Tea for Twenty

12 August 2016

This blog post is kind of difficult to write.  Not because it’s super emotional or traumatic but because I’m a super klutz and spilled my entire cup of tea over the keyboard and now the keys are kind of sticky even after sitting in rice overnight.  C’est la vie.  I apologize now for any horrible spelling errors; the P and Y keys are really tough.

Remember how I talked about a big working tea fundraiser that would bring in beaucoup bucks to the library renovation fund?  Well, it happened!  I spent the week leading up to it in a permanent frenzy trying to make sure that donors were informed, the staff were ready, and the venue and supplies would be sufficient.  Three days before the event, Brother Patrick and I met with the chairman.  Originally, the party was to be held at Kyotera Stirling, remember?  The town hall-esque place that the chairman owned and would lend us the space, chairs, tables, cups, thermoses, for free?  Yeah, well, three days before the event, doesn’t he say “wouldn’t it make sense to have the tea party at the school?  Let’s do that.”  And yes, it definitely would make more sense to have it there, but it’s in..you know…three days.  He tells me not to worry, we’ll inform everyone, he has all their contacts.  I wasn’t so sure.  I tend to spaz a bit (ok more than a bit) when things change so suddenly, but my friends kept reminding me that in Uganda, things work out.  Maybe not how you’re expecting them to, but they always work out.

So the three days before the party were spent collecting supplies, like tea, and making sure the staff knew of the change.  The day of, we secure a chapati guy, all the needed materials, I buy milk, and everything was in motion.  I show up about an hour beforehand and the P7 room is all set up.  The sisters from the church came and helped put it all together.  There’s a table in the front of the room covered in a beautiful cloth, chairs set up for the special guests, tables in the back set up all nicely decorated for tea, and even a TV in the front of the room playing music videos from a DVD (we don’t want the guests to be bored while they wait).  To top it off, an artist from the PTC stopped by to draw some welcome signs on the front chalkboard.  Everything was coming together.  Except one thing:  we were planning for maximum 50 guests.  I bought tea and bananas and coffee and bread and butter and chapatti and milk for 50 guests.  The room is set up for approx. 50 guests.  The number or people who show up? Not including staff, maybe 13.  My heart kind of sunk when we began, I couldn’t believe how few people had come.  But then again I wonder if it really would’ve been a bigger turnout at the former location. 

"Enjoy Da Day!"

The work tea went really well, though.  We had a schedule and everything.  Opened with prayer of course, thanked everyone for coming, the chairman made opening remarks about the library, kind of took a detour with his own agenda and how he’s raising money for cancer research (ok, let’s get back on track, now), and we had a library tour…in the dark.  The sun had long gone down and we don’t have electricity in the library room YET.  We will.  After the tour, we came back and took tea and people came up one by one, made a little speech, and dropped some cash in the donation box.  Everyone was in good spirits, enjoying the tea, socializing, donating money, it was an all-around good time.  My favorite part though was looking outside during the speeches.  We had left the library door open and some students had come back and snagged some books from inside.  They plopped themselves down outside the security light and were pouring over the books, taking turns reading out loud and having a great time.  That was really the moment that stuck with me.  It was nice having people come and donate, but it’s really the students that matter most here.  I want to finish this project more than ever now.  It’s a slow job, but if students are able to have a free space to come and read different books, then I’ll feel accomplished.  Libraries are kind of in my blood; I’m channeling mom’s mojo into this one.

 

After all the donations, cash and pledges, we had raised over half a million shillings!! WOW!  From the few donors that came, they were extremely generous.  We’re only about 150k off of our community donation requirement.  I’m so proud of the library committee team, they’ve even pledged to donate 80k shillings!  It’s a great feeling to see something finally start coming together.  Now all I need is the grant money to come in and we can start on constructing the shelves and tables.  After the term is over, I want to start cleaning out the room, organizing the books that are already in there, and maybe even begin painting.  It’ll happen slowly slowly, but it’ll happen.  Goals are accomplished with patience.  I learned that when I mended my first mosquito net during training, and I’m learning it now.

