Cloud watching in Ethiopia: Warner blogs from the Writeshop

Editor's Note: Warner and the team at the DRR residential 'Writeshop' at Debre Zeit, 45 km SE of Addis Ababa, were not about to allow something as trivial as the lack of an internet connection prevent them from blogging. Instead, just as sailors' wives would once receive a dozen letters in one parcel, so a package of blog posts arrived over the weekend from this remarkable event, as Warner made a run into Addis and the connected world. I'll post them in order over the next few days, so you have a feel of how the event developed. Now read on...

Blogging Notes from Warner Passanisi, Wednesday 5th Dec - Day 3 of 12 of the DRR Writeshop residential workshop, Bonita Youth Center, Debre Zeit, 45 km SE of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (with no internet connection).

I'm happy to have finally arrived after two sleepless nights (one of my bags containing all my DRR materials was sent not to Addis (ADD) but to Accra (ACC)!) It's great to be here and amongst some 40 people in a single room, all committed to working together over a period of two weeks to produce "Disaster Risk Reduction - A Practical Guide in the Ethiopian Context".

With a significant ECB3 investment, through Save US, of around $100,000, it is important to support this innovative approach as much as possible. I am very grateful again to the resourceful Maurice McQuillan for agreeing to participate and be a lead author on one chapter, plus to have the commitment from Save, especially through Teklu and Stanley. Hats off again to Dr. Million for being instrumental in putting this together.

Around a circular arrangement of tables sit almost 40 people. This group includes a real mixture of skill sets and backgrounds. Most are Ethiopian nationals, of course, but we also have several participants from Kenya, and one each from Nigeria, Malawi, UK, US, and Ireland, plus 2 from Tajikistan. However, there are only 2 women, a fact lamented by the group. We have 4 community farmers, plus representatives from government, UN, at least 2 universities, NGOs, and other community leaders. Whilst conducted mainly in English, there are at least 2 other languages used. The ECB turnout has also been good - 15 ECB agency staff (only IRC not involved), including 6 from Oxfam (GB, US, and Canada), 2 of which were visiting from the OGB Tajikistan program. I am really impressed with the quantity and breadth of quality of the turnout. I'm also impressed with Dr. Isaac, the lead facilitator from IIRR, who have been recruited to run this writeshop. He is a bundle of never-ending energy, optimism, and great experience. It's a pleasure to be working with him and his team.

Days are 8am to 6pm Mon 4th through Fri 15th. This is a residential workshop, using a location and formula that IIRR have used several times before. We work, eat, sleep alongside and play with our colleagues. During that time, and with much IIRR experience of leading this process before, we should have collectively completed the 3rd draft of all chapters, with much of the layout, flow, and graphics having been completed while working with the in-house artist and DTP professionals here with us. Multi-facilitated, with many editors and authors, the work is done in plenary and group sessions through an iterative process.

Interesting to see that we have only just touched upon the topic of climate change, and yet it is raining, and it is December, and as several participants have noted, no one can remember it raining in December for 30 years!! My personal favorite of the first sessions I attended was hearing from the 4 community farmers describe some traditional early warning systems, such as cloud watching, and wind tracking related to livestock and pet behavior.

Now back to the sessions.....