Well what an exciting and interesting week I have had. On Sunday there was a big name in town and in true Bahraini style this was a strange mixture of pomp, circumstance and innocence. Muhammad Yunus came to open the Social Business Week with a keynote address. He was inspiring and down to earth, radiating the kind of happiness that I have truly never seen before.
He was able to be comfortable with the required formality and not to be disconcerted by any of the incongruous happenings. In the breaks he was open to his rock star status. And seemed to enjoy having his photo taken with anyone who wanted to do this. The opening ceremony was stacked full of the usual protocol elements (including a fleet of shiny metal Dhows handed out to people who truly don’t need more ‘gifts of appreciation’), the rows of reserved seating and the hordes of local photographers snapping away through the whole thing.
The speech was great – and the things that stuck with me were:
Find ways to be useful to another person, make your business all about the ‘other’, start small and he advises young people to reframe their work expectations and to pledge “I am not a job seeker, I am a job giver” and to start their own businesses early in their lives. Ironically the majority of the audience were rather middle aged.
Those of you who know me know all about my friend Ronnie and his terrible struggle to find rewarding work in Bahrain. His return to Bangladesh, his return to Bahrain and the way he touched my heart in the process. He is now back in Bangladesh as he really couldn’t sustain himself here. His plight is one that is experienced by thousands of people all around the world and it is particularly hard to see here in Bahrain as this is a small place and it is hard to ‘close your eyes’ to it.
Recently there have been quite a few suicides reported in the paper – men in the work camps usually hanging themselves. There are so many men coming here to find a way to support their families and in the process losing themselves and many years of their family life. I won’t go on, if you live in the Middle East you know all about this, if you don’t live here my blog is not enough space to educate you beyond the superficial.
So what is the connection – well Muhammad Yunus comes from Bangladesh, as do many of the migrant workers here. His impact on the poor in his own country is well documented. He hopes to affect change throughout the world through spreading the word about Social Business. I hope he is successful . It is a simple concept. But one that is strangely hard to get your head around.
Simply put it is the same as a normal business except that once the costs of the business have been met the profits get recycled into the company, there are no dividends and no external shareholders. A rule of thumb on the salary what the founder should get paid is a market rate salary in start up and however successful it becomes this should not exceed 7 times of the median salary of the country you are in – otherwise things get out of balance again. The idea is summed up in the triple bottom line concept (people, profit and planet) and here is a link that will save me words.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_business
So back to my point – if I am to do something useful for another and try to make a small contribution to improving things for workers here what can I do. The people I meet always want to have a laptop – they know this is a gateway to all sorts of things that will help them. So I asked Professor Yunnus how I could create something – he advised to ask the labourers (duh) what they actually want to involve young people in creating some ideas with them to figure out how to develop this in a way that is sustainable. So I am going to do this. After I had asked the question I had a number of people come up to me and want my card (new experience at networking events). So watch this space.
On an ironic note, as I left the last Grameen Creative Lab on Wednesday evening (these were workshops run to encourage young people to generate ideas that could work here and that will solve social issues here) I was accosted by a young man. He was going through the bins looking for cans to sell. He wanted money, obviously, but as it turned out he also wanted to talk, he was here without a visa and in a very poorly paid job and was trapped here due to his financial position. He had an education but couldn’t get proper work.
He looked at me and said “but tell me sister why are you here? your country USA has so many opportunities” (I let that pass), “go home, Bahrain doesn’t have things to offer now”. This was the third time I had been challenged with this question in one week (once from one of the guys running the workshops). Then he asked me about my husband and instead of referencing the imaginary one I have invented for these occasions I revealed I was not married, “Sister this is very bad, when you die Allah will punish you, really punish you” .
So instead of a simple thank you I got a bit of an earful – they say no good deed goes unpunished. He asked for my phone number (for odd jobs rather than a date I think). I have learned a little and so I asked for his -and so Kawser I may get in touch so you can help me create Laptops for Labourers – he works as a tea boy at the Society for human rights – and perhaps we can take a small step together and I can be useful to another in a way that will make me happy. He will likely die of shock at getting a call bit if he survives maybe he is part of the answer to the question I keep being asked.
news from a small island 
See…., four posts later and you have 273 followers
brilliant, keep on going
xxxGabriela