The inaugural conference of the African Association of Sign Language interpreters’ (AFSLI) took place from 25th to 27th May, in Abuja, Nigeria.
Unfortunately, the date wasn’t confirmed until 21st April 2017 giving us just one month to organise a budget, raise the money (not yet achieved) organise flights, accommodation, transport, etc. to get Bakary, Lamin and Yahya to the conference.
Trying to achieve this has been so fraught with difficulties that, up until they were on the plane to Nigeria, I really, REALLY didn’t believe they were going to get there. In fact Malcolm, one of our project’s advisers who knows The Gambia really well, regularly messaged me to ask whether the constant problems weren’t “sending [me] a message that this really isn’t a good idea.”
Well, I can be really bloody-minded at times, and I knew how important this was to the interpreters (as it would be to me were I in their shoes), so I wasn’t going to be beaten just because every single thing went wrong.
The description that follows is just a sample of the frustration of trying to make this happen. It probably doesn’t adequately convey the hours of staring at the screen wondering ‘why’, or the many, often loud, ‘what the f*@k’ moments. (And the less said about the distraught phone call to my wife where I allegedly said I “wanted to nuke the world so I didn’t have to deal with this any more”, the better).
Anyway …
The first three weeks – missing passports, unaffordable flights and accommodation, accommodation, all seems sorted …
First we spent a couple of weeks looking at costs and devising a budget, to see what we could afford. It didn’t help that this included costs in; sterling, dollars (to take to Nigeria to change to naira), dalasi (for purchases in the Gambia), naira (for in Nigeria), and eventually also West African CFA francs (for the overland travel), with various exchange rates between them all. It also didn’t help that we didn’t know if Bakary would be able to come, as he’d had his passport stolen, and with the recent change of President, the Gambian government had stopped issuing new passports.
Also, you’d think I know this, but I hadn’t realised quite how big, really big, Africa is. Banjul (Gambia) to Abuja (Nigeria) is 1,600 miles.
I also hadn’t realised that flying those miles in Africa is REALLY not easy. Most flights were via Europe, which is why they cost almost £4,000 per person! That’s more for a single flight than we’ve ultimately spent on the whole expedition.
Lastly, hotel prices in Abuja for some reason were almost London prices. Again, not affordable.
However, Bakary was promised a passport in time, we found flights with the Nigerian airline Arik Air for £700 pp (via Dakar, Accra, and Lagos), and I found affordable accommodation through Airbnb.
Whilst our project didn’t have sufficient funds in hand to send the three interpreters, recognising the significance of this conference to the development of professional interpreting across Africa, and the Gambian interpreters’ place within that network, the support group agreed to send them, and fundraise these costs later.
Week four – flaky airlines, everything going wrong, and just how last minute can it get …
I had planned to book the Arik Air flights in the UK (better exchange rate, no money transfer costs). However, over several days the website variously: threw up error messages, asked me to input my pin number (I really don’t think so), and then finally told me that it doesn’t accept payments from abroad - for an international flight !?! This was confirmed by their man in the UK, who said he’d sort it out, and then never phoned back. So instead I planned to transfer the money to The Gambia, and pay from there.
Whilst I was trying to organise this, Malcolm (from GDCSP) contacted me with a press release saying that 68.5% of all Arik Air flights were routinely cancelled, and bankruptcy looked likely. Happy to be told (and avert potential calamity), but deeply cheesed off to have to start again with looking for flights.
So with just three days left before they were due to set off, we needed to make alternate plans. Nigerian and UK travel agents were no help, but Lamin suggested that instead they go overland to Dakar (Senegal), and fly from their with Air Cote D'Ivoire. This meant them leaving The Gambia on Sunday 21st, as the only fight to get them there in time left Dakar on 22nd. This was also both cheaper and more reliable.
Unfortunately, the date wasn’t confirmed until 21st April 2017 giving us just one month to organise a budget, raise the money (not yet achieved) organise flights, accommodation, transport, etc. to get Bakary, Lamin and Yahya to the conference.
Trying to achieve this has been so fraught with difficulties that, up until they were on the plane to Nigeria, I really, REALLY didn’t believe they were going to get there. In fact Malcolm, one of our project’s advisers who knows The Gambia really well, regularly messaged me to ask whether the constant problems weren’t “sending [me] a message that this really isn’t a good idea.”
