My First Bad Day at Work (prefaced by two eye-opening road trips to remote job sites)

I had my first bad day at work today. It was the product of the days that preceded it that were above average. Today is a Thursday, and I can easily say it all started on Tuesday. I’ve been working on two separate projects for the majority of my time so far. A fair amount of time is being spent learning all the ins and outs of the office but the majority easily is spent discussing and designing and familiarizing myself with the codes and their origins over here.

Tuesday had a job site meeting (or more appropriately, a ‘clarification meeting’) 2.5 hours away (north of Durban) at a bridge site where ian (my carpool ride) and coworker gary would be introducing the project to all interested contractors and subcontractors. The bridge has been designed by bcp and all that remains is the receiving of tenders (bids) from qualified contractors. Rather than go into Thursday I’m gonna go into some details about two very very different parts of south Africa, both of which are very different from what we’re accustomed to here.

The meeting was held in the town hall of a village on tribal land. I’m always comparing this place (especially the townships) to mexico. The analogy still sticks except I’m not sure if goats and cows wander around mexico to this extent. About this village: it’s quite large and like an Indian reserve in the states, it is owned/governed by the south African government. Instead it has a chief (with seven wives of course) who was born into the job. There is no law enforcement, all issues and concerns involving land appointment go through the chief and his advisors. He is given a stipend from the south African government so he does not collect a tax from his people thus they don’t pay any tax. The village, quite a large one comparatively I’ve been told, is near and on land with a little jungle home to a bird found nowhere else in south Africa let alone the world. This makes this little bit of nearby jungle quite a tourist destination for birdwatchers which is where bcp comes in. the road in and out of this town used to be hand made (yes literally) and people wishing to travel to this part of south Africa needed 4-wheel drive as well as resilient backsides. bcp has been in charge of the road being built through this village until it meets up with another unpaved road that is currently undergoing the same process. This road includes a couple bridges (one of which is already done). The existing bridges are literally underwater during heaving rains and currently have a significant amount of the abutments broken off and downstream a few meters. The new bridge will be several meters higher thus increasing the span and required engineering but this is not a major project like the one I visited last time I was here which crosses the mgeni river.

Because of the potential conflicts between the local “government” and a construction crew driving through creating noise etc, bcp appointed a liaison to the chief on the payroll. The liaison is a white bloke named “titch” who grew up on a farm with his german parents and all his zulu neighbors. So he grew up speaking zulu and german. When he grew up he went to an Afrikaans school. He later learned English in school and now speaks that at home with his wife who is from England. He used to work for the parks service and has no technical experience… he’s just someone that can talk to both sides.

After going over the contract documents and project description everyone drove out to the site 22km away (16 paved, 6 unpaved). I drove with titch who explained the village, the chief and how everything works there. The Africans still don’t believe in land ownership and thus nobody owns property. You ask the chief if you can have a piece of property and he approves or disapproves. You then build your home on the property however you want out of whatever you want. Most are brick (it’s cheap) with a thatch roof (or metal) with wood framing holding it up. Sometimes glass windows. Sometimes not. I unfortunately left my camera in the boot of ian’s car so I couldn’t take any pictures of the amazing village. One other thing that was amazing, and titch told me it would blow my mind when I saw it, was how the vegetation changed 100% after going over a single hill. It had been lush green grass with jungle like what you would see apes moving around in and then, poof, you’re over this one hill and you’re in what they call the thornfeld. Acacia trees, cacti, and aloe (stuff with thorns) and no more green grass. Why? “This side doesn’t get any rain.” That’s Africa. Just like how my side of pietermartizberg gets A LOT more rain than the howick side where a lot of my coworkers live. I wish I had my camera but I’ve been assured that I’ll be back there in several months once construction gets under way.

