I’ve got sunshine in my bag….
… just in case it’s still raining in the UK. We really have too much sunshine here; crops are withering and there is starvation in some areas especially Teso which was first of all hit with floods and now drought.
I pass the quarry twice a day and never cease to be fascinated by it – it’s like something out of the Russian gulag! Men, women (some with babies strapped to their backs) and children sit by heaps of different sized stones and hit them all day with a hammer to reduce them in size. Across the murram track where traffic and animals pass, without any safety considerations, is a maze of old metal conveyor belts shuffling stones from one place to another – the noise is deafening.
Further along men shovel gravel into trucks with only a basic face mask against the incessant dust and beyond that other men make concrete blocks using a basic ‘box’ which they fill and then close the lid compressing the mixture inside.
The vehicles are ancient and abandoned cabs lie half-buried in the sandy dust! I took photos one Sunday when fewer people were working as generally they don’t like being photographed there – maybe they are illegal immigrants.
It’s been good to have fresh water while I’ve been here as my neighbour has a water filter so I haven’t needed to use the chlorine tablets.
I decided to go to Mabire Forest on Sunday. When I was Uganda the first time in March 2007 there was a demonstration in Kampala against the government’s decision to ‘sell’ some of the forest to the Mehta Corporation for sugar cane cultivation. I’m glad the say the protest was successful altho’ three people were killed during the demonstration.
Unfortunately as the matatu approached the Forest the heavens opened and we had torrential rain. Many drivers pulled over – but not our intrepid driver who bravely went on luckily avoiding both puddle and other vehicles!
As you’re never sure how long rain will last I decided to go on into Jinja. I’d been before but enjoyed buying crafts and seeing again the source of the Nile and eating in my favourite place, Rumours, on the bank of the Nile. I had a rolex – an omelette in a chapatti.
For some reason many Asians settled in Jinja and they were responsible for setting up the Nile Breweries near to Jinja in the 1950s. After most were expelled by Idi Amin in 1972 the town became a bit of a ghost town and the once wide streets and colonnades of shops are looking a bit neglected. But it’s a good place to spend a Sunday afternoon and there are spectacular views of Lake Victoria.
On Friday the children of St Barnabas said goodbye to me with songs and dances. I bought them some biscuits to have with their porridge. At 6pm Labson had an end-of-term staff meeting and presented me with a traditional African carving showing a teacher and three children with ‘To Christina Spinney’ along the top and ‘From St Barnabas School’ engraved along the bottom. It really is very special!
I have really enjoyed my stay here. I needed to confront my nemesis that was St Barnabas school as I didn’t enjoy my time with them when I was here last. But this time it has been great and I’ve felt part of the school. The children’s enthusiasm for books and reading has been inspiring and I will be endeavouring to obtain more in the future and send them out.
Well this is my last day! I have just arranged for Herbert to collect me at 2.00am as my flight leaves Entebbe at 5.10am. Originally I had intended to stay until Saturday but the opportunity to see U2 in Cardiff on that day required me to leave earlier! I’m sure you’d have done the same! Actually this week is a bit of a none-event as school has finished and there is a week’s rest before the holiday programme starts.
I hope you have enjoyed reading my blog! I will try to put some photos on when I get back home but I’m sure most of you will see them soon anyway!
If anyone is interested in learning more about Hope for Children or sponsoring a child, the website address is: www.hope4c.org It costs about £12 a month (less than a pint of beer a week) to provide education for a child which includes uniform, food, holiday programme activities and pencils and exercise books etc.
Until I see you – take care.
Tuesday, 18 August 2009
Thursday, 13 August 2009
‘Good morning, Madam’
This is how I’m greeted! Unlike in England where people only sit next to each other as a last resort, in Uganda people intentionally sit beside you on a matatu and greet you! Those who know my name say, ‘Good morning Madam Chris’ – pronouncing Chris like crease! So to some I am ‘Madam Chris’, to others ‘Teacher’, to my friends ‘Chris’ and to many just ‘Muzungu’.
I was honoured on Monday afternoon – the Executive Director of Studies for the school came to meet me. She had heard about the library I set up last time and my efforts this time so she wanted to see me in person and greet me! We also had the official handing over of the books and laptops and photos were taken! I managed to leave before seven - the mossie witching hour - as I didn’t have any eau de deet with me and bought a couple of chapattis for my tea as I had no time to shop – such is the price of fame!
My typing skills have really been put to the test this week. It’s end-of-term report time and it started with someone asking if I could put their results on their electronic report cards. I agreed and that opened the floodgates! Now they don’t bother to write the comments down – they just dictate to me! T. Justine is classic – she thinks out loud – so I’m not sure if what she’s saying she wants me to write! She’ll say something like ‘Can add and subtract..’ and I’ve just put the full stop and moved down to the next column, when she says, ‘…correctly’! So it’s back up the column…!!
I have suggested to them that Labson might expect everything to be done as quickly next term and I won’t be there! But to be fair the computers are second hand from the senior school and some of the keys stick – probably in large part due to the dust under them – which makes it doubly difficult for them. I bought a couple of kid’s paintbrushes to clean the keyboards which has helped. Only one mouse out of three works so I showed them how to use the arrow keys but we still need to swap the mice around! There is also only one flash drive so again it’s a matter of saving to the desk top and working from that so someone else can save to the flash for Labson to have the info on. What fun!
T. Isaac did his dissertation for College in 2002 and doesn’t have an electronic copy so…….. you can imagine what he asked me to do! Actually it’s about the Nile Breweries Industry and very interesting and not too long!
Still no gas! But I finally remembered to buy a new plug so the kettle now works and I have hot water for tea when I need it!
