More adventures...

So I know I promised in my last post to write about the thrilling conclusion to our trip to the North, but I have just returned from our second excursion out of Kampala, and have a whole new set of adventures that I want to impart while they are still fresh in my head (Don't worry I'll come back to Lira some other time). We began heading west out of Kampala towards the town of Mbarara the main town of the country from which the current President Museveni. The Baganda, from the tribal kingdom in which Kampala is located are absolutely convinced that this region, in which the kingdom of Bunyankore is located, is given special treatment by Museveni, and are therefore the wealthiest part of the country. I don’t know if this is true, but I found it interesting that our first stop is this region was to the UN Millenium Development Village. This is one of a handful of villages selected by the UN (in conjunction with the local government) throughout all of Africa in order to basically perform a test run to see how much it will cost per village to fulfill the UN Millenium Development Goals in Africa. These goals include building of infrastructure, access to health care, food security, access to clean drinking water etc. The village itself was fairly impressive. The people in the village were Bairu, which I understand to be the agricultural sub-tribe of the Banyankore (their counterpart would be the Bahima, the pastoral sub-tribe). They had vast fields of matoke plants (for those of you just tuning in matoke is a type of banana/plantain that is served cooked, often mashed up, and the people here absolutely love), safe water, and a reasonable clinic, all implemented by the UN initiative. Of course, I can only speculate that the reason this area out of all the hundreds of tribal regions in Africa was selected was Museveni’s doing.

A note on tribalism, in the states, particularly in the Anthropology classroom, we are often discouraged from using the term tribe to define groups of people in Africa. This is because the term tribe is an incredibly vague term that could mean any number of things, and because it very often the connotation of referring to primitive people who wear masks and dance to animal skinned drums around a fire in hopes of causing rain. So for clarification, I just want to note that tribe here is used to refer to an ethnic group. For purposes of analogy I have describe myself as coming from America but belonging to the New Jersey tribe, or the Hispanic tribe. People here use the term tribe as a means of defining themselves, and while they are not tribes in the sense most American would consider a tribe, they are very real identities that have very real effects on politics and social relations in Africa, a perfect example is the case of Kenya in which the Kikuyos and the Luos (and basically everyone who wasn’t a Kikuyo) came into conflict over the election results. Another point of clarification worth mentioning is that kingdoms within Uganda normally refer to the kingdoms of the Great Lakes region in Africa before the arrival of Europeans (though in some cases they refer to newly formed kingdoms aimed at giving cultural autonomy to a certain group). These kingdoms exist today as cultural groups. The kings are not political but cultural leaders. Though they have political influence in that they affect the attitudes and ideas of the people within the kingdom, the kingdoms are not politically governing bodies in any way. In an almost contradictory way much as people refer to tribes in Africa, they will also make sweeping generalizations about Africa itself. This is another practice which socially conscious American are strongly discouraged from doing since Africa is such a diverse place that almost no generalization can be made about the nation as a whole. However, when explaining a certain custom an African will often start his sentence saying “In Africa we do ….” I find this amusing both because they are so visibly divided by tribe that its incredible that they can even identify with ruling state, much less an entire continent and because it is a little like an US citizen saying that “In the Americas we do ….”.

Anyway back to the trip. The next day we visited Rukararwe, a forest-conservation NGO which also focuses on researching traditional medicine. This was a very relaxing visit, including a walk through the forest I which we looked at trees with medicinal value. While the fifteen girls in our group were busy ogling over the diminutive French tour guide, Brendan and I enjoyed the nice scenery and the calm garden like atmosphere of the place. We learned that they were selling an herbal remedy to Malaria that several studies conducted by either Cambridge or Oxford scholars (I can’t remember which) concluded were more effective at treating the disease than the current medical treatment. This boosted my confidence enough to try a few herbal remedies for myself. I was feeling slightly congested that day and so I purchased two packages one which promised to clear the sinuses and the other which was a cold remedy. I have yet to try the cold remedy since it requires boiling the powder in a liter of water. However, the sinus decongestant was just a powder you were meant to snort up your nose. This caused a sneezing fit lasting about fifteen minutes which, while hilarious, yielded no signs of improved sinus congestion. I do not know if remedy would have worked given strict adherence to its prescribed application since after that experience I have yet to go back and try a second dose.

After this came the part of the trip I think everyone had been looking forward to most, the game drive through Queen Elizabeth National Park. The initial drive was actually quite disappointing. It was during the middle of the day, when most animals are hiding from the heat of the African sun. However, this safari drive was followed by a boat ride down the local waterway which more than sufficed for the lack of game viewing on land. Here we saw a plethora of hippos, crocodiles, various birds, water buffalo, and were even charged by an elephant. The elephant had been enjoying an afternoon bath, when we approached it with the boat. The elephant began to retreat as we approached, but then turned and began to run towards the boat, fortunately for us, the water became too deep for the elephant to charge. Next he began to splash about and spray water in our direction. It is entirely unclear if he was really trying to charge or was just playing with us the entire time, because whatever he was doing seemed rather enjoyable. All of this could not have been more than 15 yards away from our boat, and I managed to get some great footage of the giant at play.

The next day we left our hotel at five in the morning in hopes of catching a glimpse at some of the safari animals we had not seen on our game drive yesterday. As it turned out this was too early as we spent the first forty five minutes or so of our game drive in the dark of night, unable to see any animals. However, as the sun came up, we saw we were virtually surrounded by various water buffalo, gazelle, antelope and even some things that looked like the white tailed deer everyone hates so much at home (they are more exciting in Africa). This was all well and good, but no one goes on safari to see these animals. Given that in this area of Africa there are no giraffes, zebras, or cheetahs, we were on the prowl for some lions. We were on our way to a gathering of vehicles (usually a good sign that there are lions to be seen) when just 200 yards away or so, our van became stuck in the mud. We all got out and pushed and after a good ten minutes finally freed ourselves just in time to see all the cars pulling away. While disappointed we now knew that there were lions about. It didn’t take long for us to spot a male and a female about twenty five yards from our van. While this seems like a ways, when watching a beast that can cover this distance in about two bounds, it seems remarkably close. The male lion did not seem amused at our presence and began growling (which was awesome!). We soon learned that this was because it was defending a kill recently had. I kid you not the video footage I took here is worthy of National Geographic.

