Remember this guy?

Last spring I was on a mission to keep our Academic Dean, Dr. Hemphill away from a small liberal arts college in Shreveport and locked up at the Clinton School. I tried my best citing everything from Shreveport sucks (apologies to anyone from Shreveport) and well . . . saying how the poor students minds' would be aimless without him. I couldn't lock him up at our school because 1) that's not what any upstanding public servant would do and 2) I don't want a criminal record just yet (at least not for kidnapping).

I'm happy to say that Centenary is treating our former Dean well. In fact he's famous! We should all ask him for his autograph. I might even have to put all my old papers on ebay and sell them to the highest bidder because his red pen marked it.

Wrapping things up

My time has come to a close here in New York City. Yesterday I had lunch with the gang from PCI Media Impact and we played a fun little game called "high/low" where we each went around the circle and stated the high of our project and the low.

The high. Well that's an easy one -- meeting and working with Alleyne Regis in St. Lucia. Our team which consisted of Alleyne, Sarah, and me was definitely a force to be reckoned with. Funny that I thought all those leadership classes and team dynamic info would be over with when Practicum concluded. However, working with this team was even more intense in the 10 weeks in St. Lucia probably because we were thrown into a project overseas.

The low. Well that's an easy one as well. I had this great idea to make an "internet cafe" inside our home one day which meant pointing a fan on one side of the table, and borrowing the from my room to have a stereo effect of fans/cool air at the kitchen table where we plugged in to our internet connection. It was a great idea until my little box fan fell a few feet from the counter to the floor and totally busted. For weeks I had many a sleepless night wrestling with the hot air and windless nights.

For the rest of this month I'll be working on a second draft of my deliverable, a Monitoring & Evaluation manual for my client, PCI Media Impact. After that my work will be done and then I'll begin preparing for my final project with the Clinton School. Wow! Time flies quickly.

One more for the road

When Sarah and I were still in St. Lucia we enjoyed our weekend ritual of going to the movies. We had low bar expectations for the movie; our only criteria was to have air conditioning and be entertained. Well on one very rainy Sunday we dashed through the raindrops and huddled under the cement stairs of the pedestrian overpass to wait for the bus.

There was man standing there too trying to avoid the rain while waiting for the bus. So, I said hello like you do in St. Lucia. His response was, “Aren’t you going to say Happy Father’s Day?” I think the look on Sarah’s and my face was a bit befuddled. Yes it was father’s day on this particular day, but how were we supposed to know this guy is a father? Should we assume every man is? What to say next?

I quickly said, “Oh yes! Happy Father’s Day!” But then he started talking to me and the more he said the less I could actually see of Sarah. She claims she had to turn her body around the corner to stay dry, but I know better SARAH LEER!

So I was pretty much left standing there with some stranger who was talking about Father’s Day. Somehow the conversation went in another direction when I asked what this guy did. You know what he said? He was the crowning winner of Karaoke competitions across St. Lucia. Not only was he so proud of his achievement, he actually said, “You know I’m just a regular guy. I mean, but it’s a pretty big deal… I win Karaoke competitions all over this island.” Really?!? Had we just run into the St. Lucian version of Ron Burgundy?

Not only that, but he topped it off by singing a Karaoke song dripping with saccharine lyrics and melody. Wow! I wish I had recorded it, so you could actually hear and see what we experienced. Neither of us recognized the song, but it was truly an interesting performance. I guess you can’t escape Karaoke no matter what part of the world you’re in.

What I’m up to this weekend

I like to mix fun with work (after all that is precisely what Entertainment Education is all about), so when I planned a trip to New York for meetings with my host organization PCI Media Impact I also scheduled in a little yoga time. This is no ordinary downward dog though. I’m attending children’s yoga teacher training at Karma Kids Yoga near Union Square.

It’s a 30 hour course that goes completely from beginning to end on how to instruct yoga to children of any age. During the training we have to remember what it was like to be little kids who jump and play and frolic. Somewhere underneath all that maturity (ok maybe not that much maturity in my case) is a little child just waiting to come out and play. Being five years old again, however, is tiring! How did I do it back then? I’m sore in places that I didn’t even know existed. If I could pop my arms and legs off right now and replace them with new non-tired arms and legs that would be great.

