The blog of Lucy, disability advisor

Hallo from the Maldives, widely thought of, and marketed, as a paradise for beach lovers. As my plane landed the rain was so heavy we had to sit and wait ten minutes before we could disembark. That was just over a week ago, and it has been raining nearly every day since. I am glad I am working and not here as a tourist!  The capital of the Maldives, Male, takes me, a slow runner, 35 minutes to jog around. It is a concrete jungle of narrow streets, high rise buildings, 100,000 people and an inordinate number of cars and motorbikes, considering you can walk anywhere in 20 minutes!

The HI mission in the Maldives was established after the tsunami of 26th December 2004. Our operations were planned to run until 2009, and now here we are with three month left to go. My job, as Country Director, is to close down the programme, ensure all the necessary reporting is completed, and ensure that our partners have the capacity (in terms of finances , skills and human resources) to sustain the projects where necessary. There will be an evaluation of the programme as a whole in October, the terms of reference for which we are currently working on.

My first week was spent with Jeroen, the departing Country Director. He briefed me on the status of all projects, and the outstanding work to be done over the next three months, as well as can be predicted. There was a lot of information to absorb, but all very interesting, and clarified by some field visits and meetings with partners. Some of the highlights last week included.

A visit to a small densely populated island called Hinnavaru, north of Male, for two days, to observe the work of an impairment screening project we are undertaking with the Ministry of Health. I observed screening in the island school of all the children, class by class in quick succession. The screening could detect visual, hearing, physical or cognitive difficulties, and children identified as having a difficulty were referred to the hospital for further examination. The results have not yet been compiled, but it seemed few of the students displayed impairments in Hinnavaru, although there is much variation from island to island, and comparison of data will produce interesting findings. The team then proceeded to screen in the community. On completion of the project the results will be an indicator for the government of the levels of impairment, and will serve as a tool for the planning of service provision.

I took part in a badminton session for children and adults with intellectual impairments which HI supports. There was great participation from all the players who enjoyed it immensely. The sessions are run by two volunteers from the Maldives Badminton Association. From discussions it seems the group is sustainable as there are virtually no costs involved in the project, and there is a strong commitment from the participants and their families.

I was impressed by the work of the newly formed Maldives Deaf Association which HI supports, and seems a dynamic organisation which has given a great opportunity to many deaf people in Male to meet. I joined one of the meetings which was well attended by twenty plus young deaf people. They have already produced a dictionary of the Maldivian sign language which will be launched soon, and they plan to start some island associations too.

There are many other projects which HI has been involved in, and still is involved in, and I am gratified to see that the work seems sustainable and also provides direct benefit to people with disabilities. Now I must continue to read up on reports, meet key people and organize my ‘things to do’ list which is rather out of control. Relevant to planning is Ramazan which starts next week and lasts a month. Although people continue to work, the hours are reduced and work tends to slow down.
Hoping it stops raining soon, Lucy

Hi! The time has flown since I last wrote. I worked regionally for two weeks, discussing plans and strategies with another of our country programmes in the region, and with their partner, a semi-government organisation working with people with disabilities. Although the partner seems to be very interested in improving the lives of people with disabilities, it is still difficult to ascertain their genuine commitment, and identify methods for measuring progress which will be satisfactory to both HIB and the partner. However, it is possible, and essential and very soon a strategic plan shall be developed.

There has also been another holiday since I last wrote to celebrate the Cambodian King’s birthday – hurrah! I don’t want you to think we are always on holiday, but April and May do have a substantial concentration of them. Some friends of mine visited and we explored the N.E. of Cambodia on trail bikes that we hired. The N.E. is very sparsely populated, beautiful, and home to a number of ethnic minorities who are quite maligned here. We were almost unscathed by the experience (motorbiking off road), however, it is the beginning of the rainy season, and in rural areas where the roads are unsealed,  just a few minutes of rain can make the going treacherous. I’ve never experienced mud so slippery AND sticky at the same time! But it wasn’t just us clumsy barangs (foreigners) sliding all over the place, I was relieved to see everyone on two wheels floundering. Although I think we were the most pathetic.

Last week I went on a field visit to HIB’s Community for All project in Siem Reap Province, N.W. Cambodia. This is a project which I wrote the plans for about two years ago, and I wanted to see the reality of the implementation. I was very impressed by the team of field staff who work with people with disabilities in 24 villages currently, soon to expand to 48. The object is to link people with disabilities together, find if they want to form what are called self-help groups, and then give initial support to this process. The aim of the self-help groups is to give people the chance to identify problems they may experience and try to find solutions together. One group I visited had had a great success – a few of the participants were supposed to receive a veteran’s pension from the government, but were not doing so. When the group members realised this shared problem, they went to the office responsible en masse, debated with the officer, and now receive their pension punctually. It was very satisfying to see the project in action, and achieving tangible successes.

At the end of last week me and my colleague (Operations Coordinator – Jeanfrancois) had a joint leaving party. It was a great event, with many colleagues attending, at our Country Director’s house (Bruno Leclercq). It was also a bit sad, because of course it is the beginning of the end. People brought us lovely gifts and sweet words! My weekend was then filled with putting my belongings into piles – for home by freight, to give away, to carry with me when I leave on a trip to India, to throw away, to return to HIB etc. It is a bit stressful.

This week, as well as trying to put the piles into boxes, I am finishing reports and have lots of appointments to drink beer (not in working hours). It is quite difficult to keep focussed when I sit at my desk actually. I keep realising new tasks to be done – close my bank account (just did it at lunch time), pack my bicycle with pedals off , buy gifts etc.

In addition to the excitement and emotions around leaving, there is also a new opportunity ahead of me! I shall be returning to the Maldives as Country Director to close the programme. This will be for three months from August to November. Actually, it is a great opportunity for me, as I commenced my work with HIB there, establishing the first year of the programme. We always anticipated it would close in 2009 as the intervention is a result of the tsunami which destroyed a tenth of the Maldivian’s homes. It shall be very interesting to go back and see the results of our interventions there. Also, the Maldivian president who held power for nearly 30 years was replaced last year through real democratic elections, so I am interested to see what the impact of this is on the country.

Now, I really must get on with my end of mission report, but shall write again from the Maldives in August!

Last week was Khmer New Year. It is a big holiday in Cambodia where traditionally everyone goes home to their village, and enjoys throwing water by the bucket and bag full, ostensibly to cleans each other of their sins, but actually, just to play… quite hard. I really wanted to see Hong Kong before leaving Asia, so took advantage of the three days leave and went for a short break. It was a great trip! I arrived back in Phnom Penh last night, and woke up at five this morning thinking about all I have to do over the next six weeks.

This week I am focussed on two pieces of work for our Headquarters. Firstly I am compiling some information from the countries in the region where HIB works, and the way in which they work with people with disabilities in communities. We are trying to identify common approaches, and some good practices to shape the way we design guidelines which will help the country programmes deliver good quality and high impact community projects in the future. Secondly, HIB is adopting what is called a rights based approach. However, many of us are not sure what this really means, so I am (will be!) doing some research and drafting some ideas specific to HIB relating to this.

Now I have to go as I have a lovely trip ahead. One of the staff of Cambodia Disabled People’s Organisation (CDPO, an organisation HIB has been working with over the last few years), is leaving and to say farewell we are going on a boat trip on the grand Mekong river. Most of the staff working for CDPO are people with disabilities themselves, and the boats are treacherous to get on – there are lots of steps down the bank, which then give way to mud, followed by a narrow plank up onto the boat… But everyone loves to go out on the river so much that these difficulties are worth it, and of course, we will raise awareness about how inaccessible the boats are just by using them.