Nwa Webale (I give thanks)

Many firsts came out of this Thanksgiving day.  My first Thanksgiving away from my family, my first Thanksgiving actually cooking myself, my first Thanksgiving where a very minute fraction of the population even know what Thanksgiving is... the list can go on forever.  We had the choice to just ignore the holiday, pretend it didn’t exist, and just spend our day as a typical day in Uganda.  But, we decided to bring Thanksgiving to Uganda, for the ultimate Thanksgiving experience.  Luckily Thanksgiving is a holiday based around food, and giving thanks, which basically means the Thanksgiving atmosphere can be created anywhere in the world…just maybe in a little different way.

 Crime Scene

We started our Webale-giving off crossing the boarders between Uganda and American tradition by slaughtering some chickens.  My friends Ashley and Emily had quite the urge to slaughter their first chicken… and goodness did they pursue that urge with the greatest possible force.  I mean, if your going to choose to slaughter a chicken AND have Thanksgiving, why NOT make it special by adding both events together into one??  They went out early morning, picked them up some chickens, and brought them home live!  I proceeded drinking my morning coffee while watching Ashley stroke the chickens claiming that they taste better if they are calm before being HACKED. 

Plucked and ready to ROAST

Next was the main event… Anyone who knows my history of fainting knows that I steered clear of the crime scene, but I made sure I was sitting just a room away so I didn’t also suffer from F.O.M.O. (fear of missing out).  There were surprisingly no noises from the birds, yet some screaming and ewwing from the friends who decided to go through with the murder.  Our little newspaper reporter Nina gathered this whole event on video as she turned her head the whole time cringing… vegetarians…

Next came the feather plucking which took some time.  Then there was the gizzard pulling… in that process we found an egg!!!  That was when the word “groowel” came to formation (a combination of cool, gross, and crewel). 

We then proceeded on with our cooking festivities.  I was in charge of garlic mashed potato’s and stuffing.  Everything was going great, the potatoes were peeled, the stuffing was ready for the oven, the chickens were plucked… and the power goes out.  I was waiting for a little more Uganda to come out. 

Apple Pie

After a half hour doing the power dance (which sadly didn’t work this time) we decided to go to the wonderfully furnished apartment that we would be facilitating our giant Ugandan Thanksgiving.  A kind man named Stan, from Newton, MA whom I met in Mbale when visiting the Jews and have become close with through the past weeks, offered his humble abode for cooking and dining. 

We spent nearly all day at his house cooking, and having a ball.  The whole room actually smelled like Thanksgiving!  We stuffed and roasted the chickens, made all the side dishes… I must say, with such little resources I’m quite impressed with the results.  And, because we invited many guests that were not capable of cooking in their homes, we just told them to bring wine… and boy did our Thanksgiving have one.  It was a real American Thanksgiving!

The guests all arrived, the food was all ready, and we gorged.  I have kept repeating the fact that I had never been so full in my life, and I was not exaggerating. 

FOOD

Plate number 1

Thats just Gravvyyy

There were at least about 25 people in this little apartment in Uganda, celebrating.  We all went around sharing our thanks, and went through the whole process… cheers-ing to everything.

I remember Thanksgiving last year like it was yesterday.  I was at the pinnacle of convincing my Mother and Father to let me embark on this adventure.  I remember thanking my Mom for being so supportive and willing to let me go halfway across the world to Uganda… And look where I am today!  At that point last year I talked about coming to Uganda and never actually expected to go.  Now I’m here with 2 weeks left, wondering what the heck is happening next?

WE GO, WE GO, CHEETAHS WE GO

Yesterday was among one of the best days I have had so far in Uganda, so I apologize for the long post, but somehow I need to find the words to justify the experience I had. 

It all started the other day at Frisbee pick-up, when two Canadian’s on the team announced that there was going to be a soccer tournament for 150 kids ages 7-14 at Makerere University (right by where I live) this Saturday (yesterday), and they were looking for volunteers to coach or assist in the event.  So, naturally I asked my friend Chloe (shout out Chlo) to join me in coaching, and from there, it was history. 

 We got to the field at 8:30 AM, unaware of the destiny that was about to take place in our future.  Within an hour there were 150 Ugandan children (half recruited from slums, half just from the Kampala area), SONY speakers BLASTING music provided for casual dancing on the sidelines all day (SONY sponsored the entire event fyi), a terrifying clown who was making balloons and dancing creepily, and two moon bounces!

