Shifra, a young girl that was my shadow and a very wonderful companion during our time in Nshenyi village. We gave her these very sporty yellow rubber boots :)
The cattle on the farm had humongous horns!!! Luckily they were docile and not aggressive :) the people in this area are part of the bahima tribe, which are a cattle/herdsmen tribe. They valued cows!! Most of them didn't eat cows, but drank the milk. The cows are a status symbol so the more cows you have (no matter what your house looks like, etc.) the more respect you gain in the community.
Myself and Shifra
Myself and ShifraWe are in the middle of the savannah and miraculously we have an internet connection (what a contradiction!). I will try to update as much as I can on our activities, by typing my journal entries (which are relevant) from the beginning. . . I will post some pics later hopefully :)
Jan. 11/2011
Dear Journal,
Today has been a wonderful day. This morning we went to the villages to visit some of the beneficiaries of the 'ROAD' (the ROAD is an NGO started by our friend, Emma and it is aimed at minimizing poverty in the rural areas. I will write more details later. This is located in SW Uganda, along the border of Ruwanda, Tanzania and Uganda). We talked to a lady who has been volunteering for the ROAD. She has three children and looks after many other children. She is struggling to make ends meet. Her name is Nankunda Mercy. We talked to her about possibly giving her a goat and her responsibility with the goat: to rear it and give it lots of food, water, etc. She promised to take good care of it, and keep it so it will produce other goats that she can raise and sell off for money for food, school fees, etc.
Mercy and her female goat, which we handed out the day after we met her and her family.
Then we visited a lady named Mangadelena Bamaryo. Her story is very difficult: she recently mourned the death of her son, who had raped her. He had a 'mental problem'. She is old and quite weak but her daughter and grandson are there to help her. Apparently she had a goat but it was killed by bees (which later I found out isn't that far fetched). We asked her if the goat we proposed to give her would die and she assured us 'no'. We also told her she was not to just sell or eat the goat but keep it well and we would be back to check on how she is doing.
Mangadelena with her local goat. She had requested a local goat as they are more 'hardy' than the exotic cross goats (which are locals crossed with Boer goats from S. Africa).
The children in the area were so many!!! They came in crowds, crying 'mzungu'. Apparently some of them had never seen a white person before. The people here produce too many children! It would be very good to talk to them about family planning and instead of having more children to sell some excess food to increase their quality of life. 90% of people in Uganda are subsistence farmers, and if they have lots of food, they will just have more children!! In order to sell the food, they require good transport routes (roads) to move foodstuffs to market. Unfortunately the roads are not in any shape to reliably transport goods to a major center.
The children we met in a village. We brought some clothes that were donated to us by a used clothing store in Rocky Mountain House (Next to New). Once the kids found out that we were giving out clothes, they came by the hundreds running and shouting, in hopes of getting ONE piece of clothing.
We also visited a young girl, Prudence, whose father just died. She is 20 years old and is in Senior 4, which is 2 years from completing her high school education. Tanner and I spoke with her about school. She showed us some books on what she learned in school. The writing was excellent and what she was learning was very advanced. We asked her what she wanted to be. She said a veterinarian :) trying to model after me. I think she was inspired by our talk to continue her education, as she may have ended up dropping out of school and staying home to help her mom. She has 3 other siblings, and her dad was the breadwinner of the family, so she doesn't have the money to continue with schooling. We promised to help her with school fees in the upcoming school year, which starts in early Feb.
Tannner and I with Prudence, a very shy, modest Ugandan girl.
A lot of people ended up where we were and of course speeches were made. It was really touching. The kids wanted to feel my hair: they were so amazed at it!
Jimmy and Emma (our Ugandan colleagues) laughed when we went to get water and the local people said (in the local language, which we don't understand) 'Ah, for them they like water' as if it was so strange.
Jan. 11/2011
Dear Journal,
Today has been a wonderful day. This morning we went to the villages to visit some of the beneficiaries of the 'ROAD' (the ROAD is an NGO started by our friend, Emma and it is aimed at minimizing poverty in the rural areas. I will write more details later. This is located in SW Uganda, along the border of Ruwanda, Tanzania and Uganda). We talked to a lady who has been volunteering for the ROAD. She has three children and looks after many other children. She is struggling to make ends meet. Her name is Nankunda Mercy. We talked to her about possibly giving her a goat and her responsibility with the goat: to rear it and give it lots of food, water, etc. She promised to take good care of it, and keep it so it will produce other goats that she can raise and sell off for money for food, school fees, etc.
Mercy and her female goat, which we handed out the day after we met her and her family.Then we visited a lady named Mangadelena Bamaryo. Her story is very difficult: she recently mourned the death of her son, who had raped her. He had a 'mental problem'. She is old and quite weak but her daughter and grandson are there to help her. Apparently she had a goat but it was killed by bees (which later I found out isn't that far fetched). We asked her if the goat we proposed to give her would die and she assured us 'no'. We also told her she was not to just sell or eat the goat but keep it well and we would be back to check on how she is doing.
Mangadelena with her local goat. She had requested a local goat as they are more 'hardy' than the exotic cross goats (which are locals crossed with Boer goats from S. Africa).The children in the area were so many!!! They came in crowds, crying 'mzungu'. Apparently some of them had never seen a white person before. The people here produce too many children! It would be very good to talk to them about family planning and instead of having more children to sell some excess food to increase their quality of life. 90% of people in Uganda are subsistence farmers, and if they have lots of food, they will just have more children!! In order to sell the food, they require good transport routes (roads) to move foodstuffs to market. Unfortunately the roads are not in any shape to reliably transport goods to a major center.
The children we met in a village. We brought some clothes that were donated to us by a used clothing store in Rocky Mountain House (Next to New). Once the kids found out that we were giving out clothes, they came by the hundreds running and shouting, in hopes of getting ONE piece of clothing.We also visited a young girl, Prudence, whose father just died. She is 20 years old and is in Senior 4, which is 2 years from completing her high school education. Tanner and I spoke with her about school. She showed us some books on what she learned in school. The writing was excellent and what she was learning was very advanced. We asked her what she wanted to be. She said a veterinarian :) trying to model after me. I think she was inspired by our talk to continue her education, as she may have ended up dropping out of school and staying home to help her mom. She has 3 other siblings, and her dad was the breadwinner of the family, so she doesn't have the money to continue with schooling. We promised to help her with school fees in the upcoming school year, which starts in early Feb.
Tannner and I with Prudence, a very shy, modest Ugandan girl.A lot of people ended up where we were and of course speeches were made. It was really touching. The kids wanted to feel my hair: they were so amazed at it!
Jimmy and Emma (our Ugandan colleagues) laughed when we went to get water and the local people said (in the local language, which we don't understand) 'Ah, for them they like water' as if it was so strange.
No comments:
Post a Comment