ABDF

Sunday, March 16, 2008

Well the past couple of days have had me getting a lot done, and yet not, at the same time.  Until last Monday, the catch phrase was “after the election.”  After the election this, after the election that; all business was put on hold until after the election.  Understandable, I guess, considering no one knew what was going to happen.  Now the problem is all this damn rain.

As I’ve mentioned previously, the monsoons have not ended.  It just keeps coming and coming.  The past two days have been particularly bad.  It ended finally this afternoon, but for the 24 hours previous, it rained non-stop.  And I mean non-friggin-stop.  It was a steady, continuous downpour.  Not excessively heavy but it never got light either.  No thunder and lightening but just steady, monotonous. Big, fat, heavy drops.

It’s starting to cause a lot of distress as flooding, while not deep, is surprisingly extensive.  The east coast is entirely flat; I can’t think of any hills in the immediate area at all.  All the roads, even the main north/south road, are a mess and the water is at least ankle deep in many places.  As a result, there has been some displacement from homes, and many of the roadside open air markets are closed.  In a place like this, households only have a couple of days worth of food, and so families are starting to run out.  And with the uncertainty of markets being open, shopping becomes a catch as catch can affair.  True, shops in town are open, but they don’t normally carry much fresh fruit and vegetables, let alone meat, and what they do have tends to be pricey, even during normal times.  That is, of course, if the trucks are even delivering; another bad effect of the flooding. Additionally, the rough seas are preventing the fishermen from doing their job and fish, more than any other meat, is the most affordable staple protein here.  So it would be way too early to say people are hungry.  I’m only saying that it is causing a great deal of disruption.  Today I heard one person grumble that she is unable to make fish curry for lunch.

So I have been filling my time with all sorts of meetings; project meetings, potential project meetings, and some meetings that I have nothing to do with, but I have nothing better to do and I know someone who is going.  All of this is well and good, I suppose.  It’s good to plan things out and try to nail down future dates for actual work, and it’s also good to hear of potential projects for the future.  It’s good to keep busy. But really, I’m getting antsy to go out and actually do something.

Even with the best weather, things here move very, very slowly, and part of the adjustment process learning to slow down.  In the past I’ve tried to bulldoze things, and while it does improve speed a little bit, the amount of energy spent for an incremental increase in time can be exhausting.  And it ticks people off.  On the other hand, if you let things develop in their own good time, nothing will happen at all.  So I’ve tried to find a middle ground, and I’m good at letting people know what I expect and by when.  I’ve also let people know that I’m not here to do all the work, and I want them to do their own part too.  If they don’t, I won’t.  I find being clear about this a motivating force.  Plus with all that needs to be done here, there’s always someone else willing to do their part on another project.  So I’m positing our projects as first come, first serve until the money runs out.  See?  Competition can work!  Well, at least it can help.

I tentatively accepted an important non-ABDF project today.  USAID, the biggest government-funded foreign development program in the US, and one of the biggest agencies in the world as a whole, has a Sri Lankan program called ASAP, which stands for Accelerated Skills Acquisition Program.  From looking at the grant application, this program is designed to increase the skills and capabilities of the Sri Lankan workforce through training and job placement.  Sounds pretty vague.  So I go to a meeting tomorrow in Kattankudy to meet the Batti District representative for USAID, and I will ask questions and get details.

Some Muslim friends of mine in Kattankudy want to apply for this program, and have asked me to supervise the project.  These folks, led by my friend Shafi, run the Muslim People’s Co-operative Society (MPCS).  This is a Kattankudy charitable society that requests/cajoles support from the business community to aid the poor.  Until now they’ve pretty much reactive; dealing with the tsunami and associated displaced persons, and then last summer’s military offensive.  Right now they are giving food to families displaced from their homes by these incessant, dreary, irritating rains.

So after we all meet with the USAID rep, and I have a clear idea of USAID’s expectations, I’m going to have a frank discussion with my friends about THEIR expectations for the program, and specifically what they expect from me.  I’ll also let them know what I would expect from them, in terms of time and work.  Then, if I think their wants are reasonable, the project goals attainable, and my friends’ commitment firm, then I’ll agree to supervise.

It could be a useful project for the community and good experience for me.  Or it could be an expectations nightmare.  Stay tuned folks!

