The Central African Republic on the screen

Danish Documentary on CAR, think it will be hilarious...

Pictures

Some people have asked for pictures, the problem howver is that if you take pictures in Bangui there is a high risk that the military or police will confiscate your camera. Therefore I can only take pictures in places where the security forces are absent, which is rare.

Posted a picture from the Oubangui hotel, the internet connection here is quite good and it is quiet. On top of that the view is fantastic with the DRC a few hundred meters away with its green hills and foggy valleys. Beautiful sopt really.

Hopefully I'll get to take at least some pictures before I leave. We'll see.

Tonight I am having dinner with a representative from the French embassy, it will be very interesting to see their point of view on the SSR as France hasn't really been invovled in the process but still do engage in SSR activities bilaterally.

Nightbird

I normally get up between 07h00 am and 08h00 and I think that is reasonably early. Apparently it is not so as people here constantly are mocking me about sleeping in the morning. The day before yesterday the fruit woman who comes here three times a week to sell fruit, had a good laugh when I said that I felt a bit sick and that’s why I had been sleeping in this last week. She was laughing loudly and said “oui, bien sûr...”. 

Ok, people here get up at 5h00 am but I don’t. I work best at night, my intellectual abilities are normally on top between 20h00 pm and midnight. Nothing strange about that is there. I would have to adapt if we didn’t have a generator for electricity where I live as there are blackouts all the time but we do. So I work at night, either at home or observing people at the nightclubs although that normally is limited to the weekends. I am apparently a very strange creature but I am quite used to people thinking that.

Yesterday I decided to go out for dinner as I was bored sitting at home, so I had an omelette and a beer at a restaurant really close to the apartment. After I walked a few hundred meters to a bar where there normally is lots of people, ex-pats and Central Africans to see if anyone I know or who might be good to get to know was there. The place was full of people so I thought I’d stand in the bar but the barman suggested I sit down at a table where a guy was sitting by himself so I did. Later his friends showed up, all working for Medecins Sans Frontiers (MSF). We had a good time and one of the guys just didn’t stop telling me that I should go to Rwanda instead. I just had to go to Kigali, straight away. I tried to make him understand that I am not doing research on Rwanda but no success. Perhaps it is a sign, next year in Rwanda? 

It was already dark so I asked them if they could drop me off at home afterwards, it is some 500 meters to the apartment from there but not very wise to walk alone at night. They could but then the man in charge showed up. He said no as the insurance wouldn’t cover a person not working for MSF. Ridiculous. We are talking about 500 meters maximum but what to do. I could have walked next to the car for all that I care.  So I thought I’d take a taxi, one second later it started to pour down and there was thunder and lightning. People, goats and taxis disappeared and the road was totally empty. I was the only one left except for the bar woman so I chat with her for a while waiting for the rain to stop. Then one of her friends showed up and she asked him if he could drive me home, so he did but before that we did some club crawling down town. Nice but probably not that wise as I don’t really feel that well.  

Yesterday morning the girl I rent the room from drove me to the French embassy to see the doctor. As there is no health care to talk about in this country the embassy has its own clinic that is open to all Europeans and other Westerners but they are paying more. Got some proper antibiotics and other drugs and I already feel better. I really didn’t dare to tell her that I had medicated myself as she is quite a frightening French woman. She said I was silly who hadn’t come there straight away when I got sick. True that. Hope I’ll be fine in a few days.

As I wrote in the last post I there is some confusion about the focus of the study. I guess I will have to rename it as suggested by Skyttedoktoranden and look at the problems with reforming something that does not exist. I am not saying it is bad, wrong or anything just very difficult and to an ambitious programme might only lead to disappointment. I am meeting with a journalist and man from civil society later today I think it might be interesting. I definitely need to meet people who are not implicated in the SSR process as well to get a grip of the problems and obstacles.

I’ll keep you updated. 

Confusion

At this point I am a bit confused about the objective, or rather focus of the study. The more I get to know about the SSR process here the more confused I get. What is problematic is that although the process was launched in 2008 there has been very little progress after 2009. The external evaluation from October 2009 is quite good and gives a good insight of the state of play. Since then very little has happened so it is still valid. The process has been blocked during the last 20 months due to the elections and surrounding problems. This means that for me to get any added value doing interviews I need to slightly change focus. 

