The end is near...

 

Me and the head of the tinsmiths at the stove factory

“I want to see you one more time before I die”…this was the thing an HIV positive friend of mine called to tell me the other night. Keep in mind: not “before you leave” not “before we don’t see each other for a while” but “before I die”…dramatic? You would think so, but it’s actually not, it’s just sometimes how it is and well, after living with the virus for years now and counseling others to get tested for it, my friend Jane has accepted that. Still, I’m not going to lie, it kind of freaked me out. So here’s the long and the short of it: these next 6 weeks before I leave are going to be hard. After 3 years and 3 months in Uganda, it’s time to say goodbye.

You’re probably thinking, man, this blog entry is just depressing. While so serious Heather?

Let’s just say, leaving Uganda is going to be bittersweet. Bitter for all the reasons you can imagine: the uncertainty of when I will come back here and moreover, the uncertainty of who will still be around when I finally do return to visit. But don’t worry, I’m not leaving this place in tears (that’s just not my style). I’m going to do as any Ugandan would do and tell people exactly what they want to hear, whether it’s true or not. Luckily, there’s no word for goodbye in Luo (the local language) so I won’t need to use one. I’ll just say “Rwate Wanen” or “We will see each other when we meet (again).”

Still, no matter how you phrase it, I hate goodbyes and would prefer to not think about it more than I have to, so let’s focus on the sweet stuff. I have loved my time in Uganda and along with a wealth of friends and slightly darker skin, it’s given me a lot, not the least of which is a next step. I’m starting graduate school at Purdue University in Indiana to get my M.S. in Environmental Engineering. It’s a two year program starting in August and I’m tremendously excited. Between now and then, the plan is to wrap things up here and travel.

My work this year with International Lifeline Fund (ILF) is ending on a high note. ILF is really pleased with the results and well, I just couldn’t be happier. My Institutional Fuel-Efficient Stove Program (the one I’ve been developing and managing for the last year) is up and running at full speed and will be self-sustaining (meaning it pays for itself) with 2 Ugandan Stove Officers managing it by the end of July (this is from being essentially non-existent last June). Schools and institutions throughout Uganda are saving a huge amount of money on firewood including my old school, Y.Y. Okot Memorial College in Kitgum and are singing our praises to other institutions. When the Executive Director of ILF visited Lira the other week, he was shocked at how far we had come (being self-sustaining is almost unheard of in the NGO world) and is starting to plan with earnest his vision for the future of the program. I have learned so much about stoves, finance and marketing in the last year and cannot say how grateful I am to ILF for this opportunity.
 

I’ll leave ILF on May 13th, spend 3 days with Peace Corps to finish up and make sure I don’t have any remaining parasites trying to jump ship with me, and then I’m off!...for 3 weeks…I’m spending some quality time hiking, swimming, bargaining and seeing the sites in Kenya, Tanzania and Rwanda before returning to Uganda on June 5th for my friend Bernadette’s wedding on June 7th (she is a Peace Corps Volunteer who came to country with me and is the only one who extended with me for a third year). After she’s hitched, it’s overland (using public transport) to South Africa via Kenya, Tanzania, Malawi, Mozambique and Zimbabwe, stopping on the way to have some choice adventures and acclimate to the cold weather (it will be winter in southern Africa) before getting on a plane out of Johannesburg on July 3rd (my last and next blog posting will be to post pictures from my last weeks in Uganda and this trip).

And so now to the thing you have all been waiting for: my return.
I will be landing at Dulles International Airport at 330pm on July 4th (Qatar Airways 51) to banter with the customs officers, reintegrate and of course, to see you.

A woman using cooking locally (not using a stove like ours)--source: WFP

As I have told my family, the only thing I feel that I need when I get home is to see fireworks (if you have an amazing viewing plan in DC, let me know and we’ll make it happen), but they for some reason think I may need other things. So, if you are an expert in: buying cars, technology (this includes, but is not limited to computers, clouds—not the white fluffy ones—and anything that starts with “I”), pop culture, the canned food aisle, reintegrating or speaking slowing using small words so I can understand, your services will be needed. Otherwise, I’m looking forward to seeing you and hope that all stays well with you between now and then.

  

My institutional stove construction team

  



2 other PCVs (Bernadette and Rachel) at Bernadette's engagement celebration



A cook using one of our stoves (compare to the woman cooking above)



Uganda's Golden Jubilee!

