Not blogging right now

Instead of blogging I have spent way to much time watching movies. When I blog it’s usually because I’ve been following world events, but when I follow world events from Prince Albert, Saskatchewan it stresses me out immensely.

• Congolese refugees are streaming into Uganda
• Somali pirates capture an oil tanker
• Protests are going on in Bangkok still
• A black man was elected President of the United States

I feel like I am sitting on the side lines and watching these events pass me by. It makes me ache and want to scream. What am I doing here?
So I don’t blog right now.
I watch movies.
But I am almost finished with the movies now and nearly have another book review finished so I will begin blogging again.

…. I hope.

Where is TIA?

I am both excited and worried.

I’m excited because it looks like the new President of the United States will be Obama. This makes me very happy – for more reasons then I can list.

I’m worried because one of my favourite blogs – TIA (short for This is Africa) has disappeared! Completely and Totally. If anyone knows what happened please let me know.

I’m excited because tomorrow I hit the road for La Ronge, an area three hours north of where I live. Myself and another reporter from the paper will be doing some reporting on issues more north of us – the so called “Northern Notebook”

African Reading Challenge: The White Masai

The White Masai
By Corinne Hofmann

Maybe I was biased from the beginning. I told my self I wouldn’t like The White Masai and then I didn’t like it. It wasn’t the story I didn’t like, it was the main character – she was just so stupid.

As a fiction – it wouldn’t have been so bad, cheesy romance where love overcomes all (but not really). But as a “true story” it makes me want to scream with frustration. It took a lot of effort to see it through and I just kept thinking how many millions Corinne Hofmann must have made capitalizing on her “love story.” It’s insane.

To begin Corinne is on vacation in Kenya when she sees a Masai that she falls deeply in love with. So after going home she breaks up with her boyfriend and returns to Kenya to hook-up with said boyfriend. She goes back to his village with him etc.

There are a few trips between Switzerland and Kenya she decides marrying him is a good plan and does so without any understanding of culture, lifestyle, local language or plans for the future.

She is unable to live like locals although she tries – can’t fill her roll in the society and ends up mooching off other people. She opens a store for a while. Then she starts getting really sick because in her attempt to be a “real Masai” she doesn’t take precautions for her decidedly not Masai body. She gets malaria and Hep C among others.

Eventually she has a baby and her husband begins to get insanely jealous and long story short she flies back to Switzerland and sends notes back to Kenya saying sorry, but I couldn’t take it anymore.

The end.

The stupid part is – with some modifications she might have been able to make it work – but she completely ignored the advice of everyone. Also if she was so determined to be the “white Masai” she probably should have acted like a Masai woman and less like a European one – that may have helped her immensely.

Sure she was in love and everything she did was for that love. But, she was so naïve it was insane and then – in the end – she markets the whole thing.

This book – while an “interesting exotic tale of love and adventure” – left me with a bad taste in my mouth.

Moving up in the news world

This is a screen grab from a moment of excitement at work when it was realized my article on breast-feeding had launched the Prince Albert Daily Herald to the main Google News Page – my photo and article and everything! Probably the first time the Daily Herald was there – kind of exciting for everyone…


And yesterday my story on the Northern Radio Telephone Service went out on the CP wire – with my name still attached to it. That is kind of a big deal!

Blog Action Day - Local Poverty

Today is Blog Action Day and the theme is poverty, a topic that is often avoided because of the immensity of it.

What comes to mind when someone tells you to think about poverty?

For most people it is the extreme poverty. The one billion people in the world who may not survive the day and every minute of everyday is a constant struggle.

In Southeast Asia I saw that kind of poverty where families lived in tin roofed and cardboard complexes that stretched for miles on undesirable real estate. In small villages, way off the beaten track, in Uganda, I saw some of that – small, dusty children, with big eyes and bigger bellies. Non governmental organizations have done a very good job keeping that kind of poverty on television and on donation request forms. And don’t get me wrong it is something that needs to end.

But, there is a more local poverty, the type most people step over on street corners in North American cities, the type some people yell “get a job” at and it is more prevalent then most people want to know.

Why don’t we want to know? Because we don’t like to think our system has failed someone. We like to think that everyone has the same opportunities and some people have wasted them. To a certain extent I even felt like that – the starving people overseas are MORE in need, and MORE deserving of help.

Then I moved from Uganda to Prince Albert and realized a lot more people overseas have more then we think and lot more people in our cities and towns have a lot less.

In Saskatchewan one in 10 households will have trouble securing enough food. In the Aboriginal community these numbers go up to one in three – if there are children in the homes the numbers go up again to nearly 44 per cent.

Can you imagine? Fourty-four per cent of families in Aboriginal communities in Saskatchewan are not sure where their next meal is coming from? Probably not everyday, but even having to make the decision paying rent or feeding your family once is too often.

It’s almost funny how easy it is for some people to explain why people in our communities don’t need help.

If I say one in three households are food insecure, someone will tell me “well their bands should be caring for them,” or something far more nasty but to that effect.

If I say “what about homeless people on the downtown eastside?” someone will tell me “they are all drug dealers or prostitutes,” like it means they don’t deserve help.