Just in case you thought I might not be having any fun I want to reassure you that often my neighbour Janet and I get together with Sarah my room-mate when she was here or Mama Jordan who lives with Janet to watch ‘Dr Quinn Medicine Woman’! Janet has the boxed set and they all seem to have a thing about Sully – the meaningful looks heavy with unspoken passion, the fleeting touches – you know the sort of thing if you’ve ever seen the programme! We sit drinking tea or sometimes wine!
It’s lucky I can bring two bags back with KLM as I have so many beads and crafts and dried fruits etc. I just hope they arrive in Bristol the same time as I do!
Tomorrow is my last day at school and I’m sure they’ve got something planned! To find out what – check my next (and last) blog early next week.
Have a fun weekend.
This is how I’m greeted! Unlike in England where people only sit next to each other as a last resort, in Uganda people intentionally sit beside you on a matatu and greet you! Those who know my name say, ‘Good morning Madam Chris’ – pronouncing Chris like crease! So to some I am ‘Madam Chris’, to others ‘Teacher’, to my friends ‘Chris’ and to many just ‘Muzungu’.
I was honoured on Monday afternoon – the Executive Director of Studies for the school came to meet me. She had heard about the library I set up last time and my efforts this time so she wanted to see me in person and greet me! We also had the official handing over of the books and laptops and photos were taken! I managed to leave before seven - the mossie witching hour - as I didn’t have any eau de deet with me and bought a couple of chapattis for my tea as I had no time to shop – such is the price of fame!
My typing skills have really been put to the test this week. It’s end-of-term report time and it started with someone asking if I could put their results on their electronic report cards. I agreed and that opened the floodgates! Now they don’t bother to write the comments down – they just dictate to me! T. Justine is classic – she thinks out loud – so I’m not sure if what she’s saying she wants me to write! She’ll say something like ‘Can add and subtract..’ and I’ve just put the full stop and moved down to the next column, when she says, ‘…correctly’! So it’s back up the column…!!
I have suggested to them that Labson might expect everything to be done as quickly next term and I won’t be there! But to be fair the computers are second hand from the senior school and some of the keys stick – probably in large part due to the dust under them – which makes it doubly difficult for them. I bought a couple of kid’s paintbrushes to clean the keyboards which has helped. Only one mouse out of three works so I showed them how to use the arrow keys but we still need to swap the mice around! There is also only one flash drive so again it’s a matter of saving to the desk top and working from that so someone else can save to the flash for Labson to have the info on. What fun!
T. Isaac did his dissertation for College in 2002 and doesn’t have an electronic copy so…….. you can imagine what he asked me to do! Actually it’s about the Nile Breweries Industry and very interesting and not too long!
Still no gas! But I finally remembered to buy a new plug so the kettle now works and I have hot water for tea when I need it!
Just in case you thought I might not be having any fun I want to reassure you that often my neighbour Janet and I get together with Sarah my room-mate when she was here or Mama Jordan who lives with Janet to watch ‘Dr Quinn Medicine Woman’! Janet has the boxed set and they all seem to have a thing about Sully – the meaningful looks heavy with unspoken passion, the fleeting touches – you know the sort of thing if you’ve ever seen the programme! We sit drinking tea or sometimes wine!
It’s lucky I can bring two bags back with KLM as I have so many beads and crafts and dried fruits etc. I just hope they arrive in Bristol the same time as I do!
Tomorrow is my last day at school and I’m sure they’ve got something planned! To find out what – check my next (and last) blog early next week.
Have a fun weekend.
Tuesday, 11 August 2009
‘Poverty makes you have what you don’t want’
This is Monica’s definition of poverty. She’s twenty nine and has a fifteen year old daughter. The eldest of seven children, she was brought up by her grandparents as her mother was still at school when she had Monica. When her mother and her new husband had six more children, her mother thought Monica would have a better life if she married. So at the age of thirteen Monica was married to a man she had never met and had her daughter when she was just fourteen and a half.
When the relationship ended, Monica, who had been living in Lira in N Uganda moved to Kampala to begin a new life. Her daughter attends school and Monica funds this with a variety of part-time jobs. She never attended primary school herself but has recently started adult literacy classes and in a few weeks has exams. She attends for two and a half hours on four evenings a week and would like to do a dress-making or computer course so she can get a better job.
Although she often refers to God’s role in her life she realises that she has to make her own way and that everything that has happened to her is a stepping stone to a better life.
To return to her definition of poverty: She and her daughter live in one room and have to share a pit latrine with fifteen other people including children who shall we say are not always fastidious when it comes to squatting and hitting the hole and who don’t clean up after themselves – so she doesn’t want a dirty latrine but she has no choice. As well as getting wages where she works she sometimes also gets money to buy some bread for breakfast. Without this she would have to eat greens which are really animal foodstuff but which are eaten by people when there is nothing else.
Although she told me she didn’t have much money and she will struggle with her daughter’s senior school fees, I feel she is very proud of her achievements and gets great satisfaction from them. I have the greatest respect for her.
Now you know why I eat my posho!
Both boys and girls at St Barnabas school have to have their heads shaved regularly unless they belong to a tribe that plaits and beads the hair or are Asian. Children whose hair is considered to be too long are sent home from school until they get it shaved. This means they probably won’t get any food all day and will just hang around the slum as their parents are away working. A visit to the salon costs just 500/- for a small child and 1,000/- for an older one, but an increasing number of families are unable to afford this amount. 500/- is the cost of my matatu ride to school; it will buy an avocado, but a loaf of bread costs 1,500/- ,2kg of rice is 6,600/-, a pineapple is 2,000/-, a banana costs 200/- and a band aid costs 100/-. A large jerry can of water costs 200/-. The women who are making beads are getting 500/- an hour and most people in Africa exist on just $1.25 a day, which is 2,500/-. Most households are headed by lone women and seem to have at least three children, so there is not a lot of money to spare.
