The Road to the Horizon

[i-Madonna in Malawi]

Next to Hollywood, Bollywood and Nollywood, we also have Aid-y-wood: the way that celebrities throw money at humanitarian causes.

Here is one. Read in the New York Times:

("Raising Malawi",.. ) A high-profile charitable foundation set up to build a school for impoverished girls in Malawi, founded by the singer Madonna and fellow devotees of a prominent Jewish mysticism movement, has collapsed after spending $3.8 million on a project that never came to fruition.(...)

Madonna has lent her name, reputation and $11 million of her money to the organization. (...)

(...) the plans to build a $15 million school for about 400 girls in the poor southeastern African country of 15 million (...) have been officially abandoned.(...)

(...) an examination found that $3.8 million had been spent on the school that will now not be built, with much of the money going to architects, design and salaries and, in one case, two cars for employees who had not even been hired yet.(...)

(Source)

[i-presidential palace Haiti]

As we passed the sad anniversary of "One Year after Haiti", it is interesting to go through the stream of commemorative articles coming out...

It looks like every single humanitarian entity eagerly reported on their activities in the past year.

I am looking for one article where an NGO or humanitarian agency does an honest self-evaluation, highlighting not only what went well, but also why the relief effort sucked and what THEY could do better.

Give me one article. One honest NGO. It will foster my hope that honesty in the humanitarian world has not completely disappeared.


Picture courtesy Bahamas Local

[i-child%20in%20Haiti]
January 12th 2010, around midnight, I was sitting in my living room, in Rome, browsing through the latest updates from friends on Twitter. As many of the people I follow work in the "aid business", a few started tweeting about an earthquake in Haiti. The news was that "fresh" that the main news sites (CNN, BBC,..) had not picked it up yet.

I opened a window displaying the latest Tweets on Haiti and found plenty of people tweeting from the ground. A feed with the latest Haiti pictures on Twitter showed plenty of images posted from mobile phones. The devastation showed this was a heavy earthquake, which took a high toll. It was clear from that moment on,

It was strange, sitting by myself, in my living room, and watching the tweets and pictures scroll by in real time as they were posted,  but that is how my story with the Haiti emergency started. A few days later, I flow to the Dominican Republic, to start the emergency support office. I came back six months later.

We are now one year later, almost. It is interesting to see the articles, and more so, blogs and agency websites picking up on the "one year anniversary" of the earthquake. Already since December. Normally, that never happens for an emergency. At least not on that scale. To me, that is a sign something stinks.

It seems the stream of "Haiti, one year on" has people split in two camps... On one side, the press hammers the relief effort. And on the other side, you have the relief agencies trying to justify how well they did their part.

Check out the aggregation of those articles via Humanitarian News, also available on RSS.

Mmmm.. and I am biting my tongue weighing to what I can say, and what I can't say here, on this blog. What I should say, and what I shouldn't.

Let me summarize it in one sentence: What, for reliefworkers, should have been a pretty standard schoolbook example of "a sudden on-set emergency" (typical for natural disasters), has turned into a humanitarian relief disaster.

Picture courtesy AP/BBC.

This is a post I wrote three years ago. It seems the subject is still ever so close to the hearts of many, so I brought it onto the foreground again.
There are several excellent insights people posted in the comments. I'm interested to hear your point of view.

link[i-link]In the previous post, Shylock explored, in a ironical, cynical, self-criticizing way, what personal future we, aid workers have. We wonder the earth, gradually getting used to travel all the time, often in harsh places, and very often in search of a thrill. Gradually we get addicted to it all.
But is there life after this.. after this life of a gypsy? Do we become gypsy disasters after years of behaving like a disaster gypsy, roaming from one emergency to the next?

No matter how much we chuckle reading the previous post, in the end, it is not funny. Far from it. Many humanitarian workers have a problem to find 'a life after this'.. But it is even more sad to realize how few actually "have a life even now"... Even now, many forget, or at least compromise, their personal life because of their addiction. The addiction to the horizon, to the adrenaline.

And now I want to you stop for a moment, no matter what you are doing. What I am going to tell you, is very close to my heart...

link[i-link]No matter how you twist and turn it. The professional world is still a man's world. This world in general is still a man's world. It has been for hundreds of centuries. From the time men dragged women into their cages by their hair, we have come a long way, but we are not there yet. "There" being "offering equal chances, and equal opportunities to women".

