It’s all relative
Another Ugandan blog about power disconnection – but this time a solution!
Umeme – our electricity suppler – have arrived to cut us off, which means both my home and my office are without power.
We rang the office to see what the problem is but were told we’d have to go in person to sort the matter out. Great. All other work has to be put on hold for the day.
‘Come now’ the guy said.
Electricity disconnection again (thanks to a previous tenant!) More previous wasted days…
Patrick and I jumped straight into the car, he to do the smooth talking, me to be the ‘mzungu back-up’ if that’s going to help move things along (unfortunately it often does).
Half an hour drive to the office. By the time we arrive, our contact has gone to the hospital!
We sit in one office for a while. Then we’re told to go and sit in another office. People are sitting around reading the paper and chatting but this turns out to be just a queue waiting to join the queue in the next office.
So we wait our turn. We’ve rushed to get here and there’s no sign of any drinking water available. It’s hot. We dutifully wait and shuffle into the next room.
We’re seen by someone who then tells us we were actually supposed to have been seen by the young lady in the previous office. We file out again, bored and frustrated.
Patrick gets chatting to the young lady – and lo and behold she is one of Patrick’s relatives – I should have known! A quick catch-up on family news and our electricity is reconnected.
That’s the funny thing about Uganda: an event happens out of the blue that lays waste to your whole day’s plans. You run around in a frustration trying to rectify it, usually to no avail. And then, when you’ve given up trying, out of nowhere a solution suddenly appears! And it’s usually in the form of a relative!
Count yourself lucky
This week we’ve been busy: straining to glimpse African Presidents flying overhead in their Chinooks and swerving off the road as the Presidential motorcades plough past, to and from the African Union meetings being held in Kampala. It makes me sick to think I might be breathing the same air as Robert Mugabe.
A girls’ best friend. Having my first dog Baldrick has made adjusting to my new life easier
I feel like chicken tonight. boda chickens Kampala
BUT IT’S NOT ALL BAD NEWS
Dung beetles rock. Lake Mburo Uganda
Cholera outbreak in Namuwongo
It’s been raining heavily all day.
The gutter is falling off the front of the house (not that the landlord cares) and Eva has a polo neck jumper on “It’s so COLD!” she says, while I sit here in the same light clothes and sandals I always wear.
Rain here is both a blessing and a curse.
Uganda is a fantastically green and lush country. The two rainy seasons mean that many people (98% of the country are subsistence farmers) can plant and harvest twice a year.
The rain often follows an intensely hot day and is the perfect antidote for the very fine red dust which inevitably gets into everything. People somehow arrive at work spotless, years of practice tiptoeing round puddles.
The roads below Mount Elgon were so muddy, we almost had to abort the hike! Even the 4×4 needed a push!
But the downside to the heavy rain is the havoc so much water can play: soil erosion leading to poor crop yields / increase pressure on forested areas, destruction of roads (few have tarmac), dangerous driving conditions, inability to travel and therefore the knock-on effect on education and successful running of businesses. If it rains, everyone’s very late for work, you can depend on it.
The biggest infrastructure investment this country appears to boast of is the drainage channels than border the country’s roads. Some of them are quite posh! But many of them are de facto garbage tips (no such thing as Municipal Garbage collection here). People wee in them: men stand up and aim from up high, women climb in and crouch. Recently I saw the legs of a dead dog sticking out of a Post Office sack in a channel near my house (well I smelled it before I saw it). The funniest thing was seeing a brand new car tipped at a precarious angle, nose first into the ditch on a narrow (but fast) road.
But today’s worry is the spread of disease: Eva reports that most of Namuwongo is closed. The Council have been ordering food vendors off the streets in an effort to crack down on a Cholera outbreak in the slum / shanty town just below my house on the marshes. Eight people have died from Cholera this week.
The heavy rain has poured down the hill into the shanty town, washing rubbish and sewage with it, no doubt flooding some houses. This area is prone to flooding, having no drainage channels or anywhere for the water to run off. Mosquitoes quickly breed in the stagnant water ready to pass on Malaria the very next day; Cholera thrives in these kinds of conditions.
