What makes Africa special?

I want to capture some of those tiny insignificant things that actually make Uganda and Africa special to me.

Winged invaders and their predators
In early December our land was suddenly overrun by clouds of grasshoppers. It still has large swathes of mixed grasses, their favourite haunt. Bright green, these insects were gliding in uncontrolled frenzy from one clump to another. The sky was tinged with emerald. Within minutes Akaloosa Children’s Village (private!!) was overrun by another creature in its wake – humans! All of Bulega’s inhabitants seemed to have also reached a state of frenzy and homed in to our land! In their case it was an insatiable longing ………. to eat the grasshoppers! In fact, roasted I think they are absolutely wonderful and crunchy, although admittedly it is an acquired taste! Children and parents alike were running around screaming with delight, seemingly totally unaware of their uncontrolled excitement and noise! For me it awoke memories of holidays in Brittany and the mid-afternoon descent upon the beaches by the locally holidaying Parisians, with their shrimp nets, winkle and muscle buckets. Happy memories; joyous times. Again, revolving around acquired taste - the sense of transition into adulthood as one ate and actually enjoyed the sort of things that normally only adults would be expected to eat. Two days later and our site was deserted once again … it was like waking from a dream. Why is it that such creatures evoke such amazing moments? If only we could ‘pot’ and give away free this joyous elation – the world could be made safe again.

Safari ants and their prey
The major threat to human peace and tranquillity on Akaloosa Children’s Village farm is not snakes - of which there are quite a few – but safari ants. These tiny (in fact not so tiny, come to think of it!) creatures exist in their millions, and periodically decide to safari (Swahili for ‘go on a trip’). Beware! They are everywhere! Get in their way and one will never forget it. Of course one doesn’t do it deliberately. Being brown/black, and moving in a long, thin, meandering line - only three or four ants wide – they blend beautifully into the background. And I don’t always remember to walk around intently staring at the ground! In my last incident I was helping unload sacks of chicken manure from the Hilux truck by our huge Muwafu Tree. Seconds later I was aware of creeping upwards sensation from my ankles up to my groin of myriad mandibles sinking deep into my flesh! For a man I can only say that this is the nearest thing to the ultimate in nightmares. But unfortunately this was no dream, but real! Now that I am relatively used to it (did I really say that?) I no longer strip to the underwear as an involuntary response, but have learnt the more subtle (ha!) squeezing and swatting of the clothing to the flesh with massive blows and clasping actions, whilst leaping metres into the air, hollering and screaming. The running around, leaping and gasping with pain is no doubt hugely funny to the distant viewer, but it is in such times that men bond together at a level and intensity rarely experienced, especially in Uganda!! For we alone know just how humiliating and awful it all is……

More about ants: drum beats
At other times one is walking through Akaloosa ….. and suddenly there is a shimmering, humming, hissing, rattling vibration emanating from the undergrowth all around. The first time it happened I thought I was imaging it, or that it was a rattle snake (not in Uganda!). Then I noticed that it stopped as I froze ….. and started again the moment I moved. After the fear had died down (Africa can still be a dangerous and frightening place to be alone in at times!) I peered down, having first done the safari-ant check, only to realise that the entire area was infested with millions of some other type of ant, each of which was somehow vibrating its immediate blade of grass or piece of bark or whatever else each was hanging on to. Like a thousand tiny castanets, the entire ground seemed to oscillate. Another amazing cameo act that probably no-one else notices, but for me makes this place so incredible.

Showing off ... it must be love doing its thing, babe
I must have been created with a curiosity that makes me fascinated with things that no-one else seems to note. The other day we were sitting close to the veranda under the shade of a tree, when I became aware of the most intense bird song and, out of the corner of my eye, darting movements deep in the dark green canopy of the Jack Fruit tree above. The sound was so intense that I just assumed that everyone with me was captivated by it too. But, as is often the case I alone seemed to notice! As I infinitesimally slowly shifted my position I saw the most bizarre dance taking place of a tiny male bird before his beloved! The dance consisted of vibrating his wings hundreds of times a second and then making a lunge vertically upwards towards his intended, stopping inches off her face and then shooting back down to the same twig, to start over again. This sequence took between 1 and 2 seconds each time, with perfect timing, such was its intensity. After a few minutes I could contain myself no longer. I pointed it out to one of our Ugandan ‘mothers’ sitting next to me, who was absolutely bewitched by it, almost certainly something that had taken place within her vicinity thousands of times in her life without noticing!

Signs of madness?
Only in Uganda? Crazy company names abound on shop fronts: ‘Praise the Lord Beauticians’; ‘Hallelujah Electricians’; ‘Jesus is Lord Hairdressers’; ‘Cannot Be Beaten Carpenters’; ‘Bethlehem baby clothes’; Emmanuel Pipes and Solvents’. Of course the spelling is normally wrong, but if I typed it like they write it you would be worried! However, I saw the best one the other day just by Owino Market in Kampala. I first noted the company name: “Jesus Saves”, and then realised that it had a second line that followed in the same type face and weight. In fact the whole sign read: “Jesus Saves Garments and Fabrics”!

