Is the glass half full or half empty?

Kamwenge has been visited by 2 Australians for the last couple of weeks – Tim and Sophie from Sydney. They are trustees of a local community based group, Toro Integrated Childcare and were visiting the project as part of a wider tour to report back to the other trustees in Australia. As is often the case when we have first time visitors to rural Africa, they asked how we managed to keep positive despite the poor school environment that Ugandan children have to learn in every day.

This got us thinking – how do we manage? Well, we think there are several answers to this question, although when we think about it, it is difficult.

• Firstly after some time here we just accept that this is what school life is like for pupils and it is not in in our power to do anything about a lot of what they suffer. For example we cannot build new toilets in every school. We have to concentrate on those things that we can have an impact on, such as ensuring that good use is made of available water to provide hand washing facilities. It is only when a newcomer arrives that we see life through eyes that have developed-country standards.


• We make a conscious effort to look for the positive elements that are happening – headteachers and teachers who are working hard in difficult circumstances and that we can work with to improve the education for their pupils.


• We look for small steps of improvement and praise them. So when we are despairing, we think of those pupils who have set up rotas to fill the hand washing facilities daily and the head teachers who enthuse their staff and put the ideas they get at workshops into practice.


• Lastly we concentrate on what we feel will make a difference in schools and to pupils’learning and work hard to empower what are known in the jargon as change agents – those who have the ability, the power and the respect to make changes for the benefit of children.

Not a very satisfactory answer, perhaps, but one that works for us.

Next week is our workshop for promoting healthy schools and we found it difficult to stay positive when one of our funders withdrew their money 7 days before. It was too late to cancel as we had already sent out the invites, bought the resources we were going to distribute and printed the participants handbook. So with some last minute juggling we managed to sort things out but it puts further workshops in jeopardy if we cannot replace the lost funds.

Of course when the going gets tough the tough go shopping, so here is Sabrina with the jerrycans to make hand washing facilities for the attending schools and cotton wool for the first aid kits we will be handing out!

This is the last week of the long school holidays – since the beginning of December – and the new school year starts on Monday. We have been preparing for our ‘Promoting School Health’ workshop, which is taking place in the 2nd week of term. This has involved researching the internet, preparing lesson plans, priming other experts to lead sessions, writing a participants’ handbook and buying resources to hand out on the day. This is a new skill for both of us and we agonise over every part of the workshop to ensure it will be OK!

Most of the time we have locked ourselves in a spare office in the district education department and tried to ignore all the comings and goings. This was quite easy to do except for a couple of days this week when the place was crawling with anxious headteachers. Why? It was the day that the school results for Primary Leaving Exam (PLE) results came out. These are of critical importance for Ugandan schools as well as the district, as they are used to grade both of them, and it was like A levels, GSCE’s and SATs results day all rolled into one.

Children are graded from 1 (highest) to 4 (lowest) and each school hopes to get as many 1’s as possible. The size of the smile on a headteacher’s face gets bigger with every grade 1. Conversely those with none hurry out! We tell them that it is about children doing their best and reaching their potential, as well as trying to include the 50% of children who drop out before they even get to PLE, but it seems to fall on deaf ears at this time of year.

James from Rwengoro school got 4 1’s, so he is very happy!

Flight to the hills

After a wonderful Christmas and New Year break in snowy Bicknacre (see our back garden above) catching up with friends and family, we are back in hot and sunny – well apart from the odd tropical thunderstorm – Uganda. The journey was very good and we were pleased to find that Kathy, an old friend of Sabrina’s that she did her nursing training with, was on our flight. In the too short time of the flight and over breakfast in Entebbe, they were able to do some catching up and exchange details of what they were doing. Kathy runs a charity called ‘BirthLink’, which provides support and education around the world for all those involved in the care of low birth-weight and sick babies.

After 2 days back in Kamwenge, we were invited by the District Education Officer, Eric, to go and visit his family home in Kisoro, in the far south-west (bottom left hand corner for those of you who slept during geography) of the country. It was an 8 hour drive and we climbed 2200 feet to get there but the scenery was stunning. Kisoro itself is in a bowl surrounded by mountains, with several large lakes around the town and we climbed to over 8000 feet, round a twisty steep road, to get over the lip of the bowl.

The area was formed by volcanic action and it is littered with caldera – extinct mini volcanoes as in this photo – that are all extensively farmed. This is because the area is very heavily over-populated as it is bordered by Rwanda and the Congo. Both of these countries have had internal conflicts in the recent past and many refugees have settled in Kisoro to escape the fighting. We went to the border with Rwanda and after shaking hands with the Rwandan border guards and smiling sweetly, were allowed to walk across and have our photos taken in front of the sign. We then walked back again! Still counts as a trip to another country in our book.

Sabrina was pleased to find this pub in Kisoro town. We are now back in Kamwenge preparing for the new term, which starts on February 1st.