The initial idea was to look at how the SSR process has affected the state’s capacity to protect the population but as the process has not had that much effect at this early stage that idea has to be dropped. At this point the donors, mainly BINUCA (the UN integrated peace building office in CAR) which is the main international actor here with regards to SSR, are trying to re-launch the process together with their national counterparts. As the short-term objectives to a large extent have been reached it is now time to continue with the mid-term. Unfortunately it is only one sub-sector, democratic oversight, that has a strategy for the mid-term 2011-2013 and this is yet not approved on the political level. This is a really interesting period to be here as the actors involved are preparing to continue the process. Nevertheless I need to make it clear to myself what the focus of the study should be now.I am thinking perhaps to compare levels of violence in the different provinces but not sure yet.

One aspect that is quite interesting is that this is, as far as I know, the first time the SSR concept as a whole is used as a basis for a reform meaning that the approach is holistic and that several sectors are involved including not only the police and armed forces but also finance, judiciary as well as cross cutting issues like democratic control and corruption. It seems however like CAR might not be ready for these types of reforms. Several people I have been talking to who has lived here for many years are quite pessimistic about the prospects for the reforms. Firstly it is impossible to do everything at once and considering the fact that CAR is a country where the most basic services are not functioning, such as health care and primary education, it might be difficult to start in that end. Secondly, local ownership is complicated when the locals lack capacity, expertise and knowledge. Even high ranking people within the administration often lack education and write French poorly. 

The question is what local ownership actually means in this context. When civil society is this weak, the state has no control over more than half of the country and largely fails to provide the population with basic services one can wonder which locals should own the process? Some people I have talked to compare the CAR to an enterprise that has gone bankrupt and mean that the only way to get back on track would be to put the country under international UN administration for an initial period. This clearly goes against all ideas of local ownership. The SSR process in Bosnia-Herzegovina is an example of and externally controlled and implemented process and it is clear that this is not unproblematic although the context is very different from that here. Without being either pro or against I believe that there is some truth in this observation in the sense that the state and civil society have extremely low capacity. On the other hand it might be so that when the donors actually have a partnership with the national counterparts, rather than controlling the process themselves, this means that the reforms will take time which not always suits the time frame and expectations of the international community. 

Hence it might be interesting to use the CAR as an example where the holistic SSR approach has been turned into a practical reality and try to understand what difficulties arise when doing so in a fragile post-war state. Egnell and Halldén emphasise the importance of taking into account the state-society relations when designing and implementing SSR. In countries where the state does not function in the Weberian sense, where there is no common polity on elite level and civil society is weak SSR is extremely difficult to implement and if that is to be done the reforms have to not only be adapted to the realities on the ground but also to not be too overambitious as that increases the risk of failure. It might be a good idea to turn the focus of the study to these issues as CAR is an example of a country with extremely low levels of all three factors. 

The objective of the study would then be to understand the difficulties to use a holistic approach and also to put light on the role of the donors and what added value their presence actually has. The CAR is also interesting from the perspective of coordination among donors as it is to a large extent France’s “playground”, still after more than 50 years of independence. The French are obviously influential here and although they only to a limited extent have been involved in the SSR process as such they do engage in SSR activities and have been doing so for a long time. The fact that the intelligence services still are left out of the SSR process although it is one of the sub-sectors can to a large extent be explained by the French resistance. I am yet to meet with French officials and hopefully I’ll get to meet someone on Thursday. It will be interesting to see what they have to say about the subject.

Apart from thinking about different ways to continue with the work here I have been eating lots of good food. On Sunday I had an excellent dish of capitaine (fish) soaked in lemon sauce at a quite good restaurant that serves French style food. The day before on the other hand I had lunch with one of my contacts, he likes local places and brought me to a “someone’s backyard type of restaurant” where we had chicken and rice with Maggie sauce. Such a cliché but the food was really good and the big mama was sitting outside making it in the open air. Love it. 

The CARian (!) experience is exhausting, fantastic and sort of surreal. I guess TIA is an expression you can’t use too often, This Is Africa. It is. And hard core, I could have gone to Kenya or Ghana, something that would be have been easier to digest but here I am and although it is hard sometimes I love it. I do.

The bad side of Bangui

Tuesday after a weekend of madness I was quite exhausted. I started to feel weird, warm and I was sneezing like crazy. As I was sitting at the café writing the last blog post I really started to sweat. It took at bit longer than expected and suddenly it was dark. Nightfall always comes as a surprise. As I don’t like to walk alone in the pot-holed streets without any street lights when it is dark I had to take a taxi. I didn’t see any taxis coming so I crossed the street. On that side it is quite dark and the lights from the café don’t reach that spot. Apparently it is a corner full of thieves but that I didn’t know. 

