Headed To Ghana - Some First World Travel Problems

I am back in Accra, Ghana for (what is now) my semi-annual trip working on Theodora Project and Rotary Club to End Human Trafficking Economic Development Initiative (EDI for short). The two projects are at very different points of their development. 

Theodora has gone beyond the stark, 'new concept, can it even work?' phase to the 'we've proven the concept, we have a working business, can we create meaningful succession and scaling.' That's pretty cool for sure as I've detailed in December. 

EDI on the other hand is absolutely in the 'can it even work?' phase. And if I am to be blunt and truthful, I'm not sure it is. This isn't because I think the concept is bad, unworkable, or have the potential to make it. The problem is I don't have the time and the energy to make the start-up work. 

I was fortunate that the fate that put me into the Theodora situation, coincided with me still having enough time and energy to do the intense work necessary to get it over the challenges to success. Now, six years later being in my late 70's rather than my early 70's, I don't have that energy and my time is running . 

Anyway, I'm not sure why I started writing on this. I will come back to it in a subsequent post. What I wanted to write about was my actual flight experience to Ghana which brought up to me just how we lose perspective in the world. 

I was able to get a really good fare on this flight but it meant having overnight layovers in each direction. That makes for a long travel time. Plus, leaving the airport to get a hotel (I still saved well over $1k doing things this way) and having to go through whole airport security thing over again.  

So this particular set of flights had a whole litany of annoying/irritating things. To note:

• Delta Airlines not seeming to be able to get its computer system to remember when your documents have been checked leading to you have to recheck them numerous times.
• Delta's app completely freezing when you go to a place requiring a special visa, meaning it is not available to track your flight details or other information.
• Running into one of the most anal TSA agents I've experienced in ages in Atlanta that made me (and others) do things in the TSA Pre-Check line require me (and others) to go back and forth between the screening gate and the line you put your belongings on multiple times, screwing up the process for everyone as a result.
• Getting Business Class seat that was incredibly hard causing all kinds of problems with my arthritic shoulders and hips.

The first three of these were all before I got on the long-haul business class flight and I was in a pretty crappy state-of-mind when I boarded my flight from Atlanta to NYC. The flight attendants on boarding asked how I was doing, and I kind of vented. And at that very moment, images of Los Angeles, Gaza, Syria, Sudan jumped into my head. And I immediately made note of that observation to the same crew members I had just bitched to. 

I won't say I immediately moved into a state of bliss. I was still annoyed. But I took my whole attitude with a distinct grain of salt.

Back From Kumasi -Winding Up Trip

Everything went smoothly in Kumasi. My flights with Africa World Airlines were all on time. Weather was fine. AND, I had a really great meeting with the young man who heads up the Muslim Family Counseling Service's street children advocacy program. TM is an impressive person. He's energetic, with a positive attitude. He and his small team spend a lot of time out, in the environments where young people are ending up living on the streets because of lack of economic opportunity. As such, he and his organization are ideal partners for the Rotary Club to End Human Trafficking's Economic Development Initiative. 

We spent most of the time I was there visiting actual environments where people are living and the different populations. This meant me getting out of my comfort zone and going rather deep into parts of the city I would never go on my own. But it was necessary in order to get the real picture.

Listen to TM in one of those environments, the Central Market

 We were able to reach a consensus on the specifics of demographics and modifications to the programs we want to approach. Hopefully, I will be able to have this second Pilot Project ready to kick-off by the first part of next year.

I was back in Accra on Thursday for a full day and evening of meetings both here and back in the U.S. Today I'm working from my apartment, wrapping things up and will be heading back to the USA on Saturday.

 

 

Transition 8.5.3.b238.Alpha Version 2024

While researching this post by going back over all the posts I've made labeled 'Transition', I was a bit overwhelmed by the number of times I've proclaimed (like Star Trek) the 'Final  Frontier' of transitioning had been reached. Actually the last year or so, I've gotten much better at understanding and accepting that I never really 'transitioned' from one state to another. What happened is I left a steady state as a working adult and entered a state of near constant transitioning, hence the recent exposition and acceptance of de-I and Wife's life as a telenovela. So with our telenovela imagery firmly in mind let's delve into the latest plot twist.

