ANZAC Day the Cyprus Way

The alarm was startling at 4am.  Not so bad for me but deadly for Ross who got to bed at 12.30am due to a very busy week at work.  We woke Jessie and Angus who took it pretty well and left Sam & Anna asleep in the care of Monica who slept over to help us out.  It's a common expression in our house these days: "What would we do without Monica?" No wonder this was the first Dawn Service we've been able to attend since the arrival of children!

Because the ANZAC cemetery is located in the Buffer Zone; we were shuttled through the gates via United Nations mini-vans.  Police and military personnel all decked out in full uniform & medals had our children fairly wide eyed for that time of day.  The service was a formal, sit down affair with numerous prayers and beautiful pieces of literature being read out.  We had one veteran in attendance; a Greek Australian who had fought in the Battle of Tobruk in WWII. Many wreaths were laid and all the Dawn Service traditions were kept, helping the small contingent of Australian & New Zealanders to feel very at home. I found it an aptly reflective time, helping to put life into perspective. As the sun rose and illuminated our surroundings we looked up to see both Greek and Turkish soldiers watching over us from their respective posts on either side of the buffer zone.  The military is always visible here.

At one point during the service, a 'Turkish-Australian' police officer read an excerpt from the famous letter that Ataturk wrote to the mothers of the fallen Australian soldiers.  It was a poignant moment, especially in this place where the reality of a frozen conflict is all too apparent:

"Those heroes that shed their blood and lost their lives,

you are now lying in the soil of a friendly country,

therefore rest in peace.

There is no difference between the Johnnies and the Mehmets to us,

Where they lie side by side, here in this country of ours.

You, the mothers, who sent their sons from far away countries, wipe away your tears,

Your sons are now lying in our bosom and are in peace.

After having lost their lives on this land,

they have become our sons as well."

Despite the kids getting a bit cool throughout the service, they were both very attentive and we were glad they came.  The promise of the "Gunfire Breakfast" afterwards was enough food for thought and, I suppose, 'thought for food' kept them quiet.  We sat with a few sergeants from the British Military, hearing stories of their various posts which change every 2yrs. No doubt Cyprus is not a hardship posting!  Their children attend Boarding School in England, providing them with a home away from the ever-changing family home. I felt quite fortunate to live here and have all our kids with us. After a quick feed, it was time to get off to work and school.  No ANZAC Day rest allowed here.

'Twas a morning to remember...stepping out of our normal routine to remember those who served and sacrificed so many years ago.  Lest we forget.

My weekend in Agia Napa (by Jessie)

Uncle Graham, me and Anna

On Saturday we went to Ayia napa for a weekend. The drive was 1 hour and 15 minutes. In the car I was complaining because we were wasting our whole afternoon looking for a hotel with adjoining rooms and at a good price. I kept on saying that I wanted to stay in a 5 star hotel and that it had to have full board. At last we ended up staying in a village called Panthea village with 4 pools, a sauna, a spa, a restaurant and over 10 water  slides that opened the day after we left!!!!

On Saturday night we ate at the Flintstones restaurant-a real hoot that was!

On Sunday we had a swim in the pool and then dad, Anna and I went to the airport to pick up our dads cousin uncle Graham. When we got home we had another swim and the drove up to the big church on the headland and then looked at some sea caves. After that we just drove to the harbour and got an ice-cream.

When we were leaving, dad,uncle graham,Angus,SAM and Anna drove back to the village and mum and I went for a drive to try to find a nice restaurant to go to for dinner. We got back and decided that we would just go to the buffet at the hotel. After dinner uncle graham went back to catch up on some sleep and the rest of us walked across the road to the fair to have a ride each. Angus and Sam went on the ghost train and mum,Anna and I went on the calm Ferris wheel. The next morning we had breakfast and then had a swim and then headed off to the beach. The water was SO, SO, SO clear. There was a cafe and the view from it was just gorgeous!   Here are some pictures of the view and the beach.

The view from the cafe.

How clear the water was.

Some sea caves.

Just the beauty of it!

Dad feeling the glory of diving in on a 30degree day!

The sea caves on a grey day.

Mum and Dad being romantic in the ocean.

Learning from failure

Last week I travelled to Jakarta and West Kalimantan in Indonesia for some leadership meetings and to visit a number of remote education projects.  It's always good to spend time visiting projects in another region, particularly to hear from communities and staff about successes, failures and various programming models.  The communities we visited were located in Northwest Kalimantan, and are implementing an education approach in several of their schools called AJEL (Active, Joyful, Effective Learning).  AJEL has been jointly developed with UNICEF and is being piloted in a number of schools across Indonesia.  Central to the AJEL concept is a high level of community engagement and ownership in the education process, as well as a strong investment in teacher training.  Many of these communities historically have had very low levels of education attainment, with many children leaving school at a very young age to end up as workers in palm oil plantations or illegal mining operations.  Both these industries have had disastrous environmental impacts in Kalimantan, so the development of alternative economic opportunities is necessary to try and break the current cycle.  Increased education attainment levels for children is key to facilitating these alternative opportunities.  

