Corruption update

I see that Transparency International has just published the 2009 Corruption Perceptions Index (see this earlier post for more on this). It's interesting to see that Ireland has moved up the table to 14th place with 8 points (formerly we shared 16th place with the UK on a score of 7.7). The UK is now in 17th place, still with 7.7 points.

However, I'm also pleased to see that Indonesia's position has improved slightly too - up from 126th place with 2.6 points to 111th this year (2.8 points).

Somalia still languishes at the bottom in 180th place with 1.1 points while (rather surprisingly to me at any rate) New Zealand is in 1st place with 9.4 points.

Still not legal...

In my naivety, I thought that leaving the country last week to go to Singapore and returning to Maumere was all that was required to validate my new visa. It turns out that I was mistaken; this was only the means of switching from my previous "social and cultural" visa to a new single entry visa. After returning, I then embarked on the process of applying for my temporary residence permit. I met VSO's passport agent (Father Hubert, a local priest !) in Maumere last Wednesday immediately after returning and handed him my passport and a stack of documents so that he could start the process. Since then, I have visited his office on four further occasions with yet more bits of paper, most of which have to be signed by the hospital director as my employer. The latest visit (Monday morning) brought the news that I am to stand by and wait for a summons to be fingerprinted (for the third time since arriving in Indonesia) but that the lady who does the fingerprints was sick on Saturday so we're not sure when this will happen ! There must be only one person in the immigration office who can do fingerprinting.... As with most things in Indonesia, there are no prescribed forms to be completed for the visa application, just a bundle of miscellaneous documents certifying this, that and the other.

My burgeoning radio career has reached new heights since last week with the successful (well, adequate anyway) completion of my first solo broadcast on the newly established hospital radio MEDIKA 107 FM. Last Saturday, I was persuaded to present a one hour English language programme – the big difference between my previous SONIA FM broadcasts and this one is that there is no producer on hospital radio so it really is a solo effort ! I think it went ok, I even received one or two SMS requests during the programme so it looks like being a regular feature – one of the things about hospital radio, of course, is that the audience changes from one day to the next so the concept of regular programmes is not as important as on a local station. MEDIKA 107 FM broadcasts to the town of Maumere (about 10km range) but nobody knows that yet as the official licence has not arrived so it has only been publicised within the hospital! I suppose that makes me a pirate broadcaster....

On Saturday 4th July we "celebrated" Independence Day with Mik & Jess at their beachside house at Gading Beach, including mokehitos, a new take on the local hooch which went down very well !

This week is being interrupted by the presidential election which takes place on Wednesday 8^th July and means a day off work. The run up to the election (in Maumere at any rate) has been extremely low key compared to the hoop-la that I witnessed in Bali for the general election in March but it will be interesting to watch. Anyone I have asked expects the incumbent Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (known as SBY and the country's first directly elected president) to be re-elected even though they all also say they won't vote for him themselves (I'm not sure how that will work). As this is only the second ever presidential election here, I think that many people are not completely au fait with the system. SBY has two opponents for office - Megawati (former president Sukarno's daughter) and Kalla (the current vice president).

So.... "what exactly have you been doing ?"

It’s now just seven months since I left my “permanent” and pensionable employment without much of an idea of what was coming next. Maybe it’s time for a little review.....what exactly have I done ?

Well, apart from lots of sailing....

I did some lazing around.........

I travelled to Malaysia on a container ship......

I visited Singapore, Brisbane, Sydney & Melbourne..........

I sailed around the Whitsunday Islands..............

I sailed around the islands of the Andaman Sea in Thailand............

I spent two weeks on Koh Lanta and in Bangkok............

And of course, there were a few beers along the way ...........


However, in the middle of all that idleness, the one constructive thing I did manage to do (and the one which is going to have the biggest influence on the next bit of my life) was applying to become a VSO volunteer. I’m still not 100% sure of exactly what my motivations were on the day when I decided to do this, but the die is now cast and I’m very much on the critical path to departure to Indonesia next Sunday.

Watch this space for more...

The final preparations

The last few days have been a bit hectic as I make the final preparations for departure on my big holiday trip. My tickets arrived this week and the travel agency has confirmed that my ship is on schedule to arrive in Thamesport early next week. I have now booked all my accommodation and transfers (I hope), researched how I am going to get from Tanjung Pelepas to Singapore, bought supplies of five different foreign currencies (which really makes you appreciate the convenience of living in the Eurozone), and completed most of the other things that need to be done before departure. However, there have also been some recent developments which have made the process even more rushed.

Some months ago, when it was apparent that I was going to be joining the ranks of the unemployed this summer, I started to consider what I was going to do next. I very quickly came to the conclusion that I didn't immediately want to start another job similar to the one I had just finished (especially in the multinational environment). One of the options that I considered was taking on some voluntary work and I went along one evening to an information evening run by VSO. VSO is an international development charity with a very high profile in the UK, but, due to the fact that they have only recently established an office in Ireland, have a lower profile here at the moment. Having attended the information evening and spoken to some friends who are returned volunteers from other agencies, I decided to go ahead and complete the long and detailed application form. Shortly afterwards, I was called to attend an interview and assessment day and a few days after that I was told that I had been selected and would be added to their database of available volunteers. Almost immediately (much to my surprise), I received a placement offer with a very thorough job brief, description of the workplace etc. which I had some time to consider before formally declaring my interest in accepting it. The challenging part is that the time between my return in January after my holiday trip and the start date of the placement is very short indeed, in fact much shorter than I had wanted so I will have only two weeks after getting home before departing again, this time probably for about 16 months (and during that two weeks I have to attend a five day pre-departure VSO training course). I will post more about the placement in due course but for the moment, you can do some homework on Wikipedia on the likely location by clicking here.

The prospect of this placement starting immediately after I returned meant that the bill for my vaccinations climbed substantially and my vaccination certificates now run well into two pages ! While I am now up to date on almost all my jabs, it appears that the vaccination for Japanese Encephalitis is currently unavailable in Ireland.

Last night I attended my last band rehearsal for some time (I have played in The Stedfast Band for many years) and was delighted to receive a most useful present of a Sony SSB radio from my friends in the band. Many thanks to all in Stedfast for their good wishes and generosity - keep practicing while I am away !