side by side

I’ve talked before about how Peace Corps is a dichotomy. At times I think it may just be the unfamiliarity that makes everything seem this way, but sometimes I feel like this is a place where the extreme seems to thrive and both sides of the coin coexist side by side.

Since I have been in country, I have seen great savannahs, impenetrable rain forests, and vast swamps that look as if man has never even been near them, and I have seen factories pumping what looked like used motor oil directly into a roadside ditch right outside their property, forests leveled and plains burned to make way for new farmland, and entire towns coated in dust from all of the construction in the red earth.

I have had unknown children sprint up to me wanting to do nothing other than hold my hand, and I have been woken up at all hours of the morning by other children fiercely demanding that I give them money, a computer, or any number of my other possessions, which they inexplicably know I have.

I have seen life on the highway. Literally. I actually saw a woman give birth on the side of the road. But I also saw death on the highway when a man fell from his perch on top of a moving truck and had been gorily ripped open, lying with his insides spread over the road.

I am always easily recognized as someone “not from around here”. This, at times, has resulted in total strangers inviting me to take lunch or tea with them, or just thanking me for coming to help their country. At other times it has resulted in people yelling at me to “go back to (insert foreign country here)”.

I know people that work from sunrise to sunset, cooking, cleaning, farming, and getting their children off to school every single day, but I have also walked past groups of men who, despite being drunk off their asses before noon, can’t afford their own children’s school fees. When they incredulously demand “YOU GIVE ME MONEY!” they often don’t even hide the fact that they are planning to use it to buy more booze.

My complexion, darker than most Western workers but much lighter than their own, has caused total strangers to want to take a photo with their favorite international football stars Carlos Tevez or Cesc Fabregas (me), but it has also gotten me furiously accused of being a terrorist or a Muhindi (person from India), probably both of which implying equal disdain in the accusers’ eyes.

I have seen months, packed with new and exciting things every day, fly by in an instant. I have also felt the hours stretch so long they seemed like weeks where I would hardly leave my apartment or speak to anyone for days on end.

I have met people who have selflessly devoted their entire lives (not just the two years I am giving up) to the service of other people, receiving hardly anything in return outside of their own contentment, but I have also seen hordes of people who have taken jobs in aid or religious service only because they are the best paying (and most easily extorted) positions available locally.

I have met local people with hardly anything to call their own share meals, lend money, and even take in lost children to raise as their own, expecting nothing in return, but I have also seen people in power with their hands in the pockets of needy schools, orphanages, and any other number of other organizations.

Having said all of these things, I guess it’s not altogether surprising some of the mood swings that I, along with many of the other volunteers in country, experience, but I think it would be a mistake to attribute them entirely to outside forces. Sometimes I feel up when everything is going wrong, and sometimes I am down for no reason at all. I guess I haven’t quite figured that one out yet, but I’m looking into it.

***Note***
Special thanks to my friend, Devon, for the photo. He took the shot and photoshopped it. I liked it so much that I couldn't help but steal it. I feel like the photo does a great job in getting the point I wanted across. In his own words:

THIS is Peace Corps. Same pic. Flip it. Desaturate it. Sew them together. Bright, warm. Black/white Drab. It's the "ups" and it's the "downs." And when you put it all together, it's a beautiful view... sunrise on the horizon. The beginning of a truly unique day.

You can check out Devon's blog here - http://megandauganda.blogspot.com/

I also have my new address finally. Check it out on the right side of this page under "Contact Info".

two great american holidays

More old photos. These should have gone with the stories about my birthday and the boat ride/4th of July, but I had trouble uploading them all. Hope you enjoy them anyway.



***Note***
These albums have been about halfway uploaded to the site for a while so it's possible you have looked at the album before today but not seen most of the photos now there.

site!

Photos of my old site. I have been trying for weeks to get them up, and titled the album "Site!" when I had just moved in and was still very excited about Rwenjeru. If I were to title it now, it would probably be "site..." and would have been accompanied by an effect that sounds like "wanh wanhh waaaaaaannnnnnnhhh". You know what I mean.

a fresh start

Monday, I finally made my move away from Rwenjeru Campsite. The people whom I had lived with were all quite surprised to see the Peace Corps truck pulling up. They quickly set to work trying to make tea and set up a nice little outdoor meeting area to show the PC staff some hospitality, having no clue the real reason for their arrival.

