Vikings: did they really exist?

Posted on August 21, 2012 by wordpressgrethe

“The Vikings is a created identity that everybody uses for its own purposes”, says an intruiging exhibition in the Stockholm National Historical Museum / Historiska Museet (http://www.historiska.se ). They have a complete collection of every possible antique Viking asset, but they also contest the very existence of a Viking identity and I have to say, they do that quite convincingly. It really made me smile.

They explain that in 1864 Germany attacked Denmark and Denmark lost Southern Jutland. So the Nordic countries felt threatened. Their reaction was to create the Viking myth so that others would feel frightened to attack them. Ain’t that a marvellous story!
Apparently the creation of the myth was successful so it became a habit. When universal male voting rights were introduced in 1910, the Vikings served as example: ‘all free men had a vote in the Viking time’. During the second World War, the Germans used Viking dresses and symbols to convince Norvegian men to join them, as if the Vikings were some kind of prehistoric SS-men. Then after the war, everybody was longing for peace so the peaceful side of Vikings as peasants was emphasized.

When Sweden was discussing EU-membership in the years ’80 and ’90, the Viking identity was presented in favour of EU-membership expressing how actively they were trading in many places in Europe. And isn’t the EU about trade most of all!
And now the most funny part comes. Actually gender and diversity have become an important theme in life. So what happens to the Viking identity? In the presentation of Viking history, the prominent place of women in Viking society is shown. And the Vikings have now become people who were very open for other cultures and ideas.

So the Viking identity can serve many goals. Applause for a Historical Museum that is splendid in its normal exhibition of historical artefacts and in the meantime so creative in the reflections about the interpretation of what they exhibit. Very worth a visit!

Another blog about this museum: Who tells your history?

Another blog about Stockholm; Diversity in hotels, it exists in Stockholm!

Maybe you like to read also about this museum: Archaeological museum Haarlem

Diversity in hotels; it exists in Stockholm!

Posted on August 9, 2012 by wordpressgrethe

Diversity in hotels: it exists in Stockholm!

All women who travel frequently for business will recognize what I experienced: most hotels are somehow similar, ‘efficiently’ organized, coloured in white/cream combined with black or brown, in one word: predictable – which is nice -, but boring – which is a poor contribution to the joy of life. The more a hotel is ‘business’, the more urgently Pay TV is brought to the customers attention. I have no specific opinion about men watching Pay TV but I do not want to be confronted with it when I travel for work. Finding a big sign to advertise Pay TV in the middle of my bed when I enter a new hotel is an absolute minus point for me and I never return to that hotel. Why don’t they bother to just find out whether the new customer is going to be man or woman? Is that against the rules of ‘efficiency’ in business hotels?
Stockholm proves how different this can be! The Collector’s Hotels offer a completely different environment. The hotels are full of antiques in all colours, live paintings turn the walls into something special and beautiful and many details are taken care of: from a special gift to the customer arriving until little cards on the breakfast tables with interesting quiz questions about Sweden. I felt at home in this hotel from the very first minute, it is nice and comfortable to travel like this!
The Hotel info says: “we are convinced that our chain of hotels are in step with times” and “Personality and history is scarce in the hotel business; but we feel that there is a lot more that we can do to change that“. They announce they might expand outside of Stockholm and even outside of Sweden. I think their concept would be real added value in Amsterdam. When they start a hotel in my home city, I will be the first to advertise it! It’s great when you see that people in a ‘standard’ business have the vision and the courage to introduce diversity…

Other blogs you might like to read:
Forget about the rules. Be human.
Travels with Herodotus
South Korean wisdom
Japanese looters

What people in Zimbabwe learned (and will Malawi follow?)

