Paris Blitz

This was my third 24 hour trip to Paris. As is easy to do with Paris, I came up with a game plan for my solo visit. I picked a decent 3 star hotel that would be walking distance to most major attractions - Hotel de Vaneau St. Germain in the 7th district. I decided to go to Musee d'Orsay, because I had never been and because I wanted to do something cultural before succumbing to the shopping. The museum was as described - amazing and full of famous works. My favorites were all of Toulouse La Trec's works the Whistler painting of the old woman in the rocker and the Renoir collection - I think I prefer Renoir to Monet - this I just found out.

Right before I arrived, I checked facebook and saw that a very good friend from Uganda, Sarah, was in town. This was an even bigger deal, because she lives in Australia. We met for a long lovely lunch near the Museum. It was great to catch up, drink some wine and for a moment have a partner in Paris.

At Sarah's suggestions, I headed over to Rue du Passy for some shopping. I was able to get a few French tailored items without breaking the bank. I snapped a few shots of the Eiffel Tour just as it was lit up -- never gets old to gaze at that amazing structure.

Exhausted, I headed for dinner near my hotel. It was recommended on Trip Advisor - Midi Vins, but it was a disappointment. The atmosphere was nice and it was jam packed with locals, but the food was meh.

In the morning I thought about running to Le Grande Epicerie, the food hall of the great La Bon Marche, which wasn't too far away. But I was just too tired. Instead I grabbed a croissant and a coffee at the place on the corner. As people walked by with fresh baguettes tucked under their arms, my mouth and brain struggled to comprehend the amazing light crispy pastry I was imbibing. Ah Paris, even briefly, you never disappoint!

Abidjan un peu

Well, I made it to West Africa. It was nice to compare and contract with East Africa, although I tried to be one of those annoying development workers who spends the whole time talking about their frame of reference country (i.e., Uganda). My first observation is that the food is great. Ivorians are into spicy. At lunch one day, I asked the woman sitting next to me if I could have a tiny bit of her mound of habanero. I took about a 1/4 of tsp and mixed it into my fish dish. She took the mound, about a tablespoon, and mixed it in. I started eating and it was delicious and then I sputtered and coughed. And then to my mortification, I sneezed. Oy! At least I got the table laughing..at me.

As I have a serious African fabric addiction, I noted that there are two places that produce the famous fabric on the continent: DRC and Ivory Coast. Yet, I managed to resist the urge to buy new stuff. This did not stop me from practically drooled as women strolled by, dressed to the 9s, tailored to perfection in patterns and colors I had never seen before.

The infrastructure in Abidjan was impressive, especially considering the recent violent and bloody conflict. There were nice big highways with overpasses and under passes. A newly renovated university. Water that is treated ad apparently safe to drink, although I did not test that theory. And yes I did compare Abidjan to Kampala and Abidjan puts Kampala to shame!

I got to spend time with Jeanne, of course. Her estate is similar to her last one: palatial and cavernous (unpack, JB, unpack!) It was always a blast to have Jeanne host me and a few of her new colleagues, not least to watch the scales fall from their eyes as she mixed intriguing cocktails (and by intriguing, I mean toxic). Nothing like a ginger champagne mixed with a gooey "liquor" from Kinshasa. While dancing to Akon this made sense. The next day, not so much.

My one complaint was the weather. On the one hand it was lovely to feel the heat of the African sun. It is so much stronger and I could just feel the vitamin D rushing into my body. I didn't get to the much celebrated beach in my short time there. But despite it's promise, it would be hard for me to ever live in Abidjan, because of the very hot and very humid inner city heat - like DC in August. My hair is still not speaking to me! Despite liberal applications of my finest hair schlack, I had to keep in tightly wound in a bun almost the whole time. But for a week, in the middle of the winter doldrums, this work jaunt was worth it.

Ghost of L'Enfant

Charles de Gaule airport sucks. I say this not to compare it say on a scale of 1 to Juba airport bad. I say this in an opposite-of-a-Hertz-ad kinda way. Even if you go like a business pro, you will inevitably be slowed by delinked terminals, long long LONG walks down narrow walk ways under construction with signs that have arrows pointing down to mean "walk on" and on and on. I will now ease up on Dulles' Mad Max vehicles.

I asked a person today where to go to check my bag once I got my boarding pass and she said, "oh, you are in the wrong terminal." I refused to believe her and asked another person, who pointed me down a long long LONG walkway but at least it was in the same terminal. And why do they need to check boarding pass and passport as you are going through security? I don't mean to enter security. They do that too, but as you're trying to remove belts, shoes, etc, you also have to use a third arm and hand it over. Sigh.

