Lebanon

Downtown Beirut

So, technically I've been living in Paris for the last four weeks.  However I'll be spending just my second weekend here this weekend, as I had one lightning trip back to Mossley (I nearly wrote "home to Mossley" there, will have to work on that) and of course one glorious week in Beirut!



Jenny and Roland at our apartment

Lebanon is just beautiful.  Landing on an airstrip so close to the water I could have dived in from the plane, I was left scrambling for my camera (or at least for the new blackberry - not the best camera in the world as you will see).  Beirut is set on the hills around the Mediterrean and with sparkling blue skies it was just mint.



Neighbours overlooking the roman ruins

I was there with a few other friends for the wedding of Roger, who had worked with us at Canga.  And didn't they look after us!  We had the use of a holiday apartment in the hills not too far from his home village, and Jenny and I had a real struggle to be allowed to pay for anything at all.  We ended up having to play tricks just to pay for lunch occasionally.  The apartment was stocked with food, Roger had bought us new pillows, we were ferried around everywhere; perfect hospitality.  Including at his family's home the night before the wedding, which was just lovely (although perhaps they could have been a little less generous with the whiskey!).

We got around a bit and went site seeing, particularly in "Downtown".  Although it's still called the Souk of Beirut (Souk is a kind of arabic market), it felt more like the Champs Elysée than the more traditional sort of crowded market place.  As you can see from the top photo, this is a city well and truly recovered from the war (practically ancient history now - it finished in 1990 after all.  Apparently the young things these days refer to Baghdad rather than Beirut as a synomym for murderous chaos).  What was also noticeable is that it was a perfectly liberal country.  I particularly liked the cosy way that the churches were cuddled up to the mosques, as in this photo.



Best wedding music ever



The wedding itself was just amazing.  Roger and Yara are christians, so it proceded more or less in line with any other church wedding, at least a first.  Having said that, our french friend commented on how odd it felt for him to watch a catholic service conducted in arabic!  Across Europe being arabic is widely seen as synonomous with being muslim, which of course it not always the case.

Anyway church, beautiful flowers (which mandatorily have to match the bridesmaid's dress), lots of exceptionally well dressed and coiffed people... and then after the service it was off the reception.  Here's where it got really cool - the food (all Lebanese specialities) was amazing, the venue was great, the black label jack daniels on every table went down well, but what I really loved was the dance floor. The couple entered the area to the tune of the Pirates of the Carribean theme song (you know that bit when Captain Jack Sparrow makes his entrance on the mast) and immediately started dancing.  Everyone soon joined in, and so it went, wandering back and forth between the ever changing buffet on the table and dancefloor (with fireworks!).

The next day was nice and cruisy, we took in the Jeita Grotto, an amazing cave complex, went through to Byblos, reportedly the oldest town in the world (part of the Phoenician empire in case you were wondering) then a late lunch in a beautiful restaurant by the sea.

One last night in Beirut and we made the most of it in the best nightclub I've ever been to - All White, with the top open to the air, the lights of Beirut behind us, great music and an amazing crowd.  Breakfast Lebanese style then it was back to the airport and "home" to Paris.

Paris

And once more a new blog title ....

Visas.... again

I’m sitting in the UK Home Office Border Agency Public Enquiries Office (that’s a mouthful) waiting for what I think will be stage 5 of the visa application process, not counting the 4 or so people who stopped me for information before I even made it to stage 1. The scary thing about this last stage is that my number is no longer up on the board, possibly explained by the subtitles on the video message on the wall that says “biometric results can take up to 3 (!!!) hours to return”. (These results include my fingerprints, taken for the first time ever.) So it looks like I’ll be making myself comfortable. The young, very serious lady on the video now is saying (according to the transcript underneath) that I could have some crayons and paper if I wanted, but I think I’ll just stick with writing this and eating my cheese and cucumber sandwich (seriously the best option that was available in the wee cafeteria).

It is hard to believe that I have been here for 5 years nearly. The immigration officers at Manchester Airport have been asking me for some time now what I was going to do after October. At least this last time I had an answer for them (I have an appointment for renewal). I think that it should be straightforward; I certainly seem to meet all of the necessary criteria. But who knows, the UK like so many other places are getting paranoid about immigration, the conservative government has made some outlandish promises to slash numbers from outside the EU and things are just generally getting tougher. A worry for me, because my employment with Rio Tinto is based on me having the continued right to live and work in the UK. (A pleasant looking gentleman is now telling us that he hopes we will have a positive view of the PEO and welcomes the filling out of a customer service form. I think I’ll do that and mention that forewarning of a potential 3 hour wait would be welcome.).