I don’t understand it. If someone needs help, they need help – it doesn’t matter if you are black, white, or Aboriginal.

If we can send money away – why can’t we support some organizations here at home? I’m not saying to stop donating overseas. But, can you imagine how the local food bank or women’s shelter feels when they see the community pull together to send money or items to save starving orphans in Mali when they cannot give a starving child here something to eat.

My solution spread the wealth. If you only have enough money to donate to one organization keep doing it – but drop by the food back with an extra package of spagetti, leave used clothing at the Salvation Army or one of the collection boxes found in most cities.

Don’t have anything to give? Never under estimate the value of volunteering. Many “soup kitchens,” food banks and housing project operate on volunteers.

And while you are serving soup you might meet some of the people you are helping. Suddenly, the person you stepped over isn’t so scary and their look of gratitude might make you stand up and tell someone else to do something.

Because, as clichéd as it sounds, we can only end poverty (at home and abroad) if we work together.

ABC

I would imagine the goal of these poster mail outs was to make people vote conservative. However, after receiving two of them in the mail – paid for by the taxpayer – it just make me think “ABC”

Anybody but Conservative.

The Bang-Bang Club: Book Review

The Bang-Bang Club
Snapshots from a Hidden War
By Greg Marinovich and Joao Silva

“Let’s go find some bang-bang”

The Bang-Bang club is a group of photographers that banded together to lessen some of the dangers of working in the townships around Johannesburg in the early 90s. The book tells the story of the four (and some of their friends on the periphery) Greg Marinovich, Joao Silva, Kevin Carter, and Ken Oosterbroek and their images. Two of those four are now dead – one shot during the last days of violent uprising in 1994, the other by his own hand after a battle with drugs, the loss of his friend, and criticism over his Pulitzer prize winning photograph caught up with him.

The Bang-Bang club talks about the biggest fear I have as a journalist and photographer. How do you rationalize what you see through the lens, when do you help, why do you do what you do?

I know this isn’t one from my originally African Reading Challenge list – but I had to recommend it! As a photographer, I liked it. As someone interested in South Africa, I liked it. It’s violent, it’s sad, but somewhere in-between is a group of adrenalin-junkie photographers who make their impact on the world. You respect them for what they do – because most of us can’t and we need to see.

US government cuts funding to condoms

The lead that arrived in my inbox two days ago -

The US government is cutting its funding for the supply of contraceptives to family planning clinics run by Marie Stopes International in Africa, alleging that it condones forced abortions in China.

MSI does some amazing work in Uganda and other countries. They play a huge role in HIV/AIDS prevention, testing and counselling in Owino Market ensuring people get access to medicines and CONDOMS.

MSI has categorically denied that it supports forced abortions or coercive sterilisation in China or anywhere else in the world, and says that the actions of the Bush government will result in more abortions in Africa, as women will be unable to get contraceptives and will end up with unwanted pregnancies.

As it turns out - at least if you listen to the group Catholics for Choice, Condoms for Life Campaign – the religious right plays a large role in influencing how USAID (and other American organizations) spends their money. On more than one occasion condoms have been pulled out of Aid packages in favour of the ABC approach to controlling HIV. I'm not saying anything about the accusations, just saying that USAID has looked for excuses for not sending condoms before this time. Funny they cut funding to condoms over abortion - that seems counter-intuitive.

If someone doesn’t believe in something that’s fine – but does that person have the right to make a life-or-death choice for someone else?

Article courtesy of Mail and Guardian (they are a great news source) and the rest can be found here.

Election Suggestion

Not that I believe in swaying the vote – I support all of you going out and making informed choices in our upcoming election – but if I was living in Saskatoon-Rosetown-Biggar I would choose Nettie Wiebe.

I first heard her speak at the annual Stapleford lecture at the University of Regina – where she spoke about food security to a packed auditorium. Here are some of the things she said back in 2005 in a lecture entitled “Who’s cooking the food system?”

• She says she believes the right to food is a basic right, putting her on one side of the International debate and she says the food system is about values, nutrition, culture, and increasingly about power.
• According to Weibe, a large part of the food system is knowing where the food is from and how far it has traveled.
• “If you are what you eat, you should know what you are eating, no?”
  
• She explained to a stunned audience that most of the food has traveled at least 2,000 – 3,000 km and that it has been packed, repacked, moved, and packed again. The human justice aspect plays a large role here.
• “You know less and less about your food the further it travels,” she said. “The less you know the less democratically involved you can be in it.”
• She says that in North America we are like those cheap toys found in dollar stores – made of 100 per cent unknown fibre. She said she thinks this is because “we have enough to eat.” Whereas 850 millions people in the world are food insecure, the politically correct term for starving.
• “We need to regain control of food at the local levels,” she said. “We need to know who we are and what we are eating.”

She knows her stuff when it comes to big phrama getting rich, ecosystem destruction, brutal human processes and money making empires. And can tell you story after story on them.
So all you in the Saskatoon-Rosetown-Biggar riding - get involved and you might have someone stand up for you.

Food Aid Changes

So according to an article in South Africa’s Mail and Guardian the United Nations is going to start buying surplus crops from low-income farmers in 21 developing countries for the World Food Programme.