After this we were completely satisfied, and returned back to the hotel as breakfast was being served. After a mid-morning nap, we set out to the village where we would be spending the next four days in home-stay learning about rural life in Kasese district among the Bakonzo people. After several hours on mostly dirt road we reached the village, located in a mountainous region at the foot of the Rwenzori Mountains. The village welcome us, with a lengthy speech by their local representative most of which I was focused on the small boy (who I soon learned was named Allen and was my home-stay cousin) of maybe two or three years, trying to hug a turkey who though tied up at the leg was trying with all his might to get away. I think this was one of the funnier things I’ve ever seen. After this introduction and welcoming ceremony, we were shown the family with whom we’d be living with. I was introduced to my home stay father whose name was Samuel Mathe (meaning third born, in Bakonzo society the order in which you were born is somehow integral to your identity, although it does not seem to confer any particular advantage in terms of treatment or inheritance). Samuel is a very kind, intelligent man, with a pot belly that instead of making him look oafish as they normally do, gave him a dignified air and a presence that made up for his lack of height. He took me to his home where I met my twelve siblings (the names of which I still don’t know entirely) and my home-stay mother, who, though very nice, didn’t speak a lick of English.

The village itself is a poor (but not desolately so) place known as Chensey, about three kilometers from the boarder of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Most people here engage in a mixture of subsistence and cash farming, almost all of the food they eat comes from their land. They also employ themselves in various other side jobs, the main one of which is brick making. The soil in Kasese district is perfect for this practice as it apparently has very high clay content. You simply add water, apply to a mold to shape the brick, let dry, and fire. Samuel told me that he has often paid for school fees by bringing a truck of bricks to the headmaster. In addition to these various subsistence strategies most people hold full time jobs. Almost all of the people who I met, including Samuel, were teachers, or training to become teachers. Because of brick production most of the houses are constructed out of brick, with ridged tin roof for water catching.

The first day, Samuel took me around the village so I could orient myself. While all over Uganda children get a kick out of seeing a Muzungu, I’m fairly confident that in this particular village many of the children had actually never seen a white man, and so there was literally a parade of small children at my heels for this entire tour. That night, back at my village home, I had the best meal of Ugandan food I have had so far on this trip. The “greens” which are normally just cooked leaves of what Ugandans call a dodo leaf, were boiled in some delicious sauce, the starches were rice and what they call cassava bread, or tapioc, which is a very sticky almost marshmallow like substance which is used as a starch. No silverware was provided and so we ate with our hands, taking the tapioc, rolling it into a ball, and then using our thumb to make a little crater which is used to scoop up the beef stew. On the side of every meal they serve a few bananas and a few avocados, both of which go surprisingly well with just about everything. Like I said before, nothing but the beef was purchased. Everything else came from their land. While eating the entire family, all twelve children, gathered round to watch in wonder. It was here that Samuel, gave me the middle name, Mathe, since like himself, I was my father’s third born son. He liked our similarity, but found it absurd that I was also the last born son, as a family of three would simply never happen in Africa.

That night, the Saturday before Easter, I gathered round with all the children, and listened as the older ones read the bible to the others (one would read in English while another would translate into Lukonzo for the younger children who had yet to learn English). In the small house, on small benches, some on the floor, everyone huddled around the dim light of a few candles to hear the good book, the image was absolutely picturesque. Afterwards, I slept in my small room, with a curtain for a door, which my homestay sister Jennifer, had been nice enough to give up for my stay. I slept fine but each morning I awoke to pellets of rat droppings in my bed. I suppose I was fortunate, as others apparently awoke to rats landing on them from the ceiling. In retelling this story the locals pointed out how hysterically funny it was that a person should fear a rat, as we are so much bigger.

The following day, after attending Easter services we ate a large Easter meal, and I was afforded the opportunity to spend some time with a few of my siblings. Though they were all very nice, communication was difficult. Even when speaking fluent English, Africans have a way of giving long winded responses without ever really answering a question. In our group we have come to call such occurrences “No Information Transferred” or NIT for short. NIT’s have occurred with lecturers, people we meet, even people working for the program such as Helen our beloved program assistant. Africans also seem to enjoy either not planning at all or keeping others in the dark concerning plans. It is common after a long day of traveling to pile into our van, fully expecting to go home, and pull up completely unannounced to some place which is not our hotel, is not on the schedule and to be placed in some activity we were completely unaware about. Donna, our program director Odoche’s wife, who is an expat Anthropologist from the states, believes African men like to keep women in the dark as a way of keeping them on their heels. So perhaps the fact that I normally roll with fifteen girls has something to do with why I never know what is going on. In truth she gives some pretty good evidence for her case. When she came to Kampala she had intended to stay for four days, give us a few lectures on performing fieldwork, and then return to her home in Kenya. However, when she arrived Odoche informed her that she would be taking us on a ten day trip to northern Uganda, and that he and Jamal were returning to Kenya, they would return when we got back. However, I have been on my own and come across NIT’s far too often to believe that women are the only ones subject to this treatment. At any rate, her solution is to talk about something other than the subject about which you are trying to get information. This as you might imagine is rather tricky, but there is some logic to it, I was once asking Samuel about how many people in the village originally came from Congo (this was not out of the blue we had been in a discussion about Congolese migration for a good ten minutes), he responded by pointing to a mother hen and say, “She knows how to care for her young”. There is simply no way he could have misunderstood me to be talking about chickens, he apparently just didn’t want to give a direct answer.

But I digress. My point is that this principle of NIT combined with limited English skills at some points made communication with my siblings next to impossible. I soon discovered words like usually, how often, and how frequently were simply not in their vocabulary, making asking any question about frequency next to impossible. Often I found myself asking a question, then upon hearing a response that was not what I’d asked for, stopping my siblings mid-sentence, asking again, hearing the same response, and repeating, until finally they had said what they wanted to say, and I walked away frustrated at having gained no further information. I think this was mostly due misunderstanding, and not NIT’s, since when they did understand me they were as helpful as possible. Anyway, while hanging out with them I dispensed some gifts in appreciation of their hospitality. I gave them some coloring books, a couple of kites, a Frisbee, a few bars of all purpose soap (used for bathing, washing clothes, cleaning dishes and pretty much any other application where soap may be needed), a bag of sugar (these last two Muna assured us were always the things village people tended to appreciate most), and several kinds of candy. This instantly catapulted me to the status of hero, we spent the afternoon trying to fly the kite without wind, and tossing around the Frisbee (which took some practice as they originally thought it was a plate). My little brother Jolan, who is about three, runs around with a big hole in the front of his pants (which seem to me to completely nullify any purpose they might have served) and wore a second had “Proud to be an American” shirt, was so excited he would run around in circles and come give me hugs every couple minutes. He later expressed his excitement by climbing a tree and trying to pee on a girl standing below. I later found that these children had literally no toys, and so these gifts were pretty significant. Jolan and his slightly older brother Joshua broke out their toy box one night. It consisted of a deck of cards that had been torn up, a few empty makeup canisters, various bottle caps they had collected, and a handful of plastic marbles (which I suppose means they are not technically marbles). Similarly I asked on of the two older boys in the house who spoke English, Richard, if he played any sports, he replied that he had been on the schools volleyball and basketball team until the ball used for both burst. Suffice it to say that very often people in the village have literally nothing to do, so any form of entertainment is greatly appreciated. While there is certainly more to do in Kampala, this holds true to a certain degree in the city as well. Earlier this morning I walked out and saw my home-stay brother Joseph painting a room. I asked if he needed any help, and he replied that he was in fact just finishing for the day. There was still one part of the wall left unpainted, and when I asked him about it he said he would finish it tomorrow. It was only about ten in the morning, so I ask him why not just finish it today. He smiled and with a laugh replied “I could finish it today, but what would I do tomorrow?”

