This is (some of) my Acholi host family.
This is the market in Gulu.
This is a busier part of Kampala.
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Pictures!
Here are some pictures! It took a super long time to upload them, but hopefully I'll be able to add some more later.
This is (some of) my Acholi host family.
This is the market in Gulu.
This is a busier part of Kampala.
This is (some of) my Acholi host family.
This is the market in Gulu.
This is a busier part of Kampala.
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Experiences of Racism in Gulu
Most of the racism we’ve experienced here has been really disturbing because it’s been pro-white racism perpetuated by the African people against themselves. Many people talk about how great the US is, and how advanced the Western world is and all that. And I guess the whole thing in Orom, where everyone expected that we would solve all of their problems because we were white, was part of the same phenomenon.
Last night, when my homestay dad was talking about alcohol, was probably the most blatant example. He had made it very clear earlier that alcohol was not permitted in his family, and that he didn’t think any students should be drinking. Plus, I know that alcoholism is a problem here, especially after life in the IDP camps, when people were getting drunk all the time simply because they had nothing else to do, but I was still surprised by what he said. He seemed to equate seeing a person drinking a beer once with an extreme alcohol addiction, and went on a long rant about the troubles of alcohol and immorality etc– all of which were more or less true, if you’re talking about severe addiction. When one of the other people in the program was trying to explain that they thought it was possible to have a drink without becoming an alcoholic, he dismissed this as impossible in Uganda, saying, “Well, maybe that’s possible in America because you have first-class white people there, but not here.” I didn’t really know how to react to this assumption that we were less likely to abuse alcohol because we were better because we were white…
But today we had a lecturer who was so blatantly racist against white people that it was really difficult to take him seriously (ok, so his whole system of religious beliefs and the fact that he was preaching to us also contributed to how ridiculous it was). His basic argument was that Acholi traditional culture and beliefs held all the world’s answers, and the source of conflict in Africa is that people are following other world religions like Christianity, Judaism and Islam instead of sticking to traditional beliefs. He said stuff like, “what is fact is that the Acholi are known for their superior selflessness and honesty” and “Acholi justice cannot compare with any other because it is the pinnacle of divine justice.” The main problem was that a lot of what he was saying would have caused riots if the words “Acholi” or “black” were exchanged for “white.”
I understand that there’s a big difference between a privileged, white person standing up in front of a group of historically disadvantaged black people and proclaiming the superiority of the white race over all others and a historically disadvantaged African standing up in front of a group of privileged white people proclaiming the virtues of his race, but still. Obviously I can’t pretend that the history of colonialism isn’t affecting his opinion, but I don’t really think that racism of any form can be justified. I mean I guess it’s “better” (or at least less awkward) than the weird inferiority complex we’ve been experiencing from everyone else, but why should anti-white racism be considered “another point of view” while any other form causes an uproar (as it should, imho)?
Anyways, I’ve gotten a Katanga (traditional Acholi dress) made! The fabric is so beautiful. All the fabric here is incredible – I want to bring all of it home with me and use it for wall hangings and stuff. The dress is a yellowy-cream color with dark purple curly lines in the background and big blue and green flower things. It’s hard to describe. Unfortunately, I didn’t realize that my homestay family was planning on getting it for me, so they were all upset that I paid for it. But it doesn’t make any sense for them to buy this stuff for me when I know that they need the money – my “sister” still hasn’t been able to go to school because they don’t have the money to pay for her school fees and transportation. Last night she asked me to try to find someone to sponsor all of her education (like, through university) and I didn’t really know what to say… I don’t even know how to find a sponsor for her.
So then today I bumped into her in town when I was on my way to muzungu café to do some work and she dragged me back to the tailor’s to get another dress made, which was not really necessary, that the family could pay for. I couldn’t say no, because it was clearly a matter of pride that they get me this gift. But now I feel so awkward because I still don’t know what kind of gift to give them… I really wish there was some polite way to ask how much is missing from the school fees, so my “sister” could just go to school now (she talks about how much she wants to go to school every day) and write her exams. But I think that even if I gave them this money, I can’t guarantee that it actually goes to her education, and I’m worried that if I ask they’ll tell me they need the full $150, and they’ll expect me to pay it… Blegh. Guess I’ll have to think of something else.
Last night I played soccer with a bunch of the small children living on the compound (I was pretty evenly matched with the 7-year-olds), which was really fun. I’ll probably give them a real soccer ball, though, since they’ve been playing with a ball of cloth scraps.
Next Wednesday we’re heading to Kampala, and then off to Rwanda! As much as I’m enjoying Gulu, I’m excited to move onto the next thing! Plus I think I’ll get to practice my French a lot with the homestay family in Rwanda, which will be great.
Last night, when my homestay dad was talking about alcohol, was probably the most blatant example. He had made it very clear earlier that alcohol was not permitted in his family, and that he didn’t think any students should be drinking. Plus, I know that alcoholism is a problem here, especially after life in the IDP camps, when people were getting drunk all the time simply because they had nothing else to do, but I was still surprised by what he said. He seemed to equate seeing a person drinking a beer once with an extreme alcohol addiction, and went on a long rant about the troubles of alcohol and immorality etc– all of which were more or less true, if you’re talking about severe addiction. When one of the other people in the program was trying to explain that they thought it was possible to have a drink without becoming an alcoholic, he dismissed this as impossible in Uganda, saying, “Well, maybe that’s possible in America because you have first-class white people there, but not here.” I didn’t really know how to react to this assumption that we were less likely to abuse alcohol because we were better because we were white…
But today we had a lecturer who was so blatantly racist against white people that it was really difficult to take him seriously (ok, so his whole system of religious beliefs and the fact that he was preaching to us also contributed to how ridiculous it was). His basic argument was that Acholi traditional culture and beliefs held all the world’s answers, and the source of conflict in Africa is that people are following other world religions like Christianity, Judaism and Islam instead of sticking to traditional beliefs. He said stuff like, “what is fact is that the Acholi are known for their superior selflessness and honesty” and “Acholi justice cannot compare with any other because it is the pinnacle of divine justice.” The main problem was that a lot of what he was saying would have caused riots if the words “Acholi” or “black” were exchanged for “white.”
I understand that there’s a big difference between a privileged, white person standing up in front of a group of historically disadvantaged black people and proclaiming the superiority of the white race over all others and a historically disadvantaged African standing up in front of a group of privileged white people proclaiming the virtues of his race, but still. Obviously I can’t pretend that the history of colonialism isn’t affecting his opinion, but I don’t really think that racism of any form can be justified. I mean I guess it’s “better” (or at least less awkward) than the weird inferiority complex we’ve been experiencing from everyone else, but why should anti-white racism be considered “another point of view” while any other form causes an uproar (as it should, imho)?
Anyways, I’ve gotten a Katanga (traditional Acholi dress) made! The fabric is so beautiful. All the fabric here is incredible – I want to bring all of it home with me and use it for wall hangings and stuff. The dress is a yellowy-cream color with dark purple curly lines in the background and big blue and green flower things. It’s hard to describe. Unfortunately, I didn’t realize that my homestay family was planning on getting it for me, so they were all upset that I paid for it. But it doesn’t make any sense for them to buy this stuff for me when I know that they need the money – my “sister” still hasn’t been able to go to school because they don’t have the money to pay for her school fees and transportation. Last night she asked me to try to find someone to sponsor all of her education (like, through university) and I didn’t really know what to say… I don’t even know how to find a sponsor for her.
So then today I bumped into her in town when I was on my way to muzungu café to do some work and she dragged me back to the tailor’s to get another dress made, which was not really necessary, that the family could pay for. I couldn’t say no, because it was clearly a matter of pride that they get me this gift. But now I feel so awkward because I still don’t know what kind of gift to give them… I really wish there was some polite way to ask how much is missing from the school fees, so my “sister” could just go to school now (she talks about how much she wants to go to school every day) and write her exams. But I think that even if I gave them this money, I can’t guarantee that it actually goes to her education, and I’m worried that if I ask they’ll tell me they need the full $150, and they’ll expect me to pay it… Blegh. Guess I’ll have to think of something else.
Last night I played soccer with a bunch of the small children living on the compound (I was pretty evenly matched with the 7-year-olds), which was really fun. I’ll probably give them a real soccer ball, though, since they’ve been playing with a ball of cloth scraps.
Next Wednesday we’re heading to Kampala, and then off to Rwanda! As much as I’m enjoying Gulu, I’m excited to move onto the next thing! Plus I think I’ll get to practice my French a lot with the homestay family in Rwanda, which will be great.
Monday, September 21, 2009
Questions
Ok, so I don't really have that much to say, but I felt like updating, and Laura emailed me a bunch of general questions about my experience here, so I'm going to copy my answers into here:
1. Can I skype? The internet connection here isn’t fast enough for any sort of chatting, but the cheapest way to call me is through skype. My phone number here is 077-953-9368 and the Uganda country code is 256. There might be some other 0s or 1s that you have to type in or something, but I don’t really know how it works…
2. What are the paper topics like? The paper topics are pretty non-academic, since this program isn’t very strong on academics (mostly because we really can’t do any readings for our classes because we have to spend time with the homestay and it gets dark early). I just finished an assignment where I made a family tree and then wrote a paper about how I got the information, how this family is different from my family at home, what that says about Acholi culture, and the implications for post-conflict development. It was really cool to learn more about the family, but my paper is probably the lamest thing I’ve written since about 7th grade…
3. Do I have any ideas for the longer project? Yeah, I’d really like to write about refugees and whether international ngos take their needs/desires/opinions into consideration when giving them aid and formulating policy on their repatriation/resettlement. If so, how do the voices of the refugees influence ngo policy, and if not, what is the impact on the refugees? I also think it would be really cool to do a comparative study of the treatment of refugees and IDPs (internally displaced persons) by governments, ngos and local population, but that’s way too big a topic for now.
4. Am I stressing about the logistics of doing the project? Yes. The problem is that the areas that the program is taking us to don’t really have active refugee camps, and I think I’d rather do recent refugees than ones that have been living in Uganda since 1960 – though that could be interesting too. So I have to figure out a way to get to and live near a camp. The other option would be to focus on IDP camps, which are closer to Gulu, where I am now, but they are being phased out, so most people have left the camps (and NGOs are clearly shaping their policy towards that goal, so I’m not sure my topic makes sense in that context)
5. What is the local language, and how much have I picked up? Here in Northern Uganda, the local language is Acholi, but almost everyone speaks English. We had some lessons at the beginning, and my homestay family is teaching me more and more. Of course, it’s a lot easier to recognize words and understand more or less what people are saying than it is to formulate my own sentences, but I’m learning key phrases and vocabulary. Unfortunately, I’ll have to start all over again in Rwanda, where the main languages are Kinyarwanda, French, and English.
