Quick update from Zanzibar

I haven’t updated this in ages. Yikes! So much to share. Right now I’m on the beach in Zanzibar. Heading back to Uganda (Bushenyi) in a few days. More to come!

Some common Ugandan Phrases:

“Ok, please”: used interchangeably used for yes and no
“I am on my way coming”: estimated time of arrival anywhere from 5 min to 2 hrs to never.
Up/down instead of left/right when giving directions
”Very fine”: if you’re more than fine, aren’t you good?
Pick and drop: not pick up and drop off
“Excuse”, not excuse me
”Push off”: to get a ride somewhere
”You are lost!”: not to be confused with actually being lost, but meant to ask “where have you been all this time?”

“Do you want to be more than friendly?” LOVE THIS ONE.

Some English words have a peculiar meaning widely understood within Uganda but mystifying to foreigners. The origin of these usages may be obscure. The best known example is probably to extend which in Uganda means move over on a seat to make room for someone else. Other words used include "pop" and is used to replace words like bring and come, for example Dan, pop that bottle here or Bobby, pop to my house.

How boda-boda got its name: The term “boda boda” originated at the Uganda–Kenya border crossing at Busia, where a kilometer separates the downtown area and the border post on the Ugandan side. Travelers dropped off at the bus/taxi station by buses or taxis or those coming to Uganda from the Kenya side were ferried over this distance by enterprising cyclists, who would attract business by calling border, border."

Cell phones in Uganda: A person finding himself with inadequate prepaid time to make a call will ring up the intended recipient of the call and hang up immediately. This has happened to me numerous times. The receiver of the call, hearing the phone ring once and seeing the number, understands himself to have been beeped. The understood message is, I wish to talk to you at your expense. HAHA!

The Vagina Monologues had a brief but notorious appearance on the Ugandan stage before being banned by government censors. The brouhaha led to the entry of the word monologue into Ugandan English as a euphemism for vagina. The newspaper Red Pepper popularized the use of the word kandahar for vagina, and whopper for penis.

Apparently everyone leaves work here (district office) at 5pm on the dot...at 6:45pm I got up to leave and found myself locked in! The doors lock from the inside!! There are no lights here either...ooops. I think it's time to pack up and find an exit somewhere. There is always the roof!

Been thinking of these lines by James Agee:

In every child who is born,
under no matter what circumstances,
and of no matter what parents,
the potentiality of the human race
is born again.

Happy weekend to all! I'm heading to Kampala on Monday...12 hours in a fifteen-seat bus (usually packed with 20 or 25 people).

Sugarcane: every child's favorite snack

Sugarcane! The kids love this stuff.

A few more pics: M.A. bartering for green bananas, Esther between the trees, the massive "African meal" described in previous post, and more pics of the children.

Mama Africa's Orphanage

These are the children at Mama Africa’s orphanage. As part of an expressive therapy technique, I asked them to draw something that made them happy. Well, at first I asked them to draw something that represented themselves, but that went over Esther’s head (she’s the one teacher who speaks some English). I expected them to start drawing in frenzy, fighting over the colored pencils, but many just sat there dumfounded. About five or six of them had never drawn before, much less seen clean paper and bright pencils. I should have thought to get clipboards to put the paper on, but they seemed content using the ground. For the children who didn’t know how to draw, I drew a cluster of green bananas on a tree, which they recognized. Slowly, a few of them began to draw. The activity took about three hours, and the end result was awesome (most popular drawing were flowers, football, and bananas). The kids presented their drawings to each other and then I hung them up around their sleeping quarters.

