Let's call this: "Sabbatical Day 0, Hour 0"

Today, I closed a chapter in my life, and opened another.

After two and a half years working in Rome, and five months in the Dominican, I thought it was time to try something different. Today, this evening, I start my sabbatical, until the end of the year. To begin with.

Sabbaticals are not new to me. I took the first one back in 1993, when I decided to work on an Antarctica project. I took another break in 1997, to go to the Antarctic again. And yet another one in 2006, for 13 months, to sail across the Atlantic, and start writing down some of my past adventures, both for work, and in my free time.

Some questions people ask me:

1. A sabbatical, why?
Life is too short not to enjoy it. I have always done things because I enjoyed them, and enjoyed things I did. I let destiny lead me. I have been fortunate in that respect. It always turned out OK. I always ended up in a place, doing things I wanted to do. Sure I took risks, often giving up "my secure life", for something more risky. But I always landed back on my feet. I am fortunate to have an employer who allows me to do this (even though for my first sabbatical, I had to quit my job), a supportive family and friends who understood my choices.
For all the previous sabbaticals, when the time was right, I made the call. I never thought twice, and never regretted it. Armed with the past experiences, this one was no different: the time was right, it felt right, so I took the decision. Because life is too short not to do what one likes doing.

2. For how long?
Well, this sabbatical will run at least until the end of the year, but is extendable up to two years.

3. What will you be doing?
First of all, I want to spend more time with my family. We lived together in Uganda, but as I started to travel a lot, Tine and the kids moved back to Belgium. Since 1999, we have been a "shuttling family". Up until 2006, I was fortunately to work "two months on, one month off", so I could spend a total of about four months per year at home. After my third sabbatical, I moved to Rome, where I could no longer work "part-time", so I saw the family less frequent. Now is the time to spend more time at home.
On the other hand, since about three years, I engaged quite a bit with social media. It became a hobby. And more than a hobby. I would like to see how far I can stretch the use of social media in the nonprofit sector. Almost like making a job out of my hobby.
Which is not new to me neither. Back in the 80-ies, I graduated as a printing engineer, but engaged in computing as a hobby. While I did my civil service, as a conscientious objector, I worked in an ecology laboratory making computer programs, and started to write for computer magazines. Two years later, I started a job as a systems engineer.
Around that time, I picked up ham radio as a hobby. Later on, in 1993, I quit my IT job, and stepped into the humanitarian aid sector, as a telecoms engineer. Again taking up my hobby as my job.
Now is the time to see if "my social media" hobby can be more than a hobby.

4. Yes, but practically, what will you be doing?
There are a number of projects I have lined up where I will be reporting on certain events, as "a social reporter", registering events or situations, and using that "input" to "broadcast" it on different media: blogs, vlogs, podcasts, and if things work well, pieces for TV or radio. Things are starting to shape up, so stay tuned.
On the other hand, I want to expand my network of blogs, their content and functionality. I definitively want to expand BlogTips to explore the horizon as to what can be done in the nonprofit sector with social media. How to use this new medium to bring the nonprofit sector's message. Be it for advocacy, fundraising, knowledge management or as a way to engage people.
There is also something brewing in the area of technology solutions for nonprofit causes. There are a number of ideas I have been playing around with since a while, as IT projects, where there seems to be a number of people (I call them "the good and the willing") would like to engage on.
For the rest, I have the agreement with my employer to call me in, when there is an emergency. Setting up things, heading a relief effort, that is what I am good at, and where I can contribute the best.

5. Where will you be?
I will be shuttling between Rome and Belgium.

6. How do you have ends meet, financially?
Since I started working, my family and I always made choices to live the moment. We have not invested a lot in fixed costs, like a house - we don't own a house, or any property -. When we earned money, we set it aside. When the time was right to spend it, we spent it. Money was never an issue. Maybe we were fortunate, although, there were many times where we could barely 'make it'.
During my 20 months of civil service, I earned US$150/month. Tine was still studying. There were times we did not have enough to eat. I think there have been four or five times, where we spent pretty much whatever we had. Each time, we 'started from scratch' again, but we never felt that as a burden. We always enjoyed what we did.

Picture courtesy Shot From the Hip

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Zen and the aidworker

When I started blogging back in January 2007, I discovered a number of blogs from fellow humanitarian. One of them was "Frida", who - at that time - worked for the UN in Afghanistan.
Over the years, I followed her road to (self-)discovery, until she ended up in her new life, and on her new site, under her own name "Marianne Elliott".