The benefit of going through all of this is that not only will I have no problems entering the UK (my alternative option would be to come in and out on a tourist visa, on which I’m allowed 90 days in any 6 month period), but I won’t actually need a French working visa. Shades of Italy... being an intra-company transfer from an EU country where I have the right to live and work to the French office of that company is all hunky dory. I think I will still need some sort of residency permit in France, but that should just be a matter of registering with the police or something. (The Deputy Director is now telling us how important it is to her that the PEO offers an efficient and customer friendly service... well certainly everyone has been very polite. Frankly though I’m seeing some potential efficiency improvements here and there...)

Naturally a very multicultural audience here, although surprisingly a few Brits as well... I can’t work that out, maybe baby’s first passport? Lots of Russian/eastern Europe accents, a few Asians, the odd American, a few Africans. Everyone looking bit stressed of course and all are being very carefully well behaved. One of the Australian guys I worked with at Canga is now doing his last stint because his girlfriend was deported immediately after her renewal was refused. She was employed as something professional in a hospital, but that wasn’t enough to let her stay. I should be ok though; the grandmother link still seems to be good. (If I want, apparently there is a prayer room and a mother and child room on the first floor according to a rather motherly looking lady, but how could I leave this room and risk missing my number being called? I might start to regret that diet coke soon.)

Hey, my number’s at least on the board now under “Biometric Case Consideration”. Only about 10 people ahead of me, so hopefully I’ll get out of here before closing time... fingers crossed!

Postscript 1: my number mysteriously moved backwards in the queue and now, some 4 hours after I first arrived, the screen’s gone blank and there seem to still be a lot of people around. Somebody came round with a wonderfully old fashioned clipboard taking numbers.

Plus I’ve been told that I can’t plug into a socket in a government building (security? stealing electricity? ) although I did manage to sneak enough juice for another hour or so on the computer. (The slightly chubby young gentleman on the video is gently explaining that if my application fails I will not, alas, be able to reclaim my £850).

Postscript 2: It's ok, they've got speakers in the toilets so I can still hear my number being called out.

Postscript 3: They called me just as I finally gave in and decided to fill out a customer survey form. And I got it! No problems. In fact, I was a bit peeved that they didn’t want more information – not even various marriage certificates obtained at some expense. Still, can’t complain, Rio paid for everything else :)

Bye bye Canga

So, that’s it for Canga.  Another chapter closed, a new beginning [insert appropriate cliché here].  And as I’ll be working on the same project, sometimes catching up with some of the same people, it doesn’t feel like I’ve totally left.  Plus from a work perspective it was long overdue.  Still, I will miss the life there sometimes.

Having said that... it's off to Paris for me!  For now I'm just chilling in Mossley, doing as little as possible.  Next week I've got the all important visa meeting (should be fine.... ) and a week's work in Farnborough before getting on that plane one last time.

Well, not really one last time of course.  I'll have to come back probably to finalise the packing.  And I'll be back here for Christmas I think. And maybe whenever I feel like a little english countryside.  Still, you know, the moment called for a dramatic flourish I think.

To wish me farewell, my team made up an African dress, very pretty.  I'm wearing my normal uniform underneath but apart from that it fit amazingly.  Apparently Alain went with Fatima into Moribadou and dragged women off the street to demonstrate to the tailor my size.  Must have been entertaining for everyone.

Not long before I left, I went with some of the other guys and we hiked from Dabatini on Pic de Fon (one half of the Simandou Range that is part of our concession) to Mt Oueleba (the other half).  Below are some pics shamelessly stolen from a few friends from that hike.  Paris is a beautiful city, but not known for it's parks, certainly not in the centre.  I'm really going to miss this slice of nature.

Canga East

Conakry news

By the way, a snippet of news from Conakry.  Remember a few months ago I said that I was staying at my boss's house for a few days, with a rather famous neighbour... the president of Guinea, Alpha Conde?  Glad I wasn't there this week (my boss wasn't either; fortunately he was on holiday).