After a discussion with Labson and having seen a couple of children who had been sent home and the surroundings they were in, I have decided to spend the last of Carl and Beccy’s money on buying a shaver for the school so that children need never be sent home again!
Another important purchase will be a long-armed stapler so that Margaret can mend the library books when the middle pages come loose and a box of drawing pins for Teacher Eddie who hasn’t got any! We put a ‘flu poster up the other day and within two minutes, three of the drawing pins had been removed!
As well as arranging the setting up the bead-making project I have been buying necklaces and bracelets to bring back with me to sell. The women are very creative and all make different designs so I have bought from four different women. Joyce told me the other day that one of the women bought a basket to carry on her head and some bananas to sell with the money I had paid her!! That is wonderful and what it’s all about! – I just wish I could bump into her and buy a couple of bananas!
I was teaching P1 last week as their teacher was off sick. They were doing exams but I also did maths and literacy with them. The latter involved their copying a poem from the board (luckily I brought some with me) and drawing a picture. There are NO resources in the classroom but I brought crayons with me and the children get soooooooo excited but they can’t share! They hold them in their hands, put them on their laps and even hide them in their socks. This is where they keep their pencils (some just an inch long!) and I had to check their socks and any other peculiar bumps in their clothing before they left the room at lunchtime and home time. This together with constant calls of ‘Teacher!’, ‘Teacher!’ and a never-ending number of pencils needing sharpening, especially as they chew the leads, made for a challenging week!! I was correcting maths on Thursday afternoon and explaining to a child how to do the sum when I looked up and half the class was missing! I went and told T. Justine who just laughed! It seems that the other classes were having some post-exam down-time and were out playing and my class had joined them! Luckily their teacher was back the next day!
So I spent Friday entering exam results onto individual report cards on the computer – a nice change and it helped the teachers some of whom are not very quick on computers. Not surprisingly my ‘special’ readers were at the bottom of the class! If you can’t read the exam paper you can’t answer the questions! As a result I have suggested to Joyce that they do some extra reading during the holiday programme.
Another funny from the paper for you: A 54 year-old accountant leaves a note for his wife. ‘Dear Wife. I am 54 years old and need a change. By the time you read this I will be in the Sunny Bay hotel with my 18 year-old secretary.’ When he got there, he found a note from his wife. ‘Dear Husband. I am also 54 and by the time you read this I will be in Pleasure Motel with my 18 year-old toy boy. As you are an accountant you don’t need me to tell you that 18 goes into 54 more times than 54 goes into 18’!!
Had a relaxing weekend and went for a swim! Ready now for my last full week!
Take care.
This is Monica’s definition of poverty. She’s twenty nine and has a fifteen year old daughter. The eldest of seven children, she was brought up by her grandparents as her mother was still at school when she had Monica. When her mother and her new husband had six more children, her mother thought Monica would have a better life if she married. So at the age of thirteen Monica was married to a man she had never met and had her daughter when she was just fourteen and a half.
When the relationship ended, Monica, who had been living in Lira in N Uganda moved to Kampala to begin a new life. Her daughter attends school and Monica funds this with a variety of part-time jobs. She never attended primary school herself but has recently started adult literacy classes and in a few weeks has exams. She attends for two and a half hours on four evenings a week and would like to do a dress-making or computer course so she can get a better job.
Although she often refers to God’s role in her life she realises that she has to make her own way and that everything that has happened to her is a stepping stone to a better life.
To return to her definition of poverty: She and her daughter live in one room and have to share a pit latrine with fifteen other people including children who shall we say are not always fastidious when it comes to squatting and hitting the hole and who don’t clean up after themselves – so she doesn’t want a dirty latrine but she has no choice. As well as getting wages where she works she sometimes also gets money to buy some bread for breakfast. Without this she would have to eat greens which are really animal foodstuff but which are eaten by people when there is nothing else.
Although she told me she didn’t have much money and she will struggle with her daughter’s senior school fees, I feel she is very proud of her achievements and gets great satisfaction from them. I have the greatest respect for her.
Now you know why I eat my posho!
Both boys and girls at St Barnabas school have to have their heads shaved regularly unless they belong to a tribe that plaits and beads the hair or are Asian. Children whose hair is considered to be too long are sent home from school until they get it shaved. This means they probably won’t get any food all day and will just hang around the slum as their parents are away working. A visit to the salon costs just 500/- for a small child and 1,000/- for an older one, but an increasing number of families are unable to afford this amount. 500/- is the cost of my matatu ride to school; it will buy an avocado, but a loaf of bread costs 1,500/- ,2kg of rice is 6,600/-, a pineapple is 2,000/-, a banana costs 200/- and a band aid costs 100/-. A large jerry can of water costs 200/-. The women who are making beads are getting 500/- an hour and most people in Africa exist on just $1.25 a day, which is 2,500/-. Most households are headed by lone women and seem to have at least three children, so there is not a lot of money to spare.
After a discussion with Labson and having seen a couple of children who had been sent home and the surroundings they were in, I have decided to spend the last of Carl and Beccy’s money on buying a shaver for the school so that children need never be sent home again!
Another important purchase will be a long-armed stapler so that Margaret can mend the library books when the middle pages come loose and a box of drawing pins for Teacher Eddie who hasn’t got any! We put a ‘flu poster up the other day and within two minutes, three of the drawing pins had been removed!
