Off the beaten track

Posted on August 18, 2011 by ileftmyheartinuganda

There is dust that won’t wash off, there are smiles that won’t fade, there is laughter that won’t be silenced and time that won’t slow down. In a place where everything happens slowly, my time in Uganda went all too quickly and before I knew it I was being rocketed from the dusty roads of the village to the sandy freeways of the desert wondering if it was all just a dream. In a way it was.

In Uganda you feel as if you have lived a thousand days in one and by the time you crawl into the cocoon of your mosquito net each night, the morning seems like a distant memory. The days are so full and phenomenal that your head is constantly spinning. On this visit to Uganda, Rose took it upon herself to show me the world beyond KAASO, straying seriously off the beaten track, wandering down every vaguely trodden path in the village, visiting over twenty households from the Empowerment Group, meeting pigs, chickens, goats and cows, traipsing through banana plantations, admiring expertly crafted woven mats and baskets, and meeting hundreds of extended family members from 9 days to 90 years old. It was an intense but incredible experience.

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When I was last at KAASO in 2009, the Empowerment Group was little more than a chance for the women to gather and chat through the evening while weaving mats and rolling magazine beads. It’s amazing the changes that have taken place over the last two years. The group is now well organised, motivated, determined and ultimately empowered. Their microloans project is thriving and helping solo mothers to send their children to school and feed their families. I felt humbled to be so warmly welcomed into their mud and thatch homes and embarrassed by their generosity as we were showered with gifts of avocados, melons, pineapples, cassava, matooke and even a feisty rooster which Rose carried for the rest of the day flung over her shoulder. I kept my distance behind while its eyes watched me the whole way home. That night we feasted on chicken. Life is immediate in the village.

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Back down the red dirt road

Posted on July 30, 2011 by ileftmyheartinuganda

I left this place with a promise to return. Whether or not anyone else remembered my promise, I certainly did and I know I would not have felt complete had I not honoured my word. To return at all was a dream come true. And to return with both my parents was beyond a dream.

After so much time away you can’t help but wonder if the children will still remember you, one of many volunteers to have made the trek down this red dirt road and I worried that maybe time had washed away the sense of belonging I once felt here.

I was wrong.

From the minute we touched down on African soil I felt an overwhelming sense of belonging, a warmth that extended past the heat of the day and a feeling that everything was in its place; I had come home. Dominic greeted us like the long lost family we came to realise we were to him, engulfed in emotional hugs. We spent a night amidst the chaotic rumbling of Kampala where you feel as if nothing is ever still and if you pause for too long you will be carried away by the crowd.

The road back to KAASO took my breath away. It felt as if I had never left as we flew back over dirt roads, through villages that had changed little in my years away, the urban quickly giving way to rural as banana palms overtook the roadside and buildings turned to mud. We arrived late at KAASO in the black of night and I assumed the children would be sleeping. Yet again, I was wrong. There was a cacophony of sound as from the darkness emerged a hysterical mob of children who would have carried away the car like a sea of ants had we not quickly jumped out and instead let ourselves be engulfed by the swarming crowd. Little hands fought to find my skin with cries of ‘Madam Emma! Madam Emma is BACK!!!’ White teeth and eyes smiled at me through the night and as their cries turned into song, my tears fell freely. ‘You are my Sunshine’ merged with ‘In the Jungle’ and the guitar soon came out for an impromptu rendition of ‘Que Sera Sera’, little bodies swaying, overcome with joy. I was home.