Here is how I see it. (and don't forget I am a man, and no matter how hard I try, I will always be a man, even if I try to look at things from a woman's perspective):

link[i-link]I look around me, and see people -men and women- alike, with loads of personal challenges through the work they do... But then I look again, and see that in most management functions in this business - the humanitarian world -, men hold the key functions (and most of them come from the first world, but let's leave that aside for a moment). I look once more, and see most administrative support positions are filled by women. Many women in this business are strong, well educated, hard working people. Many of them are young, full of energy, inspiration and aspirations. The new generation of women have been encouraged (and enabled) by their parents to get a good education. They are ambitious to develop themselves personally and professionally. Many of these young women whizz through their twenties like a breeze, and some climb up (if all goes well), the professional ladder.
All of a sudden they find themselves in their mid thirties, somewhere in the professional chain and ask "hey where is my personal life gone to?". And that is where the challenges start.

link[i-link]If all goes well, they find a partner. If all goes well. As we - men - are not always too happy to live with a partner who has a demanding career. Even fewer like it when that career takes 'our woman' away on duty travel. Heaven forbids that 'her career' would even have her live far away from us, in some dark and remote humanitarian crisis area.

"If all goes well" they find a partner, as too often at their mid thirties, what men are "available" on the "partner market"? Those coming out of their first long relationship, and not looking for something long term. The 'celibataires eternelles' or 'commito-fobes'. Those who have not made up their mind what the hell they want. The 'players'. And those already in a relationship. Or those who have failed in relationships so far.. (and all of that is a whole different discussion which I would love to have over a glass of Prosecco).

link[i-link]So "if all goes well", a partner is found. And then? "A career" you say? In this world where, no matter what, a woman is still supposed to not only bare the children, but also spend most of her time raising them? Where a woman is still supposed to do most of the household stuff? [if you are a man, think about it... If you don't agree with me, think again... Who spends most of the time with the kids, working for/in the house? You or your partner?].

So, what then? Most women are the ones making the compromise then.. Either give up their career, or work part time, etc...
If they don't, the juggle of kids, house, husband and career becomes a full time challenge.

The other evening, I went with E. over all the women we knew. And we tried to flag those we thought had found a good balance between kids, house, husband and career. And are successful in all. We found one. One woman out of the dozens of women we know, we found one.

That is a sad observation. And even more sad, when we realized that lady does not work in the humanitarian "business".

link[i-link]So, all you ladies out there. And specifically those of you in the humanitarian world! In my "The Dudettes" short story I tried (in my cynical and ironical way) pay a tribute to you all. But come and have your say too. Am I seeing things in a too dark, negative way? Am I seeing things too much from a "male" perspective? You tell me.

[i-UNHCR car]

You've been an aidworker for too long...

..if pictures from your first missions are on black and white print.

(for the aid connoisseurs amongst you: where was that picture taken?)

[i-Italians biggest donor in Adopt-a-Clitoris]

The charity "Clitoraid" is the most popular with the Italians, who account for 26.88% of the donations in 2009, according to the organisation's financial statement. This makes Italy the largest donor for the "Adopt-a-Clitoris" campaign.

I am not sure how to bring this news to you, as I don't know how it was meant. Female sexual mutilation is a crime. Punto.

How to react to the name of the charity and their campaign? I hope they actually meant it to be eye -or- ear catching and provocative.

[Loband: Object Removed -]

In Badakshan, the Northeast of Afghanistan, 6 women die in labour for every 100 babies born. That is almost four times the national average, in a country with the world's second highest maternal mortality rate...

Let's use Mother's Day weekend to think of those mothers in less fortunate countries. Maternal health continues to be a challenge for many in remote areas, where access to clinics or even primary care is non-existent. Or only exists only through WHO (the UN's World Health Organisation)mobile clinics as shown in this video. (More)

[i-Log Base in Haiti]

"Mañana, por favor!", I answer when housekeeping knocks on my door. Mañana, please, I am working...

I sit, computer on my lap, on my bed reading through a backlog of emails, catching up on work done, being done, and work to do.

I just got back from two days in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. It has been almost two months since I landed in Santo Domingo to coordinate the support functions for the Haiti crisis, out of the Dominican Republic. My days are full. My attention is switching from a meeting with one of the ministers, staff recruitment, debugging a cash advance problem, a meeting on limiting the overtime the drivers can do, a shipment which seems to be lost but really is not, stamping the numbering on the food coupons, staffing contracts and a security incident.