As well as arranging the setting up the bead-making project I have been buying necklaces and bracelets to bring back with me to sell. The women are very creative and all make different designs so I have bought from four different women. Joyce told me the other day that one of the women bought a basket to carry on her head and some bananas to sell with the money I had paid her!! That is wonderful and what it’s all about! – I just wish I could bump into her and buy a couple of bananas!
I was teaching P1 last week as their teacher was off sick. They were doing exams but I also did maths and literacy with them. The latter involved their copying a poem from the board (luckily I brought some with me) and drawing a picture. There are NO resources in the classroom but I brought crayons with me and the children get soooooooo excited but they can’t share! They hold them in their hands, put them on their laps and even hide them in their socks. This is where they keep their pencils (some just an inch long!) and I had to check their socks and any other peculiar bumps in their clothing before they left the room at lunchtime and home time. This together with constant calls of ‘Teacher!’, ‘Teacher!’ and a never-ending number of pencils needing sharpening, especially as they chew the leads, made for a challenging week!! I was correcting maths on Thursday afternoon and explaining to a child how to do the sum when I looked up and half the class was missing! I went and told T. Justine who just laughed! It seems that the other classes were having some post-exam down-time and were out playing and my class had joined them! Luckily their teacher was back the next day!
So I spent Friday entering exam results onto individual report cards on the computer – a nice change and it helped the teachers some of whom are not very quick on computers. Not surprisingly my ‘special’ readers were at the bottom of the class! If you can’t read the exam paper you can’t answer the questions! As a result I have suggested to Joyce that they do some extra reading during the holiday programme.
Another funny from the paper for you: A 54 year-old accountant leaves a note for his wife. ‘Dear Wife. I am 54 years old and need a change. By the time you read this I will be in the Sunny Bay hotel with my 18 year-old secretary.’ When he got there, he found a note from his wife. ‘Dear Husband. I am also 54 and by the time you read this I will be in Pleasure Motel with my 18 year-old toy boy. As you are an accountant you don’t need me to tell you that 18 goes into 54 more times than 54 goes into 18’!!
Had a relaxing weekend and went for a swim! Ready now for my last full week!
Take care.
Thursday, 6 August 2009
The Rwenzori Mountains
The Rwenzori Mountains are really beautiful and the safari was amazing! We set off from Kampala on Friday morning about half past eight and it took us about eight hours to get there with a couple of stops. There were the other nine volunteers, myself, Immaculate and Joyce who are the development workers employed by Hope 4 Children and the two drivers, Denis and Josh.
I had met some of the volunteers before who are/were all UK university students and who had each raised £2,500 in order to volunteer for a couple of months in Uganda. They are all great fun and from a variety of backgrounds: one lives in Kinshasha in DRC where her father works for Dept. of International Development; another has lived in Tanzania; another was Somali; one was from Australia and another from New Mexico!! So we had some interesting discussions over bottles of Nile beer as you can imagine!
We stayed in Simba Safari Camp which has only been open for six months. There was solar power for lights and hot water in the lodges but not in the dining/bar area where we ate by hurricane lamp on Saturday due to a power failure!
I wondered how the visit to the Queen Elizabeth National Park would compare to my visit to Murchison Falls and to be fair the land safari wasn’t as good – there weren’t the number of animals and there were no giraffe and not as many types of antelope. However we did see a lioness with her three cubs watching from behind a mound of earth – they will probably be just a blob of brown on the photo!!
But the water safari was wonderful! We sailed along the Kazinga Channel which links Lake Edward and Lake George. There was an incredible number of hippos quite close to the boat – some on the shore and some in the water and some with herds of water buffalo; there was a small herd of elephant playing and splashing in the shallows and chasing off a lone buffalo and a couple of young crocodiles.
There are eleven fishing villages along the channel and each gets a share of the proceeds from the trips to encourage conservation. On the edge of one village was a spit of sand reaching into the channel which was full of birds and a bit further along an elephant coming down to drink! There are over 600 species of bird within the national park and most are very distinctive and/or colourful and some are quite large. I took lots of photos as you can imagine and also tried to record a movie on the camera – so fingers crossed.
We crossed the equator many times as we went from the camp to the National Park and at one point were only 37 Km from the Congo border. Before leaving to return we drove to a high vantage point to see the Great Rift Valley spread out below us where we had spent the last 36 hours. The photos will not do it justice – it was incredible!
I had thought I might visit Fort Portal and see the Mountains and crater lakes this time so this was a great trip for me. The Rwenzori Mountains are amazing and some are supposed to be snow-capped – the wind blowing off those shrouded in mist certainly felt cold enough for snow. The crater lakes are used to obtain salt and the salt pans were clearly seen from where we were standing at a height above them. Altogether amazing or awesome as my American friends would say!
I was half way through cooking my courgette omelette on Thursday night when the gas cylinder ran out! I contacted one of the local boda drivers who strapped the empty cylinder on the back of his bike and went off to get another one. Not so easy!! Not to worry as I was going away for the weekend but I asked him to keep a lookout for one. As Africa’s telecommunication industry has skipped land lines and gone straight to mobiles, there are no ‘yellow pages’ to refer to!
When I got back there was a message to say he’d found some small ones, so off he went again only to return as they wouldn’t take a large cylinder in exchange for a small one! I’ll have to contact Dawn and see what she wants me to do about this! Meanwhile Janet kindly fills my flask in the evening so I can have a cup of tea in the morning!
Reading continues to develop. Today I borrowed 100 reading scheme books from the library to use with P2 classes at school and hopefully arranged for Ray of Hope school children to visit the library next week. This is the school where I set up the reading scheme last time I was here and which was continued and developed by Dawn when I returned home.
