Goodbye and good riddance!!!
Today was scheduled to be my last day of work ... I've had July 27th starred on my calendar for weeks now. But last Thursday, as I was hurrying out of the office on my way to Alex, Mr Zarea said there was a new project for me - editing the English-language text of a series of human-rights oriented children's books HRAAP is publishing.
"That sounds great," I told him, "but I was supposed to finish working on the 27th. I suppose I can keep working as late as July 31st, but then I must be finished, because I have a friend coming to Egypt August 1st." I was assured that this would be no problem, so left the office assuming that I'd be working until the 31st. Lame, but since I hadn't had anything else planned for those days, not a huge deal.
Monday, when I returned from my holiday, Osman and I were supposed to start working. But the whole day passed and no Osman, something I usually rejoice at, of course, but this time I found myself a bit irked. So Tuesday, I emailed Osman to tell him my timeline and ask when he was coming over to the APRO office so we could get started.
A couple of hours later, Mr Zarea comes in. "You finish work on the 27th?" Umm, yeah ... like I explained to you. "Okay, that's fine." "What about the children's books?" "Oh, no problem. Osman will do them."
Hmm ... I've seen Osman's English, but whatever. Since I know for a fact that HRAAP doesn't have an English-speaking audience, I'm fairly certain the translation is solely for the benefit of the funding donor, and if it's choppy, it doesn't matter in the least. So, once again, my end date is set to July 27th. Hurrah!
And then yesterday, July 26, I was getting a ride from Mr Zarea when he says, "Oh, don't worry about coming in to work tomorrow. You're free."
HALLELUJAH!!!! I slept until the phone rang this morning (Ghada, wondering why I wasn't at work - ooops), and I never have to go back to that stupid office and pretend to be working again!!!
I didn't expect a stellar summer experience like a lot of people are having, but I really hoped this summer would give me a better understanding of human rights NGOs - how they work, what problems they face, and what it's like to be a lawyer there.
In fact, this summer gave me NONE of that. First of all, only the translator and the accountant speak English, and neither of them are the least bit interested in human rights (although Ghada insists that she was never trained in "human rights accounting" at school, and so has to be very creative in her job - cute). The lawyers don't speak English, and don't work out of APRO. Which means, after eight weeks, I have no idea what it's like to be a lawyer for a small NGO.
Additionally, even if these factors were different - I was in the same office with a lot of English-speaking lawyers - it wouldn't have mattered, because in Egypt, emphasis is placed on finding the first job you can, and keeping it until you die. No one cares if you like what you do, and you can't even choose your university major - the schools do that by your test scores. So, this means that the lawyers aren't there because they're passionate about human rights, or even about the law - they're at HRAAP and APRO because their parents wanted them to get a job! The one lawyer at HRAAP that I talked to, through Ghada, was her sister Ensar, and she hates the law and doesn't care one way or another about human rights.
The moral of the story: do your research before excepting a position! I mean, all I've really learned from this job is that I don't really want to work in Egypt. EVER. Valuable information, of course, but when asked about my summer experience during OCI next fall, I'm not sure it'll get me too far ...
"That sounds great," I told him, "but I was supposed to finish working on the 27th. I suppose I can keep working as late as July 31st, but then I must be finished, because I have a friend coming to Egypt August 1st." I was assured that this would be no problem, so left the office assuming that I'd be working until the 31st. Lame, but since I hadn't had anything else planned for those days, not a huge deal.
Monday, when I returned from my holiday, Osman and I were supposed to start working. But the whole day passed and no Osman, something I usually rejoice at, of course, but this time I found myself a bit irked. So Tuesday, I emailed Osman to tell him my timeline and ask when he was coming over to the APRO office so we could get started.
A couple of hours later, Mr Zarea comes in. "You finish work on the 27th?" Umm, yeah ... like I explained to you. "Okay, that's fine." "What about the children's books?" "Oh, no problem. Osman will do them."
Hmm ... I've seen Osman's English, but whatever. Since I know for a fact that HRAAP doesn't have an English-speaking audience, I'm fairly certain the translation is solely for the benefit of the funding donor, and if it's choppy, it doesn't matter in the least. So, once again, my end date is set to July 27th. Hurrah!
And then yesterday, July 26, I was getting a ride from Mr Zarea when he says, "Oh, don't worry about coming in to work tomorrow. You're free."
HALLELUJAH!!!! I slept until the phone rang this morning (Ghada, wondering why I wasn't at work - ooops), and I never have to go back to that stupid office and pretend to be working again!!!
I didn't expect a stellar summer experience like a lot of people are having, but I really hoped this summer would give me a better understanding of human rights NGOs - how they work, what problems they face, and what it's like to be a lawyer there.
In fact, this summer gave me NONE of that. First of all, only the translator and the accountant speak English, and neither of them are the least bit interested in human rights (although Ghada insists that she was never trained in "human rights accounting" at school, and so has to be very creative in her job - cute). The lawyers don't speak English, and don't work out of APRO. Which means, after eight weeks, I have no idea what it's like to be a lawyer for a small NGO.
Additionally, even if these factors were different - I was in the same office with a lot of English-speaking lawyers - it wouldn't have mattered, because in Egypt, emphasis is placed on finding the first job you can, and keeping it until you die. No one cares if you like what you do, and you can't even choose your university major - the schools do that by your test scores. So, this means that the lawyers aren't there because they're passionate about human rights, or even about the law - they're at HRAAP and APRO because their parents wanted them to get a job! The one lawyer at HRAAP that I talked to, through Ghada, was her sister Ensar, and she hates the law and doesn't care one way or another about human rights.
The moral of the story: do your research before excepting a position! I mean, all I've really learned from this job is that I don't really want to work in Egypt. EVER. Valuable information, of course, but when asked about my summer experience during OCI next fall, I'm not sure it'll get me too far ...
posted by Teale at 11:20 AM
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