Posted on August 3, 2012 by wordpressgrethe

What people in Zimbabwe learned

One of the Stephanos managers told me this, that in Zimbabwe people have learned something during the last years that people in Malawi haven’t learned yet. The situation in Zimbabwe has been dramatic due to political circumstances. Donors refused to give any more money to the country. The food production was very low. It ended up in a situation where there was nothing to be had for ordinary people. Even the crime rate went down, because it was no use stealing anything from others; because others wouldn’t have anything either so there was nothing to be stolen…And since the donors gave no money, the people felt completely without help. This has brought a major change in their mentality: what people in Zimbabwe learned, was to start helping themselves. If there was any land not being used for agriculture, it would now be developed by ordinary people at their own initiative. Teenagers were looking for possibilities to contribute after school. People have become more independant, more active and proud.
In Malawi, everybody is still relying on donors. People forget about following their own values and ideas and focus on donor satisfaction because the big fear of any Malawian is: what if the donor will stop giving money! This is a general mentality that children also learn at a very young age. Remember: 40% of Malawi’s national budget comes from donors! So the withdrawal of donors would have dramatic effects. However, anybody can predict that such a donor-situation will not last forever. Does Malawi need a crisis like Zimbabwe to create a turning point?
Personally I am surprised to see Malawi this poor, 1 of the 5 poorest countries in the world, I am still puzzled by it. Malawi has strong assets with a beautiful lake, mountain, wild parcs and lots of land that is not being exploited for agriculture yet. And: the customers for agricultural products (think of India, China) are already there, they don’t even need to look for them. There is a lot of unused potential. I have seen countries with ‘less potential’ and better results. Yet it is normal in Malawi to ask white people for money all the time also individually (if you’re white, try a walk on the street and you will notice). What could create the shock effect for Malawians to take their destiny more in one hand (and for donors to let them do it) – preferably without the dramatic situation Zimbabwians have suffered from.

Another blog about this theme: Dead Aid in Malawi

Other blogs about Stephanos and Malawi:
Pigs, kids, and why it works in Malawi
Seba culture and diversity workshops in Malawi

When inclusiveness met apartheid…

Posted on August 1, 2012 by wordpressgrethe

When inclusiveness met apartheid

In our last workshop at Stephanos Foundation today, participants looked for role models in change and innovation. They came up with a list that is different from what European groups would make, except for Mandela: he is always everywhere present in the list of role models participants come up with.
Afterwards one of the managers told me that Malawi did not deal with South Africa in the apartheid period the same way other African countries did. The first president of Malawi Mr. Banda was in favour of dialogue, much in line with the inclusiveness that I experienced in Malawi during the last ten days. While other countries boycotted South Africa, Mr. Banda refused to stop his contacts and met with the president of South Africa. But when he did that, he made a statement. He helt a black child on one hand, a white child on the other hand and like that he showed that all humans are equal and that that would be the way forward also for South Africa. Mr. Banda got political ennemies in several African countries because of his vision, my manager told me, but he had a vision that suited Malawian culture and did not give it up. Later, he might have become more like a dictator, but for this attitude towards South Africa he can be considered as a role model.
I think I learned at least as much as the managers of Stephanos Foundation who followed my workshops. For me, it was like presenting familiar themes and practices in a completely unfamiliar context. Maybe it could have been better if I had known more about the local context – on the other hand, this might have been the key for interaction and participation of the managers, as I asked explicitly for their help at the beginning.
One thing is for sure, themes like culture, diversity, change, innovation and even project planning don’t differ per country: only the context differs – and the language was not an easy step to take. The workshops were highly appreciated and I highly appreciated to be given this opportunity that was really ‘out of the box’ for me. Not easy, but very rewarding!

Other blogs about Malawi culture:
President in the warm heart of Africa
Pigs, kids, and why it works in Malawi
Creative use of waterpipes in Zomba