I was given the option to attend the meeting where the truth would out, and PC would tell about their discovery of the corruption and their decision to remove me from the site. Looking back, I feel like I should have definitely been there, but at the time I declined to attend. I felt more nauseous than I can ever remember feeling. I just couldn't face them. Also not in attendance was Enock, who, in typical fashion, had left town for a one night trip to Kampala about a week or so ago. I elected, instead, to put all of my belongings into the truck. 90 seconds later I was all packed up and ready to go, but the meeting continued to drag on.

I knew they would try to contest the decision, and they did. I was told after that every one of them claimed to have been ignorant to what Enock had done, and each one of them severely condemned the actions despite the fact that everyone in attendance was related to the man (including his father and grandfather). Peace Corps, however, was not there to have an open dialog. They were fed up with the way things had gone from day one, and their decision was final. They told the members of the campsite that even if they had been ignorant, Enock was a representative of the campsite, and his actions were recognized as such. If I had continued to work there, it would be a serious compromise of both Peace Corps' and my own integrity. When the meeting eventually let out, they all came over to shake my hand, apologize for what had happened, and to wish me luck. I could see that some of them were crying.

By all rights, my time at Rwenjeru was absolutely awful. I spent my first two months living in a bare apartment with nothing to do and no one to talk to. The next three weeks I was happy to move into my new place, but I was hardly doing anything constructive. That was then followed by about three more weeks of dealing with the corruption issue and being forced to essentially live a lie. In my time there I saw alcoholism, laziness, corruption, and sexism taken to degrees I had never dreamed I would see. And yet, despite all of that, leaving that day was one of the hardest things I have ever done. I knew what a crushing blow it was to the dreams of the campsite, and to each one of the members personally.

After a one night stop in Kampala, the truck brought me to my new site here in the village of Kisoga in Mukono District. Despite the effect leaving Rwenjeru had on me, I feel like a weight has been lifted from my chest, and I am ready to start anew. I will be working in conjunction with the local Catholic Church doing whatever projects they and I feel will help the people. That sounds very vague, but they already have some ideas in place, and I can tell I will be more than busy during my service here. I'll have more details about what I am doing and how everything is going later. Even now, completely removed from Rwenjeru, I still feel badly about the way things turned out, but I am trying to concentrate on moving forward, and I know things will be better for me here.

*** Note ***
My new village doesn't have cell phone reception from my old provider so I had to switch back to my old number for now. You can find it to the right side of the screen under Contact Info.

100 days of site

It’s been 100 days now since I have been at site. I guess it doesn’t seem like that much time has gone by, but maybe that’s just because I continue to keep moving around quite a bit. Anyway, that got me thinking of exactly what 100 days means here, so I figured I would have a little fun with some other numbers.


500 – Bananas I have eaten (This is just an estimate, but I promise you, it is a VERY conservative one. I generally eat quite a bit more than 5 bananas a day. Sometimes up to around 10.)

10 – Most people seen in a single compact car

483 – Text messages sent

2 – Times woken up past 7:00 AM

1000 - Biggest “Muzungu Price” mark-up percentage (price initially offered due to conspicuous skin color)

500 – Liters of water drank

13 – Number of books read (including Infinite Jest which should count for like 10)

5 – Kilos of oatmeal eaten

33 – World Cup matches watched

7 – Meals eaten with meat

4 – Most days gone without showering

190 – Days without a haircut (this obviously goes outside of the 100 day theme, but seems worth noting)

14 – Times listened to album Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix in its entirety

9 - Average distance walked per day in kilometers


As luck would have it, it looks like these first 100 days will be my last at this site. I got the word from Peace Corps that they will be moving me to Mukono this Monday. I have no idea about what I am walking into, but I am not too worried about that at the moment. It's just something I've come to expect here.

things fall apart

The other day my organization, Rwenjeru Campsite, told me to visit a local primary (elementary) school because they were under-funded and were looking for help writing a grant. Even though I wasn’t exactly asked, and grant writing is not something I am all that familiar with, I agreed to help out as best I could.

As I walked around and toured the school with the headmaster, my heart went out to the place. It’s hard not to feel moved when there are hundreds of kids grinning from ear to ear, greeting you, and singing for you in every classroom you enter despite all the hardships and poor conditions that it’s obvious they are facing. I found my smile was even more permanently plastered to my face than usual.

