Tuesday, July 25, 2006

London


I'm in London for another night. Tomorrow early morning I am off to Nairobi. I am really looking forward to it.

I had forgotten how small and crowded Europe is! People everywhere...houses against each others all the way (mind you considering I leave in a town house I shouldn't really say anything), red bricks everywhere....
It is a good reminder of why Europe in nice to visit but not the place where I want to live.

I spend the last 4 days..or is it 5 days?...wandering around buying what I need to go to Kenya and eating good food in very diverse restaurants..Since I have been here the best has clearly been the Greek restaurant down the street from where I am staying....It made me think that I really should go to Crete one day...it was that good! And of course the East Indian restaurants in London are fabulous....I really should go to India one day, but if I find Europe too busy I can't start to imagine how India will compare on that level.

I am hoping to rent a car in Nairobi and take off to the Rift area on my first couple of days in Nairobi..I don't know yet...I will be a bit short in time...I haven't heard a thing from the rig and really it is too early to tell when I will need to get back but my ticket back is booked for the very day I am supposed to go back to Algeria...I could have done with 9 weeks off this time...and yes I know that I did write that it would be too much.
I'll try to write something from Nairobi...but right now photos are not easy to upload...I'll add the photos when I get a chance.

Wednesday, July 19, 2006

This time I have the tickets

OK, this time I have it sorted out.

I am going to Nairobi on August 26th and getting back to London August 17th...a shorter trip than I had hoped.
After this I will try to go home briefly..So if I make it home it will be August 18th, August 19th type of timing.

Things here stayed exciting until the end and we nearly burnt the rig down two days ago...Even just a small fire, since it stayed small, was quite exciting. I good test on who you can count on in time of emergency!
I am leaving from the site and from Algeria tomorrow morning (august 20th)!

Sunday, July 16, 2006

I think I know

Ok, I AM flying to London on the 20th ...unless something major unrelated to work happens..
Then off to Nairobi on the 26th...or 25th I can't remember the date on my ticket...

I tell you I am tired...when you get to the point when you can sort of relax it has a way of catching up to you.

Friday, July 14, 2006

watching the end

This is it, the well is drilled!
Now logging...probably three or four days, then report writing and packing, another 3 days.
I have a plane ticket for July 20th to London, and a plane ticket on July 25th to Nairobi.

I am feeling really tired right now....I am not sure why.

I stood on the floor while we drilled the last half hour of the well. When I started this job I always use to go to the floor for the end of the well, but it had been years and years since I had done it. This well has been too much trouble and I wanted to see it done.

I know that once I sleep a couple of night in London I will be better but right now I even feel too tired to feel like going to Kenya. I feel too tired to sit in a plane for hours.
Going from the desert to down town London is going to be tough I know. It is always such a weird feeling to get back to so called civilization. The hardest is to have all those people moving in all directions around you. There is always a sense that you should keep track of the motion around you. It doesn't last very long.

Thursday, July 13, 2006

plan revision number one

So the plan did not last even 24 hours...and I have even started traveling yet.

I asked the guy I work for how much time off he thought I would have and he said "4 weeks"...right there you can see the problem.....Hmmmm!!!
If I leave the 20th and cannot start volunteering until the 1st...I can only volunteer for two weeks and even then I cannot go home afterward. I even have to hurry to get back to Algeria!
Now of course it is just his prediction.

I'm going to ask the drilling supervisor in Hassi what he thinks.

the plan.... for what it is worth


So right now it looks like I will;
-fly to London on the 20th of July.
-fly to Nairobi on the 26th on July
-"play" in Nairobi until August 1srt
-start volunteering in a school in Maasailand (southern Kenya)
-end the volunteering work either two or three weeks later depending on time
-travel some more around Kenya...again depending on time
-fly to London on August 18th to 28th (it becomes harder to predict as time goes on)
-fly home IF I have anytime left at all.

If I didn't know any better I would actually believe that there is a firm plan!!!

It will be interesting to see what actually happens!

Wednesday, July 12, 2006

I have the proof

sometimes I actually go on holidays!!! Yes, yes, I do...see I can prove it!
This is taken about three miles from the land I own in California...Jeeze I should really go there and build a shack on it. It would be such a great holiday spot.

I'm nearly done


I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. I can see the end of this well, I think..Amazing..It is half relief and half apprehension of letting go, having to write the end of well report etc...

I tell you it is time to go though. The human rapport has gone to shits. I came within seconds of making one huge tactical mistake and I was not able to fully recuperate from it. The rest is just being tired of the small bullshit that never ends and noticing what people normally say but not quite being able to ignore it.