In other news, remember all those RUMPs kits I got?  Well the PEARLS put their sewing skills to use and at the end of the menstruation lesson, each girl got to make their own reusable pad.  They loved them!  They can make them, they can sell them, they can use them, all good things for girls and menstruation.  Let’s work together to talk about it and kill the taboos. Check out the pictures:

Dorah using her killer sewing skills

Reticia

Gladys 

Jane and Angella

Olivia and Jane

This is where I stop for now.  It’s been a busy two weeks filled with meeting the new country director, having technical immersion where 3 PCTs stayed at my house for training for a whole week, PEARLS club meeting and prep, having my solar lights kick the dust, having my solar lights replaced, figuring out how to pay for those solar lights, getting other electric fix ups done around my house, cleaning, cleaning, cleaning, washing A LOT, having Medical Access come to train us on yet another computer program that we are to start utilizing immediately (yeah ok, we’ll see), and constant running around the towns for printing, shopping, meeting, greeting, etc.  I was glad that this past week was a bit more relaxed.  Mid-Service Training is coming up at the end of the month; it’ll be great to see the whole cohort together again.

I can’t remember if I wrote this before, but I’ve stopped counting water stations.  (As I write it, I feel like I’ve already said it.  Oh well, I’ll say it again) At the beginning I was going from point to point, water station to water station, counting down the days to the next break, the next vacation, the next…whatever.  Counting down the days until Peace Corps is over.  I don’t want to do that anymore.  It’ll be over before I know it, and I’m going to wish I would’ve been more present in the everyday challenges and accomplishments.  So no more counting down.  No more water stations.  I have a year left to experience this wonderful place and a year to make lasting memories and relationships.  I’m not counting down those gifts I've been given. 

All is well.
Until next time,
Kelly

Wait, hold up, I forgot the cat.  We like to take snapchat selfies:

 

 

One year and one month

5 July 2016

There’s something almost therapeutic about walking into my house after a long day and hearing the gentle hum of the electricity.  It makes it easier to scoop some natural peanut butter and homemade granola (yeah, I made something) into the yogurt I just bought from town and plop down on my front step to watch the kids come home from school.  Just like Guys and Dolls, my time of day is the golden hour: right between 6 and 7 when the heat is gone and the sun starts to set over my health center.  All that’s missing today is my crazy cat romping around.  He’ll be back within the hour for dinner and he’ll need brushed to get all the woods crap out of his fur.  These are the quiet nights in the village that I love.

RUMPS Kits!

Not sure if you’ve noticed or not, but I’m long past the one-year in country marker.  Before I start belching out a RENT song about how I measure a year, I’d like to just say thanks for the constant support I’ve received from friends and family back home.  I’ve long since run out of room to hang up cards and letters (but keep sending them!!), and the texts and skype calls I’ve gotten are the extra push that helps me get out the door every day. 

Speaking of saying thanks, a big shout out goes to the Missions team at Calvary church back home!!  I told mom how I was struggling teaching RUMPS since I couldn’t keep spending my minimal living stipend on supplies to make kits.  So she sent out the call, the troops were rallied, and last week I picked up four boxes from the post office chock full of absolutely BEAUTIFUL RUMPS kits!  Each one has two towels, cut pad shapes, needles and pins, a button, ribbons, and a little instruction sheet with a diagram if my words don’t translate well.  Thank you THANK YOU for the generous donation and support you’ve shown me from 7,000 miles away.  These kits won’t be wasted.

A recap of what’s been going on:  I’m back from Europe!  The trip was a short one but a needed one.  It was great to see everyone, to drink draft beer, to get gelato randomly, and to be annoying tourists wherever we went.  Plus, the broski decided to FINALLY pop the question and I’m getting a new sister next August!  All is well on the home front.  Counting down to Christmas now. 

The Biikira Girls Primary School Library renovation is coming along slowly slowly, but it is definitely coming along.  I am constantly blown away by the teamwork and support the library committee shows into really making this a worthwhile project.  Head teacher Teddy and Brother Patrick are always willing to make time for meetings and negotiations.  Just recently we’ve met with the Parish Priest of Biikira and he has very generously agreed to donate all of the necessary timber we need for new shelves and tables!!  That saves us near a million shillings for other supplies for like you know, books.  I love how everyone is so involved, even Sampson, our local carpenter, is the sweetest for riding out to the school on his pedal bike just to have a meeting with the priest and discuss proper timber cutting wood things.  I backed off and let them handle that stuff.  I have the planning down; they can talk carpenter logistics all they want.  Plus! We met with the chairman of the Biikira Boys and Girls schools for a meeting last week as well.  He was so into the project that he is going to help mobilize various donors around the area.  I’ve printed pledge cards encouraging people to donate, and he’ll pass those out and invite them to a tea party at the end of the month!  In Kyotera, he owns a gathering place thing where people hold meetings, performances, nighttime drinking and socializing…what’s that called.  A social…club?  Social space?   You get it.  It’s an open – EVENT HALL.  Think event hall.  That’s the word I wanted.  Anyway he’s letting us have the tea party there free of charge so all the donors can come, hear more about the project and why it’s so important to invest in a girl’s education, and then donate all at once.  I’m pretty sure he said, “It’ll be an easy way to get a lot of money very quickly.”  You go, chairman.