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There is always the worry that in returning somewhere, things will have changed. Here, I had feared that perhaps this would be for the worst. I was crazy to have doubted for a moment. Dominic and Rose have taken this school, in the words of Ivan and Miral, from good to great! Kiwi House still stands as proudly as ever, there is a full-time librarian in a library complete with books, the other volunteers here have been taking daily computer classes on the laptops we left behind, there is a live-in nurse in the sick bay Cherie so lovingly painted in the hope that one day it would be used for its intended purpose and the children are still laughing, smiling, living, loving – and singing. Even the new children know every single word to the songs I taught in 2009. It is overwhelming. Continue reading →

Setting forth

Posted on June 29, 2011 by ileftmyheartinuganda

One year and seven months later, I am flying high. I left Sydney in the red light of dawn this morning, the rising sun following behind as I flew westwards. In September last year I moved to Sydney to write and to pause, to collect my thoughts and create some semblance of stability in the ever-changing tide that had been my life on the road for the past four years. I adopted local cafes, local bars, local walks, local bookstores and of course my local beach. And in spite of my perpetual fear of ‘settling’, I found myself overcoming such worries and falling head over heels with my new home. It’s nice to know I now have a base in the world from which to flit and as my taxi took me through the deserted 4am streets, I was sad to leave. But I will let the winter take hold in my absence and return in August with the scent of spring.

I went to the beach yesterday evening one last time and watched as the sky faded from pink to blue and darkness overtook. The surfers squeezed the remaining light out of the day and two ambitious fishermen cast their lines into the surf. I was bombarded by seagulls and shared smiles with evening walkers, fellow drifters able to enjoy the last of the light that slips away while the 9-5 workers battle the traffic home. I walked on the warm sand at the water’s edge, retrieved my flip flops where they faithfully wait for me each day and farewelled the beach that has come to be my source of inspiration over the past months.

I made a promise, not only to myself but also to the children of KAASO that I would be back to Uganda within two years. I’m not sure they really understood but I am a girl of my word and now, 19 months after leaving the village, the time has come for me to return. Thus I find myself on the start of a journey that will ultimately deposit me back in the place that stole my heart. I have with me over one hundred children’s books, laptops, cameras, coloured pencils & paints, mosquito nets, malaria tablets, my guitar and my parents in tow. I still can’t quite believe I managed to convince mama and dad to join me on this potholed road but in spite of initial hesitations as riots erupted in the streets of Kampala when we were about to book our flights, the dust has settled and I will have at my side two very excited companions on my journey back to KAASO.

I am holding my breath for that first step on African soil, those first crushing Ugandan hugs, the first sight of Kiwi House, the first song shared beneath my music tree and of course my first bite of matooke…

Out of Africa

Posted on November 2, 2009 by ileftmyheartinuganda

It is the beginning of the end. I am now in Kampala on the start of my long journey ‘home’. Home being London for 48 hours then the south of France where I will be working on the Louis Vuitton Trophy for three intense weeks before crossing the Atlantic on the good ship Sojourn… Nothing seems quite real and my head is spinning trying to comprehend the fact that I have, after six incredible months, left KAASO and will soon be out of Africa. Half a year seemed like such a long time from the outset and there were definitely times when it felt like time was standing still – when you’re tired, when you’re scared, when there are bats in your room, when the pump is broken and you have no water, when the solar power dies yet again and you’re sitting in darkness… But these last few days have flown by so quickly and now I’m left wondering where the time has gone. I will soon be sitting on a plane wondering if this was all a dream, knowing that I will never fully be able to comprehend all that has happened, all I have seen and done and been fortunate enough to have been a part of for the last six months. It’s overwhelming.

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This last week has been an extended farewell, a week of finality – final classes, final songs, final hugs, final smiles, final meals, final bucket bathes, final discos, final KAASO hill evenings, final goodbyes and, inevitably, final tears. It’s so difficult leaving such a special place not knowing when I will be back, not knowing when I will see these gorgeous little faces again. But one thing that has emerged over the past months is that there is no way I cannot return. Somehow, I will find a way to get back to this incredible world. I don’t think I could live here forever – I have missed the sea, missed family and friends, drinkable wine, food other than matooke and beans and I am a beach girl at heart – but Uganda will forever be a part of me, part of my history and a part of my soul and the idea of walking away forever is incomprehensible. So I will be back, this much I know. The ‘how’ will follow…

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Before leaving, I spent as much time as possible with the children, in classes and around the school, trying to make the most of my final days with them and making sure these memories were etched in my mind forever.

