The rain also quietens life a bit – thank god.  The scene to the left is the view from my third-story apartment: explaining both red-dirt and noise. The noise is deafening here – and it’s mostly electronic, although a lot also comes from buses, boda-bodas (those wicked motor-cycle taxis we are not allowed to ride for good reason in most places), the thwacking away at wood shops or metal shops….  You name it – it makes noise.  The sounds of kids and goats and cows would be fine – that’s what I had in Wakiso where I lived with my home-stay family.  Here the night-club music blasts until 4:00 am on Saturday and was only interrupted list night by the blessed rain!

So – I’ve been asked to describe living quarters.  You’ll be disappointed as I know some of you are picturing me in a thatched roof mud hut somewhere, stepping out of my door to see Giraffe, Elephants and the occasional Lion.  No – I am in the industrial heart of Gulu town, the third largest “city” in Africa.  I’m here because of the wars that raged for decade and left thousands homeless, living in squalid IDP (Internally Displaced People) camps where starvation, rape and Aids raged.  The peace treaty was signed in about 2008 and people  have somewhat returned to their homes.  I say somewhat, because most of these people lost their ancestors while in the camps and many of the children now inhabiting northern Uganda were born there.  So they have no reference to tell them where their family land is. In those conditions, people do not learn to live in society, how to mother, trust or learn.  Peace Corps and many other NGOs are here to attempt to heal some of that and help create relationships and skills that in theory will help them move forward.

So back to living conditions, but that describes the social environment…  The apartment!  Yes – I’m in an apartment in what feels like the projects, BUT it has luxuries like electricity (sometime), water (sometime) and a flush toilet.  So that makes me lucky.  When I arrived, it was dark and raining and the electricity had gone off. The prison-like gate you see here is the entrance to my balcony, which overlooks the first scene in this post. Every centimeter of surface was covered with a thick layer of – you guessed it -red dust and cobwebs, and there was no furniture.  As was explained by my supervisor, almost as dismayed as I was,  explained  “Ugandans don’t believe you will arrive until they see you.” There is a lot of cultural underpinning to support that belief.  So we set about to get the bed, desk, chair and book case that our host organizations are required to furnish along with housing.

It arrived andwas assembled, then Ojok, the driver/trainer went out in search of supplies with which to chase the dust away so I would at least be able to sleep here.   Oh yes – and we had to find the mattress as well.  Nothing is easy here.  Now totally dark and still raining, the market had closed as well as most of the stores (remember, no electricity) and the streets are packed with people running our to get gas for their lanterns, etc.    We found enough to get us by, and my Ugandan male supervisor took the mop and cleared enough dust and cobwebs out of my bedroom for me to sleep.  You have no idea how rare that is – for a male here to do cleaning and much less for a woman.  He’s obviously educated and evolved and really does want his newly minted volunteer to stay.

The place is on the second floor (really the third, but they call it the second floor) and is maybe 50 feet off the busiest and noisiest highway in Gulu.  Within an eighth of a mile there are: the furniture mfg. district, two bus terminals, 4 gas stations, several boda-boda stages (where all the bodas hang out and wait for business while listening to their boom-boxes), an old market now inhabited, and untold numbers of clubs judging from the noise at night.  Starting about mid-afternoon, rubbish is burned somewhere in back of me -emitting a toxic cloud of burning plastic vapors.  Paradise.  But, I remind myself that I have running water, electricity……

The place is tiled, has two bedrooms, a living area, a bathing area and a room called a kitchen, but there is not stove or any cooking device.  I’ve bought a 2-burner gas job, but there is no propane in the city an the moment.  So I am living off PBJ sandwiches and whatever packaged soups I can make with boiling water.  I have an electric kettle, because boiling water is required if one doesn’t want a whole smorgasbord of horrible diseases spread by un-sanatized water.  Oh – it has a “balcony” overlooking the squalid market behind me.  But that’s good because I can hang out my laundry – always done by hand.

And there you have it…  This morning is good because I have my good RutaMaya  organic coffee brought from Austin, brewed using my electric kettle and a plastic French press.  No cream (no refrigeration), but sugar.  So I am at least functional and glad I thought ahead.  In fact, thanks to Travis and Brett – who studied catalogs and have survival training and outfitted me with the most amazing selection of gadgets (and ALL of which I have either used or loaned out),  I am probably the best equipped PCV in this group.  Thanks guys – I love you.

Work is beginning slowly and big wigs from Comic Relief are getting a dog-and-pony show today, so I’ll meet them.  Getting a PCV here is a huge deal as we have to be requested and a lot of vetting (theoretically) goes on before we are assigned.    That’s it.  Off to cut my hair and get presentable.

Thanks again to all of you who provided entertainment and goodies.  Now that I am somewhat settled and have the occasional jolt of electricity I plan to avail myself of a little escapist activity.

The post Arrival: the Land of Red Dust appeared first on Nancy Wesson Consulting.

We also appreciate this belatedly as we hurl down roads and swerve around “slow” traffic announcing the driver’s intention with much honking of horns. Relieved that we are entering flat country where – ay least – we cannot fall off the mountain, we are soon dis-abused of this false sense of security when we pass an 18 wheeler that has just jack-knifed left and tumbled off the cliff  before crossing the bridge over the NILE!!  

Yes – it is a trip to realize one is crossing the Nile that every child has grown up learning about in history and geography class.  It is a raging white water river in this part of the world and explains why white water rafting is big sport here. The danger in white water rafting is not what you’d expect – is getting Shistomosiasis. Don’t think I spelled that right, but spelling aside, Shisto is the disease caused by the little worms that get inside you flesh and wreak havoc on the liver and other body organs.   I think I will bypass rafting…

Onward to Gulu, which we have been told is a lovely little town.  One must put on the Uganda lenses to hold this view.  It is filthy by US standards and although the countryside is lush, there is little else around to lessen the feeling of despair when one enters.  Although some of the roads are paved, nowhere in Uganda is any evidence of the concept of cleaning up trash or just not throwing it wherever the urge strikes.  There are Boda-Bodas, some cars (mostly those owned by the hundreds of NGO’s here) bicycles, people, critters, hand-hauled carts, etc.

If you can look past that you see an amazingly industrious people, carving out commerce and life in every parch of land, every square inch of available space and every moment.  

This market (right) and the ingenuity of this mobile-carwash pictured below stand in stark contrast to the open dump.

The Acholi people are just emerging from 25 years of war and the NGOs rushed in to assist three entire generations who have known nothing but life in war camps.  Once released, most could not return to family land as there was no family left to locate said land.  Children born in war camps gave birth to and raised other children in those same camps.  So society is being rebuilt, education is re-starting from the ground up, and trauma being addressed in a million different ways.

That’s the landscape.  I’m working with an NGO called LABE: Literacy and Basic Adult Education, aimed at bringing education to the villages – mud huts with thatched roofs housing about 5 – 10 people per hut.  (When these programs are started in one of these communities, it doesn’t take long before there are 140 learners, flooding in from surrounding areas, to learn to read and write their native tongue sitting under a tree in the dirt.  In the rainy season, school is displaced by – rain, lightening, and crop demands.)  In direct contrast to the larger towns, these hut compounds are meticulously clean.  Where there is no money to buy goods and plastic, there’s no debris and the Ugandans are very clean people in their personal care.  I think it will be a great project to support and can’t wait to get started, but for the next four weeks or so, we’re back in Wakiso training.  

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