The Presentaiton

I'm sitting in an airport staring into space with my mouth open in between typing into my blackberry. It's been a busy couple of days.

I was up until after midnight last night working on the slides for my presentation today. The fact that I woke up at 6am today only to discover that the Meridian Hotel I was staying in had absolutely no hot water - great start to the day. My next realization was that I definitely overdid it with the Tai-bo “great buns” (DVD) workout last night - my glutes were killing me.

The presentation with one of my colleagues was on the work I've been doing here for the last three months on the traditional medicine market. We presented to a group of folks from the Department of Forestry, Department of Environmental Affairs, National Herbarium and Botanical Gardens, and the Universities - the gatekeepers of knowledge in the field of traditional medicine in Malawi.

The Chairman started off the meeting by welcoming the “lady and gentlemen”. Yup, once again I was the only woman in the room. There are so few professional women in Africa, is it any wander that I am rarely treated as an equal by my African colleagues? The presentation was well received and generated some good debate about the competing interests of conservation of medicinal plant species, promoting traditional medicine as a parallel healthcare system, and commercialization of medicinal plants as a livelihoods option for rural communities (our focus). Of course the debate was managed in a typically African way - more debate about how to best structure the discussion than actual substantive talk.

Now I just need to somehow capture all of this information in a paper in the next 8 days. I am really looking forward to that weekend of relaxation in South Africa on my way home. (Except of course for the shopping and errands that I need to do).