Marianne actively shares her experiences as a person, in the humanitarian world, enticing others to do well. For the world, and for themselves. Recently, she interviewed me about my experiences as a person, in this roller-coaster of a life as an aidworker. The interview, you can read here.

Yesterday, we did an interactive Q&A session via Twitter, together with some like-minded people. You can read through the trackback here.

Both the interview and the Twitter session made me think how often we ignore many things in life that should be important to us, getting too sucked up into the whirlpool of work. Particularly in the type of work we, aidworkers, do. Often in all of it, we forget life is more than work, and while our time on this planet is limited, we'd better make good use of it.

The timing of it all came just right. In two weeks time, I will wrap up my mission here in Santo Domingo, and since a few weeks I've been thinking what to next. I thought the time was right for yet another sabbatical. Another breath of life, before embarking in the next adventure.
 
Sabbaticals are not new to me. I took the first one back in 1993, where I decided to go to the Antarctic. I took another break in 1997, to go to the Antarctic again. And yet another one in 2006, for 13 months, to sail across the Atlantic, and start writing down some of my past adventures, both for work, and in my free time.

So, as of mid June, I am off again, for 6 months. No clear clue yet as to what I will do. Spend more time with the family, that is for sure. Shuttling between Rome and Belgium, as I want to continue being connected to work. I also want to have more time to experiment with social media and see how far I can push the Web 2.0 tools for the humanitarian cause. We will see what we come up with, and where we will end. Destiny has always been good to me, so I not worried. We will see... Life is too short to be boring. And a bit of a breather will be good.

Picture of Marianne in Afghanistan, courtesy of Marianne Elliott

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Rumble: One Thing I Didn't Do This Sabbatical

As I said before, there was no set plan what I wanted to do during this sabbatical. One thing I did think off was to write a novel. A love story partially set in Africa.
I wrote the first twenty pages in the Caribbean but never completed it. Oh, and I wrote the ending too.
I don't have a plot. Not written anyway. It is all in my head. That, and the title. Here are the first lines:

At Last the Sun Rose.

A novel to be finished. By P.Casier

At last the sun rose, in a veil of pink, orange and red, bright, and vivid. The clouds forming a low mist ring around the hills, tried to hold on as long as they could, sheltering the valleys from the warm sun to come. Wrinkles of smoke coming from some huts and villages in-between the hills mixed with the mist, creating the unique intense smell of humid wood fire –almost sandalwood - he always linked to this place. The leaves from the banana trees, the palms, the mango trees in the garden would be dripping of dew by now..
The mango tree. ‘The big one’, she called the one in the corner of the garden in his house. ‘You know, Jack, the big one, is one of the reasons why I always come here, to your house’, she once said laying with her head on his chest on the deck chairs on the terrace, ‘Him and you.. The big one always gives me shade when I want to sit here on your terrace, and you… you… give me everything else.. almost..’ Her mouth had curled into her typical mysterious smile.. Sometimes she was so difficult to follow, to understand, to grasp. Spoke in a symbolic language one moment, and was so direct in her remarks and questions at other times that it hurt. Jack remembered that moment. He had kissed her forehead and stroke her hair. The moment, that weekend had been perfect, and there were no needs for words.

The sun climbed fast, and he got out of the vehicle, looking at the sky.. ‘Where were they?’ Wagonga, from the air control tower, called him on his walkietalkie. ‘Jack, channel 14, HF’. He jumped back in the car, switched on the shortwave radio, and tuned the antenna. The background noise disappeared and he heard clearly ‘Roger Entebbe Control, runway 14, approaching and switching to VHF 118.2. United Nations UK95 out’. Good old Sam’s voice… He did not see the twin engine plane yet, but he knew which direction it would come from, and tried to focus his sight on the horizon. Once again both Jack and Sam were connected to her. Both of them had, without hesitation, taken control of the situation and done what needed to be done. ‘Lisa, my god, Lisa.’ He looked over Lake Victoria at the end of the runway, trying to spot the approaching plane, and imagined how the fishermen must be making their way for their daily catch of Nile Perch, the local delicatessen, and then tie the fish over the back of their bicycle and ride them to the market later today.
The Beechcraft plane had switched on its bright white landing lights, and for a while this was the only thing he could see, those lights, as it approached. Sam made a perfect landing, idled the pitch of the propellers and turned onto the tarmac in front of the airport building, coming to a standstill fifty meters from Jack’s car and the Red Cross plane next to it.

