Somehow I’ve reached the final week at Barefeet – where on earth has the time gone?! I’m not sure how I’m going to be able to cope with the peace and quiet of 33 Holborn, having been subjected to spontaneous drumming and dance performances in the office here over the last month (team, you better start brushing up on your moves to help with the adjustment)!
For some reason Zambia has turned me into an insomniac (I’ve seen 1am most nights) and those of you who know me well know that I not only love my sleep, but I also need my sleep. Without it I am a total bear with a sore head, so has been a bit of an ongoing challenge for me (understatement of the century). Nobody be offended when I say the thing I am looking forward to seeing the most when I get home is my gloriously comfortable bed.
Last week was spent finalising the sponsorship proposal templates which I’ve put together for the team so that they can tailor their approaches to each of their sponsor prospects, building a prospect database, putting together a ma-hoosive excel planning spreadsheet covering all aspects of the Festival and a million other supplementary checklists. I heart Excel, so was good to work with something familiar having spent a few weeks feeling around in the dark a little. It was BUSY but the team seem to be happy with the documents I’ve put together, so I’m feeling positive that they’ve now got the right tools to be able to execute on a really powerful Festival this year. We have decided on the theme of ‘Infinity’ in honour of the everlasting impact that Barefeet have on the vulnerable children’s lives and as a symbol of empowerment for those young people. Debs from Octopus’ Marketing team has also volunteered to help design the look & feel of this year’s event based on the theme, which they are incredibly grateful for (as design expertise is fairly scarce in Zambia), so they are really looking forward to her input!
Lusaka is prone to frequent black-outs, which seem to occur at totally sporadic times throughout the day. Last Wednesday the power was out for the whole day until around 11pm, so I had to seek out a coffee shop with a generator in order to get some work done for the day. Not a total nightmare, as the coffee was pretty decent for Zambian standards, but not ideal when it means no lights and no fans! The power also went out on Thursday evening just before I was hopping into bed. I managed to tuck myself inside my mosquito net with the aid of my iPhone torch and was trying to drift off the sleep when I felt something crawl on my leg. I flicked whatever it was off and then fumbled around in the dark for my phone to shine the torch around. THERE WAS A MASSIVE COCKROACH RIGHT BESIDE MY PILLOW!!!! I bailed out of the bed by ripping the mosquito net out from under the mattress and had to use all my power not to scream the house down. I managed to hunt down a can of bug spray which had a couple of squirts left in it, at best. Sods law, when I got back to my room the little bastard had disappeared from sight. I stripped all the sheets off the bed, shook the pillow cases and still nada. Just when I felt defeated, I spotted him underneath the cabinet – good night, cockroach. Not cool, Africa. Not cool...
For my last weekend in Zambia I took a teeny-tiny propeller plane (an hour of me, white-knuckled) to Livingstone to see what all the fuss was about our there (apparently there's some famous water feature or something)?!...
The Falls were absolutely breath-taking – nature at its best. The sheer force of the water is incredible, with the spray leaving you absolutely soaked (not a bad thing given it was a toasty 36 degrees the day I was there). It’s something that I’d implore everyone to go and see if you are lucky enough to have the option. To top it all off, whilst on a boat cruise of the Zambezi, I was absolutely delighted to see some elefunks emerge from the undergrowth and jump into the river for a swim. So special to be able to see them frolicking in their natural habitat and an amazing end to my last weekend in Zambia.