Two last points about titch and this road: during the drive we passed black children of every age in their school uniforms (slacks, white shirts and ties). It was like Hogwarts just out down the road. They were walking back in this moderate heat (it would have been far worse just months ago) up these pretty big hills back to the village we had just left. These boys and girls in their shirts and ties were going to leave this paved or unpaved road they were walking on hike into the hills with the brick and thatch houses not big enough to park a large car in. maybe it’s just me but it boggles the mind to contrast the school uniforms with the walk and the homes they’re walking back to. Compare it kids in the usa who drive half a mile to school and wear clothes that they bought at a department store that came with holes in them already. And also consider what an education means out here. Not that much.

Secondly, titch showed me a piece of land on a hill that the chief is letting him build a retirement home on. “virtually unheard of” they say to have a tribal community let an outsider in like this. But I guess that’s why bcp chose titch.

Next on the list: the b.e.e. black equality empowerment. In construction projects it dictates that every project needs to have an emerging contractor of a minimum skill level with a certain percentage of underprivileged (aka black, Indian or women) on the payroll. Jews don’t earn them points. Every contractor or sub is ranked by the dept. of transportation. The main contractor needs to be a ‘stage 6’ and he needs to employ a ‘stage 4’ or higher. Every stage 6 rep at the meeting was white (except maybe one) and every stage 4 was black (and young). There was even totally bored and disinterested girl in her mid to late 20’s there. My guess is having a girl representing a company while a guy sits there next to her and asks questions makes a company more likely to get picked. That’s just my guess.

I was mostly on board on that 2.5 hour each way drive up the coast to see more of the country. And I did. We left maritzburg (pmb) at 6am so I was tired when we got back.

Moving on to Wednesday, I had another field trip, this time with bruce himself. This one was a 3.5 hour drive south to inspect a project we’ve been brought in to check another firm’s obviously questionable design. Bruce and I left pmb at 7am and got to the site where we stayed for about 1.5 hours looking at information we’ve trying to get emailed to us for a week and walking around in a culvert I’ve been running numbers on for the past week. The culvert had 10 meters of soil above it and was about 2.5 meters tall with about 5cm of water running through it. Walking down there, james the site supervisor for the engineers we’re… auditing… told me I should put on some gumboots before we go down there. Now, before I left, Tristan explained to me that they call condoms in south Africa “gumboots”. Turns out it’s really slang when gumboots originally mean rubber boots… the equivalent of what we call “rubbers”. roll that one around in your head for a bit...

Speaking of which, the sabc news are talking about how the government is discussing creating red light districts especially for the world cup in 2010. they’re seriously considering this to accommodate international guests.

I took quite a few pictures of the site visit and the drive there and back (it was a loop). I’ll post them eventually. By the time bruce and I got back to the office, it was time to leave for an office cocktail party for one of the directors who is retiring after 25 years from the roads dept. a 30 something year-old is starting next month and an older engineer, peter, is moving up to take his place in the roads dept. the cocktail party gave me a chance to work on figuring out the office soccer team and ways to watch and play some pickup soccer in the coming weeks. It also gave me a chance to, as usual, get questioned by the administrative women in the office about how I’m living and how can I possibly stand it? The most popular question I’m asked is: “how do you cook at your small place?” and then second is: “YOU DON’T COOK?!” tied for third are: “CEREAL?!!!” and “YOU’RE KIDDING?!!!”

After the cocktail party I tried to watch south Africa play sri lanka at cricket at ians but I was in need of sleep so ian took me home where I fell asleep and missed the first close finish of the tourney so far thanks to the sri lankin bowler breaking a record I had asked about moments before falling asleep. 4 wickets in 4 balls. I had asked earlier, “has anyone ever bowled 2 wickets in 2 balls?” 2 in 2 is extremely rare but possible.

That brings me to today, Thursday. I spent the morning going over the new direction we’re going with the culvert analysis now that we’ve been to the site and can move on. So I started moving forward but got held up by a question about some software that took me around the office trying to figure out the solution. Then I was finally shown how to bill my time (I asked, “how do I bill time that’s spent learning how to bill time?”).