It is not the amount of work that tires me, it is the intensity in which issues come, and need to be dealt with. Not that I don't like it, but in the evening, I pass out on my bed...

After two days in Haiti, I wonder how my colleagues can deal with their work, which is a ten fold more complex than mine. They don't have a comfortable hotel room, five floors up and 1 minute away from the office. They either live in Camp Charly, the tent camp for the humanitarians, or have to shuttle to the boat anchored off shore, to spend the night. Given, the boat is more comfortable, but it takes anything between one to two hours to get there. Some of the staff pitched their tent in the back of the container park, in "Log Base", right next to the airport, where most UN agencies set up tents, tarps and office containers, making it the "humanitarian nerve center" of the operation.

The humanitarian part of Log Base is nothing but one narrow road, lined with parked vehicles, crowded with people moving around between the offices, and filled on either side with "offices".

The fortunate have a 20 foot office container, some with airconditioning, with tarps over them to avoid water sipping through the joints. The less fortunate have massive tents to work in. Meetings are held in open spaces covered with tarps, or half open shelters. Lack of working space is common with most containers cramped with four people, hardly fitting the make shift desks, filled with files and folders hardly leaving space to fit their legs inbetween.

The noise is constant, mostly from planes and helicopters taking off or landing on the airstrip a few hundred feet away. During the meetings, when the screaming noise of yet another Ilutsin taking off builds up, people just stop their sentence for thirty seconds, and then continue as if nothing happened. Like pushing the 'pause' button on a video.

Most of the containers are now properly wired up onto the generators, and have network connections to the servers and satellite links. Nothing much we can do these days anymore without connectivity, be it for emails, telephone calls, or registering all procurement or logistics transactions onto the central servers in HQ.

Luckily, during my two days, it was neither hot, nor raining, and many staff commented "this weather is as good as it gets". I can imagine the dust, humidity or mud on other days.

There is a constant flow of visitors. Army personnel, staff from the other agencies and NGOs, civilians, people from the government and local communities, people coming back from assessment missions or distribution points. It makes it hard to keep concentrated to the task at hand, as people get interrupted every other minute.

And although the spotlight of the world's cameras is no longer focused on Haiti, the humanitarian operation is still to peak. While during the first six weeks, the utmost urgent needs were being met with loads of cargo being flown in, the steady massive flow of the aid cargo coming in per ship has started. While one plane can bring in up to 100,000 kgs of aid supplies, a ship can bring in 400,000,000 kgs in one go. So the logistics and distribution challenges are only starting now.

On top of it all, the rainy season has begun, making the need of the bringing in supplies even more urgent. And we have the hurricane season just around the corner.

So, sitting back in my hotel room on this Sunday, I can not have but admiration for the staff working in Haiti. Many of them were present during the earthquake. They have lost their homes, suffered from loosing family or friends, scarred by seeing the human misery day by day.

I wish anyone criticizing the humanitarian agencies on the ground in Haiti, could spend a week there, working with them and feel what it is to be faced with the daunting tasks ahead, where "Mañana" might not be an option.


Pictures from my visit to Haiti, and random snapshot from day to day life here, can be found on Shot from the Hip.

[i-link]

Yesterday, my day started at 3 am trying to catch up with emails. At 7 am I was off to a dentist as one of my teeth gave me a problem. Waited for 30 minutes and the dentist did not show up.
Back to the office, getting a hang of the things to do during the day. We got requests to find 1 million bracelets to be used in Haiti for a food distribution. We only found half a million, but it was too late. The food distribution crew in Haiti had changed their plans already. We are now looking at paper coupons to be used for the distribution, in different colours, printed in a particular way so we could avoid forgery. Our two procurement staff went off on a hunt.

While I was on route to a meeting, 1.5 tons of food supplies, rations for our own staff, were being loaded on the plane to Haiti. An hour later, I was back to the office.

Meanwhile we got an order in for 1 million bags to hold up to 12.5 kgs. Off went the procurement staff again.
Around the same time, we received about 15 new staff. Some to strengthen our office, some on their way to Haiti.

At 11 am, I received a phone call they needed an extra finance officer in Port-au-Prince, who needed to organise the new base camp which was being erected for our staff still sleeping in make-shift tents. One of our staff volunteered, packed her bags and checked out of the hotel. The problem was that she did not receive security clearance to fly out, and I spent about one hour on the telephone trying to get the clearance in. Five minutes before we had to close the flight manifest, I got the verbal OK from our security staff in HQ who was in contact with the security staff in Haiti. Our finance officer caught the flight just in time.