6. Do they have good English? It varies. For the most part, yes, but we still have some challenges communicating because of accents and different ways of phrasing (for instance: “somehow” means “sort of” and “stubborn” is a term of endearment meaning silly, talkative, active, etc). My homestay dad has very good English, my "mom" has good English, my "sister" has decent English, and the rest of the kids are learning, so their pronunciation isn't so great, but they still know a lot of English.
7. What’s the food like? Bland! Granted, I’ve had beans and posho (this completely flavorless food object made from, I think, cornstarch and water) or beans and rice for the past three nights, so I’m in a bad food-mood. Usually meals consist of posho or rice and a warm dish – beans, chicken soup, spinach (over-cooked and mushed) in peanut sauce (actually a lot better than it sounds), fish (buried somewhere under all of those bones!), or vegetables. It’s certainly decent food, and it’s filling, but I’m definitely missing American food!!!
8. How was the ice cream at the muzungu café bad? It was kind of grainy, instead of being smooth and creamy – i.e. it was bad by American standards, but here it was great simply because it was ice cream
9. Am I collecting any recipes? Not really… Most of the food they make here you can get the basic ingredients in the grocery store and then throw them together – which I guess is really good for people like me. But regardless, I’m not sure I’m going to want any more of the local food for a while after I leave…
10. What are the other people on the program like? Great! Everyone’s really friendly and outgoing! It’s a pretty big group (28), which I think is kind of unfortunate, but there’s no one that I wouldn’t want to be here…
11. Do any of them stay nearby? Yes, Emma lives down the path from me, and her family is really good friends with my family, so we pretty much do everything together. It’s been really really nice, especially because we can walk home together if we’re ever out past dark.
Cool, that's all for now. Promise I'll have something more interesting to say later in the week, or next week. If you have other burning questions related or unrelated to what I'm doing here, post them in a comment!
1. Can I skype? The internet connection here isn’t fast enough for any sort of chatting, but the cheapest way to call me is through skype. My phone number here is 077-953-9368 and the Uganda country code is 256. There might be some other 0s or 1s that you have to type in or something, but I don’t really know how it works…
2. What are the paper topics like? The paper topics are pretty non-academic, since this program isn’t very strong on academics (mostly because we really can’t do any readings for our classes because we have to spend time with the homestay and it gets dark early). I just finished an assignment where I made a family tree and then wrote a paper about how I got the information, how this family is different from my family at home, what that says about Acholi culture, and the implications for post-conflict development. It was really cool to learn more about the family, but my paper is probably the lamest thing I’ve written since about 7th grade…
3. Do I have any ideas for the longer project? Yeah, I’d really like to write about refugees and whether international ngos take their needs/desires/opinions into consideration when giving them aid and formulating policy on their repatriation/resettlement. If so, how do the voices of the refugees influence ngo policy, and if not, what is the impact on the refugees? I also think it would be really cool to do a comparative study of the treatment of refugees and IDPs (internally displaced persons) by governments, ngos and local population, but that’s way too big a topic for now.
4. Am I stressing about the logistics of doing the project? Yes. The problem is that the areas that the program is taking us to don’t really have active refugee camps, and I think I’d rather do recent refugees than ones that have been living in Uganda since 1960 – though that could be interesting too. So I have to figure out a way to get to and live near a camp. The other option would be to focus on IDP camps, which are closer to Gulu, where I am now, but they are being phased out, so most people have left the camps (and NGOs are clearly shaping their policy towards that goal, so I’m not sure my topic makes sense in that context)
5. What is the local language, and how much have I picked up? Here in Northern Uganda, the local language is Acholi, but almost everyone speaks English. We had some lessons at the beginning, and my homestay family is teaching me more and more. Of course, it’s a lot easier to recognize words and understand more or less what people are saying than it is to formulate my own sentences, but I’m learning key phrases and vocabulary. Unfortunately, I’ll have to start all over again in Rwanda, where the main languages are Kinyarwanda, French, and English.
6. Do they have good English? It varies. For the most part, yes, but we still have some challenges communicating because of accents and different ways of phrasing (for instance: “somehow” means “sort of” and “stubborn” is a term of endearment meaning silly, talkative, active, etc). My homestay dad has very good English, my "mom" has good English, my "sister" has decent English, and the rest of the kids are learning, so their pronunciation isn't so great, but they still know a lot of English.
7. What’s the food like? Bland! Granted, I’ve had beans and posho (this completely flavorless food object made from, I think, cornstarch and water) or beans and rice for the past three nights, so I’m in a bad food-mood. Usually meals consist of posho or rice and a warm dish – beans, chicken soup, spinach (over-cooked and mushed) in peanut sauce (actually a lot better than it sounds), fish (buried somewhere under all of those bones!), or vegetables. It’s certainly decent food, and it’s filling, but I’m definitely missing American food!!!
8. How was the ice cream at the muzungu café bad? It was kind of grainy, instead of being smooth and creamy – i.e. it was bad by American standards, but here it was great simply because it was ice cream
9. Am I collecting any recipes? Not really… Most of the food they make here you can get the basic ingredients in the grocery store and then throw them together – which I guess is really good for people like me. But regardless, I’m not sure I’m going to want any more of the local food for a while after I leave…
10. What are the other people on the program like? Great! Everyone’s really friendly and outgoing! It’s a pretty big group (28), which I think is kind of unfortunate, but there’s no one that I wouldn’t want to be here…
11. Do any of them stay nearby? Yes, Emma lives down the path from me, and her family is really good friends with my family, so we pretty much do everything together. It’s been really really nice, especially because we can walk home together if we’re ever out past dark.
Cool, that's all for now. Promise I'll have something more interesting to say later in the week, or next week. If you have other burning questions related or unrelated to what I'm doing here, post them in a comment!
Friday, September 18, 2009
Orom Youth Center
I think I need to preface this entry with a quick warning: the experiences I’m writing about have been by far the most uncomfortable of the trip so far, and I’m definitely going to sound really negative. That said, I knew that I was getting myself into a program that would make me very uncomfortable at times, and I really wanted that discomfort. Even though what we did today was not at all pleasant, it was still a really eye-opening experience, I’m so glad that it happened, and I’m still very happy to be here.
With that said, we’re currently in Kitgum, another district in Northern Uganda. It’s definitely nice to get away from the homestay family for a couple days (we’re staying in a hotel with electricity AND running water!) When we arrived on Wednesday, after a long, bumpy drive made particularly slow by the mud from the torrential downpour the night before, our patience with “Africa time” (i.e. everything starts an hour late and entails a lot of waiting around) had really worn thin. We were then guilt-tripped approximately 25 times about how a group of school children we didn’t know anything about had prepared a day of activities and traditional dance performances and stuff that we were supposed to have gone to that morning. Not sure how that managed to be completely omitted from the schedule our academic director had given us…
Anyways, Thursday morning we had our filling, nutritious breakfast of sandwich bread and butter, bananas, and coffee, then waited for the bus for an hour (as usual) and finally drove off to the school. When we got to the village the school was in, the children lined the side of the road clapping and singing for us and holding up pictures they’d drawn about cheery subjects like child abuse. We were like celebrity rock stars driving through throngs of fans – it was a little creepy. I couldn’t help but think about what it would be like if this was an American school or camp with foreigners visiting (particularly what it would be like if it was a school/camp full of white children and black visitors came) – not a very pleasant thought. For a horrifying minute we all thought that we were about to just drive right past these children and keep going, but then we realized we had reached the schoolyard.
The head of the school, an imposing woman who had the kids marching around like soldiers to the sound of her whistle (no joke, it looked like that scene at the beginning of the Sound of Music only with about 250 kids instead of 7), then guilt-tripped us another 7 or 8 times about how we weren’t going to spend the entire day doing the activities they’d planned for us. The children then sang for us, did a traditional dance for us, and recited a poem about how they don’t have any rights, and then all of a sudden it was time for us to go. I’m not sure which of us was more on display. Sometimes it feels like we’re this circus act that comes to the villages, draws out all the children from what they’re doing to stare at us, and then moves on. But at the same time, it was also like, “here’s a school in Africa with underprivileged children catering to you.” I guess it’s just weird that we get this special treatment—which reinforces the idea that we’re these strange, mystical beings with so much money and power and influence—and then we just drive away without getting to interact with them or really get a sense of what their life is like at all. So that felt kind of weird.
But that doesn’t even begin to approach our experience at the “youth center,” which was another couple hour’s drive away (very narrow, bumpy, swerving roads + delicious packed lunch of one hardboiled egg and piece of greasy chapatti (like naan bread) = unhappy students). The first thing we noticed about the youth center was that the “youth” weren’t really youth at all. Actually it was more like all the grown men in the village and a couple women. The second thing I noticed was that the pit latrine there was actually, hands-down, the #1 worst toilet I have ever experienced in my life—and I’ve now seen/smelt quite a variety of nasty bathrooms. Words cannot even describe.
The idea of the “youth center” trip was that we would talk to the local community in Orom (next to Karamajong, where there have been conflicts with the cattle-rustlers) about how their life has been since the start of the war and how they are trying to restore peace etc. This was the very first time they had ever had such a discussion with a group of white people. We were broken into groups of 9 students and about 50 villagers, and told to start asking questions through the staff, who translated.
It was horrible, for all of us students. Basically it turned into the villagers giving us a long description of their problems (our children do not want to go to school, we have no food because of drought, we have no jobs outside of agriculture, the government doesn’t provide us any services, the government is corrupt, we can’t keep any teachers here, the returned child soldiers have severe psychological problems, there is hatred and crime within the village, etc etc etc) and then asking us for a solution. As in, “Please tell us right this instant what we can do to improve agricultural efficiency,” “Please go to your government and tell them to give us a factory so we can have an economy outside of subsistence farming,” “Please have your government build us a health center.”
I have never in my life felt a) so overwhelmed by the enormity of the problems that I think should be fixed or b) so disgusted with the perception of Americans and of Africans’ dependence on outsiders.
This village was so tiny, but it alone needed such a complex set of solutions that I could hardly wrap my head around the idea. Just helping this one community could be one’s life work, and it would still probably fail (I say this both because the implementation of the solution would be so complex and prone to failure and because I strongly believe that it would take the investment of the local community to truly be sustainable). And then multiply that by all of the villages like this in Uganda, and all of the countries in Africa, and all of the similar villages in countries in other third-world countries—and bear in mind that these villages all have different problems and would need different solutions… I thought I was going to faint (granted, the heat and car-sickness probably contributed to this feeling).