The event began a little slow, trying to organize 150 children into teams is quite a difficult task, but Chloe, a friend named Patricia, and I were given the team name Cheetahs… and a team that I could never replace.  At first the team was skeptical of the American girls coaching abilities, but we loosened up the team with some icebreakers and laughter and the skepticism shortly passed. 

The fields were filled with muddy water, and half the kids were playing with bare feet.  The first game was filled with slipping, sliding, and oh… a WIN!!

The cheetahs were on a roll, and we were not about to stop for anything.  Our team was pumped, and of course we started attracting other volunteers to support our team because we were just so damn good!  We had two little stars on the team who had amazing spirit and played even more amazingly!  Game two was a little bit of a slap in the butt, we tied 1-1, but nothing could hold us down… nothing.    After this game it started POORING monsoon style.  We were held under the buffet tents for about a half hour, until the rain finally deceased.  The fields, amazed at the fact that they could possibly be any worse, were pools of muddy water.  My white shoes; now completely brown.  The next game was the last game before an amazing buffet lunch, and the lunch never tasted so good, because defeat is sour, but luckily victory is SWEET (aka we won).  After lunch we preceded on to the semi finals, where… you guessed it, WE WON!  The field were so muddy children were just sliding all across the field.  The ball wouldn’t actually dribble, but in stead the kids would just kick the water until it floated into another puddle to then be kicked again. 

We then waited for about another half hour to see our competition for the finals.  We waited around, bonding with other volunteers, and pumping up our team.  Our competition was the Lion’s… in my head I was thinking, this is impossible!  How can a cheetah beat the king of the jungle?? 

The game began and we the coaches (the 3 original coaches had now grown to 10) were shaking in our boots, mostly because it was rainy and cold, but also because this was what we had been working towards all day.  The game went back and fourth, puddle-to-puddle, and no goals were to be made.  It came to half time and still no score.  We pumped up the team, and there, in that huddle, despite our cultural and language barriers, we had an understanding.  We deserved this trophy, not just because we were the most skilled team, but also because the entire team was SOO into it, jumping up and down to work the blood.  We were going to win this.  Our little star, Christopher, who hurt his knee in the first game, but continued to be the star and make all our goals the whole day, placed a foul kick strait into the net.  THE TEAM WENT WILD!  The boys ran over to the side and slid into the mud out of excitement.  But the game wasn’t over.  Me, Chloe, and 4 other coaches were so excited on the sidelines that we couldn’t help but dance.  The last three whistles blew and we went Insane!!  The kids all ran into the puddles and slid.  It was pouring and freezing, but the adrenalin of winning was keeping us fired up and okay with anything coming our way.  Even a monsoon couldn’t have stopped us!! Funny thing is, a monsoon didn’t stop us…Chloe and I ended walking home in that monsoon looking a lot like crazy people covered from head to toe in dirt. 

The award ceremony was fantastic.  Ian, one of the Frisbee guys and organizers of the tournament announced first place of the tourney.   “ I am happy to announce the winner of the seniors tournament… the CH- CH- CH- CHEETAHS!!”  The crowd went wild, and we got a huge trophy!! Oh, and I got two free t-shirts!  So, all in all, it was the greatest day ever.  For those of you folks who think volunteering is a chore, just remember that it is what you make it, and most of the time its almost as if they are volunteering to entertain you for the day. 

Frisbee players? or volunteers?  BOTH

CHEETAHS!!

 Casual dancing on the sidelines.

 NUMBER 1!!!

 After I laid out face first into a puddle. (p.s. I walked home looking like that)

Born winners.

We may not share a continent, but we share the love of the game.

I have found a miracle… In the back allies of Lugogo cricket field I found a sign that despite a world of corruption and calamity, fate and fortune still exist.  I found a group of Ugandan’s playing the sport that brings people together in coexisting values, attitudes, and a love of zanye (playing)… that sport being... Cricket…

But it was behind the cricket players where I found the Ultimate Frisbee Team of Kampala, Uganda!!!!

Well, besides the fact that I am super duper out of shape, and I have tossed about 4 times since I got here with a warped from my luggage Ruckus disc (For those of you who don’t know, Ruckus is the University of Vermont Ultimate Frisbee team I play on), I was able to crank out some good ol’ Ruckus-skills.  The discstration (equivalent to frustration, but worse) that has been bottled up inside for the past 8 weeks found me drooling with excitement (literally drooling).  The players were fantastic, there were about 20 of them, they played a simple stack force flick, and apparently have been playing at this field three times a week!!!  Where the hell have I been?? 

