VSO

Just a quick update on VSO and my travel plans.

A couple of weeks ago I was lucky enough to hear from the VSO team regarding my CV. I'd held off applying for ages. I didn't think they'd accept me to be honest, as I only had a couple of years in the Voluntary Sector. That's why I took the TEFL course.

However, they did accept the CV, and a couple of weeks later they got back to me offering two positions. One is working with d/Deaf HIV/AIDS victims in Kenya and the other is working in Rwanda, helping to develop a national sign language manual - not easy between three national spoken languages: Kinyarwanda, French & English!

It was a bit bizarre as I’d just given a Sociolinguistics presentation a couple of days before on the problems arising from standardising national sign languages! There's a fantastic academic study done on this, looking at what happened when the same thing occured in Bali. It's complicated, and created a lot of issues to do with identity and access to education, but knowing the pitfalls perhaps I could help to tackle it differently and with a certain level of awareness and respect for minority sign languages.

Anyway, I put my hand up to Rwanda. They sent me a huge amount of information on the customs, culture, etiquette, geography, history and so forth. One interesting quirk is that after the 1994 genocide a rule was passed that the government had to consist of a minimum of one-third female representation, and now has the highest level of female representation of any government in the world! The rationale being that women would never allow such violence to occur again. Questionable perhaps, but interesting.

The departure date is for the 9th September, but I cannot go so early as my dissertation finishes on 14th September and I have a family commitment for the first week in October. They are discussing whether this can be moved now. I have not got the job for certain, I still have to pass an assessment day in London. I have the preparation material but have not been issued with a date yet. It is a non-competitive interview but quite full-on, assessing your character and asking many personal questions.

Anyway, I shall write more about this as and when things progress. I must away to the other side of town with Eric to meet Suki & Co. Suki's just discovered she got 70% on her MA, and she's also moving house this weekend, so the gang's out for celebratory drinks!