Travel Plans for 2015

Posted on March 4, 2015 by Åsa Giertz under My life, My Travels

When I wrote my 2014 recap, I was thinking of what I could expect from 2015. Admittedly, I don’t think 2015 will bring any life altering changes for me and I don’t have any major new projects that I plan to undertake. However, I already have several exciting trips planned that I look forward to very much. As I wrote in my previous post, I am shortly taking off for two weeks of work in Rwanda. Since I work in agriculture and often go out in rural areas to talk to farmers, I tend to see more of a country and the people there during my business trips than most people do during their travels. (I need to point this out because I’ve realized that when some people hear the word business trip, they think I spend my time in stuffy airport hotels and windowless meeting rooms, which is almost the opposite of what my work-related travel looks like.) Immediately after my trip to Rwanda, I’m going to the Scottish Hebrides and Edinburgh with my friend Andreas for a week. It’s a trip that has been in the planning for almost five years, so it’s about time! Later this spring, I have work trips planned for South Africa, Malawi, and possibly Central Asia, and I’m hoping to make it to Stockholm at some point and also to go and visit my friend A in Los Angeles. Summer is still open but I have some ideas, including going up to New York at some point and maybe seeing Montreal. And then in September I will likely participate in a conference in London. So without any major events in the outlook for 2015, I will definitely get to see a lot of interesting places and meet many new people.

Map from MapsofWorld.com

Three days in Rwanda

Posted on February 28, 2015 by Åsa Giertz under My life, My Travels, On Agriculture and Food

I’m just on what might be my shortest work-related trip ever: I just spent three and a half day in Rwanda to present our work on agricultural risks for the launch of a joint report. It was a good event and there was a lot of interest in the topic of agriculture and risks, so I’m really glad I went (you can read some of the things the Rwanda New Times wrote about it here and here). It was fun also because two old acquaintances from Moldova (one of whom I worked with) saw my name on the invitation that went out for the launch event, and contacted me contacted me. The “development sector” (for the lack of a better word) is such a small world in a way, and it’s not the first time I cross paths with people on different continents and in different organizations. The visit was really short, though, and I barely had time to see anything other than the office and my hotel, but fortunately, I’m going back in a few weeks. Here is a photo that I snapped in the car on the way to the airport – streetlife in Kigali:

Working in a Global Organization

Posted on February 9, 2015 by Åsa Giertz under My life

It’s 10:30 pm on a Monday night and already past my normally early bedtime. But I’m up waiting for a work-call from Bishkek. Because of the 10-11 hour time difference between Washington DC and Bishkek, we normally have meetings really early in the morning here, catching my colleagues over in Kyrgyzstan before they leave for the day. But this time, we are also connecting a colleague who is located in Oregon, i.e. three hours behind my time, so it was more convenient to switch the day and do it early in the morning across the world instead. And yes, constantly working with between six and eleven hours’ time difference, like I do, changes the context in which we work because it’s always necessary to keep in mind that there may only be one or a few hours available when I get to the office in the morning until my colleagues have left for the day. So it’s important to have a clear picture of what needs to be done by the end of the day already at the start of the day. Also, an empty inbox at the end of the day may be overflowing when I get to the office the next morning, since some of my colleagues have almost done a full day’s worth of work by then. But I also find it fascinating how easy it still is, despite all this, to work effectively with a team that is spread out across 14 time zones. Because my colleagues and I work for the same managers and see each other on a regular basis, and because we share a common culture in the organization’s goals and values, I barely think about the geographical distance between our offices. I know my workplace is not the only one working in this way, but I’m sure there will be a lot more in the future. Wouldn’t it be great if, for example, universities were spread out more across the world? So that students could take their different classes in places that are closer to the specific topic? I think there are universities that are already doing this (like John Hopkins/SAIS and Columbia University) but maybe there will be more in the future…

While waiting for their call, I’m studying Russian grammar and vocabulary for a test that I have tomorrow. Kind of fitting, even though our call, of course, will be in English.