For a moment, there was no more Entebbe airport, no more people rushing about, getting the Red Cross plane ready. No more friends and colleagues standing around him, no more doctor and nurse walking to Sam’s plane. He just focused on the door of the plane. It swept open, and Sam, good old Sam, pulled the stairs out, and started to give orders to the ground crew. Sam came up to him: ‘Jack, come with me.’ and snapped him out of his daydreaming. No more shouting now, but a soft, considerate, determined voice. ‘Jack, she came to conscience just for a minute during the ride. She called for you. Go with her, you have my blessing. Take care of her, she is in a bad shape.’. As he turned away his head, not to show his tears, his voice broke ‘Please take good care of her, she is now in your hands. Yours and God’s.’

Jack’s mechanical and practical mind took over, as he walked to the stairs of Jack’s plane. He instructed the handling crew to take her stretcher slowly and horizontally. The nurse held the plastic bag of serum up, and slowly they moved her to the waiting plane. Before he knew it, the engines started up, and he was sitting next to her.
‘Lisa, Lisa’, was all what his heart said, whispered, shouted, cried. It was weird, she did not look different from the last time he saw her, about two weeks ago, when she left for her usual one month tour of duty in Gulu, about one hours flight north of here. A normal goodbye, a hug, a kiss, a ‘be careful’. But he forgot in this line of work, each goodbye might mean two people might never see each other again. ‘How much we all had taken life for granted. Did I really enjoy every single moment I shared with her? To the fullest? It might have all been past now, with no more future. Never a word again from her, not a glance, not a touch, not a breath’, he thought, as he touched her hand and moved a brush of her long black hair way from her face. Her face felt hot, but it looked like she was sleeping, in a soft deep sleep, resting. The doctor lifted the white sheet covering Lisa, and only then Jack saw the wound in her side, and the blood on the sheet. The deep cut from the machete.

Maybe for the next sabbatical?

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Rumble: What Better Way to Spend a Last Evening?

What better way to end this thirteen months' sabbatical than with friends? A picture from last Saturday, the day before I left home.
There are always a lot of 'lasts' before you leave. Last time shopping, last time picking up the kids from school, last Sunday croissants... This was the "last dinner". Left to Right: Patje, Tine, me, Katrien, Mark and Rosa. All friends since a long time.. :-)

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Rumble: I Am Leaving on a Jet Plane

The past two days, I spent mostly doing the last chores around the house, and laying in a hammock in the garden.
When I closed my eyes, all the sounds became so clear. The fizzling of the leaves overhead, the buzzing of the insects, the song of so many birds, the laughter of kids playing nearby.
I just lay in the hammock. Looking at the sky. At the trails of a plane.

How symbolic, laying in the cosiness of my home, looking at the trails of a plane. The dilemma of the leaving and the wanting to stay. The hollowness of the absence of loved ones leaves, and the eagerness to chase rainbows.

The pain is there. But the horizon is calling. I have to go.

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Rumble: The Sabbatical - The Day After

Ending this sabbatical once more feels like jumping into the void. Once more it feels like I am ending one period in my life, and starting a new one. Lemme see, for the… sixth time already :

• After working in a digital research company as a graphical expert, I stopped what I did to start my civil service at a university lab, as a software developer. People said I was nuts to give up my well paying job simply just because I refused to go to the army. I preferred doing a $150/month job for 20 months, rather than doing 10 months of army service (with all living expenses paid for).
• After 20 months, I returned to the company as a system engineer. People said I was nuts as I did not have a degree in IT nor in system engineering, so how could I make a career in that?
• Two years later, I started in an inter-bank company to manage their IT network. People said it was nuts, as by then I was well established within my previous company and had my career all laid out in front of me. So why change?
• Two years later, I stopped working all together, to write a book, and to organize an expedition to the Antarctic. This really freaked out friends and family. How do you mean, you will stop working. For how long? To do what? Go to the Antarctic???
• Two years later, I started in this ‘line of business’: the humanitarian work. People said “So you give up a career to help people you have never seen before? In the midst of nowhere, in the midst of danger? Surrounded by deceases and people pointing guns at you?”
• After moving through a number of humanitarian organisations, I got into my current organisation, by coincidence… And.. stayed there. (Eleven years already. Me, who never worked for a company longer than three years. Ever. This does say something my current employer, no?)

No wonder that people said I was nuts to give up my director’s position, my diplomatic status, and (in short)my professional life to start this sabbatical. And the same people now say "How come, you are going back to work, and you still don’t know what you will be doing, not even where you will be based?"

Somewhere they have a point in the last bit though.. In January I informed my employer I was coming back, but wanted a different position than the one I left in Dubai… Now, 10 days before starting, I still don’t know exactly what I will do. A test again for my philosophy of ‘trusting in destiny’. Will this pull me through once more?