It’s so easy in the classroom to critique the “cookie-cutter” solutions that aid organizations try to implement without consideration for the local context, but sitting there imagining how incredibly vast the scope of development challenges is, I began to have a lot of sympathy. It seemed like the only way to make any progress whatsoever would be to try to find a slightly imperfect solution that would be widely applicable and would improve life a bit in a lot of places, and then to hope that the local community could tweak this solution to suit their needs better. This is what my doer-brain was arguing – and then my thinker-brain would argue back just as fiercely that these solutions would never really work and would ultimately be a huge waste of time, effort and money because they weren’t catered to the local situation. So I was left feeling utterly helpless.
One of the main things that drew me to this kind of work was the sense that I would be accomplishing something, making a difference. For the first time, I began to worry that I’d only ever feel inadequate for all the things I hadn’t been able to do. Very discouraging.
Just as uncomfortable was this perception that, because we were white/Westerners/Americans, we held the solutions to everything. We’ve already heard this sentiment in weaker form – Santo thinking that the world’s human rights problems could be solved if the US would ratify all the international treaties and norms; our lecturers literally not believing that there was such a thing as poor people in the United States. But this was the most blatant expression we’ve ever heard. We had to try to explain to these people that we wanted to help, but we simply couldn’t provide the advice they wanted; that we could try to give them tools and support, but the solution would ultimately have to come from themselves.
Even though my thinker-brain knew that the solution had to come from them, my doer-brain was so skeptical. These people have no education, and no starting point, it seemed. Our normal framework of thinking about the problems is so different from the reality there. Our tendency was to invoke the state’s responsibility to its citizens: we kept wondering, why can’t they pressure the government to provide public schools and pay the teachers competitive wages? But they have literally no political power. Even if they could voice their opinions to the bureaucracy, they do not control enough of the votes to be able to threaten the government with anything other than an armed rebellion – and looking at these people who had suffered over 20 years of violence, the idea of them causing more conflict seemed to fall somewhere between impossible and cruel. They cannot organize with other villages facing the same problems because they have no communication or transportation infrastructure. The government therefore has no political motivation to help these people. And even if they did, corruption is so rampant that services would never get there.
And what about corruption? What makes a government official who has to feed his own family all that different from an American who says, “well, we have to feed our poor before we can donate any more to the third world”? (I mean, other than the idea that the government holds a legal obligation to its citizens and the US doesn’t really have the same obligation to the third world). But the point is, I don’t want to just point accusatory fingers at corruption because it’s just as much a symptom as a cause.
Half of me was left with this feeling that I had been idealized to this god-like position to which the American can never live up, and frankly should never live up. The other half felt like until I (or the international community in general) became that god, I’d perpetually feel overwhelmed by the extent of the challenge.
I feel like I should try to at least end this entry on a more positive note, so here are some good things: 1. The stars! Are incredible here! The first time I saw them, I was walking outside with my host sister and mother, and they thought I was so funny because I couldn’t keep my eyes off the sky. They both had to guide me along the path to our neighbor’s house and kept calling me a “baby” because I couldn’t keep my footing. But seriously – wow. You can even see the Milky Way. It’s so beautiful. And almost every night you can see lightning in the distance, which is really cool. 2. I’m really loving the messages and updates from people back home! Keep writing! I love hearing about what’s going on at home/school; it’s a really nice break from things here sometimes. 3. I’m finally starting to make some progress on my research project! A “brother” of one of the guys in the program works for Oxfam and was able to answer my questions and give us some really great, concrete information about refugees in Uganda; hopefully he’ll also have some useful contacts for us.
With that said, we’re currently in Kitgum, another district in Northern Uganda. It’s definitely nice to get away from the homestay family for a couple days (we’re staying in a hotel with electricity AND running water!) When we arrived on Wednesday, after a long, bumpy drive made particularly slow by the mud from the torrential downpour the night before, our patience with “Africa time” (i.e. everything starts an hour late and entails a lot of waiting around) had really worn thin. We were then guilt-tripped approximately 25 times about how a group of school children we didn’t know anything about had prepared a day of activities and traditional dance performances and stuff that we were supposed to have gone to that morning. Not sure how that managed to be completely omitted from the schedule our academic director had given us…
Anyways, Thursday morning we had our filling, nutritious breakfast of sandwich bread and butter, bananas, and coffee, then waited for the bus for an hour (as usual) and finally drove off to the school. When we got to the village the school was in, the children lined the side of the road clapping and singing for us and holding up pictures they’d drawn about cheery subjects like child abuse. We were like celebrity rock stars driving through throngs of fans – it was a little creepy. I couldn’t help but think about what it would be like if this was an American school or camp with foreigners visiting (particularly what it would be like if it was a school/camp full of white children and black visitors came) – not a very pleasant thought. For a horrifying minute we all thought that we were about to just drive right past these children and keep going, but then we realized we had reached the schoolyard.
The head of the school, an imposing woman who had the kids marching around like soldiers to the sound of her whistle (no joke, it looked like that scene at the beginning of the Sound of Music only with about 250 kids instead of 7), then guilt-tripped us another 7 or 8 times about how we weren’t going to spend the entire day doing the activities they’d planned for us. The children then sang for us, did a traditional dance for us, and recited a poem about how they don’t have any rights, and then all of a sudden it was time for us to go. I’m not sure which of us was more on display. Sometimes it feels like we’re this circus act that comes to the villages, draws out all the children from what they’re doing to stare at us, and then moves on. But at the same time, it was also like, “here’s a school in Africa with underprivileged children catering to you.” I guess it’s just weird that we get this special treatment—which reinforces the idea that we’re these strange, mystical beings with so much money and power and influence—and then we just drive away without getting to interact with them or really get a sense of what their life is like at all. So that felt kind of weird.
But that doesn’t even begin to approach our experience at the “youth center,” which was another couple hour’s drive away (very narrow, bumpy, swerving roads + delicious packed lunch of one hardboiled egg and piece of greasy chapatti (like naan bread) = unhappy students). The first thing we noticed about the youth center was that the “youth” weren’t really youth at all. Actually it was more like all the grown men in the village and a couple women. The second thing I noticed was that the pit latrine there was actually, hands-down, the #1 worst toilet I have ever experienced in my life—and I’ve now seen/smelt quite a variety of nasty bathrooms. Words cannot even describe.
The idea of the “youth center” trip was that we would talk to the local community in Orom (next to Karamajong, where there have been conflicts with the cattle-rustlers) about how their life has been since the start of the war and how they are trying to restore peace etc. This was the very first time they had ever had such a discussion with a group of white people. We were broken into groups of 9 students and about 50 villagers, and told to start asking questions through the staff, who translated.
It was horrible, for all of us students. Basically it turned into the villagers giving us a long description of their problems (our children do not want to go to school, we have no food because of drought, we have no jobs outside of agriculture, the government doesn’t provide us any services, the government is corrupt, we can’t keep any teachers here, the returned child soldiers have severe psychological problems, there is hatred and crime within the village, etc etc etc) and then asking us for a solution. As in, “Please tell us right this instant what we can do to improve agricultural efficiency,” “Please go to your government and tell them to give us a factory so we can have an economy outside of subsistence farming,” “Please have your government build us a health center.”
I have never in my life felt a) so overwhelmed by the enormity of the problems that I think should be fixed or b) so disgusted with the perception of Americans and of Africans’ dependence on outsiders.
This village was so tiny, but it alone needed such a complex set of solutions that I could hardly wrap my head around the idea. Just helping this one community could be one’s life work, and it would still probably fail (I say this both because the implementation of the solution would be so complex and prone to failure and because I strongly believe that it would take the investment of the local community to truly be sustainable). And then multiply that by all of the villages like this in Uganda, and all of the countries in Africa, and all of the similar villages in countries in other third-world countries—and bear in mind that these villages all have different problems and would need different solutions… I thought I was going to faint (granted, the heat and car-sickness probably contributed to this feeling).
It’s so easy in the classroom to critique the “cookie-cutter” solutions that aid organizations try to implement without consideration for the local context, but sitting there imagining how incredibly vast the scope of development challenges is, I began to have a lot of sympathy. It seemed like the only way to make any progress whatsoever would be to try to find a slightly imperfect solution that would be widely applicable and would improve life a bit in a lot of places, and then to hope that the local community could tweak this solution to suit their needs better. This is what my doer-brain was arguing – and then my thinker-brain would argue back just as fiercely that these solutions would never really work and would ultimately be a huge waste of time, effort and money because they weren’t catered to the local situation. So I was left feeling utterly helpless.
One of the main things that drew me to this kind of work was the sense that I would be accomplishing something, making a difference. For the first time, I began to worry that I’d only ever feel inadequate for all the things I hadn’t been able to do. Very discouraging.
Just as uncomfortable was this perception that, because we were white/Westerners/Americans, we held the solutions to everything. We’ve already heard this sentiment in weaker form – Santo thinking that the world’s human rights problems could be solved if the US would ratify all the international treaties and norms; our lecturers literally not believing that there was such a thing as poor people in the United States. But this was the most blatant expression we’ve ever heard. We had to try to explain to these people that we wanted to help, but we simply couldn’t provide the advice they wanted; that we could try to give them tools and support, but the solution would ultimately have to come from themselves.
Even though my thinker-brain knew that the solution had to come from them, my doer-brain was so skeptical. These people have no education, and no starting point, it seemed. Our normal framework of thinking about the problems is so different from the reality there. Our tendency was to invoke the state’s responsibility to its citizens: we kept wondering, why can’t they pressure the government to provide public schools and pay the teachers competitive wages? But they have literally no political power. Even if they could voice their opinions to the bureaucracy, they do not control enough of the votes to be able to threaten the government with anything other than an armed rebellion – and looking at these people who had suffered over 20 years of violence, the idea of them causing more conflict seemed to fall somewhere between impossible and cruel. They cannot organize with other villages facing the same problems because they have no communication or transportation infrastructure. The government therefore has no political motivation to help these people. And even if they did, corruption is so rampant that services would never get there.
And what about corruption? What makes a government official who has to feed his own family all that different from an American who says, “well, we have to feed our poor before we can donate any more to the third world”? (I mean, other than the idea that the government holds a legal obligation to its citizens and the US doesn’t really have the same obligation to the third world). But the point is, I don’t want to just point accusatory fingers at corruption because it’s just as much a symptom as a cause.
