Sunday, June 20, 2010
Getting to Colorado
Enough posting for today. Just a quick update. If you want to see what was going on during the first week of the Unreasonable Institute (at the start of this month) head over to www.unreasonable.tv
72 hours at home
NB: Written in June, but the events are from the end of May.
After over 20 hours of travel, I made it back to O'Hare airport in Chicago where I started this journey on November 13, 2008. I got to see my parents and my sister (only one was in town, but she was especially generous in giving me things to taunt her about). We spent a lot of time catching up. After that, I got to spend some time with friends at home.
Grace is one of my oldest and closest friends, and she's one of the few people I know who can form stronger bonds with a puppy than I can. It was nice seeing her and her puppies. Her brother also showed me his tattoos, which are pretty impressive. The most memorable part was definitely when she let me play with one of her new pets. I can't seem to remember the name of the pet, but she crawled up my arm and climbed onto my head. I think I prefer puppies to snakes.
Amy is one of my good friends from college and she works downtown, so I went and spent an afternoon with her. We visited the Art Institute of Chicago and walked around Millenium Park and Navy Pier. I have to say that in 3.5 years of going to school together, I doubt I saw her in a skirt even five times. And then, on her off-day from work she was wearing a skirt. It's amazing how life post-college changes us. Anyway, we had a fantastic day and caught up on tons (a lot has happened to both of us) and spending a day in downtown Chicago was really revitalizing for me.
I also took the opportunity to stop by my old high school and say hi to some teachers. It was great to talk to a lot of people and see how things have changed in such a short time. (Well, I graduated six years ago, but still...) I walked past the chemistry classrooms and thought fondly of how much I learned there (Mr. Hunt who taught me for two years has since retired) and how useful it had been during my time in Kenya. I gave a short talk to a class and realized that it's hard to sum up the previous 199 posts on this blog. Even to give a quick synopsis and some lessons learned. I could barely string together a few words to convey much of anything.
We also had family over on Friday night. It was nice to see my cousins and catch up with them (more people on the list of people who I should send updates to but never manage to). My dad threw a fantastic barbecue. I finally met my sister's fiancé and learned a good deal about him (I think he already knew a lot more about me). After that, I snuck out for a quick poker game. I had a string of rough hands, but ultimately won 25 cents on the night. I also got to catch up more with high school friends, including one who is about to go serve with the Peace Corps. I also gave him a bunch of files and packing tips for his imminent service.
And then it was time to fly away. Not back to Africa, but on to Colorado. More to come on that soon.
P.S. 200th post :)
After over 20 hours of travel, I made it back to O'Hare airport in Chicago where I started this journey on November 13, 2008. I got to see my parents and my sister (only one was in town, but she was especially generous in giving me things to taunt her about). We spent a lot of time catching up. After that, I got to spend some time with friends at home.
Grace is one of my oldest and closest friends, and she's one of the few people I know who can form stronger bonds with a puppy than I can. It was nice seeing her and her puppies. Her brother also showed me his tattoos, which are pretty impressive. The most memorable part was definitely when she let me play with one of her new pets. I can't seem to remember the name of the pet, but she crawled up my arm and climbed onto my head. I think I prefer puppies to snakes.
Amy is one of my good friends from college and she works downtown, so I went and spent an afternoon with her. We visited the Art Institute of Chicago and walked around Millenium Park and Navy Pier. I have to say that in 3.5 years of going to school together, I doubt I saw her in a skirt even five times. And then, on her off-day from work she was wearing a skirt. It's amazing how life post-college changes us. Anyway, we had a fantastic day and caught up on tons (a lot has happened to both of us) and spending a day in downtown Chicago was really revitalizing for me.
I also took the opportunity to stop by my old high school and say hi to some teachers. It was great to talk to a lot of people and see how things have changed in such a short time. (Well, I graduated six years ago, but still...) I walked past the chemistry classrooms and thought fondly of how much I learned there (Mr. Hunt who taught me for two years has since retired) and how useful it had been during my time in Kenya. I gave a short talk to a class and realized that it's hard to sum up the previous 199 posts on this blog. Even to give a quick synopsis and some lessons learned. I could barely string together a few words to convey much of anything.
We also had family over on Friday night. It was nice to see my cousins and catch up with them (more people on the list of people who I should send updates to but never manage to). My dad threw a fantastic barbecue. I finally met my sister's fiancé and learned a good deal about him (I think he already knew a lot more about me). After that, I snuck out for a quick poker game. I had a string of rough hands, but ultimately won 25 cents on the night. I also got to catch up more with high school friends, including one who is about to go serve with the Peace Corps. I also gave him a bunch of files and packing tips for his imminent service.
