Setting the Scene.......

My placement is in a small town called Sayula, In Mexico. I had this idea that it was going to be a very rural town and quite frankly was expecting the worst:no running water and no electricity. To my surprise it is not that rural at all, yes its small but you can still find all your basic amnetities and more (I was even surprised to find a sushi restaurant). It´s one of those towns where everyone knows eachother by their name and knows eachother´s life stories. In my view it can be both a good thing and a bad one. I guess I have internalized the ´culture´of a big city like Toronto where I can walk down the street and enjoy the feeling of anominity- i mean really lets face it...sometimes we just have those days when we want to be an anonymous number in the crowd....well I do anyways.

Besides that Sayula is a bit of a paradox- it contains some elements of a growing progressive ´pueblo´ while at the same time still stuck in some of the older conservative values of the past.
Elections were held yesterday here in Mexico, and so the whole month of June I got to see the political life of Sayula come into action, and to my surprise got to see one of the only female ever candidates of the town rise up to gain much support.... so much for machismo right? So here is a town that was on the verge of having a woman govern yet things like homosexualtiy is still a very big no no. A few of the friends i´ve made here are gay and its very odd to see that they continually have to hide being gay or that they are a couple because of it being a taboo. However, i did get to spend a week in the bigger city of Guadalajara and it was refreshing to see gays and lesbians holding hands in public and kissing, and reading in the newspaper about the Gay pride parade the weekend earlier. It just shows you to the extent that whithin the same country how the ´culture´and attitudes of certain things change and differ because of it being a big city or a ´smaller´town. Oh and about that anominity feeling I was talking about earlier... it was great to feel that in Guadalajara as well!

Now, on where I am staying..... hmmmmm let me just put it this way: the family is super nice and welcoming and have been nothing but a great host family...BUT.... it has been hard to adjust to a more conservative lifestyle and having host parents that are way toooo overprotective. Here´s the skinny: I have been on my own since i was 18 so I am very accustomed to pretty much being able to do whatever I want or go wherever I please. Besides the fact of living on my own, my family ´culture´has always been one that is very liberal and open. So needless to say that when I arrived here to this home and had to accept their very early curfews, the fact that I wasn´t allowed to walk the streets on my own or take a bus to a neighbouring city, or could not openly say I wanted to go out for a few drinks with some pals definitely had me fustrated. It was a world I never had to expereince in my life and one that I thought I wouldn´t have to at the age of 24. Now don´t worry Larissa or Natasha, I am not turning into a rebellious teenager and not adhereing to my hosts , HOWEVER, I am also not one to be quiet or not attempt to alter a few things. After talking to many people of the town I realized that crime is not a big thing and for the most part safety levels in the street (especially in the daytime) are pretty safe. I think in fact that even though its Mexico and their is such a stigma associated with the country because of the crime and dangers seen in the news, there is more of a chance of something happeneing to me in Toronto than Here in Sayula. So i had a talk with my host mother, and using my very diplomatic skills was able to get them to agree on me letting me walk the streets on my own. I cannot tell you how good it felt that day when I went out on my own to explore the town. I felt like I had regianed a little bit of my independence! Little by little I am finding ways to accept the rules of the house, yet bend them just a little to make sure that I get to experience everything that Sayula and mexico has to offer...

The Organization that I am doing my placement at is called ´amigos de la naturaleza en el mundo´ and their aim is to instill an environmental culture throughout the town in where the citizens are conscious and aware of all the environmental problems and of what they can do to better the situation. Besides Amigos de la Naturaleza, there are two other organizations that are also working to do the same, and theses three Orgs. regularly meet to work collectively on the environmental issues. Right now their main project they have been working on for a while now has been to establish a Garbage and Recycling Collection system for the households of Sayula. Its been quite interesting to see this unfold....their pilot plan of this recollection has started in one neighbourhood so far, however it has not been as successful as they hoped. Although the three organizations have gone to inform and teach each and every household of how to properly separate their recycles apart from their garbage, their still exists a problem of many people not separating their garbage and at the same time of the garbage collectors not collecting the garbage. At the same time we are still waiting on the municipality to give the green light for the recycling center so that their is an actual space for the recycling material that could be collected. Its madness I tell you. I had never stopped to realize how efficient our garbage collection program is in Toronto...almost everyone knows to put their garbage out the night before and poof like magic you wake up the next morning to see it gone and just your empty bin lying on the ground. However, i just learned of the strike going on in Toronto by the workers...so much for the efficient system I guess.

Amigos de la Naturaleza is a more grass roots organization. There is no office, no website, or no specific time structured for work (I do not have to be ´INto´ work at ´9 am´ or anything like that. Our meetings are very sporadic and our members all have day jobs they have to work at during the day before they can concentrate on the work for Amigos. Because of this my own work is not fully outlined and I do not have set tasks to carry out- this is something I am not accustomed to as I have always worked at offices where I knew exactly what had to be done. It has also been a bit fustrating in terms of not feeling like I have contributed or have really made an impact with the Org. I have openly expressed these feelings to my boss- the president of the organization and to my co-worker, and they have helped me tremendously in terms of adjusting and making me realize things work a little differently down here.

My Second day here my boss asked me what I would like to have accomplished while being in Sayula this summer, I responded by saying that I wanted to make a difference in the way people thought and acted towards the environment in Sayula and would hope to see some results by the time I left in August. I was surprised when he flat out said: don´t get your hopes up as the results may not be visible by the time you leave. And I wondered then, how could i not see results if i try to work as hard as i could this summer?
I am coming to slowly realize he is right. I know the attidudes and actions of the citizens cannot be changed overnight, in a month nor in three. This is a slow and very ongoing process that will take years for the effects to be seen; its literally changing the environmental culture of a town.
Its been quite the roller coaster ride for sure, nevertheless I am trying to learn and enjoy from every minute of this experience.