Half of me was left with this feeling that I had been idealized to this god-like position to which the American can never live up, and frankly should never live up. The other half felt like until I (or the international community in general) became that god, I’d perpetually feel overwhelmed by the extent of the challenge.
I feel like I should try to at least end this entry on a more positive note, so here are some good things: 1. The stars! Are incredible here! The first time I saw them, I was walking outside with my host sister and mother, and they thought I was so funny because I couldn’t keep my eyes off the sky. They both had to guide me along the path to our neighbor’s house and kept calling me a “baby” because I couldn’t keep my footing. But seriously – wow. You can even see the Milky Way. It’s so beautiful. And almost every night you can see lightning in the distance, which is really cool. 2. I’m really loving the messages and updates from people back home! Keep writing! I love hearing about what’s going on at home/school; it’s a really nice break from things here sometimes. 3. I’m finally starting to make some progress on my research project! A “brother” of one of the guys in the program works for Oxfam and was able to answer my questions and give us some really great, concrete information about refugees in Uganda; hopefully he’ll also have some useful contacts for us.
Monday, September 14, 2009
Women's Rights and Hypocrisy
UGH ok I am getting more and more frustrated with the way women are treated. It’s not even so much the division of labor – women = housework; men = providing for the family – as the nonchalant way that men can say, as though stating fact “well, women are the weaker sex.” GAHHHH
Mom: to answer your question about whether I have to follow the cultural norms, no. As a guest, I have been treated like the men (I always eat with the men, I'm served first, I'm mostly able to interject my own opinions (if they stop talking long enough for me to politely get a word in edgewise) etc) and I get to talk to the women and help out in the kitchen. So I guess I'm getting a bit of both worlds.
Santo, as fascinating as he is to talk to – when it comes to his opinions on Ugandan politics and his ideas of human rights and how they clash with mine – can also be incredibly frustrating to talk to. He really likes the sound of his own voice (seriously, he was BORN to be a pretentious professor) and he’s one of those people who state all of his opinions as fact. When we were talking about Uganda-specific issues this was a little less apparent, though I was aware of it to some extent – I was mostly interested in his opinion sort of as a case study of a local and non-Western opinion. When he tries to talk about things outside of Africa, however, it’s really obvious (“Well, the British race is the most populous race in the world because all Americans and all Australians are British so when you combine all of those people it makes the biggest race.” FALSE and FALSE.)
More frustrating is when he uses the terms “human rights,” “justice,” “peace,” “Obama,” etc as vague, sort of interchangeable terms for “everything right in the world.” Sometimes I think he just throws these terms into whatever he’s saying without thinking about what they actually mean, so that the sounds like he’s right. He also clearly doesn’t consider the equality of men and women to fall under human rights – though he’s quick to repeat that all people are equal.
But MOST frustrating is when he contentedly lectures that Christians like him believe that a man should only have one wife – something he repeats fairly regularly. [Side note: They seem intent on knocking religion into me, so soon I’ll know all sorts of “hallelujah” songs and how to cross myself in Acholi. Just what I wanted!] Now, I knew that he had had a wife before his current wife, but that she died ten years ago. I was a little suspicious of the timeline because his current wife (Daisy)’s oldest daughter is almost my age. But I didn’t ask questions, mostly because I was completely overwhelmed (and still am) by the sheer number of children running around! I have NO idea which one is which, and who belongs to whom.
One of our assignments is to create a family tree of our homestay family and write a paper about it, so this weekend I casually asked people about their family members as I was helping out in the kitchen. [I am still confused. Take for instance, “She’s my uncle’s daughter so she’s my mother but we are sisters.” WTF?!] So as I was going out on Saturday with my “half-brother” Dennis, the oldest son of the first wife, I innocently asked how many brothers and sisters he had. Suddenly he got really embarrassed, and launched into his life story for the next few hours. So turns out he was actually from another relationship between the “first wife” of Santo and another man (with his own set of children from his marriage to a woman who went and attacked Dennis’ mom). Santo, meanwhile, has at least 16 living children (at least two have died) with at least FIVE different women, whom he usually courted about three at a time, I guess?
And then he has the nerve to sit there in front of his wife, who has taken in Dennis’ brothers because his mom died, and say that good Christians should only have one wife, and that women are inferior to men – oh, but he’s all about “human rights.” GAHHHHHH. Fortunately, our neighbor Winnie is able to poke fun at exactly this hypocrisy without making it too obvious, so I can kind of vent my frustration at him under the guise of siding with her.
So I ended up getting in a big argument with Dennis about women’s rights, and how I think that housework and providing monetarily for the family should be split equally between men and women, and how women aren’t given the same priority as men in education, and basically how men can be just as immoral as he thinks women are, etc etc etc. I don’t think I accomplished anything, but it felt good to fight over it.
One of the women who does most of the cooking, Jackie (don’t think she’s related, but she and her husband have a hut in the backyard of the compound), overheard most of this conversation. So the next morning my “mom” explained that the only reason she doesn’t eat with the men is that the kids like her to eat with them, and at dinner tonight Jackie and Nancy ate with us. I kind of get the impression that they are only doing this to appease me. I don’t know… I guess we’ll see.
Ok, that’s it for now. Hope everything is going well back in the US!
Mom: to answer your question about whether I have to follow the cultural norms, no. As a guest, I have been treated like the men (I always eat with the men, I'm served first, I'm mostly able to interject my own opinions (if they stop talking long enough for me to politely get a word in edgewise) etc) and I get to talk to the women and help out in the kitchen. So I guess I'm getting a bit of both worlds.
Santo, as fascinating as he is to talk to – when it comes to his opinions on Ugandan politics and his ideas of human rights and how they clash with mine – can also be incredibly frustrating to talk to. He really likes the sound of his own voice (seriously, he was BORN to be a pretentious professor) and he’s one of those people who state all of his opinions as fact. When we were talking about Uganda-specific issues this was a little less apparent, though I was aware of it to some extent – I was mostly interested in his opinion sort of as a case study of a local and non-Western opinion. When he tries to talk about things outside of Africa, however, it’s really obvious (“Well, the British race is the most populous race in the world because all Americans and all Australians are British so when you combine all of those people it makes the biggest race.” FALSE and FALSE.)
More frustrating is when he uses the terms “human rights,” “justice,” “peace,” “Obama,” etc as vague, sort of interchangeable terms for “everything right in the world.” Sometimes I think he just throws these terms into whatever he’s saying without thinking about what they actually mean, so that the sounds like he’s right. He also clearly doesn’t consider the equality of men and women to fall under human rights – though he’s quick to repeat that all people are equal.
But MOST frustrating is when he contentedly lectures that Christians like him believe that a man should only have one wife – something he repeats fairly regularly. [Side note: They seem intent on knocking religion into me, so soon I’ll know all sorts of “hallelujah” songs and how to cross myself in Acholi. Just what I wanted!] Now, I knew that he had had a wife before his current wife, but that she died ten years ago. I was a little suspicious of the timeline because his current wife (Daisy)’s oldest daughter is almost my age. But I didn’t ask questions, mostly because I was completely overwhelmed (and still am) by the sheer number of children running around! I have NO idea which one is which, and who belongs to whom.
One of our assignments is to create a family tree of our homestay family and write a paper about it, so this weekend I casually asked people about their family members as I was helping out in the kitchen. [I am still confused. Take for instance, “She’s my uncle’s daughter so she’s my mother but we are sisters.” WTF?!] So as I was going out on Saturday with my “half-brother” Dennis, the oldest son of the first wife, I innocently asked how many brothers and sisters he had. Suddenly he got really embarrassed, and launched into his life story for the next few hours. So turns out he was actually from another relationship between the “first wife” of Santo and another man (with his own set of children from his marriage to a woman who went and attacked Dennis’ mom). Santo, meanwhile, has at least 16 living children (at least two have died) with at least FIVE different women, whom he usually courted about three at a time, I guess?
And then he has the nerve to sit there in front of his wife, who has taken in Dennis’ brothers because his mom died, and say that good Christians should only have one wife, and that women are inferior to men – oh, but he’s all about “human rights.” GAHHHHHH. Fortunately, our neighbor Winnie is able to poke fun at exactly this hypocrisy without making it too obvious, so I can kind of vent my frustration at him under the guise of siding with her.
So I ended up getting in a big argument with Dennis about women’s rights, and how I think that housework and providing monetarily for the family should be split equally between men and women, and how women aren’t given the same priority as men in education, and basically how men can be just as immoral as he thinks women are, etc etc etc. I don’t think I accomplished anything, but it felt good to fight over it.
One of the women who does most of the cooking, Jackie (don’t think she’s related, but she and her husband have a hut in the backyard of the compound), overheard most of this conversation. So the next morning my “mom” explained that the only reason she doesn’t eat with the men is that the kids like her to eat with them, and at dinner tonight Jackie and Nancy ate with us. I kind of get the impression that they are only doing this to appease me. I don’t know… I guess we’ll see.
Ok, that’s it for now. Hope everything is going well back in the US!
Riots in Kampala, and the Muzungu café
Since my last entry, I have carried 10L of water, on my head, from the water pump to my house (~5-7min walk), and eaten chicken gizzard, twice! Yay for new cultural experiences! ...Kind of. Chicken gizzard is one of those delicacies that foreigners have no desire to eat, a fact which the local people do not understand at all. It’s reserved specially for the guest, meaning I get to eat it every time they serve chicken… ugh. Those of us who have eaten the gizzard agree that the texture is similar to what you would expect a human ear to taste like (kind of rubbery) with a chicken-like flavor.
I want to note that I should have mentioned in my last post that it’s incredibly hypocritical that Santo is all about “human rights” but the women in his family have an inferior position to the men. More on this later (maybe in the next post).
I thought I’d write about the riots in Kampala, since I don’t know how much they’re being reported in the US. First of all, Kampala is very far from where I am staying right now (over half a day’s drive over a bumpy, poorly-managed highway), and the political issue that is causing these riots is not related to the conflict with the North. So the riots shouldn’t affect my program or my safety at all, which is good.
Some history to the present riots:
Before the colonial period, there were a number of kingdoms in Uganda, including Acholi (in the North, where I am right now), Buganda, and Bunyoro. The Baganda had a highly organized political system, and were therefore considered superior by the British, who contributed to their development (economically, educationally, etc) much more than to the other kingdoms. Baganda were given positions of authority, while the Acholi in the North were used for manual labor—creating some of the underlying tensions of the conflict between the North and the rest of the country, including the rise of Kony and the LRA. To this day, the Baganda and Acholi hold to certain stereotypes about themselves and each other: the Baganda consider themselves the most intelligent and developed, while the Acholi pride themselves on being strong and brave.