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/us-says-assassination-attempt-on-guinean-president-totally-unacceptable/2011/07/20/gIQAlXZFQI_story.html

I just checked my previous blog and you can see that I took an almost identical photo of the house as the Washington Post/Associated Press.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jul/19/guinea-president-survives-assassination-attempt

The guardian has more.  This is really unexpected - when you're in Conakry you get no real sense of this sort of tension.  However the president's under an awful lot of pressure to deliver basic improvements in people's lives, the sort of thing that takes time and people get impatient.  Plus of course this isn't a part of the world where everyone's signed on yet to the whole democracy idea anyway, many preferring a strongest takes all philosophy.

Change is in the air....

It's nearly the end of the first week of my two weeks break at home in Mossley and I've decided I need a personnel secretary.  I had all of these visions of me taking long walks in the hills, reading a book or two, doing some french lessons.  But no.  Instead I've been running around like crazy trying to do all sorts of boring things.

For example, just 2.5 years ago my passport expired and I got a new one.  Foolishly I decided not to spend the extra 50 quid or whatever it was and got a standard passport instead of one with extra pages.  Now I've got a measly 5 or so clean pages left, I need a swag of new visas that will take several of them and so I decided to get a new, bigger one.  Only the Passport Office tells me that because of some computer glitch I have to apply from scratch, which means masses of original paperwork, some of which I don't have and hence have had to apply back to Australia for.  I also need to make an appointment to go in person, in London (a £150 train trip, full day)  - but I can't make the appointment until I've got the number of the certificate that I've had to apply to from Australia... it goes on for quite a while like that.

I've also now got two tax returns to do.  In the UK, the majority of people don't need to put in a tax return if they are simply pay as you go employees.  This is both good (less work) but also bad as people don't even know what sort of tax deductions they might be able to get.  I think on balance I prefer our system because it makes us more financially literate.  I'm constantly amazed by how little otherwise educated people around here know about managing money.

Of course that's not the exciting news, which would be.... I'm moving to Paris!!!  The contract's signed, the date's agreed, I've just got to get the visas sorted out, hence the fuss as described above.  It looks like I won't need a French working visa if I've still got my UK working visa and it's an intra-company transfer (shades of Sicily?).

Of course, I now need to renew my UK visa. I cannot believe that I have been here for nearly 5 years.  Whenever I fly back into the country (relatively frequently), they ask me what's my basis for being in the country, I say I've got an ancestry visa and point them to the correct page in the passport.  A few trips ago, for the first time, the immigration officer then asked "So what are you going to do after October?". *gulp*.  It expires in a mere 3 months.  I should be able to renew it....  

So my next FIFO swing into Guinea should be my last.  Should be, depending on all these factors.  Of course I'm sure that I'll go back to Guinea every now and then on visits.  The project's not due to be completed until 2015, and this current Paris assignment is just to the end of this current stage of project development, ie to the end of 2012.

But I guess the blog will need yet another new title?

I'll try and update a wee bit more frequently.  I never find time in Guinea alas. 

Bacteria

Looking down to Robin Hood's Bay from Scott's mum's B&B

Back in Mossley again, but only for two nights.   I flew back from Guinea last Saturday... via Monrovia.  I mean seriously, Monrovia?!  It sounds like something out of a b-grade vampire movie.    The earlier flight from Conakry to Monrovia (actually the capital of Liberia) had made it all the way there, had some problem with the landing gear or something and then... wait for it... decided that the ground crew at Conakry was better than at Monrovia and so turned back.  I’ve been one year in Guinea now; somewhere can actually be worse than Guinea, really?  Really truly???

So our flight to Paris took a detour to drop the somewhat irate passengers off, hence missed flight to Manchester and didn’t get home to Mossley until about 12 hours later than normal.  No big deal though.

Walking along the cliff from Robin Hood's Bay to Whitby

This rotation I took what I think was my 6^th dose of antibiotics since I first went out there.  The first was for a gastro condition, which while extremely unpleasant did have some excellent weight loss side effects.  The next two were for a horror ear infection combined with the worst flu I have ever had.  My entire sinus cavity was full from top to bottom and goo was oozing out of every orifice – gross!  I picked up some good future prevention tips there – always take the drugs to clear your nose because the infection afterwards is most painful.