What’s been totally thrilling and neat about the teacher training is how it’s reinforced many of the things I’ve learned over this past academic year at the Clinton School. Allowing children to speak empowers them. Have options for children to pick and choose what they want do that day. Don’t just tell a child what to do, show a child how to do something. Above all make the class fun and engage them. If that doesn’t sound like Social Change I don’t know what does! Anything that empowers a child from such an early age is a great thing.

For the rest of the weekend if you need to find me I’ll be on my yoga mat… or should I say flying a magic carpet with my imaginary helmet and seat belt on.

Classmates practicing headstand.

Transitions

In my studies of Entertainment Education I’ve learned that when writing an appropriate EE script whether it be on TV or radio, it is essential that there are three types of characters in a story.

1) Negative characters – these characters exhibit all the behaviors and attitudes on any issue that the program is trying to change in the general audience
2) Positive characters – a character (usually 1 or very few in number) that exhibits exactly the behaviors and attitudes on any issue the program is promoting. This is a role model.
3) Transitional characters – represent the majority of people who can waiver from negative to positive behaviors. Usually the audience relates more to this character.

Even though in real life I don’t choose to believe that no person is truly good or bad, I do like the concept of applying “transitional characters” to life. Since each of us are essentially in the transitional state of our characters for our entire lives that allows us to discover the negatives and positives to any situation/issue/problem. More importantly though then realizing oneself is a transitional character, is the knowledge of knowing that each and every person one interacts with is also a transitional character.

Here’s to the process of transitioning!

Public Service and the City

When I was 21 I had my first internship in New York City. I worked in a boutique talent agency in the literature department. My job was to copy scripts and look over scripts that writers in hopes of getting them optioned had mailed in unsolicited, which is really all to say I read a bunch of bad scripts that summer. I wish I could remember the various plots now, but I remember picking up a book one day with no chapters and a bunch of run-on sentences about some guy’s salacious lifestyle. I don’t know whatever happened to that one.

Anyway, one day at this internship my boss’s colleague came up to me with a sheepish look in his eyes and said, “I feel really badly about this…. I hate to ask you this, but would you mind going to Starbucks for some of us?” I said yes for two reasons. One, any opportunity to wander around the city even if it is to a coffee shop I don’t like was fun. Two, I’m not beneath grabbing coffee. All jobs have their glorious moments as well as their less glorious moments, and you can only get to the glorious stuff after you do a lot of non-glorious stuff. And there will always be non-glorious stuff to do.

Today was day 2 of my wrap up with PCI-Media Impact, an organization that uses media in innovative ways to create social change. They’ve done projects all over the world and mine and Sarah’s work was specifically involved with climate change in the Caribbean. Yesterday they invited me to sit in on a meeting with Soul City who was presenting their latest endeavor in the field of entertainment education. The things I heard were amazing! I mean using reality TV in a way that transforms communities in South Africa just blew me away. There needs to be more shows like this.

Hearing about other EE organizations across the globe was just the beginning though. We sat down and looked through my deliverable; I gained some great feedback on how to improve the manual I’m drafting for their data collection method. The work continues!

Unfortunately or fortunately depending on how you look at it, no one at PCI asked me to grab them coffee, though I would have gladly. However, this morning I got off the metro and stumbled into a great little coffeeshop and grabbed myself some coffee. An iced capuccino. Yum.

Randomnicity

What do you get when you have 5 former Austinities and 1 current Austinite who all descend upon the nation’s capital? You get this lovely photo below taken after we stuffed ourselves silly with Ethiopian food. (Notice the food coma state present in most of the people's eyes.)

It’s like the planets have aligned when the 6 of us never really even planned on spending this weekend together. It is a wonderful homecoming though, and so good to see these old friends who have been scattered all over the U.S .

My friend’s father who lives in D.C. and was also at dinner, told me this morning “What a great group of friends you guys have. I mean really!” I couldn’t agree more. I will take them as well as many others with me in my pocket wherever I go.