Apparently 80 per cent comes from developing countries but all from traders (aka middle men) and large scale farmers (possible bad labour practices?).

The article says

"The world's poor are reeling under the impact of high food and fuel prices and buying food assistance from developing-world farmers is the right solution at the right time," said Josette Sheeran, WFP executive director, who said the Purchase for Progress scheme was a "win-win".

Win-win indeed – wonder why it took them so long to come up with this?

Charitable foundations established by Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft, and Howard Buffett, son of billionaire investor Warren Buffett, are funding the project, which targets some of the world's poorest countries, including Sierra Leone, Malawi, Ethiopia and El Salvador. It is expected that 40 000 tons of food - enough to feed to 250 000 people for a year -- will be purchased in the first year.

Right it took Bill Gates and Howard Buffett to come up with this…

The farmers will be required to form collectives and the usual UN requirements for growers to provide surety bonds, transport and packaging materials will be relaxed or waived. By selling directly to the WFP rather than to middlemen, it is expected that the farmers will receive higher-than-normal prices.

That’s great – I have nothing bad to say about it!

Although it’s entertaining because as we grow closer to the deadline for the millennium development goals it seems that us developed countries are realizing we are going to have to work at achieving them

Apparently we just can’t make goals and then sit back – we have to work for them.

I really need to read...

One of my favourite bloggers, Tumwijuke at Ugandan Insomniac posted a list of books she is embarrassed not to have read… then asks what about you.

So mine are:
Manufacturing consent by Noam Chomsky
The Weathermakers by Tim Flannery
Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
The Sacred Balance by David Suzuki
Long Walk to Freedom by Nelson Mandela

What’s yours?

No more miniskirts? Are you kidding?

Uganda’s Minister of Ethics and Integrity strikes again

From BBC

Uganda's ethics and integrity minister says miniskirts should be banned - because women wearing them distract drivers and cause traffic accidents. Full story here.

… right….

Someone please, please tell me this is kind of joke.

Oh, it's not. That's really unfortunate. As a joke its kind of funny. As the reality - its really not.

To me this sounds like an excuse followed by the plea the girl was dressed like that so she was asking for it.

I kind of thought (maybe hoped) that Ugandan society was way past that stage.

Can someone please explain to me the actual purpose of an Ethics and Integrity Minister anyway? What does he has to follow? Are their guidelines? A rule book (or two)? Because I’m not really sure if a self righteous male should really be dictating the results of his moral compass to the population at large.

Since I have been paying attention he has done the following:

• Told the Nigerian group P Square that if they sings their most famous song Do Me he would ban then from ever coming back – they sang it anyway (and it was awesome live!)
• Banned the Vagina Monologues, I’m guess because of the word vagina, and not because he is totally anti the womens' movement (although I’m sure he is).
• Banned a conference for female sex workers, who were suppose to talk about protecting themselves and being less vulnerable, they ended up traveling to Nairobi
• And now… the mini skirt ban

This is why there needs to be a separation of church from state. Just saying.

On route to somewhere

Many of you think I’m dead or got lost on route somewhere. The second one is mostly true. I don’t know where I was heading, but somewhere along the way I find myself in Prince Albert, Saskatchewan.

As I was starting to feel sorry for myself, long for a developing country, and for the types of things I would get to write about there, I realized something. So many of those issues I want to write about are here. And as soon as I stop churning out three-plus stories on SPCA walk-a-pet-a-thons and lunchtime nutrition for back to school I will delve into them.

A few observations I have made since arriving here a little over two weeks ago:

• There is more racism here then I ever saw or experienced in Uganda – EVER!
• As many as 22 per cent of the population doesn’t make enough money to feed themselves or their families
• Injection drug use is high and therefore so is HIV
• Prince Albert sits on the edge of nothingness

I’m a little more settled and a feeling much less tired so there will be more to come! And as soon as I get my library card, I will finish my African Reading Challenge books. Please don’t stop reading now that I am in Saskatchewan: you will miss lots and nothing is permanent in my life. Not even this. And I am on my way to somewhere; I'm just not sure where yet.

African Reading Challange - What is the what

What is the What
by Dave Eggers

I almost stopped reading at page 50, then again at page 100. I hated the book at page 200. It was a great read, but the story was just so horrible. Each time I decided I wouldn’t read anymore, I read more, and in the end I really like it.

It is the story of Valentino Achak Deng, he is a refugee from southern Sudan, the ethnic conflict and problems that happened before what are hearing in Darfur. In the mid-1980s he flees his village becoming one of the “lost-boys.” His journey takes him into Ethiopia, before the refugees are thrown out, then back into Sudan, and finally he ends up in a the semi-permanent refugee camp in Kenya. He dodges malaria carrying mosquitoes, gun carrying soldiers and rebels, camel riding murahaleen (militias), crocodiles that eat people and 4000 other children on the move.

I think the part I found so hard, is the same thing that made the book so good, Valentino Achak Deng’s problems didn’t end when he got to America.

The story is gripping and heartbreaking, it is filled with adventures, tragedy, triumph, and suspense. And no one knows what is the what although several times Deng comes close.

