Five Weeks Left

It looks like getting to the point where we need mediators with Martha may have been worth it just to get such sweet mediators. Josh and I would know them anyway, as one of them is our internship boss and the other also works for the African Foundation for International Law and the ICTR. We met with them yesterday to talk about the ICTR and it was so awesome! Josh and I also got our first major assignment yesterday. Up until now we were just going through all the Peace and Security Council decisions from 2004 to 2006 and creating an index by country. This week, though, we are starting real stuff. Basically, I was assigned Angola and Josh was assigned Sierra Leone. Decisions were made about each country in 2004 and we are going to write a summary of the conflict and interests of parties involved up until that decision. Then we review the decision in relation to the interests of the parties.
I’m a little terrified because these are for the journal that gets published every year. Because this internship is actually intended for graduate students, it’s possible that Roland will decide we aren’t actually very good at it and assign us something else. If it works out, though, Josh will be writing for every decision pertaining to West and South Africa and I will do every decision pertaining to East Africa and the Great Lakes Region. That is sweet because it will help me with my thesis, is exactly what I’m interested in, and will be fairly impressive when I am applying to grad school and have a bunch of published law reviews. Also scary, though, because if it does get to the point where my work gets published, I will be under public scrutiny of people who actually know what they are talking about.
After the meeting yesterday I went to Emusoi to teach the girls some more dances. I’m a little bit uncomfortable with my role there because even though it’s really fun to teach them soul line dances and charleston, I wouldn’t say that it is necessarily beneficial to them. They have fun and get physical activity, but they are already awesome dancers. I want to do more facilitating discussions about peace and gender roles, but it’s so hard because my Swahili is so bad. And I am pretty sure they are putting pictures of me on the website, which is kind of weird. I am uncomfortable with the paternalistic attitudes of volunteers that come here to “help teach the Africans” and I wonder what it looks like to both the girls and the people looking at the web site. Yesterday was fun, though, and I think they are at least enjoying it.
Dad comes to visit in a week and a half! I’m really excited to have him here and show him around. It will be good for all of us to have a Dad here I think. And then there are only three weeks left. Crazy!