Several cultural practices have grown out of not having anything to do. First of all, people take their time doing everything. Absolutely nothing in Uganda is ever rushed. To an American traveler from the North-East this can sometimes be a bit frustrating. Second, they spend as little time at home as possible. They are always, as they say, moving around. Whenever they go anywhere, they will frequently drop by other people’s houses along the way. When they arrive, unannounced, the host will drop whatever he or she had been doing, and sit to talk, sometimes if the conversation is good, the visitor will stay a while before resuming whatever he had been on his way to do. However, such visits usually last no more than a couple minutes. Since most people in the village are family, people have no problem with this practice, and will often offer meals to visitors. I also hypothesize that this boredom attributes to peoples extreme religious zeal, very often the bible is the only book people here have, and nearly all Christians have read it cover to cover. Finally I hypothesize that NIT’s are also a cultural defense against boredom. When an answer is long winded, and yielding very little desired information, the response itself not only fills up time, but is also likely to incur more questions (although personally, I will often simply just say “never mind” and drop the whole conversation right there). This also explains why our introductory meeting took so long. Town gatherings are a special event, and a variation from normal activities, people look forward to them, and do not wish for them to end. On the first day our group could not wait for the meeting to finish, but on the second to last day, when our program director Jamal came by each house and informed us that the meeting had been cancelled, I was hugely disappointed. I had been sitting around, looking forward to this meeting all day. We did end up having the meeting, and though all points of discussion had been touched upon within the first five minutes, we stayed around and dragged the meeting out to a full hour.

While village life is not exactly the most exciting lifestyle, do not get the impression that I spent four days in complete boredom. To the contrary, I learned more in those four days, and had more new experiences than I can even impart here. My village stay was by far one of the best parts of my time in Uganda, has afforded me memories that will last my whole life through, new relationships that I hope will continue throughout my life, and has altered my perceptions of the world around me. I had a wonderful experience, and apparently, my family had a wonderful time with me as well. They told my program directors that I had really adapted to the village way of life, as I would try anything they asked of me, and was generally a fairly easy guest. I also heard rumors circulating that the neighbors were calling me the “chief of the village”. I was honored that they thought so highly of me, and in truth I was happy to try whatever they wanted me to. As I’ve said before the food here was better than food I’ve tasted anywhere else in Uganda, I learned a lot about the local agricultural practices, and got to help out with daily chores like fetching water from the river, making bricks, weeding the crop fields, and washing clothes. Apparently in Bakonzo society, refusing an offering is somewhat rude, so though at times I felt like I was taking more than my fair share from people who in fact had very little, by trying a bit of everything, I was actually acting properly.

Like I said, to try to impart to the reader everything I have experienced on this trip would be impossible, and already I’m finding this post a little long winded (almost Africanesque), so I’ll just give you one last highlight. On the last evening of our homestay, I took the kite, and about half a village of small children (who in the village are much more autonomous than in the states, they are treated much more like an adult both in the work load they are given, and in the freedom they are afforded; pretty much all of them, some as young as three, gave no word to their parents as to where they were going, and just saw me coming and began to follow) down to the schoolyard. On the dusty field we tried to get the kite to fly, but the wind simply wasn’t strong enough. Fortunately most of the children, having never seen a kite before, were content to play the game, see how long you can keep it in the air and then try to catch it when it falls. After this, one of the children came out with a soccer ball made from bundled together plastic bags, held together by rope. So we all joined in a large game on soccer, playing barefoot on a dusty impromptu field. Of course, even the small children were much better than I, but I was at that moment right in the middle of what felt like an incredibly iconic image of the third world, school child with no shoes, no money for a real ball, using what little resources they had to play their favorite game.

The next morning before we set out, my home stay family gave me the gift of a table piece which one of my sisters had knit, and a brand new button up shirt. I was touched by their kindness, but slightly embarrassed to accept such a gift from a family who didn’t wear new clothes themselves. In fact, a new shirt is actually pretty hard to find in Uganda, since so much of the clothing industry is fueled by the second hand industry. Also my brother informed me that he had awoke at four in the morning in order to go to town and purchase the shirt before I left. At any rate I thanked them profusely and went on my way, hoping to someday return to Chensey and see all of my news friends again.

I soon learned that while many of my fellow students had similarly wonderful experiences in the village, I learned on the bus that some had not enjoyed themselves as much, and could not even see their way to completing the village stay, so radically different was the lifestyle from what they were used to. At any rate I had been looking forward to our reunion as a fun time where we could trade the crazy stories we had aquired over the past few days with the only people who would really be able to relate. I was sorely mistaken. In truth for a group whose composition is 88.2 percent female, we had been exceedingly fortunate to make it this far without any significant drama. But in our final stop on this trip, Fort Portal, our luck ran out. On the bright side, the excess of petty bickering, gossip, underhanded insults provided excellent research material for Brendan and I’s soon to be published joint study entitled Girls are Weird: An Ethnographic Study of the Little Understood Upper Middle Class American Female. The next day was even worse. We went to Semliki Nation Park, a rainforest preserve where there were supposedly chimps, monkey’s and forest Elephants. This should have been a highlight of the trip, but the ride there was took three hours on a windy dirt road, many were feeling under the weather from whatever they had eaten in their homestays, and when we got there the weather was too rainy to really do anything, so we basically piled back into the vans and headed back. This was truly bad luck, as this is the only rainy day we have seen since we have been in Africa. Even in the rainy season it normally only rains for about half an hour, and that’s normally at night. Needless to say everyone was pretty miserable, and with tensions already fairly high, it didn’t take much to send people off. When one van mistakenly ate a Pringles can that they did not know had been intended for both vans, shots were fired. Brendan and I could do nothing but keep our mouths shut and watch the ridiculousness unfold. After lunch we headed (unexpected) to a village of African pygmies known as the Batwa. While everyone was excited to see them, this also ended up adding to everyone’s misery. These people had been chased out of the rainforest where they used to forage, and left with no subsistence strategy except to prostitute their culture to tourists. We went their and they literally put on a song and dance (that I’m convinced they made up as a tourist gimmick), and overwhelmed us in a sea of vendors trying to sell us crafts. One thing I did learn is that pygmies actually are much smaller than the average human.

