Honduras

The point is, I'm moving to Honduras, and I want to do some explaining about that. I also want to do some thinking about it, but I'm not sure if I'll have time.

Back in 2001, before the end of the end of history, I spent 6 months in Central America, 4 of which were volunteering in an orphanage in Guatemala. I kept a journal back then - a paper one, like - and I couldn't possibly describe all the things I thought about working in that orphanage in one blog post, when 6 months worth of scrupously hand-written entries didn't begin to cover it. So I'll do it no justice at all by saying that I loved it, but it wasn't development. And at some point in that 6 month trip, I must have decided I wanted to become a development worker.

I don't think I am one just yet. What I am, at present, is an intern in an international NGO. The NGO will remain nameless, because that's the convention, but I'm pleased to say it's one I respect most of the time, and to the best of my understanding, it's no more dysfunctional than any other organisation in this field. I've worked on the Southern Africa desk in that NGO for the last 12 months, and in October, I'll move to "the field", and work on the Central American programme.

I'm not a nurse or a nutritionist, and I'm not an engineer. I don't have the sorts of skills needed to build things or make things work better, more efficiently, or with bits of twig. In fact I think I'm probably just a technocrat. So my job is based on giving money to small local organisations ('grassrooted', we say), and trying to ensure that they spend it like they said they would and that in doing so the things that they said would happen as a result, happen.

I happen to believe that this is a wise way of working, though I admit that's not much of an explanation. The idea behind this very common sort of development work is that we Northerners have little to add to Southern societies (that they don't already have) other than solidarity. And money. There are enough Honduran people to run community projects in Honduras, enough Honduran nurses and engineers - if they don't all flee to the States because they can't make a living wage at home. We're trying to - what? - enable those individuals and groups to thrive.

The notion is known, in a warm and fuzzy way, as partnership. I hope that I'm suitably cynical about partnership and the overuse of the term (I am, after all, an Irish lefty with suspicions about that very notion here); but let it be said that I believe in its veracity too. And this year will give me a chance to test it enormously. My organisation is well-known in Teguc. It has influence over government, donors and civil society. Sitting here in Dublin 8, I believe I'm going out to work for the good guys and fight the good fight. At least I hope I am. I'll let you know.

Enough! I'll be living in Tegucigalpa, working in an office, visiting community groups and watching what the government is doing. I'll be researching and writing and thinking and meeting new people and having the craic. Not, I hope, catching Dengue fever as my predecessor did.
I left Casa Guatemala in 2001 determined to return to that context, but working for an organisation I could respect. I think this is my chance.