99 Red Balloons-Siobhan DuVall

Today we were back to Pastor Francis’ for another day of working with classes and visiting microenterprises.  We also stayed late today to assist the adult students in planning their microenterprises.

I introduced the P1 (1^st and 2^nd grade) class to Pictionary, which was fun.  I also observed some lessons and we all shared observations and feedback after the classes were over.  I made the mistake of thinking I could make balloons for the P1 class and then make balloons for the other classes later on.  However, once one balloon hit the courtyard areas, I was mobbed by the entire school with cries of “Next one is mine!” and “Balloon for me!” it was a little overwhelming but with Michael’s help we managed to make at least one balloon for every student.

Pastor Francis and his wife, Prosper

We visited two more mircroenterprises this afternoon.  The first one was one of the most impressive yet.  His name is Charles and he is a wood worker.  However, he went to three years of college at an art school and is passionate about bringing more art to his community.  He said after school he realized he needed to also make money so he decided to do “functional art” by making beds, tables, and other types of furniture.  It allows him to design artistically while also providing a product for customers.  He showed us some of his work and it was truly impressive.

The second microenterprise of the day was a single mother who is building a clothing sales business.  Once a week she travels to Jinja to the market and buys children’s clothing.  She then comes back to Lugazi and sells it door-to-door in the slum areas.

We had offered to stay from 4-6pm in case any of the project development students wanted some one on one assistance from us.  Only two students showed up so that gave the rest of us some time to hang out with the students.  I made some balloon animals for them and they were a big hit and the students had fun braiding our hair.  They are fascinated by our hair because they texture is so different and because they all have such short hair (boys and girls) and ours is much longer.

As we walk around the slum areas we always attract quite a bit of attention, especially from kids.  Some of them have shown us toys they have made and I am so impressed by the creativity and what they create with random things other people have thrown away.  Here are a few examples:

Take Me To Church-Eric Hozier

Everyday seems busier than the last and while Sunday began with a relaxing start, it got busier and busier as the day went on.  We were finally able to sleep in and relax around the campus for a few hours in the morning, which was nice.

At noon we all took off for Kampala to see some sights.  Transportation continues to be an adventure and today we rented an entire mutatu taxi for the day.  As a result, we were treated to some African music videos on the drive, mixed in with some Michael Jackson and Phil Collins hits from the 80’s (our driver told us he really loves Celine Dion J.

Our first stop was the Acacia mall for an ATM stop.  It is so fascinating to me that malls look and smell the same wherever you go.  After this quick stop we visited the craft market, which has locally made crafts and gifts for some souvenir purchases.

Next we visited the Ugandan National Mosque (formerly Gaddafi Mosque) in Old Kampala.  After receiving proper head and ankle covering, we went in for a tour.  Hassan, our tour guide, was very animated and happy to share information about Kampala, the Mosque, and Islam with us.  We learned Kampala received it’s name as a combination of the word camp, because the British first made their camp there when they colonized, and the word impala which are antelope that used to be very prevalent in the area.

The mosque is the second largest on the African continent and was finished in 2007 with monetary help from Libya so it was originally named Gaddafi Mosque.  It can hold up to 15,000 people and an additional 1,100 women in the gallery (women are not allowed to worship on the main floor in case they distract the men).

While we were on the tour we learned about Islam, how they pray, and Muslims in Uganda.  We also happened to be in the mosque for the 4 o’clock prayer call and were able to watch the muezzin call the prayer over the speaker for the entire city-that was a pretty cool experience.  We also trekked all the way up to the top of the minaret for a 360-degree view of Kampala.

After disrobing from our mosque-appropriate attire, we quickly ran over to the Ba’Hai temple, which overlooks Kampala from a different hill.  Even though the temple closes at 5:30 each day, and we arrived at 5:30 exactly, we were allowed a short 30-minute visit.  It seems most things in Africa can be negotiated which is both a blessing and a curse but this time worked to our advantage.

