needed admission. When he tried to tell me that it was normal for babies to lose weight before they started gaining I had to pull rank for the first time and explain that I had been doing this for 20 years and this was not normal and the infant was at risk of dying if they did not get fed soon.  The infant was admitted and then sent to Belize City for further evaluation.  

One success story involves a young boy who had a chronic infection of his bone, called osteomyelitis.  It started over a year ago as a wound that got infected and then was not treated fast enough or aggressively enough. When I saw him he had a draining wound in his leg coming from the bone. After several weeks of phone calls back and forth with the orthopedists at the hospital in Belize City and through the generosity of Dan, who drove the child and his mother up to Belize City, he finally had surgery and 10 days of IV antibiotics. We have seen him several times now at the clinic since he got back and so far it looks like he is healing well. We will keep our fingers crossed that he will heal completely.  Our next project is working with a group in the US to get a child with cerebral palsy and severe scoliosis up to the states for surgery. Len is working on the visa end and I am working on the medical end. We will see what happens. Not so easy is the 2 year old in one of the farthest villages who has leukemia which was diagnosed about 6 months ago. The family took the child to Mexico for one round of chemotherapy, there is no chemotherapy available in Belize, and he seemed to do better. However, his symptoms are back now and the family is unable to afford a trip back to Mexico. I am not sure there is anything we are going to be able to do for this child. Treatment in the US would take 2 or more years and cost thousands of dollars and it is unlikely we will be able to arrange for this type of care in time to help them.

We have also found time to rest and relax. The month of September has 2 holidays in it. One was a 3 day weekend so Len and I finally made it up to Placencia. We stayed at a lovely resort, the Inn at Roberts Grove, right on the beach.  Because it is the off season not much was open in Placencia, so we spent 2 days sitting on the beach, resting, reading, swimming, kayaking and eating. On the way back we stopped at the Jaguar preserve again for another hike, called the Ben’s Bluff trail, which was lovely but not as spectacular as the first one we had done there (sorry Ben).

Walking from the airport to our hotel in Placencia

Relaxing at the resort in Placencia

Hiking Ben's Bluff trail at Cockscomb Reserve

The second holiday was Belize’s Independence Day, which is celebrated with fireworks and parades. The fireworks went off at 12 midnight, way past our 8:30 bedtime these days.  I did wake up for them and was able to see a fair amount from our veranda, as they were set off on the pier about ½ miles from our house. Len slept through the whole thing. The parade the next day was great. Floats from local businesses and organizations, school marching bands, and dancing troupes. The whole town was decorated with Belizean flags, which we have been told is the only flag in the world with a human figure on it (it actually has 2 human figures on it). Next weekend Len is organizing a Hillside retreat for Dan and Maria and us to discuss goals and projects for Hillside in the coming year. We will be staying at a lovely resort about 30 minutes from the clinic so it will be a combination of work and relaxation.

Drummers from TCC at the Independence Day Parade

Dancers at the Independence Day Parade