A ‘funny’ from the local paper to end on: A man lay on his death bed surrounded by his wife and four children. Three of the children were tall and good-looking; the youngest however was short and quite ugly – the runt of the family. ‘Tell me wife,’ said the man, ‘are you sure the youngest child is really mine?’ ‘Yes dear’, she replied. He smiled and died a happy man. ‘Thank goodness he didn’t ask about the other three’, she thought to herself .. …. and smiled!
Keep smiling! Ugandans are always smiling and it’s catching!
The Rwenzori Mountains are really beautiful and the safari was amazing! We set off from Kampala on Friday morning about half past eight and it took us about eight hours to get there with a couple of stops. There were the other nine volunteers, myself, Immaculate and Joyce who are the development workers employed by Hope 4 Children and the two drivers, Denis and Josh.
I had met some of the volunteers before who are/were all UK university students and who had each raised £2,500 in order to volunteer for a couple of months in Uganda. They are all great fun and from a variety of backgrounds: one lives in Kinshasha in DRC where her father works for Dept. of International Development; another has lived in Tanzania; another was Somali; one was from Australia and another from New Mexico!! So we had some interesting discussions over bottles of Nile beer as you can imagine!
We stayed in Simba Safari Camp which has only been open for six months. There was solar power for lights and hot water in the lodges but not in the dining/bar area where we ate by hurricane lamp on Saturday due to a power failure!
I wondered how the visit to the Queen Elizabeth National Park would compare to my visit to Murchison Falls and to be fair the land safari wasn’t as good – there weren’t the number of animals and there were no giraffe and not as many types of antelope. However we did see a lioness with her three cubs watching from behind a mound of earth – they will probably be just a blob of brown on the photo!!
But the water safari was wonderful! We sailed along the Kazinga Channel which links Lake Edward and Lake George. There was an incredible number of hippos quite close to the boat – some on the shore and some in the water and some with herds of water buffalo; there was a small herd of elephant playing and splashing in the shallows and chasing off a lone buffalo and a couple of young crocodiles.
There are eleven fishing villages along the channel and each gets a share of the proceeds from the trips to encourage conservation. On the edge of one village was a spit of sand reaching into the channel which was full of birds and a bit further along an elephant coming down to drink! There are over 600 species of bird within the national park and most are very distinctive and/or colourful and some are quite large. I took lots of photos as you can imagine and also tried to record a movie on the camera – so fingers crossed.
We crossed the equator many times as we went from the camp to the National Park and at one point were only 37 Km from the Congo border. Before leaving to return we drove to a high vantage point to see the Great Rift Valley spread out below us where we had spent the last 36 hours. The photos will not do it justice – it was incredible!
I had thought I might visit Fort Portal and see the Mountains and crater lakes this time so this was a great trip for me. The Rwenzori Mountains are amazing and some are supposed to be snow-capped – the wind blowing off those shrouded in mist certainly felt cold enough for snow. The crater lakes are used to obtain salt and the salt pans were clearly seen from where we were standing at a height above them. Altogether amazing or awesome as my American friends would say!
I was half way through cooking my courgette omelette on Thursday night when the gas cylinder ran out! I contacted one of the local boda drivers who strapped the empty cylinder on the back of his bike and went off to get another one. Not so easy!! Not to worry as I was going away for the weekend but I asked him to keep a lookout for one. As Africa’s telecommunication industry has skipped land lines and gone straight to mobiles, there are no ‘yellow pages’ to refer to!
When I got back there was a message to say he’d found some small ones, so off he went again only to return as they wouldn’t take a large cylinder in exchange for a small one! I’ll have to contact Dawn and see what she wants me to do about this! Meanwhile Janet kindly fills my flask in the evening so I can have a cup of tea in the morning!
Reading continues to develop. Today I borrowed 100 reading scheme books from the library to use with P2 classes at school and hopefully arranged for Ray of Hope school children to visit the library next week. This is the school where I set up the reading scheme last time I was here and which was continued and developed by Dawn when I returned home.
A ‘funny’ from the local paper to end on: A man lay on his death bed surrounded by his wife and four children. Three of the children were tall and good-looking; the youngest however was short and quite ugly – the runt of the family. ‘Tell me wife,’ said the man, ‘are you sure the youngest child is really mine?’ ‘Yes dear’, she replied. He smiled and died a happy man. ‘Thank goodness he didn’t ask about the other three’, she thought to herself .. …. and smiled!
Keep smiling! Ugandans are always smiling and it’s catching!
Thursday, 30 July 2009
The dream has been realised!
Wednesday July 29th 2009
Today for the first time children from Namuwongo slum have visited the library and taken a book home to read! This morning I took P4 class down to the library and this afternoon it was P5’s turn. When I established the library last year we appointed Ritah as librarian, but she soon got a job using her IT degree and a new librarian Margaret was employed. I met her last Saturday for the first time when I went to Saturday reading club. She is great! The library is in good hands! She is very enthusiastic about books and reading and really wants the project to succeed.
She is already working with groups of disadvantaged children from the community who are not enrolled in school and tomorrow begins classes for six women who have got micro0finance grants and need to improve their basic literacy and numeracy skills to improve their businesses.
Next week my aim is to get the slum school where I worked last time into the library! I’m visiting tomorrow and will not leave until we fix a day and time!
The books at St Barnabas are already looking dusty and well-used - which they are. Every lunch time the children come for books and sit in small plastic chairs on the veranda reading – often there isn’t a book left on the shelves!
