Chopsicles

In my previous post, I promised to write something more about the experience and the culture of being here, but I’ve been finding it particularly difficult to distil my disjointed thoughts down to anything meaningful. Nevertheless, here are some thoughts so far.

Time

Prior to coming over, I went through a whole bunch of training material with SIM Australia, talking about the Zambian culture and various things that can cause tension for people doing this sort of work. One of the things highlighted was the difference between a people oriented culture and an event oriented culture. A simple example of people oriented culture is that, when heading to a meeting, if you run into someone you know, it is more important to acknowledge the person and spend time with them than it is to attend the meeting on time. Acknowledgement is quite a big thing.  Normally, I would be fairly shy and often not say hello to a stranger unless they’d said hello to me. However, through the readings, I realised that this would be interpreted as me not valuing that person, so I’ve been making an extra effort to say hello to most people who I meet. It’s been surprising how warmly this has been received, and people look so very different when their face opens up in a smile. I think that during my previous time in Kenya, I’d probably misinterpreted the people as being unfriendly and, as a result, had come across as being quite rude myself.

The other side to this orientation is that you need to be pretty flexible in terms of deadlines and expectations. When something is scheduled for 9, it will often start at 9.30. It would be easy to get upset about this, but when you consider the hardships that many people go through, I think it’s easier to readjust our expectations. Not everyone has a car and they may be at the mercy of whatever transport is available, if they’re not walking.

A street in Solwezi, the closest town, about 200km from the hospital

There is a wonderful rhythm to life here that I don’t think I fully appreciated when last in the region. Things just happen, even though it initially looks a bit chaotic. Life is adaptive rather than planned. However, it does mean that life is much more ‘in the moment’ and death is a lot more present. I attended a staff meeting at the theological college here and, rather than starting with all of their current work duties, the meeting started with each person sharing about how their family was and any health issues. Someone shared how a family member had fallen off a truck whilst going to market. When people pray for travelling mercies here, they really mean it. Road traffic accidents seem to be relatively common.

Music

The music has been just incredible. I’ve captured a bunch of different sound files on my phone but I can’t upload them currently. In a couple of the churches I’ve visited so far, they’ve had hymn books (in both English and the local languages), and started by asking for suggestions from the congregation. Someone will say ‘number 242′ or some other number, and then someone will lead with the first line from that particular song. By the end of the second line, most of the congregation has joined in with a resounding wall of song, it’s quite incredible and the joy it brings to the participants is remarkable.

Choir at an outdoor church service

Food and being a ‘local’

The staple food here is nshima (see below), a food with a consistency something like mashed potatoes, made from maize meal. It’s often eaten with an accompaniment of cabbage and chicken or fish. It’s eaten with only the right hand, which takes a bit of getting used to, but I actually really enjoyed it (in moderation!). I’m not sure how I’d go if I had to eat it for pretty much every meal, as most locals do.

From Wikipedia - Nshima (top right corner) with three relishes

On a similar note, I’ve been reflecting lately on whether it really is possible to live as a local in places where we serve. This was kind of triggered when a missionary who’s been here over 30 years said that, although people often say that she’s a Zambian, she knows she’s not and never will be.

My current thinking is that being a ‘local’ is probably not entirely possible, and also not necessarily desirable. Like anywhere, there is a wide range of different local lifestyles here, some of which vary according to wealth. I’m never going to look like a local here, I’d always stand out as someone different, and I’m not particularly keen on sleeping on the floor, eating only Zambian food and trying to adjust my stomach to drinking local water. Furthermore, there are certain things that I’ve grown accustomed to in my 35 years that I’m rather fond of and which help me navigate life. Nevertheless, if these realities are acknowledged, I think it is still possible to be mostly happy and work effectively and respectfully as an expatriate. It’s kind of obvious when I write it down, but it’s been something of a revelation to me.

Ok, that’s all for now. Just on the bus returning from Victoria Falls where my highlight was having our small boat chased by a hippo. I’ll write more about that shortly.