I have this tiny little purse in which I keep my passport and some money, I normally carry it hanging in front of me. As I wasn’t feeling that well I didn’t realise it had slipped back. The purse also has a pocket which you can’t close, in that I had my phone. It is a really crappy old phone and I would probably only be happy to get rid of it so I am not that careful with it. So I was standing there trying to get a taxi without any luck. Suddenly this UN car pulls over, stops and reverses, the window opens and a man shouts to me “Watch your bag, there is a guy behind you trying to stick his greedy fingers in it”. Oh my. So I turned around and there was a smiling guy looking all innocent. The UN man asked me where I was going and then gave me a ride home during which he held a lecture on how NOT to get rid of all your stuff which basically went like this: “do not stand in dark corners with your bag open and phone visible for anyone to grab, hmmm quite obvious one would think. Silly me. Apparently he works with security for the UN personnel here so I assume that is why he saw what was about to happened.

The day after I felt even worse, I really caught a bad cold so I spent the day chilling out but also prepared the two interviews I had Thursday. The interviews actually went quite well although I was soaked in my own sweat which then froze as soon as I stepped into the offices, very efficient air condition. I really don’t like that, never use it as it always makes me sick. 

To cure myself I thought it was a good idea to have some whiskey with a French police man in the evening. He has been working with the SSR process quite a lot so I thought it was a great idea to combine work and pleasure. The idea was great but it didn’t cure my cold. 

This morning me and the girl I am renting the room from went to the market together with her boyfriend. It was great: colourful, crazy, busy, smelly and absolutely fabulous. I definitely need to go back and buy some fabrics to have some skirts and dresses made. Then I bought some antibiotics, hope it will help. I really don’t have time to be sick plus it is terribly boring and particularly annoying when you start to get “culturally exhausted” as my former boss put it. The fact that I am a woman is occasionally an advantage as it makes it easier to get in contact with people I need to meet with BUT with that comes all kinds of weird suggestions, expectations. It is quite exhausting to constantly have to balance in between, on the one hand you can’t snap those guys off as that would ruin your work, on the other hand you must not in any sense encourage them. I try to use the tactics of avoiding to answer directly, keep to small talk, smile and play stupid. Or play stupid is perhaps not the right way to say it. I am stupid thinking that people actually would treat me in a professional way as I am used to. 

There are several things that I would say are culturally exhausting but what annoys me the most is the attitude from some people (read men) from the international community. No respect whatsoever for any kind of work ethics as they buy prostitutes like a normal person buys bread. It is tragic to see. In particular the complete lack of shame. Here everything is ok and when your wife is not here you “obviously” have to “have fun”. Such people make me sick and even more so when they represent intergovernmental organisations and alike that are supposed to do something good or at least do no harm. It is a damn shame. It is definitely time for the donor organisations to do something about the code of conduct of their employees. I mean seriously, how credible is it when those people come talk about human rights, gender equality and justice during the day and in the night they bang a girl in front of everyone at one of the nightclubs paying her less than the price of one beer. I am not surprised but quite disgusted to see it happened so openly, no shame whatsoever. None. It is time to think about the added value of the international presence when this is the side effects.

Les boîtes de nuit à Bangui

I am quite exhausted after a weekend of partying exploring the restaurants and nightlife here in Bangui. It started on Thursday evening when I had dinner with some French and Belgian people. We went to a restaurant that is really close to where I live, it was not bad at all and I had fish, “le Capitaine” which is a white, tasty fish. I didn’t come home that late which was good since I had a rendezvous with the military chaplain the next morning (as I have mentioned already). The meeting was ok but I don’t think it is fruitful for me to have him introducing me to some of the soldiers. Firstly he does not agree to me interviewing them but wants me to give them questionnaires (as I have mentioned). This is quite complicated since I cannot be sure they will fill them in without anyone supervising them. That would obviously affect the reliability of their answers so that won’t do. Secondly I get the feeling he wants to get some money out of it as he said that there is a need for some paperwork to get me into the barracks, which would cost me a certain amount of money. As I already have access to high ranking officers through my contacts here, without paying anything I don’t see how he could help me. Well, it was good to meet him anyhow and talk a bit about his work. 