Entering the slum is like going into a different world, it’s like being on a post-apocalyptic film set, a maze of narrow pathways just feet from the railway track, between houses made of strips of battered wood and rusty old corrugated iron. But it’s full of life, the kids are incredibly curious and fun. They haven’t been exposed to tourists so they’re delighted with a “Bye!” (said at a very high pitch) and a wave; they rarely ask for money (yet – give it a few years …)
Child next to open sewer of Kampala slum
It’s alarming to read that the Council now plans to demolish houses in the slum without pit latrines. As it’s a shanty town I imagine everyone’s there illegally, so what comeback will they have? This could create quite a stir. Read more here about work to improve infrastructure in Namuwongo’s shanty towns.
I forgot to buy our usual bananas for breakfast so gave Simpson money to get himself some chapatis – just hope he didn’t buy them in Nam’ this morning…
Note to mother:
Cholera is passed through water and human contact. I don’t eat street food and we boil and filter all our water (and frankly we don’t s**t in the street either!)
You still on for January visit?!
“The cheque’s in the post ….” apparently
How you deal with a trip to Kampala Road Post Office is a good indicator of how you’re getting to grips with life in Uganda.
My weekly disappointment. Isn’t a postbox supposed to contain letters? Postboxes at Kampala Road Post Office
Off to the Post Office in the morning to see whether I have any birthday cards (29th September). I have absolutely no illusions about getting any cards or letters (even though I know some have been posted!) Any I do receive will be a bonus with bloody bells on. Here’s how my trips to the post office go:
Kampala Road Post Office WEEK 1: slight disappointment
“Where’s the letter I’m expecting? Oh well, post must take a while to get to Uganda from the UK …”
Kampala Road Post Office WEEK 2: resigned disappointment
“VSO have told me to learn to be patient, so I must be. At least I have some post to look forward to when I come next week.”
Kampala Road Post Office WEEK 3: real disappointment
“What?! I don’t believe it. It’s taken me nearly an hour to get here and still nothing in the postbox.”
Kampala Road Post Office WEEK 4: real disappointment
“For God’s sake, this is starting to annoy me! Dad’s going to be so disappointed I haven’t received his letters.”
Kampala Road Post Office WEEK 5: frustration
“Bollocks. I forgot the post box key.”
Kampala Road Post Office WEEK 6: excitement
“I just know there’s definitely something in there for me!”
Kampala Road Post Office WEEK 7: anticipation .. followed by confusion .. followed by disappointment
“But …? Damn I should have known … oh well, it’ll turn up eventually.”
A very happy volunteer. Isla opens welcome post – and chocolate!! – sent from friends in the UK
Well I gave up checking the Kampala Road post box months ago but some tips are:
- Write URGENT: EDUCATIONAL MATERIALS on the package
- Write “with God’s speed” or similar (apparently this works!)
- Ask me when I next have someone coming over from the UK (nowhere near as much fun but success guaranteed!)
- The best mail address for me is c/o VSO (VSO staff apparently check the post box every day and I can walk up the hill to collect it rather than go into the – only – post office in town).
- OK just send me an email then!
“Not for dumping” SNIGGER. The box for incorrectly addressed mail inside Kampala Road Post Office Uganda
Birthdays often engender a bit of navel-gazing.
As I settle into my new life in Uganda, find myself asking:
- Would I have been happier living in a mud hut in the forest with no electricity and no running water?
- Do I really want to play netball ever again? A friend talked me into joining a team at a local community centre. (I was crap first time around).
- Why did I buy a tortoise?
See you soon for the answers to some of those questions.
Are you new to Uganda? Read Uganda for beginners – an introduction for new expats.
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My ‘new’ new life
A: a mzungu with a dog!
I feel I’ve been out of touch recently, suffice to say things are very definitely on the up, after a difficult couple of months. Delighted to report:
• I have a dog!
• Making headway at work & getting on really well with Patrick and Enid (office staff) and Eva (house girl). 
• Simpson (our gate boy) – who has his very own bullet point because he’s my best Ugandan friend – has started university. I’m so proud of him but I miss hearing his happy voice around the compound during the day. [PICTURED: Simpson studying outside his room]
• The knee held up! I had 50+ people round for a big BBQ and dancing till 4am this Saturday. The great thing about VSOs is they’re all happy to chip in. “Best party I’ve been to in Kampala” Jo said and she knows how to party! Jo was my dance partner at Africa Hash and we love S Club 7. We’re both over 40 and We Have No Shame.
Out of town …Kampala riots far away
It’s ever hot in Kasese as we check on the ex-poachers clearing papyrus on Lake George to make way for the new marine ranger station
I woke to the sound of birds (and possibly a baboon!) this morning at the Uganda Wildlife Authority hostel on the Mweya peninsula in Queen Elizabeth National Park. A fantastically beautiful place tho the accommodation is very basic: only 1 tap works, the curtains don’t close and there are no hangers on the rail. But boy was the bed comfy!