Here’s where I got stuffed; my work visa is still not ready. So I don’t have a bank account. I’m being paid out of petty cash whenever I ask. Without a bank account it’s tough to buy a car. However, I’ve recently learned that I need a ‘drivers license’-type license from the d.o.t. to buy a car regardless of money and visa. Basically once I get the license, my company can put up whatever money I need to buy a car. Problem is Candice, the girl that answered the phone every time I called from the states, said she could take care of it before the weekend if I got her pictures of me. Everybody told me different things that I would need and different places to get them. I walked a couple blocks to the store “game” which is like longs drugs and found out they don’t take the picture that I would need. Pippa suggested I take the company bakkie and rob drew me a map. I then wandered around trying to find the keys only to find out that it wasn’t even there. Kevin had it. So then I tried to get a ride from one of the secretaries. Finally bridgit to me to the Victoria mall where I paid 30 rand to have a guy take a picture of me with a 3 megapixel camera (not even on a tripod) where they printed out 4 copies and handed it to me 15 minutes later. On the way back I joked, “I’ll bet the second my ass hits my chair when I get back, bruce will check to see if I’m done with the numbers he gave me”. Sure enough 5 minutes after getting back, bruce walks in. he’d heard I was out getting my picture taken but I don’t think he knew it took me the entire afternoon. Grrr… and tomorrow is the month-end braai. Wow, I’m something like 3 weeks behind and I haven’t even been here that long. Our offices have locks on them so I think I might just lock the door tomorrow to keep people from meandering in and asking “howzit?”. The one thing of importance: making plans with virgilio to see 300 tomorrow night. Shazzam!

I think that’s enough to last awhile. Remember: send me an email letting me know how things are going wherever you’re at. I should have email at home soon (I hope) so I’ll try to answer all the emails that’ve been sitting in my inbox unreachable to the likes of me.

Cheers,

Jonah

Week Two (Snakes & Thunderstorms)

ok, i promised i was going to enact a new policy of "if something exciting happens, wait a day or two before writing about it". i was thinking i needed to sleep on stories and see if i still thought they were so amazing the next day before sitting down and writing 10 pages about it. this was inspired by my experience with getting a haircut. looking back, it was weird but not worth writing about. the point to gather is that i'm constantly sticking out like a sore thumb because i don't understand policy over here that's totally the norm. people look at you like you're crazy when your hairstylist offers you a drink or tea and you say, "no thanks, i'm getting a haircut right now. i think i'm busy". i also didn't expect a 10 minute scalp massage. i'm sure steve experienced similar in malaysia but at least he had coworkers and family to guide him through it.

i'm sitting down to write about finding my first frog in my place. something jumped out from behind the trash and i thought it was just a gecko, but it was a very colorful frog. the part of the story i want to relate is that when i went to get the landlord and ask him what to do (the question seemed more appropriate in my head), he said that frogs are a good sign. it means there aren't too many snakes around. brown (non-poisonous but biting) snakes are very common around here. yesterday's headline was 'house overun by snakes'. there are newspaper salesman on each corner (you get to know them by name eventually and practice your zulu or whatever language with them) and you can read the headlines while waiting for the robot (traffic light) to change. ian, my ride to work, explained, "it must be a good day in the world when that's the headline". the main paper for kwazulu-natal province buries it's foreign stories deep. angelina jolie's baby, however, counts as a local story. madonna too.
moving along, ian had read the story that morning and told me that the woman with the infested house believes someone cast a curse on her. she said it earnestly and it was reported with all seriousness. ian says a very considerable portion of the population really believes in that stuff.