Branding and cloning in Uganda

In our area most Ugandans pronounce an 'L' and an 'R'. So the other day I saw a cloned version of a Philipps iron under the name 'Phirips' !! Ho HO. Happy Christmas

Into Africa: Karamoja and bust!

Having recovered from the Mbarara trip I was now up for more. My dear friend Pastor Benson, aged 30, who had been living with us for the last month or so following a number of shameful actions by a Christian NGO against him (whose corruption and abuse I was trying to expose) - who had previously been employing him - had decided that he really should go back to his three churches that he had planted in Abim District of Karamoja. His reason for being so far away in Kampala (about 270 miles) was that the pastors he had trained up to run the churches took no salary and were so poor that he worked in Kampala to send their salaries back, whilst he virtually ran ‘on air’ it seemed. At least living with us he had enjoyed free accommodation and cooked meals every night, and he was looking much more healthy!

Anyway, it was an opportunity for him to move all his worldly possessions, plus Barry the cockerel, legs tied together; all were packed into the back of our Toyota Hilux single cab truck, and off we set at 5am for Karamoja. You need to understand that Karamoja is feared by Ugandans. They perceive it to be a place where men and women walk around totally naked, steal cattle, and kill wantonly - a generally nasty sort of place. Telling people that I, a mzungu, was driving there alone with a Karamojan brought reactions of blood-drained faces and sharp intakes of breath. I might as well have been sailing off the edge of the world.

In fact it was a pretty daft thing to do because the floods (which had been on the international news) had blocked the best route there and instead I had to travel the long way around, via Lira, with no guarantee that the way was open that route either.

But the truth about Karamoja, that I knew before leaving, was that there are two tribes of Karamojan, and that it is the pastoralist tribal group to the extreme NE that are indeed very warlike, naked and dangerous. Furthermore it is a poorly reported fact that the Government has been systematically trying to wipe out the Karamojan people and isolate them from any help and aid. So the propaganda machine is well oiled against them. Because the life of the Karamojan people is so dangerous, with government helicopter gunships and troops periodically attacking villages, most Karamojan families have a number of Kalashnikovs tucked away under their huts. The government is currently using this as a reason to seriously erode their freedoms.

Anyway, we travelled up the infamous Bomba Road towards the Lowero Triangle. This is described as the most major highway to the north, but in fact it is a series of huge potholes all joined up by bits of tarmac; to start off with it is an amusing challenge to find a route through at anything above 20 mph, but after a time one is so worn out that the road seems to perform a war dance before one’s eyes. The route is literally lined with broken down lorries, such is the war of attrition that the road exacts. Huge signs proudly advertise the government’s road improvement programme, and one then hits mile after mile of mud track with Everest-like speed humps every 100 metres. What they are trying to slow us down for is hard to work out since no-one is working on the road. Instead all that happens is that the mpg is halved for everyone, the vehicles’ suspension systems and chasses are slowly smashed to smithereens and the economy of Uganda spirals further downwards. It is good for the mechanics of Uganda of course.

Lowero and the triangle of land to the west is where most of the worst excesses took place during the Amin years and then during the Mbote II reign afterwards. Thousands of people disappeared. From there we turned off the Gulu road for Lira, a major town in the north. There we had a traditional Ugandan lunch. This entails being scowled at and ignored by the waiters, who try and do all they can to avoid giving customer service, and then having a choice of one meal. There is no real need for choice because it will be the same wherever you go: pocho and beans, some meat with ‘sauce’ (anything that is not meat or pure starch/carbohydrate), matoke, rice, potatoes and perhaps a vegetable. All eaten with the hands. Trying to eat sauce with the hands is a real skill and the pocho is essentially designed to be formed into a little cup between fingers and thumb on order to soak up and hold as much as possible. There are no puddings.

And then we turn off onto the main highway east to Kamaroja. See the pics. Imagine the sort of mud track that leads to broken down rented garages on a run-down British council estate, and you would be twice as good as this highway. The truck was piled high with chairs, table, and 3-piece suite, and we got stuck in mud about 2’ deep. I have learnt a rocking backwards and forward technique – aided by as many people as one can muster on a country road 100 miles from anywhere - which fortunately, and after much prayer, did get us out, since the 4-wheel drive decided to pack in. We crossed a few bridges where there was no bridge to be seen as it was covered by river, but made it through.

Karamoja appears as a line of distant hills. It is a truly magical and wonderful place. I say magical but one should probably say ‘supernatural’. The stories of witchcraft are quite extraordinary and few people reading this will believe them, so I will save them for personal encounters with you! After 10 hours travel we arrived in his village of Kiru, nestled snugly between the same long range of hills to the west and a series of huge ‘volcanic plug’ rock hills. The entire village was a series of family circles of ‘bandas’ or thatched round houses, carved into the surrounding grassland. No power, no phones, no roads, no cars, no hospitals, no Post Office, no banks, hardly even any boda boda’s!! When it gets dark, that’s it. As we drove through the long grass and entered the family circle we were greeted by the entire family doing the traditional African whooping, piercing cry with the tongue. Such excitement and celebration! The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end. There were about 30 people of all ages but 19 of them were aged under 10. Very dark-skinned and thin; there is no fat. The clothes of the children hung in tatters, and the buttons had mostly disappeared. None of the kids had underwear. But they were happy and able to celebrate virtually anything. Life is a series of opportunities to break from a weary and grinding poverty. When the harvest goes then everything goes. There are no real reserves. Life is lived on the edge. I handed over ‘Barry’ to the elder, and he was thrilled; apparently I did something right! He is alive and well and breeding furiously.