 Today is Uganda’s Golden Julibee!  50 years of independence or in the words of one of my more cynical Ugandan friends: 50 years of living in darkness...haha, funny right?  Maybe not, but there is a middle ground between this jubilation and cynicism and it’s the place I’ve been living for the last 2 and a half years. 

On this joyous occasion, I would like to invite you to join me for an insider’s look into Uganda after 50 years of, well, living outside of England’s rule. 

Here’s a brief outline:

·         The English appointed the king of the central tribe the ruler of Uganda

·         In 1966, the Prime Minister, Obote, committed a coup d’état when the king was out of the country. 

·         After a few years, the leader of Obote’s military, Idi Amin overthrew Obote.  Idi Amin had a lot of support when he came to power, although when a number of his enemies started to disappear mysteriously, all the Indians were forced out of Uganda causing an economic crisis, the Israeli captive situation in Entebbe, and well Amin declared war on Tanzania…things changed.  

·         Tanzania and some Ugandan exiles threw Amin out of power and then after a few interim governments, Obote (from before) was elected.  During this period, known as Obote (II), his rule was marked by a lot of violence, particularly in the SW region...

·         He was overthrown by an army led by Okello who then had a short but very violent reign.

·         Then in 1986, the leader of a guerilla army, Musevini came in from the West and overthrew Okello.  Musevini is still in power and well I won’t get into the politics that surround his rule being a PCV and by order, politically neutral.  During Musevini’s reign, however, the LRA ravaged the north in a 20 year war before being forced from Uganda in 2007. 

Do you see the darkness part?  Yep, it’s there, and unfortunately, it’s only these types of things that usually make the paper...   

I am reading a book on Africa meant for people who have never visited here.  The author is a British journalist who has worked throughout Africa for the last 40 years.  He describes a conversation he had with a young man who said that if the press would covered all the happy things about Africa, then the continent would be able to pull itself out of this constant cycle of war, coups, and corruption.  He answered that journalists rarely cover things like that anywhere, Europe, the Americas, and Asia included because it does not sell papers.  More people, however, visit Europe, the Americas, and Asia than Africa, providing an alternate source of information about these places.  Fewer people provide this for Africa. 

Maybe that’s why living in Africa is addictive for certain people.  It’s like being privy to a secret: that Africa is not all war and danger, but that there is another side that cannot travel the miles to other places as well as the other more depressing stories. 

I was talking with my friend and fellow PCV Steve the other day as we reflected on a recent trip through some local villages.  We concluded how wonderful it is that in Uganda you can act as if you are someone’s best friend immediately upon meeting them.  It’s kind of a fake it until you make it idea.  You take the first few sentences to greet and then, before you know it, you have inside jokes and although you may part ways a minute or two later, you part as if you’ve known each other for ages.  Such a phenomenon has little to do with hospitality and everything to do with the immediacy of the culture.  Everyone lives in the now (which is problematic for people trying to plan projects or budget).   All the tears you want to shed for someone must be shed the day of the funeral.  If you want to spend time with your family, you do it now, even if you are supposed to go to work instead.  There’s no holding back, no let’s wait until later.  If people do delay something until later, there’s a 50/50 percent chance it will happen at all.  Obviously, that something was not important enough to happen “now now” rather than “now” aka “later.”

So back to the inspiration of this blog: jubilation of the golden variety.  Today is about forgetting about the “darkness” of the past and the uncertainty of the future and celebrating what we have today: family, food, and sunshine.  So although most of you all are an ocean away from the joyous occasion, I hope you too will raise a glass in celebration of any and all happiness you feel in this moment and in the hope that the next 50 years will be brighter than the last.

You win some, you lose some, and some get rained out, but you have to dress for them all aka There and Back Again, a Peace Corps Extendee’s Tale

If I got to see you during my time in the Americas, let me just say, wow, you look amazing and I can’t believe how wonderful you are. If I didn’t see you, sorry, but time is not always an accommodating mistress and I have returned already to what my father terms as “the bush” in the hopes that I too one day can say “Dr. Livingston I presume?”

While home, I got to visit the bustling city of Bogota, Colombia, the patriotic city of Washington, DC, and the historical city of Williamsburg.


