Day 54: Moody Toosday

I’m writing this from a conference room in the world class Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens; it is completely beautiful. However, I feel like that is just about the only thing I got going for me right now. I’m here for a feedback workshop for a certain government department that we conducted an evaluation for on one of their programs. It’s a pretty cool program – it gives disadvantaged people skills, hires them on a contract basis to use those skills, and has a social development component as well that educates beneficiaries about issues such as health, conflict resolution, gender diversity, etc. The ultimate goal is poverty alleviation through equipping these beneficiaries and then successfully transitioning them into the economy.

So, when I read the evaluation report and put together the powerpoint presentation of findings for the workshop a few weeks ago, it sounded pretty great. There were clearly a few government admin issues, but yea, cool program. Now though, getting into this workshop, oh my gosh. Its almost the end of day two and it feels like we’ve gotten nowhere. Everybody is on a different page, people don’t want to go with the process, communication stinks, and we just can’t get down to doing the work. Everyone is a critic of the activities that have been planned for developing this strategic plan. I’ve wanted to scream on maybe 15 occasions. Its been a great learning experience for me in terms of watching my supervisors facilitate this whole show, they’re doing an amazing job. Like I said, I would’ve melted down and run to the bathroom crying or something. They’re just keeping it cool and moving on… (where they’re moving on to, however, ultimately remains to be seen).

I’ve been invited to jump in and help out with the group work, but at this point I’m quite intimidated by these obstinate bureaucrats. They’re currently arguing about what the purpose was of the last hour of group work we did before lunch. Whoever ordered the catering for lunch today was a huge failure; it was all platters of fried food. All nice interesting shapes of fried food, but seriously, its all still fried food. I ate two spring rolls, some mysterious fried veggie paste, and a chunk of chicken. Oh wait, the chicken drumsticks weren’t fried, but they were covered in something orange and fattening. So now, after lunch, I’m sipping a cup of nasty instant coffee and trying to keep up with what the heck is going on. I avoided the instant coffee for so long, but I had to get up at 6 today to catch the train out here. I guess seeing the sunrise while running across the CBD to the train station was nice. Geeze, what an adventure.

I have gotten into a bit of a funk over the last few days so its just comical that this workshop has plopped its fat bum on top of that. The Connect program is a difficult social bubble to live in because its all so transitory – people are always coming and going around the beginning/end of each month. One of my best friends, Hunter, left yesterday, and that is SAD. I was supposed to get a new roommate on Sunday (now she’s coming Thursday) and that is nerve-racking. I hope she’s cool since we’ll be sharing a room and stuff. Cailey is leaving in like 3 weeks. I’m sick of being in a long-distance relationship that spans hemispheres. I want a car so I have a degree of freedom. I have too much schoolwork to do and no time in which to do it (since I’m working fulltime and all). And I need to figure out what the heck I’m doing in May. The mere thought of what comes after May is too terrifying to mention, so I won’t. For now, I guess I’ll focus on surviving this workshop. Thanks for listening to my huge whine-fest. Can someone please put my mommy on a plane now so she can come give me hugs and kissies???