dimanche 29 novembre 2015

Flying Out: Lima

I am at DCA waiting for my flight to Houston.  In Houston I will connect to my flight to Lima.  It is pretty simple; I fly 3 hours to Houston, then 7 to Lima.  All told, it is a pretty easy flight route.  It certainly beats the 24 hour slog to East Africa, though I do miss the the frequent flier miles from those trips to Uganda and Kenya.  I also miss the chance to pop out of the airport in interesting and new places like Doha, Dubai, Amsterdam, among others.

I am headed to Lima for a week for work.  It is definitely going to be a busy trip.  There are a lot of important meetings, looking to move work forward for the next few years.  I am hopeful that my contributions this trip will amount to more than smiling and nodding.  I mean, I was brand new for the last trip, and would not have had much to add, but still.  I would like to speak.  Speaking is an attainable goal.

This morning I woke up at 7 to work out.  It was cold, grey and raining outside, but I did it anyway.  I felt like I was achieving something laudable by exercising this morning.  Just by getting out of bed I had basically patted myself on the back just for being awake.  I jogged a couple of miles in the rain, irritated that it was raining.  I came back and made a breakfast of toast and yogurt, then got ready.  Naturally, since it was 48 degrees outside, the heat in our apartment was auto-turned up to 80.  So I was sweating in the apartment after showering--probably more than when I was running in the cold rain.

I have come to accept that I will sweat when I get ready.  Even if I give myself 4 hours of leeway for getting to my destination, I will still sweat because I am alive and thinking.  That means that I just know I will sweat to the airport.  Every trip, pretty much ever.  So you are welcome future seatmates, I will be sweating next to you for a least the first 30 minutes of the flight.

Now I am here and I can hear the United staff trying to lure 11 people off this flight with $500 vouchers and a promise of a later flight out.  This always seems to happen when I cannot change my flight at all.  It is a total bummer.  But I am going to go see if there is anything they can do to still get me to Lima tonight and change my flight.  If they can guarantee that, I would for sure take $500.  We shall see!

Keep traveling!

jeudi 5 novembre 2015

Update and New Things

New job.  New jobs are tough.  I have only been at this one about 8 weeks, and I feel like I am just starting to know what questions to ask, when to ask them, and why I should ask them.  The next step is knowing what to do with the responses.  I catalog them in various ways.  I scribble them into a note pad, then I type them.  Then I look through them again.  They strain through my consciousness as though my brain were cheese cloth. I know I retain something but what is it that passes through the fine mesh?  That is the next next step--I need to figure out what I don't know I am not retaining.

Good people at this new job.  I love working with the Forest Service.  It is a totally different atmosphere than VE.  I miss my VE friends and family dearly, but I am excited to be in a new venture.  International Programs at the Forest Service sometimes has the feel of a start-up.  It is frenzied, fast-paced, high demand, and involves a lot of marketing and relationships.  Then sometimes you run into the standard government barriers: i.e. 3 weeks to get fingerprints to and from the FBI so I can get an ID badge with a chip that will allow me to log onto my computer outside the office.  There is a lot of papeleo that I am learning to process.  I have to be both flexible and detail oriented; I am standard form driven and able to improvise--or at least that is the goal I am shooting for.  In any case, it makes for an exciting work place.  Many of my colleagues are former PCVs and thus know the realities of living abroad for several years on end.  Many have lots of development experience, and love IP for its ability to eschew some of the rhetoric fatigue and get down to solid programming.  It is a very cool place.

I am loving living with Lee.  It has been the rightest move I have ever made.  I love to know what she thinks, what she does when she thinks she isn't doing anything at all.  I love the routines and the new types of adventures.  I love 9:00 pm after work when we decide to go to Mexico City for the hell of it.  We can, we do, we are learning together what works.  It is pretty remarkable.

All the while, DC is cooperating too.  The weather has not turned its back on us yet.  It is a bit of an Indian summer with warm temperatures, soft breezes and pleasant attitudes.  I love re-learning a place, and still having solid friends around with which to accomplish that task.