I was proudly ushered into Benson’s hut. He had built it himself and it was superb. I love vernacular buildings - they are perfectly designed for their environments. This was no exception. Such buildings cost nothing to build: the structure is made of bamboo poles, branches and trunks of trees all tied together with bark from a special tree, and covered with grass thatch - all harvested off the mountains. From the inside looking up is a beautiful radiating pattern of bamboo, circular ties, and thatch. A mud brick wall appears to hold the roof up, but closer inspection reveals that the whole thing is carried on the (naturally termite resistant) tree trunks on the perimeter and that the wall just fails to meet the roof at the eaves; instead there is a small gap which induces a draft of air all round the perimeter, cooling the interior. Benson explained that it also stops the termites climbing up the wall into the roof. The whole house is built on a raised brick plinth; the thatch roof throws water outside this plinth, thus preventing the houses flooding. Although it looked quite small outside, from the inside it was Tardis-like and quite expansive, with a beautiful hanging screen separating the sleeping area from the living area. All cooking is done centrally (by the women!) over a few stones and bundle of branches. To get in to the hut one has to bend virtually double and stoop low under the thatched eaves. I really struggled.

I was the centre of attention wherever I went. Few mzungus ever go to Karamoja and if they do they certainly don’t stay in a family hut circle and eat the local food!! But I was not only doing all that but also driving a truck everywhere with 32 people in the back of it, all singing their hearts out! This was part of the congregation of the three churches, who all came together for a glorious festive weekend with mzungu interest or affection for kids here, and they revel in it. So ‘Pastor Stephen’. I spent much of the weekend picking up and dropping off the folk from the three churches along the valley: Katabok, Abim, and Otalabar. Otalabar was a gold mining village, and the church there were wonderful people, led by the village chief, Ben, who was only about 35. But then that is ‘mature’ here, where life expectancy for men in the whole of Uganda is 49, and there it will be well below the norm. The rest of the time I had about 25 children following me around; I do love being wit African kids and men rarely show any much so that a drunk policeman came to see me one evening and asked me to pray for him to become a Christian because he had “just seen Jesus coming down he mountain (me) surrounded by children”!! HIV/AIDS is a serious problem here as there is absolutely no treatment/hospitals etc. and alcoholism is on the increase especially amongst teenagers, with the obvious ‘unsafe sex’, ‘fumble behind the bushes’ (also called rape – women have almost no rights) consequences.

Yes I did mean 34 in the truck (including inside the cab), and them all sitting on top of a mass of very knobbly firewood for the church feast, and all the cooking utensils, pots and pans etc.

Karamoja’s beauty was inspiring. Because of the rains it was lush and green, and everything looked great. The hills are spectacular due to their volcanic origins. At the end of the valley is ‘Devils Mountain’ (see photo) which is so imposing and ominous that it sent shivers down my spine. It is completely overrun, so the locals will tell you, by spirits, and anyone that goes up there goes mad or never returns. To give you a feel of the supernatural, there was a large group of ancient trees nearby it that we drove past. They are still there (most trees get cut down) because the locals have dedicated them to a snake god that lives there. They regularly go in there with goat’s meat and other oblations which are left there for the enormous snake, and various blood sacrifices are made.

The Sunday service was an extension of the rest of the weekend which consisted of almost continuous singing and dancing, led mostly by a miniscule young fellow who appeared to be double jointed and have a built in microphone in his larynx! The church they had built was a massive version of Benson’s hut, but lozenge shaped. I was the preacher, and I enjoyed the atmosphere of total acceptance and friendship. They loved the fact that I was jiving along with them and trying to sing the songs in their language. At one stage I thought that I was learning a local hymn but slowly realised that it was in English but with an extremely strong accent: ”Ay em a weeena; ay em ay weeena; or the deble no ees ay em ay weeena” (I am a winner, I am a winner, all the devil know is I am a winner).

Lunch after was under the shade of a massive mango tree: yes you’ve guessed the menu!! It was a taste of heaven to sit surrounded by such beauty and to know that I was one with these amazing, resolute and ancient people; they accepted me and wanted to share their lives with me.

The rest of the weekend I spent cooped up in Benson’s hut being grilled by the village and church elders on a range of touchy theological issues but mostly pumping me for how they could generate income and Development projects that would get the whole local economy moving. For them there was no doubt that the church had to be the catalyst for economic improvement; no-one else was going to do anything. The reason for this was that there was no other mobilised group around, because everyone had their lives totally occupied by farming and unless organised in a larger whole in this way had no time left to do anything except in December and January (dry, hot season). As always, in Uganda, it was the lack of capital that was the problem (or so they felt) and I was being asked to find someone to give them money to do this and that. I, on the other hand was trying desperately to show them that being given money was totally unsustainable and failed to deal with the real issues, which are the lack of markets, lack of co-operation and organisation, lack of education (most have never completed senior school or even junior school, although a fat lot of good either would do them in Uganda on the whole) and lack of business entrepreneurship. I am going to tell you the outcome (positive) of these discussions some time in the future.

