Archive for February 2012
Can you remember starting school? I have vague recollections of going to St. Margaret's CoE Infant School, Durham in the early 1970s with my elder brother, when free school milk was still provided in little glass 1/3 pint bottles. Leading my eldest daughter as a toddler into Clapham Junction Asda Creche is a much more [...]
There are seven of us (if you don't count Lemon, Lime and Grape - our three 'pet' geckos that live behind the curtain) living in a simple yet spacious house in south-east Ouagadougou. We do not have hot water but, in the 35 degree (and rising) heat, this is not something that I will miss. [...]
This dreary February has been brightened up for me by my new-found joy and addiction to 'Borgen', the Danish political thriller with a wonderful, powerful woman Prime Minister. It's even better than my other, and laugh-out-loud, favourite, 'In the Loop'. But neither captures the sheer physical hard work that comes with being at the top [...]
We have spent the last few weeks learning about the needs of Afjalpur dairy co-operative members and getting to grips with their livelihoods situation. Amongst many other things, the outcomes of our baseline survey showed how essential it is for all members to receive training. It is very encouraging to see how such a simple [...]
Young people complaining about adults. Could be anywhere in the world. Could even be the UK. But in this case, it is Peru. Over the past few weeks, I have been lucky enough to attend several meetings, forums and community events addressing youth issues in Peru and one of the problems which is brought up [...]
No walk in Addis is dull. A multitude of sights, smells and sounds confronts your senses on a daily basis. During a five-minute stroll, you could be approached by a street child trying to sell you a stick for brushing teeth, see a herd of donkeys being led by a man with a whip, and [...]
In the past few weeks I have learnt about and experienced a lot more Hindu culture. This started with being invited to the wedding (bebaha) of a relative of the host family. During the early afternoon I went to the groom's (dulacha's) house to view some of the wedding preparations. It was very interesting to [...]
It's the beginning of a new month, and I've just celebrated my 1st anniversary of blogging and tweeting about my work in DFID. I have to say I have really enjoyed it so far. It's brought Information and Communication Technology (ICT) into my life like never before! Last week on twitter, this map of twitter users [...]
"Do they drink anything apart from tea in England?" That was just one of the questions our students had for us in our first week of teaching at a youth centre in Villa El Salvador, Peru. Although I couldn't entirely deny our love of tea, the children were surprised to find out that, just like [...]
Trapped in my office at dusk, yet another heavy rainstorm sweeps over Harare. I make a start on this post, until the electricity fails and the room is plunged into darkness. Travel is risky: last week, trying to get to a meeting during a storm, I passed two vehicle shunts; and the large gum trees [...]