They opened up to me with those warm muscular Frisbee arms, and invited me to play in their hat tournament on November 20^th!!!!!  This all just happened so fast, who WOULDN’T drool??? They even told me where they go after pick-up to eat, and I happened to be going to Bubbles for trivia night anyway!!! It was true fate.

I rushed home as much as you can on a slow moving, jammed taxi, to share my experience with my roomies.  I ran inside and started screaming and jumping, and drooling, and lets just say they though that I had just solved the problem to world hunger. 

Now, for the past two weeks I have been playing every Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday, making great friends, and re-learning the skills I yearned for the past 8 weeks. 

Of course, communities seem to be a theme throughout my life.  I study community development, I visited the Jewish community of Uganda, I am working with a self-help community in Mityanna for my independent study, and now I find an unlikely community of Frisbee players (40 people wide might I add) in Kampala!  The power of communities in my own life is what inspires me to work with such complex community development issues in my lifetime, and is inspiring me to continue work every day with ADAM, despite its complexities and the slowness of the process.  It takes time to develop a community to its fullest potential, but the communities I am a part of today just prove how strongly and endlessly those communities can prosper for generations to come.

Kampala is my CITYY

I have now lived in Kampala on my own for 6 days.  I have gotten my fix of cooking and eating American food in the hostel (including making chili out of the beans that the villagers had given to me).  Stir-fry, pasta and garlic bread… my friend even made chocolate pudding with gummy worms and Oreo’s on Halloween!!! (I dressed up as an American tourist in Africa; quite well actually, some people even caught on and called me Muzungu!).  Anyway, I’ve found my new taxi routes to Makerere Kiconi, normally only recognized when told to go by the MoGas station.  My hostel is wonderful.  My roommate Nina and I have made it just like home, with tapestries on the wall, desks full of books, and fully equipped with mosquito nets?  I live in the hostel with two other SIT students Nina and Ashley, and on weekends another joins the festivities.  Last weekend we explored a little by discovering a quaint touristy craft shop to spend all of our money at, a fantastic little coffee shop called 1000 Cups, and a BAGEL AND CUPCAKE (red velvet butter cream) PLACE CALLED “I <3 NEW YORK KITCHEN!” (Also known as the sudden but very timely death of my healthy living) 

As for my progress with ADAM, it is moving… mpola mpola (slowly by slowly).   The group has identified for themselves the challenges they are facing.  One of the challenges is the market.  Last Thursday Cosmas (the chairman of the group) and I went around to neighboring villages to try and sell our soap.  Though many people claimed that they needed the soap, they simply could not afford it despite its low price of 1500 UGS per bar.  The problems that the group encounters are the same problems of the people all around the rural villages… There is no money circulating in the villages, which makes it almost impossible to gain an income unless they sell to urban areas where people are more likely to have disposable income.  For this challenge we discussed a few solutions.  I suggested that maybe they sell to people according to how much money they have.  In other words, create tick marks on the bar, so that when a person is in need of soap but can only afford 500 shillings of the bar that is the amount they can get.  Or, perhaps more tangible in the future would be to sell in town centers just as Mityana town or Kampala at a higher competitive price, which would enable them to subsidize the price for local villagers.  Though, before embarking on this suggestion I think they need to focus a little more on quality.  Another challenge was participation of all the members.  It is quite apparent that only some members are committed to the soap production and selling, but the lack of motivation is truly destroying the benefits that should be coming their way if they stay committed.  My hope is to continue to mobilize them and motivate them until they begin to physically see and hold the benefits in their hands, which will then motivate themselves to expand and sustain. 

As for my challenges, communication is a large barrier.  As an outsider, I am able to give so much information and ideas to improve their situation, but the language and cultural barrier prevents me from clearly communicating with them.  Though it is frustrating, I think that in a way it is a good thing they don’t understand me fully because it gives them the chance to critically think and problem solve to help improve their own situations.  At the end of last week, I asked them to write down the challenges they face in making soap and selling it.  They wrote it down in Luganda, and I got it translated.  I was happy to find out that they are seeing the same challenges that I am seeing, and that they are aware that they need to do something about it.  Each step is an excitement to me and the group.  And as time goes on, I look forward to learning critical applications to the world of development.