Report from the Dunes
A status report, with mangled metaphors
This report is being written in mid-January; the story of my time at Gobabeb is now halfway through. Now, I never did take any classes from Grinnell's reportedly stellar English department, but what I learnt of narrative arcs in middle school suggests that the uneventful introductory quarter of my time at Gobabeb, detailed above, should be followed by a quarter in which conflict is introduced, a third quarter in which events reach a climax, and a fourth quarter consisting of an extended denouement, which I will spend napping and sipping cooldrinks in the shade of the Old House veranda.
Well, that's sort of the way it's working out. Shortly after I submitted my first quarterly report the calm seas that I had enjoyed during my first three months at Gobabeb (I'm switching from a narrative metaphor to a nautical one-hang on, readers, this might get awkward) became choppy and unfriendly. I never quite foundered, but I did have to trim mainsails and batten down some hatches to make it through to Christmas unscathed. I learnt my lesson, though: I had allowed two long-term projects to putter along without ensuring that I really understood my own role in them, and that was a mistake. Between November and December I was feeling close to overwhelmed with the magnitude of a couple of projects I really didn't feel comfortable with and I was largely dissatisfied with how I had handled my first batch of students (and occasionally dissatisfied with how they dealt with me). But the storm is now mostly over, and all that remains is finishing up a few loose ends with those projects-some minor repairs and modifications to the ship that is my stay at Gobabeb in this increasingly strained metaphor.
The point is: things got a little rough here for a while. My introductory time at Gobabeb came to a close and demands on my time-including demands I didn't feel particularly well prepared for-multiplied. Still, I did actually make it through, Lessons Were Learned, and I have high hopes for naps and cooldrinks in the not-so-distant future.
Hello Mr Chips?
One surprise this year was how much teaching has played a role in my job here. In past years the RITA fellow had an assisting role in the Summer Desertification Programme (SDP), a long-running DRFN project where roughly 15 Namibian university students would spend two months at Gobabeb and elsewhere in Namibia working on field research. SDP, long donor-funded, is being wound down and has been replaced by a programme known as Gobabeb In-Service Training (GIST). Suffice to say that with this programme I have a total of ten students here for some ten months of the year (four for four months, six for six months). They aren't as closely supervised as SDP students were, but the demands on my time are still considerable, particularly since I have had to take on more of an organizing role for the second session.
It hasn't been entirely smooth sailing (more nautical clichйs, ahoy!). In particular, I had trouble with the first GIST because I didn't understand how closely I was to be involved in students' work, and I hadn't been involved in any of the planning. The second GIST came close to collapsing entirely when a coordinating figure in Windhoek was dismissed, but we recovered it, and I've had much more say in the planning so far. Right now we're only a week or so into the second session, but already I feel more confident about where it's headed and what it is I need to do to make it work. And the current students' projects are terribly exciting, involving as they do all sorts of community interactions and interesting work in another field I don't know anything about: agricultural research.
All this teaching is not quite what I signed up for-it certainly wasn't in the job description. Fortunately, it's actually been a pleasant way of finding out that well-planned presentations and lectures can thrill in the same way that stage performances do, that teaching things like stats and writing skills is good for me in and of itself, and that I wouldn't mind doing more teaching in the future. Hurrah!
At the center of it all
In a previous report I suggested that Gobabeb was an interesting place to work for those interested in development. This point could use some elaboration (and not just because I'm running out of things to say in this report). When I was considering what to do after graduation Namibia was high on my list, but I was concerned that I would not be experiencing the "real" Namibia, and that another option might provide a more authentic developing-world experience. In retrospect, this was silly.
Certainly Gobabeb can sometimes feel like a different planet, and living and working here is very far from the average Namibian's daily experience. But on the other hand, you get a distinct feel here for the workings of Namibia's government, you meet and work with all kinds of folks in the education sector (from local primary teachers up to university administrators in Windhoek), you meet students of all stripes from the various corners of Namibia, and you have a distinct chance of going out and doing fieldwork in a variety of different areas around Namibia. Then on top of that you meet a bunch of interns and researchers from South Africa, Europe, and the US. Interested in international organizations? Check out the various scientific networks Gobabeb is keyed into, or the UN conservation programmes it's interested in joining forces with, or the aid agencies it deals with on a regular basis.
The point is, dear readers,that Gobabeb's got a lot more links to the outside world and to the rest of Namibia than you might think from a cursory examination. I've dubbed the phenomenon "globabebalization" (also a little silly), and it's fun to be at the heart of it.
Things to do in Gobabeb when you're bored
First off, I'm rarely bored here. So the title's a little deceptive.
But my real point here links to the above section: no matter what else is going on there's always the marvelous range of people to enjoy and get to know. Last Friday, for instance, I played in a soccer game where the teams included Germans, Americans, and Namibians from five different ethnic groups. There were at least eight languages being used to shout and swear in on that (sandy, very bumpy) field. And when we got tired of playing soccer the Topnaar let us ride around the field in a donkey cart while watching the sunset. Magnificent.
What else did we do that weekend? A weekend, I should mention, that included no TV because our satellite receiver was completely kaput? Well, the Saturday involved a sundowner on the dune and a pudding race tournament. Then it rained-a glorious, 45 minute, 4.5 mm rainstorm. We all danced and hooted and hollered outside in that exceptional downpour and enjoyed the lightning show over the dunes. Then on Sunday I ran planning sessions and stats classes with the students I'd partied with the night before. Never a dull moment.