“You didn’t tell us the answer: What is the what?
My father shrugged. “We don’t know. No one knows.”

Bombs Away

I was listening to my grandmother talk about life in her village during the Second World War. She was saying how sometimes they would have to abandon their homes to hide out in the woods during bombings. That’s how her mother lost her job.

Apparently the American military was aiming for a road being created from the north of Italy straight through to Poland to help the Nazis move (whatever it was they were moving). Anyway, they missed. Instead the military hit the peanut oil factor where my Nona’s (grandmother’s) mom worked. Employment over. I understand now why they all left their homes – mistakes like that are costly for lives.

I made a typically snide remark about American Intelligence – mentioning the bombing of the Chinese Embassy in the Balkans.

"I think they make mistakes even now,” Nona said knowingly.

It seems that when it comes to bombing things from a plane things haven’t changed much drop the bomb and hope for the best.

African Reading Challange - We Wish to Inform You...

We wish to inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with our families.
by Philip Gourevitch

I had heard bits about the book, but what I was expecting was depressing accounts by Tutsi survivors from the 1994 Rwandan genocide. Instead I was surprised by this book that pulled me in telling me, yes some survivors accounts, but far more interesting what happened after, the role (or lack thereof) of the international community, and a peek at the bigger picture.

During the 1994 genocide the world at large was left in the dark about what was happening in Rwanda. Many in the media and NGO world wrote the actions of the Hutus off as “tribal conflict.” However with the subsequent migration of Hutus (both the killers and innocents) after the genocide into the Congo, the media became involved as cholera swept through the “refugee” camps. Suddenly those responsible were becoming the victims. And they were using the Aid organizations to their advantage.

“Many humanitarian Aid-Workers told me they had similarly anguished thoughts [of wanting a natural disaster to take out the refugee camps], but that didn’t stop them from settling in. It bothered them that the camp leaders might be war criminals, not refugees in any conventional sense of the world, but fugitives. It was unpleasant to hear these leaders say that the refugees would never return except as they had come, en masse, and that when they went back they would finish the job they had started with the Tutsis. And it was really disturbing that within weeks of their arrival, even before the cholera had been brought entirely under control, armed bands from the camps began waging a guerrilla war of blood cross-border raids on Rwanda. Some humanitarian agencies found the extreme politicisation and militarization of the camps so distasteful that in November 1994 they pulled out of Goma. But others eagerly filled the empty places.”

I had never heard this and Philip Gourevitch does an amazing job of interviewing everyone. It’s an opportunity to hear the story of the genocide and what happened after from all sides – victim, “criminal,” politicians – both locally and foreign, Aid workers, NGOs. It is absolutely worth the read!

One part in particular stood out to me. It is a description of genocide.

“’I hear you’re interested in genocide,’ the American said, ‘Do you know what Genocide is?’

I asked him to tell me.

‘A cheese sandwich,’ he said. ‘Write that down. Genocide is a cheese sandwich.’

I asked him how he figured that.

‘What does anyone care about a cheese sandwich?’ he said. ‘Genocide, genocide, genocide. Cheese sandwich, cheese sandwich, cheese sandwich. Who gives a shit? Crimes against humanity. Where’s humanity? Who’s humanity? You? Me? Did you see a crime committed against you? Hey, just over a million Rwandans. Did you ever hear about the Genocide convention?’

I said I had.

‘That convention,’ the American at the bar said, ‘makes a nice wrapping for a cheese sandwich.’”

The best way to sum up the book is the words of Robert Stone, an American Novelist.

“Young Philip Gourevitch brings us a report from the killing fields of Africa that makes him as a major successor to the handful of great correspondents who have risked life and safety to bring dark truths to a world reluctant to know of them. Like the greatest war reporters, he raises the human banner in hell’s mouth, the insignia of common sense, of quiet moral authority, of blessed humor. He has the mind of a scholar along with the capacity of a good novelist, and he writes like an angel. This volume establishes him as the peer of Michael Herr, Rysard Kapuscinski, and Tobias Wolff. I think there is no limit to what we may expect from him.”

And the title? It comes from a letter from a group of Tutsi and moderate Hutu that were hiding in a hospital, knowing the end was coming. They thought they may write to their mayor hoping he might help. (Turns out, he was probably behind it.) The politeness of the letter seems so out of place considering the circumstances.

Review written for the African Reading Challenge.

AIDS 2008 Day 5: The Good, Bad, and Ugly

The Good

• The current President of the International Aids Society (IAS) is Julio Montaner in his inaugural speech he called on Stephen Harper by name to step up! And even better the next IAS president is Elly Katabira, the first time an African will step into the role!!!
• Amandla Ngawethu, was the call and response of a protest calling for governments to realize that poverty played a huge role in the cycle of HIV and Aids. These Xhosa/Zulu words which originated during the anti-apartheid movement simply mean “power to the people.”

The Bad

• “HIV is a virus not a crime” New laws have been enacted in some African countries that can land those who transmit the virus (knowing or unknowingly) to someone else can end up in prison. Including in cases of Mother To Child Transmission.
  
• In the US 65 per cent of Black women make up the new infections and these women are 23 times more likely to get HIV then white women.