Well, I can be really bloody-minded at times, and I knew how important this was to the interpreters (as it would be to me were I in their shoes), so I wasn’t going to be beaten just because every single thing went wrong.
The description that follows is just a sample of the frustration of trying to make this happen. It probably doesn’t adequately convey the hours of staring at the screen wondering ‘why’, or the many, often loud, ‘what the f*@k’ moments. (And the less said about the distraught phone call to my wife where I allegedly said I “wanted to nuke the world so I didn’t have to deal with this any more”, the better).
Anyway …
The first three weeks – missing passports, unaffordable flights and accommodation, accommodation, all seems sorted …
First we spent a couple of weeks looking at costs and devising a budget, to see what we could afford. It didn’t help that this included costs in; sterling, dollars (to take to Nigeria to change to naira), dalasi (for purchases in the Gambia), naira (for in Nigeria), and eventually also West African CFA francs (for the overland travel), with various exchange rates between them all. It also didn’t help that we didn’t know if Bakary would be able to come, as he’d had his passport stolen, and with the recent change of President, the Gambian government had stopped issuing new passports.
Also, you’d think I know this, but I hadn’t realised quite how big, really big, Africa is. Banjul (Gambia) to Abuja (Nigeria) is 1,600 miles.
I also hadn’t realised that flying those miles in Africa is REALLY not easy. Most flights were via Europe, which is why they cost almost £4,000 per person! That’s more for a single flight than we’ve ultimately spent on the whole expedition.
Lastly, hotel prices in Abuja for some reason were almost London prices. Again, not affordable.
However, Bakary was promised a passport in time, we found flights with the Nigerian airline Arik Air for £700 pp (via Dakar, Accra, and Lagos), and I found affordable accommodation through Airbnb.
Whilst our project didn’t have sufficient funds in hand to send the three interpreters, recognising the significance of this conference to the development of professional interpreting across Africa, and the Gambian interpreters’ place within that network, the support group agreed to send them, and fundraise these costs later.
Week four – flaky airlines, everything going wrong, and just how last minute can it get …
I had planned to book the Arik Air flights in the UK (better exchange rate, no money transfer costs). However, over several days the website variously: threw up error messages, asked me to input my pin number (I really don’t think so), and then finally told me that it doesn’t accept payments from abroad - for an international flight !?! This was confirmed by their man in the UK, who said he’d sort it out, and then never phoned back. So instead I planned to transfer the money to The Gambia, and pay from there.
Whilst I was trying to organise this, Malcolm (from GDCSP) contacted me with a press release saying that 68.5% of all Arik Air flights were routinely cancelled, and bankruptcy looked likely. Happy to be told (and avert potential calamity), but deeply cheesed off to have to start again with looking for flights.
So with just three days left before they were due to set off, we needed to make alternate plans. Nigerian and UK travel agents were no help, but Lamin suggested that instead they go overland to Dakar (Senegal), and fly from their with Air Cote D'Ivoire. This meant them leaving The Gambia on Sunday 21st, as the only fight to get them there in time left Dakar on 22nd. This was also both cheaper and more reliable.
I tried to book the flight, and couldn’t from the UK (of course). So I needed to get the money to The Gambia so that they could pay a local travel agent. On Wednesday I sent the money to the account we usually use in The Gambia, but then couldn’t get hold of the account holder to ask him to pass on the money to the interpreters. By Thursday evening I gave up and decided to send the same amount again, but this time by Western Union. However it turns out there’s an £800 transfer limit unless you have your ID checked, which takes 3 days (of course). I didn’t have three days …
So Friday, me, my wife, and a random friend all signed up to WU and each sent £800 to Lamin. We tell Lamin that the money won’t arrive until Saturday morning. He tells me that travel agents are usually closed on Saturdays (of course). After a few hours he messages me that the shop will open especially for him at midday on Saturday.
On Saturday morning we’re told that the transfers have been flagged as potentially fraudulent and stopped (of course).
We get that cleared up, Lamin receives the money and heads off to the travel agent. When he gets there, he finds out that the ticket price has increased overnight, and he no longer has enough money to get them (of course). This is starting to feel quixotic.
After tense negotiation (at least that’s how I imagine it), the travel agent sells Lamin the tickets on the promise that I transfer them the extra money by Monday.
On Sunday evening Lamin messaged to say, all good, and they are on their way.
Then on Monday evening, Bakary messages me to say that they won’t let him into Abuja, as he hasn’t got a vaccination card. (His vaccination card was taken with his passport, and he’d forgotten to replace it.)
