And the winner is...

Jen!

You didn't know she was up for an award, you say? Then allow me to start at the beginning.

As you all probably know by now, Jen's primary responsibility here is doing labor diplomacy - interfacing with labor unions, manufacturers, and the Cambodian government among others. She loves this, and is very, very good at it. We've mentioned before how she has several times gotten people out of jail, prevented illegal strikes, and just generally prevented a collapse of the Cambodian economy. These are all Good Things, I think we'd all agree.

As it turns out, the State Department agrees. Every year they present one Foreign Service Officer the "Excellence in Labor Diplomacy" award. In order to be considered for this, the FSO's post needs to send in a nomination. Around the time nominations were due this past time, people at Main State called Jen to suggest that she get her nomination in, and that if it was a little late it would be no problem. Jen hadn't been thinking of nominating herself, but the DCM was very supportive of the nomination and took a rough draft from Jen and did amazing things with it. Everybody at post signed off on it and sent the thing in.

Well, a month or so ago Jen started getting hints from these people at Main State that they appreciated all she has done, and they would be showing her how much sometime soon. This past week they did just that, and announced that she is the new Labor Officer of the Year!

It perhaps isn't clear from this just how big a deal this is, so I'll expand a bit. This award will be presented by Sec. Rice herself, in mid October, and Jen will very likely be flown back to DC for just this event. She will also be presented with $10,000 as an additional little thank-you.

Finally, in case you still don't think she's about the best FSO there ever was, we are pretty certain that she's one of the most junior people to get this award, given that it was based on the work she did in her first year of her second tour. I've been saying things like "rising star" to her for years, but now maybe she'll believe me.

The first few weeks

It has been almost three weeks now since I started my job, and I think I can truly speak about how things are going on that front. The first week or two were a bit rough, as they can be with any new job, just because of the steep learning curve. Although I've never done anything quite like this before, it helped a great deal that I already knew the staff and many of the kids. Now, three weeks in, I know all the staff, and can greet by name about 90% of the kids. The identical twin girls in Ellie's class are still tough for me (the teachers tell me it is something about a spark in the eyes that identifies one of them), but I think I'm doing well on that front. I get on well with the staff, I think, and inspire only a little bit of terror in them. I think having not only a man but a white man in the manager job is a bit intimidating for the almost-all-female staff. That and the fact that I mentioned I wanted to start doing performance evaluations.

The job itself consists mainly of coming in each morning, chatting with parents, and then finding out that something I didn't know existed needed to be done yesterday. Then I struggle for a while to figure out what actually needed to be done, I do it, I apologize to somebody for having been late, and then go on to the next day. That is about 80% of the job. The rest is doing something I know needs to be done tomorrow. The process there is the same as the other, but without the apology.

Despite that, I am actually enjoying myself. The kids are all really lovely. Some of them (not just my own) call me "dada" or "papa", in part because that's a Khmer-style term or respect, but also because Ben and Ellie call me Daddy, so it seems natural that this must be my name. I have an amazing amount of variety, from managing enrollment lists, payroll and school policies to wiping runny noses. Jen pointed out that this is very much the same thing I do at home, just on a much bigger scale.

Sadly I have no new pictures relating to work. Sorry for the all text posting. Once I get my office decorated I'll post some before and after photos.