Half Term Holiday

Good to have a week off over half term, though wouldn't call it restful exactly. Put some shelves up in the dining room, which should have been relatively easy, but discovered while drilling the holes in the wall that I really needed to get some decent drill bits. How did I discover this? When the bit snapped in half as I will drilling into the wall. Thankfully I only ended up with a nasty gash in the wall paper rather than my head.


Realised that perhaps I needed to spend a little more than £2.75 on a pack of drill bits if I was to have any success with DIY. After splashing out £16 on a new set, the drilling suddenly became easy and the shelves went up in no time.


After that it was down to the New Forest for a couple of nights camping with friends. A great three days, with excellent weather, after all the rain at the beginning of the week. Went for a cycle ride one afternoon, where Annabelle discovered the delights of a tag-along bike rather than the baby seat. Zachary wasn't so keen on his baby seat, but stayed put long enough for us to have a good ride.


For the kids sake (OK, mine as well!) we went on a model train ride too.


It was the journey home the following day that really turned into an adventure. We set off about 3 pm on the Saturday, but hadn't been going too long when there was a bump and and a big judder. Decided to pull off at the nearby services and have a look. Some rather worrying looking wires hanging down under the car, so called the breakdown people.


This was when it got really interesting, as we're not in the AA or RAC like normal people, we're members of the Environmental Transport Agency (see http://www.eta.co.uk/). They have a network of garages and breakdown trucks across the country and when you call them they find the nearest one to you and they come and sort you out. Saves vans and trucks crossing the entire country helping stranded motorists.


So we were picked up by a guy from Owslebury Garage (http://www.owsleburygarage.com/) near Winchester. Apparently the drive belt had gone, and the wires we had seen were the frayed ends of the belt. This meant that the power steering had gone, and the alternator as well, so the battery would eventually go flat if we carried on going. We had the option of all getting into the cab of the breakdown lorry, or staying in the car. As there were no seat belts in the cab and no way to secure the child seats we opted to stay in the car. A very odd sensation sitting in your car being carried on the back of a lorry.



After trying a couple of places to get the right spare part, and failing, we were taken to Owslebury Garage itself. Turned out to be a cottage in the middle of nowhere, with various car parts and trucks scattered about. After a bit of a wait we were taken all the way back home on the back of the lorry. This time we decided to go in the cab, as it was a two hour ride, and so strapped Zachary's seat onto the bench seat in the back of the cab. Annabelle sat on Liz's lap most of the way.

Quite an adventure, but we didn't get home till after 9pm, instead of 5.30 when we should have been back.

Zachary's 2nd Birthday

26th March was Zachary's 2nd birthday. Amazing to think he's already that old, it really doesn't seem that long ago that he was born. Had about a dozen little friends over to help celebrate and it stayed fairly much under control - no big fights or floods of tears. They also ate up most of food, including Zachary's great birthday cake.

He's quite into cars, especially Mini's. In fact he's very good at spotting cars that are the same as ours or friends and relatives. He seems to be obsessed with any form of transport and loves going on trains or buses. He can spot an aeroplane flying overhead before any of the rest of us. And now he is talking so much more, I can even understand what he says when he points up in the sky at an aeroplane flying overhead.

Lovely Wedding

Saturday was Graham and Jane's wedding.

I had the immense privilege of being an usher, so got to dress up in a penguin suit and look important for the day. The children were being looked after for the day by some friends so we got to enjoy the whole day without having to deal with bored children. They had a great time as well, so we all get to enjoy ourselves.

Wedding was great - lovely service, great music, old friends to catch up with, then a ride to the reception on an old bus.

Food was excellent (including my special mushroom-free starter - thanks!), speeches funny and the drink flowed - a great occasion.

The only disappointment was that I just missed out on a bottle of champagne by predicting Bruges as the honeymoon destination, not Brussels. Well, enjoy the beer you two - treat yourselves to a bottle of Kwak in the Grande Place, you can't beat it.

Thanks for a really fun day.

On to Jakarta

Sunday evening, fly to Jakarta for two days of meetings. These are with the World Vision Indonesia office, to discuss future plans for longer term work in Aceh, after the Tsunami Response programme has finished.

A pretty full two days, after a busy couple of weeks, but the outcome seemed to be quite positive. A lot more work to be done on planning and transferring work from the Tsunami Response team to WV Indonesia, but a lot of the groundwork has been done.

Meeting finished about 4.30 Tuesday afternoon and I then headed straight for the airport for my flight home. A long journey - first a short hop to Kuala Lumpur, then an hour's wait before a 13 hour flight to Heathrow, followed by two hours in the coach to Warwick, train to Leamington and taxi from the train station to home.

Its been a good trip, but its great to be home again!

Shop till you drop, then go to the beach

A nice lie-in Saturday morning, a chance to catch up on the blogging, then picked up by Jun and his family to go shopping.

For a place that has been pretty isolated due to the war for about 30 years, it has a strong culture and seemingly thriving local arts and crafts. They produce excellent embroidered and patterned bags here, in all shapes and sizes. Brought a couple back last time and Liz uses hers as her main hand bag. Decided to buy another one, in a different style and design, and a small bag for Annabelle. Couldn't find anything for Zachary, will look in Jakarta. Also bought myself a nice T-shirt, with a map of Aceh on the back and on the front a design involving the swords that have become the symbol of Aceh and its resistance to outsiders.

Then picked up some more people and did some more shopping and a bit of sightseeing, including the boat that had been picked up in the tsunami and placed on top of a house. It's still there two years on. Not sure what the eventual plan for it is, but they could repair the house and use it as a memorial or small museum about the tsunami, with pictures and stories inside. That would seem to me to be a good way to use the place, rather than just have people come and gorp at it without finding out more about what happened.

