Why I Work With Sketchy Men

Today was an interesting day. I did not wake up feeling motivated but around 10am I finally decided that I had about 13 things to do and time was wasting. So I went to the high school to talk with the director (not there, come back in the afternoon), then to the health center to talk with Marleny or the director (both in Huari, come back tomorrow), then to the internet (actually did get some stuff done there…), then to a meeting with Sketchy Man #1. I do not trust this guy but, annoyingly enough, he has changed his tactics and approached me with a purely work related topic of development work, centering on public health and environmental topics. Well, shoot, that is what I work in, I guess I have to meet with him. So, after some arguing (ex. “Why don’t we meet for dinner?” Me: “Why don’t we not meet at night?” Him: “So dinner?” Me: “No, tomorrow, at 1?”) we finally decided to meet in broad daylight, in a public place just like in the movies.
So, we meet, he asks if I’ve already eaten lunch. I said I have. So, we go to a restaurant where they proceed to serve me lunch… wait. He starts trailing off topic into personal lives so I quickly ask him about his project and finally we look all professional again as now we have papers to read, and I’m happy.
Turns out he is working on a project for the mine but wants to do something else completely apart from the mine, dealing with reforestation and hygiene / nutritional education. We even find real, concrete, doable ways for me to support this project and it’s settled that we are going to be asking the municipality for support. So, basically, this guy seems to have an accurate understanding of what my role is, what my role isn’t ($$$), and what topics I would support (public health). If he weren’t so sketchy this could be the perfect business relationship.
THEN, as I poke at my soup, the mayor walks by…and then sits down for lunch! So, we run all this by the mayor and chat about life. The only downfall of the discussion was when salaries started getting discussed and the mayor point-blank asks me, “How much do you get paid?” Well, shoot. I can evade questions from almost anyone but I feel like this would be a bad time to say, “Hey, it’s really hot today, no?” (PS- Don’t laugh, it works on just about everyone…. : ) So, I tell them, sort of, and to my relief, they say, “Oh, that isn’t very much at all….” Whew…
Alright, mayoral approval of idea, then we proceed to talk to the Health Regional Director of Ancash, who happens to be in town and who Sketch also happens to know. So, we have the support of two key authorities in San Marcos and at a regional level and this weekend Sketch is planning a meeting with environmental engineers, nutritionists, and agricultural engineers in Huaraz. Well, that’s a lot of progress for this town. This happened inside two hours, by the way.
After all was said and done, he turned to me and said, “Well, would you like to take a break? Maybe watch a video?” Oh there you are, Sketch, I wondered where you had gone… My reply, “Oh right, that call I just got, they said I have an urgent meeting in Huaripampa, sorry, I have to get going…”

So, Sketch and I are doing a project together…. I’m going to have to make a longer list of excuses…