Smh In The Wild

Four years old and still growing but in which direction are we going ?

SMHprojects is four years old today and still growing into a happy and healthy little company. Turnover is up again this year but more importantly it is that the profit that has risen modestly and will match the inflation that our home life is experiencing from ever rising energy bills and a growing teenager to feed.

New customers have appeared which is always great for your feeling of insecurity and worry that you are living on the halo effect of your past employed life. The forty something guy who used to work for Flamingo is not the reason I am employed anymore but is still a big part of why I am employable and should not be forgotten.

I have watched people that I know leave good companies and be successful consultants and we all need a good contract to start us off. It is almost invariably related to what we did while employed and when that contract ends our skills and relevance that made us attractive have also then faded. The year three slump that I feared as the initial start up contracts passed by has not materialised this year and I am feeling more confident for 2012. Around me the debt crisis, death of the Euro and impending gloom covers the daily news and feeds my paranoia that the SMHprojects train will reach the buffers but I simply have no evidence to back this assumption up.

I enjoy having a little company that employs a few people from time to time and has a certain scale and mass. Although much of the turnover is paid out to Air France or Hilton Hotels the passage of invoices through the company seems to keep pace with the money going out and leave some to feed family homer. Its not as if I have built anything that has any asset value or physical presence outside of the heap of paper on my desk but somehow the end of year statement is a little flag fluttering on my fragile sand castle for this year.

18 business trips since January has led to 87 days away from home which amazingly is three less days than last year but not a great deal better. The balance of the trips was actually worse as they were compressed into the first seven months which is reflected in why I was able to do a years turnover in only 9 months ! - 30% of your time away from home before the summer holiday arrives is a serious miscalculation by any standards and one lesson I have to heed next year.

For anyone counting the carbon footprint (which I don’t) I covered 110,839 miles in various airplane seats visiting 22 different cities and 14 countries but only ever passing briefly through a hotel lobby or darkened cold store or warehouse on my way to sending another invoice. It seems that I am unable to decouple the travel mileage from the company profit at the moment. I am sure it is still down to a lack of confidence in my ability to write down my expertise instated of “performing” at meetings that forces me to travel more than I should.

Despite some lessons and soul searching over the summer break it is starting to feel like this jobbing sabbatical may last longer than I thought four years ago. (First Day - New Job) 

2012 is looking promising and I need to concentrate on quality rather than quantity. More work that pays more from less travel is the goal for 2012 and try and leverage my experience of the last four years into more paid work from paper and less from voice. – Easier said than done for sure but one that I have to remind myself if this is to be anything more than a fifth year of hamster wheel activity.

Christmas is coming to Nairobi

A long flight to Nairobi and an early start to get back to the airport tomorrow for my Joburg flight. This is the Hilton Nairobi which is like stepping back a decade. Jaded, faded and down right expensive but I need a hotel close top the airport. The internet is by scratch card from the business centre on the ground floor, my room is on the fifteenth floor, I am trying to check in online for the flight tomorrow but they want $50 cents a page to print. The wireless in my room is not strong enough to connect and there is no socket connection. I am going up and down in the lift like a rat in a trap.

The executive lounge is about to close but I paid my $300 dollars and I am going to get some free booze before they go. I have finally printed off my cards for tomorrow and will try and shove two large glasses of red wine in my face before they throw me out for the night.

Traditional Frankfurt Christmas Market– In Birmingham ?

 

As kitsch as it certainly is a German Christmas market cannot fail to stir the festive soul even the hardest of Pah-Humbuggers like me. Row after row of cutesy wooden huts offering absurdly large sausages, spiced wine, wooden toys and cow bells. Its hardly a celebration of modern German culture but it is what the season demands and there seems no shortage of cities that are happy to beam-in a Christmas Uber-fair to boost the atmosphere in our high streets now depleted of optimism and atmosphere.

