Isummed up last week what needs to be done here to get the NGO proper on track with their organizational strategy. This week I was planning to get busy with that. At least that was the initial plan anyway because the Friday after the meeting with Kate and Hu, they suggested going to Demre. For those not knowing where this is, you are not alone because my fat ass thought we talked about a Turkish dish. Anyhow, Demre is a small town outside Antalya, but what the heck am I suppose to do in Demre, you might ask.
Building bridges
Now obviously, it’s important to have a solid backend and strategy. Still, the organisation’s direction is set by actual feedback from fieldwork. I can’t get a good feel of the brand, organisation and people behind it with just sitting comfortably behind my desk. Furthermore, because of the many complexities the nature of this NGO faces, communication with the local people and government is essential for the NGO to succeed.
So the plan is:
- Talk to the local population,
- Introduce new ways of revenue’s for the locals
- Get the local Turkish government on board with this
- Create housing accommodation for the tourists on these routes through the locals
- Re-educate them from farmers to hosting guests
- Connect agencies to them
- Mitigate between different municipalities
Dear Lord, it seems like a heck of a week I got ahead of me when you read it like that, isn’t it ?. You aren’t wrong because it took me 3 hours to get to Demre and from there, each place I had to visit took another 1 hour to get there to talk to the mayor and then back having a meeting with the locals again about it. I can’t complain too much because most of them are cooperative, and Turkish hospitality is just wonderful. By the end of day one, I drank 5liters of tea and 1kg of sweets. But not everyone is happy to see you tough.
Breaking old habits is hard
Even though you got good intentions, convincing people of breaking old habits is not easy. This is applicable at all levels of life, whether you like your coffee in a certain way or running a business. Ever wandered into a shop that looked like it has frozen in time? I like nostalgia, and I myself love to walk endlessly through these places, but they are, however, not very good for your business or personal growth, for that matter. You have to be like water and adapt to your surroundings as they are everchanging, so are you. Helping people break the mould is a subtle art form that you have to practice carefully because if you come at it too hard, you will come across as pushy and controlling. However, you can’t change their ways either if you don’t point out their current stalemate.
The trick is straightforward, stop talking. For the first hour, I just listened to them, listen to their stories and feel their lifestyle. This gives me great insights into what they value are and how they seek to cherish them. This is different from the mayor, and this is different from the local farmer and everyone linked within this chain. My job is to mitigate and translate between all parties to have everyone’s noses pointed in the same direction. However, the downside of this is you could get too involved with the whole process, which I always do because I am too vested in any project, and I will treat each job as if it is my own organisation.
I got more than I bargained for
By the end of it, I was really started feeling the fatigue kicking in, and my eyes would doze off between meetings, but I am stubborn. On the last day, I had to come completely out of my comfort zone ( I mean my desk and youtube) and go into the field and find a water system. Yes, you read it correctly; I was now in the middle of nowhere somewhere on a mountain 800m high trying to find water. As I walked on my sore feet, feeling the heat on my forehead with a clear sky, I chuckled and thought: well, this was not part of the plan, now was it? No, I was not doing a reenactment of the Tomb Raider game trying to find lost treasures and underground rivers but what I was looking for is very essential for the project.
Basic human need
The purpose of finding water systems is a straightforward but crucial part of the organisation. The NGO maintains archaeological roads and sites, but to do so, it has to work at fairly remote places, as I mentioned before, 800m high on a mountain with no access to water or accommodation. They do this with the help of volunteers coming from all around the world. These volunteers come and camp for weeks on these mountains, and they build these roads, but they need water. There are water systems under these mountains that were placed during the Roman empire, but they have become hard to find through the ages. My job is far from playing Indiana Jones, but it was certainly a humbling experience to find these water systems to help the volunteers coming weeks ahead. It is February, and it is already 21 degrees; imagine you have to build a road in the middle of April with the scorching sun burning on your skin. I am thankful for these volunteers, but you won’t see me around when that time comes! So the least I can do is to find them some water.
Humbling and inspiring
On the way back, I was looking at the mountain we had just climbed the day before, and I could not stop but to feel inspired by the work the NGO is doing here, the efforts the volunteers are putting in, how life-changing it must be for the locals. And as I walked into the office in Antalya, I crawled behind my laptop and started writing the strategy I planned for them a week ago. I am exhausted but fired up and ready to rock; I will do what I do best, so they can be the very best of themselves and have a better chance of succeeding tomorrow (that sounded quite good actually, I might have to copyright that and print some shirts). Even though my plans have been delayed for a week, it has actually ensured that I will deliver a better job, and for that, I will never be apologetic for being too vested in my projects.