Baseball in the Dominican Republic. Tigres de Licey vs Estrellas for those who might know. For those who don't, baseball is huge in the DR and this league is just starting now. Soon--and even in this game--players from the Major Leagues are slowly migrating back to play and the quality of ball steadily increases from now till the end of November. While this game was well attended, by the end of the month it will be packed. And not only Dominicans play in this league, I noticed that several of the pitchers were Americans.It also had most of the trappings of an MLB game, pizza and beer vendors, a mascot in a large furry costume, cheerleaders gyrating to regeton--OK, that last part seemed like a distinctly local flourish.

When I said I was going somewhere warmer, I definitely did not mean the commuter flight I was just on where it was like sitting in a meat locker for an hour and a half. Somehow temperature control in airplane cabins seems to be kind of a thing. Makes sense I guess; a thin metal shell thousands of metres up in the atmosphere. But now, really I am going somewhere warm. Leaving New York and heading for the Caribbean. 

Worst check in time ever: 37 minutes 24 seconds.  This due to some parts and tools I am carrying which made for an extra careful security check, plus my gate number was incorrect which resulted in some wandering and staring at flight info screens. I am headed somewhere warm though so no complaints.

Made it. 23 hours 42 minutes. This is from door to door so includes a few hours travel time to and from airports. So actual time on planes was much less. Overall a fairly painless journey. On arrival, the kid sitting beside me maybe 11 or 12, was so fast asleep that even when his younger sister was pushing on his nose he still didn't wake up. Oh that we could all sleep so soundly on the plane.

This is classic Chagga agroforestry, otherwise known as the homegarden. I've probably talked about this before. The grass in the foreground is cut for feed for goats and cows. You can also see yet another one of those planted trees popping up in the open gap in the grass. There are other small seedlings just like this to the left and right of photo and all along this hedge. In the background you can clearly see the multi-level nature of the garden, some very tall trees, and a middle layer of smaller trees, a lower layer of shrub like trees (coffee in this case), and then some smaller plants at ground level. The idea is that everything is working together, making the best use of light and space at all levels. Underground as well, the picture would be similar if we could see the rooting zones of the various plants. They would also be making good use of the moisture and nutrients available by drawing from different depths in the soil. This system in a sense is trying to mimic nature. Not a perfect mimicry though, since many of the species you see are actually not native. The top level, the acacias and other large trees are most likely native. And the grass is native. However, a lot of the other species have been introduced at some point. Coffee came from Ethiopia hundreds of years ago. Avocado as well, and the wild cassava trees you see in the middle were also probably introduced by Portuguese traders 500 or more years ago. Banana is also not native, although apparently archaeological evidence indicates that it may have been here for 1000's of years. I would say that probably about one third of the species  you  see in this photo are native,  and the remaining 2/3's while mostly naturalized and viewed by many as local plants, are strictly speaking from far-flung foreign lands.

Finally photos as promised. Only 3 days late. This first shot shows several lines of trees planted on a hillside. The slightly older (maybe 4-8 years old) trees in the foreground are obvious, but if you look about 3-4 metres down the slope you will see another line of smaller trees that are maybe 2-3 years old. And you'll have to take my word for it, or try to zoom in really close, but there is another line of new seedlings another 3-4 metres down the slope that appear to have been planted this year. Like I said in my post earlier this week, these are discoveries I made just walking around on my own. I don't know for certain who planted them or why, but I found examples like this pretty much everywhere I went. So whether we, as an organiztion, get credit or not is not really the point. Either way lots of trees are getting planted.

This is Calliandra. In this case the family has planted it along the edge of their property, and are chopping it regularly at ground level so it is growing like a hedge. This is serving (probably) at least 4 functions, which include marking the edge of the property, creating a barrier against soil erosion, providing fodder for livestock (calliandra is high in protein), and providing firewood for the family (ideal for cooking). Some people would say, "well calliandra is not native to east Africa so it is threatening the ecosystem". I would say it may be doing the opposite. By allowing families to collect firewood from their own backyard, it reduces the need to send wives or children far into the forest, where they will be most likely cutting down native species.

OK. I didn't get a chance to upload photos. Sorry, long day. And, well, they're not all that exciting anyway. But I promise to do them tomorrow. 

I went out with the evaluation surveyors today and had a chance to walk around a bit while interviews were going on. I noticed a house where someone was using the double dug technique to produce vegetables although this person is not actively participating in the program. I also noticed that there are small trees everywhere at least in this particular community. You have to understand that this was me just wandering around on my own. No one was showing me their special project. But on my own I could find planted trees everywhere. Now, because I was on my own I couldn't confirm whether any particular tree had anything to do with our program or not but I don't think that really matters much to me. Tonnes of trees are getting planted either way. Tomorrow I'll try to upload some pictures if I can.