Our admin staff pulled out their hair as we had about 10 people on hold to fly off to Haiti, which was beyond the allocation of hotel rooms we had, and there was a shortage of rooms in Santo Domingo.

A group of air ops officers got their clearance, though, but they could not find tents in town, so they would have to sleep on the ground on the ground, in Port-au-Prince. They still flew after a final scramble for tents.

Meanwhile suppliers were coming in to show samples of paper and bags. A selection was made while we were still on the phone trying to get hold of tables and chairs for the new office tent in Haiti.

Meanwhile, I negotiated with the hotel about the delays to get OUR new office space. Next to me, a senior staff was organising the newly arrived travel officer, and finance staff. The logistics guys received two cargo airplanes carrying relief supplies for different agencies. About 50 trucks of food left for Haiti, and we dealt with a problem of the fuel supplies at the airport. One more staff was negotiating extra storage space at the port, and another was trying to arrange a mission for an incoming staff who would help us with the tracking of the truck movements to the border.

At 16:30 I gave a briefing for new staff, and at 17:00 we had the daily staff briefing,

I went for a smoke around 19h30, surprised it was already dark outside.

One thing came in after another, and after a final briefing with a new arrival, I crashed in bed at midnight.

Today was not much better, except that I only got up at 6 am.

Just got an urgent phone call from Haiti. They need half a dozen paper cutters to cut the coupons used at the food distribution.

Off we go. Another day in the paradise of Santo Domingo. At least we had a beautiful sunrise...

[i-link]

It seems "the first wave emergency response" for the Haiti earthquake is over. Two weeks after the disaster, the first-responders who flew in to Haiti will slowly start to demobilize, to be replaced by new staff to stay for the next months.

At the same time, the structures of the response is now gearing for a longer term support. Teams are being reorganized, communications and facilities are being set up catering for an influx of staff and supplies, and things start to be more organised.

The main focus of our team right now is to ensure the relief supplies (for us, mainly food aid, and humanitarian cargo for other agencies) and aidworkers themselves, coming in through the Dominican Republic can go into Haiti fast.

As the office facilities in Haiti were destroyed, a new base camp and floating living quarters (a passenger ship which will anchor off Port-au-Prince) are about ready to be put in use, so our staff can move out of the make-shift tent camp. Over here, in Santo Domingo, we are setting up a supply chain (procurement and transport) to bring in food, office equipment and consumables for those accomodations and offices, so our staff has a minimum of comfort, other than a sleeping bag.

Days and nights are still merging into one. Last night, I crashed at 8 PM, exhausted after a full day of chasing security clearances, organising the '2nd wave' of support staff for our office, meetings with suppliers, the UN coordinator here, etc... I started my work day at 3 AM. Most of my time is spent on two things: organising and debugging. The first more looking to the future, and the second concentrating on adjustments in the present.

We are running well, I am proud of the team. We are ready for the second wave of the emergency response to start. A wave which will be large than the first initial response. And longer.

Picture of our team in Santo Domingo courtesy Enrique Restrepo

[i-haiti%20earthquake1]
Haiti: thousands of people did not survive the earthquake. Two million people will require food assistance.
Over the past days, many people from our organisation have already left to strengthen the team we had already on the ground in Haiti, and to set up the support operations in the Dominican Republic.

I don't often write about the humanitarian work I actually do, in an attempt to isolate my work from my blog. This, I can say: Tuesday morning, I am off on a plane to the Dominican Republic to help set up and manage the support operation in Haiti's neighbouring country. It will be the main food and humanitarian supply pipeline for the months to come.

I got the advanced warning on Friday morning, got confirmation in the afternoon, and received further instructions over the weekend. On Monday, I will pull in all the information I need, and Tuesday early morning I am on a plane.

Initially, I will be gone for two months, but I am not sure for how long I will stay. Two days gave me time to say goodbye to my loved ones, and to prepare myself. "Leaving on a jet plane" can not be more appropriate.

I will be posting updates as much as I can.

Picture courtesy WFP/Alejandro Lopez Chicheri

link[i-link]Two weeks ago, readers sent in nominations for the "2009 Humanity's Shame List", a Top-10 highlighting the last year's events we, humanity as a whole, should be ashamed of.

I pulled all suggestions into a poll and for one week, readers could vote on this post. A total of 299 votes were cast before the deadline of Dec 31st midnight.