Certainly there are moments when I catch myself staring off and thinking of Uganda.  I miss it.  I miss the light there, I miss the smells.  I long for easy evenings on the porch with the dog and the donkey.  I even miss the loud neighboor up the street with his loud parties that I still was never invited too.  I miss the thrum of music, the whine of boda bodas, and the orchestrated semi functional calamity of the place.  Every day brought something unexpected and outside my frame of reference.  I think I feel that space in my day to day at times.  I don't need to go back right away, but it feels nice to think about it.
I was just in Chicago and New York, and I am headed to Peru at the end of this month.  I will certainly write between now and then.  And I hope to update from Peru this trip, too. The last trip was too busy to take time to write from there.

So, I guess all this is to say that I am happy and I am grateful.

More soon.


Keep Travelling.

jeudi 30 avril 2015

Nashville

I am in the Nashville airport after 4 days of great food, good exploring, lovely weather, and some quality music.  I came down from DC with Evan for a couple of days.  I work remotely right now, and I can just as easily work from Nashville as I can from DC, so I figured I would try to see something new.

Nashville is a beautiful city.  It is green and lush.  The urban areas to not spoil the beauty of the setting.  That is partly because the urban areas are small, and fairly unobtrusive, and partly because there is a lot of open space around Nashville.  It is an interesting mix of southern hospitality, warm and welcome people, a modern urban food, art, and cocktail scene, honky-tonk and state capital.  It mixes all these things pretty well (I say as 4-day expert).  I enjoyed it very much.

We arrived on Sunday night and took a driving tour of Broadway and the downtown strip.  We went along 2nd street and the bars there, and then back through downtown.  We had dinner at a Tex-Mex place called El Chico.  It was not remarkable, but it was good.  I am not an aficionado of Tex-Mex, given that it is not so popular in the West.  It involves queso which is a definite Mexican tradition.  Check it out.  It is a funny cuisine.  It is like middle America ran headlong into Mexico.  After dinner we went to our hotel and then walked around the Gaylord Opryland Hotel.  We were staying next door to the Grand Old Opry concert hall.  It is an uninteresting brick building that is steeped in music history.  EVERYTHING around it is named Opry something rather.  The Gaylord Opryland Hotel is a massive hotel and conference center that is like Disneyland for southerners.  It is so strange and themed and landscaped and all indoors.  It smells like a casino and Disneyland were blended together with lots of southern accents.  After our walk we went to bed.

During the days we mostly would exercise in the morning, then have a delicious lunch, work more in the afternoons, then go out for excellent dinner food. On Monday we worked from the Dell offices on their sprawling compound by the airport.  We had massive burgers at Gabby's, worked more, then went for another walk prior to dinner at Peg Leg porker.  It was amazing bar-b-que.  The line at peg leg was long, but worth the wait.  We had bar b que nachos, and pulled pork.  The meat was so tender; sweet and savory with a delicious give to it.  It was almost buttery.  No one flavor dominated, not too seasoned or sauced, allowing the meat to speak for itself in concert with the other flavors.  IT was awesome.  I tried some local Yazoo beer, too.  It was crowded the whole time we were there, but there was space for seating and we never felt cramped.  It was in a cool part of town called The Gulch.  It was a great experience eating there.

From Peg Leg we went into downtown so I could see Broadway on foot, drink some beers and listen to music.  We walked out to the midway point of the foot bridge and we took some great photos of downtown.  We wandered into a bar and listen to Garth Brooks covers for a while.  Then we continued on to Mike's Ice Cream for delicious hand-made ice cream.  We walked out to the river and sat on benches along the river and ate our ice cream cones before heading back to the hotel for the night.

Tuesday I was able to hang out in East Nashville and go to Barista Parlor for incredible coffee and workspace.  I went into a shop called Fuselage where everything was expensive and too hip (4 sizes too small) for me.  It was a well-curated store though.  I just didn't need a $98 vintage union jack scarf, or $38 bespoke candles.  We stayed in East Nashville for dinner, drinks and trivia night at the Hop Stop where they had many many beers on tap, and great food.  It was a bar b cue centric menu with nouvelle takes on everything, but the food was still good.  I drank too many beers, but we took 3rd in trivia and had a great time while doing it.  My brother has some great friends and coworkers here.

Wednesday I was working out of the Dell offices all day again.  We took a trip back to East Nashville to eat incredibly delicious tacos at Mas Tacos Por Favor.  They are the best street tacos I have had outside of Mexico or Los Angeles.  I also had a rich and creamy cold-brewed iced coffee with horchata instead of milk.  It was fantastic.  I would say there are a few good cases of great coffee in Nashville, but overall the coffee game is lacking.  That evening I went for a run along the Cumberland river.  It was beautiful and green.  I got almost as many stares as in Africa (fitness must not be as common?  I had something on my face?  I don't know...)  But it was green and beautiful and the river made for a great backdrop.

