Life on the Rails

[Admiral Yi]

What does Sofia do in Michigan?  Are there still bureaucrats to be hustled sweet-talked?

[Savonarola]

What does Sofia do in Michigan?  Are there still bureaucrats to be hustled sweet-talked?

Her role, right now, is to run lab tests in Florida.  This may change as the project heats up.

GE is a products oriented company; but my teams role is projects.  We don't have a standard template for a project and we've never done two the same way.  When one project ends we have a number of people who don't necessarily have a role in any another project.  This is where I was at the start of this project, my background is in radio and traffic analysis.  It's also where Mike was, his background is in project management.  Right now Sofia has low level tasks on two projects, but that will probably change we get either new projects, or the projects she's on become more desperate for resources.

This will probably change under Alstom, since that's more of a projects oriented company.  I assume they have more standardized roles.

[Admiral Yi]

What in her background, apart from speaking Spanish and having been born in Colombia, fitted her for the Colombian fixer role? 

[Savonarola]

What in her background, apart from speaking Spanish and having been born in Colombia, fitted her for the Colombian fixer role?

Originally she was a teacher.  She still has a number of the habits of a teacher (the Italians call this deformazione professionale.)  One time we were at a meeting, she was talking and Glen interrupted her with an obviously ignorant question.  She just railed him out and then continued on with her lecture, it was like we were all back in third grade.

She had a second career as an engineer in the oil and gas industry; (among other things she worked in Venezuela during the Chavez years).  Her engineering background is in systems engineering which (as best I understand it) is determining the best way to structure the entire project.

[Savonarola]

Perspective

Barranquilla is a much larger city than Santa Marta.  It's about 100 Km from Santa Marta, but with the road conditions and traffic it takes two to three hours to get there.  One time, early in the project, Jeff and Bill needed parts to put together the signaling cases.  They struck out in Santa Marta and headed to Barranquilla to look. 

They found mostly what they were looking for and decided to have lunch in the city.  As they were eating they overheard four young women speaking English next to them.  Jeff started talking to them.  They were Canadian and had just recently graduated from college.  In celebration of graduating they were taking a trip through South America.  They had started in Colombia and were going to make their way to Chile.  Bill told them what they were doing was incredibly dangerous.  He was there with guards and there were all sorts of diseases and revolutionaries everywhere.  He tried to convince them of the danger in their trip, but they insisted they would be just fine.

In further talking to them Bill and Jeff learned that already two of them had their purses stolen and their passports with them.  They were planning to get new passports issued to them at the Canadian embassy in Santiago.  Bill tried to convince them that they couldn't cross international borders without a passport; they needed to head back to Bogota, but again they insisted they would be just fine.

Things have a way of working themselves out when you're twenty-three that they don't when you're older.  I think that the girls will actually be just fine; although there are many dangerous parts of South America especially for young women.  The public transportation in Bogota for one has a bad reputation in that regard.  There are other dangers for the traveler too.  Flavio, who was Brazilian, told us that in Sao Paolo you knew you were going to be robbed sooner or later.

It occurred to me that their account, even if we were to experience the same thing, would be different from mine.  There wouldn't be racism, dynamite fishing or elderly hippies annoying locals in their version.  Even Ken and I, who are from similar backgrounds had a very different take on the experience.  One day we were discussing the people of rural Colombia.  Ken said "They're always happy because they live such uncomplicated lives."  I replied, "They don't have clean water; air conditioning or even electricity.  There are tropical diseases everywhere.  I'll take our complicated lives."

So if we spirits have offended anywhere in this account; this is only my own personal narrative.  Everyone would find something different in such a strange land.  I found Colombia fascinating, frustrating, filled with adventure and far too hot.  It was a weird and wonderful experience; one that I'm glad to have even with all the difficulties.

[Eddie Teach]

  I found Colombia ... far too hot. 

Good thing they let you go home to Florida every so often.

[MadImmortalMan]

Things have a way of working themselves out when you're twenty-three that they don't when you're older.  I think that the girls will actually be just fine; although there are many dangerous parts of South America especially for young women. 

