engineering.

Some rather boring, but necessary, notes on my work:

I'm working with an organization called a mancomunidad, which is responsible for providing basic services to people in several municipalities. Mancomunidades serve as a base for health care, basic technology and water systems to the many small communities which make up municipalities. In my case, there are four municipalities which are represented and around 80,000 people. Our office has 17 employees in Copan Ruinas and around 180 people working in the field. (This is a staggering number of tecnicos compared to the population and I hope is a strong indicator of the success of the mancomunidad.)

I am also working very closely with a local NGO which consists of one person based in Copan Ruinas. They have recently received equipment to start a water testing lab and I will be helping to identify the quality of water in the entire region. I imagine this work will be like other lab work, slow and repetitive, but I am very much looking forward to it.

During the next three months I will be continuing to get to know the community and local organizations. In about a month I will begin the training and construction of a project designed by the volunteer who I replaced. I will also begin some new designs of my own and will finally be practicing all the civil engineering I learned in school (none!)

Oh, and the other day it was raining and I had to put my umbrella up before I left the house because it was raining on the inside, too. But it was totally worth it when I had nutella and banana crepes for breakfast:  a case when the Bad and the Good average out to Who Cares? I Had Chocolate For Breakfast.