“Absence sharpens love, presence strengthens it.” – Benjamin Franklin

Happy 4th of July, dear friends!

Haiku: Returning Home

The soft sounds of rain
Waiting patiently to board
Farewell, island life.

Letter to myself

Recently I have been reading a bunch of 20-something self letters where women write letters to their 20 year old self. They are very sweet, and I imagine I will have a LOT to say to myself when I reach my 30's. For now I'm still a 20-something self... but I was inspired to write a letter to my Pre-IPSP self.

Dear Judy from late April,

Hello dear. Calm down! Seriously you are going to get everything done before leaving for St. Lucia and then some. The boxes will be packed, the furniture will be moved, and the assignments turned in -- all with the help of some wonderful friends.

Don’t set expectations about the people and the culture for a place you’ve never been to, you will either be sorely disappointed or think you are a God. So stop it, that’s not becoming of you. You will be happy eating plenty of plantains just like in Panama. You will get so much more sun in your entire life and so much rain in St. Lucia that you will then forever be confused as to which one you really like more. It’s a conundrum.

You will miss people and they will miss you, but in the end be grateful for any communication that you are lucky to receive. Even though internet connections suck sometimes, you should be grateful for that too. Oh, remember to back up all your work. Trust me on that one.

You are not responsible for the decisions anyone in your family makes or doesn't make, especially from afar.

There will be so much to do in your project in St. Lucia that at times it might be overwhelming, or it may be difficult to even know where to begin. That’s normal. Take it slow and every little bit helps. Your boss will appreciate any contribution you make. Letting go of a project can be just as hard as letting go of a person. This will happen several times over in your life (hopefully projects not people), so get used to it kid.

And please, remember to wear sunscreen.

Love,
Judy from late June

What’s your service song?

Every public service trip abroad is made memorable by whatever song is playing in the bus, the restaurant, and in the street. You know what I’m talking about, that song that is inescapable. The song that maybe at first you hated, but have grown a soft spot for since… a song so indelible that every time you will hear it going this point forward you will be flooded with memories of this summer.

Often times that song for me is a recycled American song from the 80’s or 90’s. For example, I know KC in South Africa is listening to a lot of Celine Dion. However, in St. Lucia they’re pretty clever with using songs on the local radio to express deep opinions and beliefs. No need to repackage American music here. My service song is well in three short words: amazacrazy, awesome, and disgusting. It’s true. Listen for yourself. I present to you, “I Do” by Qpid.

What the heck are they talking about you’re thinking. “Did you really really really wring the panty? To make the man say I do?” Folklore in St. Lucia says that when a woman wants to marry a worthy gentleman all she has to do is wash her underwear and make sure that dirty water is wrung into macaroni (a favorite dish here) she cooks. After the man eats the macaroni pie he will forever fall in love with said woman and be with her until death do they part. Or at least until he eats macaroni pie washed in someone else’s underwear.

This $*%&ing song is stuck in my head ALL day, every day. Thanks, Qpid, whoever you are. I will never look at macaroni the same. I may not ever be able to eat it again either. Barf!

Logic Model

Remember in Decision Making & Analysis or wait is it Analysis of Decision Making or Analysis for Decision Making... (Julie & Monteith help!) well whatever.... anyway remember that day last fall where we went over logic models? It may have sounded like it could have been the study of an attractive model wearing glasses, a pocket protector, and other nerd gear. But nope, a logic model is actually a visual way to map out the causal relationship between components of a project and projected outcomes. Zing!

Tonight I thought it would be fun to make a logic model of my IPSP or at least parts of it. You know, like you do. Behold dear friends, my logic model! Proof I was listening and learning that day.

Click photo above to enlarge (not this sentence).

I like Creole

English is used everywhere in St. Lucia, but in the rural villages and occasionally walking down the street I hear Creole. I love how Creole sounds, and I’ve picked up a few phrases and words here and there. I can say: boy, darling, good morning, good afternoon, good evening, how are you, I’m fine, and don’t do that. I know it’s not much really, but I’ve enjoyed learning the meager phrases I know. I’m really kicking myself now for not taking a Creole language class, because it is such a fun language.