On Tuesday I went into the community with Joyce to meet some women who make beads out of paper with a view to buying lots and bringing them home to sell. Joyce is keen to expand opportunities for these women who are HIV+ (the correct term being ‘women living with AIDS’) to establish a business with a guaranteed market. We discussed the funding and agreed that 400,000/- was needed to set up the project: 100,000/- to buy varnish, strings, elastic and fasteners etc; 120,000/- for a guillotine to cut the papers and 180,000/- for a month’s wages for each of ten women. This is 1,500/- per day; they will work three days a week for three hours each day. We also discussed paying them even well they are not well enough to work, as they still need nutritious food to enhance the effectiveness of the ARV drugs they take.
I am going to use the money raised and donated by Beccy and Carl who did a sponsored bike ride riding a tandem for 22 miles, coping with a puncture and numb bums!!!! So a big ‘THANK YOU’ to them. I will give Joyce the money and she will buy what is needed so the project can begin at the beginning of September. Prior to that, she is involved in a holiday project for the sponsored children at St Barnabas. Development workers never rest – they are amazing! Hopefully she will send the necklaces, bracelets to me via the BA pilots and I will be able to sell them with your help and send the money directly to Joyce so the project is sustainable and the women have some self-respect and a much-needed income.
The school day at St Barnabas is long but somehow quite relaxed. Classes start at 7.00am with an hour of ‘extra study’ (this is not for P1 and P2). The other ‘extra study’ period is from 4.30-5.30 and children only need to attend one of them. (This is when I do my extra reading support session). The ‘normal’ day is from 8.00-4.00pm and at 4.00-4.30 the children clean the classrooms! There is a half hour break in the morning when sweet ginger tea and a samosa is provided for the teachers (the tea is served in a battered metal kettle!) and there is an hour for lunch which is also provided.
Teachers seem to have quite a few free periods during the day but as they all either walk to school or come by boda-boda they use this time for preparation and marking as there is no way they could take work home with them. The craze in the staffroom at the moment is Scrabble and they often play over lunch-time! Children move freely in and out of the staffroom – remember it is also the library - but generally children are welcomed and tolerated and possibly as a result they are not ‘in your face’ as much as British children seem to be.
Well I’ve been invited to go the Queen Elizabeth National Park this weekend with Immaculate and Joyce and nine other volunteers from UK – so that should be fun! Hopefully will see the Rwenzori mountains, a few crater lakes and possibly tree-climbing lions – I’ll let you know!
Answer to puzzle – only vowel used is ‘a’ and all consonants are followed by an ‘a’. I’m sure you all got it!
In the meanwhile – keep reading – you don’t know how lucky you are! And if you come across any children’s books you don’t need any more or at car boot sales etc – remember there are some very keen children at St Barnabas who would just love them!
Wednesday July 29th 2009
Today for the first time children from Namuwongo slum have visited the library and taken a book home to read! This morning I took P4 class down to the library and this afternoon it was P5’s turn. When I established the library last year we appointed Ritah as librarian, but she soon got a job using her IT degree and a new librarian Margaret was employed. I met her last Saturday for the first time when I went to Saturday reading club. She is great! The library is in good hands! She is very enthusiastic about books and reading and really wants the project to succeed.
She is already working with groups of disadvantaged children from the community who are not enrolled in school and tomorrow begins classes for six women who have got micro0finance grants and need to improve their basic literacy and numeracy skills to improve their businesses.
Next week my aim is to get the slum school where I worked last time into the library! I’m visiting tomorrow and will not leave until we fix a day and time!
The books at St Barnabas are already looking dusty and well-used - which they are. Every lunch time the children come for books and sit in small plastic chairs on the veranda reading – often there isn’t a book left on the shelves!
On Tuesday I went into the community with Joyce to meet some women who make beads out of paper with a view to buying lots and bringing them home to sell. Joyce is keen to expand opportunities for these women who are HIV+ (the correct term being ‘women living with AIDS’) to establish a business with a guaranteed market. We discussed the funding and agreed that 400,000/- was needed to set up the project: 100,000/- to buy varnish, strings, elastic and fasteners etc; 120,000/- for a guillotine to cut the papers and 180,000/- for a month’s wages for each of ten women. This is 1,500/- per day; they will work three days a week for three hours each day. We also discussed paying them even well they are not well enough to work, as they still need nutritious food to enhance the effectiveness of the ARV drugs they take.
I am going to use the money raised and donated by Beccy and Carl who did a sponsored bike ride riding a tandem for 22 miles, coping with a puncture and numb bums!!!! So a big ‘THANK YOU’ to them. I will give Joyce the money and she will buy what is needed so the project can begin at the beginning of September. Prior to that, she is involved in a holiday project for the sponsored children at St Barnabas. Development workers never rest – they are amazing! Hopefully she will send the necklaces, bracelets to me via the BA pilots and I will be able to sell them with your help and send the money directly to Joyce so the project is sustainable and the women have some self-respect and a much-needed income.
The school day at St Barnabas is long but somehow quite relaxed. Classes start at 7.00am with an hour of ‘extra study’ (this is not for P1 and P2). The other ‘extra study’ period is from 4.30-5.30 and children only need to attend one of them. (This is when I do my extra reading support session). The ‘normal’ day is from 8.00-4.00pm and at 4.00-4.30 the children clean the classrooms! There is a half hour break in the morning when sweet ginger tea and a samosa is provided for the teachers (the tea is served in a battered metal kettle!) and there is an hour for lunch which is also provided.
Teachers seem to have quite a few free periods during the day but as they all either walk to school or come by boda-boda they use this time for preparation and marking as there is no way they could take work home with them. The craze in the staffroom at the moment is Scrabble and they often play over lunch-time! Children move freely in and out of the staffroom – remember it is also the library - but generally children are welcomed and tolerated and possibly as a result they are not ‘in your face’ as much as British children seem to be.
