"An introduction from Afghanistan" - DFID Blogs go Live
Vicky lives on a military base in Helmand Province, Afghanistan. She doesn't get out much, so she's started a blog to talk about the work she does there for DFID, the Department for International Development.
Vicky is one of five bloggers we've been coaching in the art of effective blogging. Emily Poskett is a Statistics Advisor in Tanzania and Howard Taylor is Head of DFID in Ethiopia. There are a couple more in the sidelines who'll hopefully be up and running very shortly.
We're very lucky in that our blogging volunteers are superb writers with extremely interesting lives and situations with enormous scope for great photography. They are going to provide a fine insight into the work that DFID do and the effect they have on the people of the countries in which and with which they work.
The coaching programme has had its challenges. As you can imagine the budget to fly us to Tanzania was not made available, so coaching is happening online is the same manner as we did with CivicSurf. The DFID bloggers are in full-time positions working seven days a week and in time zones and work patterns that don't necessarily coincide with our 9 - 5 UK life. Thankfully Griff Wigley, who has been leading the coaching, works flexible hours.
The site was built by Simon Dickson from Puffbox and it looks and functions fantastically. He's pushed WordPress beyond existing boundaries and included a very simple to update Google map which allows you to zoom in on the fertile valley within which Laskar Gah is sited and see the contrast with the desert all around.
So please pay a visit and leave a comment and subscribe to the RSS feeds.
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