The next 3 were because of a skin infection.  One weekend in Conakry I went out to the islands, which were lovely and normally no problem.  That far away from the city the Atlantic is clean again.  However once I went for a walk and went swimming and noticed that the water didn’t seem as clean as normal. 

Old whalebones at the bay in Whitby

Over the next few days every little cut or pimple or dry patch or blister turned septic.  One in particular on my arm was horrendous and the swelling went from above my elbow down to my wrist.  It was very painful, but being in Conakry I waited until I got home... I got off the plane at Manchester, caught the train to Manchester Piccadilly, another to Stalybridge, change for Mossley, and then walked across the road from the train station and into the doctor’s clinic with my suitcase still.

I asked the receptionist if I could see a doctor.  She said sorry, no space available today.  I rolled up my sleeve and said I’d just come from West Africa... she gasped and said we’ll get you an emergency appointment in the next 10 minutes.  J

Watching Dumfermline "the Pars" win their last match
 in the second division and be promoted

So, antibiotics again.  They cleared up the problem nicely.  However a few rotations later... exactly the same thing, this time on my elbow.  I was in Conakry again so I sent an email to the doctor at Canga asking if there was some sort of cream or something I could get.  He took one look at the (admittedly ugly) photo and said get ye to the clinic for more antibiotics.  *Sigh*.

This time they took a sample and grew some bacteria in a culture dish.... so when it happened for the third time the Canga doctor was able to give me the right sort of antibiotics.  Because it wasn’t just any kind of bacteria, it was MRSA, also known in England as a superbug that randomly kills hospital patients.  So this led to me spending a lot of time in the clinic, getting the nasty big lump (bigger than my hand) cleaned out, a daily intramuscular injection and a twice daily drip.

Amazing science and arts centre in Valencia

The funny part of all this was that this time the lump was on my arse, so the doctor and nurses, who are friends in the tiny Canga village that I have dinner with often, now know me a bit better than I’d like!

The photos by the way are all my my last break - a few days in Whitby, watching football in Scotland then off to Valencia.  Today I'm off to Lanzarote on the way to Paris through back to Guinea.  It's a tough life! 

Lots of good things to eat at the Valencia market

Baby Jocelyn

Baby Jocelyn.  Not something I ever thought I’d say!

A few weeks ago I was back at Canga, attending our daily toolbox meeting.  Since I went back to Guinea in January in the middle of an evacuation from site because of some local unrest over jobs (unfortunately Rio Tinto cannot employ all of the thousands of local youngsters without jobs) I have spent a lot of time in Conakry.  There I have been helping the Economic Development team look at options for improving electricity supply in the capital, where the situation is pretty dire.  Let’s just say that the Rio Tinto head office is in the area deemed the number 1 priority by the local electricity company, and our power goes off at least 10 times a day.

Anyway, as a result I’d only spent a little bit of time on site at Canga.  My team of electricians was pretty happy to see me back as we had developed quite a bond over the time where I had no supervisor working for me.  Normally the supervisors deal with the day to day problems and I just step in over any major problem and to make sure that the projects are on track, etc.   However without supervisors I was having to spend most of the day with the guys, solving all the problems that came up.  Not my forté, but we struggled through

Anyway, back on site again and one of the electricians whispers to one of the senior electricians who whispers to the new (expat – French Canadian) supervisor.  Everyone a bit closer suddenly cheered and clapped, but I hadn’t heard so I said “What was that Kalil, I didn’t hear you?”   Francis responded.... “Nestor would like to tell you that his wife has recently given birth to a baby girl... and he has named her Jocelyn”.

Well, needless to say I was flabbergasted.  This is one of the biggest compliments you can give a person in Guinea, with lots of traditional cultural implications.  I had arranged for Nestor to join Rio Tinto from one of the contracting companies, so I knew he was grateful for that but still.... let’s just say that I wouldn’t be surprised if this was the first little Jocelyne in all of Guinea despite Jocelyne being a French name (Jocelyn is actually the masculine version – French people when they meet me are surprised because the feminine version is with an e at the end).

I gave Nestor and his wife Seni a small gift of 300,000 Guinean Francs (about €30) when I left, and will take in some baby clothes or similar when I go back... I suspect that they are delaying the baptism until I get back (Nestor being one of the 30% or so Christians – the rest of my team are Muslims.  They all get on really well, for example if one of the Christians is on call during Christmas, one of the Muslims will work for him and vice versa for Ramadan).

