Visiting projects in Uganda and Kenya
Hi everyone, sorry for the long silence, the past few months have been very busy, with lots of interesting things going on.
In January, I was off to North Rukiga Area Development Programme (ADP) which is by the Uganda- Rwanda border. This time around, I decided to travel more efficiently.
Instead of flying from Nairobi into Entebbe and then enduring a 7 hour journey by road to the ADP, I thought I would fly into Kigali, Rwanda, and then take a bus across the border into Uganda. So started my adventure!
Rwanda
I was excited to be visiting Rwanda for the first time. I was impressed to find that Kigali is a clean and orderly city, although they drive on the wrong side of the road (the right).
The people seemed to be genuinely friendly, which was came as somewhat of a surprise to the- ever-watchful-in-case-you-might-want-to mug-me Nairobi resident.
Then came, the language surprise- although I am well aware that there are many similarities between languages of Bantu origin, I was surprised at how similar Kinyarwanda and my native language - Kikuyu were.
If I listened carefully, I found that I could understand most of the words. This made come to the following conclusion: Kinyarwanda must be Kikuyu’s long lost cousin!
North Rukiga, South Western Uganda
While nothing extraordinarily exciting happened during my visit to North Rukiga, Uganda, I did get to spend some quality time with the staff at this ADP who were currently undergoing the complex task of designing their strategy for the next five years.
This made me realise that I haven’t told you what an awesome group of incredibly dedicated, hardworking and passionate of staff we have within our ADPs.
Mutonguni, Eastern Kenya
After North Rukiga, I was off to Mutonguni, Eastern Kenya, to support an evaluation exercise to gather information on our performance on previous projects and to gather baseline information for an upcoming maternal and child health in Africa project.
During this exercise, we worked with a large team of up to 50 people. This was one of the best teams I have worked with, with each member giving their best and working effectively towards the goal.
Household visits
We visited 394 households in 200 villages in the Mutonguni area, using community health workers as the enumerators. This physically, mentally and emotionally demanding exercise is one of the most enjoyable experiences I have had to date.
Nothing beats interacting with community members in their homes, seeing first hand some of the challenges that they face.
Over and over again we would meet community members who were obviously very poor, yet they would welcome us very warmly, often giving us mangoes which were in season. Many would offer other gifts, even chickens! I was deeply humbled.
Leave Comment
Comments