big back flash, badaboooumm!

5 minutes ago, a big back flash, smashed into my face, brought back the whole year in Azerbaijan, the whole mix of pictures, feelings, memories, emotions,... they still feel so fresh. Got an email from a Baku-expat-friend, who has put on paper some thoughts. Brought up again so much of things, it is difficult to believe that I am not going back to Baku, that I am not part any more of that strange crowed of oil-workers, lost souls, prostitutes, development workers, Azeris,... that hang out at the same few not too bad places in a strange town. It feels strange that I will not be in Baku once I step out of this office.

The email makes me think as well about my blog, how I have started to write less personal and why I have started to put more and more pictures and to write less... will try to come back to a more personal and honest way of writing, even though I am very frustrated to write in English. It is just not the same. Its a fact, I am lazy to work on my writing and I will never be able to write the way I would write (spontaneously) in German.

I am sitting here in front of my computer at the RTP office, from time to time a mosquito reminds me that I have not taken my Malaria pills the last two days. The window is open, is dark night (can't see any but really any light outside!), the office is empty and all I hear is some chirping (drdrdrdr) and from time to time a dog barking. Difficult to believe that I am in the middle of a town (actually the capital of Zambia!)

Even more difficult it is to realise that I am in Africa. I would have no problem to believe that I am in Azerbaijan. Especially after reading that email. Even Geneva sounds strange to me right now. It feels strange to be somewhere else than Azerbaijan. Africa is the absurd place to be when you have the feeling to be in Azerbaijan. It seems that Africa is not real in my perception. Its not a real place (so how can I be there?). Africa is Safari, hunger, HIV and poverty. Africa is the continent I do not know a lot about. Africa is the place everybody knows about its problems, but not a lot of people know about its beauty and facination (or is it just naive me?) How can you have a normal life in Africa. Going to work, eating, sleeping and going out from time to time. Maybe my life here is not really the Zambian way of living. Maybe I should stay a few days in a compound or somewhere in the rural regions to realise that I am in Africa. Maybe I should spend less time in the office. Maybe it is just to much to digest. Some days ago, I went through some of my pictures done in the last two years. So many places, so many people, so much of experience,... in the end I was just crying. What to do with all this impressions, feelings, emotions, experiences,.... Shall I be happy about the intensity of my life? Shall I be sad about the transitory characteristic of every moment? What to do with all the memories of Baku? Should I just be thankful for the past and open for the future. It is at the moment just a little bit too much...

haha, I should write only on weekends, when I am not tired, not homesick, not emotional and when I have time. Right now, I am touched by a friends email, I am tired of a long meeting-day, I am a little bit homesick (meetings where "taff" and cultural shock slowly sets in) and I definitely should be home at this time. Biking at night is just not funny at all. If you want to know how I feel: Take a bike, close you eyes and try to drive on street with heavy traffic, with lots of pot-holes and in a place where people drive on the left instead on the right.

Yep, the whole left/right thing. Why can't human beings not even agree on that? Does it have any cultural meaning (beside the fact that Zambia was colonized by the UK). Do countries where traffic drives on the left side tick differently then countries where everybody goes to the right? No politics connections here, but just confusing that even while walking. People tent to go to the left side when passing by... yep, my world is upside down. It is dark night, I am on a different continent, I am on the Southern Hemisphere (far away from home) and still its the same time here than in Switzerland. Can anybody explain this to me so that I understand it not only logical but as well emotionally?

I miss walking in Baku's ugly roads, I miss the comfort of a small place like Geneva, I miss my friends and I love being here, in this strange completely unreal (to me) place. Hey, I just killed another mosquito! Hurray! Time to go home.

Oh, nearly forgot. Doreen, her daughter and maid are going to be at 'home'. Doreen's house burned down last Saturday, now everybody stays in different places. Husband and twines somewhere else,... what a big shock. I don't know how she manage to come to work like nothing has happened. Sitting in meetings all day and having to move again in the evening. Why I am thinking about my world being upside down. I better go home and spend some time with her sweet little daughter!

lol