This part of the history is not related to the riots in Kampala, however. The king of the Baganda, the Kabaka, continued to hold much power throughout colonialism, and the extent of his power has been a point of extreme contention since the end of colonialism. Most of the post-independence political parties were formed over the issue of whether the Kabaka would be returned to his former position of absolute authority over the Baganda, who would form their own state or whether he would only play a partial role in a country-wide democracy. Ultimately, after different parties agreed to join forces, the country was left with a federal government, and the Kabaka was given a special status, with power over the Baganda. The power of traditional government has been a source of tension ever since. They were abolished under Obote I (I’m pretty sure), and reinstated by Museveni in the late 1980s, but denied any political role.
During the colonial period, the Bunyoro kingdom partnered with chiefs in Northern Uganda to launch a revolt against the British, the Baganda and the Kabaka. The rebels were defeated, and the British decided to reward Buganda for its loyalty by granting the kingdom some land from its neighbor, Bunyoro. These are known as the “Lost Territories.”
After independence, a referendum was held over the status of the Lost Territories, which were mostly comprised of Bunyoro. However, through political manipulation, Buganda kind of held on to them, and the issue has sort of lain dormant for a while. [Ok, there’s probably more history here, but I’m forgetting]
The riots:
On Thursday, the Kabaka announced a visit to the Lost Territories, which are ambiguously part of his territory, but not really (the indigenous people are all Bunyoro, but the main language spoken there is Lugandan – the language of the Baganda). Museveni told him he was not allowed to go visit them, sparking riots in Kampala, as the Baganda feel that Museveni is simultaneously stepping on the traditional power of the Kabaka and siding with Bunyoro against Buganda. Bunyoro, meanwhile, has warned/threatened the Kabaka not to come to the Lost Territories.
The riots were pretty intense, from the reports we’ve been getting here. About 7-10 people were killed on the first day, and I think around 5 or 6 in the next couple of days (it’s hard to get reliable news around here, as the radio is mostly in Acholi and we don’t have tv, internet, etc, and it’s a long walk to town to buy a newspaper). Somewhere around 60 people were injured or hospitalized, and all the roads into and out of the city were blocked. Tires and buses were burnt by the mobs, until the state brought in the army to reinforce the police – tear gas was released, crowds were beaten, etc etc. I don’t really know the details, since news is so hard to come by.
I have to say, it was really entertaining to see my homestay family debate the riots, because they hate the Baganda/Kabaka AND they hate Museveni – so they couldn’t decide which was worse. They still kind of waver back and forth, but I think they’ve settled on hating the Kabaka for claiming that the Lost Territories belong to him, and Museveni for they way he’s handled the situation. They think that there shouldn’t be any traditional government—they have been quizzing me on what exactly the Queen of England does, thinking that that would be a good compromise solution. [[As a side note, they were also very intrigued by Obama’s healthcare speech – as they are with all things Obama – and had me explain the US healthcare system Uganda-style: in terms of the road-sweeper and the district commissioner]]
Personally, I do think that Museveni has authority over the Kabaka, and I think that the role of the traditional chiefs should be as limited and depoliticized as possible. Really the chiefs only reinforce the tendency among Ugandans to identify with their ethnic group (Acholi, Baganda, etc) instead of with a civic identity of “Ugandan.”
Mostly I just want the riots to end [and hopefully by the time I post this they will have] especially because it’s one more thing keeping my “sister” Nancy from going to school. Her school is in Kampala, and she hasn’t been able to get the money to go, so she’s still at home even though school started last week. As much as I love having her around, she should be in school, and she definitely wants to be there. I really hate how the people with access to the best education complain about it so much, when so many people are doing everything they can just to get to their school.
I also want to mention what was possibly the highlight of my week: the muzungu café. Muzungu is the Kiswahili word for “white person,” and little kids often gather by the side of the road to shout “Muzungu!” at us. So someone found the café where all the muzungus in Gulu hang out. It’s run by a white person, and I actually thought I might have died and gone to heaven when I walked in. It’s like the quintessential NYC cafés that I spent my summer exploring, transported to Gulu. There’s internet, various types of coffee/espresso/mochas/etc, grilled cheese sandwiches, yogurt and granola, candy bars, banana bread, nutella banana crepes, ice cream (really bad ice cream, but ice cream…). We were in muzungu ecstasy.
I want to note that I should have mentioned in my last post that it’s incredibly hypocritical that Santo is all about “human rights” but the women in his family have an inferior position to the men. More on this later (maybe in the next post).
I thought I’d write about the riots in Kampala, since I don’t know how much they’re being reported in the US. First of all, Kampala is very far from where I am staying right now (over half a day’s drive over a bumpy, poorly-managed highway), and the political issue that is causing these riots is not related to the conflict with the North. So the riots shouldn’t affect my program or my safety at all, which is good.
Some history to the present riots:
Before the colonial period, there were a number of kingdoms in Uganda, including Acholi (in the North, where I am right now), Buganda, and Bunyoro. The Baganda had a highly organized political system, and were therefore considered superior by the British, who contributed to their development (economically, educationally, etc) much more than to the other kingdoms. Baganda were given positions of authority, while the Acholi in the North were used for manual labor—creating some of the underlying tensions of the conflict between the North and the rest of the country, including the rise of Kony and the LRA. To this day, the Baganda and Acholi hold to certain stereotypes about themselves and each other: the Baganda consider themselves the most intelligent and developed, while the Acholi pride themselves on being strong and brave.
This part of the history is not related to the riots in Kampala, however. The king of the Baganda, the Kabaka, continued to hold much power throughout colonialism, and the extent of his power has been a point of extreme contention since the end of colonialism. Most of the post-independence political parties were formed over the issue of whether the Kabaka would be returned to his former position of absolute authority over the Baganda, who would form their own state or whether he would only play a partial role in a country-wide democracy. Ultimately, after different parties agreed to join forces, the country was left with a federal government, and the Kabaka was given a special status, with power over the Baganda. The power of traditional government has been a source of tension ever since. They were abolished under Obote I (I’m pretty sure), and reinstated by Museveni in the late 1980s, but denied any political role.
During the colonial period, the Bunyoro kingdom partnered with chiefs in Northern Uganda to launch a revolt against the British, the Baganda and the Kabaka. The rebels were defeated, and the British decided to reward Buganda for its loyalty by granting the kingdom some land from its neighbor, Bunyoro. These are known as the “Lost Territories.”
After independence, a referendum was held over the status of the Lost Territories, which were mostly comprised of Bunyoro. However, through political manipulation, Buganda kind of held on to them, and the issue has sort of lain dormant for a while. [Ok, there’s probably more history here, but I’m forgetting]
The riots:
On Thursday, the Kabaka announced a visit to the Lost Territories, which are ambiguously part of his territory, but not really (the indigenous people are all Bunyoro, but the main language spoken there is Lugandan – the language of the Baganda). Museveni told him he was not allowed to go visit them, sparking riots in Kampala, as the Baganda feel that Museveni is simultaneously stepping on the traditional power of the Kabaka and siding with Bunyoro against Buganda. Bunyoro, meanwhile, has warned/threatened the Kabaka not to come to the Lost Territories.
The riots were pretty intense, from the reports we’ve been getting here. About 7-10 people were killed on the first day, and I think around 5 or 6 in the next couple of days (it’s hard to get reliable news around here, as the radio is mostly in Acholi and we don’t have tv, internet, etc, and it’s a long walk to town to buy a newspaper). Somewhere around 60 people were injured or hospitalized, and all the roads into and out of the city were blocked. Tires and buses were burnt by the mobs, until the state brought in the army to reinforce the police – tear gas was released, crowds were beaten, etc etc. I don’t really know the details, since news is so hard to come by.
I have to say, it was really entertaining to see my homestay family debate the riots, because they hate the Baganda/Kabaka AND they hate Museveni – so they couldn’t decide which was worse. They still kind of waver back and forth, but I think they’ve settled on hating the Kabaka for claiming that the Lost Territories belong to him, and Museveni for they way he’s handled the situation. They think that there shouldn’t be any traditional government—they have been quizzing me on what exactly the Queen of England does, thinking that that would be a good compromise solution. [[As a side note, they were also very intrigued by Obama’s healthcare speech – as they are with all things Obama – and had me explain the US healthcare system Uganda-style: in terms of the road-sweeper and the district commissioner]]
Personally, I do think that Museveni has authority over the Kabaka, and I think that the role of the traditional chiefs should be as limited and depoliticized as possible. Really the chiefs only reinforce the tendency among Ugandans to identify with their ethnic group (Acholi, Baganda, etc) instead of with a civic identity of “Ugandan.”
Mostly I just want the riots to end [and hopefully by the time I post this they will have] especially because it’s one more thing keeping my “sister” Nancy from going to school. Her school is in Kampala, and she hasn’t been able to get the money to go, so she’s still at home even though school started last week. As much as I love having her around, she should be in school, and she definitely wants to be there. I really hate how the people with access to the best education complain about it so much, when so many people are doing everything they can just to get to their school.
I also want to mention what was possibly the highlight of my week: the muzungu café. Muzungu is the Kiswahili word for “white person,” and little kids often gather by the side of the road to shout “Muzungu!” at us. So someone found the café where all the muzungus in Gulu hang out. It’s run by a white person, and I actually thought I might have died and gone to heaven when I walked in. It’s like the quintessential NYC cafés that I spent my summer exploring, transported to Gulu. There’s internet, various types of coffee/espresso/mochas/etc, grilled cheese sandwiches, yogurt and granola, candy bars, banana bread, nutella banana crepes, ice cream (really bad ice cream, but ice cream…). We were in muzungu ecstasy.
Thursday, September 10, 2009
Homestay, part 2
Ok, more about the homestay. Right now it’s my second night, and I’m enjoying my time here more and more as I’m getting to know people. They are trying to teach me bits of Acholi vocabulary, which is an endless source of entertainment as I butcher their language. I have now been taught several greetings, chair, food, dress, market, rice, beans, papaya, table, door, boy(s), girl(s), my name is…, and a few other phrases. So far the best bet is to say “thank you” or “thank you very much” every few words. It’s unbelievable how many times they say thank you – at times when it doesn’t even make sense in English. They thanked me for waking up this morning, for coming back from school, and any number of things. It seems to be just a filler phrase that they throw into any circumstance.
I also really enjoy the way they greet each other. They have this whole dialogue back and forth of greetings, which roughly translates:
A: “Hello, how are you?”
B: “Yes, I am fine”
A: “Thank you”
B: “Good”
A: “Yes”
A: “How have you been?”