It came time to leave. I was pretty humbled that, despite losing their g-nut (peanut if British) harvest to the rains, they gave me a huge sack of g-nuts, and a black, male goat as a farewell gift. As I drove off I was hailed and told that I was taking a woman and her baby back with me to Kampala. It turned out to be Mark’s sister (our ‘boy’ and now Cherish Uganda security guard)! So off the four of us (including goat) set. I had foolishly run out of money, and although the tank was full of diesel I knew it wouldn’t get us back. So at the first village I picked up about 15 people at a 30% fare compared with the taxi-buses as far as Lira (75 miles for about £1.50), which raised enough money to get me home and made a whole lot of people going to market very happy! So actually I had twice as much baggage as 12 people since each had about three huge sacks of maize or g-nut or sunflower seeds. Oh, and a few babies each!

It had rained solidly the previous day, on top of the already heavy flooding. I had a bad feeling about the trip, knowing as I did the track’s previous state. Over the weekend Benson had accidentally poured scalding water all over my bare foot and without any clean water or dressings and treatment it was looking very mean. I had put my boots on and hoped for the best. We got very, very badly stuck; this time the mud was up to 4’ deep! A line of lorries and trucks had been bogged down all night, and because each one normally has myriads of people on board over a hundred people had slept outside in the rain all night and were pretty fed up and very muddy. At this stage I had not yet picked up any passengers. I had 10,000UGX (£3) in my pocket and needed this as payment to get about 40 men to help push me and I wasn’t sure how many more times I was going to get stuck. The 4-wheel drive still wasn’t working. One man was being really helpful (unique) and it turned out to be a pastor and close friend of Pastor Benson. He was like a angel of mercy and , after we had all dug out a route through the mud for all the other lorries, managed to persuade the others to push me. After about a 2-hour delay we were moving again. Progress was very slow, as I soon had my 15 (or so) passengers, and I stopped before about 30 subsequent boggy patches to work out a very careful route through before even thinking of trying it. The Waldron technique, learnt from Ugandans, is to get up to maximum speed and hit the mud with everything you’ve got, hoping that pure momentum and weight will take one through. Screaming and shouting helps part the muddy waters.

After 11 hours of travel and several at standstill we arrived. My foot was in a terrible state, and it took 6 weeks to heal, using the classic ‘honey bandage’ technique……. I as told I was lucky not to be in serious trouble with my foot. But it was a great trip; it opened my eyes to so much, and to get life truly into some sort of perspective. To see what dignity there can be even with virtually nothing, and how hospitality is the number one virtue on God’s earth. Just for starters. If your soul is barren, go to Karamoja.

Pictures, from top: the main highway from Lira to Karamoja; same, a typical bridge!; first viw of Karamoja - magic; arriving in Benson's famly encampment; Benson's aunt, shelling nuts; Benson proudly showing me around!; the inside of Benson's hut; 32'nd person climbing in ...; church family; church building - free construction; Devil's mountain; being Jesus!; memorable moments - I; memroable moments - II - dancers cspecially turned out form me; memrobale moments III - life with the granary; memroable moments IV - late evening - blowing away the chaff.

Getting away from it all; the Mbarara Introduction

Having almost been here a year I really haven't seen much of Uganda. But the chance came to change all that and this and this and the next post will cover two very dramatic adventures in opposite ends of the country!

I met a carpenter called Jimmy many months ago in Entebbe, and over the ensuing time he had been selected as the 'trial' carpenter for the village project. Fin and I were invited to accompany him to his Introduction (explanation follows later). This turned out to be close to the Tanzanian border at a place called Rugaaga, SE of Mbarara. This is the Ankole tribal region, famous for its long-horned cattle. There is a huge national park here but is set aside for refugees who have been living here for up to 15 years, from Rwanda, Congo and Sudan, managed by UNHCR. Seems like an intractable situation as they have greater property rights than Ugandans and so don't want to leave ....

All I knew was that I was effectively being asked to be a musee (dignified old man) at the Introduction, which meant a position of some honour. Since his dad was dead I was sort of acting in locus parentii. An Introduction is the point at which the Ugandan 'chap' asks the parents and family of the 'chap-ess' he loves if he can marry her - a sort of engagement negotiation. Because its all down to money and gifts.

Fin wasn't able to make it; Jimmy was broken hearted at all this as I think I was less of a draw. Fin is amazingly 'people-centric' and at over 2m high is quite a sight! So I set off in our Pajero along with 8 others, which is too many for the car, especially over a journey of some 250 miles on bad roads! Still BO-assimilation is a noble virtue to pursue. We travelled over the equator for the first time, through Masaka (just under half-way) on the west side of Lake Victoria, and on to Mbarara, where we picked up the 'fixer' ("There's loads of room" I roared!) and where we stayed the night in a motel. It was at this point that I began to understand why perhaps we had been invited. Jimmy clearly didn't have the budget for he Introduction and needed us to bale him out! I paid for the evening drinks and the meal for all of us. After negotiating with the motel manager, who wanted me to pay in full before even getting into my room, and to pay room service at each step (this is rather vague statement as I would say that the steps took about 1 hour each to get to my room), and having won, I switched on the TV (the main luxury of the room) to discover that there was one channel, comprising of soap of such dire acting and story line (albeit in Lugandan) that it soon sent me to sleep. I woke to take supper. After watching the others drink my money away on 'wanagee' a local lethal brew, the supper never arrived (2 hours) and so we moved on with great disgust and went over the road where the food appeared on our plates within 5 minutes: pocho (maize flour mixed with water - the staple), beans, chicken stew, matoke (savoury mashed banana - another staple), chips, rice, potatoes, sweet potatoes. Is there enough starch here, I asked myself? Back to bed.