The Baha’i religion was founded in the mid-1800’s in Iran (then Persia).  The fundamental beliefs are based on peace, unity, and equality.  Baha’i’s believe in oneness of religion and humanity and their temples are nine sided and have nine doors to represent nine major religions.  There are only eight Baha’i temples in the world and this is the only one in Africa.  No rituals or preaching can take place in the temples, they are only for meditation and praise.

We learned that Uganda is considered the spiritual center of Africa.  One person told us this is because it has freedom of religion and is the intersection of the Christian and Muslim areas of Africa.  Someone else told us that it is because the source of the Nile is in Uganda and the Nile is important in both Christianity and Islam.  It seems like both are viable reasons so we'll go with both :)

 

After our quick visit, we were off again to Ndere Cultural Center for an evening of traditional dancing, music, and food.  There was an enormous buffet of Ugandan food as dances were performed from around Uganda and East Africa.  My favorite was from the upper Nile region but everything was amazing and the MC was hilarious-making fun of just about everyone in the crowd.  My favorite part was at the end when the MC said, if the world did more dancing together, we would always have peace and then invited everyone in the audience down to the stage for an international dance festival!!

Change the World-Eric Clapton

Many of our group went rafting on the Nile River today (that’s in our plans for next weekend-although it sounds so crazy, I’m a little freaked out about it now…) so a few of us went to Lugazi to help out with a project development program and then on to the town of Jinja.  Jinja is the second largest city in Uganda and is known for being the source of the Nile River.

Our day began back at Pastor Francis’ school.  
In the evenings he teaches classes to adults to promote various community and economic development ideas.  He currently has two classes going on-project development, economic development, and a counseling class where people can earn a counseling certificate.  While we were in town, he had all of his students come to a special Saturday training on life, administration, economic development, and program development that are all Michael’s areas of expertise, as a result, Michael had prepared materials for us to use in helping the students develop their ideas.  We spent some time going over the main ideas as a large group and then broke into smaller groups to provide more one-on-one guidance as we discussed the students’ project ideas.

Working on developing measurable objectives

Many of them needed help breaking down their big idea into manageable and realistic action plans with steps they could take to accomplish their goals.  After some time in our small groups, we got back together to hear how things went.  The students were very excited about the information we shared.  Michael had provided some handouts they could use as templates for future projects as well and they were very excited about taking those and applying them to their different projects.

Some of the projects the students were interested in starting were: building a school, starting a business of craft projects, creating an afterschool program for orphans, offering classes to teach parents about child behavior and development, starting a computer access business, offering counseling workshops to families, starting a bakery service, and starting a poultry farm.  As Pastor Francis says, “small steps make big changes” and I think we helped take some steps towards planning and accomplishing their goals.  Pastor Francis was very appreciative of the materials and guidance we provided for the students.

While I’ve spent most of my blog so far talking about Uganda and all I’m learning here, I am learning equally as much from conversations with my colleagues on our many trips to and from different places.  I’ve had some amazing conversations about paradigm shifts as a result of traveling, religion, education and social programs in Finland, education and development in Uganda and Rwanda, and much, much more.

Today’s hour long drive to Jinja was another insightful conversation about development models and philosophies, and how someone can truly make a difference when situations can, at times, seem so hopeless.  We also discussed African experiences.  One thing I mentioned is that I expected the level of development to be higher than what I’ve seen so far. 

When I was last in sub-Saharan Africa in 2002 I met a Masaai warrior living in a mud hut who gave me his email address.  Since it’s fourteen years later, and there have been so many technological advancements since that time, and I’ve seen “mobile money” stands all over, I expected the level of development to be a bit further along.  However, as we visit the slums each day, I am shocked by the lack of development, the distance that must be traveled to water, the lack of infrastructure.  Many people do have cell phones but they are very basic phones capable of calling and texting.  They are not like the phones used in Brazil that can hotspot a wifi spot for you.  As a result, most people do not have access to the internet.  Unemployment is high and wages are very, very low.  A teacher will make 150,000 shillings a month, which is the equivalent of about $50.  The majority of people’s salaries go towards food and rent and, as a result, it is nearly impossible to save up enough money to go to school, buy a house, or start a business.

