Quick take the wheel!

Have you ever been asked to fly a plane? Imagine this scenario if you will. You have been playing the nintendo Top Gun game, the only one I remember having as a kid, and you've mastered all of the first level but the landing, the only part of the game I remember. You then, during a trip in a plane, are extremely curious to see how a plane looks like in real life. The pilot is excited to show a youngster such as yourself his "office", pre 9/11 of course, and chats with you about someday being a pilot. As you are only 12 years old anything is possible and you start to entertain the idea of someday being a pilot. Just as you are imagining your first day of flight training, the pilot starts the engine and takes off. You are surprised you aren't rushed back to your seat but decide not to ruin a good opportunity. The copilot gets up and says the view is better from his seat and he is going to get a drink so you rush over and enjoy the view. While day dreaming about a snow ball fight with the clouds you the pilot says to you, in all seriousness, "Can you take over? I might be awhile but you know how to land right?" And without waiting for a response disappears. Wait what? Me? But I can't get passed level one at home.... oh crap!!!

That basically has been my last 2 weeks. Oddly enough two of my friends have had similar experiences. The first 3 months at site we are suppose to be surveying the lay of the land. At most planning out projects to start after our January training. As a small enterprise development volunteer (affeciationally called a SEDie), the most "business" I am to do is a fesiblity study in my last month at site. My health volunteer friend last week was watching her homologue give a presentation on the importance of giving birth at the doctor's office rather than their house when all of a sudden the Malian got up and motioned for Emily to continue. Emily did her best but was completely lost on what to say and how to say it in Bambara. My other friend, Hunter, is working with the education system in Mali and has already been asked on the fly to teach 2 classes, one in ninth grade science and one in English. Not only has Hunter never taught before all in French, he also has never taught before in English. I'm happy to say he did superbly considering. After both of these stories I felt a little less bothered by being made to give a speech without notice durning my women's shea butter meeting. I did have a few things written down luckily and did better than I would have thought. I was suppose to address all of the women in the surrounding villages at the next meeting so I thought my homologue was better at preparing me than my friends' homologues. That was until today, Saturday, market day, my day "off", the day when no one works....... except for of course random meetings you are uninformed about. As Emily and I were getting ready to leave to do our weekly shopping my homologue informs me that 2 men have come from the capital and that I have to meet them. No big deal I'll just buy a few things, run back and shake some hands, have lunch and call it a day. Before even getting to the market we run into the "big wigs" and I have to go back for the meeting. Emily continued on with the thought that I would catch up with her in 30 minutes or so. We started talking about an organic certification process that will start in January and ended with the need to make this village the center for shea butter production for the surrounding villages. After a 2 hour long meeting in a mix of Bambara, French and a small amount of English I am asked to write up a business plan for the shea butter co-opportive including wages for the women making the butter and packaging designs for the shea butter in the next two weeks before our next meeting. Wait what? Where did the training wheels fly off to? I can barely speak to the women, much less help them decide how much to be paid! Needless to say I will not be going to the waterfalls next weekend. I hope my economics and business classes will come in handy now. I feel completely unprepared and unqualified for this, but as I hear from Mindy this is how the real business world works. It's a good thing I recently came to the conclusion I work best under pressure. The "fassen your seat belt" sign has been illuminated, please prepare yourself for landing.