Friday I had lunch with people from the EU delegation and it was interesting to hear the EU point of view on the SSR process here as the EU has supported the process both financially and technically. To summarise the view of the process and its effects was not that optimistic and I got to hear about several difficulties in implementing the reforms. I’ll get back to that at a later stage but in short the lack of political will makes any progress difficult. 

In the evening I was invited to a birthday party, by one of the French from the dinner on Thursday evening. It was nice and I gave him a rather silly elk wearing a scarf with the Swedish flag and a schnapps glass with a Darlecarlian horse and the Swedish flag on it. The guests were mainly Belgians and French in their 50’s but there was one girl and one guy my age, both French. The latter took me out to explore the nightlife in Bangui when the old ones wanted to go to bed. We went to two different nightclubs, one with a more African ambiance as the clientele and the music was mainly African. At the other club there were quite a few ex-pats although very mixed and the DJ played hip hop and R’n’B from the US. I had a great time and was dancing the night away! It was great and I got back around 6 am, completely exhausted. It was nice to go out and dance, I wouldn’t have been able to do that without being accompanied by someone who knows the city. I really hope I’ll get the occasion to do it again. 

Saturday was quite calm and I had a long siesta in the afternoon. I had planned to just stay home but things don’t always go as planned. One of my really good friends had emailed me a few days before to put me in contact with one of his really good friends who was coming to Bangui for a few days. I emailed my phone number and the guy called me Saturday. I could not refuse that so I went off to see him at the café where I often go to use internet. We chat for a bit and had a nice time and then one of his colleagues turned up. Then it turned out that he also know my very good friend who put me in contact with the first guy but they had no idea that they both knew him. He felt obliged to call our friend and I guess he was more than a little surprised... It is a small world. What are the odds? 

On Sunday I was invited to a pool party and fortunately it had stopped raining. Saturday it was pouring down and I was slipping around in the mud of the streets while people would shout at me “go to the other side” trying to help the lost white girl slipping in the mud. But when Sunday came the sun was shining again. The party was excellent, started around 1 pm and continued until it got dark. I was floating around in the pool the whole day as snacks and drinks were served without interruption. That’s the good life isn’t it! We had some sort of lunch/dinner around 3 pm and I think that was the only time I actually got out of the swimming pool. Most of the people from the birthday party was there. Apparently the owners of the house also use to do jetski on the Oubangui river. That I want to try but I guess that has to wait until next time. Hence I came home completely exhausted Sunday evening and just died in my bed. Yesterday I was still a bit tired but today I was definitely back in business and went to the ministry of defence to meet with some people there who work with the SSR process. I do feel a bit sick today though and my poor throat apparently does not support the local cigarette brands.

This week I have scheduled two interviews on Thursday so tomorrow I’ll spend the day preparing the questions to get the most out of it. That’s all for now, tonight I’ll get to bed early, early. 

A plus!

Beer at the President's sister's house

Wednesday I had a beer at the president’s sisters house. It was all very odd I actually wasn’t meant to be there. It all happened thanks to my abilities to communicate with Norwegians... One of my Central African contacts here called me Wednesday and asked if I wanted to have a drink. Of course I did. We went to a bar, had some beer and then he needed to go as he had a meeting with some foreign investors working in the energy sector. As they were next door at a hotel he said we would pick them up and then he would drive me home. Great. It turned out that one of those men was Norwegian. As I am Swedish and on top of that married to a Norwegian I greeted the Norwegian in Swedish. My contact thought this was fascinating and asked me if I wanted to go with them, I could translate if there were any language difficulties. Sure I said but it wasn’t really necessary as one of the investors was a Cameroonian man speaking both French and English. Anyway, I thought we would go for dinner but in the car my contact said we were going to the president’s sister’s house. That’s how I ended up watching three men interacting with the president’s sister while drinking beer. It was very interesting indeed. I was particularly fascinated by the South African guy who was not only very direct and explained that first of all he didn’t deem it necessary to meet with the president, second that they were interested in investing in the energy sector and NOT to build schools, hospitals or other things that the president’s sister was asking for, thirdly he asked her for a picture of the president but as she didn’t have one that she could give away he got one of her instead. He was really happy and said he would put the picture on the wall in his office. We were all laughing at his funny behaviour except for the Norwegian who just sat there quietly. It was all very odd. Then we were off and I went home.

