How I Ended Up Here
Thursday, November 30th 2006 - 10:17 AM
You may be wondering how i came to be working in Afghanistan. You're not the only one - i've been wondering that too!
I seem to have led a very unsettled life - particularly since i migrated to Australia from Britain in 1985. I've done a lot of travelling - overseas and around Australia - and i'd kind of got to the stage where i felt like settling down. A bit, at least...
I was living on the coast of northern New South Wales, right near a beautiful beach, and i was working for the Northern Rivers Tenants Advice and Advocacy Service, in Lismore, as a tenant advocate. Among other things, my job involved representing tenants in the Consumer Trader and Tenancy Tribunal - and i'm pleased to say i never actually lost a case!
I first got into the housing advice field by working for the Advisory Service for Squatters, in London, in the early 80s. This organisation provides legal and practical advice on squatting and other housing matters. It's entirely unfunded and run by volunteers, and it's been going for over 30 years now.
Anyway, i was lucky enough to have a good job - in an area of very high unemployment - and i was intending to keep it for longer than i usually managed to keep jobs, which wasn't very long! I was also going to TAFE ("tech college", for the non-Australians reading this) one day a week, studying arboriculture (tree surgery) - and i wanted to finish the course and get my Cert III at the end of the year. But fate - or rather, Saturn - had a different idea...
Date: 09/07/06 11:15:00
From: Gavin
To: Will
Hey Will,
Want to come to Kabul for 2 months? Paid job, radio stuff - managing a few projects while I'm away? Somewhere in July/Aug/Sept?
Gav
Date: 09/07/06 11:33:10
From: Will
To: Gavin
> Want to come to Kabul for 2 months? Paid job, radio
> stuff - managing a few projects while I'm away?
> Somewhere in July/Aug/Sept ?
I'd love to mate. But i've already got a job. I don't think they'd agree to me having 2 months unpaid leave at such short notice.
Will
Date: 12/07/06 09:04:32
From: Will
To: Gavin
Subject: Ok
Well, my team at work are all very enthusiastic and telling me to go! (Obviously hoping i'll get blown up!) So i guess there's no barrier to me going to Afghanistan, if the job's still on offer. But would early August be any good? I can't see any way to do it before that.
Will
The job was with an organisation that was building and maintaining community radio stations all over Afghanistan, and the job title would be "Technical Adviser".
It might seem like a bit of a jump from "Tenant Advocate" to "Technical Adviser", but i've always been a jack of all trades. And, over the years, i've had a lot of involvement with community radio too, among other things.
It's funny how my anarchist, activist, radical ratbag past seems to be paying off these days - in the form of well paid and interesting jobs!
But of course, it wasn't quite as simple as it first seemed...
Deirdre - the senior advocate at work - was off on leave in September and i could take two months unpaid leave, but it couldn't coincide with Deirdre's holiday - which made things awkward. Deirdre said she was happy to move her leave dates to October, but that was as far as she could move them.
I could just squeeze in two months unpaid leave between now and when she went on leave - but it would be tight and i'd have to move out of the house i was living in before i went, as the landlords had already told us they wanted us out in mid September, when the fixed term of the tenancy agreement ended.
It was going to be really difficult, as i had leave booked from Mid December to mid January and was planning to go to England for christmas. I would have to move out, go away for two months, come back for two months and either have nowhere to live or find somewhere for two months and then go away again for a month.
Discussing employment terms with Jan, my future boss in Afghanistan, she told me the pay was tax free. I queried that because, as far as i knew, i'd have to pay tax on my income there, in Australia, if i worked overseas for less than ninety days. "Why don't you come for three months?" she said. "Why don't i?", i thought.
In the end, i decided to give notice at work and go to Afghanistan for three months. I managed to negotiate a compromise with Jan about when i would go - because i couldn't face going at the beginning of August and having the massive amount of stress, finishing work, moving out of home, finding somewhere to store my stuff, etcetera, all squeezed into about three weeks. Also, i wanted to be able to go direct from Kabul to England for christmas in December.
So the final plan was that i'd go in the last week of August and stay till the end of November. What i'd do after christmas, well, that would have to take care of itself. But i somehow started to get the feeling that this three month stint in Afghanistan wouldn't be the last of it, and that i'd be back there again next year.
And so here i am. That three month period has just finished and i'm still here. I'm off to England for a month in the middle of December - and then i'll be back here in mid January (inshallah), for another six months or so.
You can see some of my photos of Afganistan at
WillKemp-Photos.com/afghanistan