Flumpy and Douchebag Return

Ok apologies my lovely public, I have been away. To be honest there are times you don’t want to write, it interferes with experience. Well that is the press release anyway, more likely I am just too lazy.

Much has happened. Hiking into the hills that surround this dusty town, afternoons learning Dreamweaver, a liquid ton of hot chocolate.

In my personal life I even decided my relationship needed pet names. After literally minutes of consideration I christened Girlfriend ‘Flumpy’. Which I thought was pretty funny. ‘Flumpy’ was less than pleased however and said that if I was going to call her that ‘stupid fucking name’ then I would be called ‘Douchebag’.

Project Flumpy has now been abandoned.

Larks aside the other thing I have been doing is trying to understand Xela. a place (much like a hissing Komodo) that takes time and patience to penetrate. After writing that brief article where I cautiously waved my pom poms for this place I kept talking to people (they certainly kept talking at me). I am still trying to understand the nature of volunteering and all the do gooding projects that infest this town.

What I found surprised me, although I should have been wiser. There is all the gossiping, bitching, disillusion and tribalism of any other human situation. In other words just because Xela is all about high flown ideals doesn’t mean the boggier parts of human behaviour don’t come with it.

There are people here CV building, there are the ‘Development Grumps’ who go wild at the mention of the term but are still involved in it then bitch about the people who don’t ‘understand’. There are people here who are sad because they feel their time here, trying to do something good, has been a failure. Furthermore they consider any attempt to ‘help’ misconceived to begin with and thus entirely doomed.

If you listen to some Xela is some sort of ethical Sodom and Gomorrah.

Personally I still think it is a great thing but as I say everyday you learn and the delusions are peeled away that little more. Motive and effectiveness, short term fixes for long term problems-those are the issues.

Almost insoluble too, at least up close.

Of course if you ask me, just for being here most of the gringos are leaving dollars and gaining knowledge, and that’s a good thing for both sides.

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