Sunday 19 December 2010

Last lines, with love from Uganda

A group of us caught a bus at the crack of dawn yesterday morning over to Jinja, a town east of Kampala along Lake Victoria and on the Victoria Nile river. This town is a hub for adventure seekers drawn to the activities on offer along the river – the white water rafting is particularly renowned, but we were in search of the Nile Horseback safaris. What a trip! The ranch was situated deep into the bush, requiring (happily) a boda ride from Jinja into the jungle, down mud tracks and through villages to reach the property, spectacularly positioned overlooking the Nile, with acres of land and stables for 20-plus horses. The 3 more experienced riders among us were sent off with a couple of guides on a 2 hour ride of the sort which health and safety precautions and general British reserve would never allow back at a riding stable in the UK.

Embarking on a trail overlooking the river, we were then taken into the heart of rural Ugandan life, along tracks through communities of mud huts, feeling our way through paths in the undergrowth amidst banana plants, ducking our heads for low-hanging jackfruit trees, through tea plantations, corn fields, cantering our way wherever possible. The people in the local villages must be very familiar with mzungus passing through apace on horseback, but I certainly felt a little apprehensive (although utterly exhilarated) as we cantered along the dusty tracks with children rushing out to wave at us, goats and cows tethered feet away, women hanging out their washing. The long canter up through the corn fields along a track about 6 feet wide with corn rising high above us on either side was fabulous! Sweaty flanks (the horses), huge smiles (all of us) and nasty blisters (just me) when we finally pulled up to slow down at the top of that hill and surveyed the vast landscape, glistening in the midday heat around us. A perfect final flurry as I gear up for my last 24 hours here in Uganda.

What will I miss? New friends, the entertainment offered by the social life and humour of everyday occurrences, the adventure, the joyful passion which so many Africans exude so freely, the cultural surprises, the energy which comes from the sense that so much needs to be done in terms of development and progress – the fact that so many people we meet socially, Ugandans or ex-pats, are engaged in development work of one sort or another; the 'big fish in a small pond' element meaning that someone with a good brain, a good idea and the resources and wherewithal to implement it, can rise professionally and effect change relatively easily. I'll miss the colourful existence, the adrenalin-filled boda rides, the sunshine, the babies of course, oh and the Nile beer.

What will I be glad to turn my back on? The lethargy which hangs low over so much of the population, the inefficiency, the inability to depend on good standards. The relentless noise and dust and the unwanted attention that you attract as a mzungu, and a female one at that (I have been tempted to get “I'm fine” tattooed onto my forehead in answer to the CONSTANT “how are you, mzungu?”'s with which we are plied wherever we go). I will certainly be glad to inhabit a grasshopper-free bedroom again (the hotel room in which I've been staying for the final few days has granted me quite an edgy experience – one encounter with a lunging grasshopper even resulted in the breaking of the visor on my beloved boda helmet! These insects are vicious I tell you...)

And I could add so much more to each list.

In a dull moment, I will always be able to recall how uplifted I have felt seeing the view of Kampala over my shoulder as I zip up Namirembe Cathedral hill, homeward-bound on the back of a boda, and the insanity of snaking our way through the traffic, markets, people, animals, the intensity of sounds and smells around us which makes for your average 'popping into town' over here. I'll remember the evocative aromas of the jungle on our trips to the Nile or to visit Cissy. Many, many unforgettable moments; and maybe one day I'll drop by again. But for now, a different stage beckons.

So, thank you Kampala... and so long!

Monday 13 December 2010

Reflections

There is 1 week remaining for me here in Uganda and my mood is definitely changing. It's not that I don't want to return to the UK, but there is definitely a sense of 'reality' knocking. With a new job to start in 6 weeks time in Somerset (brilliant news!), my studies to pick up again in February (very worthwhile) and the world of general responsibility with which to be reunited (c'est la vie), the heady excitement of this adventure on the other side of the world starts to become somewhat diluted. For many of my colleagues here, this world is their long-term reality. They have contracts at Childs i and Kampala is their home for the foreseeable future; they are doing fantastic work in this country.

There is a strong part of me which would love to follow up my Ugandan friend's suggestion to look for a teaching job out here and really settle in for a year or two. I believe I would be happy. Life here for me as a mzungu from The Land of Far Far Away (last week's panto Shrekerella was fabulous!), despite the daily 'challenges' associated with Kampala chaos, power cuts, corruption and so on, is stimulating, fascinating, shocking, inspiring, entertaining, eye-opening and so much more in ways which my life in the UK tends not to be. It is the extent of the dampening of those factors which has pushed me to undertake such trips every few years – moving outside of one's comfort zone, overcoming the initial hurdles of fear, anxiety, discomfort and home-sickness, can deliver you to a place where so many slumbering senses can be awakened.

