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Be ready for change……deciding on a project: Flexibility is key!
My first two weeks here in the SalvaNATURA office were full of introductions and awkward, ‘do I know you?’ moments, which were made more fun by my inability to speak to the majority of the staff due to my inability to speak Spanish. Although, it definitely helped me to quickly learn the most important formal greeting phrases!
Working in the office. Head phones are a necessity! Oh yeah, we're a little short on space at SalvaNATURA.
After finding a spot for myself and my laptop, I began the process of defining a project. In the beginning I had a lot of ideas tossed my way by my boss, Oliver Komar, who is the director of the science department. I’ve now come to realize that he always has a lot of ideas, but since I had only been here a few days I wasn’t prepared for it, and I was extremely overwhelmed. I was then on my own to decide what I actually wanted to do and what my goals were. My project changed from designing a reporting tool for SalvaNATURA to communicate conservation project results to landowners and farmers; to a project looking at breeding bird numbers in different agricultural habitat types; to assisting with the monitoring project.
Now I am helping to collect and analyze data from a five-year bird monitoring project. The project’s goals are to identify the status of the bird populations of the country and determine conservation priorities. It was very stressful, and at some points I felt like I would never be able to make up my mind. All three projects were so interesting to me. Several panic attacks later, and after considering all of the possibilities, I made my decision. It was most important for me to work on something that I could feasibly complete and that met the needs of SalvaNATURA. The bird monitoring team needed the most help with both the field work and the analysis. We are planning on having the report written by August for presentation to the project donors.
One of my first coffee plant encounters.
At the moment I am doing a lot of sitting in front of my laptop cleaning up the data, correcting mistakes, and getting everything in the same format. I get to go out in the field for a couple of three-day trips each month also, which is amazing, and makes the data mining bearable ;)
All work and no play makes for a boring trip, so thankfully my boss Oliver invited me to come with he, his wife Lorena, and his 6-year old daughter, Yvonne, on a hiking/birding trip to a near by coffee finca (coffee plantation) the first weekend I was here. I was feeling rather alone and out of place, so I was very happy to be invited to tag along. It also meant that I would get to see my first coffee plantation! We left the city in the morning and after only a short 20-minute drive we were winding our way up a mountain with a lot of people and livestock on the road to make the trip a bit slower, but it was an incredibly beautiful view when we finally did get to the finca. And the finca itself was SO cool.
Menu from the mountaintop restaurant, and a cup of their coffee.
The owners had just built an outdoor restaurant a few months earlier in order to attract more visitors. I was in love. What could be better……good birding, good food, and really good coffee all in one place? After that we went to go see the new Narnia movie and get some ice cream (it was nice to be adopted for the day).