In the morning it became clear that the 'fixer' was very worried that Jimmy had not bought enough gifts to win over the family. Off they went to buy paraffin, a huge sack of sugar, and laods of other bits and pieces. Oh, I think I paid again!! Imagine a Pajero now with 12 people and sacks and jerrycans loaded up making the final journey through the bush on the worst tracks I had seen so far!! Close fellowship. I should talk about the 'fixer'. He has to be a man of great repute locally who is known to the bride's family well, and also a friend of the groom. It is his job to lead the negotiations and to ensure that a good case is made for the match, including an acceptable speech.

We arrived at the village. This was on top of a vast rounded hill of ginormous propertions, and where no-one (they said) had ever seen a muzungu (white person) before!! I was the centre of attention especially when we all got out and went into the local hotel (hahaha) to change into my kanzu. This is long white robe, designed to make a man look like Jesus. Why am I laughing at the word 'hotel'? You need to imagine a tiny corridor, unlit, with an earth floor, off which is a room about the size of a coffin in which there is a persons entire possessions and onto which I step to change. Oh and there is no door and a queue of people stare at my semi naked and virulently white body......

So off we go to the house to the Introduction. Except that we are now very late and we take a wrong turn somewhere in the midst of sea of scrubland. I say 'turn' dear reader, because I don't mean 'take another road'. I mean that there are tracks about as wide as a a boda boda could ride on through thickets and scrub, miles from anywhere, which they are enthusiastically encouraging me to drive along, winding between trees about 3' apart. We are totally lost.

Eventually we find a house belonging to the uncle of the bride but are told that if we continue we will come in via the 'back door' and 'kitchen'. The mind boggles; how can there be qback door inthe middle of the bush? . We are directed back around another circuitous route and finally (trumpets) get to a place where we are screamed at to back up as it is a rule that you are not allowed within sight of an Introduction venue until they give consent. And it is also rule that you have to wait an age just to test your resolve, even if you are hours late (which we were).

Immediately an intense debate started to take place between all the male members (except me) on the track where we had parked in view of the banners and festivities. It seemed that every possible problem or objection that the bride’s (Beatrice) family might raise was being covered by some sort of strategy. Copious notes were being made on paper. Jimmy was sweating buckets. I tried to pull him away to look at the scenery and have a joke or two, but suddenly we were being invited to the gathering, and within a few seconds we were entering the decorated area and sitting down at a row of seats facing about 60 of the family’s friends across a table with a cake and decorations on it. As always in Uganda there was an MC with a dreadful PA system which crackled, whistled and hissed and was far too loud. He loved his own voice (being the local headmaster) and bossing everyone around and cracking interminable jokes about the mzungu (me) there in my kanzu. In-between music of all types was played, from Abide With Me to the latest Ugandan disco-reggae number. What a racket echoed down the valley.

Ugandan ceremonies are very formal; formal, protracted and tedious! Because we were late they apparently had cut down the ceremony but boy it was still long! Firstly the ‘fixer’ did a speech introducing everyone, during which various key people for the bride’s side came and went down our line shaking our hands; the women kneel as they do so. I do so approve!! Next the ‘arranging aunt’ did a brief speech ‘giving away’ Beatrice; strangely in Uganda it is the aunt and not the mother that conducts most of the ‘rites of passage’ events for a girl. Aunts and uncles are very mportant here. Then another speech is given in which the ‘fixer’ sets out the offer to the bride’s family. He and the family elders plus the musees from our side (they didn’t invite me!!) go out to haggle and barter. This took ages and in the end the family decided that they needed more paraffin and I was duly asked to stump up the cash for this! During this time I was invited out to say a few words; as I said many had never seen a mzungu before, so I was quite a novelty.

The match agreed a game is played where various women of all ages, from ancients to children, come out in procession pretending to be the bride, and the groom has to reject them all and ensure that he selects the right one. Finally the bride comes out with her splendid retinue and proceeds to pin a flower on the lapel of her fiancée, to prove that she knows which one he is also. In our case this was a flashing electric pom pom flower which was quite excessive and gross in my opinion.

The next sequence of events was a preach by the local minister, followed by hands being laid on them and a simple blessing and dedication of their lives during which rings were exchanged.

At this stage, feeling very faint, we were at last invited to go out and eat a meal! Sighs of relief. Great meal consisting of goat stew, beef stew, goat liver and kidneys (this is a delicacy and treat and meant to prove that the goat has been specially slain for the event, or summat). All served up with the normal matoke, posho, rice, sweet potatoes, various vegetables, plus millet porridge/bread (a sort of gritty mush that is very sticky - like dough).