Other than drinking beer at the president’s sister’s house I have met with some government officials who are in charge of the reforms of the different subsectors of SSR. Tuesday I met with those in charge of: intelligence, city and town planning and democratic oversight. I was introduced to them by my contact from the international community and I got the opportunity to listen to him talking with them about the process. I plan to schedule some interviews with those people next week but just by listening to their conversation I got a really good understanding of the process which facilitates conducting the interviews. In the afternoon I went to the office of the deputy national coordinator for SSR who showed me all the important documents and explained where the process is at. I came at a very good time it turned out. The process has been stalling for over a year due to the electoral process, however most short-term goals have been accomplished and now it is time to re-launch the process and develop strategies for the mid-term. There is only one sector that has a mid-term strategy: democratic oversight. It is great that he gives me access to all the documents but even better I can work at his office if I want which gives me the opportunity to consult the documents and use internet. That is really very kind of him. 

Yesterday he picked me up at home and we went to the office together in the morning. It is not that far away, I could walk but the Central Africans have a hard time understanding that white people can walk to places. I was working for a while and then we went to the Minister of Defence (MoD) where I met a really interesting person. It is a young Lieutenant who works as a military advisor to the chief of staff at the MoD. He also wrote his master thesis at the University of Yaoundé while doing an internship together with the national coordinator. The thesis deals with the disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration (DDR) process here in CAR. Very interesting as DDR is closely linked to SSR and a necessity for any type of reforms to actually be fruitful in consolidating peace. He also explained that the conflict(s) in CAR are extremely complex as there are several dimensions to it. 

There is the politico-military dimension, the elite level of the conflict, then there is an ethnical dimension to it and on top of that there are tensions between pastoralists and farmers which occasionally lead to outbreaks of violence. Furthermore the Lord’s Resistance army (LRA), Chadian rebels and criminal elements are operating on the territory which shows the regional dimension of the conflict.

Now the army chaplain just arrived to the café we will talk about the questionnaires to the soldiers.

New update next week.

Kwa Na Kwa

So many interesting things have happened since I wrote last time.  Kwa Na Kwa means Work, only work in Sangho, the national language but is also the name of the political party that supports incumbent president Bozizé.

During the last few days I have been walking around Bangui to get a feeling of the city, its people and what it has to offer. I really like this place, it is small and you can reach most places by foot. I have not yet been bothered by the military or the police which is good as the security forces are the ones most likely to bother you when you walk around. Other than that it seems like a relatively safe city, at least during the day. There are no bad neighbourhoods Nairobi or Johannesburg style. I like that I do not have to worry about taking the wrong turn and end up in a bad area especially since I have no sense of orientation what so ever.  

Saturday evening I was invited to dinner by a person from the international community here with many years of experience working with SSR in African countries. It was really nice and he updated me on the current situation of the SSR process in CAR. We had local beer and fish with some kind of “specialité africaine” that looked like a mix of sea weed and dill. It was really good but too much food. Never too much beer though! We had a really nice time and he said he’ll introduce me to some of the main stake holders in the process during the coming weeks. I even might be able to come with him when he is meeting with other international actors and Central African counterparts. That would be fantastic as it would permit me to not only do in-depth interviews with people involved in the process but also to observe those actors when they discuss the subject. I cross my fingers and hope for that to happened. He said he would call me this week so I am waiting for that. 

Although it is both interesting and relevant to my research to meet representatives from the international community and the Central African government I also think it is important to hear the opinions from other actors on “lower” levels in the hierarchy like civil society and the low ranking soldiers. As civil society to a large extent has been left out of the process (as I understand it) it is important to get information from those actors as well. I have some contact details to civil society representatives but have not yet been able to get in touch with them. As for meeting with the soldiers I just might be able to do that as I’ll explain further down.