The owner, Mama Africa – she won’t reveal her given name – always insists on feeding me when I come. Yesterday she prepared a HUGE “African meal”, consisting of matoke, yams, Irish potoates, beans, fatty beef, pumpkin, mazie (a kind of dough you use to scoop up the beans), and spinach. I expected her to invite the two teachers to eat, but it was just me and Esther (the one teacher that speaks a little English). M.A. sat there while we ate, all smiles, and of course I couldn’t eat more than a plate or two of all those carbs, so I suggested we give some to the other teacher or to the children. She said the children had already eaten, and I wanted to protest but thought better of it. She even insisted I take take home the leftover yams, which felt so so wrong. The children eat a small bowl of oatmeal for breakfast and a huge bowl of matoke for dinner. And whatever snacks I bring them that day. The children – mostly around 5 or 6 yrs of age -- don’t speak a word of English yet (they are in P1 and P2; children here don’t learn English till P4), but they always seem happy to see me. On Tue I went out in the fields with M.A, a two hour walk on a narrow trail studded with cows and goats. We had tea with a very old lady who lived in a small mud hut, very neatly decorated. They asked me questions (through Esther) about marriage in America, Obama (of course), and family. Everything I said seemed hilarious to them. Anyway, so M.A. bartered with the old lady for a month’s worth of green bananas, which I bought for her. We walked through the fields while she pointed at different clusters. They all looked the same to me, but she has a discerning eye. So the kids are set while I’m in Kampala this month, which is something, but hardly sustainable. They do have a few chickens…I’m thinking maybe I can buy them a bunch of chickens and have someone make a coop; they can raise the chickens for eggs, sell them, and use the money to feed/school the children, also an activity the children themselves can partake in. We'll see...


Here is Felix modeling the football the kids popped in pineapple patch! He’s so adorable!!

What I'd like for my 30th birthday

Chocolate Kahlua Cupcakes

Quick Update!

Busy week at the orphanage. I'm taking the children and Mama Africa into town today to get some food (green bananas), books, and clothes. This should see them through the next month or so. There are 16 kids at the orphanage (mostly from northern Uganda), all in Primary 1 and Primary 2(ages 5-8). The orphanage is basically one long mud hut with two rooms for classes/sleeping area. There is an outdoor charcoal pit for cooking, an outdoor toilet area, and a field where the kids play. Mama Africa has owned the place for fifteen years or so, and she has two full-time teachers/caretakers. One, Esther, speaks English. The rest - including the children - speak the local language. One child, Talent, doesn't speak at all, and the other Joaiane, is partially blind. The other seem somewhat adjusted, although the lack of school materials mean they are only learning 1-2 hours a day. The rest of the time they sit in huddles. Yesterday I taught them how to play freeze tag and duck-duck goose, a big hit. We also played football and they somehow managed to pop two balls by kicking them into a pineapple patch. I think today I may try some kind of expressive art therapy.

Mama Africa makes her own hand creme (more like perfumed lard) which she hopes to eventually sell in town. I'm looking for small glass containers and sticky labels (to wrap around the jars). If you have any thing like this, please send my way (or if you are in DC give to Elizabeth before August 24). Letters seem to take forever (or maybe the post girl is holding them hostage because I refused to pay $1 for a single postcard!) but packages arrive in a timely fashion (6-8 weeks). Also...I would LOVE a novel or two!! Particularly Ron Carlson's "The Signal" or Andrew Rice's "The Teeth May Smile but the Heart Does Not Forget: Murder and Memory in Uganda".

My address:
Katie Wagner
Silent Voices
PO BOX 170
Bushenyi, Uganda
East Africa

So, yesterday I was running and a very old man grabbed my boob! I've become good at shaking hands and not breaking stride, because everyone here wants to shake hands and it is rude not to. Anyway, so I'm running on a logging road in the mountains (gorgeous scenery) and I see this ancient man ahead, all wrinkles and bags with bloodshot eyes, leaning heavily on a walking stick. He had his hand out so I slowed down to shake it, and then he swiped at me! Ha! I left him in the dust, of course. Harmless man, but funny. Then I went to get my first African dress, although I daresay it was made in Japan and I paid a fortune, the Mzungu price of $11 after bartering for twenty minutes and insisting the man sew the torn belt loop. I'm wearing it right now, and feel rather matronly; it is an XL (!!) and a little big, but covers my shoulders and knees, which is a must for women here. Will send pictures soon.

A funny post later about my contentious co-worker. If anything, she makes for good stories!

