It Gets Better (Friday June 24th 2011)

It gets better.....

Friday June 24

I woke up a lot more optimistic today. We have some sort of data to look at and I’m glad that we get to participate in the data collection process. It also feels extremely awesome to have something that we have worked on for such a while bears us some fruit. This morning after settling in at UB we began going over the activities of the previous day. We decided to go over each question and comb over each slowly. A few questions had to be changed into simpler terms because they were confusing and questions had to be moved around to help with the overall flow of the survey. We also discussed the optional questions dealing with domestic violence and I shared with the group that I actually did not feel awkward to ask those questions since by the time I had gotten to them I had already gotten into a conversation with the individuals I was interviewing and they were opening up. Roberta also mentioned that sine domestic violence was so prevalent in Belize she was surprised that majority of respondents had not indicated that it was an issue in their household. Maybe we were lucky and got the people who did not have physical abuse occurring in their house and maybe they were lying. I think to gauge a sensitive subject such as domestic violence you have to get into a very comfortable rapport with the person you are interviewing so that they can open up to you. Maybe when we actually do the survey we will have people tell us what goes on behind their closed doors in terms of domestic violence. Only time will tell.

            After combing through the questions we were happy with what we had and then headed for lunch. In the evening we headed to another local expat coffee shop PerkUp, where I had their amazing frappucino as a reward to myself for all the hard work. It was a welcomed chocolate cool relief . While I was waiting for my order to be filled I got into a conversation with a couple next to me and inquired about why they were here in Belize. Long story short they had come here to share G-d’s word. Something inside me tickled and I decided to ask, “What is your religion/denomination?” I think I was also alerted by something about them, maybe an aura? I don’t know but the answer I got back was “Seventh Day Adventist” (SDA). I almost burst out of my seat as I also told her I was an SDA. She then introduced herself and invited me to church tomorrow. After exchanging phone numbers she left and I couldn’t wait. After they left I shared bean creating the Epi-Info database with the new corrected questions. This week has definitely turned out into something very positive.