Aaaaaargh

Well, yesterday's question of who was right remains unresolved as today the agency wasn't even able to get my application INTO the embassy at all! Without the required form they wouldn't take it in with their other applications afraid that it might damage their reputation with the embassy. Instead, they sent a courier to go stand in the regular queue for mere mortals. The same 25 metre long queue that was my reason for asking them to do it for me in the first place indeed. I don't know if I should be reassured by the fact that evidently I am not the only one stuck on the wrong side of the iron gate or not but the result is that I still do not have a visa. We'll give it one more try on Monday but if that doesn't work the whole trip is off. Again. To be continued...

Catch 22

After all of the delays, postponements and cancellations last year it is still a bit hard to believe but, if all goes well, by this time next week I will be in Russia. If all goes well, I will at last be walking the streets of Moscow. If all goes well...

"Why so gloomy", you ask? That would be because so far nothing about this has been straightforward. Of course there was all of last year's trouble. Then this year things again got pushed back from April to May to June. However, in the last couple of weeks the project finally picked up some momentum. Dates were fixed for the second week of June. Enthusiastically I set about getting everything sorted and armed with my paperwork I showed up at the Russian embassy. Unfortunately I wasn't the only one with that idea. The queue covered a good 25 metres of the pavement and at 12:00 the iron gates shut mercilessly. Luckily the university recruits an agency that, for a fee, takes over this tedious process sparing me second trip.

This morning I came into the office fully expecting to be all sorted by the end of the day. I ordered my tickets and a courier to get my documents to the visa handling agency. So far, so good. And then the call from Russia comes... apparently my trip would have coincided with a public holiday shutting down office life for a week. Oops. The big shock, however, was that instead of pushing the dates back, this time they were pushed forward! A quick call learned that the flights had not yet been confirmed so we could still move those. Of course the visa application form had to be revised though. An hour later we were back on track. And then the call from the agency comes... one of my forms is not correct and they need an official letter from the Ministry confirming my invitation. The problem there is, the letter does not exist. The confirmation was given over the phone and there is nothing in writing. The agency is certain the Russians will not approve my application without it, my host organisation is equally certain there will be no problem. I will find out who is right tomorrow.

So by this time next week I should be in Russia. If all goes well...

The coping cycle

Phase I: DENIAL

No, it cannot be... not so soon already? But didn't I only just graduate? Surely this cannot be right. Somebody has made a mistake, it has to be. Check those dates again!

Phase II: ANGER

No mistake, you say? Well, now that just isn't fair. What did I do to deserve this? I'd like to have a word or two with whoever decided that! It is just totally unacceptable.

Phase III: BARGAINING

But can't I stay 29 just one more year? Six months? I promise I will seize every day of it. Come on now... please?

Phase IV: DEPRESSION

That's it then. It's all downhill from here on now. I can see the wrinkles already. Go away, leave me alone.

Phase V: ACCEPTANCE

Not that bad, you say? Honestly, you promise? Well, in that case:

Birthday Party 2008

After all, a girl only turns 29 twice, right?

The final one

It already feels such a long time ago that I reinvented myself by enrolling in business school. I submitted my thesis eight months ago and have had my results for quite some time as well. The only thing I hadn't done yet was graduate. However, as of today, I am officially an alumna of 3 different universities, all vying for my donations and my loyalty (but mostly my donations).

Each of my graduations has been unique in some way. The MSc chemistry was fun for its small scale and personal touch. The PhD...well, that's just such a special day the way we do it in the Netherlands, nothing can top that. And now this one: the most pompous of them all. Never before have I shared my graduation with several hundreds of people. Never before have I had an orchestra present. Never before have I had a little old tailor help me into my never-before worn robes.


The black robes and the purple hood in the back (which you can't see very well in this picture) are the official colours for MSc degrees at Imperial College. The pink V-shaped bit in front is characteristic of the business school. It all looks and feels very Harry Potteresque, minus the wand.

The day was good fun even though the actual ceremony gets very tedious after the first two hundred graduants or so. At least I got to walk across that stage of the Royal Albert Hall, had my name horribly mangled by the announcer and stood attention to God Save the Queen. But that's it. I have done this in all forms and varieties now. There is nothing more to try. Besides, I'll need to start making a lot more money before I can afford to become alumna of any more institutions!

Graduation 17 May 2008

The art of conflict resolution

The year 1978 marked an important turning point in the field of public health. No, the fact that it also happens to be the year I was born has nothing to do with that. While my mum was changing my nappies back in Holland, somewhere in the former USSR some of the world's public health leaders were gathered at a major international conference to produce what was to be known as the "Alma Ata Declaration". In a nutshell, this declaration urged all governments to work towards "health for all" by setting up and strengthening systems of primary health care.

Now why am I telling you all this? The fact is that ever since then a debate has been going on between proponents of this primary care based strategy and people who believe in the strength of so-called vertical approaches. To understand what is meant by that, picture for instance a dedicated polio immunization campaign or a malaria eradication programme. Such approaches are dedicated to only one purpose; they have their own health care workers, their own funding, their own priorities. There are some obvious advantages. Vertical programmes tend to be much simpler to manage, there is a clear link between action and effect and somebody can take the credit. The trouble is that having a number of these isolated pillars of care in a country can become very inefficient and drain the general health services of resources. Furthermore, the priorities of all these programmes may not be in line with national ones, particularly when external donors are involved.

And so the debate has continued for the past 30 years. The strange thing about this debate is that it seems to be a lot of rhetorics and emotion but very little evidence. So, the reason I have been working my a*#e off lately is that this week a number of bigwigs in the field are gathering to discuss how we can move beyond this deadlock and start having a more productive dialogue. My job was to help supply the evidence and analyse which approaches have been most successful under particular conditions. As you can imagine it's a fairly high profile piece of work and I am very pleased to have been able to chip in. I really hope to get my hands on more assignments like this. I just hope that the deadlines can be a bit more ... healthy.

And then there was light

Helloooo? Is there anybody out there?

I wouldn't blame you if you have all abandoned me by now for I sure have been pretty negligent of you. What can I say? I'm sorry. For the last couple of weeks I have been buried alive. Buried under a mountain of work so high that I am surprised it didn't crush me all together. Working days of 10 hours gradually slipped into 11 hour days, then 12 hour ones and this week I one day even left the office at 10pm! The building takes on a whole new appearance at that time of the evening, let me tell you. For weeks my world became smaller and smaller until I reached complete tunnel vision. My dreams were filled with paragraphs and tables and that was on good nights. Falling asleep when your brain cannot switch off anymore can be tricky.

But now I have reached the light at the end of the tunnel. Squinting I step into the bright real world. I am alive again. Hello world, remember me? So now what do I do...?