C’est moi, l’homme d’hier….

I began my “petit sondage avec l’équipe de comtable” to find out what their current level of understanding was with excel and learn just how consistent practices were amongst the accounting team.  I found fairly good consistency among the group and my findings were able to break the group up into two groups;basic and advanced.  With the basic group we would cover off file management, formatting and basic formula creation and with the advanced we would cover off  design options, DSUM and Pivot Tables.  While meeting with Richard, i had the pleasure of having someone pull their chair in close and ask…”so how long will you be here?.”  A good feeling He expressed that this was the “vrais capitâle” that he needed.  This in relation to his ability to easily create summaries and formulate recommendations.  I took a chance and said this is the “penga” of excel for mangers.  I understand “penga” to be the Mooré word for force or power.  I took this from the Mooré expression “Wend Penga” (God’s Power).  I think it went well as Maurice, one of the leaders at SEMUS looked over the bridge of his glasses and nodded with agreement, as a large smile grew upon his face.  As I was meeting with Richard, I realized that I was using patterns of conversation as I communicated with him.  You see when people get excited, and when they afford me far too much credit in my level of comprehension, they begin to speak more animated and more quickly.  To maintain momentum you are forced to rely on some pattern recognition and to only try to focus on the areas that you think are critical.  He’s telling me something about the past…He’s giving an example of the past, he’s reflecting on a negative experience, he’s reflecting on a positive experience, he’s reaffirming that what I am proposing will create value.  I may be right or I may be wrong on my intuition but that’s all I’ve got.  But then again, I’ve sat in plenty of meetings where everyone speaks the same language, in fact they’ve got a pretty good command of the English language, and they’re still talking about two different things…even though they agree.

Maurice joined the conversation near the end and we talked about how important starting off with a strong base was.  That it was the design of the information up front that would dictate the potential of any system.  This to me was a very good conversation.  In the end it is turning out that others at SEMUS would like to attend the training of the “Nasarah”. :)

As has become my daily routine, I headed out for my lunch hour walk; actually it’s a 3 hour walk.  I’ve been focusing on an area outside of town towards the south (I think). Out there  a man riding a bicycle wearing a blue robe and white cap began to approach from the direction I was heading.  Just as he passed me he called out “C’est moi, l’homme d’hier”.  Just before that moment, I had recognized him as the man I encountered yesterday.  A very stern looking dude who was building a new home (brick unit) for his family.  I stopped in to observe this fellow’s construction efforts and asked if I could take a picture of him working on his home.  It was damn hot and I was very impressed how he was working so hard; making the bricks(banga) and constructing the building. As I passed by his home on the return of my walk, I snapped an additional picture.  I got the feeling from the intonation of his call out to me that he wasn’t very happy with the me snapping another shot.  It was a great relief to see today that I had misread what he had said…or at least he didn’t keep a grudge.  Even before this happened, I’d like to run out there one afternoon and hand him a nice cold “Coca”  (Coca Cola) as he toiled in the mud and sun.

It’s cool to be recognized here now by the locals.  There’s another guy that I ran into way out on the other side of town.  I could see him racing across an empty section towards me on his motorbike, as I was chatting with some small children.  At first you are kind of like “Oh boy what have I done” or “what’s this guy going to try and pull”.  But when he pulled up beside me, the hand came out and he just had that look on his face of recognition.  A few minutes later I discerned that he was part of the plethora of poeple I met on my first day at SEMUS.  Each time this happens, I think I’m developing more and more “street cred”.