An 8 hr journey from Kampala – and I’d slept for 3 hours of that – but still slept like a log in Mweya.
Just killing time in an internet café in Kasese – it’s always very hot here – while we try and get in contact with the company who are transporting our converted shipping container to Kahendero on Lake George. This is the site for our latest Marine Ranger Station and last week my UCF colleague Patrick was on site overseeing a team of 25 ex-poachers cut back 1200 square metres of Hippo Grass and Papyrus (much of it 2 metres high) along the Lake edge. It’s very tough work, all done by hand, but the men were disappointed the work came to an end. There’s not much round here apart from fishing and cattle grazing (often within in the Park and therefore illegal too). The cement company Hima is a big (and controversial) local employer.
This large catfish was an unexpected bonus for the team of ex-poachers clearing the papyrus on Lake George. The fish was divided between the labourers and taken home for dinner
The villagers at Kahendero are naturally suspicious – many of them are fishing illegally (using undersize nets, fishing outside designated areas etc) – as we roll up with UWA rangers. This is essentially a subsistence community but because of their location on the Park edge, they receive 20% of Park revenues to spend on business investment, income generation and so on. Each community decides where the money is spent and this is managed by UWA who also spend time ‘sensitising’ the community on conservation issues.
Ex-poachers clearing papyrus Lake George PHOTO UCF
People have to live and we recognise many depend on the land for grazing and Lake George for fishing but it has to be done sustainably and currently it’s not. By restricting certain activities we are actually giving them more control over their futures.
Hippo footprint outside the boat station, Northern Lake George
So where is the shipping container? And what is it for?
Converted shipping containers are regularly used for storage e.g. VSO has one in their compound in Muyenga. We’ve had windows and a door fitted to ours to make a secure storage unit for the boat. This – along with a week long life-saving and boat handling training programme – equips UWA to intercept and arrest poachers on the Lake and rescue fishermen (many of whom can’t swim). Kahendero is UCF’s 5th such set-up but is strategically placed on the north of Lake George, an area of high illegal activity, so possibly the most sensitive.
About the riots…
It all kicked off yesterday in Kampala.
First msg I got when mobile network back on was from VSO Emergency number: “Riots in Kampala. Please avoid town.”
The Kabaka (King) of the Baganda tribe was advised by the government not to visit a certain area for fear of starting a fight. Govt was damned if it did interfere, damned if it didn’t – so I understand. There were demos in town and the army was called in after a policemen was killed. Several people have been injured, two (?) killed. It’s in a specific area of town (other side of the city, far from Namuwongo) in response to a particular issue so nothing to get unduly worried about.
A day in the life … species by species
Adjusting to my new life in Uganda – here’s my daily routine, one species at a time
“Greetings!” as we say in Uganda.
The view over my compound wall. Namuwongo ‘go down’ by railway Kampala
We may not have the same change of seasons here in Uganda as we do in Europe but the insects and other animal species don’t know that! They come and go in phases. If you’ve been reading my blog regularly you’ll have met:
- Mosquitoes and cockroaches – hell, but they do their own relentless thing all the year round!
- Flying ants with enormous wings
- Grasshoppers – or Nsenene – eat them or smoke them?
- Black Jumping Spiders – er… they’re black and they jump! Small and dead comical.
- Black ‘stumpy’ flies. A few millimetres long, they look like their wings have been clipped.
- Ants, o yes. And they’re still here.
- This week I’m noticing “Tim Burton’s” spiders – very thin scraggly long legs and tiny bodies. Proper name Golden Orb Spider.
Come back Ma, it only visited us once!
If you’ve ever wondered what my daily routine in Kampala is like, here we go, species by species:
My love-hate relationship with this beautiful bird was put to the test recently
I’m usually woken up by a Woodland Kingfisher …
In Uganda there are five or ten of every kind of bird… in the UK we have one species of starling and one species of kingfisher; in East Africa there are 15 types of kingfishers and 31 types of starling!
…or the ugly clack clack clack of the Hadada Ibises (Ibi?) – how can such a beautiful bird make such a bleeding racket? (And live in all that s**t come to mention it …?)
Marabou Stork, Mweya, Queen Elizabeth National Park
God forbid it’s an enormous (5ft / 1.5m) Marabou Stork flying overhead. They look so clumsy.