After about twenty minutes of being here in foot crunching pain and rib bruising crowds I can only think that this market is too large and in the wrong place. After you have literally pushed and shoved through the crowds trying to stay together and not get swept away in the wash of (or unwashed) people you browse the the first five familiar stalls that you came looking for. Then you have really seen it all. Its not unique artisan crafts but more and more of the same as you keep looking for something special and something better. The massive crowd funnelled and squashed between the shop fronts and the B&Q sheds makes you feel like human toothpaste as you are reluctantly squeezed along with the will of the crowd. No time to browse or to wander along snow lined cobble streets we are just a moving meat filling in the jostling bad tempered bratwurst of humanity. It is Saturday and peak time, but the reason for the crowds does not lighten this disappointing experience.

I keep trying to smell cinnamon and wine but only get cigarette smoke from iPod and bling laden teenagers foul mouthing each other in Ali-G speak. I really want to eat Black Forest Gateau made from a secret family recipe handed down through the generations but had to settle with defrosted carrot cake from Brakes Bros catering in Northampton. My motorway cafe cake was served up (chucked onto a plastic plate) by the same grumpy eastern European teenager employed by a local labour agency emblazoned on his T shirt. Behind him three of his friends argued, texted and generally looked forward to closing time while the rubbish piled up and the makeshift trestle tables and became awash with spilled drinks from plastic cups. No Ho,Ho,Ho, not Santa hats and not even a paper plate with holly on it – just F.O. attitude and fifteen quids worth of frozen cake served from a hand with a blue plastic glove on it. – That's not traditional that's just normal crappy UK.

Last year we went to London and the parkland setting was better. Perhaps the darker skies, colder weather, but definitely the bigger space made a difference. You could smell the sausages cooking, the spiced wine steaming and there was a lot of atmosphere. I know that trying to stage a traditional German market in Birmingham staffed with grumpy underpaid Lithuanians must be a challenge but its time that someone realised that “biggest” and cheapest may not be the most important components. – Someone needs to care !

Someone needs to try and find some real Germans with a smile, some accordion music music played by musicians and (that is not rapper based) and try to create some atmosphere. Perhaps I am asking too much and should go to Germany to find a traditional German market ? – Seems a bit obvious now as I nurse my swollen feet and try to feel charitable about Christmas.

Long wheelbase and eleven wheels

Rutland water and the first trial with the new Electric bike that we bought yesterday. Peter has all the energy that a twelve year old should have and as I am past the being sick in the hedge unfit stage of cycling Sue needs a little help to keep with us. We all enjoy a cycle to the local pub when caravanning so today is our first experiment with powered pedals. Cycling to the pub may not be an an adrenaline fuelled lycra-fest but its a great way of getting some fresh air with a beer or two built in for good measure.

First outing with the tow bar bike rack was about 75% successful and still needs a few adjustments with the big spanner but overall we are good. I won’t miss lifting three bikes on to roof of the Volvo and I certainly would not have been able to lift the new powered bike above my head !

As we headed out this morning with the bikes on the back of the Land Rover it felt like holiday (again) and I could have just kept driving all the way to Dover and then down to France. I keep wondering if late autumn in France is log fires, autumn fruits and seasonal food or just a another reason for them to close the shutters and bars and leave the visitors to wonder if they all left town.

Perhaps one year I can take this photo by a a lake in Provence and not in Northamptonshire ?

World Toilet Day–but I am celebrating early

About 4am this morning a familiar rumble in my guts told me that I should head to the bathroom quickly. Some two hours later I ventured back to bed. I checked the time on my phone and noticed a new tweet from the Gates Foundation about World Toilet Day !

The World Toilet Organization – Yes it does exist - created WTD to raise global awareness of the struggle 2.6 billion face every day without access to proper, clean sanitation.WTD also brings to the forefront the health, emotional and psychological consequences the poor endure as a result of inadequate sanitation. On November 19 we are all encouraged to stage events to raise awareness and cash for projects to bring better sanitation to developing countries and the global poor.

One idea on the website is to hold a sponsored toilet sit in a public place – not I hasten to add a functioning toilet or you will end up getting arrested or approached by some strange people !

Well …. If today continues as it has so far I may be up for a few quid for my efforts..

Plane spotting

If you have been up since 2.30 am the brain does funny things, it starts to go off in odd directions as you fight the urge to sleep and block out the noise of the departure lounge. So here is the thing…..

I have been to Kenya and back six times this year on this plane in the same seat….