That night we went to Bricktop's which was only okay.  But the best was having cocktails at Patterson house.  They make hand crafted cocktails that all include many expensive ingredients and liquers, and are generally cocktails dressed to impress.  The setting is a lovely old house with tin tile roofs inside, low dim lamps, ceiling fans, cozy booths, and hip people.  It was a chic spot to get to hang out with Evan and his friends.  We stayed for a couple of cocktails and then left before the place was too packed with well-heeled hipsters and Vanderbilt folks.  We cruised down music row and then headed back out to the hotel.

Now here I am at the airport, ready to fly back out.  It was a great trip!  I want to come back and dig in a little more.  I still can't get my head around the accents.  The southern drawl adds 3-7 extra syllables into everything and ranges from quaint to unintelligible.  I want to see more music and understand that scene a little better.   I would like to have hot chicken, which I missed this time.  I want to do a little more shopping and eating and drinking.  So, I am starting my next trip list now.  Hopefully Lee can be with me on the next one, too.


vendredi 17 avril 2015

Blossoms

Hitting the Gym...Sort Of

Since being back in DC, I have been so happy to get to go running a lot.  The weather has not always cooperated up to this point, but now as we move towards May, things are only looking up.  The trees are getting leafy, the flowers are out, the weather is consistently not angrily blowing sleet directly and personally at me while I run.

Running is lovely, and with Meridian Hill Park across the street, there are great stair sets I can run.  However, I have been wanting to find a gym where I can also lift weights.  I don't want to get ripped, just more fit and strong to help my running and tennis game.  I want something like this ideal body.  So, I have begun the gym hunt.  Fortunately for me there is a YMCA a 5 minute walk from our apartment.  It seemed like a good place to start.  I think of the Village People happily costumed and festooned in flamboyant sequined headdresses touting the benefits of such an affordable, supportive place.  This Y is a little different.

I walked in the Y in the brand new renovated building.  The lobby of the Y opens directly into Sweet Green.  For those of you who know DC, that should set off some warning bells.  For those of you who don't, click here.  It is a great place.  I was greeted by a woman who handed me a form to fill out.  She asked me why I had been so lazy and never showed up before.  Okay not really she asked if it was my first time in, and that she would set me up with a tour. 

After filling out the form, Chris, a young, fit black man came over to me and said "LOOK AT ALL MY MUSCLES! WHY DO YOU EAT SO MUCH CAKE? HAVE YOU CONSIDERED PROTEIN POWDER?" And after my brain's self judgement filter switched off, I realized he actually introduced himself and offered to show me around.  The gym was beautiful, not like any Y I had seen in the past.  It was full of young 20-somethings and early 30-ers, mostly white or ethnically ambiguous enough to be hip and nonthreatening to the general populous, and wearing designer workout clothes.

He showed me the ecomill treadmills that are powered just by running, no electricity (why not just run outside?) and the 4 types of elliptical machines and 3 types of stationary bikes.  It was all over whelming.  So many bodies moving in a poorly timed ballet, in sync but chaotic.  It was overwhelming.  Behind the cardio floor was the pool and the weights were below us.  It was new and clean and modern.  The locker rooms were spacious with nice showers, saunas, and steam rooms.  It was all very good.  At the end of the tour he said, "So I hope you feel pressured enough by all these young bodies to buy a membership immediately!  Thanks!"  Then he directed me to the same woman as before who asked about my laziness.  She smiled sweetly and explained membership options.  I told her I would have to talk to my girlfriend about it first.  She nodded her understanding and said, "alright then, enjoy quitting before you get started this evening!"  Then I used my free day to work out.


I think I will get used to all these things again.  But the gym just seemed like a lot.  And it seemed funny to walk outside to exercise inside after not doing that for two years.  And all those aggressively fit and nicely dressed young people were intimidating!  So many yoga pants!  But I can do it.  The gym search continues, and in the meantime, I will be out for a run.

dimanche 29 mars 2015

Washignton, DC Part 1

I am finally sitting down and having some time to write on here for the first time since being back.  I have been back a total of 12 days.  In some ways it seems like I have been here a lot longer, in some ways, the time is very short, and I feel like I just arrived.  Either way, it is not that long, and musing over the actual perception to reality difference is a bit too meta to really be interesting.

