Friday, February 18, 2011

Return from Tajikistan

So, I got back from Tajikistan on Tuesday, Feb 15th. It was a LONG trip home (especially with an 11 hour delay in Tajikistan and an unplanned overnight in Istanbul, Turkey), which made me really happy to sleep in my own bed. And, luckily, my flight got back in the afternoon, so I went to bed at 7pm, slept till 7am and kicked jet lag’s butt. No jet leg. Woo hoo!

I had a great time in Tajikistan. The capital was neat and had lots of good restaurants and cafes. Because there was so much to do for the training, I didn’t get a lot of time to do sightseeing, but we had fun. We had a big dinner to kick off the week and to get to know each other. It was mostly our Tajikistan staff, but four members from our Afghanistan team came over as well and also one of the local NGO partners in Tajikistan joined. He was an expert in Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) and actually ended up giving a large part of our DRR session, which was pretty cool.

The Mercy Corps staff there was amazing! They had incredible capacity and such great attitudes and work ethic and were very interested in the training. I have to give them a lot of credit because even after five days of training, they were just as enthusiastic and engaged, which is always nice to see when you’re the trainer. Of course, giving them chocolate throughout the week doesn’t hurt. (wink) I gave my part of the training, which didn’t go as well as I had hoped, but also wasn’t as bad as I feared, so that’s good. As I said earlier, I still have a lot to learn about Early Recovery in Emergencies which is supposed to be my “expertise” and it showed during the training. One of the participants asked me a question and I had no idea what the answer was and wasn’t quick enough on my feet to think of something. So I had to look it up in the book and then give a half-assed answer. Oops!! (blushing from embarassment) But they were interested and engaged and wanted more time, so that’s always nice. Then on Friday, I gave another more in-depth session just to the program staff that went very well.

On Saturday, we did a big emergency simulation and I got to try on my acting skills (they’re not very good). I played a military checkpoint and I delayed two teams access to their “beneficiaries”. I also played a store owner willing to sell (and price gouge) the teams as they tried to buy items to help their beneficiaries. It was a lot of fun and I’m looking forward to doing it again. In late March, we have two more of these trainings coming up, one in Indonesia and one in Myanmar (formerly Burma). I’m hoping that I will get to go to these trainings as well, since I’ve never been to either country. Yay!

The weather was not so great that week. It was beautiful the day we arrived, but the following day it rained until midday when it switched over to snow, then it snowed for three days and then rained for the rest of the week. The next time I saw sun….the day we left and that was only because our flight was delayed for 11 hours. Get this….the flight was delayed for 11 hours due to “weather conditions” in Dushanbe. The one day in 10 days that the sky was blue and clear and the sun was out and shining brightly. Was the weather condition that the weather was too good? You tell me. No idea. : ) Silly airline! Anyway, the day before we left (as it poured down rain all day), we went on a guided hike outside of Dushanbe. Well, let me clarify…in Dushanbe it was raining, 30 minutes outside of Dushanbe where we were hiking in the mountains, it was snowing (about 6-7inches on the ground). When they said “hike”, I heard “walk up a gentle slope”. Since I was not planning to go on a hike when I packed for Tajikistan, I showed up to the hike in jeans, a sweater, ankle socks, and my $9 slip-on tennis shoes from Payless. Did I mention no umbrella? The rest of the group was all geared up in waterproof, insulated North Face coats and pants and wearing water proof hiking shoes. They even had extendable hiking poles, neck warmers, umbrellas, waterproof backpack covers, etc. That was my first clue…I was thinking I should have said that I wouldn’t go on the hike at that point, but I didn’t want to seem like a wimp. How dumb am I?? Very!

So….we drive up and I’m watching the snow come down and down and down (did I mention I had a whole in one of my cheap, cheap sneakers? We get out of the van in about 4 inches of snow. My feet are cold before we even start walking. One of the guys lends me some super techy socks, which helped a lot. Then another guy gave me an extendable hiking pole because he was worried about my crappy shoes! (pause for embarrassment…again). Then we start hiking. I was doing okay, except that underneath the (about 6 inches by this time) snow, there is a little bit of water, which then turns the snow to very wet slush. Mostly, I’m able to avoid the slushy parts. About 45 minutes in though…there’s about 100 yards of 6-inch slushiness. First my shoes get soaked, then both pairs of socks, then my jeans up to the knees. After another 15 minutes of hiking my feet are freezing! Now, I hated to be a whiner, but I was like “OK…and….I’m done. Thanks so much for the hike. See you guys down at the van!” It was like walking around on the Titanic after it started to sink. An hour later when I got down to the van (which had driven farther down the mountain due to the snow), my frozen feet were numb and I was a little cranky (wink). My two colleagues came with me. I crawled into the van, stripped to bare feet, put my brand new gloves I got for Christmas (thanks, Lauren!!) on my frozen feet (I like my toes and want to keep them!) and slept for the next hour and a half while waiting for the rest of the group. Next time they say….”Hey…want to go for a hike?” I will know better and say….”Heck, no!”

Anywho. That’s it in a nutshell. Enjoy the pics!! If you are wondering more about the org where I work, you can check it out (and the Tajikistan, Pakistan and Iraq programs) at www.mercycorps.org. I think you can even make donations there. (wink, wink) : )

Love, Jill