Just ask my liver
With a sprinkle of self realisation and slap on the face with malaria, I’m back. And with a wave of excitement and drive like never before. You know that saying ‘what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger’? Well, it’s true. Just ask my liver.
Work has been nothing short of a struggle for me. Being the over-achiever I am, I was constantly knocked back with the lack of motivation and, what seemed to be, care from my colleagues. I think I can only admit now, knowing that it has been part of a huge cultural learning curve, that I have NEVER played so many games of Solitaire in my life. I would’ve gone crazy with boredom otherwise.
But amidst it all there were a few small triumphs and only last week I felt they bore the fruit. The little seeds I had planted, not short of determination (and probably stubbornness), leading up to this national event I was evaluating and involved with, had finally sprouted!! After receiving a very affirming email from my boss in Moresby (whom I thought disliked me - the young, passionate, persistent, tall, white girl) I was reassured of why I was in this (insert blasphemous adjective) country.
Although Papua New Guineans are very warm, welcoming people on the outset, it takes a very long time to penetrate the politics and be fully welcomed into a community. Let alone for your opinion to matter, or your voice to be heard. Rather difficult for me, who likes to tell a story or four.
Bit by bit, I am slowly working through the layers of the onion that is the relationship with my new hometown. I hope by the end of the two years I will be close enough to realise fully the name I have already been humbly dubbed, a ‘trupla Tolai meri’. A true local lady.
Lesson 21: Onions, ogres and PNG communities have layers. And lots of them.
Work has been nothing short of a struggle for me. Being the over-achiever I am, I was constantly knocked back with the lack of motivation and, what seemed to be, care from my colleagues. I think I can only admit now, knowing that it has been part of a huge cultural learning curve, that I have NEVER played so many games of Solitaire in my life. I would’ve gone crazy with boredom otherwise.
But amidst it all there were a few small triumphs and only last week I felt they bore the fruit. The little seeds I had planted, not short of determination (and probably stubbornness), leading up to this national event I was evaluating and involved with, had finally sprouted!! After receiving a very affirming email from my boss in Moresby (whom I thought disliked me - the young, passionate, persistent, tall, white girl) I was reassured of why I was in this (insert blasphemous adjective) country.
Although Papua New Guineans are very warm, welcoming people on the outset, it takes a very long time to penetrate the politics and be fully welcomed into a community. Let alone for your opinion to matter, or your voice to be heard. Rather difficult for me, who likes to tell a story or four.
Bit by bit, I am slowly working through the layers of the onion that is the relationship with my new hometown. I hope by the end of the two years I will be close enough to realise fully the name I have already been humbly dubbed, a ‘trupla Tolai meri’. A true local lady.
Lesson 21: Onions, ogres and PNG communities have layers. And lots of them.
Comments
Post a Comment