My Project

So, now that I've been here a week and a half, I can give you all a little bit more information about my project, or maybe I should say projects. . . . . Marcelo (my partner from Brazil) and I are working with the APPD (IND) which in English means File/Archive, Library, and Data Processing Unit.  Our goal is/was to develop a high-level strategic plan for the office incorporating advice and options on how to better align their enterprise IT and data management systems.  I must say, we've come a long way in the time we've been here.  There have been many challenges including understanding the project, setting the scope for what is obtainable in one month, working through language barriers, working with a translator (not as easy as one might think), and learning about the culture, values, and beliefs of the citizens of Makassar.

On Monday, we presented our high-level preliminary report of what we have learned so far and how we think we can help.  We ended up giving them some initial recommendations of short, mid, and long-term strategies for each of the three departments in the unit/organization.  We are spending this week identifying tools they can use and hopefully will be making some kind of training for them to deliver next week.  What is frustrating is that there just isn't enough time to do everything we'd like to implement.  We will leave them with mid and long-term recommendations to implement in the next six months to three years.  However, even with the short-term recommendations, we will only be able to implement one or two of them, but hopefully they will be ones with the greatest impact and they can try to do the rest on their own.

Marcelo and I are working great together!  It is interesting in that I'm not only learning about Indonesia, but Brazil too!

Discussing priorities

Marcelo and Jess

English Class

So, last Friday (March 16), I did my first "English Lesson" with a group of people from the office.  We did spend the morning working, but did do language lessons in the afternoon.  I tried to teach them English while they tried to teach me Indonesian!  We called it sharing.  For my first lesson, I focused on pronunciation.  It got me thinking about how I actually form letter with my mouth, lips, and tongue - something that I don't think about very often.  But, some of the sounds we use in English are not used in other languages, so they are hard to make if you haven't used them your whole life.  Our translator said I should change my career and become an English teacher!

English Class Part 1













Small but fun class!







#ibmcsc

End of Week 1

I have been very delinquent in updating my blog these past few days.  Actually, there has not been much free time and when I've had a few minutes, I was trying to catch my family on Skype.  So, let me bring you up to date.

Thursday - March 15
We spent more time interviewing some of the staff at the Government Office (our client).  Even with a translator, the language barrier is there, but we are making some progress each day.  When leaving for lunch, we saw the security team practicing outside of the building.

 

Thursday night the team went to dinner and then some went to karaoke!  It is quite different from what I am used to in the US.  In the US, karaoke is usually set up in a restaurant or bar by someone who owns equipment.  Then, all guests are able to sing on one system.  Sometimes people don't get to sing as often as they want to, but the whole crowd gets to hear every song.  In Indonesia and the place where we went, you rented a small private room with its own couch, television, and karaoke system.  This was a super fun time and I expect we will do this again at some point!  It was interesting that some people knew about karaoke, some didn't, and some people hadn't listened to music much before.  I am learning a lot from my team members about their own countries, cultures, values, and beliefs.  It is really cool!

Can anybody guess what I'm singing?

This is a great team!

#ibmcsc

Makassar Libraries

Today, Marcelo and I visited two very different libraries - both very different.  The first one was attached to a kindergarten (on the other side of the wall) and the Moms were starting to pick up kids when we were getting ready to leave.  They were very nice and fun to chat with.  Their English is WAY better than my Indonesian!  I really appreciate them trying to speak it.  Hopefully they appreciate my attempt at their language.  They loved seeing pictures of my son and husband.

The second library was larger, had more books and had some sort of software they used to list all of the books in the library.

We spend a lot of time this afternoon evaluating everything we've learned from the three departments: File/Archives, Library, and Data Processing.  We have more questions to better understand the current environment and processes, but are making progress. Hopefully by the end of the week, we will know which areas we can help and what the priorities are.

Tonight, it was Nitu's (a member of my 10-person team) birthday.  She is from India.  We threw her a surprise birthday party which was super fun!

