Bryan said Yes! :-) ;-) ;-D

Saturday 7 Sep

Since my last update, there had been a blur of meetings upon meetings, most of them productive, but some of them, quite honestly, I could have done without!

End of week 3, I still have not managed to draw up financial statements for the first 10 / 11 months of the current accounting year ended 30 September 2013 as yet L … BUT, an awful lot of good work has been and still is being done!

No org chart – too political a hot potato. However, all the major tasks have been streamlined, joined up and procedures written as we go along. The beginning of collaboration may have just been born in Haiti, well, at least, in a music school in Jacmel!

The principal trustee, who, in his own words, recognises that he is not IT literate. However, he said that if I recommend networking the current disparate IT hardware (at a cost of 450USD for materials and labour will be provided free by a local IT specialist) to enable collaboration, then he accepts this expenditure!

I am very pleased with the work that everyone puts in in the last 3 weeks. We have come a very long way in such a short time! I am spent, knackered but happy!

It is now Saturday lunchtime and I will sign off from work till Monday morning. Not totally however, Bryan, an ex AfID volunteer is currently based in Haiti (4 – 5 hours drive from Jacmel) for another organisation, is coming to Jacmel to meet up with me.

Before I came out to Haiti, AfID told me of Bryan’s presence here. I got in touch with Bryan and asked him to come to the school and do a recce mission for me. This, he duly did and gave me feedback. This enabled me to do most, if not all, of the required prep. Which means that once I got here, I had been able to hit the ground … sprinting!

Anyway, back to my reason for mentioning Bryan here. The poor man does not know that he is going to be asked (by me !) to do a whole lot more for the school… I think that it needs close monitoring / coaching for another 6 months or so… I am going to ask Bryan if he would be prepared to give up some of his little enough spare time to come and help the school, maybe, once a month! Watch the space. I hope that the man from Del Monte will say … “Yes!”