After some pleading with passport control, they issue him with a new card, for a $50 fee. Luckily however, I’d already sent $50 emergency money, though I hadn’t expected it to be need quite that quickly.
There are three things I want leave you with from this experience.
1) When booking travel insurance, I needed their home addresses. I discovered that they don’t have addresses in The Gambia. Sometimes I forget just how different and difficult life can be over there, and then something like this reminds me.
2) Whilst it often really felt like I was trying to organise things 2,700 miles away Africa – as I was - the internet at times made it feel as though I was organising something just round the corner. Whether having real-time conversations through the Airbnb app with hosts, WhatsApp-ing with Natasha (one of the conference organisers), watching Twitter live streams of the conference itself, or Facebook messenger discussions with the interpreters. This was a real example of how technology can be a force for good, and can shrink the world in positive ways.
Again, it was also a reminder of the challenges faced by the interpreters in The Gambia where infrastructure such as telecommunications cabling for internet access is both uncommon and unreliable. Developing a web access infrastructure sometimes seems like an add-on, or a luxury, until you realise how it’s absence is such a fundamental barrier to development.
3) And lastly, Lamin sent me a comment about his learning that made all of the effort seem worthwhile.
My CPD (PDP) next time is going to be on developing my vocabulary. How am I going to achieve this? Is by going to Libraries to collect Novels, read them and if I came across a word which I don't know, I will immediately refer to my dictionary. Why do I need to this? Because as a SLI, you must not say I don't know this so I cannot sign it. If you do that as an interpreter, the Deaf person will be lost without knowing. So that's not an excuse in any way. That is why I want build my vocabulary more and more hence am not yet a professional SLI but a LEARNER in the making.
So Friday, me, my wife, and a random friend all signed up to WU and each sent £800 to Lamin. We tell Lamin that the money won’t arrive until Saturday morning. He tells me that travel agents are usually closed on Saturdays (of course). After a few hours he messages me that the shop will open especially for him at midday on Saturday.
On Saturday morning we’re told that the transfers have been flagged as potentially fraudulent and stopped (of course).
We get that cleared up, Lamin receives the money and heads off to the travel agent. When he gets there, he finds out that the ticket price has increased overnight, and he no longer has enough money to get them (of course). This is starting to feel quixotic.
After tense negotiation (at least that’s how I imagine it), the travel agent sells Lamin the tickets on the promise that I transfer them the extra money by Monday.
On Sunday evening Lamin messaged to say, all good, and they are on their way.
Then on Monday evening, Bakary messages me to say that they won’t let him into Abuja, as he hasn’t got a vaccination card. (His vaccination card was taken with his passport, and he’d forgotten to replace it.)
After some pleading with passport control, they issue him with a new card, for a $50 fee. Luckily however, I’d already sent $50 emergency money, though I hadn’t expected it to be need quite that quickly.
There are three things I want leave you with from this experience.
1) When booking travel insurance, I needed their home addresses. I discovered that they don’t have addresses in The Gambia. Sometimes I forget just how different and difficult life can be over there, and then something like this reminds me.
2) Whilst it often really felt like I was trying to organise things 2,700 miles away Africa – as I was - the internet at times made it feel as though I was organising something just round the corner. Whether having real-time conversations through the Airbnb app with hosts, WhatsApp-ing with Natasha (one of the conference organisers), watching Twitter live streams of the conference itself, or Facebook messenger discussions with the interpreters. This was a real example of how technology can be a force for good, and can shrink the world in positive ways.
Again, it was also a reminder of the challenges faced by the interpreters in The Gambia where infrastructure such as telecommunications cabling for internet access is both uncommon and unreliable. Developing a web access infrastructure sometimes seems like an add-on, or a luxury, until you realise how it’s absence is such a fundamental barrier to development.
3) And lastly, Lamin sent me a comment about his learning that made all of the effort seem worthwhile.
My CPD (PDP) next time is going to be on developing my vocabulary. How am I going to achieve this? Is by going to Libraries to collect Novels, read them and if I came across a word which I don't know, I will immediately refer to my dictionary. Why do I need to this? Because as a SLI, you must not say I don't know this so I cannot sign it. If you do that as an interpreter, the Deaf person will be lost without knowing. So that's not an excuse in any way. That is why I want build my vocabulary more and more hence am not yet a professional SLI but a LEARNER in the making.