Halfway Home
Well, it’s March 12th. Exactly 405 days into my 810 day service. Yes, I’ve reached the halfway point. It’s amazing how fast we adapt to new surroundings, because there is really nothing foreign about Honduras for me anymore, it feels like I’ve been here a lot more than just 405 days. That being said, I’m amazed at how fast it’s all going. To think, after replicating this half, I’ll be unemployed and on my 30 days of medical coverage until I’m expected to rejoin society!
I was meaning to prepare a more in depth blog report because of the significance of the day, but like every day between blog entries, I just haven’t found the time. So, since I’m keeping it short, I’ll give you a few updates/highlights:
Work: Busy. For the last three weeks I’ve been working a lot with the women’s cooperative, trying to get them to organize their production for this year. You see, the way it has been working is that members show up when they please, work for as long as they please, then disappear again. This doesn’t work. It’s impossible to plan or set goals this way. So we’ve sat down twice now (another meeting this week), and discussed how to change this. First, we outlined some goals for the year in terms of production, saying how much and when we will produce what products. Next, we are going to assign crew chiefs to head up each product (we focus on six major products). Each crew chief will be responsible for getting her work force organized, getting the raw materials, and meeting the production goal. I’m proposing bonuses and incentives to help reach those goals.
With the production squared away, I hope to work more with them on sales and marketing. Right now, they sell to their local market her in San Marcos and reach an extended market (nearby cities, San Pedro, Tegucigalpa) through distributors who come to San Marcos, pay the box price for the product (smaller profit for CICAL) and then sell it in the larger cities. First of all, we plan to set up our own little stand in the market here in San Marcos with the idea to increase our visibility. You see, San Marcos is small, but there are thousands of even smaller towns around us. On Saturday and Sunday these people come here to the “big city” to buy their goods. What I want is for them to recognize our brand and for the people who own the pulperias (neighborhood grocery stores) to buy in bulk from us. As for reaching markets farther away, this is difficult without transportation (they have no car or driver). However, we are 1 hour from the border with El Salvador and there are a lot of people in that little country that love bottled baby corn… Thoughts and suggestions appreciated.
Other projects: I finished the HDH website http://www.hermandaddehonduras.org
It now has english and an updated menu. Let me know about errors you find.
I’m also working with a lady who wants to start an inventory in her business and expand to a new location. She’s very anti-planning, but we’re working on that.
A lot of my time is spent playing with Access and Excel, trying to design better ways to collect and sort data that small businesses can use.
Personal: I’ve started a garden! I bought a shovel, borrowed a pick axe and tore up the rock hard earth that is in my front patio. I’ve started burying compost from my kitchen in the ground and my girlfriend’s dad gave me a bunch of tomato seeds and a little Styrofoam container to start the seedlings. I want to plant tomato, spinach, onion, and maybe some green peppers. Gardening advice appreciated.
Yesterday on Sunday Neidy and I went for a bike ride to La Labor, a neighboring town. It’s about 15 kilometers away and just gorgeous. It was a beautiful day: sunny cloud spotted skies, 80 degrees, birds, insects, etc. That good smell of clean, dry, fragrant air was all encompassing and very pleasant. We had a traditional Sunday soup there with a co worker and came back pretty tired. I finished plowing my garden and went to bed.
Friday my Dad is coming with my Uncle and my Cousin! I’m very excited. You too can visit this beautiful land that is Honduras.
Well, that’s it for now. Hasta la proxima.