Having filled our tums, there was a huge palaver about the bride- Beatrice - cooking the last meal for her eldest brother and family, and she and he cut a big cake that she has made (not) and dish it out together to everyone there, starting with us lot, then their parents and close relatives, then everyone else.

Final speeches and lo! It was time to go. We wended our way back through the wilderness and it was now getting dark. They all wanted me to drive back to Kampala (we would have arrived at about 3am) but I was driving a car of 12 people and was in incredibly tired and knew that I would probably never see my family again if I did! So muggings paid for everyone to stay in the same motel in Mbarara another night (plus a meal), and the nest morning we drove back in a leisurely fashion to Kampala, stopping at the equator for photos, and just after Masaka by the Lake to buy very cheap and fresh (alive) Tilapia (fish). These were strung to the radiator in the normal fashion; everyone you pass has Tilapia across their grilles!

The whole weekend had been a quite unique and extraordinary adventure. How the other half lives! And had cost me about £150, which for us is a fortune!! The relatives all solemnly promised to pay me back but one learns here that it is more about effect than substance, and in the end, a week later, Jimmy and Beatrice came round with a live cockerel in a plastic carrier bag and a big and very heartfelt ‘thank you’! But I put it all down to a very rewarding educational experience!! I named the cockerel ‘Barry’ (after Mbarara) and he spent the next 3 weeks waking us up at some ungodly hour because I wasn’t allowed by the rest of he house to serve him up for a meal - which was specific the purpose of the gift. Oh well. Read on ….

Photos from top: Standing in East and West one small step ......; what children look like when they see their first white man; all the 'musees' in their 'kanzus'; rehearsing the questions and agreeing the strategy; Jimmy - sweat pouring off his brow - will his offer be good enough?; the bride and her retinue; pinning the flower on the right man; getting the cake; the most beautiful girl there; hands laid on for the blessing; Barry the coskerel from Mbarara.

The Garuga Road: almost home!!

It was an odd feeling to return from the UK to find so much accomplished without me! Humbling, and yet encouraging that we are a team and that the intensive planning had paid off. Now it is the beginning of September, the month when the autumn rains should begin, and we saw the roof go on the first house and our first crop - beans - gathered, threshed and winnowed. Our yield, on very poor sandy soil at the bottom of the site, and without any manure or fertiliser, was about 800kg/hectare - which is the standard yield in Uganda on a soil containing 8kg of nitrogen/hectare - which we certainly don't have. I watched the threshing by the local women, using large poles cut from trees on our land on a huge canvas we spread on the ground, with great emotion; to see 167kg of beans from 10kg sown - 17 beans per plant - was unexpected as I quite anticipated a much lower yield. The net value of the harvest was about £59 and I mused that this tiny harvest had created about 15 person-days employment within the local village over a period of about 90 days on about 3/4 acre. It may be a small number but it is a ripple across a very flat pond, and it will gather momentum.


The whole of the farmed land is now laden with produce. The maize in places is towering over 2.5m high. The sweet potatoes leaves are pouring like green lava over the mounds. Cassava, intercropped with more beans, is spreading like a miniature jungle obliterating the reddish soil.

We were having terrible trouble with monkeys (Vervets) who were stripping the maize nearest the forest rim of its cobs, and so we bought two male puppies for Mark, our Karamojan guard to train up to see them off. After 3 weeks of this trouble (3 times a day), we also sent out a prayer request to our supporters and within 24 hours the monkeys mysteriously vanished - the local people had no explanation at all! It is a salutary reminder that God has a deep interest in fruitfulness and the balance of His natural world and man's husbandry.



And at the same time the roof finally went on to the first of the three houses on site! It made a huge difference - to feel enclosed AND sheltered from the sun and rain. What was thrilling was the coolness within, despite my decision not to include a ceiling. I had argued that the design elements of significant cross-ventilation, high roof, and the huge overhanging eaves preventing the sun striking the walls, would all combine to remove the need for a ceiling, but it is always slightly scary for an architect when the theory comes to be tested. But at the same time the large windows let in a very significant level of light and allowed great views out, which I was determined to achieve.


The three housesare higgledy-piggledy and fit between the existing trees, following the contour of the land. So many of the NGO schemes are in serried ranks, as well as trying to aspire to some sort of colonial architecture. I feel that what is needed is simple design, using the materials that the local people know how to work with and with which they feel comfortable. I don't want the children and mothers feeling as if they are living in some sort of institutional design-statement. The focus should be a natural family life in simple but well thought-out surroundings where we don't fight nature and the culture but work with it.


One of the most exciting aspects of our work is to see how early we can involve Ugandans in what we are doing and to start handing over our roles to them. I believe that it is daft to suggest that Westerners are 'better than Ugandans' . What I believe is true is that we have been raised with an amazingly privileged education and training. We have hundreds of years of democracy and good government and systems of justice , bureaucracy and so on. We are also fortunate to have been brought up in a country where, generally, there is equal opportunity and access to work and positions not based on corruption and 'who one's father knows', but on real ability. I believe that we need to spend intense, quality time with Ugandans to help them to get the benefit of this from our lives and way of tackling things, whilst at the time time we learn humbly to 'walk with them' and learn about how Ugandans have managed to cope without these things. So right now we are working with a young man called Sam, a construction manager, to get him on board and to take on the task of managing the Ugandan construction teams on site. At the same time to work with us on transferring our ideas into reality in the best way in this set up. It seems to be going well for all of us.


