The Discovery Process

Discovery is an arduous, exhausting process. Part of this field attachment is to take in as much as we can and learn about certain key communities and the issues that they face, then determine an appropriate intervention. We have been to some communities that have such large-scale problems; you would have to change the mindset and social dynamics to have any effect on the health and economic issues faced by the community, not to mention political issues concerning the relation with the border to the Congo. It also feels weird to come in as an outsider and try to solve issues of a community that is not my own. However, I am so grateful that we are traveling with Ugandans. While none of them are from the area we are in, it is so useful to be able to compare my reactions with theirs and realize that just because I am from a more developed country a lot of what we are seeing is a shock to them as well and they really want to do something about it.  They are all very intelligent and passionate. Here we are at the equator.

I think that it is common for people to become so accustomed to their surroundings that they may no longer see just how many problems there are. It can take an outsiders perspective. Also, we are being guided by local people from the communities that we are working with. They are our educators and they know what their challenges are. We are also being taken to projects that have been very successful and are operating well. It is nice to see successful projects and it is necessary for generating the momentum and the energy for tackling larger issues. There is never one single solution. Issues of poverty, HIV/AIDs, mal-nutrition and food insecurity are multi-faceted problems.  People keep working so hard to simply treat the problem that they are unable to work on the root cause of the issues.

I am going to throw in a picture of me with some African Children just for the fun of it here to break up the text...This is at the fishing village. No sign of any guardians. They just followed us around. 

Our team keeps coming back to the concept of ownership. In some situations, it seems as if people have become too used to being given services for free. In a way it takes away from the value of the service and also the magnitude and implications of the problem. I’ll give you an example. HIV. The community that we all felt the most overwhelmed by was a fishing village called Kyanga. There are a number of factors that contribute to the state of this village. For one, it is fairly isolated with only one road in and one road out. Also, they are in Queen Elizabeth National Park, so there are issues surrounding land use. The Congo is on the other side of the lake and also relatively close by land. The village nurse’s best estimate was that roughly 30% of the population is HIV positive and there is a large issue with sex workers, both local women and women coming in from the Congo. Testing and ARV pills for HIV are given out free. The nurse stated that the general mood around HIV seems to be that it is just something that a lot of people have and that there is free treatment for it, so why worry about preventing it. Obviously this attitude will solve nothing. We are wondering if the level of free services provided for it is having a negative consequence of taking away from the magnitude of the disease.  

Amidst all of the heaviness, there is good. Today we visited a project called Give a Goat. Essentially they identify households in need and give them a goat. There is mandatory training provided before a household gets a goat and they are required to give the first offspring of their goat back to the center so that they can give it to another family. Up to this point they are working with 380 households, the majority of them headed by women. The families are also able to bring their goats to the center for breeding. The center also has a primary school for a small fee and a health clinic as well through which they enroll their members in a communal health insurance program. They also treat their water on site so there is clean drinking water. All of their electricity is generated with solar panels. They raise chickens, goats and pigs and cultivate maize, bananas, pineapple, coffee and eucalyptus. It was a really wonderful place that is making a noticeable impact on the rural community. 

This is the view from the property:

Here is one of their billy goats. Pretty cool lookin' dude. I think he posed for me. 

Annnndd.....I was in goat heaven. I grew up with goats and I absolutely adore them. It was so nice to be around them. Such neat creatures. He gave me a kiss!

I am going to leave it here for the sake of ending on a positive note. We have ended the discovery phase of the project and are going to move into figuring out what possible interventions would be for various communities that we have visited. I am excited to see what we come up with. 

Cheers from Uganda!

Love, Sadie

Photo Album Link!

The weekend has come and we have been able to have some down time.
Here is a link to my photo album on facebook:

Bwera, Uganda

Getting to know Bwera

One correction from the previous blog: We are not in the area of the mountain gorilla. Aside from that disappointment, everything else has been really wonderful. Our days are really busy from morning until night and I have been trying to reflect on all that I have been experiencing and learning.

The human is an extremely adaptable animal. However, we can also become so accustomed to our environment that we no longer fully realize our surroundings. Certain things that used to shock us no longer do. Problems that seemed insurmountable get integrated into the everyday way of life as something to deal with rather than something to solve.  While these statements can be applied to any country of varying levels of development, I am reflecting on what I have experienced of Africa. In the past week, we have visited a pastoralist community, an independent farmer who has worked hard and built up an impressive operation, a commercial mango farm, a market at the Congo/Uganda border, a district hospital, a water treatment facility, a public school and a private school. Not to mention countless meetings with local Community Development Officers, Micro-Finance Lender, security forces and meeting amongst our own team. We have been busy!!! I will not summarize every activity due to time, but I will share some. Here is a picture of our team.

Most of these things I got to experience on my first trip to Tanzania…so the initial shock has already been dealt with. However, I am still left with this overwhelming sensation of hopelessness. Even when I think I have a good idea of how to implement a possible solution, how? There is a lack of infrastructure, resources and money…always a lack of money. However, people here are hard working and good spirited. They appear to be so much more grateful for the little that they do have than many people that I have met that have more than they need. Myself included at times. So...I have to quit complaining, get off my butt and do something!

So, on that note, let me share some of the issues faced by the people we have visited so far. I’ll start from the beginning:

The pastoralist community: 

The livelihood of this community is cattle. They practice open grazing of their herd and face issues of land and water scarcity as well as disease such as Foot and Mouth Disease. These communities are surrounded by Queen Elizabeth National Park and have come to depend on grazing their animals in the park among other wildlife. Cattle are subject to being killed by lions and in turn the livestock keepers kill the lions. There is also a concern about the mixing of cattle and wildlife from a disease perspective. Another issue surrounding disease is the fact that this area of Uganda is very close to the Congo border. Animals are brought across the border and bring diseases with them. 