I have now just got back from Valencia, Edinburgh and Whitby/Robin Hood’s Bay (in reverse order), trying for once to make an effort to get out and about on my two weeks R&R.  However my personal computer managed to break down right as I was uploading all of those photos, much to my disgust, and so I'm finishing this on my work one.  Not happy.

The routine...

I'm sitting in a hotel in Paris, not far from Montmarte and Sacre Coeur, thinking that I should finally write a little bit about my routine.  I found myself telling someone the other day that my life was rather mundane, same old same old.... to which the person raised their eyebrows.  The guy selling tickets in the train station asked me this morning if I was a war correspondant!  So I guess, even though I have got into a bit of a routine, life's still not exactly boring.

I'm now doing my 8th trip into Guinea in what has been nearly a year.  Normally I have a few drinks with friends in Mossley on the Saturday night, then get up early on Sunday and get a lift to the Manchester airport. Cruise through to the lounge with maximum efficiency, hop on the plane, get off in Paris, cruise through to the next lounge, say hi to the other people heading back in (there's always someone I know) then sit back and relax for about 6 hours.  Some people complain about Air France; personnally I have a great time.  People come with drinks, then food, then more drinks... I watch a French movie with a nice glass of cognac while trying to remember how to speak the language, all most relaxing.

At Conakry I step off into the wave of humid heat and lap it up.  It's just like home (Brisbane I mean, not Mossley obviously!).  I get my bag (hopefully!), say hi to the Rio Tinto greeter and we all get on the bus to the hotel, before going off to work the next day.  (There will be a few changes now that the Air France schedule has changed a bit, but nothing much).

On the way home it's the trip to the airport, a glass of baileys in the lounge (free), onto the plane, try to stay awake for the food then fast asleep overnight until Paris.  Then it's the reverse, into the lounge at Paris, try and find that week's Economist, grab a perrier, sit down, get up, go get the plane to Manchester, fall sound asleep again, off the plane, go through the non-EU passport line all by myself (yay), grab my bag (hopefully!) and catch the three trains home, trying to avoid the junk food options at Manchester Piccadilly train station.

Back in Mossley I check my mail, avoid doing housework, go for a few walks in the hills, spend a few afternoons in the pub, do never as many things as I planned, head into Manchester for a day's shopping to stock up on creams and other things from Boots, have my hair cut, pick up a few other necessities and go to my favourite restaurant for lunch... before doing it all over again!

Conakry

Day out on Roume

As predicted, I ended up staying a full 5 weeks in Conakry, which is the longest I’d ever stayed there. Normally I come in on the plane from Paris, go to the hotel late that night then head to the office and from there back to the airport to go out to Canga. So apart from the time in 2009 when I came in as a consultant to look at the electricity situation here (the same thing that I did this time) and once when there was a problem with the plane, I’d never spent more than a night here.

Fairly upmarket local restaurant

So this has been really interesting. Now at least I understand French better, and more particularly the Guinean accent, so I can get along quite well on the street by myself. I’ve now been out to the famous MLS nightclub (it was actually pretty good), several restaurants, got out to the islands and even right out of Conakry.

I’ve definitely been living in England for too long, because these villas seemed absolutely HUGE to me, but when I thought about it, they weren’t that different to many houses in Australia.)



President Alpha Condé's house

I managed to have a few days off, and so one colleague who was up at Canga for the week very kindly lent me his house (with its pool). That was lovely and relaxing. I went to a few local places for lunch and dinner – eg 10,000 Guinean francs (€1) for a plate of gras riz (fat rice - go figure...) with fish or some local chicken (the very much not battery farmed variety, ie scrawny with masses of taste) and spent plenty of time in the pool of course.



I also managed to sneak in a photo of the house next door.... where the president of the republic of Guinea just happens to live! He hasn’t moved into the Presidential Palace yet. Needless to say getting down the street meant talking nicely to the military guards. The Rio Tinto villas themselves all have 24 hour guards as well.