Then it was off to the Aceh Museum. Like many museums in these kind of places, it could be improved and made more attractive to visitors, but it had some very interesting things. There was a traditional Acehnese wooden house, which is quite different to the ones being rebuilt after the tsunami. Also, there was a section about the history of the Dutch colonial period here. It was quite horrific reading about the brutality of the Dutch and the way the took control of the place, by slaughtering the local people and forcing them to come under Dutch rule. And what did they bring to the place? Very little I would imagine, it was already a well established city and province, trading with areas around and at one time (16th Century) one of the 5 most important places in the Islamic world. No need for civilising then, which is the usual excuse for colonialism. Just pure greed and a lust for power and slaughter. This, of course, was then continued by the Indonesians as they took over Aceh and brought it under rule from Java.

The we had a well needed break for coffee, in a busy, local coffee house. Came with little snacks, including some really nice battered bananas.

Then it was off to the beach. Felt slightly strange being on this lovely beach looking out to sea, knowing that just over two years ago it wasn't the nice tranquil scene it was today, but instead the sea was a force of destruction, killing thousands of people in a matter of minutes. A lot to overcome, but Aceh is on its way to recovery. It will take many more years, but now that peace seems to have come to the province, with good leadership and openness to the rest of Indonesia and the world, things can continue to improve.

There is potentially a lot here for visitors to enjoy - the beaches, the wildlife, the local crafts, the coffee. If they handle it right there is no reason why a good tourist industry can't develop. It needs to be tightly regulated, so that it doesn't spoil what is here. No huge beach side resorts but staying in keeping with the area, based on local businesses not outsiders to keep the money in Aceh, involving eco-tourism and partnerships with NGOs to help with the on-going reconstruction and development of the province. Then it will be a positive development.

Back in Banda Aceh

After two days visiting the projects in Lamno, Thursday was back in the office in Banda Aceh. Started off meeting with Bonie Belonio, who is the peace building and conflict resolution manager. Aceh has been a place of conflict for about 400 years, and especially so for the last 30. A peace agreement between the Indonesian government and the rebels (known as GAM) was signed in August 2005, in the wake of the tsunami, and the peace had held remarkably well ever since. In fact things have moved on so far that in December last year the first elections where held for the position of Governor of Aceh province, which were won by a GAM leader. I have been told that he is a very sensible, pragmatic leader who wants to work with others to improve things here in Aceh, so it is all very encouraging. However, after all those years of conflict, there are a lot of underlying issues that need to be addressed.

Not surprisingly I suppose, the people here have a tendency to react to situations in a violent manner, as this is the model that have seen and experienced over the years. A recent survey of the World Vision staff here in Aceh showed that 60% of the staff had direct experience of violence, either being tortured or witnessing killings. The survey included staff form other parts of Indonesia as well as the Acehnese staff, and so among the Acehnese staff the figure is likely to be much higher.

In this kind of situation it is very important to have a good understanding of the context you are working in, so that the projects are 'conflict sensitive'. It could be easy to create more conflict in the way we work if we don't understand the causes of the existing tensions and conflicts that exist in the communities where we are working. By using a technique known as 'Local Capacities for Peace' (LCP) we can build on the 'connectors' in communities (the things that bring people together) and reduce the 'dividers' (the things that pull people apart). It is Bonie's job to co-ordinate all this. He has lots of experience in this from working with World Vision in the Philippines, so it is always interesting to talk to him.

Then in the afternoon I had a meeting with the Director, David Taylor, to give a de-brief on my visit. This was a useful chat and we talked through some of the issues to be addressed in the coming months as the programme comes to a close.

I have been very pleased with how things have been going, especially after some of the problems there were around the time of my previous visit. It is also encouraging that my input seems to be appreciated and listened to, and that everybody seems to have very similar ideas as to what the direction and priorities should be.

After that meeting I then went to speak to somebody from an organisation called Community Habitat and Finance (CHF) who are doing a lot of reconstruction work here. They have quite an interesting approach which is a little different to the way World Vision has been working. Our shelter construction projects have either been based on the communities doing the building, with World Vision supplying the materials or through the use of professional contractors. The biggest drawback in using contractors is that the communities have little involvement or say in what is going on until the houses have been completed. They are involved in choosing the designs at the outset, but after that there is no involvement.

CHF use an approach where they contract professional builders to do the construction work, but the communities are heavily involved in monitoring and have to regularly sign off their satisfaction with progress during the course of the builds. This seems to give a good balance between quality construction and community participation in the process.

Friday was less of a meeting day, although I did talk to a couple of people and more a chance to catch up on other bits of work, writing up notes and be in contact with the UK office.

Friday evening was also a chance to do a bit of shopping at the local DVD shop. Managed to pick up a whole host of DVDs, and all pretty cheap. Just have to hope we can find time at home to watch them.

Then had pleasant even meal at a very nice fish restaurant with somebody from the hotel here who works for CARE International in the UK. It is always interesting to find out a bit about other organisations, how they work, what the office culture is like, etc.

Tomorrow, being Saturday, is another shopping day, though not till the afternoon, so looking forward to a good lie-in in the morning.

More drinks

As well as the coffee, they have some other drinks worth trying here. A pretty good range of fresh fruit juices, but also vegetable juices. And I'm not talking carrot and tomato. I just tried eggplant (aubergine) juice! And it's really pretty good. In fact, it is referred to as 'Dutch Eggplant' juice, so I don't know if the Dutch have very different kinds of aubergine. I probably won't be putting aubergines in the blender when I first get back home, but they are definitely worth a try if you're ever in Aceh. There is also an avacado juice, with chocolate added, which is supposed to be good too.