A Presentation on Agricultural Risk Management

Posted on February 4, 2015 by Åsa Giertz under My life, On Agriculture and Food, On Books, Movies, Education, and Conferences

One of the thing that happened during hectic December was that I was invited to hold a presentation at the Renewable Natural Resources Foundation’s congress on Adapting Food Production to. a Changing Climate. My presentation was on managing the increasingly volatile food and agricultural markets and that (video and ppt) along with those of the other speakers are now posted on their website for anyone interested. I can also recommend listening to some of the other presentations there on climate change and agriculture – it’s a topic everyone will have to care more about over the next decades!

It was also posted on the FARMD website a week or so later.

Recap and On 2014

Posted on January 28, 2015 by Åsa Giertz under My life

Sometimes, life just goes a little faster than I have anticipated and my blogging always has to pay the price for that. Actually, not that much has happened since I last posted, but I’ve had a lot of work.

In the meantime, 2014 come to an end and I tried to think of what the past year meant for me. At first, it didn’t seem like the most exciting year because my life is still very much the same as it was last year. Not bad but it somehow seems a little slower than it did a few years ago. Nevertheless, when I go through the year, quite a few things actually happened. For example, I got to see five new countries – Rwanda, Malawi, the Dominican Republic, the Netherlands, and South Africa. I also did no less than two trips to three different places in Florida this year – West Palm Beach, Miami South Beach, and Key West. So I saw a lot new place even though several of the trips I had planned did not come about last year.

Going to the Caribbean has been a dream of mine since I was little and I wasn’t disappointed. Who could with the perfect mix of paradise beaches, turquoise water, a city built by Spanish adventurers, and a history filled with pirates?

As for my work, there were no major changes in 2014, mainly because I started this job in August 2013 and I still kind of settled in last past year. However, I learned a lot about agricultural risk management, about leading teams, and about how to approach analytical tasks. I also met a lot of interesting and knowledgeable people through my work, and saw so many new places. So 2014 was a rewarding year in that regard!

I saw tea plants for the first time in my life in Rwanda.

2014 was also a year when I picked up several old and new hobbies. I learned to take better pictures and how to use my new camera. I am still not the photographer I aspire to be, but at least it was a start. Music and especially singing has always been my main hobby, but I haven’t done much of it these past years. But back in March, I found a great singing teacher whom I started taking classes for, and I bought a piano a few weeks ago, so music is back in my life again. I also started painting a little, which is something I did a lot when I was younger. And back in January, I signed up for Russian classes at work, so I am now studying Russian four hours per week since about a year, and although I am still far from fluent, I have made quite a lot of progress.

I spent several weekend afternoons painting on A’s rooftop last summer.

However, the biggest achievement in 2014 was perhaps that I finished the first draft of the book I’ve been writing on for the past four years or so. I still have a lot of revisions to make, but I probably wrote more than half of it this year, and the first draft is completed since Christmas Day.

Research for the book took me to Coney Island and Brighton Beach last summer, one of the many places that my heroine visits over the course of her summer adventure.

So in conclusion, 2014 was not an amazingly exciting year, but my life didn’t stand entirely still either! As for my mind map that I laid out in the beginning of the year? Well most of my goals were achieved with the exception of several travel destinations and with less food policy focus than I had hoped. But there is always 2015…

On the shore of Lake Malawi, which I visited not only once but twice in 2014!

A Hike in Spectacular Great Falls

Posted on November 24, 2014 by Åsa Giertz under My life

Saturday, A and I went for a hike in Great Falls National Park. Not far from Washington DC, the Potomac River runs through an amazing landscape with the state of Maryland on one side and Virginia on the other. Whenever I go there, or to Shenandoah, just out in the countryside of Virginia, West Virginia, or Maryland, I think of how spectacular it must have seemed for the first European explorers that came here. I can somehow understand how it must have confirmed their believes that earth was God’s creation, although it would have been better if they hadn’t of course. Or how the nature possessed so much power to the Native Americans who lived here. It truly does seem divine!

I think I have mentioned it before on this blog, but what has probably impressed me the most here in the U.S. are the national parks. After Jonas’ and my road trip in 2012, when we visited no less than four national parks (see my archive), I was so enthusiastic that I joined the National Parks Conservation Association and I’ve been a proud member ever since. In my opinion, the national parks are by far the U.S.’s greatest treasure!

Happy Weekend!

