Bob's Adventures in Guyana

Well, these aren't really “adventures” but they will be about a series of unusual experiences for a Canadian prairie guy.

You’re probably wondering why I’m here? Well, it’s because I'm associated with an organization to which Valerie refers as “CUSO (or Peace Corps, if you’re American) for geysers”. CESO engages its volunteers “to work co-operatively with its partners and clients to create solutions that foster long-term economic growth and self-reliance.” So I’m doing development work and the client is the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) (just like the Canada Revenue Authority (the taxman)).

The GRA wanted someone to, as they put it, deliver “project management training” for the IT Dept. I think of it, however, as knowledge-transfer and this is why: The engagement is really inventive: they want me on-site for 4 weeks. When I suggested delivering a course followed by 1-1 or 1-many consulting they quickly accepted. When I arrived here, though, they had thought about this more and consulted with the Commissioner-General (C-G), (equivalent the Deputy Minister of Finance). The C-G had decided that it should be delivered to a group of business managers as well as the IT people.

In our initial discussion we decided I should deliver the material by “dribbling it out” over 4 weeks, each week concentrating on what needed to be done in one of the 4 standard phases of a project (Initiation, Planning, Execution, and Close-out). That suited me very well. It also gave me 3d to 4d each week to reinforce the lessons through consulting.

Well, that’s why I’m here and what I’m trying to do but you’re likely wondering more about what Guyana is like?

In one, simple word, Guyana is interesting. It’s not captivating, fabulous, thrilling, gorgeous nor as sophisticated as Cuba, for example. It’s merely and profoundly interesting. The people are assertive, particularly, the women.  Throughout this blog you'll likely think I'm overusing the word but, well, it’s really… interesting:

It’s the only English-speaking country in S. America. The border to Venezuela is closed because of a border dispute. The only land links to the rest of S. A. are a ferry-ride across a wide river to Suriname and the same to Brazil, in the south. But the road to Brazil is described as “dirt” and may take up to 18h to cross. (According to the CIA Factbook, there are only 760 km of paved highway in Guyana.)

Thus, the Guyanese (correctly) think of themselves as a Caribbean country, not so much a South American country: they are on the southern border of the Caribbean and the rest of S. America doesn't speak English. Still…well, you know where the future is.

So think of a country where every day it never gets hotter than 32C or cooler than 22C. A city with no buildings higher than 5 stories. (O.K., a taller one is under construction.)  A city with no tourists (and all the distortion they bring.)

Why no tourists? Well, when the Dutch arrived in the mid-1500’s they found a land with no well-defined coast. It was mangrove swamp at the end of 5 rivers that slowly slipped into the Atlantic. When they found a place to put ashore they did what the Dutch do: build a dike and drain the land. When the English took over (eventually, in the mid-1800’s) they solidified what the Dutch started and built a sea wall that runs pretty-well the whole Atlantic coast. And they further developed Georgetown, which today is 1m below sea level at high tide. The city is also chris-crossed with drainage canals terminated at the river by movable dams (gates, really) that can be lifted at low tide to let the water from the land to drain into the river. They are closed at high tide to prevent water coming back.

But I see I got distracted about why there are few tourists. The simple reason is that there aren’t any beaches. Recall the coast was mangrove swamp. Once the land was drained there wasn’t any sand on the coast. That’s not completely true: as I walked along the sea-wall on Sunday I saw some sand but really what I saw was a mud flat. In addition, the water was an ugly brown. It was the same colour as potter’s clay: grey-brown. Interestingly (that word again), that’s because of silt from the Demerara River but mostly from the Amazon River. The Amazon silt gets into the Atlantic current and its sent up North to Guyana.

More in the next posting.