B: “I have been well”
A: “Yes”
B: “Thank you”
A: “Thank you too.”
Apparently, they do the same thing when they talk on the phone – it is only at the end of this little chat that they will introduce themselves and say why they are calling. I’m also still getting used to the reversal of “thank you” and “you’re welcome.” When the Acholi say, “you’re welcome,” they actually mean that you are welcome (into their home, to start eating, etc) – so it makes sense to say “thank you” afterwards, but it still catches me off guard.
The only thing that has made me a little bit uncomfortable here (other than choking down not one, but two hardboiled eggs this morning – blegh!) is the treatment of women. It was especially noticeable on the first day, when I was being particularly treated like a “visitor.” It was very strange to have my “sisters” serving me, washing my hands for me, and kneeling to shake my hand. If two men were in conversation, a woman would kneel down and wait to interrupt. The first night, I was the only girl in the main sitting room during dinner (other than Jacqueline, who I think is the wife of Santo’s brother (Santo is my homestay father)). I was served first, and then the men by age, and the women ate somewhere else. I was worried that they would be eating our leftovers or something – a lot of other people in the group mentioned that the women in the family ate leftovers for breakfast while they and the men ate something else. Tonight it was better though, because Emma (one of the other students) and her host mother, who I adore, came over for dinner, and Nancy (who is about my age and so friendly) ate with us.
The girls spend all day in the dark, smoky kitchen-hut working, which is definitely not healthy. [I think this weekend I’m going to help them, though I think Santo wants to take Emma and I out to see more local landmarks and to meet elders. We’ll see.] I worry that I’m just adding to their work, since they have to make special arrangements like boiling all of my water. I know at least one of the girls is postponing her return to school by a week or so to accommodate my visit, which I don’t really approve of… In any case, I’m excited to get to know the women much better too.
Santo is one of the most interesting people to talk to – though he tends to go on and on and on… I can barely get a word in, but it’s fascinating regardless, and every once and a while I can jump in with a question. He studied human rights, and worked for a while with a couple different UN Organizations, and the Uganda Commission for Human Rights. One of the main parts of his job was to visit prisons and IDP camps to check out the human rights situation there. Today we were talking about the difference between the violation of human rights and the act of committing atrocities or crimes against humanities. According to him, only state governments can violate human rights, because they are the ones that have a political contract with the citizens. Others, like Kony’s rebel group, can commit crimes against humanity, but this is not a violation of rights.
This is why he thinks that Kony should be tried in the ICC, or better yet, a court set up for Uganda like that in Rwanda. Such a court would be better because Uganda only passed the Rome statute fairly recently (I think maybe 2002?), so any crimes committed by Kony before then would not be included in the trial. We have spent a lot of time talking about justice and Kony. Kony has asked for amnesty, giving people hope that he could come out of the bush and be reconciled with the local population through traditional justice. One of our lecturers today was talking a lot about this “truth-telling,” saying that the Acholi are the most forgiving people (the lectures come with a lot of slant – Acholi people emphasize how strong and forgiving and wonderful they are, while the Baganda emphasize how intelligent and developed and wonderful they are). Anyways, the lecturer seemed at odds with what Santo and his first son Dennis were telling me last night. They said that traditionally, the person who has committed a crime would appear in front of the Elders for a “truth-telling” (in which they would confess – this part the lecturer spoke about prolifically), the Elders would then set a compensation for the victims and their families, and then there would be a ceremony where they sealed the end of the affair. Santo and Dennis kept stressing that there could not be justice without compensation (the compensation part was not really mentioned in the lecture). But how could you possibly compensate all of the victims of the conflict? That’s essentially the entire northern part of the country!
Santo also has very strong opinions about American politics. I think he knows more about Obama than I do. I was surprised when he said that he had hoped Bush would win in 2000, but he explained that it was because he was frustrated with how the Clinton administration had turned a blind eye to Northern Uganda. I think he is destined to be perpetually disappointed by US presidents who do not do enough to help Africa.
Ok, well that’s it for now. The roosters start crowing around 5:30am here, so I should get to bed now (it’s 10:30). Oh! My family has given me an “Acholi name” – Acim (ah-CHEEM), which means that I am a child who was born far away, but now I have returned home.
P.S. I'm dying for news from home/Barnard/Commonwealth etc - please comment or send me an email about what's going on!
I also really enjoy the way they greet each other. They have this whole dialogue back and forth of greetings, which roughly translates:
A: “Hello, how are you?”
B: “Yes, I am fine”
A: “Thank you”
B: “Good”
A: “Yes”
A: “How have you been?”
B: “I have been well”
A: “Yes”
B: “Thank you”
A: “Thank you too.”
Apparently, they do the same thing when they talk on the phone – it is only at the end of this little chat that they will introduce themselves and say why they are calling. I’m also still getting used to the reversal of “thank you” and “you’re welcome.” When the Acholi say, “you’re welcome,” they actually mean that you are welcome (into their home, to start eating, etc) – so it makes sense to say “thank you” afterwards, but it still catches me off guard.
The only thing that has made me a little bit uncomfortable here (other than choking down not one, but two hardboiled eggs this morning – blegh!) is the treatment of women. It was especially noticeable on the first day, when I was being particularly treated like a “visitor.” It was very strange to have my “sisters” serving me, washing my hands for me, and kneeling to shake my hand. If two men were in conversation, a woman would kneel down and wait to interrupt. The first night, I was the only girl in the main sitting room during dinner (other than Jacqueline, who I think is the wife of Santo’s brother (Santo is my homestay father)). I was served first, and then the men by age, and the women ate somewhere else. I was worried that they would be eating our leftovers or something – a lot of other people in the group mentioned that the women in the family ate leftovers for breakfast while they and the men ate something else. Tonight it was better though, because Emma (one of the other students) and her host mother, who I adore, came over for dinner, and Nancy (who is about my age and so friendly) ate with us.
The girls spend all day in the dark, smoky kitchen-hut working, which is definitely not healthy. [I think this weekend I’m going to help them, though I think Santo wants to take Emma and I out to see more local landmarks and to meet elders. We’ll see.] I worry that I’m just adding to their work, since they have to make special arrangements like boiling all of my water. I know at least one of the girls is postponing her return to school by a week or so to accommodate my visit, which I don’t really approve of… In any case, I’m excited to get to know the women much better too.
Santo is one of the most interesting people to talk to – though he tends to go on and on and on… I can barely get a word in, but it’s fascinating regardless, and every once and a while I can jump in with a question. He studied human rights, and worked for a while with a couple different UN Organizations, and the Uganda Commission for Human Rights. One of the main parts of his job was to visit prisons and IDP camps to check out the human rights situation there. Today we were talking about the difference between the violation of human rights and the act of committing atrocities or crimes against humanities. According to him, only state governments can violate human rights, because they are the ones that have a political contract with the citizens. Others, like Kony’s rebel group, can commit crimes against humanity, but this is not a violation of rights.
This is why he thinks that Kony should be tried in the ICC, or better yet, a court set up for Uganda like that in Rwanda. Such a court would be better because Uganda only passed the Rome statute fairly recently (I think maybe 2002?), so any crimes committed by Kony before then would not be included in the trial. We have spent a lot of time talking about justice and Kony. Kony has asked for amnesty, giving people hope that he could come out of the bush and be reconciled with the local population through traditional justice. One of our lecturers today was talking a lot about this “truth-telling,” saying that the Acholi are the most forgiving people (the lectures come with a lot of slant – Acholi people emphasize how strong and forgiving and wonderful they are, while the Baganda emphasize how intelligent and developed and wonderful they are). Anyways, the lecturer seemed at odds with what Santo and his first son Dennis were telling me last night. They said that traditionally, the person who has committed a crime would appear in front of the Elders for a “truth-telling” (in which they would confess – this part the lecturer spoke about prolifically), the Elders would then set a compensation for the victims and their families, and then there would be a ceremony where they sealed the end of the affair. Santo and Dennis kept stressing that there could not be justice without compensation (the compensation part was not really mentioned in the lecture). But how could you possibly compensate all of the victims of the conflict? That’s essentially the entire northern part of the country!
Santo also has very strong opinions about American politics. I think he knows more about Obama than I do. I was surprised when he said that he had hoped Bush would win in 2000, but he explained that it was because he was frustrated with how the Clinton administration had turned a blind eye to Northern Uganda. I think he is destined to be perpetually disappointed by US presidents who do not do enough to help Africa.
Ok, well that’s it for now. The roosters start crowing around 5:30am here, so I should get to bed now (it’s 10:30). Oh! My family has given me an “Acholi name” – Acim (ah-CHEEM), which means that I am a child who was born far away, but now I have returned home.
P.S. I'm dying for news from home/Barnard/Commonwealth etc - please comment or send me an email about what's going on!
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Monday, September 7
I have learned more in the past few hours in my homestay than I have the entire time I’ve been here – about Uganda, human rights, the war, Acholi culture, etc etc.
I’m living in Laroo, which is near Gulu University. My host family has a small house, but no electricity or running water. There is a sitting room with couches, which seems to be the center of family life, at least for the men (and visitors like me – though I’m hoping that at some point they will stop giving me the special treatment of a visitor). I have a room to myself, with a bed, mosquito net, and a desk (they have also helpfully provided me with a bucket so that I don’t have to walk all the way to the latrine at night, but then they said that they would use this bucket for other stuff through the day…). Behind this house, my host father’s brother is building a house, and meanwhile he and his family is living in a clay hut with a grass roof. There are a couple of other clay huts, but I can’t quite tell how their inhabitants are related to my host family – I am so confused by all the people I met today (sons and daughters from different marriages, cousins, aunts, uncles, friends, etc etc). The shower – a brick structure that comes up to my shoulders with a bucket of water – is behind these huts, along with the place where they make bricks and the pit latrines. I have been given the one marked “Adult” for my own use while everyone else is going to use the other one – a sweet but very unnecessary gesture on their part.
The kitchen is also in a clay hut in the backyard. It’s very dark and smoky, since they cook over a small fire and the hut has very little ventilation. They couldn’t believe it when I told them that it was a bigger kitchen than the one I used in NY – they thought it was very funny when I demonstrated the size of my kitchen from last year.
There are so many kids around, ranging from about 2 years old to university aged. Most of them will be going back to school soon. School started today for many kids, but some of them postponed their return by a day so that they could meet me. Others are going back next week, and a few haven’t started yet. The smallest kid is so adorable – he was convinced that I was the girl who stayed with the family last semester, and apparently ran around telling everyone that Molly was here. He follows me around, confused by my being different from Molly, and very curious about me. It is disturbing and sad to see these kids running around in clothes that are falling apart and barely covering their distended stomachs.