If you take an objective look from a distance, here is the situation

• After one year of absence in a fast moving organisation, like ours, it is as if you start all over again.
• I will certainly have a new job, a new supervisor, a new terms of reference, and probably will do something I have not done before. “What” I don’t know yet. They will tell me when I arrive.
• 10 days before leaving, I still do not know where I will work. I only know I have to report for duty at our HQ in Rome. The rest of the information will follow. Probably it will be something that involves regular traveling.
• I don't know where I will be based (can be literally anywhere in the world).
• I don't know what to pack in terms of clothing, accessories.
• I don’t know if I will be in one place long enough, to set up a second home, you know, my own ‘living base’. ‘Normally’, I would pack my crates with the minimum furniture, cooking utensils, books, different clothes, all the nice to have stuff (my personal radio equipment, some IT stuff, video recorder, tapes, DVDs,…). But can’t do that. Don’t know where I will be going. Or if I will be staying long enough to set up a nest.
  

And it does not bother me one bit that "I don't know". Feels like jumping off the cliff -again-, trusting the parasail will open up. “Yuuuuhuuuu!” (as one of my dearest friends always says)..

So,.. ten days from now, I will leave with a backpack, a case with the minimum tools for work and a small bag with books. I will kiss Tine and the girls goodbye. And get onto that plane.

I am ready to jump…

PS: Maybe just one question: Does a parasail have an emergency chute too?

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Rumble: The Sabbatical. Stock Taking.

End March last year, I ended my tour of duty in Dubai to go on a one year sabbatical. Many people said I was crazy. I had a well paid job, an excellent office which we set up ourselves, staffed with superb people, all handpicked for the job. I had a nice car, and a diplomatic status.
“Why? Why give this all up? What will you do?”, they asked me, “What will you do after that?”. I did not have any answers for those questions. I jumped into the void. Felt I had been in this ‘line of work’ for too long, felt like ‘I had seen it all, done it all’. Time to resource.

Felt fortunate in many ways, though. I have a supportive family, even though Tine did raise an eye-brow when I told her, I would stop working for a year. I also had the financial independence to do what I wanted for a while. And had a good health. So, each time people fired questions as to “Why?”, I could answer “Why not?”. Life is too short to be boring. And boredom, routine is the one thing that kills me.

Still it was quite a shock to come back home, after years running at a high pace. Especially coming from the work I used to do: emergencies. All cool and under control one moment, and the next second my phone starts ringing, telling me about an earthquake here, a flooding there, a military coup or a civil upraising. And off went our team, and up went our working hours.. Coming back home from that environment, it felt like.. Well, how retirement probably feels…

I did not have set plans for my sabbatical. As often I don’t have set plans for anything. Things just happen. It was a test for my philosophy to ‘trust destiny’. Not that I am the kind of person sitting on the side of life, and watching it pass by. But I do trust that somewhere, I will get a sign of which way to go. A sign of a road to take. And once I get onto that road, I do tend to go all the way.
So, today, with ten days to go before the end of the sabbatical year (which turned out to be 13 months), it still feels like only yesterday I arrived back home with my suitcases and bags, shouting “Honey, I am hooooome!”. Time flies. So.. it is time to take inventory of what happened. What the hell did I do with one year of spare time?

1. Went skiing with the family in Italy. Twice
2. Went sailing with the guys from work along the Northsea coast
3. Went sailing with the family in the Caribbean for a month
4. Worked in the house (high time!). Installed a new oven, a new cooking plate, moved the washing machine and dryer, installed a completely new bathroom (ok ok, I did not do all myself, but I surely did most of the shopping and planning!), new bedrooms. Redid part of the garden (installed that wooden fence that Tine wanted me to install since ages!), planted loads of flowers (which died all during the dry spell we had while sailing in the Caribbean :-) )
5. Then went sailing again, delivering a boat from England to the Canary Islands.
6. Raced across the Atlantic in the same boat. Continued afterwards up to the Virgin Islands.
7. And finally, finally, did something I wanted to do for ten years: publish the books and short stories I had written. And while I was at it, created some additional websites.

And you know, it still feels like I have been sitting on my bumb for a year. Never pleased. Ok, I agree, there are still some things I want to do before I leave in ten days:

1. New plants in the garden
2. Install the doors on the cupboards of the sleeping room, and install curtains in the dressing.
3. Ensure all family administration is done
4. Do the last hotel bookings for the summer holiday (yeah! I will do that first)…

So now, it is time to start thinking ahead. Going back to work. Euh… What work again? Well, read about that… (ruffle of a drum) tomorrow in (more drum ruffle): “The Sabbatical. The Day After…” :-)

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