I'll rant and I'll roar, Well maybe not, I'm Canadian.
on George Hamilton (Jamaica), 18/Aug/2011 13:27, 34 days ago
APOLOGYSorry. This blog is long but it has Jamaican content and discusses differences betweem the Canadian and Jamaican perspectives.GENERAL STUFFI might forget the meanings of this blog's Jamaican words once my brain is frozen again by the icy blasts back in Canada. So that's why I added some foot notes with definitions.http://slideshare.net/Melanie.K/foot-notesYesterday I had some potential blog content but no camera so it counted for nothing. I even exited an un-air-conditioned coaster bus before it pulled away from Cross Roads. I did not want to cook inside it for an extended period until it was jammed full and ready to head off for Papine. Shunning a coaster ride and defying a doctor's wrath is not something I would have contemplated a few months ago.MAYBE THERE'S A BLOG TOPIC COMING UP SOMETIME SOON?But on Thursday I have my camera and by 8:30AM I have already taken six photos. I needed it because I had worked out a blog plan for today that could have cross-cultural implications. That's potentially controversial, however I am sure that Jamaicans and Canadians are pretty much the same, so if Canadians can take criticism then why not Jamaicans?"Criticism" has a bad rap these days. You can criticize something both positively as well as negatively. People incorrectly only think negative comments when they hear the word criticism. Similarly the Newfoundland shows a positive take on the word "rant".THE SPARK THAT TRIGGERED THE BLOGSometimes the meaning of word seems to be lost on both Canadians and Jamaicans. Here are some words from a DRF poster on one of the mediation area's filing cabinets. This particular poster, a couple of pictures below.Obviously, being in Jamaica, the poster has Jamaicans words and are not just imported out-of-context Canadian ones. That's important. As a local saying goes "Cock mout kill cock".Guess who has an appointment with Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) or Scotchies soon?That makes sense. Picture yourself in Jamaica wondering whether to have fish, goat, pork or pizza for supper. Unexpectedly you hear a rooster, the very one that woke you at 4 AM. You think "why not have chicken tonight?".Back to the poster after that diversion. The first point is pretty obvious - you have to know the business. Then note the second point on keeping commitments and meeting deadlines to build credibility. To my mind I saw a huge example recently where I believe this did not happen.But what if I am wrong? If so I am quite prepared to follow points 3 through 7 myself. If I am right, how may a third party, especially sombody from a different cultural background, help somebody else keep their commitments and meet the deadlines? Other team players may be relying on a person who does not meet deadlines or keep commitments.What tools could be used to correct a breach of point 2? Do we have to do something really drastic like ranting ? Or is there some other solution that is less extreme?But first here is a real-time diversion. Who says working in an office is uneventful? Two of the interns, Nalicia and Kerie, took pity on me photographing a mere poster so they insisted I take their photo.Thank you young ladies.But back to building credibility and seeing how this blog's genesis. While trying to concentrate on my mediation department computer programming I was recently distracted for about a quarter of an hour by an animated discussion a few feet away between a CUSO-VSO volunteer and a local manager. Overhearing was unavoidable although my mind was otherwise trying to concentrate 100% on computer programming. I need quiet to program.It seems that this volunteer had been unsuccessfully trying to arrange a meeting with the manager for two and a half months. The latter had been a no-show at all the hoped-for meetings.Eventually the volunteer, who according to the American Psychological Association, may theoretically have lacked interpersonal cognitive problem-solving skills ( ICPS), asked the manager to pick the time that was most suitable. I'm just a humble retired auditor so I guess that I'm overwhelmed by the thought that the victim rather than the perpetrator can be made to sound bad. In the foot notes you can see the F word I avoided using in order to be politically correct.However the volunteer's second approach of asking the manager to identify a suitable meeting time seemed like an approach that demonstrated a cognitive problem-solving skill at the personal level. So I would conclude that the volunteer did demonstrate ICPS. So any problem must lie elsewhere.Leaving academics aside and returning to the real world. Again, nobody attended this last meeting except our non-ICPS volunteer. Five meetings in all had been scheduled for this same matter and nothing came of it.Clearly, from a Canadian perspective, arranging another meeting would be a waste of time based on past history. Nobody is going to attend, whatever they say. What can be done? Various other techniques floated across my mind but their use tended to be restricted to police officers and the CIA so I discarded them, In any event, CUSO-VSO had not approved their use.So what did that leave? Aha, there was at least one technique, ranting, left. It did not guarantee success but at least the aggrieved person could feel better at the end of it all. But what is ranting anyway?RANTINGRanting means venting your spleen or carrying on angrily for a period of time.What's a spleen? I usually intersperse photographs to break up words, however squeamish readers probably do not want to see a real spleen. A