misdirection

When I was still an unmarried gentleman of leisure, I developed a certain nightly routine to help unwind. Regardless of how late it was - within reason - I would almost always watch an episode of a DVD boxset before bed. I like to think this allowed for two things: firstly, between 42-60 minutes to expunge the last of the day's stresses and unwind a little; and secondly, to hold on dearly to the idea of making at least three quarters an hour a day which was still very definitely mine.

Since marrying, this has in some ways become a bit of a shared habit. Last year, we ploughed through all but one series of BBC spy-drama Spooks - along with most of the kettle chips and/or crackers and cheese to be found in east Belfast. (Pro Tip: there's nothing quite like grabbing whatever has been reduced daily in the Co-op on the Beersbridge Road.) Shortly before leaving, I decided that enough was enough (at least, that's how I remember it) and that the time had finally come to introduce Ruth to The West Wing, Aaron Sorkin's multi-awarding-winning drama about a fictional US White House. Quite a few people will know me as an evangelist in, and defender of, this show, and I suppose I will remain staunchly so until the day I unwind from this mortal coil.

So six seasons of The West Wing came to Niger, and have been quite literally the only thing we have watched since. We're now in season 6, so I reckon that places us at about one-and-a-half a day, but in reality Saturday mornings account for a lot of that!

But disaster struck this week. Since the DVD drive on my MacBook Pro took a dodgy turn, we had decided to use Ruth's Dell for DVD watching. This was boosted by The Single Useful Idea Dell ever had - Dell MediaDirect, a partitioned part of the hard drive that you can access without turning the main operating system on. That's fancy language for it's really quick and uses a lot less power, ideal for watching DVDs.

But the power cable seemed to have ceased to work. The odd wiggle seemed to cause the blue Power LED to light up, but otherwise, nothing. Panic ensues.

In the UK, this would be an annoyance, but after a bit of fiddling one would probably just log on to Amazon and order a replacement. A little harder here. We are not huge television watchers, but this one little bit of escapism every day or two has already become a moment of comfort to look forward to, a time to relax in the midst of the organised chaos of a mission hospital. We appeared to be now having to adjust to a future where our ways to relax with media - watching and reading - had been exactly halved. Not a tragic hardship by any stretch of the imagination, but a bit of a pain nonetheless.

Now, forgive me, Bartlet-fans. My mind should, of course, be ready to draw down knowledge from the seven seasons of learning that compose The West Wing at an instant. In an earlier time, when things were simpler and the main priority was remembering to lock the door when leaving for class, I would perhaps have instantly recalled that all is not lost in these situations. Let me explain.

In Season Four of The West Wing, in an episode called 'Angel Maintenance', President Bartlet and his staff find themselves stuck, flying around in circles and unable to land, on Air Force One. The problem? An LED indicator, which lights up when the landing gear is fixed into position, has failed to come on. Though a lot of activity ensues, including using fighter jets to check if the gear is in fact in place, the President keeps returning to a salient point made by his pilot at the outset:

"The light that indicates that the landing gear is locked didn't go on, which usually indicates that there's something wrong with the light."

After painstakingly dismantling, reassembling and rewiring the unnecessarily complicated 65W power adapter this afternoon with little more than some tweezers and a razor blade, the thought suddenly occurred to me, and so I checked.

The week long worry over the loss of a computer due to a faulty power cable was in vain: it's the flipping light that's faulty.

lawkit volume two: open for business

About this time last year, in a space somewhere between frustration and a lightbulb, this blog featured an article subtitled, 'A Call To Arms'. Initially, this author had intended to continue venting his spleen that he had somehow failed to wake up one morning to a world where he worked in the Bartlet White House.

(And with phrase composition as clumsy as that, I clearly demonstrate just one of the many reasons such a reality has yet to materialise.)

In an effort to placate a personal desire to write something a bit longer than the typical blog post, I had conceived that I could legitimise this effort by roping in others with similar yearnings. A lot of us do not like to sit down and write for writing's sake. And that's fair enough: I don't like motorbike racing.

I put out an open call, particularly to an immediate circle across Facebook and Twitter, for articles, with an open remit for content. Requesting only that they adhere to a rough style guide, and I suppose common decency, potential contributors were given free rein to write on any topic under the sun.

Which is actually more difficult that it might sound. What do you write about when the page is completely blank? When I was in the midst of teacher training, one of the axioms held about English teaching is that it's classroom suicide to give unprepared pupils a blank page and no topic. Not because they'll write something unsuitable: but rather, because the majority will struggle to just choose a subject.


I don't know if that axiom holds true, by the way. And certainly, the responders for the first four issues of The Lawkit, published during 2011 (before time constraints took over in this parish) seemed to sometimes indicate otherwise. In their pages, we covered modern history, football, live music, recipes, political and personal identity, James Bond, and safety when moshing. And these are just the tip of the iceberg.