So without further delay, here are

[i-Saleban Yussuf Noor in Somalia affected by climate change]When we hear "climate change", we think of melting polar ice, raising sea levels. At best, we might imagine violent hurricanes in South Asia.

We don't often consider how changing weather patterns affect the poorest first. We, the lucky ones, have a buffer. We are more resilient, have alternative livelihoods. The majority of people on this planet don't.

For over one billion people, a few degrees more will mean the difference between life or death. Survival of a tribe or starvation.

I was looking for a first hand recount, and asked Jane Barrett to write up something from her last visit to Somalia. Jane is a press officer at Oxfam Novib for Somalia, Niger and Burundi. During a recent field visit in Somaliland, she was met warm and generously by the communities. People were clearly eager to tell their stories to someone who wanted to listen.

Here is a story Jane wrote after meeting SalebanYussuf Noor, a grandfather and probably the last of his pastoral generation:

Somalia: A way of life lost

In Burcao, Somaliland we visited a village called Ununley. Here, in houses spread on either side of the road, live pastoralist families. When the village gathers to meet us, providing an occasion to drink tea and chew khaat, there is a distinct majority of elderly and women. Indeed, many men have gone with their sheep and goats to search for water. The latest information, a village elder tells us, is that it has rained by the Ethiopian border.

It will be busy, as many herders have heard the same. Having missed several seasonal rains, the herders have to go further and further in search of water and vegetation for their animals. Along the way, many livestock will be lost to the drought.

SalebanYussuf Noor is 75. He is one of the oldest in the village and was one of its founding members at age ten. In his younger years, his family was wealthy. “When I was young, my family was most generous. I ran a tea shop and to feed people I slaughtered my goats,” he says.

Then, the village was growing. Saleban himself owned 500 sheep and goats. Now his family of 11 own just 30. In the last ten years, climate change has endangered the pastoralist way of life that has existed for centuries in Somalia. The last four years the drought has intensified, with the most recent summer the worst. “Every place they, the herders, go they lose some cattle.”

Saleban is very concerned about what the future holds for the younger generation of the village: “The young people who are supposed to continue to build the village are leaving to places such as Lybia, the Sahara and Europe to find work and build a family. This changing weather is very bad. The people living here used to be wealthy, now they are very poor.”

He doesn’t quite know how to deal with the impact it has had on himself and his village. “We are proud. We used to live lavishly, we don’t know how to help, it sounds like begging,” Saleban said.

Saleban’s grandson has been sitting nearby throughout our conversation, drawing patterns in the sand. I ask him what he wants to be when he grows up. “Teacher” he says shyly. Then I ask his friends who are sitting around us, “Teacher.” “Doctor.” “Teacher.” “Teacher.” “Big man who can work in the factory.” Not one of them wants to be a herder like their fathers. That outlook is too bleak.

Check Oxfam's climate change blog

Picture courtesy Jane Barrett/Oxfam

[i-Jose Ramirez in Nepal]I often get questions and feedback from people who want to get started as an aidworker. Recently, I got in contact with Jose Ramirez, 30, from Barcelona, Spain. He worked for several years as an architect in several offices across Europe, before he decided to call it quits. He wanted to take his life in a different direction, doing more fulfilling work in the humanitarian sector.

As many people, he was struggling to find his way in. Where does one start? He decided to work as a volunteer, and was prepared to pay for the experience. An experience which turned out not to be what he had hoped for. I interviewed him.

Q: After your initial years in the commercial sector you wanted to work in the humanitarian world. What triggered that?
Jose: It was nothing in particular. Not "a documentary" I saw or "a terrible image in the news" which made me take that decision. It was more the lust to travel and discover. I wanted to travel through Asia, but I knew from the very beginning that I wouldn't go as yet another backpacker. I had to leave with 'a mission'. I wanted to make a difference.

Q: When you started to look for a job in the humanitarian world, what did you try, on whose doors did you knock?
Jose: I didn't try. I didn't know anything at all. It would have been very pretentious to do that since I had never been in Asia before and I didn't know if I would like it there or not. So I thought that a great introduction into the humanitarian world would be perhaps to volunteer.

Q: How did you choose the organisation you volunteered for?
Jose: I was quite lost. On the Internet, I found lots of information related to volunteering. I had something in mind: I wanted to go to Nepal. After some research and a lot of reading through load of websites I decided finally for a kiwi based recognised NGO. They work all over the world. They seemed very professional and reliable and had a programme going on in Nepal. You could pick among several kind of volunteering there: children's homes, teaching English, etc... I signed up for the community maintenance programme, although the description about the programme was very vague. I thought I could use some of my skills as an architect in that task.