spleen is a body part that looks worse than a small intestine which was what the snail in the roller coaster blog was substituting for. Imagine being a snail and introduced at a party as a gastropod whose only claim to fame was that he or she did not look as ugly as a small intestine? Ouch.What's a rant? You have to see and hear one to know one. What better person to rant than CBC Television's own Rick Mercer? He often includes rants in his TV shows . Here's a screen capture taken from his Jan 13, 2009 rant about people needing to be informed about the Canadian Parliament's activities. Politicians, whether Canadian or not, are usually appropriate targets for ranters.Some may think that with or without training you can rant about anything - just go off the deep end and you're most of the way towards ranting successfully. But while there's a visceral level to ranting, it also requires much brainpower and spontaneous word crafting skills.Unfortunately there is a niceness to Canadians. I had to work really hard to get a picture of RM looking really angry as he ranted. In spite of that, a RM's wide open mouth indicates a good rant in process. However I noted that he never once used the Jamaican swear word starting with "B" and ending with "T" during his ranting. We Canadians are so mild-mannered.Below is a very much less nice person who also ranted. He appeared briefly in a news clip towards the end of the 2011 Oscar-winning movie "The King's Speech". Note the wide open mouth again. It's beginning to look like wide open mouths are fairly reliable indicators that a rant is going on.And finally the Newfoundland people who not only rant, but they roar. Don't be alarmed. This is done in a musical sense and an unexpectedly friendly way. They are the same people who traded salt fish to Jamaica in the past. Jamaicans use the salt fish in the ackee and salt fish breakfasts that they love so much.In return the Newfoundlanders acquired empty molasses-soaked rum barrels from Jamaicans. That does not sound like a good deal on the face of it, however the inventive Newfoundlanders extracted the molasses/rum sediment from the barrels on the way towards making a perfectly fine alcoholic beverage known as screech. Trust me, this is true. Would I lie to you? Have I let you down in the past? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newfoundland_ScreechI even lived in Newfoundland for almost two years. Would you doubt a Newfie, boy? ("Boy" rhymes with "my" or the Jamaican "bwoy"). Confession time - actually I'm not a real Newfie because my great grandparent's great grandparents were not Newfies so I can aspire no higher than ever being a CFA - a "Come From Away".Looking at my watch, I see that the ranters, and ranters and roarers have had their 15 minutes of fame, so it's time to return our attention to criticism and people who may lack credibility.CREDIBILITYI think credibility is quite subjective. For all I know, the remainder of the staff believe that the manager in question is acceptably credible. However, if they are wrong and I am right, then it's our duty to help people who are credibility challenged. At least we should make them aware of their challenges.I would like to think that if I ever accidentally forgot five appointments in a row that I would buy a diary and note important meetings in it. If I did not, I would expect that my boss, with a less than happy expression, might issue one for my use. There's no point having criticism for its own sake, if it is possible to work a solution around the problem.You can get reminders in various forms these days. Thus reminders can be electronic like Winclock_Pro's program containing count downs.But in case you are not always looking at your computer all day or carrying around a laptop, then why not go with something that looks pretty and has an appropriate message on its pen?Image from homemadegorgeous.blogspot.comAN ORGANIZATIONAL ALTERNATIVE TO RANTINGBefore actively considering ranting and how to use it in this specific instance, here is an effective organizational technique that has worked for others. At the end of each work day, you can review what's coming up tomorrow, and think how you will meet your commitments, get your paperwork and files ready, communicate with others who will be impacted, etc.In practice you would use some more heavy duty organization techniques further in advance, but this is just a simple example for illustration purposes, so please bear with me.Ah organizational techniques! There's a lot of knowledge and information out there. You just need to cut it down in size to what you need in as far as possible. I saw this graphic in a Google search. The average person's brain just can't hold on to all the information in a large number of books - you have to summarize and prioritize.http://www.turkishairlines.com/en-INT/skylife/2006/october/cityscope/a-quarter-century-in-the-world-of-books.aspxSo here's an organizational techniques example. Suppose I check my calendar, notes, personal assistant or whatever I use and discover that I have meetings tomorrow in Montego Bay, Jamaica and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.I don't panic . I just make sure I have the corporate jet reserved for me. If yes, I will next ensure that the people I am meeting know that I am coming. It would be embarrassing to burn thousands of liters of jet fuel to show up in Rio when the locals were all celebrating a public holiday. How would I explain that to my boss? Hmm, executive overview, there's another work-related tool.But the strategy for being organized includes not being overburdened by books. To get organized you should only