Well I’ve been invited to go the Queen Elizabeth National Park this weekend with Immaculate and Joyce and nine other volunteers from UK – so that should be fun! Hopefully will see the Rwenzori mountains, a few crater lakes and possibly tree-climbing lions – I’ll let you know!
Answer to puzzle – only vowel used is ‘a’ and all consonants are followed by an ‘a’. I’m sure you all got it!
In the meanwhile – keep reading – you don’t know how lucky you are! And if you come across any children’s books you don’t need any more or at car boot sales etc – remember there are some very keen children at St Barnabas who would just love them!
Sunday, 26 July 2009
It’s great to be back in Kampala!
Not withstanding the fact that when I arrived in Entebbe my luggage courtesy of Kenyan Airlines was still in Amsterdam and it seemed to take forever to get my new UK mobile unlocked to take a Ugandan SIM card – it’s great to be back here!
I’m house-sitting for Dawn whom I met when I was here last time. She arrived in October last year to volunteer at Ray of Hope slum school, but decided to stay longer in Uganda. She now has a job for two years teaching music at an International school in Kampala starting at the end of August so she’s gone back to London to spend a month with her family and friends and lent me her house. It’s lovely! One of six in a compound with views of Lake Victoria from one side of the compound. It’s further out along the same road where I was staying before past the quarry. The fact that it hasn’t rained for months and the quarry itself makes everything very, VERY dusty.
I have to admit that Dawn has a cleaner so I don’t need to do my own washing and I seem to get lunch at school, so not much cooking required either! Every day we have my favourite – posho! and rice, matoke, a bit of cabbage and either two one inch cube pieces of beef, g-nut sauce or beans.
I am going to spend all my time here working at St Barnabas school where I only spent one morning last time. Labson the headmaster and I discussed converting half of the staff room into a library/reading room and on Tuesday we achieved the impossible! Some pupils and I cleared out the junk, they swept and mopped the floor while I went to Barclays to change Dollars into Ugandan shillings, then Teacher Doreen and I went shopping! I’d been to Nsambya with Matthew last time I was here to buy library furniture so knew where to go and how to bargain! The only thing was we had to go on a boda-boda (scarey!) but we came back in the pick-up with the bookcase, tables and bench. Once again Rog gave me money for library furniture – so a BIG thank you to him from all the teachers and children!
Well it’s now Friday – the week has flown!! I’ve got a ‘room-mate’ for a couple of weeks! My neighbour, Janet, who’s an engineer from USA has a friend staying and doesn’t have a spare bedroom. As they’re visiting various projects in different parts of Uganda I won’t be seeing much of her.
The reading programme is already well established! I’ve heard over 70 children read this week and in the main the older ones are very good readers; there are only about ten of those I’ve heard who need some individual help. But the younger ones still need a lot of teaching. The number of children who manage to squeeze into the library corner during break and lunchtimes has to be seen to be believed. ‘Madam I want book!’ is the usual plea!
A couple of times whole classes (50+) have been and chosen a book for a ‘reading lesson’ and I’ve gone and listened to some of them read. At other times I’ve had small groups from classes for about half an hour at a time. About twenty of the older ones have taken books home for the weekend, which has involved writing their names in an exercise book as the books aren’t catalogued like the ones I did for the library I set up last time. I’m going to see it next week, so hope all is well with it!
I’m keeping myself amused with a crossword book – very challenging – thanks Beccy and a book of code word puzzles. So here’s one for you! What links Kabalagala and taramasalata? Answer next time!
There’s a small Internet place about 5 mins walk from where I’m staying which is good for sending e-mails – I only hope it will cope with flash drives and blogs! Here’s hoping! If not you won’t be reading this – lets hope you are!! Until next time – take care and have fun.
Not withstanding the fact that when I arrived in Entebbe my luggage courtesy of Kenyan Airlines was still in Amsterdam and it seemed to take forever to get my new UK mobile unlocked to take a Ugandan SIM card – it’s great to be back here!
I’m house-sitting for Dawn whom I met when I was here last time. She arrived in October last year to volunteer at Ray of Hope slum school, but decided to stay longer in Uganda. She now has a job for two years teaching music at an International school in Kampala starting at the end of August so she’s gone back to London to spend a month with her family and friends and lent me her house. It’s lovely! One of six in a compound with views of Lake Victoria from one side of the compound. It’s further out along the same road where I was staying before past the quarry. The fact that it hasn’t rained for months and the quarry itself makes everything very, VERY dusty.
I have to admit that Dawn has a cleaner so I don’t need to do my own washing and I seem to get lunch at school, so not much cooking required either! Every day we have my favourite – posho! and rice, matoke, a bit of cabbage and either two one inch cube pieces of beef, g-nut sauce or beans.
I am going to spend all my time here working at St Barnabas school where I only spent one morning last time. Labson the headmaster and I discussed converting half of the staff room into a library/reading room and on Tuesday we achieved the impossible! Some pupils and I cleared out the junk, they swept and mopped the floor while I went to Barclays to change Dollars into Ugandan shillings, then Teacher Doreen and I went shopping! I’d been to Nsambya with Matthew last time I was here to buy library furniture so knew where to go and how to bargain! The only thing was we had to go on a boda-boda (scarey!) but we came back in the pick-up with the bookcase, tables and bench. Once again Rog gave me money for library furniture – so a BIG thank you to him from all the teachers and children!
Well it’s now Friday – the week has flown!! I’ve got a ‘room-mate’ for a couple of weeks! My neighbour, Janet, who’s an engineer from USA has a friend staying and doesn’t have a spare bedroom. As they’re visiting various projects in different parts of Uganda I won’t be seeing much of her.