My host father, Santo, told me about how the war has affected his family. In 2003, the LRA came to his house, where he and several other nearby families were hiding. They abducted sixteen children, including his son Emmanuel (now 16), and his daughter, both of whom were in elementary school. Emmanuel, who was sitting on the couch in front of me as Santo told me this story, escaped very quickly (the first abductees began to return after a week) and all of the other children came back within the next six months – except the daughter. She has never come back, and her family has no idea if she’s even still alive. A number of the women in the extended family were also abducted, and apparently were not able to return for a long time. One of the family members was sentenced by Kony to be beaten to death by other abductees, but fortunately was pardoned at the last minute, and is now back with the family.
Most of the time I just sit and listen to Santo. He seems to have an endless capacity to chat, and wants to teach me all about his work with the UN on human rights, Ugandan politics, etc etc.
I have sooooooo much more to say about the homestay, but I don’t have time right now. More is on the way!
I’m living in Laroo, which is near Gulu University. My host family has a small house, but no electricity or running water. There is a sitting room with couches, which seems to be the center of family life, at least for the men (and visitors like me – though I’m hoping that at some point they will stop giving me the special treatment of a visitor). I have a room to myself, with a bed, mosquito net, and a desk (they have also helpfully provided me with a bucket so that I don’t have to walk all the way to the latrine at night, but then they said that they would use this bucket for other stuff through the day…). Behind this house, my host father’s brother is building a house, and meanwhile he and his family is living in a clay hut with a grass roof. There are a couple of other clay huts, but I can’t quite tell how their inhabitants are related to my host family – I am so confused by all the people I met today (sons and daughters from different marriages, cousins, aunts, uncles, friends, etc etc). The shower – a brick structure that comes up to my shoulders with a bucket of water – is behind these huts, along with the place where they make bricks and the pit latrines. I have been given the one marked “Adult” for my own use while everyone else is going to use the other one – a sweet but very unnecessary gesture on their part.
The kitchen is also in a clay hut in the backyard. It’s very dark and smoky, since they cook over a small fire and the hut has very little ventilation. They couldn’t believe it when I told them that it was a bigger kitchen than the one I used in NY – they thought it was very funny when I demonstrated the size of my kitchen from last year.
There are so many kids around, ranging from about 2 years old to university aged. Most of them will be going back to school soon. School started today for many kids, but some of them postponed their return by a day so that they could meet me. Others are going back next week, and a few haven’t started yet. The smallest kid is so adorable – he was convinced that I was the girl who stayed with the family last semester, and apparently ran around telling everyone that Molly was here. He follows me around, confused by my being different from Molly, and very curious about me. It is disturbing and sad to see these kids running around in clothes that are falling apart and barely covering their distended stomachs.
My host father, Santo, told me about how the war has affected his family. In 2003, the LRA came to his house, where he and several other nearby families were hiding. They abducted sixteen children, including his son Emmanuel (now 16), and his daughter, both of whom were in elementary school. Emmanuel, who was sitting on the couch in front of me as Santo told me this story, escaped very quickly (the first abductees began to return after a week) and all of the other children came back within the next six months – except the daughter. She has never come back, and her family has no idea if she’s even still alive. A number of the women in the extended family were also abducted, and apparently were not able to return for a long time. One of the family members was sentenced by Kony to be beaten to death by other abductees, but fortunately was pardoned at the last minute, and is now back with the family.
Most of the time I just sit and listen to Santo. He seems to have an endless capacity to chat, and wants to teach me all about his work with the UN on human rights, Ugandan politics, etc etc.
I have sooooooo much more to say about the homestay, but I don’t have time right now. More is on the way!
Sunday, September 6
I’ve been feeling sick all day, as have a number of other people in the group, but I’m trying to remember to keep hydrated. [Edit: I was all better the next day] Hopefully I’ll be feeling better soon. I’m taking advantage of the fact that we haven’t started the homestay yet to hole up in my room and rest, because I know once I’m living with a family I’ll have to do my best to stay active and engaged even when I want some alone time. Apparently, the homestay parents don’t really understand that sick students want to be alone and don’t want to eat much. Instead the mothers think they should cook a huge meal “to help them heal!” – A sweet gesture, but not exactly what I’m looking for at the moment, thanks.
We had our first Acholi language lesson today, which was very amusing. We mostly learned about the background of the Acholi people, and some phonetics. The style of teaching here is so different from the US: it’s very slow-paced, and the teachers go over things again and again and again, but by the time they finally do move on, you’ve got that concept nailed. It’s like they don’t expect the students to write anything down, but rather to memorize it on the spot. I know this is similar to the sort of “rote memorization” strategies of teaching that colonizers imported into the schools they set up, and I had heard that these methods were still used in many parts of Africa, including Uganda. I just imagined that it was only used for small children or something; I didn’t really expect that I would be taught this way.
The funniest part of the Acholi class was when the professor tried to teach us how to say basic English sounds, as though we didn’t know how to speak English. It ended up being quite a lesson in communication barriers, even in English.
The Ugandans have a very strong accent, and have difficulty understanding our American accents (they are especially tripped up by “r” sounds – not unlike most Bostonians). I had noticed that Stephanie, one of the academic directors spoke with a bit of an accent especially when talking to Africans, but I didn’t realize that she was doing it intentionally. When the teacher was trying to teach us the sounds of the vowels in Acholi, I finally understood that we should all be speaking with an accent to make it easier to understand. He had written the vowels, an Acholi word using that vowel, and an English word with the same sound. The problem was that the way he then had us pronounce these sounds did not match up AT ALL with the sounds in the example English words (for instance: “bin” is pronounced “been” (and means “come”), but the English example was “pit”). These English examples made sense to him, because they were the correct sounds in Ugandan English, not American English.
Similarly, we’ve run into a lot of problems with getting answers to questions. We spent a good half an hour trying to find out what percentage of students move from primary to secondary school, on average (“well, the ratio of teachers to students is supposed to be 1:45, but sometimes there are only seven classrooms and 1,500 students, so then you would have classes outside” “Ok, so then how big would the next year be?” “Well, you have to pass the exam. You can’t move on if you do not pass” etc…) We also get a lot of contradictory answers (“Are soccer jerseys popular here?” “No. Yes.”) or non-answers (“Which one of these dresses is your favorite?” “Yes”)
Part of the problem is just the accent and the speed with which we talk, but as Malena pointed out, it’s also because we tend to give long explanations for why we’re asking the question before we ask them, and when we finally do get around to asking a question, we don’t really make it clear with our intonation. It just sort of runs into what we’ve been saying. Apparently, we need to learn how to speak with an Africa accent, and ask very basic questions.
The other thing we did today was a “drop off,” which is a standard part of SIT programs and their “experiential learning” model. It’s supposed to help us learn about local culture and develop our research skills at once. We were set loose in small groups to wander around Gulu and find out about an aspect of the local culture (my group was assigned to look at fashion), buy cheap lunch, and buy an object relating to our topic. It was easy to get people to talk to us, but such a challenge to figure out what questions to ask, how to phrase them, and what to do with the information given. Sometimes it felt like we were trying to find deeper meaning where there wasn’t any (like when we asked if there was a time to wear long skirts and a time to wear short skirts and the woman just asked, “Well what do you like?”).
On our way back to meet up with the rest of the group, two young schoolgirls (I’d say about 9 years old) wearing their best dresses were walking down the same street in the market as us, eyeing us warily and clearly trying to decide whether or not to try out their English on us. Finally one did say hi, and talked to us for a few minutes. She promised us that we could get to where we were going by walking down a narrow dirt road to the left, and wandered off. We were clearly in a residential area, essentially walking through peoples’ backyards and attracting plenty of stares, and suddenly we realized a brick wall stood between us and where we needed to be. The locals cried out “Muzungu!” (white person!) “Wrong way! Wrong way!” One of us ended up asking if we could climb over the wall, which they considered and then agreed to hesitantly. As we hoisted ourselves up on the chest-high wall, they seemed to realize what these strangers were doing, and the screams (literally) of laughter continued for a good five minutes after we got over to the other side.
Otherwise, not much to report. Gulu is lovely, if dusty, and even has a small stock of nutella! The inconsistent water and electricity has been surprisingly frustrating for many of the other people in the group. I mean, yes, it definitely is annoying when the toilet doesn’t flush when you’re sick, or when the power suddenly goes off while you’re in the shower, but I’m still surprised at how big of a deal it is for some people. I really thought that everyone would be prepared to be “roughing it” on this program – they do warn us that we will be in rural areas… We just need to be a bit more flexible.
We had our first Acholi language lesson today, which was very amusing. We mostly learned about the background of the Acholi people, and some phonetics. The style of teaching here is so different from the US: it’s very slow-paced, and the teachers go over things again and again and again, but by the time they finally do move on, you’ve got that concept nailed. It’s like they don’t expect the students to write anything down, but rather to memorize it on the spot. I know this is similar to the sort of “rote memorization” strategies of teaching that colonizers imported into the schools they set up, and I had heard that these methods were still used in many parts of Africa, including Uganda. I just imagined that it was only used for small children or something; I didn’t really expect that I would be taught this way.
The funniest part of the Acholi class was when the professor tried to teach us how to say basic English sounds, as though we didn’t know how to speak English. It ended up being quite a lesson in communication barriers, even in English.
The Ugandans have a very strong accent, and have difficulty understanding our American accents (they are especially tripped up by “r” sounds – not unlike most Bostonians). I had noticed that Stephanie, one of the academic directors spoke with a bit of an accent especially when talking to Africans, but I didn’t realize that she was doing it intentionally. When the teacher was trying to teach us the sounds of the vowels in Acholi, I finally understood that we should all be speaking with an accent to make it easier to understand. He had written the vowels, an Acholi word using that vowel, and an English word with the same sound. The problem was that the way he then had us pronounce these sounds did not match up AT ALL with the sounds in the example English words (for instance: “bin” is pronounced “been” (and means “come”), but the English example was “pit”). These English examples made sense to him, because they were the correct sounds in Ugandan English, not American English.