The fun part of CDG is trying to change terminals or even sub terminals. Try to change from 2A to 2F, I dare you. And is that 2F section L? M? Z? I think it's section WTF. Oh, and they like to change gates a lot. I passed out in a chair next to my gate on my way to Abidjan and woke up to find a completely different flight leaving from the gate and ran down a long long LONG walkway to find the list of gates and then walked some more to my new gate. I watched about 20 Vietnamese business women and men miss their flight because of this. The worst part was watching these diminutive people being screamed at by the gate attendant. And unlike NY or DC, there's probably only one flight to Saigon a day...

The rock bottom for women and girls

“The status of women in the DRC is rock bottom,” a diplomat said to me. “It is truly, devastatingly worse here than anywhere else in the world.” She elucidated her comments with anecdote after anecdote of just how bad women have it. A recent study found that women work on average 17 hours a day and men work 7. This sounds not unlike elsewhere, where women work and take care of families, but the work here is hard; hard labor hard. Women carry backbreaking loads of goods and children, they toil in the fields under the blistering equatorial sun that splits stones and they are beaten by their husbands for not working hard enough. The diplomat also revealed the clueless, hapless world of the international community that cannot produce much evidence of  meaningful impact. Perhaps she was having a bad day. But I worry she wasn't.

This meeting reminded me where I am. The farce of capital city comfort almost got me. There were lots of discussions of issues in the abstract today, with mindless droning of some shameful UN agencies. “We issued an annual report on gender blah blah blah.” I’ve assuaged my guilt over comfort on this trip with reminders of the dues I’ve paid in Gulu and Juba and elsewhere. I may even still let myself off the hook a little bit. It’s ok that not every field trip I take consists of propelling myself on shoddy, crappy airplanes to the arse-end of nowhere to get up close and personal with human suffering.

But perhaps I can do better. When I returned to the office this evening, I made it my mission to tweak my agenda slightly. “Can we ask some of these groups if it would be possible to meet with their beneficiaries?” I worried a bit about overstepping the hospitality of my colleagues, but I suppressed my fretting. This was my shot to speak to a few women and girls here in Kinshasa who suffer the world’s worst poverty and inequity. Their world cannot be substituted by visits to refugee camps in Yei or secondary schools in Pader. I must meet women here.

I also met the Minister of Gender today. She was a fabulous woman who towered over me, dressed to the 9s in an exquisitely tailored dress. I didn’t have high expectations of the meeting, because many leaders here are unabashed patrons of power. However, she gave me some hope. She outlined her priorities and chief among them was to get out into the local communities. Programming at national or even provincial level was not enough. We needed to get to the mango tree.

As always, the mango tree is my touchstone. It propels me and engages my sense of what is responsible development programming. Although I may not bump up and down on roads thousands of kilometers from nowhere on this trip, I think I can do better. I must try.

Ali Boom ba yay!

Well, I made it to Kinshasa. Piece of cake! The airport was not that scary. One a scale of 1 to Juba, I give it a 5.5. Heck, if they hadn't asked for my immunization card, I'd probably even give it higher marks.

My first day was a flurry of meetings where I floated in and out of jetlagged consciousness. I was doing that embarrassing dozing head bob in the car between meetings...

Today after what felt like 17 hours of sleep I feel much better. My IFES minder, Bernadette (chosen because she speaks the best English) picked me up and took me to the market. We went to buy fabric. I know I know,  I'm addicted. But how can one not buy fabric ("liputa" in Lingala) when one is in the heart of Africa?

Speaking of the heart of Africa or Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, I visited the shores of the Congo River after the market. This river is lesser known than the Nile, but it is infamous because of Conrad and of course the Belgians. It is wide and fast moving and I cannot imagine the crazy places to which it leads.

Admittedly it is a bit hard to reconcile the DRC I am experiencing with the one rated by the UN's Human Development Index as dead last in the world. I knew that coming over. There is often talk among development folk of being stuck in capital cities and not seeing the "real" Africa. It is true, but I'm relatively ok with that for this trip. I have paid my dues bumping up and down on God-awful roads to hold meetings under mango trees.

For now I'm focused less on getting to know Africa (we're pretty acquainted...) and more on figuring out my new job. This trip will help.

Ok, maybe writing this while devouring a "Salada Nicoise" overlooking an Olympic size swimming pool is a bit ridiculous. (There is actually a water aerobics class being taught and not one Congolese among the students.) Ahem.

But it's Saturday and the rest of the week promised to be busy with meetings to help me figure out how and where to break in with gender programming here; programming that reaches the mango tree...

The hurricane and the Hubers

In an effort to preserve some moments of Huber history I feel the need to write down a few reflections from the last few weeks.