read something short and to the point, like this book that I have read. There may be other self-help books out there, but this one worked for me. I score 98% on management in-basket exercises, so it must have worked for me.But wait a minute, I volunteer at a public interest group that does not have a corporate jet. All I can do now is to see which, if any, of the two meetings I can attend, confirm I will be there for that meeting, and let the other attendees know that I will be present. For the meetings I can't attend I must immediately contact the other participants offering my sincere apologies.No matter how sincere I sound, clearly I will have created a credibility gap with those who are going to be at the meeting. It is my responsibility to overcome that. Ah "responsibility" - another important word. I will have to be able to reassure people that I will in fact show up at the next one as opposed to leaving them hanging five times in a row, six times in a row, seven times in a row, etc.CONCLUSIONDifferent cultures have different ways of looking at things or problems. Possibly the way to go is to have a three level approach. First analyze the problem to see if a non-threatening specific solution like a diary is possible. Second, if that does not work then try criticism in a positive, not negative manner, and third if all else fails then why not try a rant?Deep down, I favor a rant instead of this rationalized level-headed stuff, but you know me - I'm Canadian. I am doomed to try and recommend the first two approaches, but if my partial Newfoundland side comes through then I will rant and I even roar.FURTHER STUDIESIf you are curious about rants you may see Internet videos of the ranters I identified . That's the best source because you have to see and hear rants - not just read about them.I have an example worked up from the foot notes below where I have typed out a rant about a stepped on toe. Toe? Foot notes? There is a link. My best links are usually subconscious.FOOT NOTESAckee - a Jamaican fruit that looks like scrambled egg when it is cooked, and is poisonous when picked at the wrong time -i.e. before it has burst open on the tree.B********t -a very rude Jamaican word and is best left in a verbal context. By coincidence I heard the word used in public today feuding Camp Road street vendors. This was the first time I had ever heard it spoken angrily after being 16 months in Jamaica.bwoy - is not an onomatopoeia because it is pronounced "by"- boy. I double checked the pronunciation by listening to this youtube video by Perfect (tadsrecords)http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3GwsQvIggYCBC - for non-Canadians it is the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.Cock- a rooster, think poultry."Cock mout kill cock" - the Jamaican equivalent of being hoisted by your own petard. Sharon Scott kindly provided me with this information.Cod - see salt fish.Doctor - a conductor who collects the fares on a coaster bus.Gung-ho - enthusiastically positive about something. American slang.Interpersonal cognitive problem-solving skills ( ICPS), lack thereof - frustrated. I was advised by Kristine in the youth department area that frustration is a word that the American Psychologists Association (APA) no longer uses. Strangely, when I searched for "frustration" in the APA's definitions I was referred to ICPS although the word "frustration" appears nowhere in it. Maybe it was hidden in a tag because the psychologists no longer want to be seen as using that "F" word?Mout - mouthOnomatopoeia (see rant below) - it sounds like some sort of large sea creature that gets confused with octopuses. Who knows? When did you last see one? But seriously it's a word that sounds like it is spelled. For example hiss, bang, splat.Petard - a type of land mine used in the middle ages according to an on-line dictionary.Rant - to continually shout and complain loudly. Angry amateurs might shout "You stood on my toe" and leave it at that. Professionals, however, embark on a loud rant. For example: "Clumsy idiots like you should not be allowed to wander unchecked through the streets without a leash! Medical care is expensive these days, you know! People who need glasses shouldn't be outside without them! Visits to hospital outpatients departments can take hours! Expensive new shoes shouldn't be wrecked by drunken, blind and clumsy fools like you! You couldn't tell an octopus from an onomatopoeia! We're going through a global recession and the recovery is not going to be helped if able members of the work force, like me, are crippled by drugged out, disoriented addicts like you!" And so on loudly for 5 to 10 minutes or until your vocabulary runs dry and your spleen is vented.It's nothing personal of course - the rant is more for the benefit of the ranter letting off steam. If the rantee learns anything, then that's a bonus. That's why an organization skill technique is usually more effective. Although as a last resort, maybe all that will be left is the rant?Salt fish - usually Newfoundland cod in Jamaica.Scotchie's - a Jamaican jerk food restaurant specializing in meals like fried chicken, curried goat and stewed beef as well as side dishes that go with them like festivals (donuts without sugar), yam, sweet potato, etc.Screech - in Newfoundland you drink this alcoholic drink with a 40% alcohol content; elsewhere it's a type of scream.Tautology - what an onomatopoeia would use to catch a repetition or a redundancy. But seriously they can slip into anybody's writing. For example I accidentally wrote "past history" in this blog. History is always in the past.THE END - REALLYRemember. Don't Forget.