After the tour, I went back to the headmaster’s office to ask a few questions and discuss what it was he planned to use the funds for. My supervisor, Enoch, had tagged along for the trip, although he had asked me to handle the process. After my discussion with the headmaster I got up to leave, and saw Enoch hand a paper discreetly across the desk. After looking it over, the headmaster replied, “This will be pending approval. For now, it must be transportation only.” This put me on alert. Enoch had me sit back down while he scribbled out another piece of paper, and handed it across the desk again. “100,000 seems like a lot for transport,” said the headmaster this time, and I knew he was absolutely right. It was something like three times the price of our transportation. Nevertheless, the headmaster signed and stamped the second piece of paper, and told Enoch to go collect at the cashier.

If I thought something was up before, I knew it was now. I needed to see what was on that paper. Clearly, it had something to do with money. I decided discretion would be better than throwing around accusations of corruption, so I walked around the headmaster’s desk under the guise of asking him a question about some of the estimates he had given me. I glanced down at the first paper while he talked to discover that mystery paper #1 was actually an invoice from my campsite to the school for my “consultative services” for the figure of 500,000 Ugandan Shillings (500,000 shillings exchanges to about $250, but if you consider things like average incomes and purchasing power, I’d say it’s closer in Ugandan terms to $7,000-$10,000).

I felt absolutely devastated. I am not trying to sound noble, but I came here to help as a volunteer. If I had wanted to charge people for my services, I would have continued consulting in America where I would be the one to profit off of my work. The idea that I was being used as a tool to exploit an under-funded school in Uganda for someone else’s personal gain made me sick.

Still in shock, I called some Peace Corps friends to see what I should do. They all convinced me that I had call PC administration, and when I did they were extremely helpful and understanding. They even came out to meet me in person the next day. They initially told me to leave my site for the weekend. I was obviously upset, and they told me to take the weekend to cool off, clear my head a bit, and decide if I could continue working with these people, or if it was finally time to cut ties and move on to another organization.

After spending the weekend with Charlene in Ibanda, I still felt no more certain about what I wanted to do. On the one hand, I was really starting to enjoy my life here at the campsite. I still did not have much faith in the work I was doing, but at least things were starting to move in a productive direction. It’s a beautiful place to live, and, my distaste for Enoch aside, I have gotten along great with most of the staff and the surrounding community. I felt an obligation to these people. I also had a bit of a fear of the unknown. If I were to leave, where would I go? On the other hand, I could not erase from my mind what had happened. I couldn’t stand the thought of continuing to work with these people. It just flew in the face of my values, and tolerating corruption on this level was not something I felt prepared to do.

Even though I still feel uncertain about what it is that I want, I feel fortunate that the Country Director of PC Uganda took the responsibility out of my hands. He decided that the organization had committed too serious a violation of policy to continue working with them, and that I would be leaving Rwenjeru Campsite. I still feel very conflicted about the whole thing, but I think deep down I know that this is what has to happen.

What’s next is still unknown, and more than a little awkward. The general protocol is for siteless volunteers to go to the capitol city of Kampala, however it is still off limits to volunteers due to security concerns over the recent terrorist attacks. That means that I will continue living at Rwenjeru until a replacement site is found. They still have no idea that I am being removed, and they actually don’t even know that I know about the invoice, and I am supposed to keep it that way just in case it becomes a security issue (not that I think it will, Mom). I even had to call the headmaster of the school, whom was made aware of the situation, and ask him to lie on my behalf in case someone should call trying to collect the UGX 500,000.

So for now, it looks like I am going to go on living a secret life. It’s definitely not ideal, but at the moment not much else can be done.

kampala bombings

I have had a recent influx of calls and emails from a lot of people concerned about the bombings that took place in the capitol city of Kampala during the World Cup Finals. I am okay, and as far as I know, no Peace Corps Volunteers or staff were harmed during the attacks.

I am currently restricted from leaving my site, and, because that is fairly deep in the village, I don't have much information or insight into what is going on.

I will say that I know both the places that were attacked. One is a rugby club and the other is an Ethiopian restaurant. While I wouldn't say that either was very popular with tourists, both places were frequented by foreign residents, particularly from the West. I would have to think that whoever planned these attacks was also aware of this fact, which is pretty troubling as far as my own safety is concerned. Outside of that, I am pretty well in the dark. I will try to keep everyone posted if anything changes.