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The teachers tried to explain to the younger children that we were leaving and would not be coming back (for now) but I don’t quite think they understood. The older children certainly did though and we received floods of letters and notes asking us not to go and telling us that they will never forget us. As if it wasn’t already hard enough to leave.

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Back home to KAASO – where the water doesn’t flow but the smiles are wide…

Posted on September 20, 2009 by ileftmyheartinuganda

Back in my world of wide eyes and even wider smiles and little hands that find my own. After six weeks on the road it really did feel like coming home pulling into KAASO where children came running to greet us from all directions. It’s like being a celebrity in a middle-of-nowhere, rural Uganda kind of way.

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We had barely jumped off our motorbikes when we were taken by the hand and led on what felt like a glory tour around the school, hearing shouts as children ran from dormitories, racing over to welcome us home. We were given Ugandan hugs – i.e. being launched at with such force that last time we returned from a trip I ended up with a bruise on my hip bone.

We soon discovered that two months had not been enough time to fix the broken water pump and the children were still having to carry water from the well in jerry cans on their heads – this was ‘Africa time’ in the extreme. Energised from our trip and feeling the full motivation of just-returned-ness, Cherie and I decided the next day to go to the well with the children to fetch our own water rather than going out of minds with no water to bathe, wash clothes – or flush our toilet. I don’t think we quite realised what we were in for. We followed the children through the school, past several mud huts, through the forest, into a field where we continued to walk until we finally spotted the well – at the bottom of a rather large hill. Trying not to look fazed, we traipsed down the mud path until we got to the well. There was a crowd of children filling their jerry cans and no line that I could decipher but the children seemed to have some kind of system arranged between them. From what I could gather, it was largely based on hierarchy. Being two red-faced muzungus, we did not feature in this hierarchy.

Eventually, we realised that we would wait all day unless we just shoved our jerry cans under the water spout, pumped by a small child that seemed happy to continue pumping for us. We ambitiously filled two 10L jerry cans each then quickly realised our mistake; most of the children had one 5L jerry can. Yes, we were much bigger than most of them but not necessarily much stronger. We struggled back along the dirt track, having to pause embarrassingly frequently along the way. It was hugely satisfying to make it back to school and the looks on the teachers’ faces was worth the effort when they saw the two of us emerge amongst the children carrying our own jerry cans. Unfortunately we got distracted by the gorgeous nursery children who came running out to see us; many of them we hadn’t seen since we got back so we picked them up and spun them around and chatted as best you can with a 5-year-old Ugandan child. It wasn’t until some time later that we turned around to realise our jerry cans had gone. We searched everywhere until we finally asked Rose in desperation – ‘Where would you take a jerry can if you were a small child?’ To the kitchen, she smiled. Back down across the school and there were our jerry cans lined up neatly outside the children’s kitchen – a wooden shack with a fire and giant cauldron-like pot full of porridge. We grabbed our jerry cans and vowed to take more care next time – if we could manage a next time…

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Back into the wild

Posted on July 15, 2009 by ileftmyheartinuganda

Our crazy whirlwind of travelling on the beaten track is over and it’s time to go back off it. We have now realised that we are not the only muzungus in Uganda as we’d originally thought. Far from it. There are places here with hot water, cold drinks, power lines that actually connect to the houses (rather than passing over the top to go to Tanzania as where we live), bars and great restaurants.

Last night we had dinner with an American guy we met along the way who made us all feel just a little bit amazing by being totally awed at how rural our experience was – he’d been doing medical research in Kampala for 6 weeks and hadn’t seen half of what we’ve been living the last two months. It was nice to be thought of as ‘hard core’ for once in my life and made me realise that perhaps what we’re doing here isn’t quite so normal as I’d convinced myself. Doesn’t everyone go and live in a village at the ends of the earth with three mud buildings and a school of needy children?