In other words, I'm craving a cinnamon scone and double tall nonfat cinnamon latte. Will someone drink one for me today?!

Kigarama Drama Group

These photos are from the Kigarama Deaf School drama group performed at the local church last Sunday. We made the Silent Voices banner! Edwin (the boy in the red shirt) is teaching sign to the parents as churchgoers look on. Took about two hours to get there and then I had to sit in a three hour church service before we could start the play. No one speaks English, so everything I said to the church was translated. The only word they understood was "Obama", haha!

My first attempt at doing laundry by hand. Let's just say the adventure took two hours and I finished covered in dirty water and soap! I looked up to find three old ladies across the street laughing at me. One finally showed me a better way to scrub, using my sheet as an example. She did this for about ten minutes, and then handed me the sheet. I thought she was done so I went to rinse it in the bucket, and she said, "Not clean! Not clean! You scrub more!!" Haha! The bathing water is very questionable here (no rain in four months)...thank god for perfume!

Fish Eagles & Other Birds

Sick, sick, sick. Let's hope it's just a bad case of stomach flu. Regardless, I'm heading out to the secondary school to provide teachers with textbooks for the older deaf students. Just waiting for Robert, my boda-boda driver!

In other words, some pictures from Lake Mburo National Park. Hippos, zebras, topis, birds, warthogs, and...maybe you can spot the buffalo?

What a crazy week! My co-worker berated me for not being what she requested: a "deaf" volunteer with a capital "D". Namely one who only signed and didn't wear hearing aids, namely one who was exactly like the deaf children of Uganda. Really...any foreigner who only signed and didn't speak would not be *exactly* like the deaf children here. Apparently, I've "undone" all her hard work in getting the parents to realize that their children will not benefit form hearing aids or speech therapy (no money for either). They've been calling and asking why I didn't come with the necessary "equipment". So heartbreaking! I get her point, but there are ways to solve this dilemma through educational meetings, fundraising, and more one-on-one time with individual families. Frankly, I think my co-worker needs to have her baby and take a lot of time off. So...there's a challenge for next week.

In addition to fundraising for Silent Voices, I'm going to work PT with Beacon of Hope (an orphanage that caters to children with PTSD) and Butabika Psychiatric Hospital in Kampala. One week a month I'll be up in Mukono, about eight hours from Bushenyi. More on this later -- off to training and then Lake Mburo for a weekend of birding!

Nicholas

This picture of Nicholas climbing a tree is my favorite! The village kids are very limber and can outrun (and outclimb) me any day.

Silent Voices Annual Meeting

These photos are from the Silent Voices annual event. The parents of the deaf children from the Butare school performed their drama play. The story line, in brief: the mother has a deaf child, the father blames the mother and leaves. The child first attends a hearing school, suffers, and then attends a school for the deaf. The father eventually comes back, and the community accepts the deaf child, etc., etc. The story line is very simple, but then again most of the audience (local parents) aren't well educated. The play is performed in the local language and translated into English and USL. Nicholas, the boy in the play, is one of the deaf children at the school. I did some of the interpreting!

The girl in this picture is Erica -- she's a deaf child at the Ishekyke school. Her mom Amanda, also in the picture, is the parent rep. at her daughter's school. Both are such awesome people here, and good role models for the other families. Amanda's sign is quite good.

Some more photos from the play! You can see the locals in the background looking on. They came out in droves from the nearby villages.

Hallelujah!! Got my first package...one month to the day! Maybe mail doesn't take THAT long? Anyway, so I'm standing outside the post-office eating a power bar when Moses rides up on his boda-boda. The following conversation ensues:

Moses: "Boda-boda?" (back to the district office)
Me: "No, I'm walking -- you took the last of my change this morning."
Moses: "Aww...come on. So, what are you eating?"
Me: "Umm..it's an energy bar with granola, kind of like maize! And lots of sugar and peanut butter. It's very American."
Moses: "Can I have one?"
Me: "No! I only have a few. But, here, you can have half of mine."
Moses chews for a minute, makes a funny face, and then says, "Is this from...Wal-Mart?"