It is too bad that our time in Fort Portal was marred by such inner group strife, since it was one of the nicest places we have stayed so far. Our hotel was right on a lake, the rooms were thatched roof huts (ironically, we left the village where they stay in brick houses with tin roofs, to the fancy resort where we stayed in “authentic” mud huts with thatched roofs). Every night the hotel would make a large campfire and the guest could sit around and talk, and around about four in the afternoon monkeys would come by knowing that guests at the hotel would feed them.

While this was rather picturesque, I was never so happy to return home to Kampala, get away from these crazy girls, and see my home stay family again. It is now Sunday; hopefully by school on Monday, everyone will have had the weekend to cool off, recollect themselves so as to at least feign civility, and come back good as new.

Spring Break '08 Northern Uganda Pt. 2

So I last left off having just finished our exciting romp about in the forest (and spread out villages) around Sipi Falls. After our day of adventure, we checked into a mountaintop hotel known as Noah’s Ark. We were originally supposed to stay in The Crow’s Nest, an inn overhanging a cliff that looks down upon the falls, but unfortunately it burned down. When we arrived there all Muna exclaimed “Something is wrong” when we asked what, he replied “The hotel is gone”. In talking with our tour guide Moses, who works for Crow’s Nest we learned that they had concluded that the fire was the work of arsonists. They said they suspected competing hotels in the area as the culprits. We took note that in this small mountain village Noah’s Ark was likely the only competition and so burning the building down had worked, though we were slightly worried about a retaliatory attack while we were staying there. Anyway the landscape around Noah’s Ark was incredible. It reminded me very much of farm and grazing land in the Rocky Mountains, except more ...African. Also the hotel had good food (including fried chicken), and the setup, individual rooms surrounding a courtyard I thought created a nice feel. I am apparently the only person in my group who like this hotel. Others on the trip will tell you that I only liked it because I managed to take a shower before the water turned off. However, this is untrue as the water actually quit while I was in the shower fully lathered in soap, I had to run around under the dribble coming from the faucet to get it all off. That night, the mountain air was actually cold. By cold I mean absolutely temperate but this is the first climate that has been anywhere close to cold in all of Africa. While it was still probably warm enough for the usual outfit of jeans and a t-shirt (it is inappropriate men beyond schoolboy age to wear shorts), everyone was so excited for the cold that we all busted out our hoodies and long sleeves. That night there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. They say that there is no other night sky like the African sky. I had not realized the truth to this statement until that night. Stars I didn’t even know existed appeared bright as any other, and familiar stars, those in Orion, the Big Dipper, etc, were so bright you almost couldn’t look directly at them. The sky was incredible. Perhaps it was this more than anything that biased my opinion in favor of this particular stop on our trip.

The next day we set off for Soroti. Whereas Mbale and Sipi Falls were in the far east of Uganda, almost to the Kenyan boarder, Soroti is more centrally located, but much further north. As we progressed toward Soroti the landscape once again began to change. The mountainous terrain slowly became flatter, and all lushness gave way to dry grassy savannah. This savannah was much drier than the savannah around Mbale, and slowly we began to peel off our hoodies, beanies, and long sleeves and the temperate mountain air gave way to blisteringly hot dry heat. This was the Africa you see on TV. The land was characterized by those dry, unending plains lands that emanate waves of heat in the distance. Along the way we pointed out at least ten random rocks amid the savannah that could easily have been pride rock (from the lion king). As we rolled into Soroti, I got the impression that it was a quite old western town (sorry to keep drawing comparisons to the western United States but that was the association I made in my mind, and the best comparison I can think of to help paint the picture). Like Mbale, Soroti is essentially a strip of buildings along dusty the roadside. The central feature of the town is incredibly large rock (mountain-like in scale) that is a backdrop to the whole town. Muna, still excited that he had someone to go exploring with, asked if I would go climb the rock with him. So Muna, about half of the group, and I trekked out around six in the evening with the hope of climbing the rock in time to see the sunset from atop. What none of us knew is that at the base of the rock lay an IDP camp full of those who had been displaced by the fighting in the North. With Muna as our fearless leader we walked around the outskirts and eventually right through the camp. It was incredible seeing just how little these people had. They have been forced to flee their homes, and gather in these camps, in squalid conditions amid literal drifts of garbage. They have next to nothing, with no means of sustainable subsistence (nearly all calorie in-take in such camps is donated and so their diet consists of high carbohydrate food and lacking in sufficient protein, vegetable matter, and anything else a human might need to be healthy) and no land of their own. Muzungus are a sight to behold for children all around Uganda, but in walking directly through this camp, you’d think that these children had never seen a white person (in truth the reason they were so excited is probably because they have only seen whites who come as aid workers, and so were expecting food or small gifts or something along those lines). Anyway by the time we had passed through the camp we had an entire village of children at our heels. It was sort of like the really corny commercials were a few people are walking down the street singing a song or something, and little by little they gain a following until they’ve got all of downtown New York following them dancing and singing and so forth, which is supposed to give you a warm fuzzy feeling as they tell you about the cool refreshing taste diet coke (they love such commercials here btw). Anyway at this point we were totally unsure as to what we should do with this horde of children following us. Naturally, Muna had a plan. He had us circle up and grab hands with the children. At first most of the children were to afraid to touch a white person, the brave ones slapping out extended hands and then running away with a triumphant look on their faces. Eventually, however, they got used to the idea and consented to join the circle. Once we were all organized, Muna began to sing a song in Swahili that none of us knew but tried to sing along. Once this ordeal was done both the children and random onlookers seemed as thoroughly confused as we were. Nonetheless this gesture seemed to do the trick breaking the stigma around our presence and from then on there was always a group of younguns at our feet as we began to climb the rock. It should be noted that these younguns (who were nearly all barefoot) were usually busy running ahead of us and then waiting up as we trekked up in step by step of the nearly vertical climb (on which someone had been nice enough to build rock steps) all completely out of breath. When we finally reached the top the view was (as usual) breathtaking. You could see for miles along the flat un-featured plains. Slightly further down the rocks were some monkeys hanging out and enjoying the view. Monkey’s always make things a little bit cooler. We wanted to have a look from the other side of the rock, but the locals told us that that was a military watch-post, and so unless we wanted to be shot at, we should simply stick to this side. Naturally Muna ran off to see if we could bribe the military men to let us have a look. The soldiers said that under normal circumstances they would have been glad to take our money in return for a look at their rock, but that since the sun had nearly gone they could not allow it. I didn’t quite get the rationale behind this, but they had the guns, so I didn’t argue. In looking at the sun, we saw that we had at least half an hour of sunlight left. This combined with the realization that we’d rather not shimmy back down the hill and then walk through the IDP camp in the darkness of night, convinced us not to wait for the sunset. Back down the hill there seemed to be a party coming from somewhere. I had earlier expressed to Muna my desire to try marua, the local brew of Soroti made from millet, which was served warm and had the consistency of a thick stew. My home-stay brother Joseph had told me about the brew and said he thought it was quite delicious. Furthermore, Professor Stone who taught my Africa: Peoples and Cultures class, had spoken extensively about his time among the Kofyar of Nigeria, who based much of their subsistence strategy around work parties, in which a days work on someone’s farm was exchanged for a party at the end of the day in which the workers would drink such millet beer. These work parties were called mar-muos, which I thought bore stark resemblance to the name for the beer they had here in Soroti. Anyway, he advised all of his students to try it if they ever got the chance, and so I was on a mission to find the stuff. Muna said we should check out the party, and naturally when we got there, there was a group sitting in a small circular hut sipping on some freshly brewed marua. Muna told the group we would like to have a taste, and they, excited by their foreign visitors welcomed the few brave souls willing to try the strange concoction. The room was full of people sitting around a pot placed on the floor in which the marua was poured. Everyone was given a bamboo straw about four feet long so we could relax and sip our marua. The locals all got a kick out of seeing our faces as the first drop of that bitter, warm, vaguely alcoholic liquid touched our tongues. The taste wasn’t awful, but it was enough that I was happy to be able to say I had tried it after a few sips (I believe that an uncertainty about the sanitation level involved in preparing the brew also prevented us all from taking much more than that). Anyway, upon emerging from the hut we found a crowd gathered around a few from our group who had begun to dance with the children to African music we had heard upon coming down the hill. The whole town seemed to be enjoying our presence. As we began to leave some walked locking arms with the children, when we reached the end of the camp the children had to be escorted back so as to keep from following us all the way back to the hotel. Though we hadn’t actually done anything to help these people I think we all walked away feeling both disturbed at witnessing how these people live, but also content that we our presence seemed to have brighten up their evening on that particular day.

