Satan's Lair

So I have been struggling to write this blog post.I can't seem to put everything together. There has been so much that has happened in the last two weeks or so.I feel more motivated right now about work, I have a better understanding of what I am doing but why do I feel this way?

I guess I should look back at what I have been doing in the last few weeks
-Struggles with work ----- lack of understanding of what my job is, how do I fit in
-Village stay ----- I lived with a family in a rural village called South Downs where I get to see first hand what small holder farming life is like (what an experience, I wish I could live there for a long time)
-The Malawian retreat adventure spectacular!!!
-The return to work

Ah. Before I start I just want to say thanks to Mike, Rose, Andrew and Matthew for the birthday wishes and card. I just got it the other day when I returned from Malawi. It was really great!

So I have explained my struggles with work before but I will remunerate them quickly for those who are just getting caught up here:
-overwhelmed with expectations. my co-workers could not stress enough how high their expectations were for me, although they never did explain they. the expectations were just high. have you ever experienced this?
-felt as if I was filling in gaps instead of capacity building (gap filling is doing work for others here whereas capacity building is assessing looking for challenges my co workers face and help them develop skills so they can solve the problem on their own......although sometimes...as in my office....a challenge is not having enough time or too much work, thus gap filling is capacity building time.....solution: time machine or somehow give everyone powers like the Flash....but then they could abuse it....fuck im rambling. need to stop swearing too..)(...would I abuse the powers of the Flash if I had them...depends on my morals I suppose....r-a-m-b-l-I-n-g)
-although I understood the Rural Prosperity Initiative from a project standpoint I was having a hard time understanding the long term effects (and short term ones also).

I left the office on June 9th to stay in South Downs until June 13th were I there returned to Kitwe for a day to wash my clothes, eat some greasy food and mars bars and pack to leave for a nearby town of Ndola. I was visiting our satellite office there to get a better understand of how big our area is and the challenges Mwakoi faces (the field officer there).

While I was in Ndola I stay with my fellow JF and good friend Patrick from U of Calgary, he is working with biosand filters which are being promoted by an NGO called Seeds of Hope International Programs....SHIP (he is a follower of mine, you should check out his blog....it is wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy better than this one).

Working with Mwakoi gave me the chance to see how marketing of farming products goes down, I never got to see this before. I had this giant image in my head that you need a suit and a speech prepared...nope. We walked into a bunch of hotels, asked the the purchasing manager, showed him/her the beans, the exec chef came in, smelt them, asked for a sample, asked for a price and then said they would call us back. Pretty easy, I feel as if I could do it now.
The main reason we were doing this was because the agreement that was arranged with Freshpikt (remember the beans, low prices being given after a higher price was contracted) was fucked to shit (agin with the swearing anthony....) so IDE is side selling the beans to hotels, government institutions (hospitals, universitys, schools) in order to get the price of 1 USD (K5000) instead of 0.73 USD. So far, so good. All the places were down with the price of K5000. Horrah! More money for rural farmers! Now we just have to wait if they want to buy the beans and if so, how many kilos are we walking about here (hopefully a billion kilos which = $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$)

This was a great experience to see how an NGO can really help out the farmers but the plan is not to always be doing this. Our program is for 3-4 years, we wont be here forever. What happens when we are gone....it is important not to do the work but to facilitate relationships between the farmers and buyers themselves. I see this being a major struggle right now but hopefully next year when/if they grow beans they can go sell them without us.
A major component of this is to help farmers identify new markets that they can sell to. There are many hospitals, restaurants, schools that are willing to buy fresh produce but there is no connection between the buyer and seller. This is were we come in, think of us like a matchmaker. We dont want to be the person that carries the lover letter to the cute boy/girl across the room, we just want to be the person who whispers into your ear who has a crush on you...then its up to you what you do.

I guess that leads into sometime very interesting we talked about at retreat during the IDE meetings which is IDE's development philosophy : When farmers are given the right information needed (whether it be for agriculture techniques, marketing information, gender equality...etc) they will use the information to maximise their benefit (it is not worded exactly like this I just made it a little more clearer here..I hope I did anyway). This goes back to the person telling you someone in your class has a crush on you...just because you know, that does not mean you are going to do it (ok ok ok... I know this is really different, you get not income benefits from dating someone...or do you?? how rich are they?...anyway..."benefits" aside...im rambling damn it). How do you teach others to make the right decision for themselves. What do you think about this? I would love to hear some feedback. I have yet to come up with an answer but it has been plaguing me for a few days now.