Sampson and the Priest looking over the timber

Bro. Patrick, Teddy, and Chairman Joseph after our meeting

I’m also collecting donations from the kiddos, too.  I think I said that in the last post?  Not a lot, just like 100 shillings, 200 shillings, whatever they can give.  I’m trying out different forms of rewards.  Like short term reward:  donate in your class’s tin, get a sweetie.  Then medium term reward:  the class which raises the most money at the end of the school term wins a super awesome super cool ice cream party!  And then of course the long term reward being a brand new bright and colorful library.  Everybody wins. 

Brick by Brick, a company in Masaka, has a program specifically for libraries.  They aim at holding trainings for teachers on how to maintain and preserve libraries for the long term.  We’re talking sustainability, people!  This is what Peace Corps is all about!  So I’ve signed up my school and we’re set to receive a free training on how to catalog, keep track of borrowers, preserve books, how to treat books, etc.  I am so freaking excited.  It’s really rewarding to see this team with me on this project.  Plus, it really helps to have a project that’s moving along instead of twiddling my thumbs in my office all day, counting how many people do a double take or even back up when they pass my office to look at me again.

Also news:  I kept going on and on about a girls’ health club that I wanted to start.  I think it was just anxiety and fear of failure that stopped me from actually doing it.  But I finally put on my big girl pants, marched into the admin office at St. Agnes vo-tech school, and talked with Father John Mary about Uganda’s PEARLS Girls’ Club.  These girls will be:
Powerful
Enthusiastic
Aware
Refined
Ladies.

Uganda is the pearl of Africa.  Get it?

Our first meeting is this week and I am super pumped.  I have team building stuff to do, snacks and sodas, games, etc.  I need to channel my camp counselor skills into this one.  I want it to be fun and educating, but I also want it to be a safe space where girls can ask those really tough questions and feel at ease among their peers.  It’ll take a lot of work, but I’m up for it.

So I think it took about a year, but I’m feeling like I really love this place.  Uganda has welcomed me with open arms.  My community has the biggest arms of all, really.  Never do they laugh at me, ask if I know Luganda, or point or tease me, unless it’s the nice kind of teasing.  That’s not to say there are things I also really don’t love about this place either.  It’s easy to get caught up in the bad.  The harassment on the street, being surrounded and bombarded in taxi parks, how I can never find a printer, the fact that it hasn’t rained since before I came back from my trip and I’m nervous about there not being enough water, or being laughed at every time I speak Luganda.  That last one gets old really quick.  But besides all that, there’s so much more about this country that I love.  I love my quiet village and the kids who watch me play ukulele after school.  I love feeling safe in my house, having my solar lights working again.  I love being included in meetings with my staff and being valued as an instructor who has something to offer (at least on the computer).  I love being able to meet up with other PCVs on the weekends and celebrating things like our one-year anniversary or the 4^th of July.  I love that everyone at my local trading center knows my name and when someone calls me mzungu, they are quickly corrected.  Things are hard here, sure, and things move more slowly here definitely.  But I’m thankful that I was randomly (or maybe no so randomly) placed in Peace Corps Uganda.  And I’m more thankful that I have another year here to solidify the friendships and connections I’ve made and to finish the work I’ve started.

Brenda and Benja lounging

Berna is preggers

Crashed a wedding. Cake ceremony!

Hi, Maria!

Happy One Year Anniversary!

We hate taxis so we snapchat

Happy Fourth of July!

With that, thanks for checking in.  Mwebale nnyo, mikwano gyange.
All’s well here,
Kelly

Almost forgot the cat tax:

Up in the trees

He doesn't like the hammock

He loves me, I swear

Waking me up every morning

F is for Friends who Fundraise Together

Woah, another blog post?  Keep em coming, Drummond.

So let’s have an update on what’s going on.

Peace Corps emphasizes primary and secondary projects.  You know, the stuff we’re supposed to be doing to make a difference at our sites.  Well since my health center pretty much has its act together, I’ve been seeing less and less of a need for me there.  I mean sure, I give HIV Prevention and Positive Living Talks in Luganda (toot tooting my horn) during the week, and I’m teaching computer lessons to the staff.  We just moved the new computer up to the ART clinic in a locked caged desk thing and it has a solar battery so we don’t have to worry about the power being on to enter data.  And those are going well, don’t get me wrong.  But I didn’t feel like those were big enough projects.  So since I’ve been working with Biikira Girls Primary School lately, I’ve been making this library renovation into my primary project.  My champion said I could, so that’s what I’m doing.