I arrived on Tuesday the 17th on a 15 hour flight from Dubai.  It was rather unremarkable.  I slept a lot, I ate 4 times, and watched a number of movies.  When I arrived, customs and immigration was the quickest at Dulles that I have ever experienced.  It took less than 45 minutes to go through immigration, gather my luggage, and pass through customs.  It was refreshing.  Usually, because of the ineffective way Dulles shuttles people from the international terminal to the main airport terminal, there are bottlenecks that are frustrating and interminably irritating after traveling from far-off parts of the world.  Luckily, I was greeted on the other side by the smiling face of Winnie Auma, our Uganda country director and my good friend from Village Enterprise.  By brother picked us from the the airport, and we began a crazy day.

My brother treated us to lunch a local diner, and I was thrilled to eat a delicious club sandwich.  Winnie ate biscuits and gravy for the first time (yeah I know, like the fattest American food, but it is legit).  Then we went to his house where we prepared for a meeting by having a skype call with Ellen in Uganda.  Then we took an Uber black car into the city, all the while I was deliriously pointing out monuments to Winnie.  This whole time I was g-chatting with Lee who did not know I was in the US, and I was pretending I was in Kampala getting ready to come to the US.  Surprises.

The black car dropped us at FHI 360 where we had a preparatory meeting for a presentation we would be giving on that Thursday.  From there we went to a meeting with the funder of our randomized controlled trial (impact evaluation) that is running on our program in Uganda.  We met Konstantin in Dupont Ciricle (I was afraid Lee would catch a glimpse of me in the circle like one of those tabloid photos of bigfoot) so I was trying my best to cover my face.  Winnie, Konstantin, and I went to the meeting and then we walked down to Konstantin's office where my brother again met me for the grand surprise!

Evan, Rebecca, and I all went to Kapnos in the 14th Street area of NW where Lee was waiting, none the wiser that I was going to be showing up with Evan and Rebecca.  It was so nice to see Evan and Rebecca pull up in front of Konstantin's office.  It was surreal to be in DC, and I had only been there for 9 hours at this point, but I was excited to see Lee's face.  We agreed that we would all walk into the restaurant, and I would come in last, somewhat hidden by Evan (I am easily hidden because I am dainty).

Evan and Rebecca walked in first, and they both said hi to Lee and hugged her.  She was beautiful in a floral dress, sipping a glass of champagne and absently thumbing through her hair.  I was last in line to say hello and at first she simply said "hey!" and then it set in that I was there, and not supposed to be there, and surprising her, and that I was there, and for the next 10 minutes she laughed, while crying, and just saying "oh my god."  It was a pretty spectacular reaction.  We had a lovely dinner all four of us, and then we went back for my first sight of OUR APARTMENT!

The apartment is lovely.  It is just the right size, there are tons of windows that throw beautiful light on every space, and it is so nicely decorated.  Lee worked hard and did an amazing job of setting the place up.  It is compact, but spacious, and not cramped.  It feels like our place, and it is such a comfortable, welcoming space.  The building is lovely, and directly across the street from Meridian Hill Park.  We are a close walk to the 14th Street strip, U street, Shaw, and Columbia Heights.  It is ideal.  We unfortunately did not even have time to do nothing and enjoy each other because we both had to work a lot.

The next two days were filled with meetings, conferences, presentations, and courting potential funders, and current partners.  But finally, over the weekend we had time to just be together.  It was amazing to know that we could go to dinner, and not feel like we had to go all the restaurants we needed to.  We could go out, stay in, go for walks, and not feel  like there was pressure to try to do everything all at once.  We shopped for the apartment, went out for tacos with a dear friend who I hadn't seen since Christmas, went to the National Zoo, and generally enjoyed being together with no hurry for the first time in two years.  We cooked meals, made grocery lists, and planned dinners.  It was such a nice thing.

On a cultural note, the grocery stores here are insane.  After coming from Hoima where there are 11 things to choose from.  The grocery store here just makes me stop in my tracks.  In 3 or 4 grocery trips, I have generally ended up with at least 7 random things (mostly cheeses or cheese products), and spent much more than intended.  The tropical fruits in the store are stupid expensive and not ripe, there are more cereals than anyone could possibly eat, I can begin to describe how amazing it is to have whole grain and health food options.  It is all overwhelming.  And, no one tries to sell it to you!  You just go and casually pick what you want.  It is overwhelming.