Hahaha!! Probably so!

I always have an abundance of mangos and avacados!

At every gathering the parents bring local food to auction to teachers and myself; these photos are from the parent and annual meetings. I got the jackfruit for 3,000 ($1.25)!! I can't say I liked it...too gummy. I usually get a bag of avocados or mangoes -- last week I ended up with ten of each. You can guess what I had for breakfast, lunch, and dinner! The long sticks on the floor are sugar cane...the children break them into pieces to suck on, like hard candy.

SV Parent Meetings

These photos are from the weekly parent meetings that I coordinate. This particular group is at the Butare School (furthest from Bushenyi Town). They ranked the areas (education, health care, etc) they thought were most important for their deaf child (all translated into the local language). Bad photo of me! I have to keep my shoulders covered, hence the shawl.

Music Primary School

These photos are from the local primary school. Donations went to materials needed for the children to make their own drums.

District Office

My workplace - the Bushenyi District Office. Takes five minutes and 25c to get here by boda-boda from my house.

I’m still figuring out my goals and projects for the five months I’m here…things move very slowly in Uganda. One meeting can take an entire day…depends on how far the locals have to walk to get to the meeting place and how well they understand English. At yesterday’s meeting with the director of the Disability Rights Fund (from Boston!), I realized the focus needs to shift from the parents to the children. My co-worker Natalie, the Dutch founder of Silent Voices, wants to keep the focus on the parents (because she thinks the parents can educate the children), but DRF probably won’t continue funding SV if the focus doesn’t shift to teaching the deaf kids how to advocate for their rights. Also, the children tend to know more English than the parents. Natalie seemed annoyed by this, but couldn’t say anything because she obviously wants the money for next quarter…quite frankly, I think she’s tired of being in Uganda. Ten years is a long time, especially when you have four kids and another on the way. She’s always cranky and negative (good thing this blog is private!). She told me last week I was like all the other Americans she’s met, “loud and flamboyant”. Haha!! Thus far Silent Voices has focused on educating and teaching the parents about deafness, sign language, etc. Good things, of course – the parents are important members of the village. But the children need more sign instruction, the children should be telling the elders what they need and want. And eventually (hopefully??) the deaf children will want to make their own life. The most difficult part of the meeting was teaching the parents about the importance of advocacy…many want their deaf child to learn how to sign and speak, but they can’t imagine them having a life of their own (i.e., getting married). To them, the child will stay behind and help with the farming.

At the moment, the deaf children of the Bushenyi District (over 100) are isolated in their respective schools; most haven’t met their fellow peers at other schools. This is mostly due to lack of money for transportation costs. The Kigarama School has the highest number of deaf children – maybe 25 – and one teacher for the deaf. The others have a few teachers who know a handful of signs, but no one specific teacher. Anyway…so far I’ve been to all five schools in the district: Rugazi, Ruhandagari, Kigarama, Isheyke, and Butare. It takes an entire day to get to the school (most are located hours from town in rural areas), hold the meeting, eat lunch (matooke), and get back home. We usually sit under a tree and go over the simple agenda: sign language lessons and auctioning (the parents bring home-grown vegetables – usually avocado – to the meetings to sell to teachers --this is in lieu of paying Silent Voices membership fees). I had an interpreter b/c many of the parents don’t speak English. The interpreter translated what I said into the local language – for example, I might say, “this is the sign for ‘house’” and the interpreter would say “house” in Runyankore and then I’d give the USL sign for “house” – which happens to be similar to the ASL sign.

Next week I’ll start developing subject-specific curriculum for the deaf classrooms. For example, a math lesson that can be taught in sign language…so the kids are learning new words as well as basic algebra. Natalie will think this is too ambitious, but who cares? These are smart kids!

Photos to come soon!!

Ndere Troupe, Kampala

A few photos from my first week in Kampala. The Ndere Troupe travels the country giving performances. Awesome dancing -- wish I could get the video to upload.