Coming back to reality

After more than two months in India, wedding hopping and catching up with good friends and good food, I fly back to Johannesburg in less than a week. Usually after this much time travelling, I'm itching to get home....but right now, I'm oddly ambivalent. Perhaps because Nagpur feels about as much like home as Johannesburg does, perhaps because of all of the not-so-fun chores that are waiting for my return, from dentist visits to construction in my flat, to trying to become gainfully employed....And of course, the very unsettling dilemma of how to create a nurturing space for a baby in my current Johannesburg life will start becoming much more real. So far, in a different life on a different continent, it's been a comfortably academic question - pondering with supportive friends about choices, crime, finances, difficult relationships and returning to school all being distant curiosities to muse about over tea. From here, I feel very calm about it all. In a week, I'll need to start navigating everything. Eish!

Still, a part of me is looking forward to getting back....cooking for myself, seeing good friends I've been missing, catching the tail end of summer, getting some 'thinking' work done that's always hard on the road, and tackling all those back burner things that always build up while away.

You can't see through the phone

The job search is going much better than expected. So well, in fact, that I've switched modes from 'Oh no! I'm about to be an unemployed single mother, my life depends on finding someone, anyone, who will hire me!' to realising that I need to think a bit about where and how I want to work.

I have been thoroughly spoiled by several years of complete freedom in my job; no physical office, and no fixed hours. I've internalised this working culture so much that the idea of going to a place, most days, to do something I could most likely do equally effectively from home at midnight on a Tuesday, seems ludicrous. Not that I think every job in the world should decentralise; more that I'm not sure I'm psychologically ready for a normal office job.

I realised this well into the recruitment process for a couple of positions. Plus, while telephone interviews meant that the issue of pregnancy didn't come up at all, I also realised that I really wouldn't feel good going on maternity leave a couple months into a new position. It's nice to know that legal protection is in place to allow it....but it would also be very disruptive, to me and the organisation, and I can imagine it creating a lot of bad will on all sides.

There has to be a better solution...something that will allow flexibility to stay with the baby, prevent me from going broke, and not make anyone feel cheated. I suspect the solution will be back to school for a year of PhD progress, if I can scare up any money for it.

Bottom line: I think I might be nuts for not taking the first job I was offered.

No Happiness in India?

I've been tasked to do some of the preparation for a research trip to Bhutan to study the economics of happiness. Due to logistics of the project (and the high cost of spending time in Bhutan), India will be the launching pad for most of the work. So, in my remaining weeks in India, I'm to have some preliminary discussions with various 'relevant' people in India doing research on alternative economic development models generally, and the economics of happiness and Gross Happiness Index of Bhutan specifically.

The economics of happiness, while perhaps not a core topic of research most places, is also far from a fringe idea. Over the past 30 years, it has made the news, been discussed and criticised, and had think tanks and academic programmes founded around it. Documentaries and TED talks extolling the virtues of economic localisation use some kind of quantification of 'happiness' as a departure point. While it's not a yet a particularly cohesive field of study, there are emerging theories and debates (equality is important. So is the environment. It's harder to figure out what culture is).

So, I was enthusiastic about getting the ball rolling. The problem is, the ball game doesn't seem to interest Indian academics much. I can find virtually no evidence of work being done on the economics of happiness - or even really different models of economic development. Why not? Is there some agreed on vocabulary about 'Gandhian economics' that plays this role, and I just don't know about? Has the spurt of rapid economic growth distracted all academic discourse on economics in India? Is it considered to 'fluffy' for more cash strapped universities?

I'm quite surprised that from the intellectual home of 'Development as Freedom', more isn't being said on this. I'd welcome any leads, or insight into why they are so hard to find...

Incubating in India

I'm sure everywhere in the world has pregnancy related traditions, I'm just lucky enough to get quite a span of them in this particular incubation period. In America, the message seems to be to carry on with your normal routine, but be a bit more virtuous (exercise more, eat better).

A common thread between South Africa and India is the need to keep the right balance of 'hot and cold'. In either place, there's no sitting on the floor. However, in India, temperature extends to food as well, and I'm discouraged from a variety of 'hot' foods - papaya and ginger, for example - and stuffed with ghee instead. Happily, I'm so well cooked for that just about anything could be added or subtracted from my diet and I'd still be round and happy.

Exercise is more or less banned (beyond puddling around the terrace), as are locking and unlocking things, and things that might be 'jarring', like taking auto rickshaws, or picking up anything heavier than a newspaper. I haven't bothered to announce that when I get back to Johannesburg, I may well be packing up and moving flats, on my own....scary thought, and a post for another day.

Job search with a belly

I found out the same week that the organisation at which I've spent the past four years of my career is running out of funding, effectively ending my contract in March. And that I'm expecting a baby. I had been thinking I was up for a change, but I was thinking more along the lines of getting a cat. Or a house plant. Well, life's full of adventures! I have loved working at GCAP; it has been an ideal fit for me; but I'm feeling increasingly positive about the idea of getting new experiences as well. GCAP's financial woes are typical of the sector at the moment; and advocacy organisations particularly. I wonder what the knock-on affects for civil society will look like in a few years time?

Job hunting when the economy is getting so much bad press is intimidating. The prospect of job hunting while 6 months pregnant equally so. I have only started the preparatory work, seeing what organisations in my line of work are hiring and updating my CV. But, it should definitely be an interesting ride. In America, many people advise you not to disclose your pregnancy during the job search, since it puts the company hiring you at risk for illegal discrimination. While such discrimination is equally illegal in South Africa, apparently after your 5th month, you are legally required to disclose your pregnancy to your potential employer (not that there would be much hiding it, in my case, unless the interviews were all telephonic....). I'm curious to see how it will be received. I certainly don't expect to be offered my dream job until after the baby is born (though I may be surprised).

Multinational Blob

Few things are more challenging then negotiating a pre-natal appointment in a foreign language. I have newfound respect for people who do this kind of thing every day. The process for figuring out how to get referrals and lab work done is intimidating, even with the help of the gynecologist next door! The 'normal' scheduling and testing routine is slightly different, which leads to initial results looking a bit 'odd' to lab technicians, always intimidating.

Perhaps the biggest lesson is that in India, it's illegal to tell expectant mothers the gender of their child, because selective abortions are so common. This means that the flavour of baby is going to remain a surprise, at the very least until I get back to South Africa. I've been assured that this doesn't have any impact on the baby shower being planned....you aren't supposed to get clothes for the baby before it is born anyway.

Blog Phase 2

Part of the reason this blog fizzled out is because my research in Lubumbashi fizzled out. I concluded that I had proposed an impossible project, and much of the last year was spent finding a way forward. All roads led to relocating my research in South Africa. While I am now restarting fieldwork closer to home, this is intimidating for a number of reasons.

I've always been quite happy with my clear status as an outsider. I can't vote, I've worked for organisations with an international focus, and I consider myself exempt from participating in public political debates. I'm interested in South Africa and try to keep across the news, but always defer to what South Africans think of South Africa.

I shifted my research here rather grudgingly, and still hadn't quite come to terms with the idea that I would now have to say things about the country that I live in. I find this changing rapidly, as I simultaneously come to terms with the reality of raising a child in one of the most unequal countries in the world. Somehow, having the well being of my (future) child tied up in this country gives me much more incentive (and legitimacy) to know more, and talk more, about what works and what doesn't.