Posted on November 21, 2014 by Åsa Giertz under My Travels

I forgot to include this little tree climber in my post on kids earlier this week. He sat in the tree, listening in on our meeting in his village, and when we were done, he let me take a picture of him. A happy pic to start the weekend with!

The Universal Food Myth

Posted on November 19, 2014 by Åsa Giertz under My Travels, On Agriculture and Food

I saw this sign at one of the hotels where I stayed in Malawi. Apparently, this must be a universal food myth! One day when I’m bored enough, I might do some research on where the idea that you can’t go swimming after a meal comes from (rule no 2 on the board).

My grandmother’s theory was that this idea developed because people used to drink alcohol to their meals, and that made them less capable swimmers. But if this is correct, how did it reach Malawi?

Kids

Posted on November 17, 2014 by Åsa Giertz under My Travels, Our World

I think I wrote in an earlier post that kids are always the same regardless of where you are in the world. Regardless of if they have a carefree childhood or if they have to grow up too quickly, they love attention and especially from adults. Once in Antigua, Guatemala, this little six or seven-year old boy came up to me and wanted me to buy jewelry that he was selling. I said I wasn’t interested but instead of walking over to the next person in the park, he sat down next to me on the bench where I was sitting and so I started asking him a little about himself. And he just talked and talked and talked about this and that; telling me his big and small ideas for over twenty minutes before he remembered that he was supposed to work and slid down from the bench, said good bye and took his box with jewelry and moved on.

At the same time kids seem to live in a world of their own. There is always something going on in their heads that they often seem to want communicate. Now that I started carrying my camera with me, I especially see it in the pictures I’ve taken in Malawi. It’s also funny because few people in Malawi have phones with cameras and many don’t even have phones at all, but every kid that I’ve met there, even in the most remote villages, have learned that phones mean taking a photo and that they get to see themselves on the screen. So they are always eager to get in front of the camera every time I pull out my phone. Here are a few of the kids that eagerly goofed around in front of the lens on my last trip:

A Food Note from Stockholm: Sweden’s Love and Disregard for Food

Posted on November 12, 2014 by Åsa Giertz under On Agriculture and Food

I’m in Stockholm right now on my way back to the U.S. I’m just doing a quick stop to take care of a few thing with my apartment and see a few friends. It dark here now – very dark! After almost a month if Southern Africa, the darkness and cold weather is like a smaller chock, but for once I don’t have a yet lag and that’s really nice! I haven’t done much here this time so I won’t write so anything about my stay here. Instead, I wanted to just make a quick note about something that I plan to write more about later, namely Sweden’s contradictory attitude to food. I thought about it when entering a bookstore in my part of town and saw the display on the photos below, in front of three full bookcases with cookbooks.

Swedes love food and are real foodies. Our restaurants have world class, Swedish chefs have been top ranked in international competitions every year for the past two decades, and cookbooks and cooking shows are more popular than ever in Sweden. We also like to try new things and food trends come and go, while some foreign cuisines become regular family meals in the Swedish kitchen. These past years, the Swedes, just like East Coasters in the U.S., have also tried to get back to basics and dig up traditional recipes and ingredients. Baking sourdough bread was for example the thing to do in Stockholm a year or two ago (I’m not sure if it still is, things come and go so quickly in Stockholm). In addition to this, Swedes are relatively concerned with the environment and do buy ecologically produced products and look for Swedish produced meat when they go shopping.

So what’s the catch? Well, Swedes have very little interest in agriculture and food production. Less than 1 percent of our GDP comes from agriculture and less than 1 percent of the workforce is employed in farming. Sometimes when I go shopping in our grocery stores, I think that people must have forgotten what fresh fruits and vegetables should really taste like because otherwise they wouldn’t buy most of what is in there. People are unwilling to pay the real cost of production and so a lot of our food is imported, also when it comes to products that are traditionally produced in Sweden. It is really ironic in some ways, given our eager interest in food and our interest in cooking and in trying new things. It seems like some groups and some geographical areas are waking up, but when I’m in ICA or Coop at home in Birkastan, I wish change would be quicker!

There are of course historic reasons for this complete disinterest in agriculture among Swedes and most of our politicians. I will write more on this topic soon.