updates

Well, it has once again been much too long since my last journal entry, but that is symptomatic of how busy I’ve been! To give an update to the bizarre labor struggle I described in my last entry: the teachers have been rehired and are all working having agreed to wait to see if Semeh can find a way to increase their pay. It almost uncanny how easily they were placated considering their initial obstinacy, and I’m still not really sure how Semeh did this. I think the brief firing may have made them more aware of how precious any job on camp really is. But I think it was also a matter of having a calm and rational meeting after a serious of increasingly heated pride-wounding exchanges; a meeting in which Semeh could better explain his budget constraints. In any event, the kids and teachers are back in school.

I’ve been so busy because every day requires a series of responses to new crises. My job puts me in the middle of a lot of “factions” (the CBW administration, the local volunteers, the international volunteers, and the international organization that sends people here…) who often don’t understand each other due to cultural differences and miscommunication. So, I spend a fair amount of time speaking to someone on someone else’s behalf or trying to broker some kind of compromise.

So, other than crisis management, what exactly, does my new job entail? Officially I am the GVN (Global Volunteers Network) representative on camp, but I prefer the title the kids gave me: “leader of the white people.” First and foremost my job is to assimilate new volunteers, running orientation and making sure they are busy, comfortable and relatively happy. This is potentially incredibly challenging given the number of volunteers and their diversity of experiences and expectations. But, in actuality, almost everyone who comes here is incredibly flexible, open-minded and easy to live with. Plus, this position lets me see the camp through their fresh eyes and experiencing anew those things that have started to melt into the backdrop of my life here. That said, this is a physically and emotionally difficult place to live, and there is not a day that goes by that I don’t take someone to the clinic – about half of the volunteers have caught malaria – or provide an ear for venting.

I also work very closely with the CBW administration, attending staff meetings and helping to write proposals for additional funding. This gives me a new appreciation for how hard it is to run such a large and multifaceted non-profit charged with a nearly impossible task. The director has to make sure that 70 local volunteers and 16 international volunteers relatively happy, ensure that 600 children have a worthwhile education and that the 21 drains on camp are cleaned and the 36 trash bins are emptied daily while at the same time ensuring that HIV/AIDs outreach is being run effectively and the recreation department has sufficient equipment. And I’m leaving a lot out. In addition to looking within the organization he spends much of his time looking outward for more funding, identifying additional needs in the community, and now to potentially returning to Liberia. In the midst of all this, because he runs one of the more visible NGOs on camp, every day he is interrupted from his administrative duties to listen to pleas for money or employment. What would quickly overwhelm me, he handles with incredible good humor and energy.

In addition, GVN sends volunteers to another organization PCO (People Caring Organization) that does conflict resolution outreach and education on camp. So, I work with their administration and their volunteers as well. This adds a fair bit of work and is complicated by the fact that CBW and PCO have their own tensions and turf battles because the director of PCO broke away from CBW and left some hurt feelings and resentment in his wake. So, there is yet more internal politics to step around. Well, at least it keeps things interesting!