Farming Elephants
5/10/2006
Greetings from Namibia!
I've managed to survive my first day in the local office--jetlag andall--and must admit that I'm really enjoying being here. The I-TECHoffice is located in a nice house in one of Windhoek's residentialareas, which is a lot like where I worked in Zambia, so I'm feeling abit nostalgic. My temporary office is in the equivalent of the diningroom and looks out onto the backyard/patio which has a nice thatchedgazebo sitting area and a pool. Everyone told me before I came that ithas been very cold here and I should come prepared...but it feels anawful lot like Seattle right now, only dryer, so its actually reallypleasant. Perhaps it wasn't necessary to bring my wool coatafterall...but just in case, I have it and won't be cold :)
Today has been very low-key since the group from WHO that I was supposedto meet with today will not actually be arriving until tomorrow to meeton Friday. So, instead I've spent my day meeting the office staff andsitting in on another technical workgroup meeting of physicians who arelooking at one of our curricula on HIV/AIDS medications. We met outunder the backyard gazebo and went through some of the trainingmaterials and I found myself fascinated by the characters in the groupand the amount of knowledge and passion they have for fighting thisdisease. All have been involved on some level in developing andmodifying treatment guidelines for the country and are considered theleading local authorities.
At one point in the discussion, Dr. Ishmael F (whose last name Icouldn't quite understand) was asked about his elephants...this ofcourse immediately caught my attention, as this is typically not a pointof conversation in most of my meetings...and it turns out the Dr.Ishmael has a cattle farm which a group of abnormally large elephantshave taken a fancy to...and since Namibia has had a lot of rain thisyear, the normal feeding grounds for this particular group of elephants,had been flooded out, so they discovered the lush feeding grounds of theDr's farm and decided to push down the fence and help themselves, muchto the dismay of the cattle and the doctor. He has repaired the fencemultiple times and tried several things to keep the elephants fromcoming back with no luck...he thinks he might be stuck with them for theseason...So, the moral of the story is, if you're going to own a cattlefarm in Namibia, be prepared to share your fields with gangs of hungyelephants.
I've also been reminded today of some of my favorite things and phrasesfrom southern Africa--first, the fabulous soft drinks Grapetizer andAppletizer...delicious! Basically like sparkling apple cider and grapejuice, but so much better...Everyday/meeting also includes a morning andafternoon tea break, complete with snacks--I should have remembered tobring my hot cocoa...always a treat! One of my favorite phrases alsocame up today--"Are we together?"--basically asking if we're all inagreement--but I just like the phrase.
Anyhow, I'm doing my best to combat the desire to go to sleep at 3:30 inthe afternoon and wake up at 2:00 in the morning, but the jetlag willwear off soon, I'm sure...just in time for me to come home mostlikely...but all is well adn I'm sure that things will become a bit moreintense as we head into next week's meetings, but for now I'm enjoyingmyself.
Cheers,
Lisa
Greetings from Namibia!
I've managed to survive my first day in the local office--jetlag andall--and must admit that I'm really enjoying being here. The I-TECHoffice is located in a nice house in one of Windhoek's residentialareas, which is a lot like where I worked in Zambia, so I'm feeling abit nostalgic. My temporary office is in the equivalent of the diningroom and looks out onto the backyard/patio which has a nice thatchedgazebo sitting area and a pool. Everyone told me before I came that ithas been very cold here and I should come prepared...but it feels anawful lot like Seattle right now, only dryer, so its actually reallypleasant. Perhaps it wasn't necessary to bring my wool coatafterall...but just in case, I have it and won't be cold :)
Today has been very low-key since the group from WHO that I was supposedto meet with today will not actually be arriving until tomorrow to meeton Friday. So, instead I've spent my day meeting the office staff andsitting in on another technical workgroup meeting of physicians who arelooking at one of our curricula on HIV/AIDS medications. We met outunder the backyard gazebo and went through some of the trainingmaterials and I found myself fascinated by the characters in the groupand the amount of knowledge and passion they have for fighting thisdisease. All have been involved on some level in developing andmodifying treatment guidelines for the country and are considered theleading local authorities.
At one point in the discussion, Dr. Ishmael F (whose last name Icouldn't quite understand) was asked about his elephants...this ofcourse immediately caught my attention, as this is typically not a pointof conversation in most of my meetings...and it turns out the Dr.Ishmael has a cattle farm which a group of abnormally large elephantshave taken a fancy to...and since Namibia has had a lot of rain thisyear, the normal feeding grounds for this particular group of elephants,had been flooded out, so they discovered the lush feeding grounds of theDr's farm and decided to push down the fence and help themselves, muchto the dismay of the cattle and the doctor. He has repaired the fencemultiple times and tried several things to keep the elephants fromcoming back with no luck...he thinks he might be stuck with them for theseason...So, the moral of the story is, if you're going to own a cattlefarm in Namibia, be prepared to share your fields with gangs of hungyelephants.
I've also been reminded today of some of my favorite things and phrasesfrom southern Africa--first, the fabulous soft drinks Grapetizer andAppletizer...delicious! Basically like sparkling apple cider and grapejuice, but so much better...Everyday/meeting also includes a morning andafternoon tea break, complete with snacks--I should have remembered tobring my hot cocoa...always a treat! One of my favorite phrases alsocame up today--"Are we together?"--basically asking if we're all inagreement--but I just like the phrase.
Anyhow, I'm doing my best to combat the desire to go to sleep at 3:30 inthe afternoon and wake up at 2:00 in the morning, but the jetlag willwear off soon, I'm sure...just in time for me to come home mostlikely...but all is well adn I'm sure that things will become a bit moreintense as we head into next week's meetings, but for now I'm enjoyingmyself.
Cheers,
Lisa
posted by jacob at 11:15 PM
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