Day 1....20 years ago!

September 4th 1998

I reported to my first real job!!

anxious, excited, worried, anxious again

I walked into the offices on Ngong road, eager to start this brand new role....me, new and the first person to officially take up this task in this upcoming NGO. I had been told to report at 9am and there I was, I think earlier than 9am. I found this lady at the reception and she welcomed me and told me to wait for someone to come and talk to me. Another lady came, greeted me well, but wondered who had called and asked me to come that day! I told her the name of the person who had contacted me (mercifully I remembered the name) and she went back into the other room. My mind was racing....for all the celebration we had already done for this new job...how come there seems to be confusion as to whether I was to be here or not!! Anyways, said confusion ended and I started off!..with an audit no less!

I stayed in said organisation for a cool 6 years!! I would never have thought that I would be in this organisation for that long. I learnt so many new things and in hindsight, its best if your first job is in a small organisation since you do/learn  e v e r y t h i n g!! you can pick calls, do proposals, do budgets, heck even do radio talk shows when the station calls for that slot you have pushing for and none of the program staff are around and the Chair tells you...well by now you know the issues, go and talk about them!!!! That was COVAW for you - Coalition on Violence Against Women!

However, the downside of being at the frontline, or so I call it, is that you see all the bruises first hand. It gets to you at some point....thats all we talked about...everyday....whole day....the stories even at lunch revolved around violence against women..and children....sad, agonising, shocking, amusing tales of what women/children have gone through.....you can become cynic number ONE even with the group counselling sessions we had. I had to leave.....urgently......I looked for an exit earnestly and finally was got my next job.

But COVAW has a special part in my heart!

I made lifelong friends who I cherish to this day. I worked with interns who I relate to to this very day!! Some got bored cutting out newspapers and filing them in the scrap book.....got bored combing through the newspapers daily for advocacy issues that we must respond to, and faxing endless press statements to all newsrooms..........while others did this with so much enthusiasm! no wonder they are successful now....A T T I T U D E is everything I tell you!!

I worked with at that time young women with fire in their bellies....full of energy and zeal...thinking of new ways of doing things, of getting the message across! we celebrated when the messages got printed in papers! its easier now...all you have to do is tag all the relevant media! We did campaigns all year round....its all about having the conversation going..once we did a silent march in Nairobi - i dont where someone got the idea...but the essence was that we shall not be silenced like the silent women walking along the streets!!......we printed posters tshirts leaflets you name it!! once we did the tshirts late and when they go to Taita Taveta, they had the wrong message!!!! .......the climax of the campaigns was end of the year....the 16 days of activism campaign! that was something!!

In 1998...the year I joined COVAW we also marked 50yrs since the Universal Declaration of Human Rights - that was the first time I was hearing of the UDHR...and of course we marked it in a big way!!

such a roller coster of emotions working in the frontline! its intense...its sad....and there are numerous happy moments worth celebrating....

Cheers to all in the frontline!!