Sylvia's Journal

Operation ‘steel belt’ was in place today which meant that cars coming in and out of Kabul are being searched thoroughly, all through the day. The resulting traffic jam kept both good and bad people who were in the know at home or at their offices. Those who did not know had bad luck and spent hours in their cars. My planned visit to the ministry was wisely cancelled.

This worked out OK since we had to finish the workplan down to the nitty gritty detail, neither my, nor Steve’s forte. We soldiered on, as had Alain in Boston, pulling an allnighter to get us his feedback in time. The product was delivered on time to our funder, in spite of the traffic jam. It was accepted and immediately followed by a request for 16 separate provincial work plans. Somehow the database did not capture that distinction and so we are back to another round of workplanning.

I had excused myself from the meeting across town (and thus avoiding hours in the car) to meet with our donor, a weekly event that is attended by our senior leadership, a category I now belong to. Instead I met with one of my teams, an event I could not miss since no one else would have been there to ask the difficult questions and provide feedback, starting the long and painful process of changing the rules of engagement. As the new boss of the team’s boss I suddenly have the kind of formal power and authority I have never had before. I kind of like it. Is this the initial seductive taste of power?

After a first polite but edgy exchange around the quality of the work product that will be showcased on Sunday to all the program managers, we engaged in a sort of dance, with both parties trying to be elegant and not step on toes while getting strong messages across. I had expected some defensive routines and they were there, but slowly, as the minutes passed, I noticed a subtle change from defensiveness to surrender, all of it packaged in light joking remarks. At the end the work product was slightly better, not as good as I would have wanted, but better and more focused, and the mood collegial.

I am getting my own office, with a door and a table, and hopefully some bookshelves to house the books that were sent ahead of me. Our office compound is lovely with the green grass, the roses and grapes, thousands of them.

We had hoped to go out for dinner to the restaurant with the nicely clipped marihuana hedge to celebrate the delivery of the work plan but the steel belt around Kabul was still there, evidenced by big blue flashing lights. We postponed our dinner till tomorrow.