Aid for orphans in Malawi

Posted on July 31, 2012 by wordpressgrethe

Aid for orphans in Malawi is a popular activity. Plenty of NGO’s have started an orphanage. The amount of orphans here is incredibly high, partly because of HIV/AIDS related deaths. Precise figures can be found in this Unicef publication: http://www.unicef.org/malawi/MLW_resources_childprotecstratsum.pdf. Unicef is not in favor of orphanages. Guiding principles for Unicef are (amongst others) that the family is the first line of defence for the protection of children and that community child protection practices are the heart of any child protection system.
The Malawian government is also not happy with orphanages and wants to abolish them if possible. Arguments in favour of that are for example:
– children are taken away from their family and community context, and thus derooted and alienated from their origins, relatives, values and traditions; it harms the children’s development
– for the price of 1 child in an orphanage, 8 children can receive help in a community
– most of the children living in institutions have a surviving parent or close relative, and they most commonly entered orphanages because of poverty, not because the parents or relatives do not want to take care of them
– research has shown that cash given directly to families is more effective than subsidies given to orphanages
– creating orphanages serves the donors more than the children
See also: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/06/world/africa/06orphans.html?_r=1
The last argument is exactly why the change of policy to abolish orphanages and work directly with communities is difficult to accept for NGO’s. It is more easy to find donors for a single child support than for a community. And it is more easy to work with children only and not with entire communities. Also, an orphanage gives NGO’s and donors the possibility to control the complete situation of a child, to offer the education the NGO thinks is important and eventually ignore their background.
In an orphanage like Kondanani – where Madonna recently got her children from – children are obliged to speak English only . They get a very good education in a merely western environment; a good kick-off in life, is the thought. Kondanani has been led thoroughly during many years and lots of donors contributed to create a world in its own, with fences around it to protect it. After primary education, various kinds of secondary education are offered and now even a Kondanani university might start on the premises. Is this kind of closed and safe environment for children, from baby until student, good or bad? One thing is sure, now that a (donor/NGO)dream that started almost 20 years ago is coming to its completion, the idea of ‘offering aid for orphans within their community only’ will not be received with a warm and open mind… This is just one example out of many. The Stephanos Foundation that also runs an orphanage in a compound is the first to be willing to cooperate for change – Unicef considers to make a pilot out of it.
Intriguing is the fact that donors/NGO’s do not automatically see the government of Malawi as leading when it comes to policies for Malawi children; they do not seem to consider their own position as supportive or additional to Malawi policies. Do they have the right to resist the government (and UN), for example by the experience and expertise they have about what works in practice, or by the money they raise, or because of the responsibility they feel for the children they are caring for in their orphanage already? Or can their attitude be considered as arrogant and postcolonial, as an ‘addiction to help’ like Dambisa Moyo describes in her book Dead Aid?
Nothing is easy here in Malawi. Yesterday’s newspaper mentioned the opening of a new road made by China and a new bridge made by Japan. It is difficult to take a government serious when it does not even make its own roads and bridges or when the members of parliament are on strike (really!) for a 137% increase of wages. However, by not taking the government serious for sure there will be no structural, sustainable change and orphanages will be needed forever (which, of course, is good news for the addicted-to-aid part of the donors/NGO’s).

All managers are alike!

Posted on July 30, 2012 by wordpressgrethe

All managers are alike! Today I worked with the management team of Stephanos on several principles for strategic planning. Interesting was the drawings they came up with after making a stakeholder analysis (see above). I will not explain them to you here but if you have been in sessions like this, you can certainly see what I mean.
Another remarkable aspect is that people will stay in a session without a break if this is what is expected from them. In The Netherlands, people usually start to ask about the break within 45 minutes time – it is not just important to have the break, it is also very important to know when exactly it will be. Here it isn’t.
Furthermore you can see from the pictures that spending money in expensive places is not for managers here. We sat in a basic room, normally used for the vocational training of Stephanos students and: without coffee or tea. Nobody was eating or drinking during the session. That did not positively or negatively influence the results I think. People just perform under the circumstances that they are used to perform. In a country like Malawi with an average yearly income of 250 euro, people do not eat and drink all the time: forget about the bag with candies and sweets that finds its way over the training tables while the workshop is going on. No such thing here.
But, miraculously, looking at your cell phone during the workshop is a favorite activity both here and in Western Europe. When it comes to that kind of communication, all managers are alike 🙂 The same goes for content: managers are managers, and they want to get things done. Give them ideas for that, and you have their interest.

Blogs about work of Stephanos:
Pigs, kids and why it works in Malawi
Seba culture and diversity workshops in Malawi
What people in Zimbabwe learned (and will Malawi follow?)

Malawi Fever Tree: what do you see?

Posted on July 30, 2012 by wordpressgrethe

The Malawi Fever Tree was during some time suspected to be the cause of malaria, as this tree was found particularly in areas where malarial fever often occured. It is a very beautiful tree with a shiny, almost glowing bright green-yellow bark but of course nobody can like it when it is supposed to bring disease.