In addition to all of our projects, we are trying to do some sight-seeing on the weekends.  It is hard to determine what we should do as there are so many things and we are only here for a limited time.  Maybe I will need to come back sometime. . . . . . I know I will not be able to do everything I would like to do.  This is tough for me!

#ibmcsc

At Client Site - Day 1

Today, our clients picked us up for work and we were able to see many things with them today.  My project is within the City of Makassar Archives, Library, and Data Processing Department.  We (my partner and me) are trying to understand how they operate, opportunities that may exist for improvement, and the day-to-day operations.  Many things are different from what I am used to.

The people of Makassar are very friendly and kind!  I wish I knew the language of Indonesia a little bit better so I can understand more of what everyone is saying.  Give me a month and see how I progress though!  One of the things they asked us to do today was to put on a short educational session on English every week - and they will teach me Indonesian in there too!  It was really cool to see their work environment.  In some places there were children with (I assume) parents at work.  This of course makes me miss my son.

Picture in the File department

We were able to see the data processing office, the employee library area (which distributes books to the 14 district libraries of Makassar), the filing office, and the storage areas.  They have documents in books that date back to before Indonesia was it's own country.

Map of the city

#ibmcsc

Meeting the clients

The entire team started today at the Mayor's office in the City Hall/Government Building.  There were presentations and an official announcement about our team being there (press, cameras, etc.).

Today, my partner, Marcelo (white shirt and tie on the very left), and I met our clients - the City of Makassar Archives Library and Data Processing.  They are excited for us to help them.  I'm hoping we can better understand their needs and opportunities tomorrow or later this week so we know how we can contribute.

After the client meeting, we stopped at a place over by the "beach" (not so much a beach, but the coast) and had some drinks.  Note: drinks usually consist of coffee, tea, or juices.

We went for a walk around the hotel area tonight and ate at a great fish restaurant!  They had the fish on ice in coolers as you walked into the entry way.

#ibmcsc

Travel #2, Meet Team, Arrive in Makassar

I've got some catching up to do here and was WAY too tired to do it last night.  Travel day #2 (or 3 depending depending on timezones) went good.  I left Seoul, Korea on Saturday for an 8ish hour flight to Jakarta.  Got to my hotel (Hotel Indonesia Kempinski) at about 10:00 p.m.  Very nice hotel - wish I could have enjoyed it more instead of leaving at 7:30 a.m. the next morning.  However, I was able to meet a few of my team members that night.  Tom (whom I met in Chicago) and I hadn't eaten yet and found a great German restaurant/bar place, Paulaner Brauhaus.  They had a band too!  It would have been fun to stay there for a few hours, but we needed some sleep.  I slept amazing although could have used a few more hours.

I got up the next morning (Sunday) and enjoyed an AMAZING breakfast buffet.  Here is my fruit plate!

Sunday morning was the first time I was able to meet all of my team.  There are 10 of us from six different countries.  Here is a picture of almost all of us plus some Australian Business Volunteers reps.

Most of team in Jakarta

Then, we were off to the airport again to arrive at Makassar on the island of Sulawesi.  That short 2-hour flight was over before I knew it (compared to the 15+ and 8 hour ones).

An interesting thing happened to me at baggage claim. . . . a girl (maybe 14 or 15 years old) came over to me with a camera and motioned that she wanted a picture with me.  Once I figured out what she wanted and said yes, her other girlfriends started cheering (maybe 4 of them).  I was told things like this could happen.

Then, in the line for the bathroom a little girl maybe 4 years old was pointing at me and having her mom look at me.  I just smiled at them.  I received several other looks/stares and am getting used to it.  Speaking of bathrooms, I've never seen nor experienced so many different types of bathrooms/toilets as I have in the past 3 days!  Everything from the fanciest toilet I've ever seen with everything automatic and lots of buttons to ones that remind me of an outhouse.  I hope I don't run out of hand sanitizer!

We got settled into our hotel in Makassar then went out to browse the mall that is close by and to grab a bite to eat.  Yes, more stares at the mall - that is going to be normal.

#ibmcsc