Medair

Rebecca always had a strong desire to do humanitarian work overseas, but did not think she had the necessary skills. However, Medair showed an interest in Rebecca, and four years later -- after two years of work in Angola and a short-term session in Indonesia -- she now wants to make Medair her long-term career.

 

Rebecca has always been interested in helping people through her profession. She did elder care and home care for years in England, where she was born. Her interest in humanitarian work was kindled when she volunteered for a short period in Turkey in 1999/2000. She worked in a camp for people who had lost their homes during the earthquake. She concluded that she wanted to make relief work her profession, but that it had to be with a Christian organisation.

 

“I wanted to do a job that had a purpose behind it,” she said, “and where I had the chance to help people. Care work offers that, but I also wanted to work in different countries. It’s a way to see new places, but also help people out as well.”

 

The value of Rebecca for Medair

 

Rebecca made contact with Medair through their website, but when she saw the different positions that needed to be filled and the job requirements, she wondered where she would fit in.

 

“When I originally looked at the list, I thought, ‘Oh. I’m not really a trained nurse. I’ve done care work, but I’m not a construction worker or whatever.’ So I wasn’t sure what things I would be able to do. But then they mentioned about the logistics and administrative side of things, and that I wouldn’t necessarily need to be specifically trained in that area.”

 

Administrative work in Africa is different from anywhere else

 

Although glad of the opportunity, Rebecca was unsure at first. She had worked in an office before, and found it boring. But she soon discovered that her concerns were unfounded: “Admin in Africa is not like admin in England. There’s plenty of variety, and lots of things going on that make it interesting.”

 

Her first job with Medair was an administrative position in Angola. Although she had some experience with different cultures, she needed to learn many skills for the first time. “For instance, I hadn’t really used a computer before. I’d only used it for email, so I had to learn how to use a computer. And yes, it would have been better if I had known some of those skills before.”

 

Rebecca learned that Medair places trust in its staff right away, giving them management responsibilities. “Whichever role you go into, you’ve got other staff under you, which you wouldn’t necessarily have in another job.”

 

She quickly became proficient with the administrative work. One of her tasks involved assisting with Medair’s large-scale food distributions to Angolan refugees returning from Zambia, which was conducted in partnership with the World Food Program (WFP). Medair distributed full food baskets – which contained a month’s supply of food for a family – to approximately 10,000 beneficiaries each month.

 

Rebecca noted that there were never really normal days, because different things were always cropping up. She described one day that began routinely in the morning at her desk, but when some of Medair’s team were delayed by police, she ended up on a hot airstrip, guarding 50 kilogramme sacks of corn while loads were taken to the compound for the next five hours.

 

Most of the time, she would spend her days working inside the Medair compound, so in the evenings Rebecca would usually go for a walk through the small town, and fellowship with local residents.

 

She got along well with her team, and was enriched by various challenges along the way:

 

“When you go to a different country, you expect there to be different cultures in the country that you’re going to, but often you forget that your team of expats have cultural differences as well. It makes for a more interesting time.”

 

A new challenge in Indonesia

 

Rebecca spent two years working in Angola as an administrator, and then in 2006 she was asked to help get a new programme started in Indonesia. Where Angola had been an established programme, now she needed to start from the beginning.

 

“I would say it’s probably the most difficult job I’ve ever done. I felt quite a lot of pressure because I had to have the whole admin side of things up and running before we could actually start implementing the water and sanitation units. We needed to know the correct way to hire staff, and how much to pay them, and all the technical details before we could then move on with the project.”

 

In the end, Rebecca found the whole experience very rewarding. “Although Indonesia was incredibly challenging, I felt a real sense of accomplishment by the time I left.”

 

The value of Medair for Rebecca

 

She appreciates the way that Medair takes care of its staff, although she confesses that she knows this a little too well. “Yeah, I put the MedEvac system to test when I was in Angola, and I was impressed with the way that worked. They had me flown out and taken care of, first in Angola’s capital Luanda, but then all the way home to England.”

 

Rebecca made Medair her full-time career. She has taken a Humanitarian Logistics course and is now working in logistics in Southern Sudan for Medair as Emergency Response Team (ERT) Project Support Manager.

 

She acknowledges that working at Medair has been a great learning experience for her:

 

“I’ve learned many different skills, and it’s also given me more confidence in myself, because I have accomplished some big jobs. It’s invaluable to work for a Christian organisation. You can share your concerns, and you can pray together. It’s so important to have that support.”