Verden kalder, Die Welt ruft, The World is Calling

Either a Human or technical error caused our delayed arrival at breakfast this morning (I was quite exhausted when setting the alarm Friday night, but so sure to have switched it on…), which meant hurrying to the pick-up-truck half an our later. The load full of freshly reaped vegetables for the ecological market in Kingston, Miki drops us of on Fern Gully Main Road (five minutes’ drive from the farm), in order for us three (Lise, Rieke, and me) to join this Saturday´s event: “Massive Dengue Clean-up in Colgate”.

The last weeks, dengue fever has been increasingly spreading throughout of Jamaica, and. Causing several infections around our neighbourhood in Colgate (the town closest to Durga´s Den). The mosquitos (Aedes Aegypti) lay their eggs in any kind of still fresh water for the offspring to hatch two-seven days later. Thus, the best and most ecological way to minimize the number of dengue-transmitting mosquitoes, is to minimize the number of potential spots with still standing fresh water. Here in Jamaica, waste management is waiting on a severe governmental investment, so trash (especially plastic) is found wherever the eyes rest.

Due to these circumstances, the Jamaican Ministry of Health asked the local and selffunded “Colgate Development Committee” (CDC) with Lise as its freshly elected President to spend the last weeks to organize an initiative for everybody feeling responsible to prevent dengue fever from reaching anyone in the community and partially condense the immense plastic overflow. Because the CDC realised the danger (everybody somehow knows somebody that has been infected with dengue) and the medical system often fails, people want to act quickly and not wait ages for the government to act directly.

Due to our error with taking care of time, the three of us meet the group of concerned locals who had already started the “Massive Dengue Clean-up in Colgate”, armed with plastic trash bags and latex-gloves. Our task is it to collect every sort of “unnatural” object that might gather water. So basically: All of the plastic along the road – since we´re not stepping on any private property. Here in St. Ann Parish, glass is the only easily recycled product, so we collect (broken) glass bottles in a separate bag. Also, the Breadnut Hill Primary School (500m from Durga´s Den) is hosting a “Polyethylene terephthalate-bottle drive” (PET-bottle-drive) which means that plastic bottles are collected in a fenced area in the schoolyard and eventually bought by a processor. The profits are used to realise further school projects. Therefore, we place plastic bottles with a small triangle and a “1” within it into the second bag with a thought of killing two mosquitoes with one stone.

The third bag is for everything else – a boatload of plastic and trash that humans have thrown into nature or lost along the road. We´re about 15 people ready to protect our local environment and ourselves. Rieke and I join up with Kenneth, a local who lives close the intersection of Fern Gully Main Road and Breadnut Hill Road – and split up the work together. Either we are slower or just more meticulous than the head of the group which soon reaches Breadnut Hill Road, while we´re still at a church´s parking lot down the road.

It´s a satisfying and at the same time disgusting work to do. Gloves protect our hands from litter, nothing smells really bad, but it´s frustrating that our Saturday morning is spent with delousing streets, because of a great amount of people´s laziness and lack of energy to dispose properly. While artificial elements are spotted, cars and trucks drive right by us, honking (which is a regular way greeting in a friendly manner in this country), and I´ve got to admit that safety vests could have shaped this event more seriously; as concerning locals we´re putting ourselves into somewhat of a danger. When picking up trash like this, bending down, grabbing, and carrying it further in the correct collecting bag, a great level of direct satisfaction is reached due to the instant change that we make. However, when looking up from the street and observing the area around, it can be quite hard to stay motivated since it´s easy to say that the enormous quantity of garbage around us is like an ocean of waste compared to the drop of decontamination we symbolize.

Because Kenneth, Rieke and I are too far behind, we miss the information of taking a left by the intersection, so we accidentally continue along Fern Gully Main Road- reaching the local barber and spotting a mountain of trash in the backyard behind the neighbouring bar. The view makes us give up instantly, and Kenneth calls for more assistance. Communication is of vital importance for an event like this: We are driven back to the rest of the group and continue from Durga´s Den in the direction of the other half. An hour later, we´re all gathered for a group picture before heading over the basic school (kindergarden) and thereby finalizing the event. The sun is starting to burn. On our way toward the rewarding soup, the President Lise, the event-manager Maureen, Rieke and I are the only ones who continue the dengue-prevention while noticing that this road supposedly has been cleaned up – but not really.

The clock is around 12, when we arrive at the basic school and receive the information that goat-head-soup is served for everyone. Luckily there is "pudding" (a sort of sweet-potato-cake and Lise knows a place where to get chicken soup, also ?

I´ve entirely lost the overview, of who has really been a part of the clean-up in which period, and since Marine has left as well, there is no final evaluation today – Lise laughs a bit when I ask about it.

Later this Saturday, we manage to take a route taxi down to the town where we spent the rest of the afternoon at our so far favourite beach by the White River Delta.