Since I am talking about retreat now, I guess I should keep doing so. No?

Retreat was set in Senga Bay, Malawi (check it out on Google Maps, it is the most beautiful place I have ever been too. I will post pictures soon as I stop feeling bad for spending so much time there while my position should be about development work and not stunning beauty..anyway...rambling) where all 13 JF and about 7 long term volunteers got together to talk about:

-challenges that each of us are facing-our impact plans-development talk-getting caught up with EWB news and values-communication strategies
(haha. one of my talks in the challenges was about how I write my blog. I am never happy with it, I tend to ramble and put too much info. i said I would try and stop....well look at this post...shit)
I won't really get into the EWB news and values or challenges since I have talked about it a lot (work wise anyway...maybe I will talk about personal challenges...if thats what I could call them...). I have already talked about IDE's development theory, so we'll see where that goes. I feel lost here, hold on. My thoughts are fading.

Ok.Back on track.

Personal challenges.

One of the things I have been struggling a lot with but I have never vocalised it (keyboarded it) was my lack of satisfaction with the way I am communicating with experience with others and my self reflection. I have been having a hard time pulling myself from the moment of any situation and looking back on what is going on in the bigger picture. I feel like a tourist all the time, maybe that feeling won't go away but it is a shitty feeling. I am trying to to my best at integrating with people and work but I can't stop feeling like an outsider. Maybe this is a common feeling, I should ask around. I as if when I talk about my experience it is about what I am doing and not really what I am feeling during that time. This is the reason I have yet to talk about my village stay, I do not know how to convey it to everyone. I don't know how I feel.
I had some good ideas given to me on how I can convey my experiences in a different way. I will be trying them out over time to see what happens. Maybe you will notice, maybe you wont.
Our impact planning sessions were designed to help us set course in order to maximise our impact in 5 areas:

-project-office-personal-community-chapter/in Canada

Some of these are easy than others. Some are very difficult. Some just won't happen ( I keep telling myself not to talk like this but it's not work...or maybe it just takes time)
My two biggest focuses will be (and have been) my office and chapter/Canada. This blog is for Canada, I have also been planning some interesting learning sessions for members of UoG as well as some ideas for explaining the challenges rural farmers face everyday. As for my office I was given some great guidance and realisation about how I was going at things in the wrong way and I feel as if things are back on track (although I now have about 10X more work to do...but I love it, I just wish I could do it with you).

Other than those sessions we had a lot of fun. The place had a bar tab than you could run for your whole stay....I had the biggest bill...anyway..it was good to get together with people and celebrate. The experience made me realise how I get alot of reflection done by talking out my problems and solving them through conversation. I need to human wall to bounce ideas back and fourth (maybe I am just used to this because of all the group work we do in design classes at UoG and the working partnership I have developed with a rather excellent friend).

I will post pictures soon. I need to.This place is fantastic.

So how am I doing now that I am back?

Well I feel really pushed because I have some awesome objectives that are pretty fucking tangible (not just...oh hey do some capacity building...well they still are that...maybe I just understand better how to approach the situation) and I have an awesome drive to get work done now that I know what this program is all about (I am sorry I have not elaborated on this yet....ah South Downs...how you changed me in such a great way...maybe not a change but defiantly an appreciation for hard work and rural farming...).

I have tons of work to get done but I guess that means time will get by faster and we can be rocking and rolling the dance floor again.

This coming week is going to be hectic but a whole lotta fun.-Going to the field on Monday with some people from Freshpikt (the bean dudes) so that they can explain to the farmers why they changed the price on them-Tues and Wens are office days to work on a proposal for our final report/tool that we need to develop ( I will explain more about it once I get feedback)-Thursday traveling to Ndola to visit some farmers and talk to my co worker about personal development and capacity building (I will also be doing this here in Kitwe but I don't know when yet...this week sometime...I just need to get times from them)

Well.This has been a book.

I am sure there are blank spots.Ask me some questions and I will do better at responding to them.

Much love to you all.