The next day we visited the Ugandan Red Cross for Lira. The Red Cross took us back to the camp to show us one of their community initiatives. It was a woman’s empowerment group who took women from the community, and gave them jobs. When we got there, however, we learned that their work consisted of taking the rock we had climb the other day, breaking it into gravel of different sizes and then selling it. In the hot sun (in Soroti the sky is so large if feels like there is no place to hide from the blistering heat) these women (and some of their children) would work all day burning tires underneath large rocks in order to break them into chunks that could then be attacked with a sledge hammer. They had no advanced equipment, no method of effectively storing their gravel, and were consumed in doing work normally reserved for prison work gangs, in order to sell their product at a marginal profit. Though one woman said she had earned enough money to send her daughter to school, it was apparent that they were all still living in wretched poverty. The grime scene despairingly reminded me of the myth of Sisyphus.

Later that day we visited Christian Children’s Fund. This is one of those groups you see on TV, preaching that for just one dollar a day you can support a child in Africa. What surprised me is that when you sponsor a child, the money you give actually goes to that one child. I had always assumed they pooled the money in order to help many children and just sent you a picture of one of the many you were helping. What is unfortunately about this system is that, should a donor decide to discontinue funding for any reason, that donor’s child loses sponsorship, and is cut off from support. Aside from this minor draw back, they generally seem to help children quite a lot. Often they will invest in a child’s school funding programs to build proper lavatories, purchase proper supplies, and so on.

That night we had a panel discussion, in which the LC5 (Ugandan equivalent of a state governor) of Soroti district was a member. Afterwards we invited the panel to stay and eat dinner with us. For no other reason than to feel important, I struck up a nuanced discussion about the Land Amendment Bill on which I had just completed a research bill. Over dinner, my theory that Ugandan’s can’t resist questioning Muzungu’s about gay tolerance held true, and even the “governor” of Soroti felt compelled to ask about it. However, the discussion did not progress very far as the man couldn’t stop laughing. He said that the mental image of two men together was too comical to handle. He did say that he believed it was wrong because if everyone was gay no one would make babies. Several of the girls on the trip brought up the idea of artificial insemination. This was a classic Ugandan moment, only here could a bunch of Muzungu’s sit with the head of a district to argue the finer points of test tube babies.

Alright that’s all for tonight folks. Mama is calling me to come to her political club meeting. Tune in next time for the thrilling conclusion to the three part saga of my adventures in Northern Uganda. I’ll tell of the city of Lira, roadside baboons, eating bugs, and the coming of the rain season. As always kwaheri!

SPRING BREAK '08 NORTHERN UGANDA! pt. 1

This past week our program took us on a trip to the east and then to the north of Uganda. Because I did not bring my computer with me I have been unable to write about these experiences as they have happened. For this I sincerely apologize to my adoring fans out there in cyberspace. At any rate the events of this trip are definitely worthy of mention and so I will recount the trip as best as possible from memory.

Before I begin recounting my trip, I should say something about my Sunday evening with Mama. This is yet another example of how she continues to amazing me. We were walking down to Kabalagala, the local commercial center, for a drink in the evening (electrical power is very sporadic in Uganda and so we frequently go out in the evening since there is nothing to do at home when the power goes out). On the walk to town we passed through a large field where Mama’s church is located. Mama directed me up to a small one room shack, and told me to stay outside since she had to attend to some business inside. Three men were sitting outside the building, one with a rifle at his feet. Mama grabbed one of the men to talk to and went inside. I awkwardly stood there until the man with the rifle directed me to sit where the man Mama had taken had been sitting. I sat down and tried without avail to initiate small talk with the two remaining men, whose English was limited at best. After several minutes Mama came back out and said we should go. At first we walked in silence and she offered no explanation for this strange happening. After several minutes, however, she said she was checking in on how the man and his family were doing, since she had been there after church this morning. She explained that she was walking home that morning and saw a crowd of people standing around the house. When she approached she learned that this was because this man’s wife had been throwing a fit, breaking belongings on the front porch and threatening to cut her children with a knife. Mama pushed her way through the crowd and tried to calm the woman down. However, as Mama described it, the woman was acting like a crazy person, and so forcibly disarmed the woman, restrained her and then tied her up so she was forced to calm down. Then Mama proceeded to sit the man and his wife down and discuss what the matter was. The woman was apparently upset that the man had made her and his second wife live in the same room. Mama explained to the man that this was unacceptable (apparently taking two wives is fine so long as you don’t force them to continually acknowledge each other), and explained to the woman that threatening to cut the children and destroying property was not an appropriate means of negotiation. She said what bothered her most about the whole thing is that there had been a crowd of people standing there doing nothing before she came. Now obviously I take this story with a grain of salt, as should you. However, I thought it interesting that she had gone the whole day without mentioning this to me or anyone else in the family, and that the only reason she had told me was because she felt she had to explain our detour.

