Week 1 Thoughts

Found this piece I scribbled a month ago (already?!)

Reflections

Day 1 was amazing. You know how I really like orientations and questions and just positioning myself within where I’m going to be in the period to come. New place; new faces; new mission. We were introduced to the team, whom I felt I already knew just from the countless videos, lectures and articles I’d read before. Gregor… well he’s a busy man. I was very excited to be here with Amazon Watch and be part of what’s going on.

Day 2 was even better! We sat in for a staff-call, and got to match voices to faces. I like how it is a ‘humanized’ team as Andrew put it; people share personal things, sickness and baby woes; Amazon Watch is small enough for there to be such an atmosphere about it.

Day 3: A lot of action! I felt so pumped. Mitch and Han were arrested, and Pizango decided to go to Lima in the end. Currently waiting on Pizango news still! Another arrest for the day, maybe? I thought of some things today: how work can be so meaningful when every single thing you do (some things fail of course) goes towards a very real end. Where does advocacy fall between being idealistic and not? Mitch gets arrested: is it just a one-off event for which he was arrested and therefore not worth it, or is it in the grander scheme of things a worth investment?

I also finally spoke with Paulina today. I think I like her! She speaks to me in Spanish, which of course I appreciated because not many are willing to do that sort of thing. Got an idea for a work plan now, which is helpful and in a sense not, because now that I have a task I feel more attracted to other themes, cachai? Its going to be investigaciones duras, school-like but very much within my interests. Well, just that I’ll never be able to work with the IDB. But maybe it’s better this way, being on the outside and criticizing the IDB (or any other large entity for that matter) for improvements could be much more valuable, less of a trap, more liberating, and real.

One thing that I’m tired of doing is refreshing my email (both) and facebook and craigslist every ten minutes. Chui. But I can’t help it.

Late Day 3: Happy Hour and chat with Aliyah! We ended the conversation slightly overly-enthusiastic and excited and in love with Amazon Watch, maybe. It was excellent though. And I am still full of praises for this organization.

Day 4:
Great that the IDB and other institutions have begun to take public consultation more seriously. They’re still top-down development institutions, and it’ll be hard to change this fact, but it is positive progress that they are beginning to take into greater account the real voices of the people they are trying to help. “Part of the Bank’s effort to become a more effective and transparent development institution.”