It is not only the sheer adventure and fun of it all, but really seeing how another part of the world ticks along. It gives you perspective; for all the ways in which my life in the months to come may resemble the one which I left behind before the trip in terms of work, social life, concerns about money, the future and the myriad of elements which make up our daily routines, I will also carry with me the experience of seeing days old babies brought to the babies' home having been abandoned in rubbish dumps or car parks, 2 year olds deserted by their mothers at police stations and all the trauma with which they will be afflicted (that is not to say that these situations do not occur in the UK and all over the world, but it is here that I have been exposed to them). I've experienced the extent to which the everyday workings upon which we rely can be disfunctional; policemen, guns slung over shoulders, hauling you over in the car to charge you a completely unjustified whopping fine, the inconvenience caused by the lack of water and power on a semi-regular basis when you are trying to feed and clean tens of needy infants, and the list goes on. Life as we know it in the West is worlds away from that experienced by so many on this planet; we would do well to shed our complacency.

There is a debate around how valuable you can be to a project or a community on a short-term basis; to spend a couple of months somewhere, acclimatise, experience the culture, contribute what you can in terms of work and then leave again. For myself, no doubt like many others, the limited timescale was my only option at this point and undeniably, such an experience can be as valuable to the person in question (in this case me!) as it is to the project or community you are working with. I hope and feel that my contribution to Childs i's nursery scheme will have made a positive difference to the toddlers' daily lives at the home, continued as it will be by Christine, a Ugandan employee there. However, I myself have benefited enormously from my time here. I left one life behind in London, riddled with cracks as it had become, stepped out into the unknown, have grabbed hold of the adventure with both hands, immersed myself in a different culture, formed special durable friendships, had Fun, felt Happy and will return to the UK to a location and job which feels far more suited to my natural preferences; I will have crossed over.

It seems to me, from my experiences of late, that if you take all the steps possible to help yourself, you are likely to be given an extra push by a helping hand.

Wednesday 8 December 2010

Bittersweet goodbyes

I accompanied Mary the social worker on a trip out to the bush with my angel Cissy, to visit her grandmother and family. Cissy was abandoned 2 months ago by her mother at a police station in Kampala and after working with Cissy's extended family the social workers established that her paternal grandmother Ruth would be happy and able to take her in. 47 year old Ruth lives with her husband and 5 children (excluding Cissy's father) plus 1 grandchild, about a 1 ½ hour drive from Kampala, in the heart of rural Uganda. For little Cissy (not yet 18 months old), to go from life in bustling Kampala with her mum, to the relative plushness of the westernised babies home with regular meals, her own cot, clean floors, surrounded by so many other babies and adults and all within 4 walls, this environment was utterly alien to her inexperienced eyes.

We drove far off the roads, down dirt tracks, through small communities of humble dwellings, through lush pineapple and matoke plantations to reach our destination. We were met by Cissy's aunts and uncle, all between the ages of about 10 to 16, as well as Cissy's brother of about 6 years. They were gathered around the family homestead – a simple but sizeable building with 5 rooms, a couple of small out-buildings, surrounded by plantation, chickens, pigs and so forth. Mats were laid down on the dusty ground in front of the house and we were invited to sit down with Cissy. The children were intrigued and excited to see their new family member Cissy in their midst (named after her teenage aunt, so it appeared).

After a while Cissy's grandmother arrived from her work in the fields. She was an extremely elegant, beautiful woman, clothed in a wonderfully vibrant deep pink floor-length dress with bouffant shoulders and a sash around the waste. She had an open, smiling and serene face and immediately welcomed us to her home, encompassing Cissy in her grandmotherly arms. This lady reminded me somehow of my own Sazy, and that is saying a lot... It was easy to see where Cissy's enticing looks come from! (I know, I need to start detaching myself from this little girl...)

Cissy had met her grandmother once before when she made the long, laborious trip to visit the babies home in Kampala with the child's father and she certainly seemed to sit quietly and comfortably in her arms for the duration of our visit. I couldn't help but well up when we passed Cissy over to Ruth, sitting on the mat next to us; it was something about this tiny child who had been so traumatised, sullen and tearful when she arrived at the babies home, fresh from abandonment by her mother, but who has over the weeks become accustomed to her surroundings, become a real little princess outnumbered by so many boys, prancing around winning everyone's hearts, but who was now being placed back with her flesh and blood, in humble surroundings but with her brother and aunts and uncle to love and play with her and a grandmother to care for her as her own – it was very poignant.

We had no smiles or giggles out of Cissy during the visit, she sat quietly, rather stunned by the whole process (which had been preceded by a 2 hour trip in a car seat! So much to take in in 1 day...) and treated her family to none of her toddling performances, but she definitely perked up when we visited her grandfather at his small shop and he plied her with cakes.