How do I know ? – well its called ‘Lima’ and of course you would call a plane ‘Lima’ if it is flying to Kenya and not Peru ?

Now – given that I have been to Kenya and back six times on this plane (so 12 flights) and not always on the same days I can only surmise that this plane spends its whole life going up and down to Kenya. That might not be weird in itself but I assumed that planes flew around a bit and got to see lots of interesting places. It seems that poor old Lima just goes to Kenya and back like a local bus service – 9 hours there – wait three hours – nine hours back – wait three hours – etc ….

Anyhow – good old Lima is here again today and I will be heading upstairs to my seat 78K in about ten minutes its good to see a friendly face and Lima has even got a smile today ……. is that too weird ?

Where are all the people ?

Its 4.40 am and I am literally the first person into the terminal which is a bit weird. – BUT – Worse !

I have been on a car park bus which arrived in the dark and the doors opened,the driver drove me here and I got off.

I went through a boarding card check, bag scan and even a random passport inspection and all in the ten minutes

Not one word of good morning or thank you or even eye contact I think that something is spooky here. At the baggage check they didn’t even stop talking to each other to acknowledge me as my bag went through the scanner and I skipped through the metal detector portal and grabbed my bag the other side.

I can only think that through some strange force field effect that happened around Hemel Hempstead I have become totally invisible, I am completely unseen, transparent and hidden on this fine Heathrow early morning. If the shops were not all shuttered I could use my new incredible invisibility talent to steal watches or diamonds or those high prices wallets with a little bird poo logo.

What shall I do with my new found superhuman powers I wonder as I am thwarted by the heavy shop front shutters ?

In a moment that reminds me I am not just a super invisible human but still a little bit mortal I need to head to the toilets

The little Asian lady leaps out from behind a trolley the size of the ark royal and throws a plastic rope across in front of me and says “go away – cleaning” and gives me a ferocious multi directional stare from under a grey mono-brow.

Wow …that's a shame just when I was enjoying being invisible it must have worn off and everyone will see me standing here with crossed legs…

Just my luck ….

Passing round the ready rubbed

 

The senior common room at the Royal Agricultural College and I am here drinking a cup of coffee and waiting for a meeting. For a little chap that went to one of the lesser agricultural colleges and studied horticulture not “farming” I took great delight today in driving up to the front door in my HUGE land rover and parking it right outside. A sort of barbarian hoards at the gates of Rome statement – complete with a Snorkel, roo bars and a hobbit.

Its all a bit silly really and wholly in my head but I can’t help breaking a smile as I see the son’s and daughters of Britain's landed gentry walking around outside. This Cotswold college does some fantastic stuff on global agriculture and in my view is genuinely world leading on food production but the Barbour jacketed ruddy faced students (both bull and cow) that roam around outside could not be more English-shire if they tried.

I had a great lunch, a nice meeting and confirmed my view that these chaps are just an amazing best kept secret.  Then I got in my Landy and roared down the tree lined drive.. still smiling …

The last time I was here was in 1983 when we stole the principals parking sign, lost 23-14 in rugby and went home in the mini bus…. How time flies.

Bordering on the ridiculous

All the talk about relaxing the border checks this week seems to mask a whole series of questions over efficiency. I travel through Heathrow almost four times a month and never have what the agencies might call a “satisfactory experience”

Last year they got rid of the eye scanning machines that allowed pre-registered people to get through. There was a four month delay before they replaced them with the face recognition machines. – Why ?

The face recognition machine machines are technically open to everyone with a the new biometric passports with a computer chip in them. But those who do not travel often simply don’t know how to use them. There is a strange symbol that looks like a mobile phone sim card but does anyone know what that is ? Elderly passengers, families with small children and most often non English speaking (but English passport holding) passengers frequently stand in front of the machines totally bewildered as computer generated voices say “step forward, move closer, move backward”

All this while the border person who sits behind the machine watching the pantomime and looking disinterested talks to a friend about not having a tea break. – No, I am not making this up this is normal practice. I raised the fact with one of the agency staff that the machines are always broken and was told by the passport checker “Its a good thing or more of us would be out of a job” – Good grief !