Anyway, on to my trip to the north. After two excruciating days of lectures at Mulago hospital (the teaching hospital for Makereri University) on public health, Wednesday of last week we finally set out for Mbale. While leaving Kampala, we stopped at a Shop Rite (strangely enough the local supermarket chain bears the same name as the one in New Jersey though they are completely different companies) at a very rich, heavily Muzungu laden part of town in order to get snacks for the road. I was elected as the representative from my van to purchase the snacks. As we walked into this ritzy Ugandan Shop Rite we were overcome by an eerie feeling that this could have been a shopping center in the American southwest. The parking lot was not asphault but intricately designed brick, and as we walked into the shopping center we passed a café that could have easily been a local Starbucks. The food selection was nearly as plentiful as an American grocery store, and they had a selection that we have been completely unable to find in Uganda, including baguettes, produce, ritz (like) cracker, and (god help me) cheese (really good cheese too). For a country with such rich and ongoing tradition of pastoralism, it is amazing that there is absolutely no culture whatsoever of cheese. After we loaded up on snack food and returned form our short vacation to Arizona back to Uganda, we wasted no time in devouring all of our provisions for the five hour car ride ahead. We were so excited to have western food we didn’t bother to contain ourselves. Somewhere amid this feeding frenzy we all aquired some strange, western food induced, high. My fondest memory of this ride was being totally consumed in laughter for no apparent reason, looking around the van at the others all equally consumed and us all trying to stuff peanut butter sandwiches, ritz with cheese, or whatever we could, into our mouths in between gasps for air.

Eventually the food high wore off, as our bellies began to fill and our supply of provision ran out. We were then able to notice that the scenery had changed distinctly, and that we were no longer in Kampala. I cannot describe to you the joy I felt at being out of the city, and into the breathtakingly beautiful Ugandan countryside. We opened all the windows, let the wind blow in our hair, and enjoyed our first breath of truly fresh air in over a month. Outside of the cities, I have yet to find a landscape in Kampala that isn’t wonderful. The landscape here was thick lush, tropical forest, but as we neared Mbale this slowly segwayed into fertile savannah. After stopping for lunch (for which no one was terribly hungry) and a few more hours on the road, we finally arrived in Mbale.

Mbale is a small town (a large town by Ugandan standards, but effectively a strip of highway along the road), that is about twenty miles from the Kenyan boarder, it lies in the shadow of the awe inspiring Mt. Elgon (sounds like something from Lord of the Rings right?) which lies on the Uganda-Kenya boarder. Our time in Mbale was spent almost entirely at the TASO district headquarters. TASO is a Ugandan organization that works to fight AIDS. They provide free testing services, offer prevention education, safe sex education, and provide anti-retro-viral drugs, to those infected, as well as counseling for the infected and their families. They are funded largely by American aid under PEPFAR. Walking into TASO was a sullen experience, as we walked through lines of people all sitting and nervously awaiting their HIV test results. After a brief lecture on exactly what TASO does, we were taken to see a drama group designed by the organization. Drama groups are an effective tool used exhaustively throughout Africa to raise awareness for HIV/AIDS, and numerous other health threats. The drama groups go around to various communities performing songs and sketches intended to be both entertaining and educational. At first I admit that I thought this method was rather patronizing, childish, and probably ineffective, but upon further consideration, I realize that they serve the same purpose as those patronizing, childish educational movies we watched in health class. While even as a child I could tell that those movies were straight up corny, they were usually more entertaining than normal health class, and they definitely helped their message to stick. For this reason I firmly believe that these drama groups are essential in health education in Africa and are an extremely effective way to pass along information, and raise general awareness (which is great because it gets people asking questions). This particular group was composed of men and women who are HIV positive, and who TASO has employed while treating. The beauty of these people struggle is overwhelming. They have devoted themselves to ensuring that others don’t fall prey to HIV as they have. Their lives have been devastated by this frighteningly prolific monster of an infection, and yet they come in everyday, put on bright smiles, and sing upbeat songs about how with education and preventative steps people needn’t live in fear of contracting HIV.

The following day we watched as this group performed at a local secondary school so that we could see how they performed with a typical audience. In beginning the school had the feeling of any of the countless high school assemblies I have attended in my life. The children were largely uninterested in what was to be presented, and were simply elated to have a break from the everyday routine of afternoon classes. Our group sat next to some students, one of whom I struck up a conversation with. I told him that we were with TASO. He laughed a little, and then asked in a polite but lightly mocking way, if that meant that we were all positive (apparently TASO is best known for their policy of employing infected people who they treat). Just for purposes of witty rebuttal, another group member asked if he was infect, when he responded in the negative we asked him if he knew because he had been tested. He said he feared getting tested (in Ugandan English people aren’t afraid of things, they fear them). We asked him why and he responded because he “liked to play around”. In short, this school desperately needed some sort of HIV/AIDS education. Anyway, as the assembly began to progress, the students remained relatively disinterested and carefree. Slowly, however, the mood of the assembly grew more serious, culminating in a personal story from on of the drama group as to how they contracted HIV. As with all stories concerning this disease, it was heart-wrenching, and since this particular story involved a young girl struggling to pay school fees meeting up with a sugar daddy (common term in East Africa for an older man who provides for younger women in return for sex) it struck very close to home for many of the students. After the testimony, the group returned and sang more songs. Muna, our driver and dear friend, had us all get up and go dance with the group completely on a whim. I could tell that seeing a bunch of University students getting so into the program also helped make the students take the presentation more seriously. When it came time for the Q&A section of the program, so many students submitted questions that they had to cut the program short. This is the only part of the program I found discouraging. We were able to read some of the questions that went unanswered, and some were from fearful students asking how they could get tested for HIV (a service TASO offers for free). I sincerely hope that TASO provided some alternate means to address these questions after we had left. That said everything else about the organization was extremely encouraging, and it was amazing to see how effective the drama groups were in raising peoples interest about HIV/AIDS.

