A few photos from 2005

Improved bean trial, Tanzania

Farmer growing artemesia, an anti-malarial plant

EU headquarters, Brussels

Iguana, Dominican Republic

Fire fighting seminar, DR

Bio-intensive gardening

Ngorongoro Crater Nat'l Park, Tanzania

Elephant feeding damage

A Floresta Loan

Lions resting after lunch

v2#12

Dec, 2005

I have to say, as we come to the final issue of 'where is bob?' for this year, that it's been a real joy to share my journeys with you. I appreciate the interest and moral support many of you have expressed, and sometimes almost feel like we are making this journey together. In fact, as the world grows smaller and smaller in this 'global age', I sort of feel like this job I have is a metaphor for the increasing inter-connectedness (both positive and negative) that our species is experiencing.

In that same spirit, I'd like to encourage your feedback. What do you like/not like? What would you want to hear more about in the future? Or, if you want to stop getting this email altogether, please let me know that too. Conversely, if you know anyone who would like to be added to the mailing list, please put me in touch with them. Much to my surprise, the number of people receiving this update has actually grown over the past year. And of course, I'd always love to hear about where you are, and what you're doing.

To answer the question for the last time in 2005, I am in the Toronto area, and will be until early February. For those of you in the area, if I haven't seen you already, maybe our paths will cross in the next few weeks. For all of you I wish you a Merry Christmas, and look forward to starting Where is Bob volume 3!

Bob

Had trouble picking my favourite photo of the year, so I tried to pick one related to the topic instead. I took this photo in Honduras, but the far side of the bridge is in El Salvador. Every year hundreds cross this bridge on their way to the promised land (Los Estados Unidos). Some may have already travelled far by the time they get to this bridge, places as far away as Africa, and the Middle East, but for many, the journey begins right here.

Northern Thailand Oct.-Nov. 2005

Here's a few shots from my Oct-Nov 05 trip to N. Thailand. I spent the month setting up small experiments with some difficult to propagate tree species, as well as just learning about the area and people.

Zanthoxylum in N. Thailand

Looking for Zanthoxylum seed in Burma

Typical lowland rice paddies

Dispersed trees with annual crops

Non-timber forest products: bamboo mats and fan palm roofing

iced coffee

hot peppers in the Fang market

transport on the Mae Kohk river

tree believed to be inhabited by a spirit, marked and protected




Buddhist temple in Chiang Mai

v2#11

Sometimes you feel a little isolated up here in Northern Thailand, sitting in the jungle, staring across the Mae Kohk River at a Burmese army outpost perched on top of a distant hill. This feeling of isolation can become even stronger when your ice coffee runs out and you can't see the waiter anywhere. Not that I spend every day at nice resorts on the Burmese border, but that particular day I was acting as driver for one of the student interns who was giving a talk to some tourists on organic gardening. The organization we are collaborating with here (the Uplands Holistic Development Project or UHDP) promotes organic farming, agroforestry, and forest management all with the aim of helping hilltribes of northern Thailand make a living in ways that are good for them and good for the forest. The hilltribe people are in many cases refugees from Burma, escaping war and persecution, and find themselves in a new country, Thailand where things are better, but they are still given a hard time by local people and often are living without any legal status.

My role here for the past month (in addition to acting as temporary driver) has been to help find ways to propagate a couple of plant species used in agroforestry systems here that are difficult to grow. This has involved travelling around the area a bit, even one day into Burma to look for seed of one species, and also talking with several farmers who are knowledgable about propagation, as well as working in the UHDP's tree nursery. It's been a good month, made even better by iced coffee and copious bowls of Thai noodles.

Bob

looking across the Mae Kohk River into Burma

 

v2#10

Still in Canada. Leaving for Thailand this week. I've been home actually for almost two months, and I must admit it's been nice. Had some down time, had a chance to do some of the fun things I like to do here, and spent a lot of time reading. Reading mostly about plants of Northern Thailand as well as other work related topics. Don't get me wrong, I still get this adrenaline rush when those big turbine engines kick in and the plane lurches forward, pulling off what always seems impossible to me, which is launching that huge chunk of metal, and 300 people, and all their luggage (do you see what some of these people take?) into the air. I find my adrenaline levels tend to stay elevated for the duration of the trip--whether it's one week or one month, or longer, I find I'm constantly having to adapt and adjust and react to the unfamiliar or the surprising. You should see me when the plane touches down at Toronto airport (on this particular trip, late November). I'm always a basket case for at least a couple days.

Bob

Photo is shot from my balcony. Note the new condo construction now blocks view of CN tower.

v2#9

I suppose that maybe, it's sort of an interesting coincidence that Africa's tallest mountain, and Africa's biggest lake are so close together (note to hydrology geeks: they are not in the same watershed). If you could charter a plane from one to the other, you could probably make the entire trip in a couple of hours. There are however, significant contrasts between the two. For one, Kilimanjaro is tall and pointy, Lake Victoria is flat and not so pointy--except in the afternoons, when the wind tends to whip up the shallow waters. Both are under severe enviromental pressures, although not for the same reasons. There are so many tourist hiking up and down Kilimanjaro that the porters are now having to pack the poo off the mountain (that's right, you heard me!). Lake Victoria also suffers from an influx of various pollutants, but since there are no porters around, green algae is performing more or less the same function and the water is a cloudy pallid green for as far as the eye can see. Please don't get me wrong, in spite of man's worst efforts, both mountain and lake have somehow managed to hang on to their dignity. In fact both are stunningly beautiful.

Lake Victoria in the evening

A lesson in giving

People sometimes ask me about the challenges of travelling and working in developing countries. I would say that one of the most difficult things is dealing with poverty up close and personal. Everywhere you go, it's with you. Years ago, long before I joined Floresta, I learned a tough lesson about that.

I had lived in Jamaica for a year, doing similar work to what I am doing now, and my term there was almost up. It had been a frustrating year largely because of trying to cope with the poverty. Just days before I was to leave the country, I was walking out of the local grocery store, perhaps feeling that frustration in the back of my mind, when I saw one of the local street kids approaching. This was not a major town by any means, but still managed to have it share of street kids who, by whatever means possible, managed to eek out a living. This kid was a regular around the store, and would often try and beg a dollar or two from customers coming out of the store. I have always found those kinds of situations awkward, and in this case it was made even more awkward by the fact that I was carrying a grocery bag full of more stuff than this boy had probably seen in months. By now I knew the pattern, I knew he was about to ask me for money, so before he could get the words out, I somehow thought it would be clever to turn the tables, and I said,"I beg you one dollar!" This poor kid, without even the proverbial shirt on his back, maybe 7 or 8 years old, had a stunned, even bewildered look on his face. He looked down at his feet, somewhat painfully I thought, and then slowly reached into the pocket of his filthy shorts and pulled out this tattered bill and pushed it towards me.

Such a simple gesture, and yet nothing short of heroic in my eyes. My request for money, I'm sure, was unexpected to him, but his response was even more unexpected to me, perhaps to both of us. I doubt if that boy knows what a profound influence he has had on me.

Few, I think could match the generosity of that boy (see Mark 12:41-44). Yet those of you who support Floresta are, like him, having a profound influence on others. I am humbled when I think of all of those who are making this work possible. Thank you.