Tony

Oh the things I miss

things i miss:

-having not to worry if this water i am drinking is going to make me sick.
-crunchy, fresh vegetables-walking around late at night without worrying about the people around me. i hate being howled at once the sun is down.
-cheerios and milk-"clean" air. walking down the highway to work or being on a motorbike as a giant bus passes by and pours 5 gallons of black smoke down your throat is about 5 packs of cigarettes, i have the math....i can prove it (no i cant)-never having to worry about power fluctuations-lack of swimming...i miss this huge
-you

things i love or that have slowly grown on me:

-african time. i hate it and love it. i tend be to rather punctual person (maranger...shut up....5 minutes is still all i need) but when i have to be somewhere i can usually show up 30min late only to find the other party is not there yet. everyone is zambia loves the idea of african/zambian time
-the "public" transport system here is off the hook. people own these busses that run everywhere as long as the sun is shinning. all you have to do is stick your hand out and get picked up. i will take a video and post it on here when i return to canada.
-bani's (fucking) pizza. patrick and I will be posting more on this in the future.
-the heat

just a shout out to any one doing research or reading lots of papers in PDF format. If you find anything interesting (anything at all) I would love to read it. I have decided to come to the office everyday (even weekends) as it is easy toget work done here and I tend to take breaks to read. So I would love to read anything that you think is rock and roll.

I have also discovered a great way of learning new things without the use of the internet (well I still use the net but I dont have it at work). I hit up random things on wikipedia (world war 2, roman empire, michael jackson...) and download the page to my key. It is an awesome way to keep up with new learning.

Somethings I have been interested in from the books I have been reading:
-Game Theory
-Philosopher Karl Popper
-Programs in Planning and Policy-
Levithan

oh.i also got invited to a wedding on july 4th.
INDEPENDANCE WEDDING WITH WILL SMITH!!!haha. but seriously.wedding time. alright.
I guess this was more about me and less about my placement.

Cheers,
Tony

sad day

hey everone.
i just got back from malawi two days ago. still trying to process everything that went through me - village stay, massive traveling, jf retreat. expect a solid post soon.

i just found out michael jackson is dead.
i wish i had a copy of thriller to console me right now.

i will miss you mj.
we all will.

overdue photo update. time works backwards here, you go from bottom to top. yeyeey

Sunset at the end of a long day in Ndola, our motorcycle broke right before this thankfully my co-worker fixed it with copper wire...ahh Zambia.

Some local fisherwomen

The spoils of a long afternoon fishing

Catching up with some local fisherwomen in Ndola

Down by the dam in Ndola

There be crocodiles in these waters

Maize farm outside of Ndola, right now its not maize season thus the reason why things look so barren.

Pineapple farmer explaining to me how he sells these puppies when they are ready. There is a farmer down the road who acts as a middle man with a South African company. This man pays the farmer K5000 for each pineapple (about 1USD).

Wait wait wait....pineapples don't grow on trees...

My village host family, our final dinner together. We had quite the feast, both John and his brother got their wives to prepare supper without telling one another so when it came time to eat they were surprised to find this out. Luckily we combined both meals into one and feasted (yet this was not as easy not well received as it sounds).

John and I being escorted through the field by a local farmer

The soon to be married couple showing us their rape and cabbage farm.

Rape and Cabbage galore. You eat and grow and sell this stuff until you have nothing else to do. There are benefits to this, people will buy it but at the same time because everyone grows this you get a pretty low price for it considering all the work that goes into it. This is why diversification is really important.

Soon to be married. House is already built, they are just waiting to tie the knot in August so they can share it together.

Puppies. What else can I really say.

Ah the wild fields of rape. Picking this is a chore, you tear the leaves off the vine then bunch a handful togther (this is about 15 plants of so of leaves). The amount you see here would take about 6 hours alone and would fetch less than K150000 (30USD).

This building has a story. In the 1950's before Zambia was Zambia it was called Northern Rhoedisia which was under British rule. There was a doctor who owned the farm which this building is apart of, when he retired he was allowed to capture those who aimlessly wander the bush and brought them here. He would feed them and take care of them while at the same time he was extracting their blood to export. This ended quickly when Independance came into play, the Zambian goverment did not renew his buisness permit.

The son of a farmer who takes care of the cattle. These cattle were given to dozens of farmers in South Downs by IFA (I don't know what it stands for). The agreement was that the farmers would rasie the cattle and then sell them to the market after a few years. Once sold they were allowed to keep the profit and the only thing they were required do in return is to pay 10% of the initial value of the baby calves (about K250000, 50$ USD).

Walking through the feilds with John. Showing me the ropes.

When you don't got irrigation equipment such as treddle pumps or rope and washer you gotta use a bucket. Ya, tons of work.

Farmer using a watering cane to feed all the rape. So much rape it is wild.