Volunteer fees were involved in all the programmes/countries. As most almost all volunteering sites asked for fees, I assumed it was a normal and indispensable practice when it comes to volunteering.

Q: What was the procedure to register, to get started with that organisation?
Jose: It was way pretty sophisticated. You fill your application on-line and submit it. After they receive it and give you the 'ok', you have to pay a US$350 'volunteer fee' immediately. Once they receive your fee, they contact you again giving you 'the volunteer package': a massive amount of information in the form of emails and pdf-file, which you have to read through. If you have some doubts you can contact the programme coordinator via telephone or email. Eight weeks before departure you have to follow up with the rest of the volunteer programme payment that varies depending on the amount of weeks you stay. I signed up for 4 months and I paid US$1,722. In total, I paid them US$2.072.

Q: Plus your ticket?
Jose: Yes.

Q: What were the promises the NGO made, what were your expectations before you took up the job?
Jose: The NGO promises emergency assistance during your stay. They covered placement with Nepalese families, which included accommodation and food. They would also provide a briefing and formation once I got there. I was very excited about it although I couldn't have any real expectations since it was still unclear which specific job I would be doing.

Q: So, you arrived in Nepal. What were your immediate first impressions. How were you welcomed, briefed, set to work?
Jose: Every placement starts the 1st of every month. You are welcomed by the local branch of the NGO right on arrival. During one week you receive information about the country, basic local language classes, explanation of the programmes. You get to spend 3 days with a Nepalese family to have a first "taste" of the basic life you will be leading in the coming weeks or months. After the briefing week you are sent to your placement, and you start to work.

Q: What were your tasks?
Jose: During the briefing, we, the community maintenance volunteers, learnt we would be helping in the construction of a brand new orphanage that was about to start right after we arrived. After knowing what we would be doing I couldn't be more excited, after all, I was an architect. It looked very challenging work. Even though I knew that I would be mainly doing "labor" work, I hoped to bring some input in the tasks. Local and experience workers were doing all the 'real' construction work supervised by a foreman and a local architect. Our tasks were merely to assist with some 'extra' work, work not budgeted and 'easy' to do by non-experience Westerners. That work included clearing off a bamboo "forest", building a bamboo hut for storage and the construction of a boundary fence. These were "crumbles" in my opinion.

This was the most ambitious project that this NGO had ever done, so they were quite focused with the fundraising, and unfortunately not really with the volunteers on site. We were left sometimes for a week without feedback from the NGO. We were working with broken tools. The jobs we did, were needed for sure and I believe we achieved a very good result. But i wondered many times if that work couldn't have been done faster and better by local people.

[i-Jose and his Nepalese host family]
Q: What did the NGO cater for?
Jose: The NGO works with some Nepalese families. These families are used to have foreigners and can speak some English. They provide accommodation and food under basic conditions. I learned after, they were paid US$60 per a month per volunteer by the NGO. Some of the families had up to 4 volunteers.
They provided as well the tools, gloves, etc...

Q: what work was the NGO actually doing. What projects did they have, who did they partner with?
Jose: The NGO was involved in several projects besides the construction of the new orphanage. They were sending volunteers to several children homes in different areas of Kathmandu run by local management. They helped help with teaching English and supervisory tasks. There were some health programme going on as well, which were carried out by volunteers with some medical training.

Q: You worked with colleague volunteers. What was your impression of them: "well willing", "adventurers", "lost souls"?
Jose: Another thing I was very excited about was to meet different people from different countries coming with the same purpose. The reality was way different from that. I was so disappointed to realize most of them were kids in their twenties. They were not focused on the job, at all. Most had come there because their parents paid the volunteering fees. I realized that those kids were probably attracted to volunteering because they didn't have to pay the expenses, themselves, which is quite sad. I met some good apples amongst the rotten ones. I still keep keep in touch with them.

Q: Even if the work itself were you able to use your presence there,"in the field" to network, to make contacts with other organisations, with other aid workers?
Jose: The aid workers network is very big in Nepal. Maybe too big and too corporated. I met some interesting people though and made some contacts I hope to use in the future.