I exposed in my most recent post the 'Other Project', the work I've been doing with the Rotary Club to End Human Trafficking. This project, the Economic Development Initiative (EDI), has energized our club like nothing I've seen since I joined the club. Here is the kicker. When I put together my initial ideas, I made a bold statement. I said, "For Economic Development in the areas we are targeting to truly work, we have to take a long, long term perspective. We must think in terms of generations." And I made an analogy of how long it took a tree sprout to become a mature giant. 

So with our club and its outside supporters buying into this, I began thinking, "How does one actually pull this off?" Well, one has to have an organization that has institutional memory, and a solid set of values that are lived and not talked about. You have to have all this institutionalized so it is not tied to any one individual. 

OOPSIE. This is where I realized that something was going to have to change significantly within my social impact efforts. To be blunt, up until now, I've had what might be called a lifestyle or vanity social impact enterprise. It was based on me without much thought as to what would happen after me. The evolution of Theodora Ghana Virtual Assistants and women in that program started to change that. But his new EDI program with its promises totally changed that. Now I was faced with the reality that for this program to fulfill its promise, there would need to be a managing entity that could survive without me.

In essence it means changing my 'lifestyle/vanity' non-profit into a genuine organization that can operate and promote the vision for many, many years to come. Not something I've ever done before. Sounds like yet another whole set of transitioning requirements.

Transition Bullet Train I am getting on board. 

Meanwhile At The Other Project

Other project you say?

What other project?

 

As I perused my blog posts over the last few years I noticed a rather interesting gap, a lack of posting related to another project I have been working on in parallel with Theodora Africa. This is the Rotary Club to End Human Trafficking Economic Development Initiative or EDI for short.

 

The story behind EDI is a classic tale of ‘Be Careful What You Ask For. You Might Get It!  😱

 

Let’s start at the beginning.

 

Once upon a time there was a cynical man who wanted to use Rotary for his own half-baked scheme to give back. He successfully got a small local club to not stop him from running off to Africa in the name of the club pursuing a dream which any one of thousands upon thousands of prior social impact Westerners could have told him was grounded in all the wrong assumptions.

 

But as fate would have it, the powers that be had decided to use him instead! And thus the crazy ride that became Theodora Africa was launched. But it was clear that this project didn’t belong in the small club where he had started with. The Rotarian who first had me join Rotary told me of the Rotary Club to End Human Trafficking. I joined and was quickly tagged to be on the board.

 

But, I was frustrated. I saw our founders had a great vision. They saw this club as a force motivating the power of Rotary International behind this one mission. However, there was no clear pathway to action. There was a lot of talk and focus on Awareness. Awareness is certainly important. But awareness by itself will not overcome a problem. There needs to be tangible action.

 

In my mind, based on my Theodora experience, I was convinced that lack of economic opportunity was one of the most significant root problems enabling human trafficking. I had a bunch of ideas how, we as a Rotary club could build a program. Partnering with one of the members I’d recruited who was an entrepreneur facilitation expert, I began doing research and wrote a White Paper to present to the board calling for us to develop our own economic development program.

 

We have very, very few people in our club who are business people. I was pretty darn sure that the board would smile politely and shelf the whole thing. I would have made my attempt and could go back to being a backbench member. It was to my shock and horror that our founding President LOVED IT! She said it was going to be our foundational effort.

 

Damn.

 

Fast forward one year. We held our kick-off meeting last Thursday. We had one of the largest turnouts of any meeting since I’ve been in the club. 37 people from four continents were there. We had 8 non-club members from Africa alone. We have our first pilot project MOU in Tamale Ghana to be signed in August (I will be there in person). We have another Ghana organization, the Kumasi Central Mosque, interested in partnering with us, an NGO in Lusaka Zambia, and another organization in Jos, Nigeria.

 

As I said in the beginning, be careful what you ask for.