The Ugly

• New laws in France allow police to take down personal information including sexual orientation and HIV status of any person attending any HIV/Aids organization or event. This type of anti democratic move is the worst of its kind since World War II

AIDS 2008 Day 4: The Good, Bad, and Ugly

The Good

• Meeting up with someone I knew from Kampala. Marion. I went to KPC (Kampala Pentecostal Church) with her on Saturday afternoons! Yay mini reunions and she said she would smuggle me back in her luggage.
• ‘The eyes of the hippo.’ Greatest phrase ever – it’s the ‘tip of the iceberg’ equivalent. It’s used by all those in sub-Saharan countries who don’t know what an iceberg is.
• The highlight of today was being called a hero. Someone who has kind of followed my work since the last Aids Conference looks at everything I did and said you are like two women – part photographer and part hero. Or something to that effect.

The Bad

• Carrying bags that are too heavy, my shoulders are killing me.
• Some of the most interesting sessions are run concurrently. So you have to try being several places at once or pick one.
• All the white, male scientists who refer to “test sites” in Uganda, like it isn’t people that are trying the microbicide, PreP, or whatever.
  
  

The Ugly

• Having people use the question period as a time to vent their issues. For example, this morning at ‘To cut or not to cut: A look at Male Circumcision” a woman from the (and I kid you not) International Coalition for Genital Integrity started spouting random “facts.” And no one stopped her for nearly 5 minutes…
• More than 1.1 billion people in the world do not have access to clean water. Can you imagine?
• Getting caught in traffic and taking 2.5 hours to get from the conference centre to where I stay. It usually only takes 1 – 1.25 hours.

AIDS 2008 Day 3: The Good, Bad and Ugly

The Good:

• The African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF). Following the idea of Akina Mama wa Afrika, AWDF is run by African women for African women, meeting the needs of those groups who are dismissed by larger funding organizations.
• The Mexican torta; it’s a sandwich only better!
• Meeting up with friends and colleagues from past conferences and experiences and catching up.

The Bad:

• When it rains so hard the sound of the water hitting the roof completely drowns out the plenary speaker.

The Ugly:

• Me forgetting that the number on the signature for my e-mail is for my parents’ house. Then having someone you are trying to impress call and talk to your mom. Good news is, he thought it was hilarious.
  

AIDS 2008 Day 2: The Good, Bad and Ugly

The Good:

• Today I met Svend Robinson. For that average person that is no big deal, but I think he is a pretty cool guy. And I got through the entire conversation without any embarrassing comments, and tripping. For those of you keeping score I am two for two.
• The global village is good, really good. People from NGOs and other organization are all together creating a completely comfortable, open and safe environment. People wear whatever they want; women rights workers are interacting with youth members who have meetings with people from Latin America etc.

The Bad:

• The walk between the global village and the rest of the conference in the Centro Bannamex is 15 minutes. It’s usually fine until you are running late for the shuttle buses.

The Ugly:

• Listening to a white, female anthropologist, tell a Kenyan researcher of the impact of medical circumcision on traditional circumcision, how circumcision should be celebrated in his community. He listened politely and I nearly went insane.
• There are so many white researchers presenting papers on African issues on behalf of a group. Why am I not seeing more of the local ‘African’ or ‘Asian’ researchers?

Developing countries

I love developing countries! Mexico isn’t as good as Uganda, but it still has all the parts I love.

• Sketchy food served from vendors that have never even heard of food safe, let alone having any certification
• Men that check me out – that are my own age – that never happens in Canada.
• Buses that pick you up when you flag them down.
• People that smile at you when you are walking down the street
• Garbage on the road and rats – okay maybe I don’t love that part but its still one of the things I am prepared to deal with here instead of in Canada.

Gotta go a protest is brewing outside the media centre and I need to go check it out.

AIDS 2008 Day 1: The Good, Bad and Ugly

The Good:

• One of the seminars I attended today was satellite linked in to Durban in South Africa. It was so cool.
• Met Stephen Lewis in the hall today and didn’t freak out. I simply asked how he was, he asked how I was, I smiled then continued onto the escalator. And I didn’t trip. Life is good!

The Bad:

• Compared to some many amazing people here, I feel awfully young and inexperienced sometimes. Conferences of this size are very overwhelming.
• I was nearly run over by the Vice President of Tanzania today. I was in the way, and his security detail tried to move me, but I was completely oblivious to what was going on, and thus was stepped on.

The Ugly:

• The worst was the audience member who stood up to tell everyone that those people in the country of Africa didn’t wear condoms because they believed in witchcraft. It took the Kenyan on my right and the Nigerian on my left to stop me from killing him.
  

Stephen Harper and Bob Marley

My dislike for Stephen Harper, the Prime Minister of Canada, has been refreshed, again.

During the opening ceremony of the 17^th International Aids Conference the President of Mexico Felipe Calderón made an excellent opening speech. He wished all of the 23,000 participants of the meetings to have much success in their work among making promises to Mexicans in Spanish that seemed to thrill all the Mexicans present.

At this point I would like to mention that Stephen Harper didn’t even show his face (or send a representative with his regrets) to the 16^th International Aids Conference. Again, Harper shows himself to be a real class act.