I was shocked and awed by the following things: electricity…all the time…and at times without even turning on a switch, the fact that restaurants almost always have what is listed on their menus (in Uganda, you usually just ignore the menu because 99.9% of the items listed there are not actually available), the diversity, the lack of potholes, the speed and availability of the internet, drinking water from the tap and not suffering later, customer service, and how little people interact when they don’t have to (i.e. walking past each other on the street, being on the same train etc).

The things that frightened me the most: highway entrance ramps (really not a good place for someone who is used to “African Time”) and the canned goods aisle in the grocery store….it just was not natural to have so many options in such little space…it took about 3 times as long and 300 times the level of concentration for me to find a can of green beans as it would take you.

The things that were the nicest were: blending in…relatively at least and, not to be overly corny, seeing and/or hearing about all of you.

On Friday, June 9th, a plane full of smart outfits, bright eyes, and well, me with more electronics in my carry-on than the energizer bunny landed in Uganda around 11pm. By Saturday night I was in Lira, my new home for the next year and on Monday morning, I started working at my new PC site, International Lifeline Fund. www.lifelinefund.org/


Very exciting things about my new home: electricity and running water, living in town (so it doesn’t take a full day to go shopping, I can actually go out after 7pm (so now I can go see the Euro Cup!)), I no longer fear that my clothes will get stolen off the laundry line, my home is no longer a warehouse for my projects or liquid soap factory, there is more than one room, and there is a front porch. It’s my version of a ex-convict’s half-way house, transitioning me from the village to America.

At my new site, I am helping revamp their Institutional Fuel-Efficient Stove project (large wood burning stoves for schools, orphanages etc.). It’s been basically dormant for the last year and a half because they were building up their smaller stove projects so they let me in like a breath of fresh air…or more likely like a passable rendition of “The Flight of the Bumblebee” to jump start it. While it’s strange for me not to have a million projects going on simultaneously and to no longer have to work before 830 am and after 530 pm, this new streamlined lifestyle may make my future blog entries less overwhelming/confusing to read.

My new mailing address is:

Heather Pasley
P.O. Box 1041
Lira, Uganda

My email is much more reliable here so let me know what’s shaking on that side of the ocean, specifically in your lives.

What I should have painted on my old house.

A happy mother in a nearby village with her ILF "rural stove."

Testing the newest model of the ILF "Institutional Stove"

PICTURES!

Currently I am home in the USA for my 30 day leave before extending for another year in Uganda.  This means that I have strong enough internet to upload photos!  Nothing's in order sorry.  If you want to see more pictures and/or the awesome slideshow from the girls empowerment camp I organized, let me know...I'm around.
 

My neighbors Amy and Emy

 


My last two stoves at my school, built with a local vocational school (BAM!)





My very shotty bus...at least its honest about its safety track record



I just flew home on this...just kidding...Ugandan Fighter Jet in the middle of Gulu...seriously





My new home (I share it with 2 other people so I'm not totally spoiled), but it's definitely an upgrade from a hut





Princess and the Pea in Uganda...getting ready for the Girls Empowerment Camp that I organized/directed called Northern Camp GLOW (Girls Leading Our World)





The taxi I took to get from Kitgum to my new home in Lira. 5 of the bags and my bicycle are loaded on top. This is the first of two times that we broke down on the normally 4 hour trip...

 

  



 

From inside the taxi I moved in...20 people in a 14 max person vehicle...very delux and spacious...