The AJEL concept has been very successful thus far, although evaluation on longer term results can only be assessed once the projects have been running for several more years. This model and approach to education in rural poor communities has application in other parts of the developing world, so we all benefitted from the field visit.  Assessing impacts, success and failure in development projects is a contentious area, as impacts (positive or negative) in these projects are often highly qualitative.  What is clear though, is that whilst many development projects have significant and lasting positive impacts for communities, there are others that fail in the longer term due a range of internal or external factors.  

Effective and comprehensive community engagement and ownership from the outset of a project is a key success factor consistently identified in project evaluations.  Seems obvious, but there are still countless projects in play around the world with Government and NGO implementers that fail to address this basic principle.  It is critical for implementing agencies to invest heavily in project evaluation, and to learn from success but even more so from failures.  I was challenged recently by the TED talk below, which profiles a case study of Engineers Without Borders, and their experience and perspective on project failures.  We need to understand that failure is not a dirty word, but rather is an intrinsic aspect of longer term success and impact.  I think this also equally applies for the corporate and non-profit sector.  The talk is about 13 minutes long, but worth watching if you have the time.

In addition to project visits in West Kalimantan, we also visited an urban development project in the slums around the harbour in Jakarta.  People in the area make their money collecting and processing garbage from the mounds of refuse that surround the harbour.  Pretty confronting stuff, but it was remarkable to visit a community centre in the midst of this poverty where children meet, learn drama and music, study, play games and also develop and lead a range of projects to improve the wellbeing of children in the area.  I am always humbled and challenged to visit these types of communities, and I often think of Jesus' words in the sermon on the mount, and that he was speaking to children and communities such as this.


"Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven".


Happy Easter.
  

A Week of Bikes

With Ross currently in the jungles of Indonesia, it was a momentous Sunday for Sarah getting out on the BIKES.

Now that the outdoor weather has arrived, we decided to get all four children Biked Up.  We had a good start with Sarah getting a bike for her 40th last November, Anna always up for any activity (on the back) and Angus loving riding his BMX around the park with his mates.  Sam was ready and willing to come off his training wheels and Jessie promised that, if given a bike, she would ride it regularly with Mum to the bakery and enjoy some special big girl time.

Last weekend, we went about formalising this coming of age for Sam by telling him that he needed to earn his helmet by sitting a test to get his Park Licence (ideally meaning that he would not harm anybody in the park whilst riding his bike).  Sam was right onto it and counted down the days until The Test.  Here he is being crowned with his new helmet and getting  ready for his inaugural first park ride!

Jessie always loves new things, especially if it's bought from the shop specifically for her, so the concept of a shiny new bike was more than appealing.  A shame we couldn't re-inforce the skill of 'waiting' and 'anticipation' and give it to her on her 10th birthday in late August....but the ulterior motive to get all 4 kids out on bikes during spring needed to prevail.  We also remember all too clearly the 'wait' she (and all of us) endured last year to get her ears pierced and we wouldn't want to repeat that again.  Parent survival I think it's called.  Anyway, here's Jessie with her new bike:

And now, to cut a long story short, today was something to celebrate.  I managed to load up the car and the bike rack with all the necessary equipment and take all 4 kids for a ride BY MYSELF.  What freedom to be able to get out of our apartment and the busy streets and ride safely for ages through bushland and around a huge lake.  Jessie spoke to my heart when she said "hey Mum, this is quite fun...maybe we could do this more in the school holidays".  You bet.

However, it wasn't all plain sailing.  The first 200m of the bike ride made me pause and question what I was undertaking.  A few drops of rain were beginning to fall, Sam had never ridden more than about 800m in circling our park next door, Angus had already shot off ahead, Jessie wasn't 100% sure of the gears and, well, I hate to admit it but I couldn't understand the trail map.  After dealing with the wide variation in riding ability and confidence, it was all worth it in the last stretch back to the car when Sam was pushing hard on his pedals singing his Mary Poppins song and he said delightedly "look Mum, I just follow the path!"

Before I go, I really need to record Sam's courage on the bike ride today.  His first long ride, first time on undulating and sometimes bumpy ground, no gears on his bike...oh, what a trooper.  Despite the tears when he suspected we were lost (quite perceptive of him really) and that we might be riding into the night (yes, quite possibly) and then Mum made him take a short cut across the bush (that was the last straw) he pushed on bravely and made it back to the car for some cake.  Wow.

It's these times in life when I wouldn't swap being a Mum for quids.