Presenting to the UNDP

Tuesday was an uber high-stress day that was exactly how I had imagined all my days on the ground here in Bluefields would be like.  It was super crazy, but also exciting.  Sunday night we received word that our contact with the UNDP in Nicaragua had finally managed to convince the organization to take a look at our operation and figure out a way for them to help us.

Of course, that meant that we suddenly had to scramble to put together a presentation, a tour, and somehow simultaneously appear to be super organized, and effortlessly professional.  HA!  Well Guillaume, Ben, Julie and I sat in our little Bluefields Office Headquarters and hammered out a presentation (in spanish, I might add) that talked about where we've come from, what we're doing now, and our 5-year implementation plan, mentioning of course, that we need close to $7M to do it right.  Fun fun fun.

Tuesday night came around, and we were running numbers up until 3 minutes before the UNDP was supposed to arrive.  We managed to get the kitchen staff to put together a little coffee and cookies tray for the presentation (since it was happening at the workshop) before starting on their preparations for dinner.  Did I mention we had offered to host the UNDP for dinner too?  Also, the workshop was frantically being cleaned and polished in the background, and certain select locals were chosen to appear busy while our tour was going on.

Anyway, the event was a huge success.  We gave a tour where local employees gave an overview of their section of the workshop - what they were working on at that moment, and how it fit into the larger picture.  We showed off the turbines that we are using to provide energy for the workshop, and then we finished in our little classroom where Guillaume gave our banged-out presentation.  Whoo hoooo!

Then it was back to the house for a super-nicaraguan meal and lots of Flor de Caña (that's awesome Nicaraguan rum, by the way)... and the real substance of schmoozing.  Thank god Guillaume's so good at it.

Here are a few pics...

Here's a good chunk of the group during the tour of the workshop.  There's local employees, volunteers, UNDP peeps, random professors from UMich who happened to hear about us and were interested, and Guillaume all mixed in there together.  At this particular point in the tour, Seb was explaining the stators, and the actual electricity production inside the turbine.  And yes, that's me in the back, center there - and no, I'm not pissed, even though I look it.  Apparently I've developed a habit of giving this kind of pissy stare whenever I listen to Spanish really closely.

Dinner with the bigshots.  The kitchen staff even managed to throw together matching table cloths and everything!  We were also lucky enough to have Lâl here - the guy in charge of the French operations of blueEnergy - in time for the presentation as well.   He works full time for the civil service in France, but spends every other waking moment he has left over on furthering the vision of bE.  The next step for him and for the French arm is to open up a point of operations in Africa based as much as possible on the model we've implemented here in Bluefields.