I throw open the curtains and out jumps a startled gecko.
Cock a doodle do… at 9 o’clock? The cockerel lives in the shanty town beyond the compound and likes to remind us VERY LOUDLY of his presence on an hourly basis.
As the day warms up a striking brown and bright blue Agama lizard wakes up and saunters along the top of the hedge. He’s ?? long, a mixture of beige and brown and the most vibrant blue. He’s a handsome fella.
Simpson killed another type of lizard (brown body with pale yellow and red belly). Simpson’s very intelligent but doesn’t know much about wildlife. He’s mad about his cows! (A pastoralist from the West, cows are a symbol of wealth and therefore highly valued). I told him off for killing the lizard. He was cornered on the toilet at the time (!) and he said he thought it was going to bite him. “Next time you come and get me” I said “and I’ll remove it for you.”
dead lizard Uganda – we nearly fell out over this one, I tell you!
As the heat of the day builds, we don’t see much other than the odd (but large and brightly coloured) dragonfly skimming past.
And when the insects get too much, I just have to remind myself that without all this food we wouldn’t have this amazing diversity of birds, one of my passions.
I do sometimes feel the Old Testament is being reenacted in my house!
That reminds me, toads (or frogs?), I often go to the sleep of them croaking very loudly after the rain.
At dusk the insects, birds and geckos reappear again. The geckos come out of their hiding spots, and stand sentry on the outside wall all night next to the security light. There are several in the house too. They TUT TUT at me loudly when I disturb them and I’m sorry that some were unwitting victims of the fumigation. They are my friends (we can forgive the fact I have black gecko droppings decorating my skirting boards!)
Not forgetting why I’m really here …
How is the muzungu managing life as a conservation volunteer?
There’s no point in pretending: I’m really behind with work and I’m not going to get it all done in the next hour it takes for Mike (UCF’s Founder) to drive from the airport.
Kati, time for a bit of blogging …
Kati is the Luganda word for so ….well .. then … etc… one of this week’s new words. Luganda is bloody difficult I don’t mind telling you. All the words are long and most of them start with K! It’s a Bantu language and so totally different from any European languages I’ve tried. Where as we would use five words to say ‘what do they call you?’ Luganda bungs the whole lot together: bakuyika?
Having an hour of tuition a week and, tho it’s hard, I have never had such a fantastic reaction when I open my mouth to say a few words: “but you’re so fluent!” people exclaim. Fact is few mzungu bother even learning the greetings (everyone speaks at least some English) and my phrases are very short! Not sure how far I’ll continue with Luganda (till VSO funding runs out probably!) but it’s a great insight.
For example, we asked how you say ‘bon appetit’ – you don’t. There is no equivalent phrase. You may enjoy your food but you just eat as much as you can! When you offer someone a biscuit, you’ll be lucky if you see the packet again – and this goes for professional people (i.e. those with money) as much as kids or wildlife rangers in the bush.
On our last field trip, I passed the biscuits around the car. I made the mistake of offering a ranger the packet (meaning he should take a couple of biscuits and pass the packet on). As he jumped out of the car, I noticed the big biscuit packet-shaped bulge in his jacket pocket ! (Rangers are on ridiculously low wages and are based in the middle of nowhere so you can’t blame them for trying it on). Even in town tho, it’s every man for himself when the food’s served and god do Ugandans pile the food on the plate.
I was offered the cutest puppy last week and still thinking about whether to have it (I have a home for it when I leave Uganda) but yesterday acquired – with VSO grant – new furniture so perhaps not a good combination! Have to do the maths and see if I can afford to feed a dog though.
Ivory poaching on the increase! How DNA is extracted from elephant dung to map ivory across Africa
Off to the field to visit the projects from Sunday. Unfortunately elephant dung is being collected without me! Had really been looking forward to the 3 day trip with the rangers across Murchison Falls National Park to collect and map elephant DNA but Patrick and I will be going to Queen Elizabeth – a ‘small’ 1978 km2 park – instead.
Very timely news on BBC yesterday saying the number of African elephants killed illegally for their ivory is rising steeply.
“Andrew Luck-Baker asks how science can stop the new upsurge in the slaughter of African elephants for the booming illegal international trade in ivory.”
You can listen to the show on the BBC here.
We are working with Dr Sam Wasser (interviewed) and it’s a superb project – to map ivory via dung analysis so poaching locations and smuggling routes can be tackled. Not only is this a great project in itself but it’s great for UCF’s profile to be associated with it.
