Not a wasted trip

Second interview done and dusted today. It was supposed to be with Ceara´s education minister, but she was called away to Brasilia at the last minute to be alongside President Lula as he signed a new law relating to education into force. You see, I only make allowances for absolutely necessary cases!

However, trying to contact the education ministry here proved elusive. Emails bounced back while phone calls ended up in the ether. So I had to make the long journey out to SEDUC (that´s the acronym) to find out about this. Not to worry though; the head of the communication team, Jacqueline, was a star, and rummaged around, producing a civil servant to interview. And not just any, but the head of planning. Exactly who I wanted to talk to too.

She was a bit hesitant on some of my questions. Being a teacher by profession (and apolitical, I suspect) she seemed a bit uncomfortable when I posed directly political questions; e.g. what are relations like between SEDUC and the unions? Some deciphering of the responses may be necessary.

And I recorganised my meeting with the education secretary- between four of them, the ministyr´s femal staff effectively organised my life for me over the next few days. I´ll be meeting Professora Sofia - as the minister´s called - 8.30 on Tuesday morning. May have to set my alarm for that one...

I also made use of the ministry´s library before hading back to the state legislature to get on with the archival research I started yesterday. Only to then jump on a bus which went round and round the same houses and streets - literally.