Columbia University & Penn State University Chapters
Uganda, Week 5
Wow. We reached the end of our fifth week in Uganda and we only have a week left. I think all of us, Karen, Suzanne (“Suz”), Jinny, Mohammad (“Uncle Mo” – his last name, Khojah, means Uncle in Lusoga), and I, are all looking forward to returning home, but at the same time, dreading parting from everybody we’ve met on this trip.
Last Saturday, we were lucky enough to attend a traditional Ugandan introduction. Since we were in Uganda, we did as the Ugandans did and dressed formerly in traditional gomesi for the ladies and kanzu for the gentleman. Suz departed with a fever in the middle of the introduction. In the evening, we unleashed our inner mother hens onto poor Suz. Something must have worked and Suzanne looked much better Sunday morning. We finished off our weekend huddled around Lionel’s (one of the local interns) laptop watching Fast and Furious 7.
This week, we installed the last of our mosquito nets, built three dish-drying racks, and taught health education at four schools – three primary schools and one secondary school. The team had some health challenges this week. Suz spent the week recovering from what we suspect was malaria and Uncle Mo started feeling under the weather in the middle of the week.
Monday was a lovely low-key day. We discussed the successes and challenges of the past week during our morning meeting. In the afternoon, we walked over to Wairaka Primary School to teach health education. We’ve found that students are more engaged in groups of less than 200 students. So for large schools, we teach up to five different classrooms in rotations. We worked out our timing so that all the interns can teach their respective subjects simultaneously.
Each of the international interns and one of the local interns at CCUg, specialise in teaching a specific health education topic. I teach drug abuse and Suzanne teaches STDs. Karen teaches HIV/AIDS and she’s started including basic sex ed so that students understand clearly how contact during “playing” unprotected sex can transmit diseases. Daniel, one of local interns, teaches sexual relationships, but only for secondary schools. He’s also been our translator when it looks if the students aren’t understanding our English. Jinny combined male (formerly Uncle Mo’s subject) and female puberty this week the teach puberty as one subject. Uncle Mo combined and now teaches hygiene, sanitation, and nutrition.
On Tuesday we installed the last 40 mosquito nets in Nakalanga , bringing our total number of nets installed up to 100 nets. Our journey was dusty as usual and by the end of our boda ride (a motorcycle that usually seats two passengers) we looked like we went through a very bad spray tan, covered in a fine layer of red-brown dirt. After installing mosquito nets, the villagers kindly provided lunch. Afterwards, we played a friendly game of football with the local women. Although our team – Karen, Uncle Mo, Jinny, Lionel, Daniel, Brenda, and I – had more manpower and an extra player, the barefoot women evenly matched us. A huge crowd of children gathered at the edges of the field and the cheered enthusiastically when anyone scored goals.
On Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, we constructed dish-drying racks in the morning and taught health education at schools in the afternoon.
Wednesday looked like it was going to stay cool and overast, but the sun came out full force when we built a dish-drying rack for Kirya Aidah, a Magamaga resident. We finished up in two and a half hours, just before it reached the hottest part of the day. Happily, the main drying area was actually square and not rhombus shaped this week. The soil was rocky and we had difficulty digging for the vertical foundations. After unsuccessfully trying to dig out large rocks in two of the holes, we tried to crack the rocks by hitting them really, really hard with Kirya’s gardening hoe. After denting her hoe *cough*UncleMo*cough*, we changed our approach. We put our college education to use and we solved the problem by moving the construction location to a less rocky spot.
In the afternoon, we taught 254 students in Primaries 3 through 7 at Nalinaiba Primary School. Our rotation timing was almost spot on, but were still concerned whether or not the students actually understood us. Even if their English is proficient, we’ve had consistent feedback that our American-accented English is hard to understand.
Brenda, our “boss” at Community Concerns Uganda, revealed that state school exams were in English. Students who go to village schools, such as Nalinaiba Primary School, have a lower English proficiency and have difficulty understanding the exams. On the bright side, the students at Nalinaiba Primary School were attentive.