Intercon security guard at a colleague's villa, happy to pose

Then it was back to the hotel to try and arrange the logistics to get me to the islands for the weekend – less relaxing. Because this isn’t the best regulated traffic in the world, Rio Tinto has a rule that expats may not drive themselves but must only travel in a Rio car with a Rio driver. All very well and good if you know the trick to always have a Rio car and a Rio driver at your fingertips. I haven’t worked that one out yet – for me it consists of begging the resident employees for their personal drivers.



Ile de Kassa



In the end however I managed it and took a small boat (pirogue) out to the islands. My second trip – I’d gone out for a day trip my first weekend. This time however I went to a different island, Kassa, and stayed overnight in a nice little chalet. Lots of swimming, reading, eating, sleeping... you get the idea.

Unfortunately I didn’t take many photos in Conakry. During the military junta government it could be a bit dicey, especially if you accidentally captured a red beret in your photo, so I’ve never got into the habit of taking a camera around. I did take lots of photos of power stations, including the hydro stations some 300 km out of Conakry that I got to visit on a little adventure (with a night’s stopover in the best hotel in Conakry, the hotel in Kindia owned by the family of my boss who were absolutely lovely) which I think won’t be of great interest to most people.



Residents of the Matoto substation



Still, I did particularly like the goats amongst the transformers in the switchyard at Matoto....



Skiing.... finally

So, this year has started off a little bit differently. I was sitting at home feeling sick and sorry for myself after a 4 week stint at Canga (ok, that bit wasn’t so different) over xmas. But then it was off to snow, finally! After 4 years in Europe I was at last getting to the Alps for some decent skiing action. One of the aussie guys at Canga had mentioned one night down at the bar (might have been New Year’s Eve, I can’t remember) that he was going skiing for 2 weeks in his break and I just said maaaaate. I’ll be there.

He’d picked Les 3 Vallées, purportedly the largest ski area in the world, and of the three valleys, a town called Méribel. Possibly (ok definitely) not the cheapest location, but then hey if I’m only going to be going skiing once every 4 years I probably don’t need to worry about that. So the last few days at Canga I managed to book a flight and a few days later in Mossley I booked myself a hotel. And a few days after that I was on the plane (as you will see this constitutes considerable forward planning for me so far for 2011).

I’d almost forgotten how much I love to ski. Turns out I also quite like to party. There was an amazing place called La Folie Douce (roughly translated as the sweet madness) which turned into something of a rave party in the middle of a run – people were dancing on the table in their ski boots and that is no mean feat let me tell you. I can barely walk in the things. Unfortunately we got into it just a little bit too much and ended up missing the last ski lift home, necessitating a rather long and painfully expensive bus journey back to our own valley.

The snow wasn’t fantastic the first few days, but it wasn’t that bad either. Then there was a nice little snow storm on the Wednesday and so Thursday and Friday were perfect, at least snow wise. I discovered that my £50 gloves just really didn’t cut it at -19 degrees which meant that I’d flying down the snow and have to stop to warm my hands up before my fingers snapped off.

Still, all in all a great trip. My only injury turned out to be fondue burn (bit embarrassing – I tried to eat the meat off the fork that had just come out of the burning oil). The food was great, the people were nice, everything to make me want to go back as soon as possible.

Saturday afternoon I was on the train home from the airport when I received a call from our travel administrator... my flight the next morning had been cancelled. Huh? I said. Cancelled. Huh?

Turned out there was a little bit of a fuss in at Canga (I’d say that I miss all the fun, but that wouldn’t be true – in fact it would be a rare fortnight without something extraordinary happening, although this was a bit more even so) and so most people had been evacuated. Some of the local people were upset that there weren’t enough jobs on offer, and our catering and housekeeping staff went out on strike in sympathy (something like that anyway, I never did quite get to the bottom of the story). As a result, the hotels in Conakry were chockers with the people who had been evacuated and so everyone who was due to have come in country that week had been delayed.

Hmm, ok, no problem I thought, settling in to a bottle or 3 of wine with my friend next door, another week’s break - I can deal with that. Except that a few hours later I received a text saying no, actually my flight was reinstated, they needed me in Conakry. So there I was at about 11pm flinging ski clothes out of my suitcase and hunting down clothes suitable for 30 degrees in the humidity after way too much red wine! I ended up packing two pairs of togs (got the essentials ok) and not enough shirts or shampoo because as it turned out I am now staying 5 weeks in Conakry instead of the few days I first thought.

More to come...