On another cultural note, everyone looks like me here.  I know that seems obvious, but there are so many white 20 somethings who have facial hair and preppy clothes in this area.  At the grocery store, the park, the bars, anywhere, there are so many of me around.  I never confronted either my sameness, or that I could be so different based on the context.  It is pretty amazing.  The crowds of people, cars, options, and general transition have led to a few panic attacks, but those have been manageable, par for the course I suppose.  Even if I am not actually dying, I feel like I am, and I think about how I could just be buried under varieties of cheese and hot sauce and suffocate under the pile, and then the panic seems all at once more tangible, but less threatening.  Cheese is a double-edged sword.  More on that later I s'pose.  

samedi 7 mars 2015

Running through Foreign Lands

Yesterday I had a profound realization.  Well, a couple, and all in the span of 38 sweaty minutes.  It was a big run for me for a lot of reasons. 

In general, running in Uganda has some element of adventure associated with it.  The roads leave a lot to be desired, when they are there.  There is a constant gaggle (I will get back to gaggles…) of small children running, laughing, pointing, generally creating chaos around you when running.  Often there are myriad wild to semi-tame dogs that take interest in the activity.  There are adults that sporadically take enough interest to cast a lazy call of  mzungu (white guy), and sidelong stare to indicate their general sense that what I am doing defies logic.  Then there are geese.

This is where I go back to gaggles.  On one particular running route that I follow in Hoima, there is a gaggle of geese that torment me.  It started about 3 months ago.  I first came running down there on a rainy morning.  There were two geese, a white goose and a speckled goose.  As I approached them, jogging slowly along, they began to crane their necks and ruffle their feathers.  I moved to the other side of the road and kept going.

The next few runs I didn't see them.  But then, about a month ago, I was running, and as I got to that section of road, there were at least a dozen geese, grazing the road where I was supposed to run.  At first I thought, "they are geese, they should see I am a superior animal, and get out of my way, like chickens do."  This was VERY incorrect.  The geese tightened into a pack, craned their necks, opened their beaks to expose razor-like rows of something akin to teeth (do geese have teeth?) and HISSED at me!  They lifted their wings and jabbed their goose heads toward me.  My heart was racing (I realize writing this how pathetic it is, don't worry).  My heart was racing (I was running after all) and so I darted to the side of the road, and sprinted past them.  I also hissed back.  I don't know, it seemed right at the time.

Then, yesterday, again I was running, and not only did I time my run such that I encountered every school child in Hoima leaving school for the evening, but the geese (more like geese-stapo) were in the road again.  So after enduring 30 minutes of heckling by children (I mean I doubt they are judging me, but I don't speak the local language, and really, they are of course judging the giant white man running nowhere in particular) I got to near the end of my road and again had to meet the geese.  They are intent on adding an additional component to my work outs by adding shots of adrenaline into my runs.  This time, the side of the road was blocked, because someone turned the shoulder of the road into a garden for growing sweet potatoes and cassava.  I couldn't trample the garden.  In my head I imagined running through the garden, killing all the sweet potatoes, and a mother and 14 children all weeping, fists balled up against their eyes, wailing "what's to become of us?"  So I made the choice to run through the geese.  They moved.

So all in all what has happened?  In sum, nothing.  I dealt with running through crowds of curious children and geese.  I saved a Ugandan family from starvation by not trampling their garden due to an unreasonable fear of domestic fowl (someone once told me that geese bite), and I lived another day.  It is often curious running in East Africa.  There is always something that reminds me how excited I am to run when I get back to the US.  At least I can take solace that in Rock Creek Park there will be no attack geese, and the whole city of DC will not be alerted to the fact that one white guy is running.


But really, why does the owner of the geese just let them out like that?

dimanche 25 janvier 2015

On Liberation and Decentralization

It seems like a common policy move for good governance initiatives in developing countries is decentralization.  It is touted as a catch-all solution to the needs of a country, simultaneously empowering local leaders while improving service delivery to poor, often remote constituents. I would not argue that it is an ineffective tool, but perhaps it is not right in all settings.

In Uganda, decentralization began after Yoweri Museveni took power from the military Junta that followed the great and terrible Idi Amin.  In an effort to improve transparency and efficacy of government action, a large-scale decentralization was put in place.  This article by political science students at Makerere University provides good background and context for the policy.  The government took action in the mid 90's by passing a law to enact decentralization, and that is when it began to take hold. 