I can also say some other not so nice phrases… I mean you need to know how to cuss in every language right? If only so you can identify it when it’s being directed at you.

You might have read that Alleyne (my supervisor), Sarah, and I have a good working relationship. We are a cohesive team. Well, a few weeks ago Alleyne’s colleague, Della, was in our office and there was chit chat about this, that, and the other. Somewhere through the conversation I called Alleyne a “salop”. Pronounced: sah-lop. Doesn’t it sound nice? Well it’s not. Della’s eyes expanded 4 inches and they almost popped out of her head. “Did you teach that to her?!?” she asked. “No. Absolutely not. She learned it on her own,” Alleyne said.

Cut to lunch the previous day. Alleyne, Sarah, and I have the best work lunches. Seriously. Often they are the best part of my day because Alleyne usually regales us with various stories. On this particular day Alleyne told us about a friend’s wedding he had gone to, and that the bride’s ex-boyfriend was present at the wedding. Well this guy was a little drunk, and at some point during the reception got a hold of a mic and his speech in Creole went a little something like this, “Congratulations. I’m so happy to be rid of that %&*$”

“Wow! Can you say that phrase in Creole?” I asked Alleyne. So he did, and I zeroed in on the word “salop” which is apparently the worst expletive in St. Lucia and said it five times so I could remember it. See this student is a quick learner. Be careful what you teach me.

Alleyne still teaches me phrases, but he’s a little more selective now.

A Fashionable Public Servant

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not exactly a fashionista or a prima dona. Just ask my roommate Julie who has on occasion walked into my room and said “are you really going to wear pink ballet tights with that dress?” I like to call my wardrobe choices “inventive” or “thinking outside of the box” but perhaps she was right on that particular occasion.

I’ve been here 9 weeks, however, and I’m completely bored with every choice of clothing I have which to be honest is like 3 or 4 options. The tank top with the grey skirt, or the tank top with the wrap around skirt, or maybe the tank top with the capris. Hey it’s really hot here! But even my clothes look tired and worn out. It’s like they want to be taken out on a long walk in the forest behind the house and be put out of their misery. . .

You know what this reminds me of? If you’re thinking of that Simpsons episode where Marge buys the pink Chanel suit and sews it into various styles of dresses that would be correcto! Congratulations, you have just won a cookie. Payment to be made in full later. IF only I had brought a sewing machine. Note to self: tell Class 6 to bring a sewing machine or bee dazzler to liven up their outfits on IPSP’s.

So without further adieu here is the complete episode, an oldie but goody from 1996: Scenes from the Class Struggle in Springfield. (Trivia: this is the first instance a female writer and director were credited in a Simpsons episode.)


The Simpsons 714 Scenes from the Class Struggle in Springfield

As Lisa Simpson exclaimed, “You look so sophisticated. Just like Mary Hart!” May you all look as sophisticated as Mary Hart on your public service projects this summer. [insert laugh track here]

The Sarah has left the building

Despite Alleyne's best efforts to keep her here, Sarah left St. Lucia today and is headed to Austin, Texas. I almost jumped in her duffel bag just thinking about being back in the land of breakfast tacos. Jealous. Have a safe flight, Sarah. Godspeed!

Sarah and our Supervisor Alleyne

Cuckoo for Cocoa Beans

Update: regarding yesterday’s post: Smells ® came out today and fixed my laptop. Woohoo! I asked the tech guy what kind of discount he got on Smells® computers and he said none. Can you believe that?!?

Ever since I read in the glossy touristy magazines that litter this island that a cocoa plantation exists – I wanted to go. I mean I had to go. Cocoa in some variation or another has been the entire basis of my palette’s happiness since the time I could remember. So last weekend Sarah and I took a bus to downtown, another bus to Soufriere, and a third bus to the Fond Doux Estate. It. Was. Magical.