Presenting the Perkins machine, a braille typewriter, to Julius, Chief Inspector of Schools and Kellon, the deputy headteacher of Kamwenge Primary School, where the unit is situated.
The local flea pit - well actually a mobile phone shop now, reflecting a major Ugandan interest.

Impressive hoe technique - all that time on the allotment obviously not wasted. Although there is a red cross volunteer very close behind just in case . . .

Dance techniques not as good as hoe techniques.

Volunteers Rob, from USA, and Wilson, a Ugandan who volunteered in Namibia.

We have had an eventful couple of weeks! Those of you who access Facebook will know that Sabrina managed to get bitten by a monkey whilst out with other volunteers in Fort Portal. The bite was tiny but no chances can be taken with rabies as it is 100% fatal. Fortunately we have both had a full course of rabies vaccination, but we still had to travel to Kampala for 2 extra injections just to make absolutely sure! Sabrina has decided she does not like monkeys any more!
Last week we went with VSO to Soroti, which is in the North-East of Uganda, as part of International Volunteering Week. We met up with volunteers from the Red Cross and UN and attended the events, which involved marching through Soroti town with a brass band and planting 250 tree seedlings! Soroti is quite different to Kamwenge, being mostly flat but with huge clumps of rocks jutting out of the ground. It is hotter and dryer as well. It was good fun and we enjoyed meeting up with volunteers from other organizations. Back in Kampala we attended a BBQ in the VSO garden which involved lots of food, drink, drumming and dancing and the next day we attended a party at a hotel where the volunteer of the year was announced (no, it wasn’t either of us!). All good fun.
We are now back in Kamwenge with only 1 week left until we go home for Christmas. Sabrina is preparing for a school health workshop that will be held at the start of the new term and Geoff is busy organizing some equipment and activities for Kamwenge Primary School’s special needs unit. He helped to get some specialist Braille equipment for the teachers of the blind and we have just listened to his dulcet tones as he was interviewed on ‘Voice of Kamwenge’ (our local radio station) evening news. Sabrina would also like to point out that she was on the news about 3 weeks ago as the guest of honour at a school prize giving but we did not find out until afterwards L.

Happy Christmas

We woke up one day and discovered swarms of flying insects and all our colleagues running around the district office grounds chasing them . . .

What was happening?

Turns out that it is a once a year event – grasshoppers. They are considered a great delicacy here, lightly fried in their own oil and everyone tries to catch as many as possible. The sides of the road are covered in sheets with dried grasshoppers ready for purchase. The real gourmets buy them live in plastic bags and pluck the wings and legs before frying.

We just got some already fried specimens and for a Ugandan friend and shared hers. They are actually quite tasty as the oil they have is very sweet, but all we could think of was the fact that they were once grasshoppers! As one of the English volunteers said, like prawns . . . but not quite.

They also herald the end of the year and the end of the rainy season – although as I am writing this during a very heavy storm I am not sure about the latter. The wife also traditionally prepares them for her husband to say thank you for looking after her for the previous year and the husband should then buy his wife a new dress. Geoff passed on the grasshoppers and offered a new dress for not getting them!

School Speech Day

P1 and P2 classes - the youngest children, singing about hand washing.

The older children telling stories through local dance.

Having been in Kamwenge for 7 months now, one of the things we often ask ourselves is “Are we making a difference?” or “Are we having an impact?”. It is difficult for us to tell as things move very slowly and often the challenges appear huge. However I was very pleased to be invited to Kyabenda Primary School's speech day last week. Not all schools have an end of term speech day, but those that do will normally invite members of the PTA and school management committee, together with parents, so I felt very honoured to have been invited as someone who has been involved in the school this term.

I was even more thrilled when, class by class, the children sung songs, recited poems, danced and performed drama, all of which had many, varied health messages. The younger children, who sang in their local language, sang a song about the importance of washing hands before eating and keeping food covered. Another class sang about the importance of washing their hands after using the latrine and protecting water from collection to drinking. One girl recited a poem called Mr. Mosquito, about how to prevent malaria, and the older classes performed a drama telling how to protect themselves from HIV/AIDS. I felt quite overwhelmed and very pleased that many of the topics I had been working on in the school were being performed in front of parents and school members. Although I am fully aware that singing about things does not necessarily mean that they are happening, I felt that perhaps I have made some small difference in Kyabenda School this term.

Nicola's visit in pictures

Nicola meeting some of the pupils at one of our schools - they are very good at handwashing and the head is the best maker of tippy taps in the district.

We met this tuskless elephant and the rest of her family on the game drive - they were very close to us and gave us a scary look at one point!

We got really wet on the way back from Rwengobe School - and we got a puncture whilst there!

It was Nicola's birthday during her visit so we had a birthday meal in our courtyard and got all dressed up especially.

Geoff and his new friend - Harry the hippo

Harry wanted this one in as it shows his best side.

Nicola at the hostel overlooking the River Nile - this is where we ate our meals.