Right now I am pulling through trying to plow my way through things like this...actual quotes of what people are telling me:
"I wish you would die now and die slowly so you really suffer" from the guy in charge of security..always a good feeling! At least I am clear on the fact that if I need security to step in they will take their time to make sure they don't get there too early.

"That guy is not kidding he really can't stand you"
Talking about the guy in charge of security and said at the lunch table in front of everybody..just so everybody knows that security is not on my side...not done on purpose in this case..

"He doesn't hate you, he just feels sorry for you"
About the same guy...it just gets better and better, that's from somebody who is supposed to be on my side! because I guess I am suppose to prefer people feeling sorry for me.

"I've already call the people you are in charged of, but do it again if you want you are the boss"
Who else but the company man who thinks that he is a great leader and says to everybody that they are the boss after he's told them what to do on a subject that has nothing to do with him at all?...He is so condescending that he thinks we buy the "you are the boss" line!!! Obviously we are just to dump to see that we are being bossed around when somebody talks to us that way!

"You are going to finish either with the bottle or with the gun"
Guess who? but the security guy...a real winner!! ..at least when he said "with the gun" he made the motion of somebody shooting themselves and not the motion of shooting me...Of course the gun is really not my style but how would he know...Oh I forget he knows everything there is to know about me.....he knows me better than I know myself now that he has talked to me half a dozen times....Another world leader, a great people person!

"You will not be able to stay the full three weeks in Kenya, you will run away screaming"
One of the French guy, racist as they come who think that the fact that people are black in Kenya is going to be a shock to me..everybody knows me better than I know myself on this location...those people are so smart and I am such a simple creature.

"You are going to hate Kenya, why don't you do something else"
Another french guy just as racist, just as sure that I really would rather hang around white people...I am telling you those people know me better than I know myself but somehow they don't seem to be able to get the idea that thir racism is their problem.

"All canadians are political morons" from somebody who knows probably a grand total of 20 canadians! Though he does admit that he knows one politcally smart Canadian.

"You are so naive" I hear mostly from the security and company men....God knows I think all people are kind and can be trusted..and I would never think that humans are the most discusting creatures on the planet....I am just so naive that I don't even think they are a bunch of stupid ass holes!!! (If you don't pick up sarcasm here...............). This usually comes after I make a statement on, for example, how bad corruption is and instead of hearing my statement they hear that I am naive about it...I get answers in the style of "wake up, of course corruption is bad, how can you be so naive?!?" Well I was saying that it was bad, wasn't I? *shrug*

"It would do you good to get roughed up a little" because it is a well known fact that being attacked several times while at work abroad is just not enough, being harrassed all the time also at work is also not enough so really somebody should beat me up every now and then. It builds character, and physical violence is the answer to all problems, right?!?!

etc etc etc...of course they are "just kidding", they "mean well"! It is like when people start a sentence with "don't take it badly" or "I don't mean it badly..." you know what comes next is going to be real shitty.

It reminds me of the end of the Kazakhstan job when the guy attacked me on the rig and the new owner of the oil company refused to send me a car to go back to town to the airport....the same warm feeling of caring...Oh I am so naive...I have never gone though adversity!!!
I must be doing something wrong! I must be doing something very wrong! Either this or I am terminally insane.
Probably both!!!

Saturday, July 08, 2006

pumpkin stew and safety "concerns"


Just as things were settling in and our safety people were starting to get use to the all thing (those on my rig are new) we just had a small incident that will change all this.
Apparently a all pile of licence plates and a reserve of fuel were found suggesting that some people were getting set up to steal cars (read carjack people) and take them south -the cars not the people- to Niger for resale.
Last night there was a car chase involving three unknown cars and a car full of our guards..the guards rolled their car...nobody was badly hurt.
So we are back to "no traveling at night unless absolutely needed" etc etc. Before people star freaking out here I should say that we do not know if they intend to steal OUR cars or use our roads to travel with cars stolen somewhere else...Sorry I am not the person with the exciting blog, the exciting blog is somebody else!

Anyway...I am going to a BBQ tonight...the second one this week, and that's the extent of the excitement in my life!!

I guess I will just have to be back before dark...before I turn into a pumpkin...would it not be funny if we got carjacked and the car turned into a pumpkin...I am not sure how much pumpkins are worth in Niger, but I should imagine not very much!!!

Which makes me think of the delicious pumpkin stew we had for breakfast in Trinidad sometimes...This time of day...I am getting hungry.

Saturday, July 01, 2006

the caravan passes

You may know the saying:

"the dogs bark, the caravan passes"


Depending on the moment I feel either like the dog or like the caravan...mostly like the dog though!