Thandanani = Google?

I have a feeling that working with Thandanani might be like working at Google. If I work at Google again after this year, I feel like it might be good practice.
When I say it is like working at Google, I do not mean all the employee perks you hear about in the news. You can replace the free meals, table massages, complimentary transportation and heated toilet seats of Google with the warm, fuzzy feeling you get in your heart at Thandanani. What I am talking about is Google's habit of throwing unsuspecting newcomers into projects and letting them loose with a pat on the back and a smile. That is just how it works there-- you step into the first day of work, they tell you they have a problem and you need to be the brains to fix it.
One of my many projects here is to make an evaluation system of the beneficiaries from the Thandanani programs. My director would love to have a neat little report of how the work they have done has impacted the caregivers and OVCs they cater to, sitting on his desk by the end of November. Here are some of the stumbling blocks I have come to on this one:
1. I need to figure out what exactly in all these programs the coordinators and their teams want to evaluate. Meaning I have to find a way to meet with them despite the fact that most people are running around in the townships all day with their projects.
2. I am supposed to make focus groups. How do I coordinate focus groups of people out in townships? I would have to have these people identified, then find a way to contact them [not like I could send them an email], and then tell them a time and place. A place? I don't know those areas at all, and they don't have addresses. How about the corner with the cows and the goats eating out of the trash, with baby chicks and piglets running around them. Wait, that isn't that every corner?
3. I am still at a total loss at how to use the public transportation into the townships. I know how to get out of the townships, but even if I could get into the townships I would have to know the place well enough to which dirt road to stop on. Right, the one with the goats eating out of the trash.
4. Oh yeah, I DON'T SPEAK ZULU. Interesting obstacle, isn't it?

So my plan is to employ a sidekick [I am thinking the intern that sits at the front desk?]. Maybe even two. And then I will have a beautiful, scientific report written up, on Duncan's desk in November.

Tomorrow I am going with Phumlani back to the school with the food garden from next week. We are going to teach them how to harvest all the vegetables so they can take them back home for supper. Yay! And then we are doing home visits for the rest of the day. Let's hope the weather is nice!