This past week has been a combination of lovely and sometimes comical happenings that have been unexpected but welcomed. I left the lovely town of Gula for Kampala after splashing through the dark and the rain to catch the 7 AM Post Bus last Monday. It was a decent ride and I sat by a young woman with an 8 month old baby, praying: “please don’t let this baby pee or throw up on me” (a not uncommon experience on the bus). It was a good ride and I have to admit it brought back fond memories to have tiny baby fingers exploring my arm and little feet pushing into me. He did not throw up.
I worked on a project at the PC office for the first three days and was ferried to the training location on Friday morning. Remember that this was to be held at the SWAMP and I’d been dreading it for two weeks. A much intentioned reprieve was delivered because the SWAMP wasn’t ready for habitation it seems. So instead, training was held at Kulika, a perma-gardening demonstration project an hour’s ride from Kampala. The universe was smiling on us all. Without going into details, I was able to stay at the site, ensconced in a room with another volunteer.
So this was a week of unexpected gifts, the first being a good seat mate for 5.5 hour ride into Kampala, the second being the Kulika-reprieve and the third being a night of utter silence – if you don’t count the pig grunting around outside my window… (Mama pig out for a stroll without her piglets?) Really – no noise, no blasting radios-calls-to-prayer-marching bands. I slept without ear-plugs. I gave my first session the next day and it went well-enough. One learns to be grateful for things like there being a projector and computer for the three Power Point presentations loaded onto a flash drive and the fact that there was power to actually use the projector. Good so far.
The new group of trainees seems solid and their training experience appears to be far superior to the one we survived. We raised so much hell about ours, they redesigned the model and it seems to be paying off. Whereas we had 10 weeks of home-stay and trekking 45 minutes to an hour through manure strewn fields, past belligerent cows and marauding attacks of local children, deep mud, insects, barbed wire and other assorted obstacles to get to training and then back again at night, they trained and lodged at the same location which was – in itself – beautiful. That one change leaves lots of time for study, guitar playing, conversation and rest against a farm backdrop of cows and pigs and goats. They appear to be in MUCH better emotional and physical condition that we were by this time in the process.
Saturday I conducted a session that I’ve presented at home many times and was delighted and surprised to be able to offer here. It’s the one on neural-networks, motivation, boundary setting and staying positive. It was very well received and opened the door for a lot of interesting conversations and a meditation session the next day. Radically different from any training PC has offered in the past, it felt good to share that part of my life and expertise here. Sunday was a totally free and unstructured day and the weather was perfect: cool and breezy accented with bird song and the occasional pig snort and turkey gobble.
Now – I have kind of a soft spot for pigs (not turkeys), as my grandmother had an enormous hog that I adored as a toddler in north Louisiana. I named this beast Dear-Sweet-Pig and docile creature that she was she allowed me to commune with her through the fence and wiggle my fingers in her piggy-nostrils (how utterly disgusting!). Why I didn’t lose a hand, I’ll never know because the pigs I have met since, have been a bit more – well – beastly. Though I’ve yet to try the finger maneuver on any other porcine subjects – it just might be a secret hypnotic Mudra for a pig 😉 I was inconsolable when my parents wouldn’t let me bring Dear-Sweet-Pig home to live in our living room in Baton Rouge. So the next morning of training, when a very business like pig trotted up the driveway looking like he ran the place, it seemed fitting tribute to Pig. The next day he was joined by some disreputable looking friends, running through the compound causing general havoc and scattering trainees, but that seemed perfectly in keeping with the cow who doubled as the snooze alarm in the morning. I like this place.
Now to Jonathan: a fine specimen of a feline living on the property. He does love his Muzungus, though as a respectable cat, he could never admit to such weakness. In fact, Jonathan became know as a fearless-stalker-of-pigs, until said pig called his bluff and chased him around the yard. Not to be outdone, Jonathan completely upstaged me in today’s presentation on Monitoring and Evaluation (not hard to be upstaged there however…). About half way through he strutted straight to the front of the room with a sizable mouse dangling from his mouth. He threw it about and tormented it to death and when he’d exhausted his fun, he retired to lounge around with his sleek brown trophy displayed under the flip chart. Clearly time for me to call it a day.
Happy Monday all!