D Day (-3) - Crazy Minds and Able Hands

When working on the thousand little things that need to be done for a conference of IDDS’ magnitude it can often be easy to forget the overall vision and aim of the endeavor. This evening, after our 7pm meeting, Amy reminded us in timely fashion just how much of a groundbreaking venture this year’s IDDS in Ghana really is. The conference has no equivalent anywhere in the world and Amy told us that this is simply because nobody in their right mind would attempt to pull off something this ridiculous. We are bringing together ninety or so people together from over twent y countries for a five week technology conference in which we are not even sure of the projects yet. The conference will include thirty separate overnight trips to local rural villages and many of the participants do not even speak a common tongue, let alone the language of the villagers themselves!



IDDS 09’ will have an increase in participants of 25% and there will be twelve projects, two more than last year. All of this, it must be remembered, is taking place in a foreign country away administrative home of the summit, MIT, is over 8,000 kilometers away! Amy told us that this would not be possible if there were not so many people in the room, and in the world, who share and understand the vision of IDDS. Amy believes that the central components that all IDDS participants/organizers/mentors/ must have are “able hands and crazy minds”. There are certainly quite a few people on the team this year who I feel are perfect examples of this!



The woman behind it all looks on...




One final feature we all share is a firm, unerring belief that we can somehow pull it all off. As such, we go into the final few days of pre-conference preparation with our heads and hopes held high.




Twi phrase for the day:


Meh paa cho, te so = Please, reduce it