The next day was Saturday, and so we had a break from our heavy regiment of educational programming, and went to visit Sipi falls. Sipi falls is located in a mountainous region of Eastern Uganda that, like all other natural landscape in Uganda is absolutely breathtaking. The landscape reminds me slightly of a more luscious, African version of the Rockies in Colorado. There are actually three falls to Sipi falls all located a good distance apart, which can only be accessed by covering gruelingly mountainous terrain. Needless to say I had an absolute field day. The falls themselves were amazing, and unlike natural monuments in America, you are free to climb all over these falls, and we did. At one point, while we were resting after a particularly steep segment on the trail, Muna approached me ask, “Mike, are you a real man?”. Of course I knew that this would inevitably be followed by a request to perform some ridiculous challenge to prove my manhood, but regardless I responded in the affirmative. He then said that if I were a real man I’d climb a tree to take a picture of the group. He then jumped up in the tree and waited for me to follow. Growing up in a rural area, climbing trees had been an integral part of my childhood, and to his surprise I followed him with absolute ease. When it was time to get down, got to a point where I knew I could jump and started to go. He grabbed my arm and refused to let me, insisting that I inch my way down, just to be safe. As soon as I had done this, just to piss me off, he jumped from exactly where I had planned. This triggered a series of outdoor related challenges between us. As the group is nearly all girls, this male bonding time was a very welcome change. It was great to have someone to do all the fun things I had wanted to do on our nature hike day. We did everything from climbing rocks, exploring caves, bathing under the falls, to catching frogs. By the end of the day Muna kept saying that we were Generals.

I suppose now would be a good time to give slightly more detail on Muna, as he is one of everyone’s favorite parts about this program, and one of the most interesting people I’ve ever met. I’ve been meaning to talk about Muna for some time now. Those of you on facebook may have noticed that I’ve changed my religious status to Munism. This is because Muna has a way of speaking metaphorically, and in such a confusing manner that we decided he very well might be the final prophet. He is always giving out useful advice in the most complex and confusing way possible. I’m sure in their day Jesus and Muhammad all spoke such metaphorically rich nonsense and there disciples were probably all like, “Man, don’t you ever just want to talk about something normal”. Muna, we have decided, must be no different. On top of that he is 43 and looks not a day older than 28, it’s got to be that good clean prophetic living. However, in all seriousness, once you figure out what he is saying he has some good advice. He also gives random insight into African culture. He is also an expert on traditional views of femininity and sexuality, and takes every opportunity he can to expound upon the topic. One day on our trip two girls were sitting outside of the communal bathroom with basins full of water shaving their legs. Muna approached them innocently and asked what they were doing. They told him that they were shaving their legs, and ask don’t women in Africa shave their legs. Muna said no. After a short pause, he said women in Africa don’t eat chicken, and left. We later found out that he said this because it is a belief among Africans that eating chicken will make girls grow beards, and so he figured that Muzungus needed to shave their legs because of all the chicken they eat. He went on to explain how Nile Perch will make female genitalia smell, and has disclosed countless other nuggets of wisdom. He also told me that I shouldn’t eat sugar since women use it to calm men down. I don’t mean to sound like I am mocking Muna, or to give the impression that he is chauvinistic. I truly have nothing but the utmost respect for the man. He told me that he never graduated from secondary school, and yet every morning wakes up at four to try to read English. He loves learning, and as such is a fountain of information, especially about East Africa. Not only that, despite some beliefs to which we as westerns simply don’t subscribe, in talking to him you quickly learn that he is an exceptionally intelligent human. He knows (I believe) twelve languages including Luganda, English and Swahili. Furthermore, given how hard it is to find a job in Uganda even with a college education he has managed very well for himself. Not only is he the head of transportation for SIT in Uganda, he also owns a company that gives private safari tours. He definitely possesses the type of personality that makes you believe that he will succeed in life no matter what. That is not to say that there are plenty of people in this country possessed of that same quality, but who are still bound to a life of poverty simply because barriers to success are too high. However, Muna’s personality has definitely helped him overcome many obstacles in his life. He is always cheerful, full of good advice, and completely unafraid to make himself known. The day we visited the secondary school, he ran up on stage as the TASO director was saying her goodbyes, and proceeded to give the entire high school a few final words of wisdom about preventing HIV. We all thought this was funny because really he is just our driver, and is in no way associated with our academic studies, and yet he just took control of the whole situation. Anyway, I just thought I should mention Muna since he is my friend, another example (like Mama) of someone I’ve come to truly respect on this trip, and a pretty big part of our experience as a program in Uganda.

So I’ve only gotten through the first two stops in our trip, but in the interest of keeping you (the reader) interested and wanting more (and in the interest of me getting some sleep) I’ll stop here and pick up with my journey in the next post. Till then kwaheri!

My trip to America

My daily routine upon arrival at the SIT house begins with two hours of Swahili courses. After this we would normally head over to Makereri University to attend a lecture. However, because of the lecturer strike, and the ensuing student strike, we have recently just been taking the lecturers (who were willing to teach us because we are not officially Makereri students and so SIT pays them separately from the school) and holding lectures at other locations (normally the meeting room of hotel Jeliza where we stayed the first week). Though the strike has calmed down, we still haven’t returned to Makereri, which is a bummer because we can no longer tell the locals we are here to study at Makereri. Saying you go to Makereri anywhere in East Africa is tantamount to saying you go to Harvard back in the States. Since people here really respect education, this meant major props. But I digress.

Today representatives of U.S.A.I.D., the United States worldwide aid foundation, gave our talk. The lecture was given at U.S.A.I.D.’s headquarters at the American Embassy. So technically, I spend my morning in America. The change of location gave the day the atmosphere of a field trip, even when we returned for our second session of Swahili we spend most of the class cracking jokes with our instructor. Seeing things run in an American way in the middle of Kampala is downright ridiculous. It should be noted that immigration to enter Uganda involved handing the man at the desk a stack of seventeen passports while we went and collected our bags. After immigration, customs was our walking out the door and finding our taxi. Entering the U.S. embassy was much harder. After leaving our bags at the door, we walked through a metal detector that gained us access to the hallway leading to another metal detector twenty feet further down. At this point we were required to hand our ID to a US Marine standing behind tinted bullet proof glass, any attempt to socialize with these guards was futile. Once we had our nametag, and a second tag informing everyone that we were required to have an escort through the embassy, we sat and waited. When our escort arrived she only had clearance to take six of us at a time, so we waited while she ferried small groups of us to the room where our meeting would be held. As we were used to doing things the Ugandan way (where there are essentially no rules, ever), we took liberty to sneak away while we waited for our escort in search of some American food (we were hoping for a McDonalds but the free muffins and coffee we found were sufficient). On the bright side this was the first air-conditioned building we have been in since leaving home. But, to say the least, I think we all expected a little friendlier welcome to what is essentially our emergency American sanctuary should we need it.

