A day in the life of...

27th July 2010

NB: This may not be a typical day. I only returned to Kindu yesterday, and Benoit is away on leave which means I’m in charge of 30 people, 2 projects and investigating an emergency project…

7.30am: Alarm goes off. Walk blurrily to the door and unlock so the house staff can start work.
7.31am: Throw buckets of cold water over myself. My hair is definitely due for a wash – haven’t washed it in about 4 days. Slightly less blurry eyed.
7.40am: Start unpacking my bag which I was too tired to do yesterday. Give the cook a grater, a vegetable peeler and spatulas I bought in Uganda (the potato masher got beheaded en route). Realise I need to wash my underwear.
7.55: Force down some porridge made by our cook.
8.00: Devotions – sing in French and Swahili. I’m leading devotions today (that’s a nice welcome back!) which I do for the first time ever in French. Felix translates into Swahili giving everyone else a second chance of understanding what I said. Then prayers and announcements. My French holds up. Sort of.
8.45: Quick chat about the HIV training proposal with Madelaine.
8.50: Transfer money so Yvonne, our finance administrator can start paying the salaries. Show her how the payslips work. Sign the authorisation for the travel movements for the week.
9.20: Catch up with Jean-Pierre, our PHP (Public Hygiene Promotion officer). Discuss the site selection of our water project and the per diems for BCZ (Government health workers).
9.50: Quick catch up with Arnold (Food Security Management) about the distribution of seeds.
10.00: Notice a load of the animators hanging around in the hut outside waiting for the payroll before they’ll go to the field. Go and give them the photos I had printed in Uganda so they can start creating the presentation boards.
10.09: Bearded by 2 people wondering how to photocopy data when our photocopier is broken. Send them to logistics to arrange to get it copied by someone in the town.
10.10: Meet with Sadok, the Monitoring & Evaluation person. Run through his plan for the week and discuss the different ways he can verify that the beneficiary selection has been done well. Chat about gathering ‘stories of transformation’. Interrupted in the middle by Josephine (our cleaner) who wants to know if the clothes unpacked on my bedroom floor need to be ironed.
10.45: Go hunting for the camera charger.
10.46: Delegate the job to someone else.
10.47: Discuss an issue over payroll with someone – explain it’s pro-rata’d from when the contract starts.
11.00: Receive a letter with information pertaining to an HR issue last week. Read and discuss with Person 1.
11.50: Discuss payroll issue with someone who doesn’t appear to be on the payroll. This is problematic.
12.00: Try ringing two different people at the Bukavu support base to discuss payroll. No answer. Write email instead.
12.05: Go and check emails on the BGAN (satellite internet thingy)
12.10: Return to office. Laptop makes a loud beeping noise and starts declaring that the hard drive is broken. Wonder if it was the 3-4 minutes of sun. Run diagnostics.
12.15: Discuss payroll issue further with our missing payroll employee. Give him a cash advance on his salary instead. Hope I’ve done the right thing.
12.35: Diagnostics still showing a hard drive error. Laptop not working. Pray.
12.40: Another payroll issue with someone who has more children than the infants allowance is showing. Wish the HR Administrator was here to deal with this.
12.45: Meet some visitors who are here to talk to Jean-Pierre. Give authorisation to Jean-Pierre to use the projector at the WASH (water and sanitation) cluster meeting this afternoon.
12.50: Laptop running memory tests. No-one waiting to talk to me. Decide to go and eat lunch whilst I have the opportunity. Finish washing underwear. Rice, ugali, beef, vegetables for lunch – quite tasty but far too much.

Is it really only lunchtime?!

13h15: Return to the office. Reboot the laptop. It’s working! Hooray! Thank God.
13h18: It’s quiet in the office as most people are on lunch break. Read emails whilst I get a chance.
13h25: Continue calendarising budget (working out what month we’re likely to spend what money in) which I started yesterday whilst waiting at the airport. Interrupted by Mama Mkubwa (our cook) with the guard for translation (she only speaks Swahili and my Swahili just isn’t that good) to discuss what food is needed when visitors arrived tomorrow.
14h00: Meet with Person 2 over HR issue
14h45: Ring Betsy, the Deputy Programme Director, to discuss HR issue.
14h50: Finish calendarising the budget. Check out where we’re likely to run into difficulties.
15h25: Write various emails - budget issues, appraisal feedback, donor reports.
16.00: Meet with Person 3 over HR issue
16h40: Meet with Felix, our Logistician, on the set-up of our new sub-base. Interrupted by another person with a question over payroll. Felix leaves to pick up some papers. He’s gone for over 10 seconds and his chair in front of my desk quickly gets filled.
17h10: Arnold pops in for a quick chat on the days work.
17h13: Person 4 arrives to discuss HR issue.
17h19: Wonder if the AC’s role is always so busy.
17h20: Feedback to Madelaine on the HIV budget.
17h25: Continue conversation with Felix on procurement and requisitions. Sign off some purchase requests. Discuss the prices we need to find out for an emergency project for displaced people in Kalima.
18h00: Try ringing our Logs Manager. No answer.
18h01: Read appropriate parts of National Staff policy manual for dealing with HR issue.
18h20: Find Yvonne still working. Suggest she goes home before it gets dark. Arrange to meet tomorrow.
18h25: Write email on logistics and HR stuff.
19h15: Go to send emails. Remember one I’ve forgotten one on security and write that. Send by BGAN
19h30: Officially finish work for the day. Go and eat dinner. Pancakes, fish and vegetable stuff. Give the rest to the guards. Eat an apple. Bit bruised – it did come with me from Bukavu.
19h50: Read through the statements for HR issues with my French dictionary at hand. Wonder whether to write the report now or leave it till tomorrow. Tomorrow wins.
20h15: Start writing a blog entry about what I did today.
20h55: Watch an episode of House and enjoy a piece of (fair-trade) chocolate a very kind person from the UK sent me.
21h45: Go to sleep, perchance to dream.