Photos from top: The first fruits - the first bean shell to be split; The women surveying the bean harvest prior to threshing and winnowing; our sweet potatoes; the latest progress on our houses; 245kg on a boda boda - the drivers, Fins and my combined weights!!

The Garuga Road: the road back home

Looking back on the last entry it seems extraordinary that I should have had such fears about my return. As it turned out people were very happy to talk about - and listen to - stories of Uganda and 'Cherish'. Money stretched to meet the needs, people were very generous to us; some gave us free hospitality, others financial gifts. A HUGE thank you to all who shared their lives and homes with us, especially my mother - Jo, my brother and sister in law - Alastair and Stella (what food!!), Julian and Elspeth Phillips, Jane Mann (amazing woman!), Rick and Bev Murrill (barbecue kings and our special leaders), sister and brother in law Rachel and Andrew, Richard and Fliss 'the Dons', Derek and Jackie Wood, and Sue Mitchell (prophetic landlady extraordinaire).

Above all I was very encouraged at the responses to my presentations in churchs and other groups. On every occasion people came up overwhelmingly positive about the content and message, as well as endorsing the aims and 'design' of Cherish Uganda. Many offered to help in all sorts of ways; from marketing, to researching, to coming out and working on the project.

It was so good to see our wonderful children, and our first grandchild- Ephraim (pronouned Efram) Ulrik, Burnham Waldron, born to Simon and Kamilla on the day I landed in the UK - 25th May! I had predicted months before that my grandchild would not wish to be born until my feet touched down in the UK, and 1.5 hours after I landed Kamilla went into labour, 10 days late .....

Hannah graduated from Brighton University in Illustration, with a 1st class honours and won the Illustration Prize, which was not a 'goody bag' like the others, but a cheque for £1,000!

Mixed with the joys was the sadness of Luigia, Sandy's mother's death on 5th July after a long and gut-wrenching fight with Parkinson's Disease. The Italian side of our family has become one of the most precious dimensions of our life via Sandy's mother, who was born in San Gimignano, Tuscany (famous hilltop town of lavish towers) and grew up in Sorrento - surely two of the most romantic and lovely places on earth?! The thanksgiving service for her life was a celebration of all she represented to us.

Getting back to Uganda proved harder. We were refused travel at Heathrow due to rules that say airlines cannot allow single flights into countries where there is no visa in the passport, and we did not have the paperwork from our team in Uganda proving that visas had been granted. In the end we had to pay fines and fly two days later , with Business Class from Dubai due to there being no economy seats until the end of August. It was my first taste of luxury in the air, but the cost .........

We had a great welcome back. Wow! Overwhelming! I couldn't work out why because when I got to the land everyone seems to have done very well without me! As I write this (6th August) two houses for the orphans are up to eaves beam level and the third's foundation is about to be cast.

14,000 or so bricks have been made on our site with the huge resulting hole to become our main irrigation reservoir (served by the 'grey water' from the houses and the rainwater run-off from the site road and land.

6 acres of land are now under cultivation, with beans ready for harvest. Maize, cassava, and sweet potatoes are coming up along with areas of forage made up of Napier Grass, Mucuna (a climbing legume of the bean family) and Calliandra - a legumous shrub great for forming hedges and stabilising soil. Leucaena, another leguminous fodder/stabilising shrub, is growing away.

Thanks Fin, Chris - and Harriet (Kulika Trust's project manager). Thanks, too, to Yusuf and Olivia, along with Mark, Paul, Rose M, Rose B, Margaret and Oboth for all the work on the land.

Rachel Parsons, the childcare manager and her team had appointed our first three 'house mothers', working closely with Watoto Homes (http://www.watoto.com/) who did an amazingly generous thing in training them and letting us take the pick of the team. They also helped ius in an extraordinaty way in helping us select our first Social Worker - Margaret - who started work today.

So I feel blest. Its great to know that a team can manage without you and still want you back. OK there are problems - it's not all good news: we have serious problems with termites, local villagers chicken and pigs, monkeys and squirrels - all eating our crops, and the maize that we bought (from a very reputable supplier) had Maize Streak Virus. We are behind programme on the houses albeit the contractor, Buster, is catching up. We have yet to build and test our 'rocket' oven. But I am inspired by this place and the Ugandan people.

Within a month or so we are going to be housing and caring for children who would otherwise have no future. We will be travelling a path for the first time in Uganda - with many watching to see where it leads. It seems so precarious - we are so few and have such tiny resources. We are such novices in this arena. But we have an amazing Heavenly Father who somehow takes clay such as us and moulds something that contain precious gold. It's a privilege. There is so little that I have to offer and yet Uganda is being changed by this little, and others are being inspired to make a difference to this mad mad world.