There is now a system operating where you join the long line of EU passport holders and then about half way along the line a disinterested border agency person checks your passport type and sends you to the face biometric machines by lifting the elastic barrier. So you still have to wait 20 minutes in the general line to get to the otherwise empty machines. – Why ?

There is a fast track lane for business class passengers but only if you are not a UK passport holder. We must be the only country in the world that gives preferential treatment to foreign business class passengers but not our own citizens. There is a fast track in departures for everyone meaning you can have priority to leave but only the Brits have to wait to get back in ?– Why ?

Why can’t there be a UK passport only lane, a business class lane, let’s get the frequent flyers through quickly by bringing back the iris scanner that is languishing in a basement somewhere.

My least favourite thing is the obsession with the elastic barriers. Quite often there are three people sitting at the nine desks and another three people fussing over moving the elastic barriers around to marshal the growing queues. You quite often see three of them trying to work out which sections they have to move to make the lines work. Its like they are doing the quick logic puzzle in the back of the Sun newspaper or playing a computer game. As they stand there and debate the line grows and they then have to run around and direct people up longer rows to buy some time to rethink their strategy. If those three people just went and sat at the desks the queues would not exist !

The agency staff will, not take your passport from you if it is in a cover or a wallet. There is an obsession with making you take it out of the wallet and pointing at the signs and sighing if you dare to approach them with your passport in a travel wallet. – Why ? – What's wrong with a little customer service and a cheery welcome home !

If they know there is a flight from Japan at 2pm there should be a Japanese interpreter ready at 2pm not some bloke with a strong Indian accent from Hounslow shouting at them “DO YOU SPEAKY ENGLISH”. In America who have much stronger checks than UK you frequently hear announcements notifying staff of flight arrivals and calling linguists to particular entry booths.

At the end of the day it’s all about a lack of customer service and a ridiculous inefficiency. We are a line of faceless cattle that they will never see again. If the lines at Coop or Tesco were like this we would move supermarkets but we cant because we are stuck with this lot.

We should replace the border agency staff with the team of teenagers from my local coop checkouts who operate a fast and efficient customer service with a smile – albeit one with pink tooth braces and very spotty faces !

Getting out of town

Sitting here eating my breakfast and still grumbling under my breath about the mess. Seeing this picture it is hard to understand why I would want to leave in a hurry but that just shows that being on your own, despite the luxury, has no benefit. Today is Saturday and to add insult to injury the sun has come out and the warmth is back. I could have sat on one of the beds all day drinking cheap cocktails and topping up the tan and no one would have complained (or known).

Instead I will be a guest of the airlines for the next 24 hours as I make my way back home to rainy England via South Africa and Frankfurt on my two least favourite airlines – Lufthansa and British airways.

Not too shabby

Windhoek is a small town despite being the capital of a large country. In the past my client has put me into B&B accommodation which although is not the usual small upstairs spare room nightmare it does limit your options. My last B&B was almost a mile from the town centre and of course there is no food. If you want an evening meal you can walk a mile into town, get a taxi or order pizza – All this is not what you need when you are here despite it being very safe to walk around.

After much gnashing of teeth from the client (and grumbling about the £100 a night price tag) I am here at the Hilton and very nice it is too. Thanks to Air France I get a Hilton Gold Card so I get a free upgrade, free booze in the lounge and access to the gym and steam room. – Splendid !

The exec lounge serves free breakfast and evening snacks saving £25 a day for meals so my grumbling client will be pleased but actually I don’t care.

Great service here with nice people, everyone remembers your name, (no grumpy and disinterested eastern European staff like in UK) quiet and clean rooms and all for a hundred quid a night. – Brill !

I wanted to go up to the roof top bar tonight but the weather has closed in and a strong wind is blowing showers so it looks like a warm bath, comfy chairs and a glass of wine watching todays premier league footy from UK – Not so bad but already thinking of how long until it is time to head home.

Sunset over Windhoek

Today was a total write off as only two of the supposed nine members of the meeting arrived. We waited for an hour, declared the meeting void and here I am back at the hotel. Thousands of miles flown, a weekend away from the family and so far I have had one meeting that lasted 45 minutes and the wasted time today that lasted 1 hour with coffee included.