One of the primary issues with decentralization is that there is not always sufficient training in rural and underserved area to take on the new administrative burdens that come with decentralization.  Well trained bureaucrats are reticent about leaving Kampala, and as such, people working in local governments do not have the same levels of education or capacity that their counterparts in the capital have.  IFPRI's paper about service delivery and decentralization touches on this nicely.

So, what do you get when you have local officials overburdened with bureaucratic tasks, not fully supported by the central government, and lacking capacity?  You get a lot of frustrated Ugandans who see potential for elite capture, nepotism, and the opportunity to milk the system.  It is an unfortunate scenario, but it is true.  Of course not all locally elected officials are this way, many serve the district and their country honestly, with a lot of integrity.  I am writing about this, however, because of the most recent example of some bureaucrats who did not act with the same decorum.

As part of the Village Enterprise program we help form business savings groups.  Business Savings Groups (BSGs) are similar to Village Savings and Lending Associations (VSLAs), except we are starting them with income generating units.  Those are the village enterprise businesses.  Each BSG is comprised of 10 businesses.  Each business is comprised of 3 business owners.  That means each BSG has 30 members.  As a good practice, we encourage the BSGs to register with the subcounty.  This ensures them some legal arbitration if there are disputes in the group, and it often facilitates the group's access loans from formal financial institutions.

Recently, I went to visit a BSG near our office in Western Uganda, and I was told a very sad story.  The BSG went to register at the subcounty, and the officials in the office charged the double the amount required for registering.  They looked at our businesses owners, saw how they were dressed, and knew they were rural villagers.  As such, they told them the price was double so that they could use the extra money to line their pockets, assuming the business owners would be too illiterate in general, and especially in local law to know they were being swindled.  However, when this was reported to their business mentor who had been training them for months, he went straight to the subcounty and was able to get their money back.

People are poor in Uganda, and a government worker in a local office makes a very low salary.  However, there is entitlement that comes with that sort of position, and a perception of power and prestige.  In the case of this BSG, all those things were wielded to milk the BSG for extra money.  Poor were stealing from the extreme poor.  Now, I am not advocating that taking away decentralization as a policy would remedy this.  In fact, I am sure it would be even harder to get our BSGs registered and backed as official organizations if there was no decentralized government.  However, decentralization with no checks, balances, or training leads to corruption and vice.

I am thinking about all this as today is Liberation Day in Uganda.  The NRM took power from the military junta and returned to a democracy.  This is a loose interpretation of democracy, given that the current president has been the president since Uganda was liberated 29 years ago.  It seems like there is still a lot of liberation to be done.  So, we keep after it, one day at a time.
BSG in Training

vendredi 16 janvier 2015

A Wonderful Winter Wedding

My wonderful older brother Evan got married to Rebecca on December 31st, 2014.  That was the main impetus for going back to the US from Uganda this Christmas.  It was a wonderful wedding, a fantastic ceremony, and such a great opportunity to see so much family, and so many friends.

First, I feel like usually, no one really likes planning New Years Eve.  So thanks to Evan and Rebecca for taking care of that for all of us.  Second, everyone tries to make epic, fantastic plans for New Year's Eve, and they are often not as great as expected.  Notable exceptions are now 1. a wedding 2. mistakenly ending up at a very local bar in Diani, Kenya.  In both cases I did no planning.  Third, it is great to get both friends and family on New Year's eve.  Usually I have had to decide, but this year, this awesome wedding brought together both worlds.  It was wonderful!

Let me start from the beginning of the vacation.  I went back to the US on the 19th.  I got to see Lee briefly in DC when I dropped off Theo the dog.  Unfortunately, I spent most of the 36 hours I was there pretty ill, and trying not to fall asleep at 7:00 pm, thanks to jet lag, and flying back to the cold and dark of mid-winter in the northern hemisphere.  After flying to DC and resting for 36 hours I went out to California.

I got to see my very close friend Bethany, who I have known since middle school.  Beth has been there through a lot, and it was so cool to get to see her in San Francisco.  I finally got to meet Joel in person, and we all ate some terrific Mexican food in the Mission district in San Francisco.  My parents were with us and we all walked around the mission, and went to Mission Dolores Park.  It was a great afternoon.

