getting trashed

It's been relatively busy the last several days... all-day tour of Kingston, Easter, football (soccer) games, etc.

Here's a few pictures that summarize some of the happenings of the last 5 days:


On a completely different note, we'll be leaving Hellshire, and thus our current host family, this coming Wednesday. Matt and I will be placed with a new host family in Stony Hill to begin our Hub-Based Training. This training will consist of more in-depth work in our specific jobs, such as job-shadowing, and site identification.

This morning us fellow PCTs got together to clean up some of the trash that is strewn all over, on the beaches, alongside the roads, on sidewalks, and so on. We wanted to do it as somewhat of a thank you to the community that we have been staying in. Granted our time this morning was much like rearranging chairs on the Titanic, as we all know that the trash we picked up today will be replaced by new trash soon enough. Nonetheless, we felt the gesture of gratitude to the Hellshire community was most important. In about 1 1/2 hours we covered about 1/2 mile, filling 40 large garbage bags.

After only being in country for 2 1/2 weeks, we could not say why trash is thrown about. Although it wouls be easy to blame the Jamaicans for such a poor habit, I am sure that much of this has to do with lack of infrastructure (i.e. trash removal services) as much as anything else. If you couldn't count on someone to come and pick up your trash on a regular basis, than what would you do with it?

To make things even more interesting, throughout the 90 minutes we were picking up the garbage, the shopkeeper was just opening her shop. She spent the entire time sweeping the sidewalk, dirt, gutters, and even the lawn while we were out there. Don't be fooled, she was not trying to outdo us. I'm sure that this is a part of her regular routine. Which makes me believe that the trash issue has nothing to do with cleanliness, self-discipline, or lack of detail in the Jamaican culture. Ohhh contraire. I recently heard a Jamaican PCV describe Jamaicans as the cleanliest, best-dressed poor people in the world. He's right. Our mom scrubs the floors daily. She cleans clothes until they sparkle and bathes twice a day. We've already told you about the pressing. And today, she informed us that we need to wash our shoes (she was referring to Matt's tennis shoes). In many ways it seems the trash issue would be an easy transition if the right means were in place...but who are we to say? We've only been here 2 1/2 weeks.