Q: Your experience was rather negative. In how far is this a generalization?
Jose: I would rather say "not absolutely satisfying". I was unable to share my negative impressions with most of the volunteers since they didn't pay the fees themselves. I met some other people and volunteers on the way and I did share this with them, we all agreed that is not certainly the way to go when it comes to volunteering.

It would be naive if I would say that money is not necessary her. It is if you want your aid project to reach somewhere. But there are different ways. If you accept money from volunteers willing to help, people that have crossed half the world in a very expensive flight, but don't put them to good use, you are a soulless NGO. No matter if you are using the money for a good cause.

Q: How did you end your assignment with them. What did you do after that?
Jose: Construction takes some time. I worked in several tasks on the building site during my stay. When I left, the construction was still going on. After that I spent some months in Nepal, did some trekking and thought of my next move. In the end, I did another volunteering task in Thailand. But this time with there was no money involved whatsoever.

In those months in Nepal, I had the chance to meet some amazing Nepalese people. They were completely astonished when they learnt we had paid US$2.000 to 'do labor work'. That really enhances the idea we are spoiled Westerners, willing to give up so much money to end up dirty with mud and with blisters in their hands. They thought nobody should pay to do that kind of job, volunteering ot not.

Q: What is your advice for those trying to enter the aidworld or who want to volunteer?
Jose: Volunteering, is a job or task that should be done honestly. It is understood you are not getting paid for it. It is very sad nowadays you HAVE TO PAY for it. No way. We have to stop the way this is working. What happens is that NGOs are relying more and more on volunteers. Not to do the work, but to fundraise for their projects. The goal is honest but the way this is done, is not.

My advice is simple: "Don't pay to volunteer". When money is involved, the word loses its meaning. Instead, I would advise people to travel to the country were aid is needed and once on site do some research. My second volunteering experience in Thailand showed me this is still possible.

The Road: Jose, thank you for your blunt answers. I wish you the very best.

If you think of starting as an aidworker, here is my advise to you.

Read more interviews on The Road

[Loband: Object Removed -]
October 8th was World Sight Day... and I missed it. Let's catch up:

45 million children and adults are blind worldwide, two-thirds being women and girls… and every year between 1 and 2 million more will lose their sight.

What makes these facts even more upsetting is that 75 percent of cases could have been prevented, or their eyesight restored, if only people had access to proper eye care. Unless steps are taken now, it is estimated that by the year 2020 blindness will affect more than 76 million people!

As one of the organisations trying to do something about it, ORBIS carries out programs onboard its Flying Eye Hospital and at hospitals in developing countries to help the blind see. While they are in these countries, ORBIS also trains local doctors and nurses in the latest sight-saving techniques so that they may gain the tools and knowledge needed to carry on the work that is done.

[i-link]
Mary is a Kiva Fellow who is currently in the Philippines. She works with ASKI, one of the Kiva's local microfinance partners. ASKI operates 24 branches of which Ilagan, Tugugraro and Cayaun were the hardest hit by the recent typhoons.

Of the 60,037 ASKI Clients, 5,943 (about 10%) were affected by the typhoons. The total damage, both personal and businesses amounts to US$1,405,808...

She wrote me an update:

The standing crops were damaged due to “VERY” strong wind. Rice crops were totally damaged and lost. Vegetables crops and fishing business were totally washed out... The above villages are still in recovery especially in the village of Antagan 1 & 2 which were the most affected.

The typhoon caused a lot of damages in the people's livelihood. Most of their ricefields which were ready to harvest, were totally wash out due to flash floods. Hundreds of cows and carabaos were also found dead.

ASKI is made up of 2 arms: an Micro Finance Institute and a foundation. When things like the typhoon hits, the MFI taps on the shoulders of the Foundation so they can offer as many contingencies as possible to lenders and still remain solvent.

ASKI has responded to the storms in an amazing way: quickly and compassionately they personally delivered $26,000 of relief goods in dangerous ares to all affected communities in Central and Northen Luzon, based on need. The Foundation has also set up a Disaster Council for future financial and logistical planning.

ASKI recently implemented mandatory crop insurance (PCIP) from the government of the Philippines for all agricultural loans. They are now speeding up implementation. The ASKI board has just approved the following loan contingency plans. Together, clients and loan Officers will decide which of 3 options makes sense for each situation: a loan moratorium, a loan restructuring or a refinance.

[i-suicide bomb blast WFP office Islamabad Pakistan]
It is difficult to imagine what people go through when a suicide bomb determines who is to live and who is not. Here is the story from Rehmat Yazdani, one of our colleagues, who survived yesterday's bombing of the UN WFP office in Islamabad, Pakistan.