Sitting on a packed, scorching bus we made our way out of the city and back to where brick houses give way to mud huts, to where you can no longer walk the street anonymously but are constantly met with cries of ‘Muzungu! How are you?!’ everywhere you go, back to our world of cold bucket showers, dusty pot-holed roads but ultimately back to our home – where there will be 623 delighted children waiting for us. It’s hard not to be a little excited.

It’s going to be a couple of action-packed weeks back at KAASO, trying to do as much as humanly possible before the school holidays kick in and we head off south of the border – Rwanda awaits…

Thank you once more for your overwhelming support for our fundraising project. Donations continue to arrive and we continue to be eternally grateful. We are going to try and get construction started as soon as possible so will keep you updated as much as our technologically-challenged lifestyle allows.

River wild & stories shared

Posted on July 9, 2009 by ileftmyheartinuganda

We have ventured along the red roads of Rakai, through the madness of Kampala and now find ourselves in a town called Jinja. From here, the Nile springs from beneath the ground to join a flow from Lake Victoria which winds its way through Uganda and Sudan, eventually finding itself in Egypt which most people (myself included until now) think of as the home of the Nile. As of today I stand corrected – Uganda is in fact the source of the Nile.

It was not until arriving in Jinja that we realised just how rural Rakai is. Here there is electricity, running water, large buildings and even a brewery (Nile Lager!). We crossed the Nile today over the Owen Falls Dam which supplies power not only to Uganda but also to Kenya, Tanzania and Rwanda. Tragically, most of the power goes overseas and for some insane reason the price of power is more here than what they sell it for in neighbouring East African countries. Sometimes the logic of this place is lost on me.

Last night was spent in the home of a Ugandan pastor named John who runs a school/orphanage just outside Jinja. He is hoping for his project to be added to the Kids Worldwide portfolio and so we spent a night asking him a million questions and feasting on Ugandan food – the hospitality here is outstanding. We went into the school today and met all of the kids. There are only 60 in the whole school (a single class at KAASO!) but next thing we knew, the entire school was in a classroom and we were singing and dancing with them, teaching them songs and I just wished I’d brought my guitar. John, the director has intentionally brought all of his teachers from the north of Uganda where people do not speak Luganda so the children are taught entirely in English. They are hugely intelligent and have the same warm smiles as the kids at KAASO. It feels strange to be away from KAASO, our Ugandan ‘home’, so it was nice to have the chance to spend some time with new children in a different part of the country.

The few days we spent in Kampala were overwhelming – three city girls plunged into the middle of rural Uganda for two months then pulled back into the big city… We were amazed by everything we saw (I actually asked someone if their lights ran off a generator or solar power – he looked at me as though I was mad – ‘Uh, we have electricity.’ Of course.) We stayed in a little guest house in the middle of Old Kampala and when we checked in I tried to show off my Luganda. The man at the reception looked at me confusedly. He did not speak Luganda. Patrick was his name and he was a refugee from the Democratic Republic of Congo. So I launched into French (a damn sight better than my Luganda!) and found out his life story. Continue reading →

Translating words into action…

Posted on July 2, 2009 by ileftmyheartinuganda

Life at KAASO continues to spin me, throw me, baffle me and make me smile. The sun is beginning to climb and you know that in a matter of minutes the day will be scorching beyond belief. After six weeks here there is a strangely contradictory sense of really belonging, while also knowing that you will never quite understand what’s going on. It’s a paradox you learn to embrace, to accept and ultimately to enjoy.

Many of you have expressed a desire to contribute, to donate in some way and for this I am eternally grateful. We arrived here knowing that we wanted to do everything in our power to help the school and the community – yet also knowing that we needed to first spend some time here to soak it all up and to understand what really needed to be done. Having talked with Dominic and Rose for hours the past weeks we have finally worked out the greatest fundraising priority for the school: the completion of the half-finished girls’ dormitory so that the computer lab and library can be vacated and used for their original purpose.