It´s dark when we get back to the farm – tired and about to make our typical Jamaica-dish; The cheapest spaghetti with the cheapest tomato sauce :D

Forige Lørdag befinder vi os efter hurtigt morgenmad bag i Miki´s pickuptruck, der inden turen til det økologiske marked i Kingston buldrer ned ad ”Fern Gully Road”, hvor den lokale ”selvhjælps-gruppe” har organiseret en formiddag med dengue-feber forbøjenden oprydning og efterfølgende gedehovedsuppe.

Man kan godt spørge sig, hvordan det, at samle plastikaffald i vejkanten kan være med til sænke risikoen for flere tilfælde af den influenzalignende virussygdom ved navnet denguefeber. Det hænger sådan sammen, at vira spredes via en myg der hedder Aedes Egypti – altså, når den kvindelige myg har stukket et menneske med denguefeber, kan denne sygdom overgives til de efterfølgende mennesker, den stikker. Og der har været mange tilfælde af dette her på det sidste i Jamaika. Myggen lægger sine æg i stillestående ferskvand, hvilket der egentlig ikke er særlig meget af i vores område (meget få søer, mere floder, der løber ud i havet). Denguefeberet har dog kunne sprede sig i løbet af de sidste uger, da stillestående vand samler sig i alt det fucking plastik, der flyder over det hele, hvilket er så dumt. Ok, tilbage til seriøsiteten: Så for at minimere antallet af myg så hurtigt så muligt, har sunhedshedsministeriet motiveret alle til at fjerne ”unnaturlige”, åbne muligheder for vandansamling. Og det er det, som Lise, Rieke og jeg er med til hele formiddagen – med arbejdshandsker, plastikposer og en masse knæbøjninger sammen med ca. 15 andre ansvarsbevidste fra området. Det er ikke altid sjovt og solen gør det ikke nemmere, når man har langt beskyttende tøj på.

Men det er dejligt at møde nogle af de lokale og føle sig en del af ”the community”. Vi får samtidig set børnehaven og grundskolen her i landsbyen ”Colgate”, og heldigvis kender Lise til et sted, hvor man også får kyllingesuppe efterfølgende :D.

PS: Billedet af Rieke der spiser en slags kage, viser hende hvordan hun nyder ”pudding”, som er kage lavet hovedsagligt af sød kartoffel (batat).

PPS: Om eftermiddagen lader vi os tage med ned til Ochi, hvor vi slapper lidt af på min yndlingsstrand ved White River deltaet. Igen, en anstrende, men virkelig god dag.

Vorletzten Samstag nehmen wir zusammen mit Lise an einer „Massiven Dengue-Fieber-vorbeugenden Aufräumaktion“ hier in Colgate Teil. Der Grund für dieses Aufräumen sind die steigende Anzahl von Dengue-infizierten Menschen in Jamaika und das Gesundheitsministerium, welches lokale Initiativen zur Minderung der Mückenanzahl fördert. Das hängt so zusammen: Wenn die (weibliche) „Aedes Aegepti“-Mücke einen mit dem Dengue-Virus infizierten Primaten sticht, kann der Virus auf jede Person übertragen werden, die nachfolgend von derselben Mücke gestochen wird. Wenn die weibliche Mücke es schafft ihre Eier danach in stillstehendes Süßwasser zu legen, schlüpfen die Larven zwei bis sieben Tage später um wieder als „Vektoren“ für das  40 bis 60 nanometer große, behüllte RNA-Virus mit positiver Polarität aus der Familie der Flaviviren (An dieser Stelle ein Danke an wikipedia.de) dienen.

Da viele unserer Nachbarn und Gemeinschaftsmitglieder entweder zu wenig Energie haben und zu faul oder unwissend sind, befinden sich ÜBERALL perfekte Geburtsorte für die Dengue-Mücke; Plastikmüll (Flaschen, Lebensmittelverpackungen, Bonbon-papier) aber auch anderer Müll, wie Glasflaschen oder Autoreifen.

Unsere Mission an diesem Samstagvormittag ist es also, so viele unnatürliche (potentielle) Wasseransamlungen zu entleeren uns zu zerstören. Mit anderen Worten gesagt: „So viel Müll wie möglich einsammeln.“ Wir lernen um die 15 nette, verantwortungsbewusste Nachbarn kennen und unterstützen die lokale Selbsthilfegruppe von der Lise die frischgewählte Präsidentin ist.

 Zwischen acht Uhr morgens und halb zwölf machen wir unglaublich viele Kniebeugen, bücken uns und schwitzen in die langen Klamotten. Bis es im Kindergarten Ziegenkopfsuppe gibt. Zum Glück haben wir den Nachmittag nichts vor und Lise weiß, wo es auch Hühnersuppe (ohne Füße) gibt :)

Am Abend kommen wir von White River Delta wieder hier auf Durga´s Den an, und fallen todmüde ins Bett, denn Sonntag ist auch ein großer Tag.