A committee has been formed.  Meetings have been had (with flipcharts!).  The budget has been planned.  Fundraising has commenced, as of today!  Here’s the low down:  the total budget we’ve calculated with shelves, tables and stools, paint and cleaning supplies, getting electricity installed, etc, comes to about 2.8 million shillings.  I applied for a grant (fingers crossed it works out) and the grant needs a 25% contribution from the community (approx. 750k shillings).  That’s a little over a PCVs monthly stipend.  So the committee and I have been brainstorming on some fundraising ideas, and I couldn’t be more impressed.  These teachers I work with are passionate about making this happen; they’ve been shooting great ideas back and forth, and I think we can actually do this.

Friday evening Brother Patrick, the Head Teacher, and I went to meet with the PP, the parish priest.  This is step one in our fundraising planning, the church.  We told him our predicament, and he allowed us to address the congregation on Sunday morning (today!).  He also offered to donate some timber that had fallen on church property to offset the cost of the bookshelves and tables.  This was all fantastic.  I went out and bought envelopes for people to pledge money into, and this morning, we stamped them with the school’s seal, and passed them around to the congregation.  The three of us who met with the parish priest also went in front of the congregation (around 400 people woosh) and talked about the library project.  No pressure, right?  Here’s the funny part.  Remember how I said the grant was 2.8 million?  Well some of my committee members thought that was kind of a low number and instead told everyone that we need 4 million shillings, 1 million of that coming from the community.  They’re really shooting high on that one.  So I thought that was kind of ironic:  Get in front of an entire church and lie.  They assured me we’d get more donations this way, so ok.  Anyway.  Some of the girls from the school were also standing up with us in their uniforms and they held the collection plate as donors came to give what they could.  It was amazing!  I was so proud of the team for being so committed and putting this plan into action.  At the end of the service we raised about 73k shillings, not including envelopes, those will come later.  So it’s a small start, but it’s a start!

The committee and I also planned to get the students involved.  We want them to feel like it’s their library space that they’ve contributed to and helped to make a reality.  So tomorrow morning, I’m addressing the girls about a competition.  I have 7 tins each with a class number painted on it (1-7), and I’ll be coming by once a week starting next term (this term’s almost over) for them to donate pocket change into.  100, 200, 500 shilling coins, whatever they can.  Once the term is up, whichever class has raised the most money will win a super awesome ice cream party!  Weeeee!   I’ll rent out the annoying ice cream man guy on his bike with the cooler tied to the back and “We Wish You a Merry Christmas” playing over and over on it for the day and get a couple containers of ice cream from the Total in town.  It’s gonna rock.

We’re also asking other schools and health centers around the area to pledge money, too.  I’m sure my health center will help me out.

So that’s my life currently.  Short post, but I thought I’d give an update.  If you’re reading this, did the conversion, realized that 750k shillings is around 220 bucks and thought “That’s not too much, I can help with the contribution,” then that’s very sweet (if you didn’t think this at all then, woops, sorry, disregard).  But the thing is, I’m really pushing for the community to come up with this money.  I want them to feel responsible for the rise and fall of this project, instead of relying on foreign aid to swoop in again and do it for them.  Allison, an RPCV who used to live here in Biikira, told me about when she had to buy her first cell phone with her own money.  She took such good care of that thing that it lasted well beyond what it should’ve.  She said it was because she had to work for the money to buy it and was now responsible for it (she also put in a kick-ass library at Biikira Boys Primary School and I'm trying to channel her work effort into my project).  That’s the same attitude I want with this library project.  If the community donates, if the students contribute, I hope they’ll feel a sense of ownership with the library.  And if there’s ownership, the library will most likely be maintained for years to come.  So maybe I’m going into this too blindly and maybe this will crash and burn at my feet, but at least I’m trying, at least I have a project, at least I get to work with and mobilize a great team and community.  Even if this project fails miserably, it won’t be for nothing.  I hope.

That’s all the goings on in the kyalo.  If you like my post, definitely check out the ever witty Katie Jones’ blog.  She gave me the inspiration to write today instead of sitting on my ass and watching the fifth season of west wing…again.

https://unitedstatesofuganda.wordpress.com/2016/04/29/no-place-id-rather-be/

And as always, enjoy the cat tax.

Bisous,
Kelly