I am shaken and traumatized after the yesterday’s blast which took place inside my office building only a few paces away from my glass-cabin. The blast was so sudden and strong that it took me some time to register what actually had happened there with all of us. It was so strong that I was thrown from my chair to a few feet away on the floor.


Everything was shattered into pieces only in a matter of seconds. When I tried getting up from the floor, I had broken wooden pieces in my hair, my head and body were aching badly as something had hit me severely. I was not in my senses and my whole body was shaking badly, the sound of the deadly blast was resonating in my ears and I was so shocked that I could not move a step. There were injured colleagues lying on the floor. My room was on fire and pieces of paper, broken pieces of doors, broken pieces of my glass cabin, windows and tables were lying here and there. I was looking at my injured colleagues in a state of shock and horror. “Vacate the building immediately”, I heard one of my colleagues saying. But I could not move till the time one of my colleague dragged me outside the building. But that was not the end of it.


The real horror started when my colleagues started taking the dead and injured bodies outside the building. Yes, bodies drenched in blood of people I worked and used to spent a major part of my day on regular basis… It was such a heartbreaking scene……We had tears in ours eyes. We were horrified and traumatized…


None of us in the office had ever imagined that this Bloody Monday will change our lives for ever and we will be left with haunted memories of the incident. I have not recovered from the shock yet, the whole scene is playing back again and again in my brain, even the sedative pills failed to calm down my nerves. None of my other colleagues are out of trauma yet. Those innocent souls who died in the blast would never be there in our office again and our office would never be the same place again….. I pray for all the departed souls (Gul, Farzana, Wahab, Abid Rehman and Udan) and I am going to miss them forever …


My mother says that it is a miracle that I have only minor injuries and I survived despite the fact that the bomb blasted only a few paces away from where I sit But I am thinking why this miracle did not happen in case of Gul, Farzana, Wahab, Abid Rehman and Udan. Why these innocent people lost their lives?? What will become of their families now?? What was their fault or What was our fault that all of us became victims of a bomb blast and are left with haunted memories ??

[i-World Humanitarian Day]
OCHA (the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs) launches the "World Humanitarian Day". It is dedicated to "thousands of aid workers who have devoted their lives to humanitarian work, matching idealism with action, and principles with practice. Their selfless and non-political endeavours are vital for the necessary acceptance by all concerned that assistance to the needy should be provided impartially and neutrally, without reference to religion, gender, or race."

In short, it is a day dedicated to us, aidworkers. Why August 19th, you may ask? On August 19 2003, "Canal Hotel", the UN office and living compound in Baghdad was hit by a massive terrorist attack, leaving 22 UN staff dead and dozens wounded, as you can read in my Ebook shortstory A Requiem for Baghdad.

August 19 2003 was a turning point after which attacks on aidworkers became more frequent and equally violent. 2008 had the highest amount of security incidents involving humanitarian aid workers: 260 humanitarians were victims of security incidents. 122 aidworkers were killed, and 62 were kidnapped. (Source)

Despite all these efforts and human sacrifices, the world is still in a sad state:

• According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), world hunger is projected to reach a historic high in 2009, with just over a billion people going hungry every day.
• Violence and war forced 15.2 million people to flee their own country while at least 26 million have been displaced within their own countries.
• In 2008 more than 9 million children died before their fifth birthday. Most of these children lived in developing countries and died from a disease or a combination of diseases that could easily have been prevented or treated.
• Every year, 1.8 million people die from diarrhoeal diseases
• An average of 211 million people are directly affected each year by natural disasters.
• Millions of the world's most vulnerable are expected to be affected by climate change, increasing prolonged droughts, repeated floods and more frequent cyclones and hurricanes.
• While humanitarian needs are increasing because of the economic crisis and other global challenges such as population pressure, global health pandemics, and price spikes, the global economic crisis puts pressure on the aid budgets of all donor governments.

[i-A Sudan bridge being built]

I just came across an interesting blog, Unity Bridge, about a development project in Yabus, Sudan.

Yabus is home to five tribes and 60,000 people, divided by a river that is impassable for up to six months every year.

The blog follows the project to build a 74m bridge which will unite the town so that both sides will enjoy access to the clinic, market, and schools all year long. The small and big hurdles, success stories and setbacks so typical for development work in Africa.

Picture courtesy Unity Bridge

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