And then it was time to fly away. Not back to Africa, but on to Colorado. More to come on that soon.
P.S. 200th post :)
Saturday, June 19, 2010
Preparing for take-off
Sorry for the immense delay. It was nice to take a little time off of reflection. I probably won't get to fill in all the details from the last month, but I'll do my best to get some of the better stories up here.
Well, just before leaving Arusha I had finally settled into a pretty good routine. I settled into the new house, which is certainly comfortable, but its location means that the kids like to visit me. A lot. I feel less like a playmate and more like a toy. It's also unfortunate that our "sitting room" is a workshop during the day, so there's plenty of dangerous things to keep out of their hands. Just a little exhausting. On the plus side, we're keeping the house stocked with lots of vegetables, so I was eating at least a salad per day. And my puppy was spending every moment that he could with me. I'm not sure how he's doing now that I'm gone. I miss him, and I hope that he'll still be around when I get back. Not exactly a sure thing.
Work was pretty hectic as I tried to finish up a lot of loose ends before leaving. Too many hours spent on accounting, but at least I squared it all away before leaving. I also followed up with a bunch of my contacts around town to check in with them. The most important stop was definitely at Tanganyika Farmers' Association (TFA). TFA has large agriculture shops in 11 major cities across Tanzania and I visited 5 of them on my trip to the south. I went in to schedule an appointment since I wasn't sure which person I needed to call. They brought me to an office and asked what work the company does, so I explained to them about how our maize sheller works. The woman was very polite in telling me that it didn't seem like a good fit with the other products that they stock. She was about to show me to the door when I stopped her. I explained how much positive feedback we had received from the branch managers at each branch and I started dropping names. I think her favorite part was when I did an impression of Mr. Werekyasa in Mafinga (every time I explained a feature of the product he just replied by saying "Sure?!?" and it kinda made me feel like I was hosting an infomercial or something). Anyway, she invited me to meet with the Director so that we could formally begin the negotiation process.
I was also trying to work on my external tasks (I woke up for the last IDDS meeting while I was in Tanzania, but was just too exhausted for one last 1:30 AM meeting). I made an introduction over email between two groups working on similar projects and got the following reply "Your intro has turned into a 10 person meeting at the UN logistics base in Port au Prince..." That was pretty exciting.
Anyway, after I finished up everything in Arusha and said way too many hasty good-byes, I returned to Nairobi. In true Daniel fashion, I had to frantically search for a small plastic bag that I lost on the bus-ride and found it a week later in my suitcase. (I swear that I turned that bag inside out twice!) I took care of a bunch of GCS errands in Nairobi's industrial area all morning. I didn't feel like taking matatus, so I think I wound up walking about 10 miles running my errands. At one point, someone on the street called me a Kikuyu (the most populous tribe in Kenya). I replied (I was walking past his stall, so it was probably shouting rather than just replying) that I was a Taita (the tribe I lived with for 12 months in Kenya). Then someone greeted me in the Taita language from a neighboring stall. I replied and greeted them back, and everyone cheered. Oftentimes, Nairobi is frustrating, but that was actually a really fun exchange.
After I finished with those errands, I decided to visit the Peace Corps office. Just outside the office, a Land Cruiser stopped alongside me and some of the volunteers who were taking care of Peace Corps business in Nairobi recognized me and greeted me. And then they told me that they were just talking about me. That was pretty random, since I had not communicated with them in 5 months at that point (all my fault, I need to be better about keeping in touch with my "neighbors"). At the office, I first went to talk to Louis (he was one of my most trusted allies there) and ask him how things were going in the Small Enterprise Development sector which he manages. We had a really nice conversation and I told him all about my work at GCS. He told me that he wanted us to demonstrate our machines at training and that he might want one for his mother who harvested such a huge crop this year that she's worried about losing it to weevils and other pests (still, that's a much better problem to have than recent years when farmers had to cope with little or no harvest at all). I also dropped by to visit with Enos (the director of PC Kenya's education program, which is the program I was part of for 14 months) and we had a nice conversation. I have to say that in general, when education doesn't come up with Enos, our discussions are very pleasant.
After that, I went back and actually spent a little time with the volunteers in Nairobi and they all wanted to know how they could buy our maize shellers as well. It was really exciting. They also filled me in on the latest program news and made me feel like I hadn't left at all. But after we all finished our first beer, I realized that I needed to hurry back to City Centre to pick up my suitcase and head to the airport for my final departure. At the airport I made some phone calls to some friends in country, but I had used up most of my credit calling Zambia and Ghana for IDDS, so I didn't get to talk for too long. Then, after passing through security 3 times (yeah, it's complicated at Nairobi's airport) I got on the plane (first time in 18 months) and set off back home.