The actual lecture was fascinating, as we learned exactly how aid from the United States is appropriated here in Uganda. The two ladies giving the speech were the first muzungus to deliver a lecture to us. To be honest, for the first few minutes I couldn’t get over how strange their accents sounded. Talking with them was also interesting because they seemed like a ten to fifteen years older, slightly worldlier version of us. I can easily imagine almost anyone in our group having their job in some developing country at some point in the future.

As it turns out Congress apparently gets to determine where nearly all the money from U.S.A.I.D. goes. This seems somewhat inefficient to me, since I can’t imagine a US Congressmen spending much of their day worrying about Uganda, much less devoting a sufficient amount of time understanding the particular needs of every developing nation that receives our aid. Of course, Congress merely appropriates funds in general terms (this much to health, this much to stability, this much to anti-corruption etc.), and so the people on the ground here in Uganda do have the autonomy to implement programs where they, as informed aid workers, think programs are needed. I was also shocked to learn that smallest portion of the organizations funding is allocated to what they term Peace and Stability. In a country that has been at war with itself for over twenty years it would seem to me that peace should be the number one goal. This is not to say that Uganda does not have other problems. The category with the most funding was Health. Funding from this section goes mainly to HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment as well as Malaria treatment. Malaria is the number one killer in Africa. These are certainly problems that Uganda must deal with, but a developed country would be better able to deal with these issues on their own, without relying on foreign aid. It seems to me that development is literally impossible so long as a country is at war. If you don’t have a sturdy foundation of a stable, peaceful nation, what hope can you have of building anything? Of course, as the lecturers explained to me, the war is not something you can simply throw money at to fix. Not only that, the things an aid foundation can do to foster peace (host peace conferences etc.) are relatively inexpensive. It seems to me that it boils down to Uganda needing to work out its own problems in the North. I don’t mean to give the impression that I was utterly disappointed with what I found today. To the contrary I was impressed by how much our government does, and how much they are trying to foster sustainable development.

When I inquired about why funding for peace was so little, the first thing the lecturer said was that it was a good point and that I should write my senator. She then quickly changed her mind saying, “actually don’t, because then I’d have to write you a reply letter that he’d sign it. People in the US, even those working for the government, always seem disillusioned by the inaccessibility of the elected officials meant to represent them. This remarkably contrasts Uganda. My lecturer yesterday saw that I was planning on doing Independent Research on the Bahima tribe (a pastoral tribe in western Uganda). He gave me the number of a woman who he said was the military advisor to Parliament, and also an expert on the tribe. He said that when I called I should just mention his name and ask for a time to meet and pick her brain about the tribe. My friend remarked that if you tried to call a congressman in the states you’d probably get some eighteen-year-old intern who has never met the congressman himself. However, in Uganda, the statesmen seem to really just be normal people (albeit better educated than most) who have no problem taking time out to have lunch with an inquisitive study abroad student.

Politicians also seem to go out and actually interact with the people here. The other night Mama took me to her favorite bar, where she remarked “big people” often hang out. I did not take her comment very serious as this bar seemed like just another local Ugandan hang out. That is to say, a small room, walls lined with chairs, where beer is served. I sat down next to a large man, and casually began a conversation. I ended up spending most of the night talking with the man, who introduced himself as John, partly because he was extremely well versed in Ugandan issues, but mostly because his English was easier to understand than anyone else in the room. As Mama and I were about to leave a man came in and sat on the other side of John. He said a few words in Luganda, and Mama explained to me that we ought to stay since he has offered to buy the entire room another round. Not wanting to be rude, I consented, and offered the man my thanks. To my surprise he gave me an awkward look and quickly shook his head. Next, to my utter confusion, a woman who had been sitting on my other side got up and knelt before John and offered her thanks (in Ugandan society it is traditional, though considered somewhat old fashion, for woman to bow before social superiors i.e. “big men”). Thankfully, John noticed my confusion and kindly asked me if I knew why people were thanking him for the round that the other man had bought them. I responded in the negative and he explained that he was in fact the Prime Minister to the King of Buganda (the central kingdom of Uganda which, though no longer politically autonomous still has its own government under their King, known as the Kibaka… I don’t entirely get what the Kibaka does, but I know that he has a lot of political pull in Buganda). He said that traditionally, whenever someone did something in the presence of the Kibaka, it was done in his name, to acknowledge that they can offer their benevolence because of the protection offered by the Kibaka’s government. He went on to explain that since he was Prime Minister to the Kibaka, in the King’s absence he his official representative, and so could accept thanks and offerings on his behalf. He said the last time the Kibaka and President Museveni met even Museveni bought a round in the King’s name as a sign of respect. Though this practice seemed foreign to me, I thanked the PM, accepted the last round and went home. This man, who I verified was telling the truth when I saw his picture and name in the paper the next day, was literally just hanging out at his favorite place, shoot the breeze with whomsoever he came across. When I initially asked what he did he replied that he was merely looking into retirement. Politicians in the U.S. would pay millions of dollars in campaign money to get this kind of PR without actually doing it.

The accessibility is of course due to a number or reasons. For one, most of these people are actually just common people, not the ivory tower elite who run things in the US. Politicians here enter into politics to become rich not because they already have money (this to me creates a paradox, in America we think it is a problem that you have to be rich in order to fund a campaign and get yourself elected to office. In this way the common man goes unrepresented. However, in Uganda people enter politics as the common man looking to make money, but this ulterior motive has made Ugandan politics among the most corrupt in the world). Another reason is that Uganda is simply a much smaller country than the US and so those in government can afford to answer letters sent to them, and aren’t continually bombarded by phone calls should they give their number out to interested observers. Of course, my position on this is also a little biased, as it seems that even the political elite hold us in fairly high esteem. They all allude to the assumption that we are going to be the next generation of aid workers, and politicians in America which means the decisions we make will have a huge impact in Uganda. So the impression they give to us may be slightly more open that the one they give to the average Ugandan.

Whatever the reason is, I think that perhaps the fact that people feel a little closer to their government may be one of the reason people here are so involved in politics. Mama has taken me on several occasions to her political club, where locals come together to discuss the issues of the day. On top of that, everyone you talk to has something (usually something fairly well informed) to say about whatever is in the news, and often even know more about our upcoming elections back in the states. Another reason for this may also be that politics actually affects people here in a way foreign to most middle class American, who are fairly secure in their lifestyle and position. Take for example the Land Bill recently proposed by M7. This bill would take rights away from landlords and grant those who have lived on their land long enough ownership. The bill something like an exaggerated version of squatters rights in the US. This bill has huge ramifications, affecting people’s ability to continue living in their homes, landlord’s security of proper rights, and development potential on the landlords land. I guess what I’m saying it is also in people’s best interest to be well versed in politics as they feel much more than we do in the states, the decisions made from up top.

Anyway, I’ve already spent too long on this post and must return to learning Swahili. Till next time.