Guinea? Whud ya wanna go thur fur?
On Saturday, October 7, 2006, I dropped Mom and Dad off at the airport in Dallas and went to the Bass Pro Shop. One would think that Mom and Dad would drop ME off at the airport considering I was on my way to Guinea, but things never quite go in the typical fashion in the Klein family.
Mom, Dad and Mary Sue were on their way to Vegas to watch Mary Sue get a big Pharmacist of the Century award with tickets bought months in advance. My ticket, bought 10 days previously, left about 10 hours later, thus giving me time to sleep in the suburban in the airport parking lot, go to buy water purification tablets at the Bass Pro Shop, pay homage to Target, and have one last go of my beloved Tex Mex at Uncle Julios with Dr. Paula Noe.
Then, the flights began. Dallas to Atlanta. Atlanta to Paris. Paris to Conakry, the capital city of Guinea, West Africa. Near Liberia, Ivory Coast, Senegal, Mali, Sierra Leone, and right on the Atlantic Ocean. It is not New Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Equatorial Guinea or Papua New Guinea. Just plain GUINEA. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guinea [Geography lesson is over now].
I'm here working for the International Rescue Committee (IRC) ( http://www.theirc.org/) . The IRC has been camped out here in Guinea for 16 years now while West Africa has been fighting it out. Refugees from Liberia, Sierra Leone and Ivory Coast have all ended up in Guinea and the IRC has been providing education and protection to the refugees so that: 1. there weren't 80,000 kids sitting around for 16 years with nothing to do but make trouble, and 2. there would be people with some skills aside from firing guns left to go back and rebuild the countries when the fighting was over. Amongst other reasons.
But all this doesn't tell you what I am doing exactly: Basically, I'm writing: Report writing to the people who give us money to keep working with the refugees (namely, the US State Dept.'s Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration(PRM)). Grant proposal writing to get us more money. General liaison-ish-ness between the field and the donors. And since I've only been working for a week, I'm not sure beyond that.
Mom, Dad and Mary Sue were on their way to Vegas to watch Mary Sue get a big Pharmacist of the Century award with tickets bought months in advance. My ticket, bought 10 days previously, left about 10 hours later, thus giving me time to sleep in the suburban in the airport parking lot, go to buy water purification tablets at the Bass Pro Shop, pay homage to Target, and have one last go of my beloved Tex Mex at Uncle Julios with Dr. Paula Noe.
Then, the flights began. Dallas to Atlanta. Atlanta to Paris. Paris to Conakry, the capital city of Guinea, West Africa. Near Liberia, Ivory Coast, Senegal, Mali, Sierra Leone, and right on the Atlantic Ocean. It is not New Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Equatorial Guinea or Papua New Guinea. Just plain GUINEA. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guinea [Geography lesson is over now].
I'm here working for the International Rescue Committee (IRC) ( http://www.theirc.org/) . The IRC has been camped out here in Guinea for 16 years now while West Africa has been fighting it out. Refugees from Liberia, Sierra Leone and Ivory Coast have all ended up in Guinea and the IRC has been providing education and protection to the refugees so that: 1. there weren't 80,000 kids sitting around for 16 years with nothing to do but make trouble, and 2. there would be people with some skills aside from firing guns left to go back and rebuild the countries when the fighting was over. Amongst other reasons.
But all this doesn't tell you what I am doing exactly: Basically, I'm writing: Report writing to the people who give us money to keep working with the refugees (namely, the US State Dept.'s Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration(PRM)). Grant proposal writing to get us more money. General liaison-ish-ness between the field and the donors. And since I've only been working for a week, I'm not sure beyond that.
posted by Jennifer at
12:01 AM
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