Greetings from Honiara

Boy this place is wet! It has rained incessantly since I got here - not stopped once ... it just gets a little lighter! It is coming down in buckets right now. Everyone says it is unusual!

The King Solomon Hotel is very nice but they have loud music until late at night. It is full of Aistralians here with an organisation called RAMSI ... a regional aid mission. Solomon islands is known as a fragile state and RAMSI are here to help strengthen justice and government. These guys like to party and last night was very noisy again. I sleep until 1am, then awake a couple of hours and then sleep until 9am! Not sure what I am going to do tomorrow when I have to be a college by 8am. My room has a kitchen - big fridge, micro, stove etc so it's pretty good. Basic but fine. I went to the local market yesterday ... a bit scary places but I am used to them from Rwanda and it is the only place to buy fruit and veg so I had to do it. I managed really well ... except it was very wet so it was muddy and very crowded. But the people here are very friendly.

I had a drink with an ex-colleague from Rwanda last night - Mike McRory - it was fun to see him although he's a mad Irishman. But he's been here for 3 years and knows everything and everyone so he will help me if I need him. He took me to Honiara Hotel and they have a self contained unit available for me from Wednesday so I might move because it will be quieter.

I've got a little Rav hire car (like my one at home) and it seems fine (when the windows close!) The roads here are terrible - VERY big potholes everywhere so you can't go very fast. The driving here is a lot better than in Francistown - no-one is in a hurry. Honiara is like a very small town ... nothing is very far. the Solomon dollar is = Botswana pula so it makes it easy for me to know how much things cost ... which is a lot! Food is very,very expensive - in fact everything is substantially more than at home.

Mike wants me to go to the Hash House Harriers tomorrow. This is sometimes called a running club with a drinking problem but also known as a drinking club with a running problem. As a Hash 'virgin' I can expect some teasing and ribbing so that's something to look forward to! I'll only go if it's not raining too much. Mike also said he will take me snorkelling one weekend - so that is good.

I met the team I am going to work with on Friday - they are all really pleased I'm here and very enthusiastic about the project and very, very friendly. Two have already said they want to take me to their village - on the other islands. Not sure how I am going to fit all this in.

Tomorrow the hard works starts - meetings at the Ministry all day. Looking forward to it.

Feed the right Wolf

My friend Bronwen in Brisbane - who I'm hoping to visit next week - sent me this story. I loved it so much, I thought I'd share it.

One evening an old Cherokee told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside people. He said: 'My son, the battle is between 'two wolves' inside us all.
One is Evil. It is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment,inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.
The other is Good. It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy,generosity, truth, compassion, and faith.'
The grandson thought about it for a minute, and then asked his grandfather: 'Which wolf wins?'
The old Cherokee simply replied: 'The one you feed”.

This resonates with a book I am reading at the moment ... called The Secret. Do any of you know it?

It's official!

No, I've not been certified insane (although there are people who think otherwise) but I can finally confirm that I am going to the Solomon Islands as Team Leader on a distance teacher training project. Some of you know that I have been talking about it for a few weeks but the contract has arrived so I guess I really have to go now.

I was first/last in Solomon Islands when I went to visit my friend Ian in Bougainville (which is strickly speaking Papua New Guinea, but it is also known as north Solomon Islands) in 1984. I'd gone to a Girl Scout Leaders meeting in Brisbane for the Commonwealth Games and then I managed to get up to Kieta afterwards. I'm sure a lot has changed in 25 years.

I'm really looking forward to this project - and not a little apprehensive as it is rather outside my comfort zone in terms of territory. But I enjoy working with teachers and it will definitely be a new challenge. I am working for NZAID and they seem like a friendly and supportive agency ... and very committed to this project. I'll be 5 weeks in-country this visit and then have to make 2 or 3 more trips over the coming year with a possibility of an extension.

I'll try to keep you posted on this blog ... as my brother said last week - do let us know every few days, we worry about you. Don't worry Bruv - I'll be fine!

Connections 2

Well my advert for Skype worked ... I am now in Skype contact with 2 more friends. Thanks to Sally and Matt for getting in touch. I've had Skypecons with people in New Zealand, California, Vancouver, Gaborone, Toronto, London, Wales, Cape Town and Dublin in the last couple of weeks. Still need to get Windhoek on my map!

Now - as for the rest of you Luddites .... how about it? Or maybe you just don't want to talk to me?

Connections

I got a call from my uncle yesterday. Nothing strange in that, you might think. But he's 84 years old and he was calling on Skype to ask for the link to my blog. We had a good chat about family and what was going on in eveyone's lives. Thinking about it afterwards, it suddenly hit me what an extraordinary tool Skype is.

2 weeks ago, I used Skype to participate in a meeting between colleagues in Vancouver, India, Namibia, and Trinidad & Tobago. I also spoke to a friend who is working for 6 weeks in Kiribati (look it up - it's very far!!). But then I use it to message chat to Laurence when he's supposed to be working in his office in London ... and to send internet links across the living room from my computer to John's! I also skype chat to friends in Seattle, Rwanda and Gaborone. All for free. I love this internet thing-y.

So those of you that I love and never talk to - please get a skype account and let me know what your skype name is ... then we can all be so much more connected. Skype rocks!

Open Educational Resources

I've just completed facilitating a workshop to develop open educational resources for the Commonwealth of Learning (COL). I was working with 2 subject teams from the Botswana College of Distance & Open Learning. The purpose of the project is to develop local online content for secondary education and to help increase the use of new teaching and learning technologies in the classroom. There are 6 countries in the project - Seychelles, Trinidad & Tobago, Namibia, India & Lesotho.

It was a really interesting group of participants and we had a fun - but exhausting - 2 weeks. We got to play with all sorts of exciting things like podcasts and blogs as well as revise some courses to include multimedia elements. They have all gone away to write the materials and we will come together again for another workshop later in the year.

I was asked to be the Country Consultant for Botswana by my colleague at COL who used to be the Director of NAMCOL in Namibia when I was the Technical Adviser there 10 years ago - so that was great!