So Cissy will return 'home' this Friday. My colleague Becks and I will struggle, but hopefully the little one will settle in before long & grow up in a loving family environment, which is the whole point of our work here.

Sunday 5 December 2010

A royal encounter... & some grasshoppers

It's not everyday that you get the chance to dine with the Queen of a Kingdom; especially one whose title, 'Nnabagereka', originates from the Mushroom clan, or who grew up with the Edible Rat clan.

My friend Pete kindly invited me along to the Nnabagereka's 10 year celebration of her Development Foundation, in the form of a dinner and fundraising event. The Nnabagereka is married to the Kabaka, the King of the kingdom of Buganda. The country of Uganda being traditionally made up of a number of kingdoms, these were abolished by Prime Minister Obote in the 60s and then several were restored as cultural institutions by President Museveni in the 90s. Buganda is the largest of these traditional kingdoms.

Although I was slightly disappointed to find that I was not sitting at the same table as Queen Sylvia http://www.nabagereka.org/, it was certainly very interesting to attend a royal event. She is a relatively young woman, is attractive, charming, clearly very popular and is involved in a large amount of social development / charity work; reminiscent of Princess Diana I thought. She was accompanied into and out of the dining hall by a host of traditionally, colourfully, ostentatiously-clad ladies, herself in an elegant black number. Unfortunately, I did not have the opportunity to curtsy to her or exchange any words, which was a shame given that I'd done my homework on her clan origins and so forth, and was ready to enquire into the well being of her daughter, whose name means 'buffalo's horn'. Nor was I able to make a particularly active contribution to the singing of the Uganda and then Buganda national anthems throughout the evening – something to brush up on before my next royal encounter, wherever that may be.

It was a dramatic contrast to go from such pomp and ceremony one evening, to the humble home of one of the little boys who had stayed at the Childs i Foundation Babies Home for 5 weeks several months ago, the following morning. I accompanied a couple of the social workers on this check-up visit, to find out how little Nimrod is getting on living back with his mother in their community. We found them outside their home, a simple 1-room building, with 1 bed and a mattress on the floor, some clothes hanging on a line and some coals for cooking, housing Nimrod, his mother and her 2 sisters. Nimrod was wandering around the community in his bare feet and the social workers were very happy to see his level of attachment to his mum, and his lack of recognition of themselves. He was also prattling away in Luganda, the local language and has apparently stopped speaking or recognising English words. It was a positive visit as far as my colleagues were concerned.

Mary, a social worker at the charity from England, and I were honoured if a tad disconcerted by the family's hospitality, as we were offered a plate of the seasonal speciality, fried grasshoppers! We were treated to observing the process of preparing them – a brimming bowlful of limbless and writhing grasshoppers (surrounded by jumping plastic bags full of the next serving's unfortunate victims) which were then tossed into the sizzling hot pan with oil and onion and minutes later proudly presented to us as a tasty snack. Well! We were being watched from all quarters so managed to sample a few, made the requisite sound effects of pleasure, before being able to bag up the remaining thousand insects (so it seemed!) to take home in a doggy bag. On the wall of their modest dwelling was a poster of the Kabaka and Nnabagereka of Buganda watching over us as we tried to ignore the gritty after-effects of having a mouthful of grasshopper eyes.

Sunday 28 November 2010

The only mzungu on the matatu

Sadly, to travel out of Kampala my beloved boda bodas are not the best mode of transport (even I have my limits!) I've wanted to see the botanical gardens of Entebbe, Entebbe being the former administrative capital of Uganda until the 1960s, an hour's journey towards Lake Victoria. The botanical gardens were reportedly where an early Tarzan movie was shot and I've heard great things about the place.

In order to catch a matatu (taxi-bus) you must go to the 'Old Taxi Park' in the centre of Kampala. This place is totally Crazy! http://www.pbase.com/bmcmorrow/image/63363780 (thanks Brian McMorrow whoever you are). A heaving hell hole where matatus are rammed in together back to back, side by side, all waiting to go somewhere... how on earth they emerge in any order I have no idea, but emerge they do. People mass through the park, carrying and trying to sell their wares, find out where you are going, get money out of you. A kindly man took it upon himself to lead me over to the far corner of the park where the Entebbe bus was parked and proceeded to get disgruntled when I wouldn't pay him for his unrequested or required service. I was bundled into the last available seat on the bus and off we went... well, to join the static traffic jam which leads out of the taxi park. The only mzungu on the matatu – fairly conspicuous really, but it doesn't bother me any more. I take the stares, respond to them politely with smiles and get back to trying to blend in.