Ochido, a fine art teacher at my school working on our East Africa Map Mural









One of my womens groups



Me terrorizing Emy...or defending my coffee mug...really, it could go either way



Northern Camp GLOW





Short, Sweet, and to the Point...somehow

Another term is coming to an end and now I’m looking forward to the long holiday break (2 months) of girl empowerment, gorillas, stove building, soap making, and of course, dreaming of a white Christmas. At site, I’ve continued to work on the stoves, books, soap, distributing AFRIpads (reusable menstrual pads that are very “smart”), classes, and maps (we have moved on from the World Map--shown here (the countries are numbered on the map and along the borders, we cut out stencils using razors and computer paper of the countries, capitals, and the corresponding number--I've recently gotten some slack for numbering the US as number 3, not number 1-Canada and Mexico come before it alphabetically...but that seems to be besides the point for most people) to the East Africa Map). This past week, I organized and gathered about 43 volunteers (about a third of the total Uganda PC population) together in Gulu to celebrate Thanksgiving (this may be one of the most ridiculous things I’ve attempted to organize in Uganda but it shockingly worked out beautifully—one Thanksgiving dinner with all the trimmings and more, no stress, no drama, and no one left hungry). All in all, I’m loving life here and have found myself really coming into my own here.
A few months ago, my family met a man named Sebastian in Washington DC who used to build fuel efficient stoves in Northern Uganda (it’s a small world after all). He gave them the name and contact of the organization that he used to work with called International Lifeline Fund which they then passed on to me. Long story short, I started talking with ILF and next year, starting in June, I’m going to be a Peace Corps volunteer working for them for an additional year, building large Institutional Stoves in and around Lira (which happens to be my second favorite town in Uganda, next to Kitgum, my current home). This will give me an opportunity to really commit myself to stove building, rather than struggling to fit my stove expeditions around my classes and other commitments in Kitgum, and will hopefully prepare me for going to graduate school for Environmental Engineering when I come home in Summer 2013.
For those of you who are shaking your heads right now (or crying uncontrollably), wondering when I will finally snap out of it, leave Uganda, and see them again, fear not! I will be coming home for the month of May (round trip paid for by the Peace Corps) before starting my third year. If you are living outside of Virginia, DC, or Colombia, it is my humble request that you see if you can make the trip to one of those three places and visit during that month. Otherwise, those in VA, DC, and my lovely roommate in Colombia, please expect me on you doorstop for however so briefly in about 5 months. I’ll write again shortly after Christmas hopefully with pictures of Gorillas, up close and personal. Happy Holidays! Make sure you let me know if one of your New Years Resolutions is to travel to East Africa!

I'm into lists right now....sorry

Hello all. For those of you in VA, I hope you and your belongings survived the earthquake! All those in VA and NYC, I hear that you are living without power for the time being which means that we can have some shared experiences now. The term ended about 2 weeks ago and will start again in a week. During the term, we took one more giant step towards finishing the World Map (there are now names on the countries (including the new Republic of Southern Sudan) and we’ve added all those pesky little islands that my students have been a bit too eager to paint right over with blue…despite the fact that they now know that Uganda is indeed quite a small ountry, anything smaller than Uganda doesn’t seem to really be worth the effort in their minds…), our students are getting ready for their national exams next term, and our power transmission was stolen so we spent the second half the term without power. At the end of the term, I joined hands with the other female teachers at my school to welcome and host Archbishop Orumbi (Archbishop of the Protestant Church here) and 2000 other people coming to see him. I also acquired two more women’s groups with whom I have started to make liquid soap (I now have a grand total of 4 groups plus my students…watch as my empire grows). I traveled to the SW to build an oven, carrying a full bag of tools (trowels, level, L ruler etc) and 3 welded pieces: a chimney that was light, but about 6ft long, a chimney base that weighed maybe 30lbs and was about 1m2 and last but not least, an oven box that was 40cmX60cmX60cm and took 2 strong men (4 weaker men) to carry (did I mention that the trip takes about 20 hours and involves changing to progressively smaller and more packed vehicles 3 times?) I put here a picture of the last vehicle which took me and 7 other people (and 2 children) about an hour down a dirt road that has seen better days. This trip made me realize that I seem to pack a ridiculous amount on public transport vehicles here (there’s a good chance I was a pack horse in a past life because most normal Peace Corps Volunteers tend to pack less and less as time goes on….). So here’s the top 5 list of things I’ve transported:
1) Oven etc (this must top the list because really, needing 3-5 people to help you carry your “luggage” really should put me up there on the level with royalty—eat your heart out Marie Antoinette)
2) 27 2*2*1 ft boxes of books and a desktop computer
3) 3 jerry cans of chemicals and other solid chemicals in a box and a large bag of empty water bottles (this has happened multiple times/in different combinations)
4) 10L of peanut sauce and 8kg of black beans
5) 13 secondary school girls and a pair of black shoes in a black plastic bag that I accidentally took, thinking the bag was mine….it belonged another unknown and now shoeless secondary school girl…whoops
Also, since I’ve now completed 1 1/3 years of teaching here, I thought I’d mention things that have happened to me here that would never happen to a teacher in the US:
1) A chicken flying into the classroom only to be caught by a student and forced back out the window, only causing a minute or two of distraction from the normal lesson
2) A rainstorm that forces 70 students to crowd around me in the center of the room because the rain was soaking 75% of the classroom and making it impossible to move or talk in the remaining 25%
3) Giving a 2 hour computer exam, 3 girls at a time, by candlelight (the generator can only power so much)
At the end of the term, I headed to the SW to be a counselor for a regional GLOW (Girls Leading Our World) camp during which I rewrote many popular Ugandan songs to be camp songs (truly, my radio listening experience here will never be the same). Afterwards, I visited Sipi Falls in the East with a friend which is has 3 beautiful waterfalls—we could get close enough to get a bit of a mist shower (the best thing about the trip is that not many tourists visit the Falls so it’s almost an untouched part of Uganda). I believe that we thoroughly entertained our guide by constantly singing (we were fresh from being Camp counselors) and by greeting everyone along the way in their local language (this is quite unusual for foreigners to do…period).
Here in Uganda, I have met a lot of people who were named after famous people (George Bush, Obama, Bill Clinton, Sadam Hussein….), but now there is a new installment to the list: a dog named Qadaffi…truly, the Ugandans know how to celebrate history.
Anyways, I hope all is well! Please tell me what’s going on with you all!