Anyway, Bob Marley goes down as being the most quoted tonight.

Peter Piot of UNAIDS: “To quote a great Caribbean poet Bob Marley ‘Get up, Stand up, Stand up for your rights – Get up, Stand up, Don’t give up the fight.”

Denzil Douglas PM of St. Kitts and Nevis: “As Peter already did I will quote Bob Marley, ‘Lets get together and feel alright.”

This really makes me think – there are Bob Marley lyrics for everything… more to come.

The Pat Down

I have a new rule; I don’t care how cheap the flight is I am no longer flying through the USA.

Okay, in reality I will likely always pick the cheaper flight, but it makes me so cranky to clear US immigration, customs and security – especially when it is all in my own country. And I am only transferring through the US – I’m not even staying.

I’m sure the security lady could sense that I hadn’t had any tea, or breakfast, that I had been up since 4:30 am and had just walked from the other side of the airport – prime candidate for “additional screening.”

I had my bags hand searched, tested, and I was patted down.

Indeed I was patted down, in full view of everyone – it was like a massage – part of me wanted to scream and the other part of me wanted to hire her full time. Although mostly it made me feel like everyone around me was thinking “what did that girl do.”

I had to take off my shoes (with small heels) to allow the security woman to reach my shoulders. Gotta say, random extra screening does not make me feel any better about security. What was she going to find that all the extra attention from the lady holding the wand missed?

Bad journalism and my response

The road to hell is often paved with good intentions. And often, no matter the intention, people who “volunteer” in Africa do more harm than good. A big part of the harm comes from the misinformation they bring back (Middle school student is on a serious mission, Jul. 4).

After spending almost a year in Uganda I was thrilled when someone gave this article to me. That joy quickly turned to horror when I read what was written about the country I had come to see as my second home.

The very first thing to say is Uganda does not smell like body odour and garbage. In the country it smells like charcoal cooking stoves, and in the city it can smell like exhaust when you are walking down the street. Sometimes, when you are wedged in the back of a minivan (the public transport) between two people for a several hours it can be a little smelly – but I challenge anyone here to smell good after long, hot, dust-filled trips. I never found the smell of garbage unless I was standing next to a garbage truck. Despite garbage on the road and mud or dust (weather dependent) people keep themselves, their clothes, and shoes astonishingly clean.

Experiencing a country for a few days doesn’t create an understanding. One out of every two children in Uganda is not HIV positive. The HIV prevalence rate is less than 10 per cent – with most people saying it is 7.6 per cent. This is very low when compared to other sub-Saharan African countries – something Ugandans are quite proud of.

The country is beautiful and the people are known to be the most hospitable. Often families take in children whose parents have died (from HIV or otherwise) ensuring the children have a roof over their heads, and hopefully some food.

There is a lot of history and culture in Uganda. Some of it is fascinating and beautiful, but other traditions are very difficult for North Americans to understand. I don’t support some of them, but it’s up to the Ugandans to change their own society. Many of the younger generation – those who are growing up to run the country one day – find the idea of child marriage as despicable as Westerners. To simply say “if girls don’t get an education they get married off to old men that rape them,” is unfair and judgemental. It paints a horrible picture of a society that is undergoing change.

If you give a Ugandan the choice between dignity – not being stared at, their lives dissected, and judgements made – and money, they would pick dignity every time. Just as we would be angry if someone wrote horrible comments about where and how we live – so are Ugandans.

I sent this article to a friend of mine in Uganda and he asked a pretty good question. “If you think it’s so bad here, then why do you come?” He answers it too. “Most Muzungus come to make money and then they go back and say nasty things.” He is referring to the numerous groups that look at the worst parts of the society and display them as spectacle to continue to keep their organizations in business. His anger is just one voice of many.

So, you want to help? Stay home. Find someone in Uganda that you trust (an individual or a sister organization) and entrust them with the money and overseeing a project. Unless you have some specific skill set that others don’t, you are not helping and just taking the jobs away from those who need them. If you travel to paint a school, you can feel good about yourself and get to know how lucky you are. But, the cost of the plane ticket alone could have hired several locals and subsequently supported their families.

While the fundraising effort to support new schools is commendable and it’s great that students at schools around Victoria are becoming aware of global issues, this money doesn’t give North Americans licence to act superior. Spend (and donate) your money wisely, watch who you listen too, and stay here if you really want to help.

Readjustment

Readjusting to the developed world is hard.

Currently, I am job hunting and soon it will be apartment hunting. These make up two of my least favourite tasks. But, it’s 100 times harder when I keep thinking about what I left behind.

I get upset when I go out. Not because I am thinking how lucky we are here compared to how unfortunate others are. I don’t feel the urge to lecture everyone I meet (although some people get it). I am sad because all of this is becoming normal again. Too quickly the Ugandan lifestyle is disappearing.
I rarely drive on the wrong side of the world.
I forget how lucky I am to have real cheese, I just think – well of course.
I am getting used to no one staring at me.

Meh, enough of that… this makes the second whining post in a row. I will start being upbeat. In fact I am starting to read another in my African Reading Challenge – We wish to inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with our families. Wait, that’s not upbeat. Alright, after that.