The computer lab/library has been completed for some time now but due to lack of space and funds, is currently being used as a girls’ dormitory. As strange as it may seem for children in rural Uganda to need a computer lab, you would be surprised at how great the need is. Many children that are lucky enough to leave KAASO to go onto secondary school end up top of their classes in everything – yet they are failing the computer classes for they have never even seen a computer before. Around the world, computers are becoming indispensable and Uganda is no exception.

In the words of the District Chairman at a recent fundraiser: ‘Very few of our schools in Rakai District having computer training facilities. You may ask: why do these people in the developing world need computers? Computers are now part and parcel of our life. We are trapped between the developed world and our traditional ways. I appeal to you passionately, please help our children to move forward so that we do not become backwards. The world is now a global village, help us to join it.’ Continue reading →

Sunset moonrise

Posted on June 10, 2009 by ileftmyheartinuganda

As if the wild and wonderful disco wasn’t enough, my Ugandan birthday celebrations continued. Sunday dawned a beautiful sunny day and Cherie and Kirsty cracked open some latte sachets they’d brought from home. It was absolute bliss to finally be drinking coffee again (the irony of it all – one of Uganda’s main exports is coffee and yet they do not process it here so by the time it gets back to Uganda, it is too expensive for the locals to buy). I opened my presents, mostly hilarious things the girls had managed to find in Kyotera, but also pictures and cards Cherie had had the children make for my birthday and they were amazing. They contained the most gorgeous messages:

‘Teacher Emmy I am happy because your going to do happy birthday on Sunday.’

‘Emma I am going to be your friend thank you to be your friend. I am going to sing for you. I love you so much.’

Then came the showstopper – the girls had had a gomesi tailor-made for me – a traditional Ugandan dress, a little like a kimono. Rose and the other women were in hysterics watching me try to tie it and all the children came out to see this blonde muzungu dressed like a Ugandan woman. I totally blended in.

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Crossing borders & disco dancing

Posted on June 6, 2009 by ileftmyheartinuganda

Another scorching day in the town of Kyotera where children still run down the street chasing us with cries of muzungu! I don’t think I will ever again feel so famous as I do in Uganda. It’s funny that after almost a month here we feel as if we are beginning to blend in, yet every time we venture outside the grounds of KAASO we are reminded of how much we stick out, the colour of our skin blinding white in contrast to these faces that live under the scorching African sun.

The last few days have been yet another whirlwind adventure – the story of my life currently. Dominic took us to the government school that he runs down near the Tanzanian border. It was an eye-opener to say the least. All the time we have been here we have been taking our perception of ‘norms’ from KAASO, overwhelming though they may be. Kamuganja School was another story. Located in the middle of nowhere, it serves a community that largely consists of Rwanda cattle herders that fled their homes during the genocide of 1994. The people carry the scars of unspeakable tragedy and the children are understandably affected. The families are scattered far and wide around the surrounding area and to get to school, some children must walk over two hours and be ferried across a river, an offshoot of Lake Victoria, by boat if they can find one. There were less than 100 students here when Dominic took over as headmaster two years ago; now the school roll is over 300. The community is extremely poor and although being a government school there are no school fees, there is no provision for such things as uniforms, resources or even lunch. Most families cannot afford even to pay for the children’s lunch which consists of one cup of watery porridge to sustain them for the day. For some, this may be the day’s food.

So we arrived at Kamuganja to be met by 300 faces, half thrilled, half terrified who clapped and sang for us as we bumped our way along the dirt road. Dominic stopped the car for us to get out and walk amongst them into the school grounds. The red earth felt like a red carpet. They were so genuinely grateful to simply have us there and it was overwhelming to say the least. Continue reading →

I left my heart in Uganda

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