Elections, independence, forests and grassroots

So I just posted recently…like yesterday but I’m about to go on another trip for a week so here’s some quick updates since most of the stuff in the last post was from 2 weeks ago.

Presidential Election
So I’ve been trying to keep up with election news in the US and I’ve been having a lot of conversations with various Ugandans about Obama and McCain. So while most Ugandans like Obama and are really excited my home-stay father and one of my brothers likes McCain, so that’s interesting. I really like talking politics with them. Its interesting to hear insights from people who aren’t American.
I also was able to watch the VP debate and I would just like to take a quick moment to say that I love Joe Biden and Palin makes my stomach churn. I could rant for a long time about it but I won’t put you all through that.

Forest Adventures
The other weekend some friends and I were going to spend Saturday and Sunday in Entebbe (a city near Kampala) the beach is there, a zoo, a lot of stuff. Someone suggested going first to the Mpanga Forest where we could go hiking and see monkeys, butterflies and birds. So in the Taxi on the way to the forest we realized that Entebbe was in the opposite direction of the forest so we would need to go back to Kampala after the forest then on to Entebbe. OK

So we hike. See cool things. It was good. A couple monkeys, lots of butterflies and some birds…one looked like Toucan Sam, sort of. We took this side path and after 3hours of hiking we were lost. Not just lost but waking in a swamp on these wooden planks that look like they would have been a good bridge 50years age. Luckily we stumbled across these village kids who were collecting firewood and the helped us find our way back to the main park area.

Then we had to walk back to the road which is kind of like a highway and then walked along the road (highway) trying to get to the closest town where we could get a taxi. So of course right when we get to the road it started down pouring. So we walked along the road for a half hour in the rain getting laughed at by people who were dry and watching the 11 stupid muzungus walk in the rain.

We eventually hailed a taxi. So normally taxis hold about 15 maybe 16 people and that’s already packed really tightly. After 6 of us got in there were 21 or 22 people in the taxi and sat all squashed and cozy for a half hourish and drove back to Kampala. We got there at 4 and ate lunch. We called it a day because we were dirty and disgusting…so no Entebbe. It was a crazy, funny day though.

AWA
So this girl in my program a few weeks ago came up with the term AWA – Africa Wins Again. The above story was an AWA moment. We say it when a situation so strange or funny comes up. Or something that would never happen back home or a time where we just look like stupid Muzungus.

Grassroots
The past two weeks my group broke into four smaller groups to study various topics more in depth. I was in the Grassroots Development group which involves empowering the poor, encouraging group formation, and savings among other things.

We learned about Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) which, without going into too much detail, gives a voice to the poor. Letting them identify who in their communities are poor, what their needs are, and how to go about lifting themselves out of poverty…It seems like a pretty obvious idea yet it is actually relatively new in Development Studies.

In the past and still today a lot of organizations come in and decide what is needed in the community but the community especially the poor don’t play a role in the decision process and in many cases the project fails, or is underutilized.

I’m going to stop because I’m starting to get more in-depth but if you want more info about it just let me know…

Anyway we visited these farmer and women groups where grassroots methods and PRA have been used. There was this women’s group and you could see in their faces happiness and the sense of empowerment they felt. The group of about 20 comes together each week and each saves 200 Ugandan Shillings (1500 shillings is about $1). They have been together for just under a year and have already raised about 120,000 shillings. They then use this money for loans to buy things for their own individual income generating activities or to pay school fees for their kids etc, and are able to pay the group back, with interest, on time.

We were taught that groups are supposed to rotate leadership positions so when we asked the group if they rotated leaders their answer was “We are all leaders.”

In meeting them its hard to believe that one year ago they did not know each other and now they take care of one another and are helping to pull themselves out of poverty together, and this was the poorest of the poor in that community. I can’t stress enough though how exciting, and hopeful their energy was.

Ugandan Independence Day
Thursday October 9 was Uganda’s Independence Day so I didn’t have class. I was hoping for parades and fireworks and people walking around in yellow, black and red (Uganda’s flag color) but honestly with the exception that the taxi park wasn’t as crowded you could have gone the whole day without knowing it was independence day.

Apparently there was some kind of something going on somewhere with speeches and parades but my friends and I didn’t find that out till after it was over…which is kind of a bummer but it was still a good day.

A few of us had lunch at this really nice Chinese restaurant (they gave us hot towels before and after eating) And the food was so good. It was the first time since I’ve been here that I’ve kind of splurged on a meal. We got our food, drinks and split a dessert for less than $7. You can’t get Chinese food that cheap even at a bad Chinese restaurant in the states.

Afterwards we took a Taxi to Lugogo which someone recommended to us. I think it was like some kind of international trade fair of maybe East African goods. I’m not exactly sure because we never went inside. You had to pay 3000 shilling to get in and we didn’t feel like paying. So we stood outside where there was a crowd looking in. And we got this man to teach us Uganda’s national anthem -First you have to stand up straight (he made us stand up straight) and look kind of like a soldier…it was at this point that we asked him if this was for real or if he was just trying to make us look silly…then he started singing it for us and a couple others joined in…it goes something like “Oh Uganda, May God uphold thee. We hold our future in thy hands.” And so on. It’s a pretty song.

We stayed for a bit talking to other Ugandans and a random Kenyon about what we should have done for Independence Day which probably would have been more helpful the day before rather than the day of.

Afterwards we walked back to Kampala, it was a kind of long walk but it was good. Along the way we saw this guy selling Ugandan flags and we decided we should each get one. The man only had 2 at the time so he had us wait while he ran to a store and got another one for us. While he was gone a bunch of other people came up to us trying to sell us things. This one really persistent man was trying to sell us a night stand and we said we weren’t going to carry it home and he said he could get it to fit in one of out bags (there is no way that would have been possible)

Anyway there are all these people around the 3 of us including the taxis full of people stuck in a jam just looking at us. So we got them all to sing Uganda’s National Anthem with us. And when the flags came we waved them.

It was a day where I completely loved Kampala and Ugandans. It was awesome. So I guess I didn’t need the parades and fireworks!

Another Trip
This Sunday I leave for my trip to Eastern Uganda. I’m going to Mbale and also doing my rural home-stay…so more updates when I come back.