Looking for housing, not a whole lot of consequence to say

I haven't had a chance to write much lately, I've been really busy.

I ended up staying up until like 3 the other night trying to send a document I finished at about 1 or 1:30. That only too so long because I fell asleep while I was waiting for the (SQL) query to finish on the server and make its way over my abysmal internet connection so I could work on it. It was immensely frustrating trying to send it, Mail.app wouldn't work, gmail wouldn't work...eventually I used the CalMail webmail because it would actually load. [EDIT: that was Wednesday night, now it's Friday morning, and still no working Gmail IMAP. Using web/basic html version)]

The other day I looked at a house in Nakasero. It was really, really nice and there was a room available in it for what would be about $350 all told. So far it's the best definite deal I've found, and I like it a lot, and the people who live there aren't too much older and in similar (development) work, so it'd be great...except it's quite far away. I'm not sure how I'd get to work, but on foot is pretty much not an option. Specials are waaay too expensive to take everyday like that -- I'd be spending like ten bucks a day on them, or something. Bodas (moped taxis, I suppose) are cheap, but, well, pretty totally unappealing because of their safety (or lack thereof). Mutatus -- big vans that are either sort of group taxis or follow predefined routes (I suspect a mixture of both) -- must be pretty inexpensive, and are heavily used by locals. That'd be worth investigating. I do know somebody who owns a motorcycle helmet because she takes bodas...that'd be an improvement, but still not great.

Anyway, I was forwarded on an email about another house with spots open that's closer; couldn't get through last night but hopefully I'll be able to get ahold of them today. UPDATE: No such luck, somebody's three research assistants took all of the openings. Oh well. A couple of Bugolobi flats ones didn't pan out either -- just as well, they're pretty depressing. These huge buildings all together on this hillside but with a little too much empty space between them, deteriorating visibly and with some of the hideous giant stork birds on the roof for effect... Also, the driveway (road?) into it looks like the last time it was patched they accidentally mixed landmines in with the asphalt. Seriously, the pot holes were mind-blowing. Driving on it was like the Indiana Jones ride at Disneyland; I felt really bad for having asked my special (cab) driver to take me there, it had to have been awful for his suspension/frame/everything.

However, Barbara, the office manager and Question Box operators' direct supervisor (she's also who contacts the experts for calls that are escalated to them because we can't) has been looking for a house as well and so had some contacts; she was also appalled at the prices people were telling me (almost certainly reflecting a mzungu [foreigner] tax, so to speak) and found a couple of places that were both pretty close and reasonably affordable; I'll check them out tomorrow, I think, which is good -- the nice, far place people wanted an answer tomorrow (though I don't think as of yet they have any other takers, so I can probably stretch it if need be, but don't want to be rude either). Anyway, Jon thought he might be able to find/scrape together some money to pay for transportation for me, in case I do have to live far. Though, I've seen the budget from Grameen -- it's pretty small, considering the time, people, and equipment involved. And Jon's already given me a place to stay, and provides lunch for everybody at the office (that's substantial: one of my meals each day, 5 days a week), out of his/his company's pocket. Anyway, though, I'll take what I can get; if my housing is only 2-300US/month I imagine if you divide the airfare across the whole time I won't be paying much more than in the Bay Area, although there are other expenses (shots, storage, insurance) that will inevitably drive it higher. But in all, not bad, considering it's also work/living experience in the kind of thing I want to keep doing, and exposure to a lot of people doing just that as their real job. (I also wouldn't rule out the possibility of landing or at least positioning for an actual job here in the future).

A lot of these development types here have Master's degrees; it does seem like it's helpful for getting real jobs in the field. Seems worth considering, at least. Doesn't pay for itself in the same way as a PhD, but it can be quite quick, as well (1 year at LSE, for instance).

Unrelatedly, I've in the past couple of days spoken to a Berkeley iSchool student doing dissertation work here, whose blog I read, and also met a guy who did one of those policy internships at Google (and because of who he worked under may have a shot at a job in the Obama administration, according to Jon), but who also just got accepted there, but isn't going because he's got a (some?) job(s) here. I know he's doing marketing work for Jon/Appfrica, and also doing something for the local Google person/people, who Appfrica did some translation work for recently, as well.

The whole ICTD community is relatively small, it seems, so everybody works for/with everybody else and ends up very well connected as a result.

And I'm not sure my modem's going to work tonight either, so this may have to wait until the morning to post. Hopefully once I settle in better and get a place I'll be able to talk about real issues instead of just what I'm doing, too, though I'll talk about that to the extent it's interesting, too.

Oh, I figured it would be annoying if I inlined too many pictures, so I started using flickr to post up photos I've taken on my phone. The photostream's at http://www.flickr.com/photos/phutterman, for those interested. I'll probably put a few into actual posts as I see fit, as well, but everything I take that I keep on my phone should make its way to the flickr, eventually (as connectivity permits).