Oh why do I live this way...it must be the money!

The first term ended last Thursday and my goodness, my school way not kidding when they told me: “sometimes, the first term is somehow busy…” I found myself with a number of projects and events, often going on at the same time. As a relaxed to my favorite “public transport” song (Nelly’s “It Must Be the Money”) last Friday on a run-down matatu (15 passenger van with 20 people instead of 15 stuffed in) that needed to be pushed a block before it could start) on my way to see a friend 4 hours away (on a road where the pot holes resemble small lakes) for Easter, I remembered that it’s been a while since I wrote in my blog. Unfortunately, such a venue is not an appropriate location for breaking out my laptop so again, I’m a bit delayed.
I have continued to work with my Life Skills club. We are still making liquid soap and doing self-esteem activities, but now we’ve added on bee keeping with 5 bee hives in front of the school, the actual bees coming soon (pictured: 2 of the hives and some of the girls "baiting" the hives with melted bees wax). I also started running with the girls and some of the teachers on Saturday morning during the school’s weekly Morning Road Run (the school just started again this term: imagine 900 girls running down the road, all singing at the top of their lungs….it’s crazy). At the school, the green club and I have also added another large stove (2nd installment of 4 as seen in the picture), copying the larger version I got to help a vocational school and some Peace Corps Volunteers build in Gulu (just south of me) in honor of Peace Corps’ 50th anniversary (see picture of a bricklaying teacher and some of his students are pictured with the nearly completed product). With the help of the fine art teacher and 2 fine art students, the world map is complete (minus the names of the countries) in all of its colorful glory, front row and center, visible from even the main road and is bound to help the students finally understand the shape, size, and location of such strange countries as Canada, India, and of course, Uganda. With all these projects, I have been more busy outside of the classroom than inside the classroom and I am still in shock about how much trust my school has in me (enough to let me draw the world free hand on a prominent wall of the school without any geography or fine art degree to qualify me) and support my school gives me to allow me to do and then to fund these huge projects. Thank goodness I ended up at a school as crazy as I am.
I’ve also started to work with 2 of the 10 women’s groups that my Head Teacher began. These groups started to help women in the same villages help each other recover from the war financially and mentally. After fleeing their homes and then living in Internally Displaced People Camps for as many as 20 years, these women returned to looted homes and lacked basics they needed to get their lives back: pots, pans, etc. Alone, none of them could afford all that they needed, so they saved together and each week they would pool their money for one member to buy what she needed. After a while, they also started to making needle points and paper beads to make extra money through the Anglican Diocese. Now, we make liquid soap with a vengeance to make money and mud stoves in their homes to save money on firewood. Between the local gossip and the impromptu composing of songs that they do as they work, these women are a lot of fun to work with.

These projects have certainly made me miss a few conveniences from America including bricks that don’t break in half if you drop them from 1 m in the air and have led to a few small disasters like purple paint spilling all over the boot of my bus, including on 20 pineapples, after being packed poorly (the only good thing that came out of this is that I have never gotten off a bus to a more concerned and helpful crowd of boda bodas (motorcycle drivers)—these people are usually more likely to laugh at or harass you than help, but I guess purple paint everywhere seemed to help my position because I swear they were all sincerely sorry about my situation).
All in all, a very successful Spring, but now I get to take a chill pill for a few weeks before the circus of my busy schedule begins again next term (so much for that free time I thought I’d have in Peace Corps). Hope all is well and keep me up to date with any and all exciting/mundane news.