We arrived in Jinja after crossing the Nile River and had lunch at a restaurant called The Keep.  They cater to Western tourists and we were able to enjoy some hamburgers, Philly cheesesteaks, Oreo milkshakes, and chips and salsa!

After lunch we did some souvenir shopping before driving back to Mukono and meeting up with the rest of the group for dinner and debriefing. 

In the Garden-Van Morrison

Everyday is a transportation adventure.  Each morning begins with a big discussion about transportation as there always seems to be a new issue or deal that needs to get worked out.  While things in Rwanda are more orderly, Uganda is known for being much more of a free for all and we have experienced that on our trip so far.

Today we rode public taxis, which was a fun adventure.  Taxis are also called Mutatus and they are fifteen passenger vans that are, more often than not, filled with far more than fifteen people.  They don’t really have any set route or stops but they do run fairly regularly so you can take them to large hubs or between cities but you can’t really expect them to drop you off exactly where you’re going, as you would expect in the U.S.  We got dropped off at our new regular stop-the Simple Supermarket and Pastor Francis met us to teach us to his school so we can do it by ourselves in the future.

One thing that is an ordeal for Ugandans is getting water.  There are water faucets spread out throughout the living areas but everyone uses huge 4.5 gallon jugs (and really any container they can find) to carry water.  Wherever we go, we see people carrying containers of water to or from watering areas.

Today a group of four of us was back to Pastor Francis’ to work in the schools, help with the garden and visit more microenterprises.  Kim, Jessi, Michael and I were swarmed with hugs and smiles and “how are yous” upon our arrival because the students were on a break from class.  We then each took a class to teach.  I was in charge of the pre-school and P1 classes-quite a challenge for me considering I’m a high school teacher who has never taught at the elementary level and that most of the students don’t speak English.  At any rate, we sang a lot of songs and two hours later-I was exhausted!

The students love to have their picture taken and then look at the pictures on my camera so I spent some time at lunch taking pictures for students.  We then had another delicious lunch prepared by Pastor Francis’ wife.  During lunch we discussed his project development class and a special session he had asked us to teach the next day about life and career goals.

After lunch we began our work in the community garden.  This involved sorting through piles of garbage to separate out plastics from compostable items, digging holes, filling them with compost and recovering them with dirt.  Two of the upper level classes and some of the teachers helped us and in no time at all we had an entire plot completed.

Since we had visited to male microenterprises yesterday, today we visited two female microenterprises.   On the way I got to try and hold a bunch of bananas on my head-they are heavy!!  We first visited a woman who has opened a salon.  She styles hair and does braids.  Her busiest times of year are special occasions and holidays although she has some regular customers who come to get their hair done every two to three weeks.  She worked on Pastor Francis’ wife’s hair as an example but when she needed the dryer, sadly there was no power.

As we walked on to the next microenterprise Pastor Francis’ wife told us about the women’s support group she hosts.  It is comprised of local female business owners and they meet regularly to discuss business practices, savings and financial management, etc.  The next business was a small shop owned by a mother of one of the most precocious students at the school.   Her shop is sponsored by a charcoal company, but she also sells some small food products and spices.  We all squeezed into her shop to hear her story.  This woman has advanced HIV and was feeling very hopeless when Pastor Francis and his wife helped her start her business.  She is doing better now although now she is having rent problems and is not sure she will be able to stay in her home, which is behind her shop. 

We made a few purchases of mango and fish and then walked back to Pastor Francis’ place.  We were supposed to speak to his project management class but in Uganda everyone arrives a little late so we played with the boarding kids as we waited and I made balloon animals for them which was fun.  Some students finally arrived and we were able to talk with them about their projects for a few minutes before heading back for dinner.  We took a public taxi back again and learned that the phrase, “In Africa, there is always more room” definitely applies to tax rides.  We were sitting in a fifteen passenger van with rows of three seats across but several times there were four or five people in a row and one time there was a live chicken stuffed under the seat like a piece of baggage.

We were all pretty exhausted by the end of the day but excited to share stories and hear about everyone’s adventures.