Thursday morning we constructed a dish-drying rack for Kasifu Namu, who also lived in Magamaga. We were down on manpower (Uncle Mo and Suz called in sick in the morning) and at one point, only Karen, Jinny, and I were working on the dish racks. The branches were sticky with sap and our site was muddy from rain (although it’s apparently the dry season). We took a little longer than usual to finish the rack, but the last hour we had reinforcements in the form of Brenda, Lionel, Daniel, and a piping hot bag of mbada, deep-fried Ugandan “pancakes”.
We went to Wairaka Modern Secondary School in the afternoon. There were approximately 250 students in attendance and the headmistress managed to squeeze them all in one classroom. The students were attentive during the beginning of our presentations, especially during Jinny’s sanitary pad demonstration and Uncle Mo’s condom on a banana demonstration. An hour in, the student’s attention wandered. When my presentation rolled around, I made sure to speak extra loud so students would not be tempted to sleep. Since all the students and interns were in one room, we saved questions until the end and handed out strips of paper for them to write their questions down. Karen got a rather funny question. It read, “Karen why is Lynn so angry”. Karen diplomatically replied, “She’s not angry – she is tired!” Made my day. I knew I sounded cross when I presented, but not that cross!
Friday’s dish-drying rack construction was also in Magamaga. Karen, Brenda, and I marched to Nabirye Kilimungo’s house. Although Daniel came a few minutes after and Jinny and Uncle Mo arrived later, we were down on manpower. Jinny and Uncle Mo were exhausted from lugging around 20 kg of potatoes along with watermelons, and pineapples they bought that morning. You’re probably wondering why in the world we wanted 20 kg of potatoes. The project team, under the capable leadership of Jinny, planned an ambitious 4th of July lunch for our CCUg co-workers and our Bugembe host family. It would double as an Independence Day celebration and a show of appreciation for our host family and CCUg.
For Friday afternoon we taught health education at Abishag Junior Primary School. In my opinion, they were the best students we’ve had so far. We had no trouble engaging the students with questions and demonstrations. And they all seemed to understand what we were saying, despite our American accents. We perfected our timing of 20 minutes per presentation and we wrapped up just under two hours with a Q&A session.
A surprising challenge was that we often competed with the bad weather while teaching. When it rains, it rains hard – big fat droplets that clang on metal roofings, which many of the schools had. It began raining heavily when Jinny and Karen were teaching in Abishag. The steady drumming of raindrops on the roof drowned any and all noise, including our presentations. The first time I competed with the rain was at another Magamaga primary school. I was forced to stop teaching until the rain passed because no matter how loud I got – and I went all the way to screeching-harpy loud, I just couldn’t win against Mother Nature.
After work, we rushed to Jinja to pick up ingredients for our Saturday 4th of July celebration. Fortunately, Daniel worked at Jinja Central Market and efficiently guided us through the throngs of dinner shoppers. Brenda placed an order for cake (star-shaped!) and secured the services of a friend to deep fry chicken. We girls were responsible for drinks (soda, beer, juice), chips (aka fries), fruit salad, salad salad, buttered corn, and hot dogs.
We woke up bright and early Saturday morning to prepare lunch. Uncle Mo and Mama Faith (the sister of Mama Sarah, the matriarch of our homestay) made rolexes – chapati rolled with plain omelette – for breakfast. Good thing too because we were incredibly grumpy peeling potatoes and chopping vegetables without any fuel in the tank. Brenda swept in with the cake, which actually looked fabulous and star-shaped, and swept out with Karen to bring the fried chicken. Suz, Jinny, and I finished up chopping the fruit salad, searing the hot dogs, and frying the potatoes. Mama Sarah took one look at my potato frying skills and taught me the proper way to deep fry.
We wrapped up by 1:45 pm and started in on the food at 2:00 pm. We insisted on self-service “American” buffet style and eating the beef sausages in buns with ketchup. Mama Sarah had looked skeptically at the “hot dog” Jinny fixed up for her. I don’t think our home-stay family approved of the health benefits of “American” food. Our corn-on-the-cob was a fail – we bought dried maize instead of fresh. That meant that our “corn-on-the-cob” was closer in texture and taste to softened popcorn kernels. Whoops.
Overall, the lunch was a success. We wanted to show our appreciation and I’m quite sure they received it loud and clear, despite the questionable quality of our cooking. In any case, we now have a healthy respect for the sheer amount of time it takes for food preparation without access to cutting boards and gas stoves.
Happy 4th of July!
— Lynn