Well, this is the first time I have had access to the internet in ages, so there is quite a lot to update you on! (It may be quite a long blog!). I left Islamabad on saturday morning - it was quite upsetting to say goodbye to all the other VSOs because we had got to know each other fairly well in such an intensive two weeks! Otherwise I was quite pleased to be leaving Islamabad - we drove past the Supreme Court etc again and it was not nice to be in such close proximity to so many guns and sandbags, although again all the soldiers seemed to be very relaxed. There are huge numbers of guns around - even primary schools have an armed guard, and when we went shopping the other day it was fairly horrible because there were guys with guns outside all the shops.

Anyway, the Director of MIED (Abdul Jahan) said that they would drive us to Mansehra the scenic route, through the Murree mountains, instead of the normal way, and i was very excited about that. But guess what happened when George meets steep narrow bendy roads - yep, I got sick. I had to sleep most of the way and was gutted to miss the beautiful scenery, but at least I managed not to throw up on the Director :) I felt better by the time we reached our house, which is great! it is huge and I have a lovely room. We have a TV and a fridge so aren't exactly slumming it. We also have a guard, which I have found very difficult getting used to. It is horrible to think that he is outside in the cold when we are tucked up warm in bed. But on the other hand he does have a job, and everyone seems to think it necessary (he doesn't have a gun, thank goodness). Everyone at MIED, in particular Abdul Jahan, have been incredibly welcoming and have bent over backwards to make sure that we have everything that we need. The electricity went off for about an hour on our first night, so he rang us up to ask whether we wanted to go out for dinner in the local hotel. Abdul Jahan even leant us his own laptop tonight so that we can access the internet!

On sunday we spent most of the morning unpacking and then were invited round to Abdul Jahan's house for lunch. he has five lovely children, and they took us up to the viewpoint so we could see all over Mansehra. His youngest child is four I think and beautiful - she was doing drawings for me, and is so cute as she was giving herself 11/10 and big ticks! I'll put some photos up in a bit. Anyway, we had a lovely lunch, Pakistani style sitting on the floor in the living room. later that day we went to the bazaar in central mansehra to do some shopping, which was completely crazy. Huge amounts of traffic, staring men, stalls and narrow alleyways with more shops.

I am so impressed with MIED. They work in the field of education, providing teacher training, resources, and other support for government schools in NWFP, areas of the Punjab and part of Kashmir. It was founded by Abdul Jahan in 2004, and has grown incredibly rapidly since then, as they now work in over 2000 schools I think. Many of the people, and especially the management team, are Ismaili Muslims from the Northern Areas. it has been very interesting finding out more about this, because it seems that Ismaili's are quite liberal - most of the women do not wear the headscarf (except in Mansehra which is very conservative and we all have to). The Northern Areas has a very good education system, partly because of the work of the Aga Khan foundation - many of the people at MIED used to work for this organisation, and have moved to the NWFP because the education system here is so much worse. Abdul Jahan was telling us about the Ismaili interpretation of Islam, and emphasising the focus on peace, tolerance and acceptance. I have really seen this even in the few days I have been here, because without exception all the people I have spoken to have been incredibly friendly, welcoming, compassionate and giving. Even if I achieve nothing in the job this year, I hope I will be able to challenge some of the perceptions about Islam in the west.

Yesterday I had a series of very interesting and a few disturbing conversations. The day started off by talking to guy who had spent a year living and working in a tent while responding to the earthquake. i also had a further conversation with Abdul Jahan and some others from another NGO who said that they slept for a whole month in their cars after the earthquake because it was not safe to enter their houses. There were over 2000 aftershocks in the six months following the earthquake. it is difficult for me to comprehend the trauma that people in this area must have been through - a guy was saying earlier that even when his chair wobbles it causes him consternation. And most of the people I am working with no doubt lost people in the disaster. Anyway, after that cheerful conversation the next was on the subject of domestic violence, which I found profoundly shocking. One of the other VSOs had told me that domestic violence is as high as 80% in some areas of Pakistan, which I found very difficult to believe, but then after this conversation, which I won't go into details, it may be easier to believe. After that I started talking to a girl who was wearing a full headscarf covering everything except her eyes. I found that very difficult as I couldn't see her expression at all, so a conversation was hard. But the most cheerful conversation (this time it was really cheerful!) was in the evening when Abdul Jahan introduced us to our neighbour, who is a good friend of his and works for Plan pakistan which is a major donor of MIED. They invited us round for dinner, because a further friend was going off for the pilgrimage to Mecca. The meal was fab, and I'll put a few photos up later. But it was quite surreal sitting down for a meal and talking to a group of Muslim men about Hajj.

There are all sorts of cultural things that it is difficult to adapt to. For example, when to cover my head and when not to. Also, at the meal yesterday I had put on a jumper, fleece and shawl because it was so freezing outside, but then they had a heater on in the house, and I was eating spicy food. But it is impossible to take off a jumper and a fleece while continuing to be covered in the shawl. So I melted.

Even though everyone has been incredibly friendly and welcoming at work, the first few days have been fairly stressful. it seems like I have to create a role for myself in the organisation, which is quite scary, and advise on the nature of their reporting systems. They are treating me like an expert, but I am not exaggeating when I say that a high proportion of people I have spoken to have said that they have 2 Masters. So anyone with expertise in report writing and monitoring and evaluation please email with advice!!!

I think that is enough for now :) Congrats for reaching the end