The reading programme is already well established! I’ve heard over 70 children read this week and in the main the older ones are very good readers; there are only about ten of those I’ve heard who need some individual help. But the younger ones still need a lot of teaching. The number of children who manage to squeeze into the library corner during break and lunchtimes has to be seen to be believed. ‘Madam I want book!’ is the usual plea!
A couple of times whole classes (50+) have been and chosen a book for a ‘reading lesson’ and I’ve gone and listened to some of them read. At other times I’ve had small groups from classes for about half an hour at a time. About twenty of the older ones have taken books home for the weekend, which has involved writing their names in an exercise book as the books aren’t catalogued like the ones I did for the library I set up last time. I’m going to see it next week, so hope all is well with it!
I’m keeping myself amused with a crossword book – very challenging – thanks Beccy and a book of code word puzzles. So here’s one for you! What links Kabalagala and taramasalata? Answer next time!
There’s a small Internet place about 5 mins walk from where I’m staying which is good for sending e-mails – I only hope it will cope with flash drives and blogs! Here’s hoping! If not you won’t be reading this – lets hope you are!! Until next time – take care and have fun.
Saturday, 22 November 2008
So … now I must pack!
Well I think I’ve achieved quite a lot! The younger Nursery children will be performing the nativity play; the costumes look really good and I think they finally know the words to ‘Little Donkey’ and other carols. The older children are going to do various sketches related to Christmas, like children meeting and talking to Father Christmas. All the children all have a headband and a star to take home and the parents who come will be offered biscuits!
Most of the slum school children can read more than they could a couple of months ago. Some haven’t made as much progress as I would have liked as they have been absent a lot. The books, flash cards and sound strips etc are there for Melissa and anyone else to use. Hopefully the teachers will encourage reading to continue and may even get involved themselves.
The Library is finished! Matt and I went shopping for electrical bits and furniture last Monday. We bought three bookshelves, a desk for Ritah and a table and came back with them all piled up in the back of a pickup! The Reading Club resources are in the library and there is a world map and also one of Africa on the wall.
The Saturday Reading Club has been set up and is in good hands. There is a good selection of reading scheme books and other general interest books, that they use, as well as puzzles, spelling exercises and colouring activities. Ritah will be in the library showing the children how to use the books and encouraging them to borrow one for a week (when they finally arrive – that is!). Even the children who are good readers don’t have books at home, so it will be great that they can enjoy books all week and not just on Saturday mornings.
Ritah has also duplicated all the reading resources I made for the slum school, so they also will be available for the helpers to use at Reading Club. She will also be around during the holidays when there is a holiday programme run by Immaculate, the Development Worker and Joyce, so the children will again be able to use the library.
The library will hopefully serve the wider community, as a homework resource for the children from Namuwongo who are sponsored to attend St Barnabas School. Many of the parents can’t read and write themselves, so are not able to help their children with homework.
I’ve had an emotional couple of days. On Thursday the Nursery children sang to me, presented me with a big card with all their handprints on and a group photo and we had a cake! On Friday the children of St Barnabas sang to me, gave me lots of little letters and a framed picture that they had all contributed to. In addition some of the mothers of the children in the slum school came to say goodbye and gave me necklaces of beads they make themselves out of paper. I felt more appreciated in two months here, than in years at my ‘previous place of employment’! In addition I’ve had meals with different people and so now I must pack!
Thank you for your interest in my exploits in Namuwongo. I’m sure I’ll be back – so watch this space!
Well I think I’ve achieved quite a lot! The younger Nursery children will be performing the nativity play; the costumes look really good and I think they finally know the words to ‘Little Donkey’ and other carols. The older children are going to do various sketches related to Christmas, like children meeting and talking to Father Christmas. All the children all have a headband and a star to take home and the parents who come will be offered biscuits!
Most of the slum school children can read more than they could a couple of months ago. Some haven’t made as much progress as I would have liked as they have been absent a lot. The books, flash cards and sound strips etc are there for Melissa and anyone else to use. Hopefully the teachers will encourage reading to continue and may even get involved themselves.
The Library is finished! Matt and I went shopping for electrical bits and furniture last Monday. We bought three bookshelves, a desk for Ritah and a table and came back with them all piled up in the back of a pickup! The Reading Club resources are in the library and there is a world map and also one of Africa on the wall.
The Saturday Reading Club has been set up and is in good hands. There is a good selection of reading scheme books and other general interest books, that they use, as well as puzzles, spelling exercises and colouring activities. Ritah will be in the library showing the children how to use the books and encouraging them to borrow one for a week (when they finally arrive – that is!). Even the children who are good readers don’t have books at home, so it will be great that they can enjoy books all week and not just on Saturday mornings.
Ritah has also duplicated all the reading resources I made for the slum school, so they also will be available for the helpers to use at Reading Club. She will also be around during the holidays when there is a holiday programme run by Immaculate, the Development Worker and Joyce, so the children will again be able to use the library.
The library will hopefully serve the wider community, as a homework resource for the children from Namuwongo who are sponsored to attend St Barnabas School. Many of the parents can’t read and write themselves, so are not able to help their children with homework.
I’ve had an emotional couple of days. On Thursday the Nursery children sang to me, presented me with a big card with all their handprints on and a group photo and we had a cake! On Friday the children of St Barnabas sang to me, gave me lots of little letters and a framed picture that they had all contributed to. In addition some of the mothers of the children in the slum school came to say goodbye and gave me necklaces of beads they make themselves out of paper. I felt more appreciated in two months here, than in years at my ‘previous place of employment’! In addition I’ve had meals with different people and so now I must pack!
Thank you for your interest in my exploits in Namuwongo. I’m sure I’ll be back – so watch this space!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)