Namibia Debrief and Detox
We spent saturday cleaning up and winding down after the weeks extravaganza. Well, actually i spent most of the day in the foetal position, dehydrated and hungover after and all-night beer and burning (cd's) session and nigh on 2 hour of sleep. Debrief and detox....
In other words, the abuse of a week of social interaction, intellectual challenge, a good bit of hard work, and quite a few namibian beers, finally caught up with me. There was debriefing at the house where Stephanie and Marek from Tactical Tech where staying. I was feeling rough, but there was a good sense of accomplishment in the room, and the discussion was positive and insightful. I love these events, with their dynamic energy, positive people and full-on geek-cred, but obviously they are difficult to pull of, and each one comes with it's own set of problems. Listening to the insights of esecially Gunner, who facilitated the event, and Wojtek who spent 20 hours a day managing all the practicalities is a great learning experience.
Th discussions ranged from evaluations of individual partiipants and their suitability as facilitators for future events, the quality and sheer volume of the food at NIED in Okahandja, and the length, breadth and planning of the sessions.
Most of the discussion probably shouldn't be replicated in public space by me, since I was an invited outsider, and I wouldn't want to abuse the trust of the colleagues who confided in me. Suffice it to say, that for myself, it was an awesome chance to learn and hear what others found good and bad, from an event that everyone generally thought was a pretty awesome thing.
Debrief was finalized with pizza, a great relief from a week of pretty dull food, after which i went straigth to bed for 3 hours of dehydrated, foetal-positioned shaking and moaning. Gunner woke me at around 4, and Kaladan, Micah, Wojtek, Gunner and I went into town. To rehydrate on salty chips and to go baragin hunting at the local Okahandja artifact market. A bowl and a mask later, and I was ready for great veggie dinner, perpetrated by Stephanie and Marek. All things considered it was good to be in closer company, talking about anything except free software for civil society, and it was a great closure to a hard but beautiful week.