We were given a tour by Omawale which means the first sun rises in African. Omawale is a 17 year old student who spends his summers doing odd jobs to pay tuition for schooling. He was a great tour guide of the plantation, and told us we could ask him anything we wanted to about the place. Boy did he regret that! This one ::points to myself:: had about 1,001 questions about shade growing, pests, cocoa, and the history of chocolate. I’m really glad the tour only consisted of Sarah, Omawale, and me because if there were a group of tourists they would have been rolling their eyes for sure. Sarah does a good impersonation of all the silly questions I asked.
However, we learned some fascinating stuff about cocoa beans. They’re grown all year round in St. Lucia because of the hospitable climate here. Plus they’re organically grown! Prince Charles even visited the plantation and toured it himself. (Very impressed.)

After they are harvested from their pods (see baby cocoa pod below) they are hulled and the cocoa beans sit in buckets and are left to ferment.






Once they have fermented the beans are put on these giant wooden slats to dry in the sun.




This is the best part! The dried beans are put in this giant chocolate bowl and someone on the plantation does a cocoa dance on top of them. It’s a special cocoa dance that is handed down from generation to generation. I asked Omawale to show us the cocoa dance, but he has not learned the dance yet. Some passing tourists heard me ask and then joined in and pleaded with Omawale to show us the dance. ::snickers:: Sadly, no dances were shown. IF only Chocolate Fountain would have been there... he would have dazzled us with dances for sure.




After the magic dance has taken place on the cocoa beans, the beans are placed again on a drying rack. The entire process takes about 3 months from start to finish. Some of the cocoa beans are sold to Hershey’s. Other beans stay here and are ground into what is known as cocoa tea. See Sarah enjoying her first cup of cocoa tea? You can almost taste it, it's so good!



Eat your heart out, chocolate aficionados! Or as I like to say: hellooooooo lover.

Laptop, you're fired.

A few years ago I was at Austin Java (a wonderful little coffeeshop) with two good friends of mine. We were meeting about a pet project that we were involved in – bridging the digital divide between the U.S. and Latin America. Well low and behold during our meeting a guy walks in with a desktop. I’m not kidding! An old iMac circa 2000. We laughed uproariously… 1) because it was a desktop and who bothers to unplug a desktop at home and drag it to a coffeeshop? And 2) we were all on our shiny Macbooks hence an outdated iMac was humorous. (Yes, we’re snobs.)

You see I love computers. Keep your fancy smart phones, flat screen TV’s, and GPS’s. This girl is completely content with a shiny, good working computer and reliable internet. Ok, I admit it. I have an unhealthy attachment to my computer. It doesn’t help that I formerly lived in a city, Austin, that did not rectify this problem but rather embraced this bad habit. See above.

Well friends, my laptop that I’ve been using this entire summer for my school project – for the sake of anonymity let’s just say this brand sort of rhymes with Smells ® -- has decided that it is going on strike and will not power on. It’s last words were 0110010101110100 001000000111010001110101 00100000011000100111001001110101011101000110010100111111 (if you don’t know what this means look it up) I was on the phone with the support team of Smells ® for about an hour last week to see if they could fix it. Oddly enough my phone call got routed to Latin America and the operator at Smells ® could barely understand me. It was quite comical. I don’t know how many times I had to spell my email address out… but it was at least 10 times. And folks my email address is long! Ug…

So I’ve resorted to using what I like to call my “vintage laptop” ummmm a spiral notebook. When I try to push its buttons, though, nothing happens. No weather updates, no interesting news articles, no NPR goodies, and no updates on what some random friend ate for lunch on Facebook. What the??? In a word, my vintage laptop is: useless. But to be fair it has straight blue lines in it in which to guide my pen, always is willing to work, and has an appealing pink cover. So in another word, my spiral notebook is: reliable.

There were many thoughts of acting out the therapeutic Office Space scenes out on my Smells ® computer. Oh Michael Bolton and Samir, I totally feel your pain. Anybody know where to get a bat in the Caribbean?

The Thankless Recycler

Josaphat Small works on a small plot of land less than a mile away from the landfill in North St. Lucia. He sorts computers, cans, plastics, and scrap metal into piles. In a few words: Josaphat Small runs a recycling center. However, few people know of this enviro-friendly entrepreneur and his business.

