Fortunately, some time has passed and some of this has levelled out;
but this is real life in Uganda. It’s
been a couple of weeks of reality checks.
These are not pleasant, b.ut things are improving - or I am adjusting
It started the week after my return from Zanzibar when I got a call
that Peter was very sick – severe malaria was the fist diagnosis – and needed
to go to the hospital, but was too weak to ride on the back of a Boda. I’d been out the previous week with a young
journalist who wanted to interview Peter for an article on the street kids, so
I wanted to introduce her and let Peter decide if he would like to be
interviewed. It was brief but it also
gave me a chance to see the school: a government school for War Affected
Children.
A serious hike outside of Gulu.
I took a private hire the first time, t be sure I knew where to go. At it was pricey. Can’t do that very often. walking is a commitment – 45 minutes there
along one of the dusties 9or now muddiest) roads in Gulu.
The good news is that Peter reported he felt accepted for the first
time in school: other kids had stories similar to his and he was no longer an
outcast. The bad news: “teaching is a
problem.’ Schools here “teach” every day
Monday through Saturday, 8am to 7pm.
This means that the kids wake up early, clean the compound and start
class. Unless it’s a private school (and
even here it’s questionable) there is not power (i.e. no lights for study at
night) so if there’s homework – it’s done by flashlight or not at all, but
usually not at all. Sunday is for
church, then classes in the afternoon.
No down time.
I learned that his school has no teachers on the weekends and they
are often not back by Monday, so there’s little or no school on Monday either. Then there’s the food issue: if you are unlucky enough at the end of the
line, the “food is finished” before a lot of students have eaten – so the one
real meal they get per day, “is not there.’
And there’s the fact that it’s always posho (think hard, overcooked
grits) and beans. hard on the stomach.
Always something here surrounding school. It’s not uncommon for the government NOT pay
teachers for 6 months.
On Saturday, Patrick – Peter’s friend as a close as you can get to
sainthood in human form, walked the 45 minutes to the school with me and we
visited. The kids showed off the
keyboard, an old discarded piece lacking batteries that morning. It took a while; by they came back with 6-AA
batteries, we discovered that the spring was “spoiled.”. We improvised with a key to make the
connection and hear a few renditions of a tune missing the upper register. Moving on the music room, we were treated to
the sounds of a “spoiled” piano whose string were rusted or missing, the felts
hanging off the strikers at perilous angles.
In the process, Peter casually informed us that he’s fainted in
football practice – malaria they presume.
By Monday, it had progressed to the point that he needed transport to
the hospital, but there was none, as the school’s vehicle is “spoiled” and he
was too weak to go by Boda. Hours later,
they loaded Peter on a Boda with a teacher on the back to hold him on… At the hospital (a government run operation with neither a
functioning lab nor antibiotics) I found
him severely dehydrated and only semi-conscious and placed on a black plastic
covered bed. He stayed the night, so
after multiple trips and planning, I provided a blanket and a sheet. Food would have to be delivered the next
morning and during the day - since families here provide all services: food,
sheets, etc.
To make a long story short, Peter
- feeing marginally better – left the hospital without being discharged
(street kids are accustomed to a lot of independence) and found his way to
another friend’s house. It was morning
before we found out his whereabouts and another set of friends (the only ones
with a car because they are affiliated with a Canadian funded church) “picked”
Peter and brought him BACK to the hospital for a typhoid test, which had to be
administered at a clinic because – yep – no functioning lab at the
hospital. It came back negative because
they’d given him antibiotics for 12 hours, but 10 other students from the
school were admitted the same day with similar symptoms.
After a few days on Cypro and anti-malarials, Peter went back to
school. After one day, he was out again
and last night took 10 phone calls to coordinate another ride to the
hospital. Today, we start again. Another PCV whose site is at a better
hospital will see if he can wrangle admission there to see if we can get to the
bottom of this. It could still be
malaria, typhoid, cholera, or giardia.
Welcome to the Petrie-dish of diseases.