Later on, people found out that the malaria mosquito who is the real cause of malaria likes the same swampy areas as the Fever Tree does. So the Fever Tree was blamed not for what it was, but for what it looked like…

Ever heard or maybe even been the victim of this kind of mechanism? Ever drawn conclusions yourself just on the basis of that first impression?

Fortunately this particular situation was resolved and we can now enjoy the Fever Tree for what it is: an special and unique kind of Acacia!

Other blogs you might like:
Rewarding managers
Creative use of waterpipes in Zomba
Mulanji Massif in Malawi: again unknown beauty

Seba culture and diversity workshops in Malawi

Posted on July 26, 2012 by wordpressgrethe

Seba culture and diversity workshops in Malawi

By now I have given 2 workshops on culture and diversity for the management team of the Stephanos Foundation. Beforehand I was wondering whether it would be possible to be of any benefit, as my knowledge about Malawi and Africa in general seemed to be low. Wasn’t it a risk to be too western in my approach, far from ‘the way we do things here’ in Malawi? But after my 2 first workshops here I can say (with some relief) that it worked out very well, also in the context of Malawi.
The awareness about culture and diversity is much bigger here than average in Europe. Most of the management team has the Malawi nationality, but they come from different tribes and have team members from various backgrounds. In workshops in for example The Netherlands, participants sometimes feel compelled to discuss the notion of culture itself: does it really matter? Aren’t we all different so what’s the point? When this occurs, it is always a participant from the ‘dominant’ group and never a member of a minority group who brings up the discussion. There is little awareness of the very existence and influence of culture and diversity – regardless whether dominant individuals find it necessary or not…
Here in Malawi I meet with strong curiosity to learn more and know how it works and what a manager can do to make it work so that diverse talents are used for the job. Exercises from The Champagne Pool (see www.diversityshop.eu) passed without any problem: be it informal rules of the organisation, what is my culture or the five dimensions of culture from Hofstede – it all suited Malawi and Stephanos reality. Also the Makeda game gave a lot of food for thought.
The fact that the Makeda game bears the name of the Ethiopean Queen of Sheba however did not seem to interest anyone. People are very practical here and not too nationalistic. Does training material come from America, Europe, Asia or Africa? No point as long as it works in the local context. In terms of Hofstede, there is a low uncertainty avoidance (low on ‘what is different is dangerous’, difference did not scare these managers off). And there is a good sense of humour, which is always nice to have. This makes me look forward to the other 2 workshops to come.

Other blogs about Stephanos:
Stage fever is an English invention
Pigs, kids and why it works in Malawi
What people in Zimbabwe learned (and will Malawi follow?)

Zomba: creative use of waterpipes

Posted on July 26, 2012 by wordpressgrethe

Zomba, Malawi: waterpipes were sent here by a donor in order to help create a better draining system. Part of those waterpipes – that by the way are a very good quality and quite expensive – found another destination as you can see on the picture above, they will never serve a draining system. Well, at least the water pipes in Zomba were not just thrown away…
Some people suggest that systems like Western Europe has, cannot work here in Malawi anyway. For example something will get broken halfway the draining system and there will be no one or no money to repair it. So then all of the street or maybe even all of the village will stay without a good draining system. A more individual or ‘serial’ approach would do better than a community system. Could be true.
A thought that comes to my mind all the time is how creative people are here in Malawi. They might not use the products the way the ‘western world’ does, but they find new ways to use them for things that apparently matter to them and that are also lacking: just like the waterpipes in Zomba. If that creativity would be combined with a (long term) business attitude, what would we see happening in Malawi!

Other blogs about creativity you might like:
Vlinderado: creating your dream
Visages Villages: brilliance of the normal

More about Malawi:
Majete Wild lifeReserve
Malawi Fever Tree
President in the warm heart of Africa

