The Time You Can't Pass On
The first time you have an illness troubled you in a foreign country is always an interesting spot to be in. The basis of so much of our knowledge on what to do, where to go for treatment, the people we run to for comfort, whether they be professionals in spotless white coats or just those in our own families, in those situations is a result of ingrained patterns particular to our own nations, it becomes a shock when we aren't there. One is left a bit of wanderer, a bit of a self-medicator as it were, without a clear guide as to what to do, and a vague sense of sunlit daze on the city streets, feeling far groggier and out of breath than the infinite number of beautiful people who pass by. All of that is a bit of an elaborate way to say that I've been a bit under the weather most of this past week in lovely London, still trying to take in as much of the city's charms whilst feeling that everyone must know how extremely sick I am as possible. I've been lucky enough to get patched up and put together at the NHS walk-in near my apartment last night, and hopefully in fighting shape for seeing The Roots in concert tonight and whatever else the week's end brings. But, at the same time, that weirdly surreal feeling of the world bending from half-heat and feverish disposition as you hit the steel steps on the DLR walkway is, in its own way, an experience worth having at least once. As is seeing perhaps the strangest concert-cum-performance art exhibit I've ever been privy to at the Barbican on a Tuesday evening, or looking up to see the Shard, in all its effusive glories, after getting out of a Tube station. -------- The biggest thing you learn from tackling a big, new project embedded within an entire political and social system you never grew up in or really engaged with before is how little those things you think apply across countries really don't. It's often said, perhaps only by my circle of friends, but nevertheless, that Anglophone Canada is merely a poorly done bar-band cover of Great Britain, but that's only true in the sense that most aphorisms my friends come up with are. The belief that a transition like this would be simple on the basis of the undeniable history that both of our nations do share is one I'd a bit naively entertained before getting to work here. It's a notion I've been disabused of over the past three weeks more quickly than most notions I've ever had . Simply put, whether its been digging through summer budget documents and struggling to determine the finer of tax credit reductions upon our clients, or running through a PAT testing certification course, I'm humbler and more grateful to know that I have much left to learn and to do over the next seven weeks. This report, which I'm well into writing at this point, though have many more people to talk to within the social enterprise and service ecosystem of East London to get their input, seems like it may just have the sort of concrete, actionable steps that can be taken to really improve lives. Unlike some of the other work I've done in the past, I'm confident this won't sit on a shelf gathering dustmites; a more dedicated team than those at Emmaus Visiting more of the Emmaus communities, Greenwich this week, with Lambeth and Brighton next on the list, I've gotten more a sense of the functionality in diversity that the organisation embodies at its best. Though the Emmaus model in all cases places an emphasis on mututal solidarity and work, in combination with individual support and training, it is highly flexible in terms of just what that might mean. Some Emmaus communities run low-cost cafes, some focus more on furniture upcycling, some focus on a high-end clientele with antique items, some are there for the cost-conscious or bargain hungry. It's that flexibility, responsive to the needs and desires of the localities in which Emmaus communities operate, that truly distinguishes it from other places I have worked, which tended towards top=down, imposed models of operation.
It is this aspect that all social enterprises, and indeed perhaps all organisations seeking to make a positive change in the world, would do well to learn from Emmaus: be firm in our values and goals, but flexible in our approaches. Maybe it is in that way we'll learn each other a little better, and be able to make those changes, no matter where we come from or where we're going.
