JOSH
Around November of last year I got a promotion at work. No longer working in the NOC with crazy hours
and instead being a sales engineer, dealing with customers and doing base level engineering for their
requests and providing the necessary quotes. Doing this made me feel like a little kid, as most of the
people I worked with had children my age. This continued for me until June when I took my first trip to
Djibouti, a small African country between Somalia, Ethiopia and Eritrea across the Gulf of Aden from
Yemen. I was there originally for a month helping to setup our operations at the state-run telecom’s
underutilized teleport. After about a month Back in the States I have since Moved to Djibouti and will
be here until July 2013 at the earliest. The country has two seasons: Hot as balls with high humidity
and Hot with less humidity and rain (5in over the whole year). It is in the northern hemisphere so we
are now entering the hot and slight rain season. Highs in the day are in the low 90s and upper 80s and
lows at night get into the low 80s and upper 70s. The record I saw was a high of 114 without humidity.
The work here is not bad and the people I work with are interesting to say the least. I could take days
trying to explain the work ethic and business mentality here in Djibouti. Everyone not above middle
management has their own business, the entire economy is almost entirely cash based and almost no
one works in the afternoons.
This Year has also been good for me travel-wise. I was able to go to the UK with my sister in March
during the PSU spring break. We visited Bealer in Newcastle, my friend from high school and some of
our family in London and ended our trip with a rugby match in Cardiff. In all it was a great experience it
was great to see family that we hadn’t seen in 10 years. I fell in love with Cardiff after that visit; nothing
beats the juxtaposition of a castle that dates back over 2000 years just down the road from a brand new
rugby stadium.
Part of the perks of working in Djibouti is I get 2 weeks’ vacation every 3months. The idea is that I can
go back to the states; however my company will pay for any round-trip flight that is comparable to a
flight back to the US. I just finished a 2 week trip to South Africa and it was amazing. I spent the first few
days in Johannesburg where I met a Brit who had sold his Ferrari to travel the world for a year. He was
at the end of a six week stay in South Africa and was flying out to Mumbai the day I left Johannesburg.
I took a first class sleeper train from Johannesburg to Cape Town, a 25hr train ride but with all meals
included. It was a great trip. 5 course dinners, 3 course lunches and 2 course breakfasts combined with
great scenery riding through the middle of the country. In Cape Town I stayed at a Hostel in the city
Bowl, right in the shadow of Table mountain. While I was there I met up with a promiscuous lesbian
form Australia, an alcoholic journalist from Ireland and a recent Northwestern photography grad from
Oklahoma. We spent the last few days in Cape Town doing our own stuff during the day and then
meeting up and drinking until the wee hours of the morning on Long Street (a really long street in Cape
town with a bar or restaurant as every other shop). Suffice it to say the first few hours every morning
were spent piecing together the previous night and determining how much we had spent and how much
of the wine I had purchased on a wine tour earlier that week we had drunk.
I am now, sadly, back in Djibouti and have realized that none of the work that needed to be done while
I was gone has been completed. I don’t look forward to returning from my next trip out of Djibouti, but
I do look forward to leaving. I plan to be back in the states around xmas and new year’s and hope to see
at least a few of you while I am there.
and instead being a sales engineer, dealing with customers and doing base level engineering for their
requests and providing the necessary quotes. Doing this made me feel like a little kid, as most of the
people I worked with had children my age. This continued for me until June when I took my first trip to
Djibouti, a small African country between Somalia, Ethiopia and Eritrea across the Gulf of Aden from
Yemen. I was there originally for a month helping to setup our operations at the state-run telecom’s
underutilized teleport. After about a month Back in the States I have since Moved to Djibouti and will
be here until July 2013 at the earliest. The country has two seasons: Hot as balls with high humidity
and Hot with less humidity and rain (5in over the whole year). It is in the northern hemisphere so we
are now entering the hot and slight rain season. Highs in the day are in the low 90s and upper 80s and
lows at night get into the low 80s and upper 70s. The record I saw was a high of 114 without humidity.
The work here is not bad and the people I work with are interesting to say the least. I could take days
trying to explain the work ethic and business mentality here in Djibouti. Everyone not above middle
management has their own business, the entire economy is almost entirely cash based and almost no
one works in the afternoons.
This Year has also been good for me travel-wise. I was able to go to the UK with my sister in March
during the PSU spring break. We visited Bealer in Newcastle, my friend from high school and some of
our family in London and ended our trip with a rugby match in Cardiff. In all it was a great experience it
was great to see family that we hadn’t seen in 10 years. I fell in love with Cardiff after that visit; nothing
beats the juxtaposition of a castle that dates back over 2000 years just down the road from a brand new
rugby stadium.
Part of the perks of working in Djibouti is I get 2 weeks’ vacation every 3months. The idea is that I can
go back to the states; however my company will pay for any round-trip flight that is comparable to a
flight back to the US. I just finished a 2 week trip to South Africa and it was amazing. I spent the first few
days in Johannesburg where I met a Brit who had sold his Ferrari to travel the world for a year. He was
at the end of a six week stay in South Africa and was flying out to Mumbai the day I left Johannesburg.
I took a first class sleeper train from Johannesburg to Cape Town, a 25hr train ride but with all meals
included. It was a great trip. 5 course dinners, 3 course lunches and 2 course breakfasts combined with
great scenery riding through the middle of the country. In Cape Town I stayed at a Hostel in the city
Bowl, right in the shadow of Table mountain. While I was there I met up with a promiscuous lesbian
form Australia, an alcoholic journalist from Ireland and a recent Northwestern photography grad from
Oklahoma. We spent the last few days in Cape Town doing our own stuff during the day and then
meeting up and drinking until the wee hours of the morning on Long Street (a really long street in Cape
town with a bar or restaurant as every other shop). Suffice it to say the first few hours every morning
were spent piecing together the previous night and determining how much we had spent and how much
of the wine I had purchased on a wine tour earlier that week we had drunk.
I am now, sadly, back in Djibouti and have realized that none of the work that needed to be done while
I was gone has been completed. I don’t look forward to returning from my next trip out of Djibouti, but
I do look forward to leaving. I plan to be back in the states around xmas and new year’s and hope to see
at least a few of you while I am there.