let's break the rule i just made two more times. i know it sounds cliche but i'm also not fitting in

whoah, power just went out. did i mention i'm in the middle of a crazy thunderstorm? i just heard a lightning strike that sounded like it belonged in a george lucas film. hell, i feel like i'm in a movie theater right now because the lightning here is a constant flickering. i've gotta find my camera to video this scene. i just bought matches for my candles after work today. well, seeing as battery life is limited, i'll wait until tomorrow to talk about the woman named 'fortunate' that cleans for 70 rand (10 dollars) a day for richard and priscilla (and starting next week, me). the story of putting my wine from soquel vineyards that i brought for bruce 3 months ago up against a wine brought by bruce's son in law. and a young black coworker virgilio.

until next time,

jonah

Half a Week Down

it's monday now. i just had my mind blown. i just saw a commercial for 'grandpa headache powder'. if you have a copy of all my radio adverts, i extracted an old ad from the 40s or 50s for grandpa headache powder. 'aaaahhhh... grandpa'

when i'm given time to let my brain stew i come up with "your mamma" lines. here's the gem for the evening: "your momma's so fat she has a mezuzah on the door of her refrigerator."

ok, it's tuesday. i'm watching the cricket world cup. it is such a big deal it has postponed regular programming. i saw a new way of getting out so the game still has some tricks up its sleaves. they just showed how some fans (pakistani team i think) are in the stands just praying and not watching. wow.

the main things i think i'll have to report on while i'm here will be of the following:
1.) the differences between us and s.a. (also the weird similarities)
2.) discoveries and stories related to me
3.) adventures at work and everywhere else
4.) new friends

so let's start with work. it's great and challenging. i've been asked to try to solve many problems along with my other fellow engineers. so far i'm not sure i've offered anything brilliant to solve the problems because they approach the problems so differently here. because of the size of the structures at this office, the simple assumptions i used to make aren't acceptable. i think my suggestions might be received better once the project moves farther along. the coworkers are awesome. many are from all over the world. many are from all over south africa. most everyone keeps the door of their office open and everyone spends a lot of time being social.
tea is served at 10, 1 and 3 and tomorrow there will be cake. oh and i think i've noticed racism at work as usual. a younger black engineer, virgilio, was hired awhile ago and isn't getting a new computer and his own office like i have. but being one of the younger new employees while all the newer employees are black or indian, i'm gravitating towards the younger set... even though in south africa, everyone gets married and has kids very young. traditional customs too. one of my fellow engineers gives money (or cows) to his bride's family. i don't think i'm gonna be able to ever go back to a small quiet office... but maybe just having me in it would make it not very quiet. bcp is almost like the halls of a high school. lots of chat and it clears out within moments of closing time.

but enough about work, what's next..? let's talk about watching television in south africa. i get 4 channels. i think all are government owned. that would explain why i understand just over 50% of the original programming. but it does show gillmore girls, joey and other american programming. but that's only when they're not showing news which is a lot of work because they have to show the news multiple times, each time in a different language (english, afrikaans and zulu or whatever). even the original dramatic programming and even sports will drop in and out of english (sometimes subtitled in the language that is being swapped in and out). this news show i'm watching ("dikgang") has clicking in it. you almost don't hear the click because it's incorporated into the words simultaneusly with the rest of the sounds. it's my understanding that most people that speak afrikaans fluently are much like the mexicans in that they refuse to speak anything else. it's this pride and independance that led to the boer war.

the grocery stores are, simply put, no trader joes except the prices. i would say the standard of living is much reduced at least in hayfields. the grocery store runs the gamut. comfortably wealthy and some pretty run down folks of all colors. so i guess at the supermarket you have a better selection of social classes than soup flavors. but i have found some good cheese. a bleu. crackers are a whole different story. i also bought some more monkeygland sauce. and in a piece of novelty news, i'm collecting weird ethnic foods of england and south africa to mail back soon. you'll all also get a kick out of the weird names of foods here (e.g. "salticrax" crackers).

new friends... no new friends. i'm coming home and working on personal projects that i was always too busy to work on back in s.c. i'm now probably 1/2 way done with the animation part of "bedbugs" and it's coming along nicely.