Photos (from top): Ephraim; Hannah and I at graduation;San Gimignano; Sorrento; the first house a week ago; 12,000 bricks in the making; sweet potatoes on site; Harriet surveying the maize and beans; the first harvest - a bean pod is opened!; Fin in the hole where the bricks came from - soon to be an irrigation reservoir

The Garuga Road: preparing to leave

As I prepare to return to the UK for my first ‘furlough’ and to be reunited with my wife (who had to leave a few weeks ago)and family, I am surprised at some of the thoughts I am having.

I am actually worrying about driving on UK roads! Me!!

I am concerned that people will be disinterested in what we have been doing and will find stories of Uganda boring. I will have little else to talk about.

I am worried about culture shock. I was away in Iran 4 months (this gap has been 5½ months) and found it hard upon my return, but I consider Uganda my home now and I think that trying to cope with the culture and conversation of the UK may be challenging.

I am worried about being able to afford living in the UK as our support will not go up to match the increased cost of living.

I am concerned that we may not find anyone else to help support us and the work that we are doing.

I am concerned that I am worrying too much …..!!

(Photos from top: Napier Grass (Elephant Grass) stems ready for planting; with poughed land ready in background; buying the calliandra at the National Forestry Centre, Mukono; Jusef planting the grass; shoebills)

As the photos show, the last few weeks have been so encouraging. Activity has been intense on site and it is transformed. Yesterday was an historic one; we planted our first crop, albeit just Napier (‘Elephant’) Grass. This is one of the three elements of our forage for pigs and cattle. The other two plants that will be intercropped will be calliandra and mucuna, which are rich leguminous forage plants which will help provide the most rich and healthy diet possible for our animals. The three grow together and can be cut and grow back again endlessly. I really can’t wait.

Today, Saturday 19th May, I watched as the land was being prepared for the first house to be built; unfortunately two small trees have to be taken out but we have replacements – orange and mango. We have had very heavy rain all week and the site is still drying out from intense flooding. This is exactly what Uganda needed but it has delayed work and made getting the estate road preparation impossible.

As usual today I woke up to the sound of the two ‘Sacred Ibises’ perched on the chimney behind me shrieking in harmony at 6.30am. It is the most raucous, noisy sound in the animal world. Why are they called Sacred?! (I think I have asked you this question before). This week working on the site has meant that I have seen loads of new birds and a tiny yellow tree frog with black spots. Today I went with my sister and her family to Entebbe Zoo and was enthralled by the three Shoebills there. They have to be the weirdest birds in the world! They look prehistoric and completely mad; they stand so seriously, often on one leg, like scientists or mad professors, and slowly lower their heads to the ground shaking them side to side as if to say, “These humans just don’t understand the depths of true knowledge; does ego posit itself?”. Then in unison they snap their beaks together like huge castanets in a laborious dance of the ages. It’s hard not to giggle.

We continue to meet others working in Uganda amongst orphans and children in need, or in the medical field. Each time we find our project ‘design’ and concept being welcomed and greeted with zest and enthusiasm; we realise increasingly that God truly has helped us to get it right thus far. Being groundbreakers, pioneers and innovators is tricky stuff, believe me! Generally we are the first to ever go down this road and of course we haven’t done anything very tangible yet! But we spend huge amounts of time ‘dry-running’ the plans together, and checking out with experts and local people the ‘fit’ of our ideas. I know I have said this before as well, but the last thing that is needed here is simple ideas. The reasons behind poverty, orphan living and lack of opportunity are many and varied (as my history teacher used to say). The solution has to be one that seeks to address a whole string of problems otherwise all that is happening is that the problem is being ‘shifted downstream’. Kids need education, and then vocational training, but they also need a disciplined life that fits with existing culture, and a change of mindset to one where they think in a new way. Ugandans, as with most people in the developing world, are taught ‘by wrote’ here and are not encouraged to solve problems, challenge data, think laterally, find successful strategies, plan for the more distant future, look at resources and how they match expectations, etc etc. The result in the leadership and management of the country is mind-blowingly awful. If we fail to address this within Cherish Uganda then we will have totally failed. Ugandans cannot continue to be spat out at the end of an education process full of knowledge but almost incapable of using it to make a difference.

I am disappointed that I seem unable to convince friends back home of the need out here and to trust me that they can invest in Uganda a way that will bring eternal rewards and huge change for fairly paltry sums. Then I remember how many times I probably walked away from similar appeals. I am seriously trying to raise the £10,000 needed to build the piggery, and a further £20,000 to build each further house for 8 children. I was able to get one (wonderful) person to contribute to Grace’s last year of education, but it still fell short of what was needed, and Sandy and I felt that we had to respond ourselves. But living here teaches me that it is better to give than receive and I was never really happy with the wealth that we had (comparatively speaking). The imbalances in the world are hideous and obscene. Pornographic. What is it that we in the West think that there is left to find in our search for ‘self–fulfilment and self-realisation’? Navel gazing is a good description. But there are signs that more and more people are fed up with the lifestyle of consumerism …..

I am sounding self-righteous. In my heart I know that I am still addicted to things and that I struggle to get over thoughts that are ungracious about Ugandans and so on. I hope that this summer as I return I might find a seam of grace to tap into so that what I share enlightens and releases and doesn’t bind-up and bore.

(Photos: the land just after ploughing: giving Kigo prison manurte freedom - inmates looking on; manure enjoying freedom - on the land; matooke holes ready for manure and planting)