With no help from the government, no advertising, and a bare bones website – few people know about this place, let alone take the long drive out here to recycle their waste. Josaphat Small recounts story after story about his plight to recycle on the small island of St. Lucia, and his previous work trying to motivate others to do the same. Unfortunately, each story ends the same. The fact is that few people recycle in St. Lucia. Even the businesses and hotels don’t recycle.

Mr. Small tells us that an upscale hotel (hint: the name of the hotel is an article of clothing you wear) wanted to be a certified green hotel, so they came a’knocking on Mr. Small’s door. Mr. Small gave them some bins and told them what and how to sort the products so that he could put them in their proper place to be shipped off. The hotel complied long enough to get the certification and then quit shortly thereafter. It was just too difficult for them to do.

This small recycling center has no sign, no traffic, and for some reason has been moved from plot to plot by the government. As soon as it starts up, the government mandates that it must be moved to another location. This humble recycling center has probably moved four times, and is set to move again in the near future.

But Josaphat Small keeps plodding on. He insists that recycling is one of the few ways to save our future. With a very small staff, they sort every weekday and sometimes if they’re lucky some of the landfill employees drop off bottles and cans that are readily found on top of the trash. Thank you, Mr. Small for all that you do!

Trash Talk Tuesday

This morning we visited the landfill of St. Lucia. There are actually two landfills on the island: one in the north and one in the south. The one we visited today was located in the north. We found out that it was built in 2003 and is projected to last about twenty years (that’s not really a long time). After 2023, it will then most likely have about four feet of dirt piled on top of it, turned into a grass hill which wild animals will roam free on, and a new landfill will have to be found.

Here is a clip of the landfill from this morning. Incidentally today was trash day for my neighborhood.

I asked what happens to old landfills here, and we passed two today. One was a giant hill which I saw some sheep feeding on, and then I thought out loud, “that’s not really supposed to be a hill is it…?” Nope. The second one, well… a giant colorful tourist hotel was constructed on top of it. Little do they know…. it gives a whole new meaning to “taking the trash out”! The puns are endless.

Solid waste is a fascinating topic/issue as it is not unique to St. Lucia. Every community has dealt with how and where to dispose of their waste since the beginning of time. I was wondering if there might be an ancient civilization that had the answers, so I used my interweb box and conducted a search. Sadly, the almighty google tells me that since the beginning of time mankind has had a problem with disposing of waste, and the cycle continues on and on and on. It’s depressing. Even the Mayans couldn’t figure out a way to properly get rid of trash. When they finally couldn’t stand it, they burned their trash. I did find out some interesting facts though.

• the first municipal dump in the western world was created in Athens Greece in 500 BC
  
• During biblical times in the Valley of Gehenna, located just outside of Jerusalem, corpses of criminals and trash were burned around the clock. Gehenna has been likened to Hell
  
• After England did some investigative reporting linking waste to the spread of diseases the “age of sanitation” begins in 1842
  

So what have I have discovered today? We’ve got a LOT of trash on our hands. Since some have considered a landfill like Hell, I wonder if the employees of landfills ever consider themselves lucky that on a daily basis they get to travel to Hell and back? And apparently we have not made any major strides during this so called “age of sanitation” aside from stopping the bubonic plague.

Then I began thinking, why do we have such a problem with solid waste? It appears that we have an inordinate amount of it and few places to stick it. Is the problem us, the role of government, or something else? How many people have actually visited a landfill? As trash seems to be something that is out of sight out of mind, I wondered what would happen if we take a giant glass cubicle and placed it in the center of town? Imagine a giant cube of trash right smack next to city hall, the capital, or wherever the decision makers are located. Each day community members would walk by this giant cube of trash and see it accumulating very quickly…there could even be a ticker like the stock market on it that tells us how many pounds of trash is in it. It also reeks, and because the structure is clear, we can see what dumb things we throw away. I think it would take 2, maybe 3, weeks for us to finally get tired of looking at the eyesore to do something.

In the words of Oscar the Grouch, “Uh uh. Sorry, Slimy, time for sleep now. So close your eyes and dream of all the wonderful trash that’s yet to come… there’ll be more trash tomorrow.”

DOH!

