RV Weekend

Well hullooo readers!

Been a while. Just returned from a Returned Volunteers (RV) weekend at Harborne Hall in Birmingham, where you may remember I did my pre-departure training just over two years ago. Before leaving Rwanda I didn't really think I'd want to go to an RV weekend, but since being back I realised it would be nice to have a weekend away and re-visit the ol' place.

It was extremely strange walking back through the door. Smelled just the same, looked the same. A fond familiarity. There were 50 or more RVs from all over the world: Ethiopia, Malawi, Tanzania, Ghana, The Gambia, China, Mongolia, Sierra Leone, Nigeria, Sri Lanka, Mozambique, Cambodia, Guyana, Indonesia and even Pakistan (whose programme office shut recently due to the escalating political problems).

We kicked off at 6pm with an excellent exercise called Just One Thing where we each brought one thing that was special from our time in placement. Many of us also wore national dress - so I got to air the mushanana that Jasmine made me one last time.

Talking of that mushanana, it was made for my colleague Léon's wedding and I found a couple of clips the other day. They're poor quality but I could never upload them before because of the internet speed:

Léon & Janine getting married.


At the reception the wedding party sing a traditional wedding song to the guests.



A quick snippet of the speech I gave - not knowing I was going to be asked to make one!

So, it was really nice to get to wear it again and to see everybody else's dress - the clothes from Ethiopia and Pakistan were extremely beautiful.

People brought a whole range of different items with them. Some that stand out were the scarf that one lady had to wear to cover her head and shoulders, and how it made her think about how lucky her and her daughter (and women in general) are in Britain, and the amount of freedom we have. Someone else brought a toy truck made out of old tins, which the kids of five and six made in her village. How many other kids that age do you know who could make such an intricate item with flip-flop wheels and a movable steering wheel? I took my two Rwandan masks. Most masks were Congolese, so it was hard to find something that was actually Rwandan. These you buy traditionally in pairs: a man and a woman, which I like to think represent Nyabinghi and Ryangombe, the spirit cults from the North and South, respectively.

Rabia was also there, we met last Christmas in Sierra Leone, where she was on placement. So we shared a bottle of wine and a catch-up. Vicki, one of the facilitators, had also done a two-year placement in Rwanda, then six months in Mongolia. I met her when she went back on holiday to Rwanda and we had a pancake fest. So, again, it was great to catch-up as we know lots of the same people.

Saturday was a string of workshops looking at re-settlement issues, careers advice, job issues, what support VSO offer etc. It was useful but long, and sometimes a bit repetitive. I'm not sure why, but it did feel a bit flat. I remember pre-departure training having a lot more energy - mostly nervous excitement - which of course RVs don't have. But at the same time the trainers seemed a bit more sedentary, and there wasn't any silliness. No WAAAA! games. I'm not sure that just because we're returnees, that we've completely lost our sense of fun. A few silly games would have helped to lift the mood a bit. After all, most of us really miss our placement countries (you could tell from the Just One Thing exercise) so we're perhaps even more in need of cheering up than outbound volunteers.

Thankfully, we completely made up for this in the bar. The red wine did flow. Rabia and I befriended Elizabeth & Oli, Anna, Dan and Alex and between us we formed a pub quiz team. We did extremely badly, but were too distracted by salt 'n' vinegar crisps to care! :) 

That part of the weekend was great: letting off steam and returning to a social scene of vols where we all had so much in common, as we'd all been in Africa. It's great to have some new friends, and Anna lives near Gloucester so I'll go visit her next time I'm there.

Finished today around 11am after a talk about getting involved in VSO and fundraising. Was interesting. Still thinking that if I can't get a job in the New Year I'll just re-apply for a short-term placement and keep building up my CV until I get an offer.

Had a bit of a green twinge at the end, though. They handed out postcards that we write to ourselves with our aspirations on, then they post them to us in six months. That's a lot of postcards to hand out each year, and it didn't mention 'recycled paper' anywhere. Then they asked us to fill out expense forms if we were donating our transport money, but they'd already asked us if we wanted to do that by e-mail before the course - so, again, not very eco-friendly.

Drove home and feeling a bit anti-social again. I was slipping back into UK living pretty well, but that's thrown it all in the air again. Now I just miss the people I met and wish we were heading to the bar tonight. That's a bit pants, but I do feel better in other ways. It's good others are as directionless as me right now, although many are returning to old jobs or to study. But it's good to feel normal again in terms of where I'm at and what I'm doing.

There was one lady there who is outgoing, on her way to Rwanda. It's very unusual to have an outgoing vol at an RV weekend, but she was between courses. As she was staying at Harborne anyway, she wanted to come. I wondered if it would be a bit negative for her - 'warts and all' - but she seemed fine, and still enthusiastic to go even after having that very realistic insight. I was the only Rwandan volunteer at the weekend, so it was nice to chat to her and look at the map of where she'll be working.

It's been a bit of an African day, actually. The shower ran out of water this morning - luckily just as I was finishing. That hasn't happened since Gikondo. Then I got back to Mum's to find the power was out on the lights upstairs, so I'm sitting here writing this by candlelight. Oddly, it's quite comforting - if you sort of ignore the carpet, radiator, cold weather and Queen-sized bed.

Anyway, will update more soon. For now, that's about my limit.