Moving along to a week that I hope has some celestial-retrograde
explanations (because these could dissipate whereas other cause might not…) the
man I have been working with on the Street-Kid project became so obnoxious with
volunteers I’d referred to him, I had to withdraw my permission for my name to
be used. That has resulted in a stream
of vitriolic e-mails that are frightening in the intensity of his anger. and
have pronounced me: the enemy! So
that project is off the books for me, but his presence is still around and the
issue still raises its ugly head. The joys of a small town in a place where
people get poisoned for less.
And then – the final blow:
the library. Much of the work
that was done to organize the adult-room of the library was undone, when the bigwigs
from Kampala swept through and demanded it be done in the Dewey Decimal System. Never mind that they have no manpower to
catalogue the books, no computer, no card-catalogue, etc. So half of the books so carefully arranged
and labelled were in stacks, shelves re-arranged, etc. This is so common in the development world
that it was just another nail in the coffin.
NGO and government offices run from Kampala where there are resources,
hand down mandates to the field where they have no concept of what’s “on the
ground.’ They issue commands that cannot possibly be implemented because they
are completely out of touch with the realities of life, lack of resources,
etc. Yes – I know I’m ranting. And I’ve had to step back. I’d already decided I can’t be attached to
the outcome of what happens here in terms of sustainability. I can plan for it, but not rely on it. Yet - but I thought I could at least get out of town
with an vaguely intact system.
Apparently not.
Fortunately, the Children’s Library was left relatively unscathed,
but the bigwig had recommended that the already termite damaged 6-foot tall
shelves be moved along the outside wall of windows, blocking the windows and
only light - so the kids could “play.” Never
mind that there is no other light-source and that rain comes in through the
windows re-creating the perfect habitat for termites whose mounds are
periodically removed from inside the library.
God bless the Ugandan volunteer who has been working with us. Stella, who started this project as a rather
unwilling participant asking what we would “give,” has – after seeing our hard
work, good ideas and persistence, become a true ally. She’s willing to stand her ground in the Children’s
Room. The most amazing victory of
yesterday and indeed the last few months came in the form of FIRE. Remember the thousands of newspapers we
organized and the many more thousands of duplicates? We’d tried for months to find a home for
these and there were 5 more years of termite and mildew-ridden issues stored in
the falling down back rooms. She had
been intransigent about letting them go.
Yesterday, as we were waiting around for a 12-year old artist to paint
an anti-malaria cartoon on the wall (lovely work by the way) she surprised us
by saying “Let’s burn the newspapers!”
Jubilant, we got to work taking loads to the pit and setting
fire. As the fire began to tickle the
edges of some stacks and we were hauling in more, we discovered a man
frantically trying to pull them OUT of the fire. After all this time, we accidently had found
a taker. We explained that we had thousands
of papers he could have for free if he would get them out of there that same
day. In an act of efficiency rarely
seen, he arrived with a wooden wheelbarrow. but then commandeered a motorcycle
trailer and a bunch of friends and took them all.
The day ended on an up beat with the papers gone, and the beginnings
of a beautiful mural. Sara, our USAID
friend invited us all over and cooked the absolute best pizza since her last
absolutely best Pizza, a fresh salad of greens from her garden AND – homemade
banana pudding. In the midst of it came
the call that Peter needed to be taken back to the hospital….
Well – that’s the last two weeks folks. We’ll see what the day brings. Me-thinks the universe is conspiring to make
it easier to leave, knowing that staying a little longer doesn’t really give me
any extra control. The networks built
will have their own life and – once again – only those projects in which people
are personally vested will move forward.
We know this, are told this, but living it in real time brings home the
reality that development work is about planting seeds. The most unlikely ones will flourish, but
not necessarily in the way you first anticipated.
Peter is back in school. And
I’ve reminded myself that one white woman cannot make up for what has formed
Peter for the past 16 years. The mural
is mostly finished in the library, even though I had to do it because of failed
communication regarding his return.
Stella the wonderful volunteer has landed a better job in Kampala and
I’m happy for her, but that means the library could close for an indefinite
period of time. We’ll need to jump
through hoops to even begin to get the city to allow more volunteers to man the
Children’s Room.
And so it begins again…
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