Well, I’ve been doing a tremendous job at being terrible at updating this blog. The trip so far has been thoroughly enjoyable and fulfilling. I could probably write more than anyone would care to read, so I’ll keep to an abridged version and try and not bore you with too many details of the technical bits. I’ve made three stops so far, as illustrated in the magnificently crafted diagram below:

Lusaka

The first stop was in Lusaka, the Zambian capital, where I was working with the SIM Zambia office to advise on their upcoming office move and some related network enhancements. Due to the relatively slow internet speeds, the windows updates had been turned off, meaning that the machines lacked security fixes for many vulnerabilities. The antivirus programs also hadn’t updated recently, either due to the slow net speeds or because of expired subscriptions. As expected, this meant that the computers were generally pretty badly infected with viruses. This would seem likely to be a common issue in many places with slower internet connections, and probably isn’t something that is taken into account when these OS paradigms are designed – i.e. they assume that users will be able to receive large updates. Internet is gradually getting faster here (check this out) but, in the meantime, I’m not sure of the way around this issue.

Ndola

After a week in Lusaka I got a lift to Ndola, Zambia’s third largest city, which is about 4 hours drive away. I was asked to help out at the theological college there to look at a couple of network issues and to review their website, but spent almost the entire two days helping a lady called Nama to design an updated website. I’ll try and post a link when it’s up. I was staying with Timothy and Zara Woo, a couple born in Hong Kong, but most recently from New Zealand. As in Lusaka, the hospitality was spectacular and the food wonderful. It’s been fantastic meeting people from all over the world who share similar passions. After two days in Ndola, I jumped on the bus to Solwezi, where I’d arranged with Rachel that we’d meet. We’d been in constant contact by Skype, text, email and any other possible means, but it was quite overwhelming to know I’d be seeing her again after nearly 4 months. However, due to cultural constraints, our reunion was limited to a rather restrained hug before we got a lift back to the hospital about 2 hours drive away. This photo is from the drive. This look is known as my ‘oh no, it’s a camera, I’d better smile’ look.

Mukinge Hospital

Here at the hospital, my first task has been to look at some issues with slow internet. Fortunately, with some help from colleagues back in Australia, there seem to have been some great improvements so far. The internet connection here is through a satellite link provided by a group called LinkNet. LinkNet do a lot of work focussed on bringing various technologies to rural Zambia, and one of their crew is up here this week to help make a number of changes. Having a solid internet connection can make the prospect of working in a rural hospital or the nearby school much more attractive to potential doctors and teachers. It’s a great privilege to be able to be part of it.

Hmmm… this update has been very task focussed, I’ll try and include more reflections on culture and experience in future updates. It’s on my to-do list.

Ah, I’m finally at the enjoyable point of being checked in, knowing that there’s nothing I can do about anything I’ve forgotten. Sitting in the waiting lounge for the Melb->Syd flight, and thought it might be a good time to reflect on what I’m hoping to get out of the trip. I’m super excited about seeing Rachel, but also pretty excited about the things I might be able to do. Someone was generous enough to donate a nice 13″ laptop, so I’ll be leaving that, together with another netbook at the school in Mukinge. Other tasks include:

• Helping with SIM office move in Lusaka, replicating then enhancing existing network
• Network support and IT tuition at Theological college in Ndola
• Network troubleshooting and IT tuition at Mukinge hospital
• Setting up two computers at school near Mukinge and providing some basic IT tuition

However, I’m trying to be prepared for the possibility that I may not be able to get as much done as I’d like. In any case, since it’s a relatively short trip, I’m trying to see it as an opportunity to learn more about what sort of IT support aid workers require, and how I might fit into that equation. At this point, I suspect the best long term outcomes will come from training up nationals. Something else which seems really powerful is establishing or improving internet connectivity, since this can connect to a global community and massively increase the resources available to a community for everything from farming and medicine, to IT and the arts. It all seems pretty obvious, but it just seems so worthwhile to me right now. Anyways, flight is about to board.  Definitely excited/nervous now.

I no longer have an excuse for procrastination, flights are booked and I’ll be leaving in less than two weeks on Monday June 6th. Key dates are:

June 6th – Leave Melbourne, arrive Zambia
June 17th – Head up to Mukinge Hospital (to be confirmed)
Mid July – Visit Livingstone/Victoria Falls (to be confirmed)
August 4th – Leave Lusaka, arrive Cape Town
August 13th/14th – Leave Cape Town, arrive Melbourne.