We had someone describing their mundane desire to get out more.

We had someone else describing the moment they held rubble from Hiroshima in the palm of their hand.

One year on from those initial musings, I am hoping that the time is right to get stuck in to Volume 2. On the editing and publishing side, I hope it was obvious that we improved and tightened the standard of the publication as we went along. We kept everything as open and free-to-use as possible; it was important that The Lawkit could circulate and spread online, unhindered by any questions over a random image that might have come from the BBC website, for example. We also learn a lot about journal and magazine layout as we went along, and hopefully that shows by Number Four. Volume Two should build on this: we have a little brand and identity in the mix now that we like; now it's over to you.

And so, here is the call. Join us in writing something about anything. It could be a page, it could be six. The topic is up to you. If you're stuck, you can read - or reread - the previous issues for inspiration, and maybe to get a feel for the type of thing we go for. But please, think outside the box. Themes always seem to emerge for each issue, so if you're really stuck don't hesitate to ask - but challenge yourself first to see how far you get.

How many times have you heard someone tell a story which seems extraordinary to you, but completely normal to them? Those are one type of story we'd like to hear, for example. But if you would rather write about a personal interest, or respond to something that's in the public arena or currently on your mind, that's also what we're after.

Or maybe you just want to give off about Ryanair. That's ok too. (Though Paul's maybe conclusively covered that one already in Number Two.)

All the previous issues also contain that rough Contributor's Guide I mentioned. We may tweak that in the future, and if that happens before the next issue is published, it will appear here on this humble blog.

What are you waiting for? Fingers at the ready...

thorny topics

Calvin & Hobbes by Bill Watterson

There's a blog post which will land here at the start of next week which will return us to the conversation about the desire to write. I have to admit, that's a desire which is, in a way, being heavily slaked at the moment.

Like all folk who serve with the backing of others, we undertook to frequently report back throughout our year living and working in Niger. In addition, what with my role as communications coordinator, coupled with, you know, always banging on about writing stuff, it seemed like a good time to show up and deliver for once. So, we pledged to blog at least weekly, and also write something longer and prayer-orientated for our signed-up supporters on a monthly basis.

Now there's the usual pitfalls for sure. What seemed remarkable a month ago already has lost the air of noteworthiness; an element of the nothing-really-happened-this-week sits heavy on fatigued imaginations from time to time.

However, all of this week I have been attempting, and failing, to cross a pothole of a different breed. The things you want to write about, but can't. Or the things you would like to describe, but fail to.

I'll explain what I mean, but firstly let me flag that I'm not referring here to some massive conspiracy to cover up truth! I'll start from another angle.

As aliens in this environment, we see and come across things that we have literally never seen before. We do things that we have never done before at a frequency significantly higher than we would experience in our natural habitat. Like poking a chameleon, for example. Today I poked a chameleon, and picked a little at the dead skin on his back. (More on that over on DesertHueys later, I would imagine!) One does not see a lot of chameleons where I grew up in Mid Ulster.

There's a political metaphor there if you happen to be feeling a bit waggish, but we'll move on.

There's also shocking things, naturally. In one of the least developed countries in the world (I've lost track, is Niger back at second or third worst?) there's no shortage of upsetting sights and sounds. And describing them is the problem. In fact, it's a problem which has held up my writing of our e-mail update for this month all week.

In this case, it's traditional healers. That's what I want to write about. Traditional - i.e. local - medicine is encountered daily by the doctors working here. I want to write a respectful, understanding piece for our friends and family back home, describing some experiences around that. I perceive it to be a very sensitive topic. I could write in stark terms and short brushstrokes - there's a lot to tell.

But across all those cultural divides, how do you write about these things and complete avoid a blindly critical tone? How do you avoid saying something is plainly right or wrong?

Maybe you don't. Maybe that's the problem, and maybe that's what I'm afraid to say. But the mission we work for is bigger, older and more important than us. And if burying vitriol until a reasonable discourse can be produced instead is the key to preserving such things, that's the way it has to be.

These thorny topics produce difficulties for aid NGOs all the time. Our communications manuals are full of them. It's not political correctness per say; but the problem is that so much of our work is based around mutual respect, goodwill, and relational ministry. You can't do that if you're impersonally criticising left, right and centre. You don't bring cake to the dinner party, and then slag off the undersized main meal. The difficulty for us is to find a way to lovingly - and usually, painstakingly slowly - build a relationship to a point where friends can be honest with each other.

All to say, I probably owe an apology, available to anyone who may have strayed from DesertHueys over to here, as to why you didn't receive an e-mail update in February. One is coming very soon. The luxury we have is that our deadlines are flexible, and I'm working this one just a little longer.