While visiting the pastoralist community, we got to observe the vaccination of a herd of cattle for Foot and Mouth Disease.

After Vaccinations, the cattle are set out for open grazing. Available land for grazing and water are scarce. Cows can go up to 70 km in a day in search of both....if I understood that right.

From there we moved on to the farm of Dorothy Police. This is a truly remarkable woman who has built up an extremely productive and impressive farm of both livestock and crops. She was widowed at the age of 32 and is now 74. She has committed her life’s work to her farm and helping others.

She raises pigs, chickens and other livestock. The pig pens are off the ground for sanitation. 

On the left are the pig pens and then one of the chicken coops is on the right. The mountains in the background are the border to the Congo. It is absolutely beautiful country.

Shade grown coffee

                      She was especially proud of the women in the group for getting their education.

From there we visited a large-scale commercial farm. The owner of the farm most likely had resources to begin with so it is not a rags to riches story. The scale of it is impressive and who doesn’t love a good mango? However, there were many problems. For one, they do use pesticides and they are near a water source but do not monitor for contamination. Also, the workers have no protective equipment when spraying other than overalls. The workers work 6 days a week from 8-noon and receive 2,000 shillings a day or 60,000 shillings a month. There are roughly 2500 shillings to a US Dollar, so that is just over $20 a month. Plus they have no housing provided for them and no health care.  

I guess that is ending on sort of a negative note. That was not my intention, but I am tired of writing and you are probably at the end of your attention span for my ramblings. I will write more later. 

We have done much much more since then, but it takes a very long time to upload pictures and I am sharing a modem with my fellow students, so I will wrap this up for now. 

Thanks for reading!

From Kampala to Kasese--A Ugandan Overview

Who would have thought that a year after returning from Tanzania, I would be writing a new blog post from Uganda? Not me. Funny how opportunities present themselves if you are open to seeing them.

After 3 airplanes and about 24 hours of travel, I arrived around midnight...and it was a 40 minute taxi ride from the airport to the hotel. I could not see much but I was immediately transported to the Africa I remembered from the smells of the dirt and diesel and food and every indescribable smell that just hangs in the warm, humid night air. I loved it. I opened my window and let the wind just blow over my face. So lush and vibrant. It was good to be back.
Enough of the romantic stuff. I suppose you want to know some more useful details.

So, what I am doing here? It is not an entirely simple answer. It is sort of a two-parter. This opportunity all started with a class that I took during my last semester at the U of M focusing on using social entrepreneurship to address sustainable development in Uganda, Africa. Our group decided to focus on the issue of Child-Headed Households, which is any household that is run by a child 18 years of age or younger. From the research that we did, it appears as if around 50% of households in Uganda are headed by children. Additionally, about 46% of the population is under the age of 15. These are shocking numbers and really hard to imagine. So, our group decided to explore the idea of setting up a vocational type school that would offer more trade oriented training to the heads of these households who are unable to obtain a formal education. Activities such as beekeeping and shade-grown coffee were explored, with the idea that we could adapt to the local needs. However, at this point, all we have are assumptions based on internet research. Seeing what the reality is on the ground with our own eyes was the obvious next step.

Over the course of the semester, we were paired with Ugandan students at Makarere University in the capitol city of Kampala. There are a total of 8 Ugandan students in areas of Veterinary Medicine, Public Health/Nursing and Environmental Studies. They are part of an inter-disciplinary program called "One Health Initiative". This approach looks at the inter-relationships of humans, animals and the environment and works to bring together multiple disciplines to improve on the health and well-being of all three areas with a specific focus on the issue of infectious diseases.

Myself and two other U of M students are fortunate enough to be able to go with these students on their 4 week field attachment in Western Uganda!!!!!! We will be traveling with the 8 Ugandan students and a few faculty members. Our home base will be in Bwera, which is located close to Lake George, Lake Edward, Queen Elizabeth National Park (they were colonized by the British in case you couldn't tell) and Rwenzori National Park. I have been told that this area is incredibly lush and mountainous and is also the home to the Mountain Gorillas!!!!! I would absolutely love to see a gorilla in person, in the wild. My favorite trip in Tanzania was when I traveled to Gombe National Park where Jane Goodall studied Chimpanzees. I still need to do a blog post about that...oops!
Anyways. I am really excited to go to this area.

While in the field, we will be visiting with local farmers, households, health clinics and community leaders to learn about their way of doing things and the issues that they face. We will hopefully be able to get a clearer picture, also, on the issues and needs surrounding child headed households. Essentially, I am just going to go with an open mind and observe.

So, that is the gist of it. I arrived on the 12th with my fellow student Jordan. We have been getting ready for our departure to the field, which is tomorrow morning, the 15th of June. I will have internet while out there, however, I am not sure how reliable it will be or how much time I will have for writing. I will update as I am able.

As of now, I just have a few pictures. I feel like this trip will be treated like the "second child". On my first trip to Africa, I took pictures of EVERYTHING. Now, I walk around and I am not shocked by anything. It just feels normal. So, I will probably take far less pictures this time around, but I promise that they will be really good pictures. Quality, not quantity this time.

Here is a picture of some of the students we will be traveling with...hopefully next time we will be with a real gorilla. May this find you all in good health. Love, Sadie