Which by the way, I realized tonight that I have had internet and a hot shower every single day of this trip so far. It almost doesn't seem right. I think I'm actually nostalgic for the days when travel to the developing world meant sharpening your survival skills and being resourceful about basic necessities.  I know there are still lots of places like that but I think you have to go further and further afield to find them.

Now we start the process all over again this time in Tanzania. This will be the 5th time in 2 months I've explained how the specific definition of household works for this particular survey and how surveyors need to double check that they've asked people about all 6 food categories (in spite of repeated reminders inevitably someone forgets to fill in one of the food categories).  If I sound like I'm getting a bit tired of evaluation,  yeah maybe. I'll try my best to stay positive I guess.

Actually I'm expecting things to go pretty well here. This is based on the fact that it went well here last time (2011) and the communication I've had with staff here prior to my arrival have had all the signs of good preparation.  Things can always not go as planned of course but I'm actually pretty relaxed going into this week.  I realized that on the drive from the airport tonight when I was mostly just sitting back and enjoying the music that the driver was playing (a local style called Bongo Flava) and not really thinking much at all about work. A local Kenyan song by the way says "big up Obama". Not that that has anything to do with anything but I just found it amusing. 

My last day in Burundi. We managed to get 200 of 320 surveys done and entered in the database which is pretty good.  The rest will be finished in the next few days. At the beginning of the week I really thought we would do much less. And data quality appears pretty good so far. Won't really know til we start analysis.

By the way,  for those who have been following news, just want to let you know that my chances of getting Ebola are almost exactly zero. That is happening way on the other side of the continent. Do you know how big Africa is? Admittedly the medical community doesn't really know much about the disease, but chances are low.

So now we're doing evaluation in Burundi. Based on the data I've entered so far (about 20 percent of surveys), my impression is that the sample of people we are interviewing is going to be the youngest of all the places we are surveying. Which makes sense when you go to a village and see tonnes of kids running around and lots of young adults. I suppose I could look up and see what the stats are on average lifespan etc, or you could, but either way I know it's overall a young country, demographic wise.

Final tally on trip duration was 29 hours 28 minutes. This is from arrival at first airport to arrival at destination hotel early Monday morning. Sorry for not updating sooner, but it's been kind of busy with prepping for the evaluation here. Not getting enough sleep caught up to me today though and I fell asleep in the truck in a village while surveyors were out collecting data. One can only go so long on determination alone.

I'm now at 22  hours 46 minutes and counting. Fortunately I nap on the plane so there is some relief in little spontaneous bits. Still one more flight to go. I think I'll stop the clock when I arrive at hotel

The guy at security check told me I was the second person today with a "very, very, long day". Which I found amusing and strangely encouraging somehow.  So  I've decided to set my stopwatch and see exactly how long. Hopefully on the other end I remember to hit stop. So far the day has been 28 minutes and 43 seconds.

And it's done. Here's all the surveys for the DR completed and recorded. Now the analysis begins. And we only have to repeat this same process 5 more times in 5 more countries. Beginning next week in Haiti.

On the hill in the background you can see some bare fields and a small forest in the middle. That small forest is a shade-grown coffee farm. It is far less vulnerable to erosion than the field on the left which is showing bare rocks. The trees help produce better quality coffee, protect the soil and also add nutrients which actually improve the soil.  From a distance you can see that it looks like a natural forest. The local organization here, Floresta, is helping farmers  to improve  these coffee plantings by  providing them with better quality coffee  seedlings which can  produce more  and are resistant to disease.

This is what Canadian companies do. The first photo shows a mining operation in the DR. If you look closely at the mountain tops especially on the right you can see the removal operation. For comparison I've added a shot of mountains in a national park

Here's what we were doing today:

That is discussing with farmers the biggest changes in their communities over the past few years. The top one is that people are being more conscientious about saving money. This is having a lot of positive effects as listed in the photo. The table you see in the photo is the input provided by the focus group consisting of farmers and community leaders. Well, the majority present were mostly farmers who also happened to be community leaders. Or maybe leaders who also happened to be farmers.

This afternoon we had some very animated conversations about this graph. Which was very exciting for me. Normally I expect people to be at the very most underwhelmed by charts and graphs. But this information really meant something to everyone around the table today and it was fun to be a part. Without explanation I'm not sure if you can get much out of this, but maybe take a shot at your own interpretation. Maybe in another post I can explain.

This afternoon we had some very animated conversations about this graph. Which was very exciting for me. Normally I expect people to be at the very most underwhelmed by charts and graphs. But this information really meant something to everyone around the table today and it was fun to be a part. Without explanation I'm not sure if you can get much out of this, but maybe take a shot at your own interpretation. Maybe in another post I can explain.

This afternoon we had some very animated conversations about this graph. Which was very exciting for me. Normally I expect people to be at the very most underwhelmed by charts and graphs. But this information really meant something to everyone around the table today and it was fun to be a part. Without explanation I'm not sure if you can get much out of this, but maybe take a shot at your own interpretation. Maybe in another post I can explain.