If you didn’t
read it, my last blog post consisted of a story in which I saved the day by
pulling out little pieces of wood from a car door keyhole, so that my coworkers
could get into the car. It was suggested
that I create a “resume” of completely random skills, sort of along the same
lines as “proficient in removing small wooden fragments from car keyholes”. If you were to ask my coworkers, they would
probably say that I’m an expert in a great many fields. Just last week, Suzan asked me to edit and
proofread a short report she had typed, about the selection of households to
receive water tanks from a grant Brick by Brick had been awarded, and about health
education sessions that were being held for those beneficiaries. I certainly don’t have any special abilities
or experience when it comes to health education or figuring out the best
candidates to receive water tanks, but, after I had finished going through it,
we gave it to Max, so that he could “approve” it. “Oh, I don’t need to read it,” he said, “The
expert has already gone through it.”
After Suzan
started to agree with him, I interjected, “What exactly am I an expert in?”
Suzan takes
this question. “Oh, you’re an expert in
the English language, designing reports, computers…” Her voice trailed off as
she listed a few other things that I can’t remember. After a bit more conversation, Max did read
the report…
I suppose
that it’s nice to know that my coworkers see me as a valuable member of the
group, but I’m pretty sure that I wouldn’t classify any of the things listed by
Suzan as areas of special expertise. However,
for some frequently needed comic relief, I confess that I do, from time to
time, think about some of the more obscure skills and abilities that have
developed as a result of living in Kalisizo for more than two years. The following list is certainly not
exhaustive, but it might give you an idea of the professional benefits of living in
Kalisizo. Of course, some of these
skills won’t be so useful after I leave…
Traveling
Skills
Navigating crowded city streets and sidewalks
– I think, at one point, I described the Kampala taxi parks as similar to
those little puzzles with sliding pieces.
There’s one open space in the whole puzzle, and you have to move all of
the pieces around before you have space to move the piece you actually want to
move. I think that this comparison still
stands. Take a few trips to this area of
Kampala, and you will be forced to quickly learn a number of skills that are
needed to get you where you need to go.
I could write an entire blog listing these – looking like you know where
you’re going, even if you don’t; knowing when to squeeze in between two taxis
that are about six inches apart; changing the position of your backpack so that
sneaky people can’t get into the compartments without you realizing it, etc…
Traveling long distances with no personal
space – When I was younger, I thought that the three or four hour drive to
the beach was long. Now, that kind of
trip would seem like nothing. I mean, I
had an entire seat to myself, and I could move my arms and legs a little
bit. The trip between Kalisizo and
Kampala takes about the same amount of time (on a good day), but I have also
been on public transport for, and I’m not exaggerating here, ten to twelve
hours in a single day (and I spend the next day being sore). This is part of the reason why I have been
able to read so many books over here.
What else is there to do?
Packing light – When you have to travel
on public transport, as partially described above, you realize that having only
one, relatively small bag with you is quite advantageous. I’ve traveled around the country for a week
or more, all with a single backpack (that still has quite a bit of room in it). When I think about the massive bags that I
lugged over to Uganda back in 2011, I have to laugh at myself. There’s no way that I needed all of that
stuff…
Household
Skills
Making candle holders…out of other candles –
I inherited a few candles from the volunteer in Kalisizo before me. Obviously, these come in handy when the power
goes out. However, I couldn’t just sit
the candle on a piece of wooden furniture, so I found a whiskey glass, also
inherited from the previous volunteer, and put the candle in there. After that initial supply of candles was used
up, I couldn’t find the same type of candle, so I bought these tall, skinny
things that can’t stand up on their own.
What to do? Well, the bottom of that
whiskey glass had started to accumulate quite a supply of candle wax, so this
was heated up, and the bottom of one of the skinny candles was plunged into the
resulting pool of hot wax. After a
while, the wax solidified again, and the candle stayed standing. Now, when a candle burns the whole way down,
I immediately stick a replacement into the hot wax. The four pencils in the picture function to
hold the candle upright until the wax cools down again…
Water Conservation – Our compound’s tap
only actually gives us water for a couple of days each week, if that. Considering that three other families live in
this same compound, I don’t get very much.
You are forced to figure out how to use as little water as
possible. Take bathing as an
example. After two years, I am now able
to get myself relatively clean with less than one liter of water (a liter is
slightly more than a quart). I have no
illusions about this. I would get much
cleaner in a long, hot, pressurized shower…but I get clean enough. And I just get dusty again within a few
minutes anyway…
Alternative Hairstyles – Over the past
year, my range of possible hairstyles increased from one (which I’ll call “let
it all hang down”) to two. I can now put
my hair in a ponytail. Yes, I’m very
proud…
Interior Decoration – For people who do
this professionally, interior decoration would certainly fall in the next
section. For me, it doesn’t quite make
it to a full-blown technical skill…mostly because the extent of my interior
decoration ability includes ripping out cool pictures from calendars and taping
them to the wall. Sort of dorm room-esque,
I suppose, but I like pictures of animals and landscapes…
Technical
Skills
Study of Indoor Fauna – My bedroom has
no shortage of (harmless) lizards, moths, and other insects, especially in the
evening. Of course, “study” may be too
strong a word. I sometimes just sit in
my chair and watch the lizards stalk the insects on the walls and the
ceiling. It should be noted that some of
the bugs are a bit too big for the lizards.