A few years ago a documentary called Cane Toads: An Unnatural History was recommended to me. Something you should know – I love weird documentaries! The weirder the better and even if I don’t know a thing about the topic, I enjoy learning about whatever the subject is. Hence an entire documentary about a giant freak of nature – the cane toad – is not entirely a stretch for me.



See Australia was having some problems with its sugar cane crops. The cane grub was attacking it. So some smart people got together in the early 20th century and over a conference talked about what to do. Because Hawaii had a similar problem which was fixed by their native cane toad that ate the grubs – someone decided that cane toads should be brought to Australia.
But what the scientists didn’t know is that the cane toad lays about 40,000 eggs because in its natural habitat only a few survive. Without the cane toads natural predators present in Australia, the cane toads quickly took over. It became a real problem, and today almost a 100 years later, is in fact, a real problem. The cane toads have a toxic residue on their skin which make them out best even the deadliest predators in Australia. (Ironic since every critter is deadly there!)

So as I was reading the news this morning (preparing for a virtual Professionalism class no doubt) I came across an article that the cane toad has reached the Caribbean!

"To our knowledge, this is the first report of cane toads causing mortality in naturally occurring predators outside of Australia," say the authors in the journal Biological Invasions.

"Although cane toads have been present on Jamaica for more than 160 years, it is clear from our observations that Jamaican boas have not yet learnt to avoid this toxic prey species." (http://news.bbc.co.uk/earth/hi/earth_news/newsid_8728000/8728758.stm)

The introduction of the cane toads in the Caribbean and Australia have created disastrous effects which have lasted decades. As I’m here in the Caribbean, I can’t help but be reminded how unfortunately all too often us “experts” in the field visit distant lands and think we know what’s best to help out. The truth of it is we’re learned in special academic fields that might not necessarily apply to communities and populations across a broad spectrum. Listening is really the first step toward social change, because when we invite voices that are often unheard we discover the answers are already there. Thus, I believe in a life which pursues public service, we're really just facilitators.

Just so you know, I’m listening. I promise not to bring any cane toads back to Arkansas. I'm not making any promises on the cute kittens I find here though. ; )

World What?

Hello, my name is Judy. I’m a Capricorn, and I’m here today to tell you all that I don’t know a lick about sports. If there were a support group for people who were raised in the south and should know a thing or two about sports but don’t – that’s probably what I would say. When I was in grade school we would play kickball on the field and I would routinely get yelled at for picking flowers in the outfield by a very scary gym teacher. Apparently picking flowers is not allowed while playing kickball. Who knew?

Not that I’m jumping on the World Cup bandwagon, because I don’t jump on bandwagons for a cheap increase in blog readership . . . but that’s apparently ALL that anybody and everybody is talking about these days. In fact, this morning Sarah was watching South Africa play Mexico and while I was in the kitchen very much consumed in cutting up a fresh pineapple I had just bought, she proclaimed I had to watch the “cute guys on the Mexican team”. Not that I disagree with her that Mexicans are cute (Hello Gael Garcia Bernal, Salma Hayek, and Jessica Alba! I mean right?!?) . . . but I’ve never watched a complete game from the World Cup Series.

Please stop throwing your tomatoes and glass bottles at me. Hear me out! I’m not *totally useless.

While I don’t know a thing about the rules of soccer or football or whatever the heck you call it. I do know one very interesting fact about the modern soccer ball (thanks to a math-loving friend of mine) that most people probably aren’t aware of. The soccer ball is the only ball made up of an intricate pattern of pentagons and hexagons. Did you know that there is only one way to assemble these pentagons and hexagons together to form a soccer ball? And no it’s not like a rubik's cube where you can take all the stickers off and replace them at your will. The really interesting thing about a soccer ball is that it is made up of 32 panels total so like I said that means that there is only one way to pattern the hexagons and pentagons together to create the sphere. Do you know how many pentagons and hexagons make up a soccer ball? Hint: each pentagon is surrounded by five hexagons. Answer provided at end of post. Don't cheat.

A soccer ball is like math in motion. It’s pretty neat. Even Gael thinks so too!

Hi, my name is Judy and I don’t know how to play soccer, but I do know a thing or two about the soccer ball. Answer: 20 hexagons and 12 pentagons.