Life with IRD

Since August, I have very much enjoyed working with International Relief and Development. Their work throughout the province is both inspired and affective. The people who are involved, from Coordinator down to the activists in the field, are focused and passionate about what they do. Meanwhile, on my side of things, not only is the atmosphere encouraging, but it has also left much room for personal growth and learning.

Based in Washington, IRD opened up a branch here in the Inhambane province in 2006 to work in Home Based Care. Simply put, home based care involves activists going from house to house within various communities and acting as liaisons between the seriously ill (mostly HIV positive) and the local hospital or health clinic. Currently we work with ten partner organizations that we fund and train to do the work, helping them to recognize the difference between diseases as well as giving them basic information and caring methods to both practice and pass on to clients and their families.

This past month, despite the usual office busy-ness, we welcomed a visit from a consultant from the states to assess our work and that of our supported partner associations. Our consultant, Suzanne, and I traveled all over the province to visit our partners for two days each as we assessed their weaknesses as well as strengths through interviews and big group activities with the activists themselves.

Now, having been on the road so long I’m happy to say that I myself have an even better grasp than before of things that I as a Peace Corps Volunteer might be able to offer. Currently I am already planning on trying to develop some of our partners’ programs directed towards orphans and vulnerable children; and am also working with my counterpart to set up a new financial management system modeled after one provided to us by our consultant. While these are more things that go with my job description already, I am all the more encouraged on working with our partners one on one so that we can address some of the issues that came up during the consultancy.

More specifics coming up soon… :)