I spent the next few days in Merced for Christmas.  I felt warm, carefree, and so at ease seeing my family and spending the holidays with them.  Evan and Rebecca flew in very late on the 23rd.  We went to a very funny, homemade church service on the 24th.  We upheld the Doty traditions of Christmas cookie frosting, and getting to hang a few ornaments.  It was made even better having my sister and nieces there, too.  I was so happy to see Julian and meet his lady Sibel as well.  Christmas is just made better with more people.  On Christmas day we ate, played games, went walking, and went to the movies.  It was so satisfying.

We went up for the bachelor party on the 26th.  We spent two nights at the stunning Ahwahnee Lodge in Yosemite.  We had a great time doing man things.  We went for a 10 mile hike and drank scotch and had a wonderful dinner at the lodge.  The rest is top secret.

From there we headed down to Los Angeles at 5:30 in the morning.  I picked up Lee at the airport and we drove straight to Disneyland.  My brother and Rebecca were having a pre-wedding fun day there.  Lee and I met Evan and Rebecca at the park along with my sister and nieces, my mom and dad, my cousin Harvey and his wife Lis, and their son Levi, Evan and Rebecca's friends Carlos and Pamela.  We all had lunch at a great Mexican restaurant in Downtown Disney.  Lee got to meet a lot of people right away, and was really thrown into the mix doing it all at Disney.  I am so impressed by her aplomb.

I was thrilled to see Harvey, Lis, and Levi.  It was great to get too see them relatively soon after the summer.  They are so much fun, and some of my favorite relatives.  It was a blast to sit with them at lunch and catch up.  I always feel like I can get right back into step with them, and we've never missed a beat.

We all went into the park and all of us rode Soarin' Over California.  A giant theater ride with seats that are elevated and move as though you are flying in a hang glider.  The seats hang from long mechanical arms, and the effect is very real.  My parents, Evan and Rebecca split off to go to bed, get coffee respectively.  But Lee, sis, the girls and I continued to ride some fast rides.  I tested Lee's aplomb by dragging her on the big roller coaster in California Adventure, as well as the tower of terror.  There may have been some genuine anger at moments, but we made it, and are stronger for it.  That night we crashed into bed at our hotel in Hollywood around 10:30.

In the morning, Lee, my parents and I had a really nice quiet breakfast.  We were able to talk and catch up without lots of other people around.  I am so glad that they got to see each other, and that we could all be together without too much else going on.

Things progressed in this way, an extraordinary stream of people and visits until the wedding rehearsal that afternoon.  It was quick and well orchestrated.  That night was the grooms dinner, which was a real highlight.  So many friends and family came.  I was SO happy to meet more of Rebecca's family and to finally introduce Lee to all of my family.  It felt like the pieces were coming together into a lovely, family puzzle.  It was so special to have all of these good people in one place.

The next day was the actual wedding.  I don't know that I have ever had so much fun at a wedding.  Even the pictures were fun!  It was a cold day for LA on the 31st.  It was clear and crisp and sunny in the high 50s.  We took photos at UCLA.  Lee of course looked stunning.  Evan and Rebecca were glowing, and their photos show it.  UCLA was a stunning, austere, and lush backdrop for winter wedding photos in LA.  It was a great choice.

There were family photos at the synagogue leading up to the ceremony.  Then the men split and we toasted Evan, enjoyed scotch, and had some time to just bullshit before we danced and sang him into the sanctuary to sign the kituba with Rebecca.  There they signed their documents, and by that time it was about time to get set for the ceremony.  I was compulsively feeling for the ring box this whole time in my pocket.  At one point the photographer came and asked for the rings to take some photos with the documents.  I followed her into the room and watched the whole time. She said "wow you take your job seriously." I said nothing.  I wanted to intimate my seriousness.

The ceremony was beautiful. It was in an outdoor courtyard full of olive trees.  The olive trees were draped with lights.  The Chuppa was lovely, and in part knitted by my aunties Beryl and Lindy.  It looked amazing.  I realize how many superlatives I am using, but the whole event just inspired superlatives.  I had a blast.  During the ceremony the Rabbi did a wonderful job.  The blessings were beautiful, and I was happy that my dad and Michael both got to read blessings.  It was great.  I cried, though I tried to look tough while doing it.  My mom cried, but I had to avoid looking, otherwise it would have been real waterworks!  Then we walked out and Lee asked me if I was crying, which made me cry more.  I have a lot of feelings, ok!?  My big brother got married!  But I was so happy she was asking me, and she was the one on my arm.  I am so thankful Evan and Rebecca asked her to join the celebration in that way.

