It’s so nice eating at Gemma & Steve’s as they have an oven. On Wednesday night I was indulged in chips and omlette. Afterwards Steve and I went to a Tej Bet, a small traditional bar to listen to Mesinko player. A Mesinko is a traditional Ethiopian instrument that’s a bit like a mini-cello except it’s held in the hand, played standing up and has only one string. To the accompaniment of the Mesinko there was a woman in traditional dress dancing and improvising songs around the names of the people listening. I love the music and the intimacy of a small room atmosphere when traditional music is played. The downside came when they tried to charge us 10 birr for a beer. 10 birr! A normal price is 4 birr.

Everything moves slowly here. My plans yesterday were spend more time with Meleshew on her professional development plan and, and with Meleshew and Mulugeta on the cluster unit plan for next year, came to nothing when Meleshew stayed home all day to look after her sick daughter. I’m reaching my tolerance limit for sitting around waiting for other people so I ended up taking an extended lunch rather than pretending to be working in the unit. During the afternoon I did manage to spend some time talking with Mulugeta about his professional development needs. He’s clear that he wants to develop computer skills and agreed that he wants to develop training skills, but I think there’s a wee bit of telling me what he thinks I want to hear. He doesn’t really seem to be interested in doing training. Usually he’s quite happy to be in his workshop making resources. He can be great to chat with and has experienced many things in Ethiopia, but he is too ready to see me as the expert who knows everything. He frequently says that he will do anything I say, but that isn’t the way forward. Trying to help him understand that if I write his CPD plan for him then it isn’t his plan is not easy. I’m still not convinced he gets it.

It poured with rain again last night after a fairly hot and sticky day. With Gill being away these last few days I’ve started to realize that boredom would be a serious problem if I was here on my own all the time. At times it seems paradoxical that I can be part of something good, that I feel proud to be part of, and to see my colleagues grow personally and professionally, but at the same time feel understimulated. Too long without adrenalin maybe.