Technical Support - Southern Province
on Rob Wootton (Zambia), 02/May/2012 15:59, 34 days ago
Time to get out and about, and push a little to get some of the people that we trained to move along a little bit quicker with the E-Mapping work. First stop was taking to task some familiar faces in Southern Province, starting with the districts of Mazabuka, Monze and Gwembe, who are all perfectly capable but easily distracted (if I am being polite!). So we spent a few hours together, running through the key bits of the work again, checking what they have been doing and how they are using the website, making mistakes and trying again, and generally pushing them to do more. The small group work was– from my perspective – quite enjoyable as I could provide more intensive, tailored help and support, and I think they appreciated it too. The last bit of trouble shooting for this week involved a trip to Siavonga. A friend had kindly lent me his car for the other visits, whereas for Siavonga I had to rely on the local minibuses. The journey there was bearable, only three hours tightly squeezed into a minibus. However, on the return leg, and barely 30mins after leaving Siavonga, we suffered a puncture. The good news was that they had a spare tyre in reasonable condition. The bad news that they did not have the right tools to remove the wheel nuts. And so we waited by the roadside, numerous cars and minibuses came and went, none of them also had the right tools, before eventually we got lucky some 80mins later. Two things for me stand out from this little episode, which at least reflect some of my experiences of Zambian culture and behaviour. Neither the minibus driver, nor the ticket boy, said anything to the passengers; no apologies or explanation. The passengers were also (annoyingly) accepting of the situation, a few whispered moans, but little real anger or unhappiness was shown. Instead, it was patience and a belief that all will be well in the end; other nationalities would not have been so quiet and kind.