Ants in my pants
It’s been building for a fortnight: a column of tiny black ants marching up and down the tiles behind the toilet cistern, 24 hours a day, the dotted black line slowly becoming a solid black line.
Yesterday I noticed ants on my toothbrush. This morning a big trail of them was marching up outside the house straight from underneath the drain cover – “and we all remember what was under there!”
From drain to toothbrush = NOT GOOD!
Simpson said he didn’t have any ants in his room this morning, but this evening he borrowed the ant powder. Just walked into the bathroom and there’s over a hundred of them running the length of the bath into my toiletries bag. It’s full of them, eating what: plasters? eye shadow? or cream for insect bites? (that’d be ironic!)
We’ve had everything else, now apparently it’s Ant Season! (I won’t be seeing you next July then Ana!! Ana – in Portugal – can’t stand ants).
“Michael Jackson is dead” notice on one of the many blackboards that line exterior walls of Ggaba teacher training college. Few schools have electricity / PCs / overhead projectors so trainee teachers have to practice writing with chalk on boards.
“MJ is dead.” Michael Jackson is dead. School blackboard in Ggaba, Kampala
Seems my Ugandan running career is prematurely over. My knee injury (slight tear to lateral minuscus), although not serious now, could be if I carry on running. Plans to run my first 10k in November are therefore unlikely.
- 2 months to get damp and rotten wardrobe seen to so I could unpack
- 4 months to get Outlook installed and running properly
So in scheme of things, 6 months recuperation for knee isn’t surprising … but having to deal with frustrations and delays in all areas of your life simultaneously is hard though.
Monday – Wednesday
- Colleagues both at a funeral (relative died of a snakebite, a Puff Adder. He lived in countryside near Tanzania not Kampala!)
- Luganda lesson cancelled
- Mobile network down
While the cat’s away….
While the cat’s away… the rats play…
Apparently we don’t have mice in Uganda. Ugandan mice look like English rats, only a lot smaller … (so isn’t that a mouse then?!)
God I’m glad this work week’s over. My knee injury is not improving so I’m really feeling out of shape now. RSI (painful wrists) has been killing me (but I do have some more exercises to try); I’m torn between getting my projects done and spending time ‘leading and motivating’ the team (one of who is possibly leaving anyway…)
Have been struggling for weeks to finish a report to a donor, a project I’m not totally familiar with, colleagues who don’t give me the full picture and a template I’m having difficulty using. I feel like I’m the bottleneck for everything. We can’t submit next grant applications until reports are done and I can’t ‘share my skills’ with the team until I understand what I’M supposed to be doing! I’m still working on the 6 month work plan VSO have asked me to put together. Still, here is not the place to get stressed: you try and buck the system and it’ll fight back even harder.
Did I say something about wanting a challenge? Next time shoot me!
Success here is measured in much smaller ways, whether we like it or not. Sometimes we’re just lucky to have power and/or phone and internet; to get a cheque signed (by an elusive and busy director). Other days we’re lucky if everyone’s at work; people get sick more often (especially with malaria; in many cases it can be HIV-related) and burials of (extended) family members mean days off from work are very common indeed. This may be one explanation for Ugandans’ less than brilliant planning skills! It is quite normal to have just a day’s notice for an important meeting. A friend was booked on a three day training course the night before it started.
I just hope next Monday is better than this week’s. This is a note I wrote to one of our volunteer colleagues in the UK:
“I came home from the field trip to find a quarter of my treasured olive oil had gone (no-one’s been cooking) and some of the honey gone too (you know how expensive that is here). Now I’m thinking about it, we seem to get thru sugar and instant coffee at a ridiculous rate of knots too. Finding another job advert torn up in the office bin didn’t help my mood either when I got back)….
UCF have asked me to pay for all the office tea, coffee sugar, etc, cleaning products, lightbulbs, candles etc. They pay Rose’s wages and the utility bills so it’s only fair – I just wish they’d mentioned it before now as I’d have kept a closer eye on what people are using… I’m a bit concerned about buying detergents, tea/coffee etc. It’s not a lot of money but Rose always ‘helps herself’ to these items and I cannot help but take it personally if I am the one paying for it! It is of course no better if she’s stealing from UCF but I don’t take it so personally. I stopped buying liquid detergent as I noticed she had taken half the bottle home as soon as I bought it.
Ugandan fruit and vegetables are tasty and often huge! Cheap too.
