Recap On Nigeria

I am sitting in the Dark here in the Niger Delta. No ÒLights,Ó which is a typical occurrence out here. The rain is pouring down and the lightning and thunder are exploding right outside my window. It is hard to put into words, but the natural forces out here seem so powerful and intense on every levelÉ I LOVE IT!

Let me give a recap of what we have been up to here in Nigeria for any friends or family members interested/ concerned. I am sorry that I have been pretty MIA lately. All or good reason thoughÉ things have been very busy and very interesting latelyÉ with lots of progress to show for it.

So, basically here is the recap. I came out here in Dec 2009, because I had met the Gov of Bayelsa State in the Niger Delta and he wanted to sponsor some community development projects in his state. After two months of reconnaissance and project preparation, things in the state government got real rocky as a reflection of the instabilities at the national level. Long story short, these extreme distractions prohibited the state government from taking community development seriously and we were not getting the attention that we had when we commenced. Then I went home and regrouped for a month. I had so much invested out here that I had to give it al one last shot before I threw in the towel on this one, knowing full well that I may come home empty handedÉ but as Jess will tell you, I never REALLY come home empty handed, whether meant to be or not. So, I got out here and again, the initial reception was extremely positive and gave me optimism that the projects would come to pass. Then things really started falling apart down here. The EFCC, an international organization that investigates government corruptions and embezzlement of government funds, showed up to in town and started investigating the place and I knew that nothing on my side would ever happen. During this process, one night while I was playing wii (yeah, super random right?, never played it in my life and I am out here playing wii one night with an Olympic gold medalist, not in wii though) I meet this very nice Canadian lady. Super rad, she had tons of experience and contact out here. I tell her what I am all about and she is like, Òwell I know this person and this personÉetc.Ó So a couple days later Nelson and I jump on a plane to Abuja, the capitol of Nigeria where we start to meet as many people as we can. We had a bunch of meetings with the World Bank, various Embassies and other stakeholders in the Niger Delta. Then one day when we are at the market, we meet this lady who runs a television program that airs on a Nigerian Station. She is very cool and is like mega connected. So she starts making introductions and we keep meeting with more and more influential people. After about a week, after meeting with professional soccer players, Senators, World Bank Officials and Embassies and being highlighted on said television show, we decided that mission was highly accomplished and that it was time to wrap things up in Bayelsa and start the decent of our trip. What had we accomplished in this process? We were able to establish and extremely well funded and influential support network who we will be able to work with for the rest of SCHAP in our sourcing for funding for projects we will be carrying out all over the world.

Once we got back to Bayelsa we still managed to keep ourselves pretty busy. We have been able to connect to two different World Bank Organizations who operate here in Bayelsa. We have picked their brains specifically about projects here as well as what it would take to collaborate. We have learned SO MUCH its nuts. So stoked and excited about the progress that we have made and how it has helped me to feel more mature and equipped and capable in my position within the organization. All the while, we try to spend as much time as possible in communities in order to carry out my informal research.

That is pretty much the story. Nelson will be heading back to Utah in a couple days and I will be heading out to Uganda and Kenya for a couple weeks in order to take care of a couple things and run some very important preparation activities with the Matoso in order to prepare for out Aug trip. Should be a good couple weeks. In order to get over to Uganda from Nigeria I have to have an overnight layover in EthiopiaÉ so I will be forced to spend a day exploring a new African city/ country. Kinda stoked about that: Addis Ababa. That will be my 8th African country! Starting to figure out the Dark Continent. Life is good. Got to keep things interesting. Despite how busy things get I try to never loose sight of the reasons that I am here. Every time I go to a community, it is SO easy for me to see all the things that could be done in order to massively increase the quality of life and create opportunities of serious progress and development for my brothers and sister out here. I love it out here. I love the landscapes and the people. I will miss this place hard core, but it is time to move on for nowÉ but looking forward to being able to get back here as soon as possible. Just donÕt tell my organization, I told them I will try to stay around for a couple months this time so that we can keep cranking out progress on our domestic operation.

Hope you find this interesting. All is well. I send my love and all that good stuff.