i miss the old carefree lifestyle of biking to work. maritzburg doesn't have bike lanes but it does have bike clubs but i'd rather bike to work than in circles with a bunch of old people.

i'll wrap up by saying that the one thing i still balk at is driving myself. bcp has offered me the company vehicle for as long as i need it but i'm too scared. i live at the end of a long steep driveway full of cars... need i say more. the company 'bakkie' is a big truck.

hope you're all well,

love,

jonah

Thoughts From My First Full Day in South Africa

well we're on day two (saturday) in south africa. my first full day. i don't have anything interesting really to report but i'm really writing this for myself. a cleansing of all the thoughts running around in my head. yesterday was very difficult (emotionally) for me but it could have been a whole lot worse. perhaps it all started when i woke up from my drug induced sleep from london to joberg. i was awake for maybe 2 of the 10 hour flight. i was seated next to a young (24ish) indian couple from england vacationing (going on holiday) in south africa and southern africa.
i nodded off for a bit and when i woke up they were gone and replaced with a blond south african on her way back from a business trip in the middle east.
i put her in her early 40s and thanks to her requesting an aisle seat the couple moved and was replaced by only her. so we three seats between the two of us. what seemed like a drinking contest broke out between us and that sums up the first two hours. the landing of the plane woke me up and i hurried through customs to jump on the durban flight. while i waited i started reading 'disgrace' by some south african author. it involves, among other events, a break in where the main character is set on fire and his daughter is raped. that, coupled with news of south africa descending further into violence, made for a very unsettling first day. pippa had a scarier-than-hell story about a break in with her in-laws. i also kept rethinking, "i've just left a setup in santa cruz that for the first time in my life was just how i liked it! and now i've moved to a place where i probably won't ever get it close to how i like it. what the hell was i thinking?!"
but later pippa took me to the grocery store literally across the street and i bought some bread, cheese and wine and i started to feel more at home.
the place is tiny. and i mean tiny. can't be too much more than a couple hundred square feet but it's fully furnished, near work, in a very safe neighborhood, and comes with a very very very nice indian family. but i still feel totally alone out here and i'm trying to use that to my advantage to work on the cartoon.

i've begun investigating the cost of internet. i might not have internet on this computer for a few weeks.

i've also started taking little strolls around the neighborhood. hayfields, it's called. cute. quiet. i'm living an amazing experience right now. i'm just afraid that if i get robbed or something worse, i'll lose the lustre of it all.

i've found a microbrew of sorts at the liquor store across the street, 'boozies'. the beer tastes like sierra nevada but it's a nice taste of home. whistling weasel pale ale brewed in nottingham road wherever that is. 100km from here they say. it comes in a plastic bottle and i can buy it in plastic 2 liter bottles like soda. it has a short shelf life they warned me. i scoffed at the shelf life. "this beer isn't gonna make it through the night" i said.
the family i'm staying with has a boy named angelo. he visits me and hangs out with me. he asks lots of questions like you would expect from someone his age. he says he's eight. he has a cricket game in a week. if i don't have other plans i hope to tag along and watch him play.

i've been offered use of the housecleaner, fortunate, once a week on wednesdays. 70 rand gets her for 8 hours. i have no idea how i can possibly keep fortunate (that's her name) busy for 8 hours a day with my meager laundry and dishes.
rouwellyn, the boyrfriend of liza, the daughter of the richard and priscilla just invited me out to dinner and to hang out tonight. he said semi-formal and i'm sitting here wearing cargo shorts, an undershirt and turf shoes.

i keep my computer on california (pct) time because i eagerly work on the computer waiting for it to be time when i can call the states without waking everybody up. eventually i'll be busy at work and when i get home everyone'll be awake and at work. i'm not sure how many international minutes i get with a 180 rand phone card but i don't suspect it'll be much. and seeing as i get charged per the megabyte for dsl, there's no perfect way to keep in touch. but keeping in touch is a super priority that i look forward to. for now loneliness is a problem even though boredom isn't.