SIDA partnership forum - where great ideas meet

Current location: SJ train heading to Härnösand, 59°23’41”N 17°59’5”E

I look out of the dirty train window and I can see how the Swedish countryside swishes by just slow enough for me to appreciate its beauty. Every now and then the sun manages to penetrate the tree line and everything becomes orange. I’m on the road again, this time heading for Härnösand. It’s not a very large city, but I must admit it has a certain charm to it, being by the water and all. I am going to a conference, if you may, held by the Swedish international aid organization SIDA. The funding for my crocodile project in Costa Rica was largely from SIDA, and now I am going back to their conference center to tell them about what I have done and meet other students who also have come back after their projects. The thing that I noticed the most the other recipients of the MFS-stipend on our first conference, was how incredibly inspiring and driven every one was. I was flat out impressed with the competence and diversity that had accumulated in the meeting room. When I got the invitation for a reunion, there wasn’t even a possibility to decline. Unlike the first conference, this one isn’t mandatory, and the number of participants is limited. After having accepted the invitation and was sent the schedule it dawned on me that this conference is not at all about us declaring what we have done with money from the state, but rather a recruitment of future employees within the government’s international aid programs. In other words, the conference seems to a cover for finding potential candidates for diplomatic positions representing Sweden abroad. They even asked us to send in out CV’s, so that we could ‘receive feedback’. Now, I don’t believe a second that they want to see our CV’s and give us personal feedback and advice just to be kind. The world doesn’t work like that - being kind is expensive. I think they are interested in finding people who fit their criteria for employment. I am more than excited to see how these three days play out.