Last week there I wrote that there is this NGO man working to counter corruption who has his office in my neighbours’ building. Today he came by to see me and I actually had an interview with him as he had time. Luckily I had prepared some questions in advance just in case.  What he does is very interesting and relevant to SSR although his organisation is not formally involved in the process. Before he worked as a priest within the police and felt that there was a need to enhance the moral and ethics within the state institutions but also in the central African society at large. Therefore, in 2005, he stared the organisation Centre International pour le Développement de l’Ethique du Leadership (CIDEL). He is a very interesting man with a Ph.D from the US full of optimism and good energy. CIDEL is a non-profit organisation working with leaders on all level of society ranging from communal leaders to ministers to promote values that can consolidate good governance, accountability and a culture of peace. It is a small organisation that, although it has been active since 2005, only slowly has expanded it s activities. Mainly due to lack of resources and funding, currently financial aid largely comes from American churches. The main objective is to counter corruption and nepotism by getting leaders together to discuss ethical and moral issues. In 2010 the organisation helped creating frameworks for preventing corruption together with several ministries (Justice, Public Security, Defence, Administration du Territoire). Before that CIDEL has supported reforms of the Ministry of Finance in 2008. Although the work of the organisation to a large extent overlaps with the objectives of the SSR process there is no cooperation between the international actors supporting SSR and CIDEL. At this early stage I cannot draw any conclusions about the reasons for this but what is sure is that trying to change the mindset of the leadership, be it ministers, officers or religious leaders is definitely necessary to achieve any actual change. To me it seems like it is an important complement to institutional reforms and probably should be a part of the SSR agenda. I am looking forward to meet more representatives for civil society. 

So at this point in time the focus of my research still is on how and why foreign supported SSR contribute to law and order. I have had some trouble to decide whether I should use the term “law and order” or “peace” or something else like “capacity” but at least I have made it clear how I define it. What I am interested in is to understand how and why/why not SSR contributes to the following:

     1. The presence/absence of illegal armed groups on the territory of the state 2.Acts of violence/absence acts of violence directed towards civilians by either illegal armed groups or the state security forces.

The state security forces are at the heart of this, hence the personnel within those forces is of interest. Has the SSR process affected the soldiers and the policemen’s will and capacity to protect civilians? This is one of the crucial questions I believe. I started to think more and more about how important it is that the reforms actually penetrate down to those that are meant to provide security to the population. I mean, no matter how much local ownership, resources and involvement of non-state actors there is, if the state security forces continue to prey upon the population the SSR process has somewhat failed. 

My study is explorative and even though it is theoretically driven and based on previous research I try to keep an open mind to be able to identify other possible explanations to why SSR does/does not contribute to peace than those proposed by the existing literature. Whether the reforms actually penetrate vertically is something I not yet have seen examined in the SSR literature. I am sure there are studies and any suggestions on readings are welcomed! 

The thought to focus on the effects of SSR on the will and capacity of the soldiers to provide security to the population came to me Sunday as I was introduced to a an officer of the Forces Armées Centrafricaine (FACA) who is working as aumônier militaire, an army chaplain that is. The neighbour just next to me in the same compound is a missionary just like those next door and  he had met this man in church and invited him for lunch. As my neighbour knows what I am doing here he asked me if I wanted to join them and so I did. It was very interesting to listen to this officer and he wanted to introduce me to some of the soldiers he is working with here in Bangui. This is a fantastic opportunity to actually talk to the soldiers and get a better understanding of the effect that SSR has/does not have on their work. I have been thinking about different methods so that I will get as much as possible out of it and thought a questionnaire would be good, given that they are literate. 

Then yesterday evening he was at my neighbour’s house again and we talked for a while and he said the soldiers do have some basic knowledge of writing and reading in French which actually surprised me. I showed him some suggestions for a questionnaire with around 20 questions that I started to work on Sunday evening, he approved with the questions and helped me to reformulate some of them. First however I have to meet the soldiers to get familiar with them. Hopefully I can arrange to go see them by the end of the week. We’ll see how this all goes but I am quite optimistic. 

Lots of things are happening and I didn’t get that much time to “adapt”. I have heard that field research can sometimes be slow in the beginning but in CAR there is no such thing as research fatigue, this country has been forgotten for such a long time. People are very eager to share their stories and experiences. Although I haven’t had that much time to relax at least I have had the opportunity to go with my neighbours’ to cool down in the swimming pool at the Residence of the US Ambassador, which is open to everyone from the American Community and their guests. I was there on Saturday and then again yesterday afternoon. It is great to get into the water for an hour after lunch when it is too hot to work and then come back home with new energy to work a bit in the evening before it is time to go to bed.   

It looks like I will be able to meet with different actors that are somehow affected by or involved in the SSR process at some level. It is almost a bit too good to be true. I guess I just have to enjoy that it all goes well now in the beginning because I am sure I will run into obstacles and problems along the way. I promise that you will hear all about it then...