Well, just before leaving Arusha I had finally settled into a pretty good routine. I settled into the new house, which is certainly comfortable, but its location means that the kids like to visit me. A lot. I feel less like a playmate and more like a toy. It's also unfortunate that our "sitting room" is a workshop during the day, so there's plenty of dangerous things to keep out of their hands. Just a little exhausting. On the plus side, we're keeping the house stocked with lots of vegetables, so I was eating at least a salad per day. And my puppy was spending every moment that he could with me. I'm not sure how he's doing now that I'm gone. I miss him, and I hope that he'll still be around when I get back. Not exactly a sure thing.
Work was pretty hectic as I tried to finish up a lot of loose ends before leaving. Too many hours spent on accounting, but at least I squared it all away before leaving. I also followed up with a bunch of my contacts around town to check in with them. The most important stop was definitely at Tanganyika Farmers' Association (TFA). TFA has large agriculture shops in 11 major cities across Tanzania and I visited 5 of them on my trip to the south. I went in to schedule an appointment since I wasn't sure which person I needed to call. They brought me to an office and asked what work the company does, so I explained to them about how our maize sheller works. The woman was very polite in telling me that it didn't seem like a good fit with the other products that they stock. She was about to show me to the door when I stopped her. I explained how much positive feedback we had received from the branch managers at each branch and I started dropping names. I think her favorite part was when I did an impression of Mr. Werekyasa in Mafinga (every time I explained a feature of the product he just replied by saying "Sure?!?" and it kinda made me feel like I was hosting an infomercial or something). Anyway, she invited me to meet with the Director so that we could formally begin the negotiation process.
I was also trying to work on my external tasks (I woke up for the last IDDS meeting while I was in Tanzania, but was just too exhausted for one last 1:30 AM meeting). I made an introduction over email between two groups working on similar projects and got the following reply "Your intro has turned into a 10 person meeting at the UN logistics base in Port au Prince..." That was pretty exciting.
Anyway, after I finished up everything in Arusha and said way too many hasty good-byes, I returned to Nairobi. In true Daniel fashion, I had to frantically search for a small plastic bag that I lost on the bus-ride and found it a week later in my suitcase. (I swear that I turned that bag inside out twice!) I took care of a bunch of GCS errands in Nairobi's industrial area all morning. I didn't feel like taking matatus, so I think I wound up walking about 10 miles running my errands. At one point, someone on the street called me a Kikuyu (the most populous tribe in Kenya). I replied (I was walking past his stall, so it was probably shouting rather than just replying) that I was a Taita (the tribe I lived with for 12 months in Kenya). Then someone greeted me in the Taita language from a neighboring stall. I replied and greeted them back, and everyone cheered. Oftentimes, Nairobi is frustrating, but that was actually a really fun exchange.
After I finished with those errands, I decided to visit the Peace Corps office. Just outside the office, a Land Cruiser stopped alongside me and some of the volunteers who were taking care of Peace Corps business in Nairobi recognized me and greeted me. And then they told me that they were just talking about me. That was pretty random, since I had not communicated with them in 5 months at that point (all my fault, I need to be better about keeping in touch with my "neighbors"). At the office, I first went to talk to Louis (he was one of my most trusted allies there) and ask him how things were going in the Small Enterprise Development sector which he manages. We had a really nice conversation and I told him all about my work at GCS. He told me that he wanted us to demonstrate our machines at training and that he might want one for his mother who harvested such a huge crop this year that she's worried about losing it to weevils and other pests (still, that's a much better problem to have than recent years when farmers had to cope with little or no harvest at all). I also dropped by to visit with Enos (the director of PC Kenya's education program, which is the program I was part of for 14 months) and we had a nice conversation. I have to say that in general, when education doesn't come up with Enos, our discussions are very pleasant.
After that, I went back and actually spent a little time with the volunteers in Nairobi and they all wanted to know how they could buy our maize shellers as well. It was really exciting. They also filled me in on the latest program news and made me feel like I hadn't left at all. But after we all finished our first beer, I realized that I needed to hurry back to City Centre to pick up my suitcase and head to the airport for my final departure. At the airport I made some phone calls to some friends in country, but I had used up most of my credit calling Zambia and Ghana for IDDS, so I didn't get to talk for too long. Then, after passing through security 3 times (yeah, it's complicated at Nairobi's airport) I got on the plane (first time in 18 months) and set off back home.
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