Real Guy Work: Drilling in Guatemala

Picture yourself waking up at 6 in the morning to the skin tingling bellow of a howler monkey.  You stumble off of your semi-hard mattress and cringe at the mind numbing cold concrete floor beneath your feet.  You then get dressed, haphazardly brush your teeth (using bottled water of course), survey the condition of the mosquito bites on your hands, before stepping outside the barracks only to be hit with a wall of humidity that leaves you gasping for air.  Breakfast is the habitual mish mash of eggs, dry bread, and refried beans, before you hop in a pick-up to begin the long and bumpy journey up a windy mountain road to an awaiting drill rig keen on discovering what lies beneath the humus covered ground.

The above description was a typical start to my day (and my partner's) during our three week drilling program in the mountainous jungles of Guatemala.  What do I do you ask?  Being a geotechnical engineer - a plethora of things.  In this instance though, my work involved drilling a series of boreholes, ranging anywhere from 10 m to 60 m deep to design the walls of a future open pit nickel mine.  I'm not going to belabor the ethical issues involved in what I do for my clients.   Those that know me can attest to my somewhat dubious distrust and suspicion of certain uneducated NGOs whose baseless assertions regarding the actions of mining companies and their exploitation of locals are at times downright laughable.  Frankly, the amount of money and resources that mining companies nowadays pour into local communities, both in sustainable social and economic development, far outweighs any minor short-term disturbance of land that will eventually be re-vegetated and reclaimed (it's called a Closure Plan...read about sometime).  But I digress.

First, let us outline the perils of the jungle.  There is the heat and humidity, for which if you do not drink water regularly, you will pass out.  Then there is the wildlife, which includes poisonous snakes (such as the dreaded coral snake) and scorpions, crocodiles (who apparently were heavily in heat at the time we were there), iguanas, every type of mosquito and bug imaginable (at one point my hands could have been described as a bulbous mass), jungle leopards and jaguars, and howler monkeys (not really dangerous unless you decide to climb one of their trees).  Luckily most of these species are nocturnal.

Let us then discuss Guatemala's societal framework, which can be divided into the have and have nots, or, more accurately, by the delineating line between urban and rural communities.  Guatemala City may be likened to any large Latin American city, with endless and boisterous traffic coupled with the unmistakable dominance and intrusion of American influence in all aspects of society (I've never seen so many McDonalds in my life).  It's also a place where Hugo Chavez and Barack Obama wage a silent war at the gas pump, with both nations feverously competing for their market share.  

In the comparative sense, citizens are fairly well off. Many can afford maids to perform weekly house cleaning and washing of their vehicles (common practice in all of Latin America), with some even employing personal chauffeurs. Juxtaposing this metropolitan existence is life in the rural country, where locals are typically poor and extremely paranoid and wary of tourists, so much so that mugging, kidnapping, rape, and mob justice are a common occurrence.  We had security guards at our camp who happily displayed their sawed off shotguns as well as undercover guards, whose shiny semi-automatic handguns tucked behind their backs made me feel all warm and fuzzy (I think).  I never felt like I was in any real danger, though the drillers I worked with did tell me a tale in which, a week prior to our arrival, some local mountain villagers emerged out of the forest thicket brandishing machetes and shotguns in an attempt to ambush and rob them; to which they hastily hopped in their pick-up truck and frantically sped away.  There were also a few instances where my nightly transport out of the jungle was accompanied by a truck of armed security guards for "safety purposes" (whatever that implied).  Nevertheless, I was comfortable wallowing in my own ignorance and not asking too many questions.

Then there is the drilling itself.  Let me be clear that I don't actually perform any of the drilling.  That aspect is left to the drilling contractor.  My role is simply a supervisory one.  The drillers are the real grind horses, having to lift and carry around core barrels and drill rods all day, covering themselves in a perpetual sheen of grime and grease, while operating a machine designed to penetrate the depths of the earth.  In comparison, the typical extent of my manual labour consists of moving around core boxes and carrying around my overly packed equipment bag that is used to log soil and rock.  The drilling hours are long, ranging from 12 to 16 hour days and the pay is anything but spectacular compared to a North American wage.  Weather conditions are irrelevant.  Watching the men work, one quickly realizes that the majority of them would rather be doing something else.  However, in Central America, being a driller means enough pay to put food on the table for your family with enough left over to drown your physical and emotional pain in the amnesia-like affect of alcohol.  

One thing that I've learned being out on a rig is that you need to respect and appreciate the men (and sometimes women).  Placing yourself on a pedestal and barking out orders will get you nowhere.  The key is to find commonality and to see the work through their eyes.  You must earn their respect...not the other way around.  Once the respect is earned, then they will be more than happy to cooperate in any task that you might put forth.  One could argue that the process is similar to that of a captain or lieutenant earning the respect of his platoon.

The above ramblings were not to prove that I had a horrid time.  The reality was quite the opposite. Guatemala is a beautiful country with amazingly gracious people.  In fact, Guatemala provided me with my most enjoyable field experience to date.  This is probably due to a combination of having an amazing person as my wing-woman (partial Top Gun reference), competent drillers (a bit of a rarity in Latin America), an overly gracious and accommodating client, and some brilliant mountaintop vistas.  Many of my friends tell me that I'm lucky to have an amazing job that offers tremendous travel opportunities and a means of experiencing different cultures.  I suppose they are right, but the work is by no means a cake walk. Oh...did I mention the secluded tropical geothermal waterfall?