Nothing Beats Studying in Belize!

My name is Carlos Kagame and I am a Rwandan student from Quest University Canada. Currently, completing my third year of University majoring in development studies. I happened to learn about Belize from a friend who has been here two years ago through Toucan Education Program, a study abroad program. I felt in love with Belize from just the stories and the pictures she took showing: food, music, culture, tourism and so on.

I tried to read some stuff about Belize as a country and I got so surprised to hear that Belize got its independence in 1981. I got more interested in knowing about the development aspect as well. One of the key tools to development is Education if you would agree with me on that.

One Friday afternoon, I rushed to the library and I found an interesting book called Education in Belize by J. Alexander Bennett. I started reading it. I flew to Belize the following day reading my book and landed in Belize on the next day. What a long flight!

When I got here all the people were friendly at the airport. I was welcomed but great smiles from Toucan Education Program crew (TEP) and my colleagues from Quest University Canada. Orlando and John, great Belizeans from TEP crew were very friendly and drove us to the restaurant called cheers. It was great and the food was amazing. Guess what RICE AND BEANS! Very similar to what I eat back home in Rwanda. I felt very welcomed.

The 12 of us from Quest University Canada stayed at Calico Jacks, one of the beautiful places that I have ever been. It was in the middle of the jungle. The following morning we went to visit a primary school which was very close to Calico Jacks. We had a great time with the kids and their teachers. We painted the school picnic tables, played soccer with them as well. These kids were so adorable; they gave us thank you notes! That made me love Belize more and its wonderful people. We also went for Zip lining. It was my first time to do so. I was a little nervous but I made it!

All these activities sound like fun and you may think we were just tourists enjoying our time in Central America. Yeah you are very right! Guess what it was not only just travelling we still had the academia part to be taken care of every evening for at least 3 hours of class and personal reflection on the academics for at least 4 hours. We had readings and assignments to do as well. We had limited access to the internet and I said rest in peace to social media such as Facebook, Whatsapp, and Snap chat and so on which made us to concentrate on our school work.

Dr. Ydahlia Metzgen the owner of the place we stayed at (Calico Jacks), she has worked with the IMF, very knowledgeable about the Belizean economy and development got to talk to us. We had the opportunity to hear from her a few times and we learned a lot from her. We also got to visit a local farmer in the village, enjoyed his water melons and we got to study about plants more so the food crops. During our stay at Calico Jacks, we visited many women’s associations for business. I was so amazed by how entrepreneurial these Belize women are.

During this trip, I learned so much in both theoretical and practical way. My colleagues and I got a chance to meet the Mayor of Orange walk district in Belize and learned so much about development in Orange Walk. We visited many places and I am sure I will share with you about it in the next blog.