The reception was beautiful.  It was like a California princess ball.  The decorations were great.  I also got to sit with my cousins Brook and Cassy and Harvey and Lis.  It was cool to have them all meet.  I could hardly eat the fabulous dinner.  I was nervous about my best man's toast (which went off very well, and I didn't even cry) and I was on a lot of adrenaline just excited to be there.  The we danced the horah and lifted Evan and Rebecca and danced them in their chairs.  Let me just say that I think Rebecca's side lucked out getting the daintier of the two of them.  Evan was not so...dainty.  But it was so great.  I loved dancing in a ciricle with my dad and brother and the groomsmen and the Waterman men.  It was such a nice melding of family and culture.  I was honored and thrilled to be there.

I was continuously swept off my feet by how beautiful Lee was, and how special it was to spend New Years together two years in a row.  Especially having her at this event it was amazing to see how it can be when we are together all the time.  We danced all night to a live band.  We took breaks for desserts, drinks (many with Harvey and Lis), shots (thanks Abby and Cooper...) Water, spending tie with family, dancing with mom and neices, too.  All the dancing at least kept me warm (I was cold ALL THE TIME) so that was wonderful inspiration, too.  Turns out dancing in a crowded room in a tux is similar to African weather.  We counted down midnight all together and rang in the New Year in wonderful fashion.  It was one of the most wonderful New Year's Eves I have had.  I will always remember it.

Eventually we left the synagogue around 2:30, and made it back to Hollywood at 4:00 and again crashed into bed.  It was such a terrific night, and I was amazed, honored, and proud to be a part of it all!  Mazel Tov!

Bride and Groom

jeudi 15 janvier 2015

Back in Uganda: Kicking off 2015

I am back in Uganda after three and a half wonderful weeks in the US.  I am thrilled to be back in Uganda.  It was such relief to step out of the plane into the warm, supple air in Entebbe, and not need a sweater for the first time since leaving on December 19th (except for two gloriously warm days in Santa Monica).  I briefly hung out in Amsterdam on the way to the US, and that was the first temperature shock.  But the worst was 9 degrees in DC at one point.  9 is just not enough degrees.

It is a great feeling to be back with the team here.  I was out in the field the last two days carrying out disbursements of our second grant.  The recipients were part of our RCT, and were in a village that was randomly selected not to receive our full program, but instead just a cash-equivalent version of our program.  Needless to say it was a pleasure to be back out in the field.

It was an odd experience being in the USA on Sunday, shopping, going to target, eating Mexican food, and being American.  I woke up in Dubai on Monday night, and by Wednesday I was deep in the field in rural Uganda.  This is one of the sets of juxtapositions that has interested me most as I have been working in Uganda now for a year and a half, (only returning to the US in the last 6 months).  It is really astounding how much freedom we have as Americans to move in the world.  It is amazing that the excess of Dubai can coexist in some fashion with the sever underdevelopment of rural Ugandan villages.  It is also to move from one day to the next through both settings.

I think this time it forced me to think about why these sorts of inequalities persist, and where real change can come from.  With Village Enterprise we are doing incredible work.  We are fomenting economic growth in the lowest strata of the Ugandan and Kenyan economies.  We are helping to build a base of economic growth that hopefully will lead to people creating sustainable business so people are equipped with the resources to eventually move out of poverty.  But we can't do it all. We have many partnerships, and really, I think that developing more, and stronger partnerships is going to be important in development.  NGO, Institution, and Aid collaboration and organization is going to be about the only thing that might promise real change.  Siloing projects, organizations, and people from one another only ensures repetition (sometimes of bad projects and programs), lack of communication, and waste of resources.  But who can work on aid collaboration?  It is like a giant process evaluation, a very meta, but very needed job.  I would love to see where some of the best efforts are if anyone has them.

Regardless, I am happy to be back in Uganda.  I am happy to get to go to the field, and I am looking forward to visiting our Kenya office next month.  I am also looking forward to our innovation summit where I learn from our staff about how much I still have to learn from our program.  The next two months are going to be very exciting and move so quickly.

Hiking in Santa Monica on Tuesday

In Dubai the following Monday
In the field in Nyamundeija for Disbursements