We’re almost at the end of my volunteer assignment. I say ‘we’ because you’ve been on this journey alongside me, dedicated readers. (And by ‘dedicated readers’ I do, of course, mean you, Ma.)

I’m not much of a liar. I’m a straight shooter and I punch above the belt. I’m like the Clint Eastwood of ethics. I once told someone her haircut made her look like a female Ray Martin because 1) I can’t lie to people’s faces and 2) it did.

If you happened to be walking past my house right now you’d be forgiven for thinking that unsavoury things were afoot. You’d hear the sound of frenzied movement and flesh on flesh slapping, followed by a breathy ‘oh, yeah, baby.’ Yeah, you’d be forgiven for thinking someone was gettin’ jiggy wit it in my domicile.*

But, alas, no.

For the last 18 months we’ve been working hard to try to make the Isabel Learning Network – the network of 18 FM stations around Isabel Province – secure and sustainable. After what seemed like a very long time of bashing our heads against the thatched leaf hut wall we’re just taken a giant leap towards this goal in terms of finding some secure, committed funding.

Something very exciting just happened and you’re the first to know.

I just – and I mean just – opened a can of tuna with a knife.

Pop quiz: Which of the following have I not eaten this year?
a) Turtle
b) Opossum
c) Dugong
d) Spam

The heat does funny things to you here.

Once I tried to climb – literally tried to climb – into the fridge. Another time I stopped typing mid-sentence, collapsed backwards in my office chair and cried out in exasperation ‘Why does anyone wear clothes here?’, to which my colleagues barely looked up because I do that kind of thing a lot. And, quite frankly, I think they agreed with me.

You know that feeling you get when you stand on a rickety chair perched on an uneven table to try and change a light bulb and you realise mid-stretch that you are re-enacting that WorkSafe ad that graphically shows the lady’s wrist muscles tearing when she inevitably topples to the ground? That ‘this is a very bad idea and I reckon I might just die’ feeling?
 

Our office sits in the choicest spot in Buala, wedged beneath not one, not two but three sprawling mango trees. (For you city folk, this is the equivalent of living on the junction of your dream address and one of the more elite Monopoly streets.) Every so often you hear the thud of mango on roof and then It Is On.

I have a special friend here.
Her name is Ellen, she’s two and she thinks I’m the bee’s damn knees.

When I returned to Buala after a month in Oz she literally ran half the length of the village to leap into my arms, shrieking my name joyfully into the balmy air.
“MAE VAKA!” for this is what she calls me. It means ‘white person’ in her language.