The botanical gardens are lush and tropical. Soaring palms, towering bamboo, long draping vines, vibrant blushing bourgainvillea – cheeky chatty monkeys flying through the treetops, what looked like a small dinosaur / crocodile crossing my path a couple of times, and the gardens sweeping down to the shore of Lake Victoria. A tranquil haven away from the taxi park's antithesis of tranquillity.

Another gem is Kampala's Baha'i Temple where we went for yesterday's Sunday morning service. I was initially drawn to this place for its green space in a city which has a significant lack of such areas. Perched on top of a hill, the temple is striking; a beautiful monument showing its graceful head above the ragged rush of everyday life. The Baha'i Faith propounds the spiritual unity of mankind – different religions are seen to pose no barriers to the oneness of life and God. The temple welcomes people from all faiths, symbolised by the 8 doors around its circular structure which are open throughout the service, onto views over the city through the calm of the surrounding gardens. It is really special.

Equally special was being listed all the merits of marrying a Ugandan man on my boda ride home, after revealing my unmarried status (have I learnt nothing?!) I did manage to get away this time, but these guys can be pretty persuasive, who knows what could happen in the next 3 weeks.....

Tuesday 23 November 2010

So, why & so what?

Nearing the midway point of my time in Uganda it is shameful not to have mentioned the main purpose of my trip, the work I am doing. For as well as having a blast careering around town on motorbikes, camping out in the wilderness, learning to salsa and so on, I am also being put to work at a very special place. Childs i Foundation is a charity which was set up to deal with the significant problem of child abandonment in Kampala. In the absence of a welfare state desperate parents abandon their babies at an alarming rate, especially if the child has a disability.

The Childs i social workers receive calls from police stations and hospitals to inform them when a 0-2 year old has been abandoned and the charity takes the child into its 'Malaika babies home'. This is a building with capacity for 25 babies at any one time and it is currently full. The children are first and foremost nursed back to good health as far as possible and the social workers work to establish whether the child can return to its parents or extended family, or if not they will search for an adoptive Ugandan family. The home aims to resettle the children in a family within 6 months of being taken in. Across town is Malaika House, where mothers go with their babies to work together with the social workers and vocational trainers to get themselves on a sound footing in order to avoid reaching the point hit by the mothers of the 25 at the babies home. Thus the 2 strands of care and prevention are addressed.

The organisation was set up a couple of years ago by Lucy Buck, a young British woman, who had spent a lot of time working with this issue in Uganda and was compelled to try her own approach. What she has done in a few years is remarkable.

My role out here has been to implement a structured 'Learning by Play' programme at the babies home and work alongside the carers to get it embedded into a daily routine. We have set up a schedule so that at certain times throughout the day the babies of different age groups are brought together for focused sessions of educational play. We're doing pretty well with it I think! Circle Time now has a good turn out as the word has got out among the ranks of the 1 year olds, and the afternoon 'messy play' sessions for the 2 year olds is getting oversubscribed as they push their way towards the nursery area for finger painting or play dough! (There are actually only 4 who fit this age group, but the crowds at the baby barrier grows by the day....). I am enjoying getting back in touch with the old 'Wheels on the Bus', 'Row row row your boat', 'If you're happy and you know it', and of course the classic 'Head, shoulders, knees and toes' routines – good training for entertaining my hordes of potential offspring in years to come!

Not having spent any real time with babies since my lovely big bear of a brother was a tiny sprog 20 years ago, this has all been very new for me, but it is a real pleasure and is coming pretty naturally I think. (If the charity considered international adoption for the babies, I think I'd be in real danger of bringing gorgeous prima donna Cissy home with me! Luckily though, she will be going back to her Dad before long, so it'll be just me getting off the plane this time).

The charity does really excellent work and is in continuous need of extra funding in order to maintain what it does and to extend to areas where it has potential to make real changes to the lives of those it seeks to help, to effect change in government policy and influence local and national practice, so very needed in this country. Take a look around their website if interested http://www.childsifoundation.org/ and if you are looking for a good cause to help http://www.childsifoundation.org/give/ they and so many others would welcome & appreciate it hugely :)

Monday 22 November 2010

Home from home

I've already found 2 similarities between Uganda & my beloved Fowey :)
  1. The car ferry which took us across the Nile en route to safari (although this one was a tad rustier & surrounded by many more hippos),
  2. The brass band at dusk up in the grounds at Namirembe Cathedral overlooking the whole of Kampala playing THE FLORAL DANCE!!! Wow, that made me smile! I almost broke out into the old routine, ha ha.

2 of the differences:

  1. Coffins being transported via boda boda (horizontally, across the back. Dear God, I hope it was empty...)
  2. Bus windscreens being transported via boda boda (vertically, in the grip of an audacious / foolhardy passenger perched behind the driver).

& there are many more on the 2nd list!