here out of choice

Week one passes so quickly.  The days are long as they are book-ended by a 30-40 minute drive to/from our hotel to the Disability Centre.  Yes that’s right I did say hotel.  The CEO wants me to come back next year, so I think he’s breaking me in gently.  There is an accommodation block for the locally employed staff at the Centre, but it is full already and has no running water – and so also a latrine.  It would be nice if there was running water (and therefore toilet and shower) when I come back next year, but its not a game changer – I remember how lucky I am to be here out of choice…

On Tuesday, our first full day of work I meet all of the staff.  Everyone speaks English (in addition to their local dialect, and I’m pretty sure they speak more than one dialect too) but I struggle with accents, so barely remember a name, let alone their role.  I can work on that later though.  I spend the day tinkering with one of the vehicles, they were having some trouble with the electrics, as everyone is busy firefighting and I have yet to get my bearings.  It was successful though, I just need some supplies from town to finish up.

The rest of the week I meet the Finance team and start to get to grips with their systems and numbers.  Neither look good, so I have a lot of work to do.  And this is when losing my glasses really begins to count against me.  I have to zoom the screen on my laptop, I can’t see a 6 for an 8! on the spreadsheets.  Happily, our driver knows a store where I can buy some; I shuffle through a box of standard strengths until I find some that are suitable.  I think they cost me 20,000 Ugandan Shillings, maybe $5 USDs.

I reflect on a week full of ‘Firsties’ (1^st World problems as I now know them).  For dinner you ask what they have, rather than looking through the menu (a trick I learned in Haiti).  You get different from what you order, but you don’t send it back (crass).  The power is intermittent and even when the power is on, there isn’t always wifi.  The shower is a bit dodgy.  The beer isn’t always cold.  Dinner takes at least 90 minutes from when we order, and we are the only guests (so we start to order on return from work, before going to our rooms to freshen up), and so on.  But I remember; I am here out of choice…