Millennium Village Southern Malawi

Posted on July 25, 2012 by wordpressgrethe

The UN is building Millennium Villages to accelerate development and the achievement of the millennium goals that were set. In many countries in Africa an integrated approach of agriculture, health care, education etc. is brought into practice. The Millennium Village in the Zomba region of Malawi contains a vaste area with a lot of very small villages and 35.000 people. What jumps in the eye at first sight is the larger scale of agriculture that is applied here, with the use of mechanics and new kinds of crops that are richer than the former ones (like the pieces of orange patatoes at the picture above). The project works with partners rather than donors (like the electricity company of Malawi), although visitors see a big sign of US Aid when they arrive.
The success formula to make this work was to have villagers involved from the beginning in the cooperation they formed, and also to give village chiefs a role in it. An increasing amount of farmers are now self supporting, getting crops from the cooperation and giving back a few bags of crops after harvesting – thus they guarantee the continuity of the project. See the picture of the barn above. They have some extra money now so that they can pay education fees for their children and have a little luxury at home.
The best breakthrough was when they started to talk business. In the beginning, ‘food security’ was in the center of the program. But when there was food security and they started to think of markets to sell their harvest to, that is when general interest and participation really grew. An important lesson learned in the Millennium Village is: start from the needs the people have (which can be different from the needs others tell them they have!).
Yet there is a lot of work to be done. It is clear that this is another project in Malawi that got a lot of outside / donor money put into. Managing the cooperation, building barns or other materials are not included in the ‘self-support’ so far. Health care has improved considerably in general, and specifically for pregnant women, but nobody pays a dime for health care. How sustainable can that model be? Well, they have some more years to go. The good news is that many visitors pass by to learn about the Millennium Village model and return to their own region full of ideas and inspiration.

Other blogs about this theme:
Aid for orphans in Malawi
Pigs, kids, and why it works in Malawi
Dead Aid in Malawi

Other blogs about this region:
Zomba: creative use of waterpipes
Mulanje Massif in Malawi: again unknown beauty
Majete Wildlife reserve in Malawi: unknown beauty

Self Help Africa

Posted on July 25, 2012 by wordpressgrethe

Self Help Africa is the new magic word and the name of a program that has several groups around the country in Malawi. So we went to see one of those new, inspiring groups in the Zomba region. After some indications received by officials, we ended up in one of the local offices of the Ministry of Agriculture in a small village. There they told us the Self Help Africa group did not exist any more because the donor stopped. Apparently a Self Help group starts on the basis of donations and is supposed to do things alone after a while. What could have been done was to hand the group over to local officials or other projects but this wasn’t done. Logically, in my eyes, as the method was supposed to be self help so why hand it over. Anyway not the most successful project I heard about so far…

At the office that was about agriculture, we did see a girl who came there for help: she was bitten several times by a raging (rabies) dog. She was placed on a bike and fastly driven away: I don’t know where, given the fact that we were a bit in the middle of nowhere – and I don’t know how much time she would have. She was very calm and very sad. I hope she ended up well.

Other blogs about this theme:
Millenium village Southern Malawi
Aid for orphans in Malawi

Other blogs about this region:
Zomba: creative use of waterpipes
Malawi Fever Tree

Stage fever is an English invention

Posted on July 23, 2012 by wordpressgrethe

Stage fever is an English invention: that is what people say in Nigeria, where performing in front of others is not the same dilemma as in many places in the ‘western’ part of the world. It is the same here in Malawi. Yesterday I spent some time at a youth meeting in the compound of Stephanos, close to Blantyre in the south of the country. Stephanos has many projects for health, agriculture and so on, and also an orphanage where many children get education at primary and secondary school level. On Sundays, they come together for Bible study and singing and they love it. Groups of young people stand in front of the group as a whole at the first invitation they get: happy to sing, without any stage fever. They simply don’t care, they are not busy with the thoughts of others (‘what they might think about me’) with the music itself.
They are spontaneous and very talented. Their sound has a good volume, because the absence of stage fever gives the result that everybody is singing full heartedly and not like in the Netherlands with their mouth half closed because of shame or whatever other reason that is withholding them. And it is maximum melodious, with tunes that are different from western or Asian music, so that we can recognize them immediately as African melodies.
(photos or video about this performance will be uploaded as soon as Malawi internet connections work better than right now…)

More blogs about Stephanos:
Pigs, kids and why it works in Malawi
Seba culture and diversity workshops in Malawi

More blogs about the culture of Malawi:
President in the warm heart of Africa
When inclusiveness met apartheid

Grethe van Geffen

culture and diversity

Tag Archives: diversity