Missing Uganda

Right now, I am missing Uganda a lot.
I want to get a boda boda, when I am running late and still have a few blocks from the bus stop to my meeting, but no bodas here.
I want to eat matoke and ground nut (strange, I know, but true).
I want to walk down a dirt road from the main road to my apartment with kids yelling ‘muzungu’ at me.
I want to sit in the sun with perfect strangers and discuss the day.
I want to go Café Pap, Ban Café, or 1000 Cups with my friends.
I want to go and dance – nightclubs in Canada seem to be overrun with 14-year-olds in mini skirts (for those who don’t know the drinking age in 19).
I want to sit in the Sheraton Gardens making fun of horribly dressed bridal parties getting wedding photos taken. Seriously ruffles, lace, ribbons, and beading don’t all go together.
I want to see things here that I find as interesting as things in Uganda so I can post more often. I miss posting all the time.

It’s getting bad. I can tell because I even missing load shedding – what? The power is still on? I miss sketchy broken-down taxis and even sketchier boda rides. I miss high-carb diets and random bouts of food poisoning – I haven’t been really sick in weeks. I miss having to fight with a mosquito net every night.

And in an effort to make myself feel better I read my favourite Ugandan Blogs: Scarlett Lion - Uganda, Jackfruity, Notebook: East Africa, Ugandan Insomniac, TIA (This is Africa), and Pernille’s Louder than Swahili. It doesn’t work. Now, I just miss it more, and am jealous of all the people who are still there.

I’m heading to Mexico to the International Aids Conference in two weeks. Maybe that will help.

Life on Vancouver Island

I live on an island. It is a big island by most standards, you can see it clearly on most maps, it takes nearly 10 hours to drive from end to end, and about three to drive across its thickest part.

But, it is an island.

This means aside from swimming there are two ways off.

One is to fly. A better option in my opinion as it takes 24 minutes from take-off to landing, but this is a fairly expensive option.

Option two is the boat. It is advertised as a beautiful two-hour boat trip between the island and the rest of Canada. Usually I would agree but not today. Today it is two hours on an over air-conditioned roller coaster. Seriously, I think I am going to be sick. Pitch and roll is not really how you want to spend two hours.

Charming, I still have to go back.

Happy Canada Day?

So for the first time in a couple of years I spent Canada Day in Canada. A novel concept I know...
But here's the worst part. After seeing the gong show Canada Day has become especially in downtown Victoria, I just miss Uganda more.
The excessive drinking, swearing, violence, and general icky behaviour from people of all ages, all while they sing Oh Canada, has really left a bad taste in my mouth.

So Happy Canada Day, but I miss Uganda.

Africa Reading Challenge - Mine Boy

Although I finished reading it some time ago – I have finally made time to review my first book in the Africa Reading Challenge…

Mine Boy
By Peter Abraham

Mine Boy is the story of Xuma, who comes from a village in the north to work the mines in an effort to find a better life. When he arrives in Johannesburg he is naïve, but quickly changes to adapt to the values of the underprivileged world in which he finds himself.

Leah, a tough woman who makes what money she can by selling illegal beer and avoiding capture by police, takes in Xuma and introduces him to the people who help him adjust to his new life. She is just one of many characters created by Abraham’s to show how people operate differently in that world.

Despite Xuma’s ability to adapt, he meets with obstacles and heartbreak at every turn, the woman he loves doesn’t return his affection as she wants the white person’s way of life. Someone close to Xuma dies. His job at the mine is threatened after an accident.

Through all of this Abraham is able to paint a picture of the resilience of the people who lived with constant discrimination during the apartheid regime.

Alright, I clearly suck at writing reviews so let me make a long story short. I really liked this book. To me, any good book is one I can’t put down because it pulls me in, I cry, laugh, and I am outraged. This book makes me feel all of it and despite it being fiction I come away feeling I have learned something. Therefore highly recommend it. And it’s a really short read – so you can’t go wrong.

100th Post

Apparently the last post was my 100th post. I feel like I should have something meaningful or exciting to say - I don't really, so here are a couple of photographs.

Public Health

I am a public health risk.

Last week my doctor had me submit several samples (actually I’ve never seen so many sterile containers in my life – a change from Uganda where they give you a film reel container).

We were going to find out what was wrong with me once and for all!

Results came back – I got my prescription.

Then the phone rang.

Public health was casually calling to asking me about my Campylobacter – you know where I got it, were other people at risk.

Nope, I told him he doesn’t have to worry; the people of Victoria are safe.

But, I understand the concern Campylobacter is supposed to be self limiting (that means goes away on its own). Looks like I’ve had it since January. Apparently eating raw meat in Ethiopia was a VERY bad plan.

Now, I’m on some pretty strong antibiotics for five days, and I’ll be back to normal – whatever THAT is.

Happy to be home?

“You must be glad to be home”

I respond with a weak smile.

“Are you glad to be home?”

Not really.

The truth?

I am happy to see my family. I am happy not to dial long distance to talk to my friends. But glad to be home? Not really.

After you live in a developing country something changes. And whatever it is I miss it.