I’m happy to help Rose with unlimited matooke (green bananas) and sweet bananas (!) while she’s at work. I brought her back a pineapple from our trip but ‘helping herself’ to what I see as my personal food really puts my back up. I offered her a headache tablet last week and when I asked where the rest of the packet was, she produced it from her handbag. I said ‘I’d prefer if you ask before you take things’, she said ‘I would ask you first’. Well evidence is to the contrary isn’t it?
The good thing is having previous VSO volunteers in the UK I can let off steam to.
Off to the field
Tuesday night is market night and the drums are playing loud on the other side of the compound wall, just a few metres away.
Our friendship was sealed when I discovered he’s not afraid of cockroaches!
This week we will be:
Visiting Bukorwe Ridge Elephant Trench in Ishasha, which measures a whopping 10 km long x 2m wide x 2m deep, created to stop elephants crop raiding villages. UCF secured the funding to excavate the trenches and the community are supposed to maintain them, but they don’t really. They want money to do it and there simply isn’t any. We operate on a shoestring, their lives have been significantly improved by the trenches but commitment is very difficult. Kikarara is very rural and poor. It’s a subsistence culture. Their village has no vehicles, not even any motorbikes and the last part of our journey takes us down windy footpaths across field after field. It’s quite moving to visit somewhere so remote. The kids will go absolutely crazy when they see me, they never see mzungus.
Community sensitisation is a big part of UCF’s work, alongside the Uganda Wildlife Authority. Here on the edge of Lake George, the messages are anti-poaching (hippo) and warnings against fishing with undersized nets
Visiting UCF’s Waterways project on Lake George to decide where to locate our next ‘marine ranger station.’ UCF funds boats for UWA rangers to intercept poachers (mostly of hippo) and illegal fishermen. An added benefit to the community is that the boat has rescued people and boats in distress and even saved lives.
Two hands of bananas guide us on our Ugandan road trip
My colleague Patrick and I visited Kashaka, one of UCF’s marine ranger stations on Lake George. Here he is pictured with some of the fishermen’s children
As if all of this weren’t frustrating enough, blossoming ‘who knows what’ with Dutch hunk is put on hold!
Four months in Kampala and am I making a difference?
I’ve been in Uganda four months today
I realise I won’t be able to achieve anything like what I’d like to. I can still make an impact of course and I have already but mostly in the ‘softer issues,’ like showing Simpson (the gate boy) how to type and use email, educating Eva (the house girl) on all the sanitary uses of bleach (!) acting as a representative for the previous volunteer and his wife (handing a cash donation to Ggaba Primary School to help them build a nursery). All of these very simple things have given me an enormous amount of pleasure, perhaps because I didn’t anticipate them.
Because things have been quiet on the work project front, I haven’t had to deal with too much bureaucracy but on TV yesterday they said Uganda ranks 3rd in the world for corruption. I admit the frequent requests for money (+ jobs + sponsorship etc) do wear a bit thin. I had two schoolgirls follow me home last week, one of them insistent (in not a very nice manner) that I give her 200 shillings for sweets. (I gave her a firm ‘nedda’ – ‘no’). This persistence is quite unusual though.
The well-stocked Resource Room at the teacher training college contrasted sharply with the 20+ year old Gestetner copying machine (pictured) relied on by the primary school next door. The college uses papier mache for models and natural resources like banana leaves and lentils to make posters and teaching aids.
I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about how I am adjusting to life here and how to get the team motivated. Here’s one of the email exchanges I had with a previous volunteer who set up the finance and admin structure here. His comments are in green.
On Saturday mornings we have the house to ourselves. A breakfast of fried eggs on toast has become our ritual
“Living above the shop.” I feel very secure. Eva and Simpson look after me very well and I’m happy with the living arrangements although I was led to believe the office would be in the garage, not the house. People are generally respectful but I do find the African habit of leafing through your books and papers on your desk – or anywhere else – without asking very annoying!
Early successes – good feedback on the Trustees reports and the bid submission, improved comms with Uganda Wildlife Authority (our main partner) and the Directors – gave me false impression that it was going to be plain sailing from now on! (VSO advise you not to expect to achieve much in the first few months). Agreed. Motivating the team. To be fair, when things get busy Patrick and Enid both react but there’s very little to manage at project level currently. I try and liven them up every morning (trying out my latest Luganda word on them!) although ‘working from home’ can mean it’s hard to liven myself up some days, let alone other people. Patrick and Enid were to some extent demotivated when I arrived but I think the mood has picked up.