Walking by a nursary of green peppers.

Nursaries gallor. Everything from green peppers to onions. Diversification baby!

A rural farmer and his family in South Downs.

The finished product of rat. Oh wow tasty it was....
That is Shima on the left, one eats that with every meal here. Your day has not happend if you have not consumed mass amounts of this food.

Oh it's me. On top of the watch tower. How lovely.

View of the main road in South Downs, this is were all the magic happens. This is the site of the currently shut down clinic. It shut down due to the only nurse working being scared off by witch craft. From what I am told it is a serious problem here.

Meeting grounds for many meetings including IDE and ministry of Agriculture ones. The one being held this day was about the new Fertilizer Support Program which allocates subsidized fertilizer to farmers. The agenda for the meeting was the facilitation of a community lead board to oversee the distribution for South Downs.

WINDMILL!!

View of the South Downs/Zambian landspace from atop the watchtower. I should have taken a photo of the tower.

Jesus.

Cleaning the rat after cutting it up.

Rat getting ready for some cutting up.

Skinning the old rat. Who needs fur anyways.

John's son Effrem.

Close up of lunch. I couldn't wait. Yes I could have.

John is such a nice guy, be bought a special lunch for me.

Harvesting rape. This was about 2.5 hours of work with 6 people. We got 89 bundles which is about k120000 ($25 USD).

This is the waterline that runs up to the storage tank at Felix's farm. He uses it to water his garden thanks to gravity.

Diesel pump. It is used to pump surface water up to a storage tank. This storage tank powers a drip irrigation system to save time and effort on the farm.

Zambian floodplain.

Felix's wife (I forget her name). She is a great rolemodel for the community, she knows how to diversify and understand the aspects of risk and planning of new crops for markets. There is a lot to be learned from her.

Oh so much rape. It never ends.

I takes 4 guys to water a banatree.

So these guys sit around all day and watch the pool fill up. When they saw that I had a camera that got really excited, photos like this make me smile.

The person who owns this farm has invested a lot of money into. He has about 4 hectars of banana trees, 1 hectar of oranges plus tons of mangos. He has a pumping system that uses a giant diesel generator to pump water from 3 boreholes into this pool. The water is then used to a drip irrigation system for the bananas.

I never got this mans name but he sure loved being shirtless and green bananas.

Two of the workers at a banada plantation near South Downs. John took me here to see a really different farm that was not a rural one.

This man brought me up a hill to see all the banana trees. Had this strange feeling the whole time I was there that this place did not fit well with everyone else in South Downs. I later learned that the person who owned this place was a wealthy guy in town who hires these men to take care of the place during the week.

Bananas!!!!

Some clouds and baby banana trees on our way to a plantation with John.

Some of John's kids. This was the first time they really came close to me. People in the village, especially children were scared of me for the first few days. By the end most shook my hand...some hesitantly.

John and Ester's family. They took care of me for a week. I learned so much about rural life from them.

Kids! I wish I recalled all their names. There was not much interaction between me and these kids as they did not know english and were hella scared of me. Regardless, they were lovely.

You could see the moon until 10am.

Ngossa stealing my hat.

I use Paul as a way to work out.

I don't know why I put this. But it is for you.

These kids really keep me grounded here. Ngossa is the bomb. She wants to be a nurse.

She has way better hair than me.

My house in Kitwe. The township is called Wuzakeli Meseshi

Ngossa

Estella and Ngossa

Rope and Washer Pump fun time.

Aggie (my boss at IDE) giving some detailed instructions on how to use the pump.

This is a rope and washer pump. It works with well..rope and washers. They run through a tube and capture water between each section of washers and carry it up, once above it throws it out the tube. This pump works really well because it can get water as deep as 50m and it really easy to use.

Instalation of a pump.

Festus explaining the differences in pumps and how each one works.

Tubes going down the borehole!

There is a crowd. Energy is in the air at this irrigation training session.

This lady recived a river pump show she can use it on her farm to demonstrate to others how effective it can be. She was chosen because she has strong leadership skills, she is a single mother and a great farmer.

Treddle pumping action!

Priming the pump

Riding in the back of a truck on the highway with all the irrigation equipment.

Irrigation training and showing off the treddle pump. Can you see all the cabbage. This pump is hooked up to a river but it can also used in a borehole as we will see above.

Oh the cabbage. Everyone grows cabbage here. It is rather delicious when fried in a pan with oil.