Even though I get paid I cannot help feeling the frustration of wasted money and opportunity to progress projects.The only people that benefit from this inefficiency is KLM and Hilton and neither are need of development money.

I am sitting here in the roof top area of the hotel trying to enjoy the last of the evening sun and convince myself that this is nice and it doesn’t matter. But it does and I am pissed about it. The meeting today was supposed to launch a whole series of other meetings that we cannot progress this week.

I am going to drink my coke and try to get a flight home tomorrow because there seems little point in being here on what has become a rather solitary luxury prison for the next three days.

Tea in Windhoek

The cafe in the park is a little colonial outpost in Namibia where white aproned waitresses will serve you tea with lemon in the bright afternoon sunshine. Its hard to get stressed or grumpy when the temperature is almost thirty in the shade and the quiet of the park is all around.

I am one hour late after the airport pick up failed to arrived (again) and I had to call them to come and get me. Despite being almost exactly an hour late here at the meeting point the people I am supposed to meet here are still the customary 15 minutes late. I called them from the airport to say that I would be 1 hour late and have come straight here with all my bags instead of going to the hotel but they still arrive the extra fifteen minutes late to keep the tradition going. Amazing – why do I bother !

Welcome to South Africa

Just a few minutes before midnight and I am heading to the transit hotel at Joburg airport after the flight down from Nairobi. The hotel is behind the customs, passport and visa area so you go straight from the plane to the hotel. In the morning you can get your connecting flight without checking in again. This is the passport check area and it is totally empty at this time of night so you just walk through to the hotel. The seven security staff at the bag check were literally asleep but one was awake enough to wave me through the scanner as my hand luggage passed through the unmanned scanner.

Such a long way from the nonsense at Heathrow where last week I was told that my fluids bag was the wrong kind of bag because it had AVON written on it. The woman made me go and get one of the free poly bags and repack my mini tooth paste and sachet of shower gel. Same size bag – just no writing.

I am really tired after three busy days in Kenya and almost missing the flight due to the rain in Nairobi. Thankfully my flight is not until 10am tomorrow so I can sleep later than usual. It really is like being in a parallel world for 24 hours where you are locked into a world behind (and above) borders but now I am too tired to care and could sleep anywhere – even alongside the bag scanning team !

Monsoon in Nairobi

About 1pm today the sky opened and the thunder shook the hotel. The rain has just poured down all afternoon and I have brought my airport journey forward by two hours to compensate. Nairobi stops when it rains as holes in the road fill up with a foot of water, vehicles break down, get stuck and die. The Matatu buses start using the pavements and grass verges to push and shove down the side of the traffic and then get stuck themselves on kerbs and in the bigger holes on the pavement.

We have been sitting here for almost an hour already and over my shoulder I can still see the hotel. David my driver says that we still have an hour and a half to go to cover the five miles to the airport – Great !

FIFA chairman in waiting

 

I have been reading the newspapers in Nairobi today that announce with some incredulity that a chap called Sam Nyamweya is the new chairman of Kenyan football. He was apparently not supposed to win the chairmanship of the brand new Football Kenya Association, but somebody forgot to tell the electorate.

Nyamweya has been apparently dogged by many corruption allegations, but he has surprisingly been able to wade through un-scathed. His tenure at the top of the Kenyan game at the different positions is well documented and he’s almost always had to defend a scandal of some sort. Loss of prize money for the club championships; 3 bans for the country while at the old Kenyan Football Federation as well as loss of gate revenues for clubs and national team; personal bankruptcy charges and the usual political dealings have been set against his name throughout his long association with Kenyan football.

Whether the allegations are true or not it is interesting to note that the new head of Kenyan football seems perfectly qualified to become a FIFA life president in waiting ! – Well done Sam and don’t forget to vote for the English bid for the 2094 world cup !!

An upgrade is always nice

A junior suite for the price of a normal room – how nice.

The bathroom is in a glass cube with electric blinds that go down or you can just sit in the bath and watch the footy as there are speakers in there too. Its my fifth time back here this year so I guess they are starting to think that I may be a good customer. As I can’t afford the full price of this room I don’t think I will see the inside of this one again so better make the best of my three days of luxury !!