Leaving Uganda...

I can't believe it, but it's true. My time in Uganda is coming to an end - very fast. In fact today. I really should start packing.

However that doesn't mean the end of the blog. Once I get home and stop crying long enough to actually be able to see my computer screen I will be posting again. A few more from Kampala, about what it's like to be home and the upcoming trip to the AIDS Conference in Mexico City.

So this is not goodbye, but see you soon.

Fish Friday

Every Friday since the end of March has involved a fish that has been grilled to perfection in a secret place with my two closest friends in Uganda.

We named it Fish Friday and it has been the site of joy, sorrow, birthdays, and celebrations.

Today I am breaking the first rule of Fish Friday – which is never to talk about Fish Friday. But, I feel the urge to share exactly how amazing a BBQ Nile perch can be!!

It comes with grilled matoke, and soda. You eat with your fingers, and it comes with the head, tail and all the fins still on.

I am not longer squimsh about eating things with eyes. In fact according to one of my friends the eyes are the best part – he also gets the ones from my fish.

This feast we keep on the down-low because it so cheap, and if word gets out, if the muzungus come the price will rise.

So each week we look forward to Friday, and this week we say goodbye. It is the last Fish Friday before I leave Uganda, and both my fish friends said it won’t be the same without me.

But for now I look forward to Friday, only two days left!

Murchison Falls

One of the reasons I have been bad with posting lately, aside from the fact I am going home soon and trying to wrap up my life here, is I was in Murchison Falls National Park.

While I could have done without the game drive – I am a bit spoilt post Serengeti – but the trip up the Nile to the bottom of the falls by boat was amazing. As was the view from the top.

After my short adventure, I have a few observations to make.

1. The hippopotamus is a huge animal. I mean absolutely massive.
2. The Nile crocodile can also grow to be huge, and I currently hold the belief that no reptile with that many teeth should be allowed to grow that big. And PS – to the boat driver, we really didn’t need to get that close
3. The Nile pushing itself through a 7m wide gorge, is very powerful, should not be tried in a barrel and is an amazing site to see.
4. Warthogs are kind of cute, when you watch them for long enough.
5. Rules in Uganda are so different than rules in North America. I was so close to the top of the falls, I would have found myself at the bottom if I had slipped – and I am a klutz.

Uganda Cranes

You win some and you loose some, and unfortunately for the Uganda Cranes they tend to lose more then they win.

But that doesn’t stop the fans.

Two weeks ago against Niger, we won and the crowd went crazy. It was a world cup qualifier and the noise was amazing.

Last week we played Benin, in Benin, and we lost – to the squirrels.

Indeed I think the Ugandan Insomniac is on to something when she said the names help. Uganda needs something tougher then the cranes, and Benin definitely needs something tougher than the squirrels.

No matter what I think of the name, the Cranes play again on Saturday, and I will be there to cheer them on.

Smarten Up...

To the people of South Africa,
Don't you remember what it was like to be mis-treated because of who you were? Why are you now doing it again?
Please stop.

Kibera

So I was in Nairobi a couple of days ago and for part of my very brief city tour I asked to see Kibera, the second largest ‘slum’ in Africa (only after Soweto).

I learned that this was where much of the violence took place during the Kenyan Crisis. They are rebuilding now, as a community, erecting new stalls in places where some were burnt down, repairing the church that was torched, and digging peace gardens in ditches that were full of the rubble.

I also learned something else. The people of Kibera were those that tore up the tracks, which stopped fuel from moving into Uganda. I was angry for a brief moment – transport during that time had been horrendous! But, then I learned why.

Museveni had sent in many Ugandan soldiers to help quell the violence and support the corrupt government. These soldiers had killed many people. Those in Kibera were just fighting back.

Suddenly the fuel doesn’t seem so expensive.

Going UP

Food prices in Uganda are climbing like crazy. Groceries in stores and the markets are getting more expensive. Children’s boarding school fees are going up – meaning fewer are attending school.

And Antonio’s Restaurant have increased the price of their breakfasts from sh 3,000 to sh 3,500.

Doesn’t sound like a lot – but that is a big, big deal.

We are definitely on the edge of a big crisis.

Not to point fingers, but I think we could maybe look at certain drug companies, who engineer genes in seeds that stop growing after one year (*cough* Monsanto *cough*) or economies that literally force the end of the ‘family farm.’

A call to the Western world, we need to stop with our wasteful habits and consume only out share or the rest of the world is going to face a very big problem.

Zanzibar

So approximately 24 hours after my mother told me the best vacation for me would be one with out my cell phone or internet access, we landed on Zanzibar.

About 8 hours after that, the power went out ... yes on the whole island.
Two days later (now) I have found a place that runs their internet cafe on generators - YAY! Internet!

Did I mention that all outgoing text messages and calls from an MTN phonecard (mine) are blocked on Zanzibar.

For two days my Mom got her wish and I was twitchy.
Feeling better now and more to come on the Spice Isle later.

On Safari

Lions and tigers and bears, Oh my! Okay, well there were no tigers or bears on the Serengeti, but there were lions, and zebras, wildebeests, giraffes, elephants, a cheetah, and a leopard.