Work, weddings and videos

Posted by Mikkel

Time flies and it is already two weeks since I arrived…

At work we are quite a bit further: an updated strategy, an action plan for 2011, a budget (or half of it to be honest) and 7 job descriptions of my new employees beginning tomorrow. In these two weeks the organization “discovered” its own financial crisis and had the director from its most important partner disappearing (to later reappear in South Africa). So it has been more than hectic to say the least! 

But I begin to feel ready to begin with the work I came here for. That means 1) developing three new short term training programs for micro-entrepreneurs, established medium sized business and larger corporations respectively (the latter will pay); 2) finding the necessary funds and beginning a one year education in entrepreneurship; and 3) setting up an incubator and linking the entrepreneurs in our network to micro-credit and investment opportunities. No way that we will accomplish all that before August, but some of it I hope! And at the same time creating a professional organization and securing it financially.

Luckily it has not been all work. It seems that no matter where we go in the world we sooner or later (this time sooner) end up at a wedding. This time somewhere out in a village two and a half hours from Kigali. A long bus ride, a never ending official ceremony at the district office, liters of fresh cow milk and an almost two hour long reenactment of the old traditional marriage negotiations between the two clans ended in a unforgettable climax: the two clan representatives settle on a price (8 “exotic” cows by the way) and they close the deal by sharing…a Fanta!!! For the rest of the wedding things got a lot more action packed: leopard dresses, dancing, tons of food, etc. And even the bride and groom came out of their hiding.

On the bus back from the wedding we had our first experience with Rwanda style DVD’s. The movie (some bad American b-movie) was not subtitled or dubbed. Instead there was a sort of narrator literally screaming throughout the whole movie: what the characters say, think, what happens and whatever else comes to mind. To illustrate: when 2 police cars, a SWAT team and another two police cars arrive at the scene to arrest the bad guy the screamer goes: “POLICE! POLICE! SWAT-TEAM…SPECIAL WEAPENS AND TACTICS UNIT! POLICE! POLICE!” Why we still use subtitles back in Denmark and the Netherlands beats me!