Herr Josef Kittl - Österreichischer Honorarkonsul der Republik Gambia

Dear Josef, We suddenly found ourselves wondering on the way to Dessau how you are doing today - just before your birthday. We must not forget to congratulate you. It has been over a year since we have heard from or read anything from each other. Our planned reunion two years ago failed due to the stupid pandemic rules that differed between West Africa, Austria, and Germany. You wanted to come from Innsbruck to Munich to "take care of some of your banking affairs," but it failed due to your injected vaccine from China, even though you were vaccinated. Unfortunately, we could not come to Innsbruck for some unimportant reason. Now we suddenly learned about your death. Dear Josef, I always had some difficulty calling you "Joe", like all your friends did. I avoided it as much as I could, but not always. I preferred to address you as Josef. I felt that Joe was somehow disrespectful to your person. I don't really know why. Next year, Josef, you would have turned 70 years young. There was so much you still wanted to do in your "unrest state". You wanted to write a book about your rich, painful, bitter, but also valuable and beautiful almost fifty years in West Africa for one of the most prestigious international children's aid organizations in the world. You had the privilege of personally meeting Mr. Hermann Gmeiner, and you were a bit proud of it. Our initial introduction to each other was somewhat bumpy. I briefly thought during my nervous job interview, "We will not become friends." You probably thought the same of me. However, you and the then-personnel manager selected me as the new project manager at the SOS Vocational Training Center (VTC) in Sierra Leone. This mutual unpleasantness continued during my probationary period. We just didn't like each other. I also had little hope that I would want to work in West Africa beyond my probation period. Therefore, within my probation period, I asked Edith, my fresh "spouse," to look at the country, the people, and our new area of responsibility before we made the final decision to fulfill the two-year contract. You, Josef, were irritated that we had not informed you of our plans and that you suddenly visited us unexpectedly from your headquarters in Gambia. After all, you were the regional director for West Africa. The two-year contract turned into almost ten years in Sierra Leone for Edith and me, thanks to you. Dear Josef, with time and the many crises, we truly became real friends. Edith, I, and all our colleagues could always rely on you blindly when we all pulled together. By the way, your "favorite country in West Africa," as you briefly confessed to us. Often, your burning, spontaneous speeches fascinated me, and each time, it was a small lesson in your philosophy, humanity, love, and passion for the work we were doing for children and young people in a foreign country. Josef, it is true: You have really left incredible, visible traces on your way, both for your mission and for the people. However, it saddens and embitters me that you hardly ever received genuine appreciation for your passionate decades-long work, not from within our organization, not from your superiors, and only from a few colleagues. Yes, really, you are and will remain a role model for us. We continue to be inspired by you. Thank you. With love and genuine friendship Edith & Andreas

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Herr Josef Kittl – Österreichischer Honorarkonsul der Republik Gambia (68)

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Herr Josef Kittl – Österreichischer Honorarkonsul der Republik Gambia

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Edith & Andreas A.:

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