At least they are the type of person that people in general are more disposed to helping out. It's probably a danger in life for them to develop the attitude that everything will be just fine because for them it usually does work itself out.

[alfred russel]

I've met several people--usually europeans--wandering around Latin America. I did a guided 4 day hike in Peru once and there were 3 18 year old swedish girls along with us that were making their way through South America. They had been there a while, and were running out of money. At the end of the 4 days, it came time to tip our guides, and they decided a tip would be too much money, and with that tip money they could get bus fare to Chile and extend their trip. 

That still pisses me off.

I'm also impressed that their parents let them go wander South America on their own like that. 

[Savonarola]

  I found Colombia ... far too hot. 

Good thing they let you go home to Florida every so often.

One morning right after I got home after my last trip down in early October, I found myself thinking, "Wow it's cold."  I looked at the temperature and saw it was 68 degrees Fahrenheit.

I thought I knew hot after spending two summers in Florida; but Colombia was much worse.  The temperature wasn't much hotter than Florida (except in Bosconia and south) but the sun was just just brutal.  Every day I would drink a liter of water in the morning and every day in the field I would sweat so much I couldn't sweat anymore.

[MadImmortalMan]

Surely it's not so bad up in the mountains. Like in Bogota.

[Savonarola]

Things have a way of working themselves out when you're twenty-three that they don't when you're older.  I think that the girls will actually be just fine; although there are many dangerous parts of South America especially for young women. 

At least they are the type of person that people in general are more disposed to helping out. It's probably a danger in life for them to develop the attitude that everything will be just fine because for them it usually does work itself out.

Well, yes, but middle age is inconceivable to a young woman.  It's best not to shatter that illusion too soon.   

I didn't meet them, but I assume this is a once in a lifetime trip.  They'll probably never have that much time again to go on such an adventure.

[Savonarola]

Surely it's not so bad up in the mountains. Like in Bogota.

Not at all; Bogota was almost always chilly (around 50 degrees F) when we went through.  Medellin and Cali are supposed to be very nice, with almost always spring like weather.  My project was on the coast, though; where it is always summer.

[Savonarola]

Why?

As we were out one day one of the drivers asked me if I had a good marriage.  I replied that I did.  He asked, "So why do you keep coming down here?"

It was a good question.  There isn't additional pay for going to Colombia (except for our few hourly people.)  We did live on expense accounts down there, but a week's worth of meals is hardly a great benefit.  There isn't an advantage to your career by being down there.  Gary, who was bitter about the project and all his other travel, would say, "There's people who never leave the office; and their performance reviews are just as good as mine, and their raises are just as large as mine."  That's true, I could have taken a role and avoided going to Colombia, may people had.  If I didn't go someone else would have had to, though.  I would have felt guilty if Nick had to, given his situation with his fiancée.

Ken used to say, "A bad day in the field is better than a good day at the office."  There were many bad days in the field, but I found myself agreeing with him.  The office is a lot of shuffling papers and attending meetings.  In the field I could get things done; maybe not quickly, but it was easier to see the results of what I was doing.

There were advantages to being in the field; I learned a lot about our product and my Spanish improved remarkably.   I made good friends down there; Bill had built and incredible team.  It's a beautiful country; I think I'll always remember traveling the length of the Sierra Madre de Santa Marta Mountains.  I felt, for a moment, what Yeats called "The lonely impulse of delight."

My driver's question was the hard one, though.  I was always worried what I could do if something happened to my wife when I was two thousand miles away.  I worried that our long times apart would damage our marriage.  Being apart was the only real hardship from the project.  I love CB, I missed her very badly when I was there, and listening to her voice over the unreliable Colombian phone service was no substitute for being together.

[lustindarkness]

Why? Because we are not afraid to sacrifice ourselves to do what needs to done. And yes,  the separation from family is the hardest part of been deployed.  Last few of your posts have resonated with me, I understand the feeling perfectly.

[Berkut]

This new job in Buffalo means a lot of time away from my family.

I definitely miss my kids.