After this morning’s meeting with my friends, I went to another friend’s (Aneesha) house for lunch to discuss our electrification project.  Aneesha is my lead contact with Olikulam Peace village.  This is the tsunami resettlement village that needs those last houses hooked up to the power grid.  Aneesha told me that the village head just got the estimate from the electricity board, and she was going to retrieve it from him Tuesday.  So soon we shall know exactly what the cost will be.  Then, assuming everything is in order, we make an appointment with the electricity board to come out and do the work.  The work itself, of course, will have to wait until things have dried out from… the rain.  Grrrrrr.

It was an interesting lunch, to say the least.  Of course it had lots of rice.  And there was Deviled Beef.  In Sri Lanka, to devil something is to make a mild, thick, almost dry sweet/sour sauce.  It’s very tasty, and entirely suited to the American palate; most of you would think it absolutely delicious.  I’ve got to get Aneesha to give me her recipe.  The other curry dish was brains.  Yup, calf brains.  Cut up into bite-sized pieces with potatoes and onions in a semi-thick yellow curry sauce.  And so of course I had to try it.  I’ve gotta tell you it was really quite good.  The brains themselves were a pale white, and had a soft buttery texture which was rather pleasant and not at all revolting like you’d imagine.  I couldn’t detect any particular taste I could identify as “brains”, but they did a nice job of picking up the subtle flavor of the mild spices they cooked with.  Altogether very pleasing.

Tuesday, March 18, 2008 (Two days later.)

Well, well, well.  The representative from USAID was two hours late for the meeting, and then only stayed long enough to tell us there was no meeting originally planned.  Needless to say, I was not a happy camper.  It was obviously that he was way behind schedule on his round to potential applicants and was going to blow us off.  As this guy, a Sri Lankan, spoke very good English, I half jokingly half seriously told him that as a citizen of the US who pays the taxes that pay for USAID, I would have expected better communication from a US organization.  And, by the way, if there was no meeting planned, why was he in Kattankudy? (The USAID office is in Batti.)  I think he got the point.  So now we have to make an appointment with some peon here Batti to get our questions answered.

I’ve taken on a job at Synergy. Synergy, you may recall, is the community development umbrella group managed by my British friend Sushila.  Last night she left for the UK for a much needed R&R vacation of several months.  Before leaving, Sushila asked me to stick around the project, and keep half an eye on things and be there for her staff.  Her staff, by the way, is this great group of 20-something year old Tamils who are pretty community-minded, by Sri Lankan standards.  They are very friendly, and very eager to get to know me.  So this morning I was to go to the office and meet with the kids (sorry – can’t help but think of them that way – if you met them you’d see why, so young and enthusiastic) and the Chairman of the Board to discuss ways I can be of assistance.  One such way might be to find a desperately needed computer (thanks for the help on this, Rachel!).

Because it’s a good way to be present at Synergy, and provide a sense of Western continuity to the place now that Sushila’s gone for a few months, and because I like the kids, I’m going to start a staff-only English conversation course.  This will let the staff get comfortable with me, and the types of exercises I’m planning will not only improve English communications skills, but hopefully build staff cohesion and teamwork skills.  These last two, especially, are never taught or developed here, a thing many Western companies and their Western managers here constantly complain about.  And certainly it will help should any of these kids get work overseas.

So I start tomorrow. We’re going to meet from 4-5 each Wednesday, for the last hour of their work day.  Gulp!  I’ve gotta get a lesson plan together quick.  At the meeting I was kinda/sorta hoping they’d say “OK, we start next week.” But these kids are so eager that one of them suggested this very afternoon!  So we compromised on tomorrow.  Thank goodness I packed my ESL Teacher’ handbook!

Today it rained a little in the morning, but soon the sun broke through for the first time in days.  Wow!  I tell you, I’ve never seen so much laundry go up so fast all around town.  Because I had this meeting at Synergy, I was delayed in getting mine done until this afternoon.  I have some drying but as I write this, it’s getting cloudy again.  Poop.  And I only got through half of what I have.  I do laundry during the rain, but drying it can take two or three days for a pair of pants and you quickly run out of space to hang stuff.  Not fun.

So those are the highlights of the past few days.

Hoping that you all are doing well,

xoxoxoxoxoxoxo

B.