We are now accepting intern applications for the 2011 Internship Program. We are looking to do trips to Papua New Guinea, Nepal, and Mongolia in the Summer of 2011 and would love to hear why you think you should be on our trip! For more information on the internship you can email, HIT@m-cam.com.
As many of you have been following the progress, the Heritable Innovation Trust program has grown and developed since the framework was introduced. In the summer of 2010, we were invited to return to East New Britain to continue documentation as well as initiate programs in new communities. In addition we were also invited by the Mongolian National Business Incubators Federation to initiate trust efforts with the Mongolian nomadic herders.
More than 72 hours have gone by and our six interns have been working day and night to create the Heritable Innovation Trust 2010, Mongolia and Papua New Guinea. It has been a grueling process but from their first draft, they appear to have a lot of great content. One Trust Item that is featured is the Traditional Sling (similar to an English Sling-Shot Device) of Papua New Guinea, which was demonstrated to them in Alakasam. The traditional shorter sling is used by the Qaqet community of Papua New Guinea, traditionally for warfare because it provides the user great accuracy.
Caitlin Boyd
Hello from Charlottesville, VA! We've been in the States for about two days now, working on the Trust document along with David Martin and Ken Dabkowski, who went to Mongolia while we were in PNG. The Trust is coming together nicely! It's been interesting acclimating to the pace here, getting back into the swing of things. Brisbane helped a little bit with the transition. We were only there overnight- long enough to go out to eat and shower, basically- but being around a big city took some getting used to.
While we have already heard that the H.I.T. PNG Team has reached the states, we received their last thoughts while on the trip.
Katie Martin:
So we have started our last day in PNG. It is really hard to believe that it is already time to leave. Time has flown since we got here. Even though it's sad to be going home so soon, I am very excited to see everyone. At this point last year, we were gearing up to go into our last week. I think that the group has gotten along so well has made the trip feel like it has gone faster.
We received two updates from Dr. David Martin today regarding our interns in Papua New Guinea.
Their last village had been to Matupit Island where they learned how the community has lived with an active volcano for over a decade. The trip included a dialogue with the community leaders about the redevelopment efforts and how their lives had been impacted.
Following that experience, they learned how to dig megapod eggs in the ash slopes of the volcano. The birds lay their eggs under six feet of ash and the community harvests the eggs by digging them up.
We received updates from our six interns in Papua New Guinea.
Katie Martin:
We got back from Raluana on Thursday and have just been chilling at T's since then. Everyone has been focusing on catching up on journal entries and preparing for David's arrival later this evening. We learned so much while we were at Raluana. Our mom, Eunice, had planned out an entire program, similar to the one that Ben from Raunsepna had last year, so we were busy busy for the 6 days we were there. I'm pretty sure that we could make just about anything out of palm fronds now.
We have received updates from our interns in Papua New Guinea. We are excited to hear that they are all doing well. There personal reflections are below:
Caitlin Boyd
We have been hanging out at T's house in Vunakanau for the past few days, resting up between Komgi and Raluana. We leave tomorrow morning for the latter, where we're told three trust items are already ready. We'll be there for around five days and a blog post will follow, of course!
In Komgi, we actually spent most of our time right outside of the village where a new cardamom dryer is being built.
Katie Martin:
So today we leave for Papua New Guinea. When we got into Sydney yesterday morning it was rainy and gray but that definitely didn't stop us from exploring. We went down to Darling Harbour and had breakfast at Starbuck's. Finally, we got to come back and take a shower after our 20 hours of flying. Never has a hot shower felt so nice. For the afternoon we just wandered around and went down to the Opera house. As we get closer and closer to leaving this morning I am starting to get more and more nervous. I wouldn't call it a bad nervous though.
The Heritable Innovation Trust team asked this year’s group of interns to prepare some additional thoughts about their upcoming trip as the trip gets closer. We wanted to learn more about how their preparations were going. Below, please find their responses:
Elspeth Missel-
Upon receiving our flight itinerary this past week, it struck me that we are really leaving in less than a month – yikes! In anticipation of the throng of papers and exams looming on the near horizon, I have tried to gather everything I will need for the trip in the past few weeks.
