Project: along with our FSD and TASO supervisors, Michael, Ray, Chelsea, and I decided on a project for the rest of our time in Uganda. The official title is something along the lines of “empowering HIV positive women by establishing household kitchen gardens as a source independent income.” Working alongside the Projects and Counseling departments at TASO, we will identify four or five families in the Nzizi community and facilitate the construction of a kitchen garden for each one. Kitchen gardens are an extremely beneficial addition to a household because they provide:
· Extra produce to sell in the market- this is a consistent source of income for women. When women have an income independent from their husbands, it gives them confidence and thus more authority within the household.
· Nutritious dietary supplements to the family’s meals- this is especially important for HIV positive people, as balanced diets are essential for antiretroviral success.
· A supplement to livestock feed- one plant, coriander, has been shown to increase milk production in dairy cows.
· Medicine- one type of plant is used as natural insect repellant while another is used to cure rashes.
Once the beneficiaries have been identified, the garden expert that we are working closely with will teach a workshop on how to construct and maintain a kitchen garden. It is extremely important that the beneficiaries are the ones doing most of the construction. This way, they are able to pass on their knowledge to future beneficiaries, and the project will continue to evolve, even after we leave. (Before construction even begins, the women are required to sign a contract promising to give a pre-determined portion of garden proceeds back to TASO. This money will then be used as the start-up sum for the next garden.)
In other news, Chelsea and I made the long trek to Jinja this past weekend to visit our friend Patrick. Jinja, the second largest city in Uganda, is famously known as the source of the Nile. It is one of the main tourist attractions in Uganda; people flock to the city two hours east of Kampala for some of the best white water rafting in the world, bungee jumping, beautiful waterfalls, and of course, the source of the Nile. Getting to Jinja requires a three hour taxi ride from Masaka to Kampala then switching taxis in the capital’s anarchic taxi park to get on a two hour taxi to Jinja. Ugandan taxis (which are more like large vans) are not for the faint of heart; be prepared for overcrowding, reckless driving, sudden stops, yelling, badgering taxi park vendors, on-board chickens, no air conditioning, and extremely cramped and uncomfortable seats. The “coastas,” smaller and less luxurious coach buses, are cheaper and less hectic, yet much more difficult to find and fill up. Despite our public transport adventures, we made it safely to our destination. We didn’t participate in any of the high thrill attractions Jinja has to offer; we decided before we left Masaka that we would save all that for another weekend. Instead, we walked around town and visited Bujagali falls, more a series of rapids than a waterfall, but magnificent all the same. We happened to run into a group of six girls from UNC at our hostel, so we all watched the USA England game together at a bar and restaurant called Two Friends, which turned out to be quite the muzungu hangout. We left Jinja in the afternoon, but not before I left my mark… literally. I burned my calf on a boda boda’s exhaust pipe on the way to Bujagali Falls. It’s a second-degree burn, so the doctor in Masaka prescribed me antibiotics. Anyways, it’s actually much less painful than my caterpillar wound was at this stage.
As you all know, the World Cup is now upon us! It’s really cool being in Africa for the whole thing; when Ghana won, it seems that all of Africa rejoiced. Ugandans celebrated as if it were the Cranes who defeated Serbia. I’ve been able to catch at least a few minutes of almost all the games.
Molls, What is this subversive notion of giving women more authority over their husbands???? Where did I go wrong, raising you?? Dad
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