The Situation

Is Jersey Shore still cool? I’ve clearly lost touch with all important things

Work Situation 

Now that we’ve hit our 3 month mark at post and just had our IST conference (in service training), we are expected be reasonably integrated and begin working on projects. This brings me to the real reason I’ve come here… development work.

My work situation here is pretty interesting yet chaotic.  As an Agribusiness Advisor, my focus is to improve profitability of agricultural operations with enhanced business practices and move from subsistence farming to commercial farming. Till now I’ve been mostly meeting lots of common interest farming groups and other contacts around the area that will be valuable resources for my work going forward. I’ve thus far learned quite a bit about local agricultural issues and the general challenges faced by the poor in West Africa. 

I am also partnered up with a micro finance institution called Credit du Sahel, and work closely with an associate dealing primarily with Agro-Pastoral common interest groups and associations in the area. I often take trips with him en brusse to meet with clients to follow up on undergoing projects and financing proposals. I am also looking to work on management projects that could improve our branch’s efficiency somewhere down the line. Being paired with an institution helps with work consistency and support, and my counterpart there is pretty legit. As a random side note, I’ve just realized everything I’ve described thus far sounds a lot cooler than it actually is. score.

Apart from primary activities, I have ended up working quite a bit with the local youth. Specifically, I had been teaching English at the local primary school once a week, and now that I’ve finished there, I will be teaching English for the last trimester at the local Jr. high. I will probably not continue with teaching English past this year because I’d like to focus on my primary work, however, it has been a big boost in helping me integrate into the community and raising my visibility around the village. Probably the most random thing I’ve worked on here is my girls group. It was a project my predecessor left me, and is something I’ve continued, with the help of my post mate, who is a girl (it makes much more sense when she is there). Every Thursday at my house we usually do some lecture or activity, followed by an English lesson. The girls range from 7 to 14 years old and are a pretty spontaneous group.  A few of them are standouts in their class and the group has been helpful to them in promoting a certain degree of ambition and motivation.  This has also helped me integrate into the community but I will probably be looking to hand off the torch as I get busier with my primary projects.

Other miscellaneous ambitions include my attempt to make the village’s first computer lab as well as an upcoming business class.  Work here comes along at a snail’s pace, but as they say in Pidgin… small small catch monkey (real English translation: little by little).