See, for instance, the picture of the moth with a wingspan as long as my
finger (and my fingers are pretty long), or the picture of the stick insect. You can get some idea of the scale by noticing
the photographs on the wall behind the insect.
Slick, my family’s cat, doesn’t look that impressed…
Translation between American English and
Ugandan English – Returning now to the Brick by Brick office, we have Skype
meetings (audio only) almost every week with Marc, the organization’s Executive
Director, who lives in New York. We have
three USB modems from different internet providers. Usually, at least one of these works... Anyway, I generally take a backseat in these
meetings, so that our Ugandan staff are the ones giving Marc updates. However, I occasionally need to step in and provide
“translation” services. My Luganda may
not be so impressive, but I’m pretty good at rewording things so that something
someone said is easily understood by everyone else. Accents are a problem sometimes, as are some
common American/Uganda phrases, that are not so common in the other country…
Do-It-Yourself Pencil Sharpening – For a
while, we didn’t have a pencil sharpener in our office. And yet, we had wood pencils that eventually
became very dull. What to do? I pulled out my trusty Leatherman Multi-Tool,
snapped out the knife, and started to spend a few minutes of each day sharpening
a few pencils that way. It was
significantly more tedious than using an actual pencil sharpener, but I got
pretty good at it after a while. The two
pencils pictured below began as new pencils, with no points whatsoever, and were
completely knife-sharpened…
Hammering Nails into Crumbling Walls – A
common problem when trying to hang anything on a wall is that the plaster
crumbles, resulting in a much larger hole than was desired. The walls here don’t exactly have wooden
studs. You’re hammering into the
plaster, and then you either hit a brick, which bends the nail like crazy, or
you keep going through the mortar between bricks. These plaster and mortar mixes are often not
so impressive, and they come apart pretty easily, once they get started. While I have not yet perfected a technique
for getting a nail to stay in the wall without big chunks of plaster falling
out, I succeed more than I fail, which, I think, is an accomplishment. I heard a story that when another volunteer’s
dad (who is a carpenter, or works in construction, or something like that) was
over here, he also recognized this problem.
Upon returning to America, he sent over a battery-powered drill, in an
effort to make it easier for the volunteer to put stuff on the walls. This idea was not so successful. The drill just made it worse. I can visualize hundreds of little flakes of
plaster being sprayed all over the place as the drill powers through the
wall. No, the best thing seems to be
some careful hammering…
Business Card Design – Changing gears a
bit, in an effort to show just how varied my job is sometimes, we had some
business cards printed for our office employees and masons about a month
ago. Guess who designed those business
cards? That’s right, I did. I suppose I was the most qualified person in
our organization to do it, since I can move pictures and text around on a
computer.
Alternative Distance Measurements – Moving
out into the field now, sometimes I need to measure long distances by myself. For example, if I’m working on a rainwater
collection project with another volunteer, I’ll need to measure roof dimensions. The quickest way to do this, especially if a
really long tape measure isn’t available, is to walk along the side of the
building and count steps. Fortunately,
exact accuracy is not necessary for rainwater collection systems, because
rainfall itself is so variable, but I’ve gotten pretty good at taking steps
that are almost exactly one meter long.
I’ve checked myself and have gotten quite close. I guess it’s just muscle memory at this
point. I just have to think to myself
that I want to measure distance, and my steps are calibrated accordingly…
Cinematographer – For the grand finale,
I’m going in yet another completely different direction. When Marc was here a few months ago, he
wanted to get some video footage of people at our partner schools talking about
the work that Brick by Brick has done.
At one school, we found a boy with very good English who was comfortable
talking into a camera. So, Marc
basically interviewed him for about a half an hour. Guess who filmed this thing? Yep, me.
I spent a half an hour kneeling in the grass (so that it didn’t look
like the cameraman was towering over this kid, who was about half my height),
with my legs starting to fall asleep less than halfway through. But, I persevered, and the footage, after
quite a bit of editing (probably needed due to my incredible camera work), will
be shown at Brick by Brick’s big annual fundraiser in New York, which is
actually happening next week.
So, that
concludes this list of some of the random skills I have picked up in
Kalisizo. Please feel free to send me
any job offers at your convenience…