I’ve seen a rough list of the work to be done over there, and it looks like I’ll be pretty busy. My two main fears are that I’ll be stuck somewhere without google, and that I’ll be stuck somewhere without coffee. If I should be stuck in a place without both, it could get ugly. Might be picking up a new laptop today, which would mean I could leave this one over there. I think I might be able to manage carrying about 3 laptops, so I’m currently looking at where these would be most needed.

Exciting news, it looks like I’ll be heading back to Africa very shortly. Rachel is over in rural Zambia with SIM and has confirmed that they’ve got some IT requirements across a few projects there. I’ve been talking with the SIM Australia guys to get all the details sorted, and looks like I’ll be going over in early June, all going well! Things are well and truly in train so I’ve been getting poked with needles, and just finished work last Friday, giving me about a month to prepare. I’m really interested in trying to offer support in a way that best serves the country in the long term, as the best intentioned efforts can often be unhelpful. To this end, I’m hoping to speak to as many people as possible to determine what equipment to take, how to configure it, how to encourage local skills, what support model works best etc.

Anyway, I’ll write further as these plans progress, but at this point I know little more than that I’ll be going to Zambia with a little bit of time in the capital, Lusaka, and some time up near Mukinge hospital. The work is likely to include some web design/updating, network configuration, computer maintenance, and hopefully setting up some new computers at a school near the hospital. I find working with schools particularly exciting because of the potential impact, but it would obviously be great to help the hospital in any way also. The rough map below is ‘borrowed’ from the Mukinge site and highlights the location of the Mukinge hospital. I’ll give it back later.

To summarise the blogging talk given earlier today, the best way to understand blogs is to try one out for yourself! The two main blogging sites mentioned were wordpress.com and blogspot.com, each of which have a simple sign up process and you really only need an email address to get started. If you want to start an anonymous blog, sign up for an email at gmail.com, hotmail.com or any free mail service and use that address, though your email address is generally hidden by default anyway in most blogging software.

The examples of different blogs on the internet shown today:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/
http://gizmodo.com/
http://lifehacker.com/
http://icanhascheezburger.com/
http://www.treehugger.com/
http://chopsicles.com/ (this blog!)
http://openobjects.blogspot.com/ (my sister Mia’s blog)

Also mentioned was a blogging site http://posterous.com/ which will create a blog from any emails posted to post@posterous.com, which I thought was pretty nifty and perhaps useful for people who don’t like the standard way of blogging. There are also numerous other ways to create and use blogs, like installing one on your own server but I’ve chosen not to address that option in detail. 

Finally, to prove that youtube embedding works in wordpress, the video shown today:

Johnny and I put together this video for the celebration of Philippa becoming a pastor. If only I had more time to do this sort of thing… its rather fun.

Many a thought has passed through my head but never when in the mood to blog. Johnny and Stacey wrote a song which we played in Burwood the other week. Here ’tis

Well, after much mucking around and many failed shortcuts, I’ve now moved old bloggacino to a new server and upgraded to a newer version of the blogging software. I became somewhat disenchanted with my previous web host so I’ve moved to a new mega server which offers a ridiculous 500GB storage. The whole moving process was slightly traumatic but has served as a useful precedent for the various other sites that I need to also move across.

In other news, I’m back working with the Police and have been using my blogging time on other activities. I’m with the police 4 days a week and spend my other day doing a bit of freelance stuff, mainly web development. One of the first of these, Sam’s site is up and running and you can check it out at soulspire.com.au. She has some lovely designs on there. I’m working on another site at the moment but my 1 day a week really flies by and evenings are getting eaten up a bit.

Other things haven’t progressed as quickly as I’d imagined since coming home. When away, one can make all sorts of resolutions about life changes and activities to undertake upon return but, through limitations of either resolve or resource, time can stretch before any of these are enacted. To do a quick brain dump, I’ve been contemplating singing lessons, bass and/or drum lessons, joining a band, learning spanish again, volunteering at a refugee/new migrant centre and a host of other less persistent options. At first, the limitation was funds as I came back pretty skint and had to conserve. Its amazing how restricting that can be… even getting out of the house costs money, but its a good reminder which makes me really appreciate earning money again. I’m now hitting the other limitation – not having enough time. It seems that finding balance is a lifelong journey