My grandmother, Alberta huber, died two weeks ago. She was 95. She was ready to meet her maker and for the most part we were ok with it. I was amazed by my Aunt Beth who took on the lion share of caring for Nana, and at the end kept a near constant vigil as I for one traipsed off to Libya. From giving her gold medals to opening windows my Aunt tried to help Alberta go with peace and grace, and she finally did. Her funeral was a celebration and not too emotional except my brother's occasional outburst or my aunt's sweet sniffles. I was only overcome once and that was when I was presented with her engagement ring. It seemed too extravagant a gift and I did not feel worthy.

Then my parents drove down for "meet the parents" weekend. This deserves a blog in and of itself but suffice it to say it went well. The Aaronson and Huber clans did well.

My parents scurried off on Sunday to beat out the hurricane which was expected to devastate the eastern seaboard. In DC we worried but the storm mostly spared us. New York and New Jersey were not spared. The history of Sandy is well documented and awful. 

My house on the Highlands was spared because it was indeed on high lands. The town was wiped out. 1,200 of the 1,500 houses in downtown Highlands will be bull dozed.

My parents had no structural damage but lost power and as of this entry still don't have it. They claim it's not so bad. They have a gas stove and a fireplace and plenty of wood. They have the camaraderie of their great neighbors. Each night of the early days hosting communal grilling parties and drinking into the wee hours.

 

Four days after the storm it was clear that my dad was finally going to have to put down his beloved dog Maggie. Just a week after my grandmother passed, Maggie did too. She went with  my parents in the room reassuring her and weeping. It's too much.

 A few days afterwards my parents are trying to rebound. My dad is back to work but exhausted. My mom called the mayor's office. They were kind but that was all. So they wait for power and the Jersey shore reels in its destruction.

We are lucky of course but it is never easy. I'm amazed that they have stuck it out. We tend to dwell on our Huber crazy, with the often quoted adage "Sell crazy somewhere else. We're all stocked up here." But perhaps we should give a little more time and credit to the incredible strength of this family. I am amazed.

Live Presidents

On Saturday Hayden and I went to a campaign rally for Obama in Bristow, VA. With just 3 days til the 2012 presidential election, I was excited to finally have a chance to see president Obama speak in person. As a bonus, Bill Clinton introduced him. Also there was Tim Kaine, former governor and current senate candidate and slightly oddly, Dave Matthews.

Dave sang a few songs which were forgettable save his incredible voice. Tim came out and if I were being honest he cast a bit of a "they made me run" vibe.

Then Bill. Oh Bill! He was hoarse as hell from trotting across the country campaigning like crazy. Even without a voice, the man could talk. In hindsight and reflecting on both men's styles, Clinton speaks like you are sitting next to him at a picnic, both of you munching on BBQ ribs shooting the shit. In a hoarse but pronounced southern draw he declared "when I was a little boy my grandmother  told me not to get caught with my hands in the cookie jar. Mitt Romney not only gets caught (pause to chuckle to himself) with his hand in the cookie jar, but he digs it in farther desperately seeking more cookies." Woo hoo! He had the crowd in his palm. All of us in the freezing cold Virginia night loved Bill Clinton.

Then the big moment...even though people say Clinton is a tough act to follow, actually waiting for a glimpse of Obama was bigger. He literally sprinted onto the stage and everyone went nuts. He had an uncharacteristically frenzied and infectious bound to him as he approached the mic. Maybe I was inadvertently swept into the moment because he entered to U2's song "City of Blinding Lights." 

He gave a speech that was at once different and complementary to Clinton's. To Clinton's folksiness, Obama offered the unmistakable air of a sitting president. He preached to us like he understood his job is to tend to us in the thousands. It was not intimate, but it was awesome. He boomed his familiar campaign speech across the outdoor amphitheater. Though familiar it felt invigorated. Perhaps it was the final days of the campaign. He used a new talking point about being merely a prop in this great campaign that he said was up to us. He reiterated the promise to work for all and that it was an American imperative to support each other. My God, how could the other side not agree with this?! He captivated us with his preaching. We were truly his lambs.

We had to drive an hour outside of DC. We then had to wait in a line for two hours that snaked through a seemingly endless parking lot where the temperature dipped into the low 40s. At one stage in the line I joked to Hayden that Obama was losing votes with such inhumane conditions.

All was forgotten as the sense of history superseded petty complaints. It was Obama's history, on the eve of a victory that seemed impossible to halt (indeed he was victorious). And it was my history too, because I knew standing in the cold, in my platform boots, leaning on Hayden for warmth that I would remember this moment for the rest of my life. This was the moment I finally heard Obama speak and Clinton too. And it was awesome.