Similarly, we’ve run into a lot of problems with getting answers to questions. We spent a good half an hour trying to find out what percentage of students move from primary to secondary school, on average (“well, the ratio of teachers to students is supposed to be 1:45, but sometimes there are only seven classrooms and 1,500 students, so then you would have classes outside” “Ok, so then how big would the next year be?” “Well, you have to pass the exam. You can’t move on if you do not pass” etc…) We also get a lot of contradictory answers (“Are soccer jerseys popular here?” “No. Yes.”) or non-answers (“Which one of these dresses is your favorite?” “Yes”)
Part of the problem is just the accent and the speed with which we talk, but as Malena pointed out, it’s also because we tend to give long explanations for why we’re asking the question before we ask them, and when we finally do get around to asking a question, we don’t really make it clear with our intonation. It just sort of runs into what we’ve been saying. Apparently, we need to learn how to speak with an Africa accent, and ask very basic questions.
The other thing we did today was a “drop off,” which is a standard part of SIT programs and their “experiential learning” model. It’s supposed to help us learn about local culture and develop our research skills at once. We were set loose in small groups to wander around Gulu and find out about an aspect of the local culture (my group was assigned to look at fashion), buy cheap lunch, and buy an object relating to our topic. It was easy to get people to talk to us, but such a challenge to figure out what questions to ask, how to phrase them, and what to do with the information given. Sometimes it felt like we were trying to find deeper meaning where there wasn’t any (like when we asked if there was a time to wear long skirts and a time to wear short skirts and the woman just asked, “Well what do you like?”).
On our way back to meet up with the rest of the group, two young schoolgirls (I’d say about 9 years old) wearing their best dresses were walking down the same street in the market as us, eyeing us warily and clearly trying to decide whether or not to try out their English on us. Finally one did say hi, and talked to us for a few minutes. She promised us that we could get to where we were going by walking down a narrow dirt road to the left, and wandered off. We were clearly in a residential area, essentially walking through peoples’ backyards and attracting plenty of stares, and suddenly we realized a brick wall stood between us and where we needed to be. The locals cried out “Muzungu!” (white person!) “Wrong way! Wrong way!” One of us ended up asking if we could climb over the wall, which they considered and then agreed to hesitantly. As we hoisted ourselves up on the chest-high wall, they seemed to realize what these strangers were doing, and the screams (literally) of laughter continued for a good five minutes after we got over to the other side.
Otherwise, not much to report. Gulu is lovely, if dusty, and even has a small stock of nutella! The inconsistent water and electricity has been surprisingly frustrating for many of the other people in the group. I mean, yes, it definitely is annoying when the toilet doesn’t flush when you’re sick, or when the power suddenly goes off while you’re in the shower, but I’m still surprised at how big of a deal it is for some people. I really thought that everyone would be prepared to be “roughing it” on this program – they do warn us that we will be in rural areas… We just need to be a bit more flexible.
Saturday, September 5
I am currently staying in a hotel in Gulu, Uganda. We will be moving into our homestay families’ homes on Monday evening, after a short introduction to Gulu.
Everyone in Gulu is so friendly! The hotel staff seemed delighted to see us when we arrived, and a few of us bumped into a group of local people who taught us a couple of Acholi phrases (or tried to, much to the hilarity of all around: apparently, we have terrible accents). However, Gulu is much less comfortable and metropolitan than Kampala. Not only is it dangerous to walk alone after dark, it seems that electricity and running water are unpredictable luxuries. When we arrived, there was a power outage, though electricity returned in the evening (a couple hours before the water stopped running in our hotel…). Apparently, they also shut the power off around 11:30 every night, except in bars and nightclubs.
I am so excited for my homestay! According to Stella, one of the program assistants, my homestay mother specifically requested someone to teach how to cook, so I’ll learn how to prepare local dishes! (Not that I’m particularly in love with the constant stream of rice, potatoes, mashed plantains and beans – I’m so used to eating a wide variety of very seasoned, flavorful food that the food here seems unbearably bland. I’m slowly learning to mix the sauces with the potatoes, etc). My homestay mother is also apparently expecting help with her digging and lifting of heavy objects, so I guess my super-strength muscles and I will be kept busy with manual labor.
The drive to Gulu from Kampala took about 6.5 hours, and mostly cut through empty, rural land. As we left Kampala, we saw a completely different part of the city from where we had been before. Kampala has a nice area that caters to the white people (with government buildings, headquarters of businesses and organizations, fancy hotels that we didn’t stay in, and fancy restaurants that we did eat at), an in-between area like where we were staying, and then parts that seem much more like what I expected to see in the city. These were the parts where the streets and sidewalks were overflowing with pedestrians, street vendors and hawkers walking among the cars. The little ramshackle shops were crammed in next to each other, as far as the eye could see, and the haze of disturbed dust filled the air.
As we drove through the rural areas, it seemed to finally hit home that I am really, truly here. After wanting to go to Africa for so many years, and seeing so many pictures of the area, it was so bizarre to look out the window and see EXACTLY the same thing that I’d seen in those pictures. The landscape looked exactly like I expected: dusty red clay-colored dirt and roads, with green grasses and shrubbery and the occasional, isolated straw hut. People were always outside their homes, working or just sitting around. We passed a number of unfinished brick structures where the builder had run out of money halfway through building something. It’s also amazing how prevalent the cell phone advertisements are. Random buildings will be painted completely pink, yellow or blue as advertisements for various cell phone companies (Zain, MTN, and Uganda telecom, respectively).
That’s it for now!
Everyone in Gulu is so friendly! The hotel staff seemed delighted to see us when we arrived, and a few of us bumped into a group of local people who taught us a couple of Acholi phrases (or tried to, much to the hilarity of all around: apparently, we have terrible accents). However, Gulu is much less comfortable and metropolitan than Kampala. Not only is it dangerous to walk alone after dark, it seems that electricity and running water are unpredictable luxuries. When we arrived, there was a power outage, though electricity returned in the evening (a couple hours before the water stopped running in our hotel…). Apparently, they also shut the power off around 11:30 every night, except in bars and nightclubs.
I am so excited for my homestay! According to Stella, one of the program assistants, my homestay mother specifically requested someone to teach how to cook, so I’ll learn how to prepare local dishes! (Not that I’m particularly in love with the constant stream of rice, potatoes, mashed plantains and beans – I’m so used to eating a wide variety of very seasoned, flavorful food that the food here seems unbearably bland. I’m slowly learning to mix the sauces with the potatoes, etc). My homestay mother is also apparently expecting help with her digging and lifting of heavy objects, so I guess my super-strength muscles and I will be kept busy with manual labor.
The drive to Gulu from Kampala took about 6.5 hours, and mostly cut through empty, rural land. As we left Kampala, we saw a completely different part of the city from where we had been before. Kampala has a nice area that caters to the white people (with government buildings, headquarters of businesses and organizations, fancy hotels that we didn’t stay in, and fancy restaurants that we did eat at), an in-between area like where we were staying, and then parts that seem much more like what I expected to see in the city. These were the parts where the streets and sidewalks were overflowing with pedestrians, street vendors and hawkers walking among the cars. The little ramshackle shops were crammed in next to each other, as far as the eye could see, and the haze of disturbed dust filled the air.
As we drove through the rural areas, it seemed to finally hit home that I am really, truly here. After wanting to go to Africa for so many years, and seeing so many pictures of the area, it was so bizarre to look out the window and see EXACTLY the same thing that I’d seen in those pictures. The landscape looked exactly like I expected: dusty red clay-colored dirt and roads, with green grasses and shrubbery and the occasional, isolated straw hut. People were always outside their homes, working or just sitting around. We passed a number of unfinished brick structures where the builder had run out of money halfway through building something. It’s also amazing how prevalent the cell phone advertisements are. Random buildings will be painted completely pink, yellow or blue as advertisements for various cell phone companies (Zain, MTN, and Uganda telecom, respectively).
That’s it for now!
Thursday, September 3, 2009
Kampala
I’m here, in Kampala, the capital of Uganda! It’s a little bit surreal. I’ve always thought that idea of wondering if you just dreamt everything that just happened was a bit cliché, but when I woke up Wednesday morning, after my first night in the hotel, I was genuinely surprised, relieved, and excited to discover that I was, in fact, in Africa. Part of this may be because I subconsciously expected the hotel room that I’m staying in during orientation to be a bit shabbier and the bed to be much less comfortable. After the beds I’ve slept in while in Asia, which are about as comfortable as a board of wood, I was expecting something similar here. Fortunately, they are quite comfortable, and I slept like a baby. The whole group is staying in a small local hotel—it’s not the Sheraton or other fancy hotels we’ve seen around the city, but it’s nice, and they’ve been feeding us well.
So far, Kampala does remind me a lot of Thailand. One of the other girls on the trip, who is from Bangkok, also noticed the similarity. I guess it’s the tiny marketshops that line the roads and are open late at night. The huge difference, though, is that so many of these shops in Thailand cater so blatantly to the tourist, whereas these seem to simply exist, indifferent to the existence of us visitors. We do get stared at when we drive around in our twelve-person van (into which we usually try to cram fourteen or fifteen people – there are 28 people in the group, a huge increase from last semester) and I think I caught a boda-boda driver taking a picture of us with his cell phone. [Boda-bodas are motorcycle taxis that weave precariously in and out of traffic, occasionally clipping the passing cars – don’t worry Mom and Dad, we are strictly forbidden to use them. By the way, driving here is crazy! There are absolutely no stop signs, crosswalks, right of way rules, nothing. Definitely glad our trusted van-driver Muna is driving, not me!]
But anyways, regardless of the stares, I feel less like a tourist, somehow, because there’s much less of a tourist economy here. The shops we drive by hold little appeal to me, but that’s because they don’t specifically target the tourist market the way the night market in Chiang Mai does. Here we see bed frames and comfy chairs, not Gucci knock-offs and kitschy knick-knacks. It feels more authentic.
It also reminds me of Thailand because of the climate. Today was sunny and warm, with a brief rain shower in the afternoon. The air is balmy and often smells like a campfire; there’s a sense that life happens outside – so unlike Boston or New York.
We haven’t done too much, so far. Mostly we’ve discussed rules, safety, health, etc. This afternoon we went to the Kasubi tombs, where the monarchs of the Buganda kingdom are buried. There are several kingdoms in Uganda, each further subdivided into clans. The kingdoms predate colonialism, but were abolished by I believe Obote, the first president after independence. They were recently re-established when Museveni, the current president, came to power, but now they are only allowed a ceremonial role. The original palace, a huge domed hut-like structure made of elephant grass reeds, is maintained to this day and members of the Buganda kingdom still come to pay their respects.
The food we’ve been eating is great, though sometimes heavy on kind of bland foods like potatoes and mushed plantains. The pineapple is amazing here, and I’m really looking forward to trying the local mangoes!
That’s it, for now. I’ll be in Kampala until Saturday, when we leave for Gulu!
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