Well its been a week since I arrived and its all be very good. The climate here is beautiful, its dusty so its quite “dull” but it’s a fresh dull not a China smoggy smelly dull. Temp in Kampala does not get beyond 30, and its relatively dry.
For my first week of training I have received as much information as I need and certainly enough to make me comfortable with my project work and the overall living and working situation.
My co-volunteer Shiobhan (Shevon) and I have also had a few adventures, funny how her extra week’s experience is so helpful. The two other volunteers that are living in Lira (and in the house I will be in) are also down in Kampala so I am getting a good idea of my placement area. I will be in a compound area with another volunteer leaving in April. The other is leaving in two weeks, so I won’t see her much. They have told me their concentration will be the north re development so I should expect to have a few new house mates during my time there.
My project specifically will concentrate on post conflict development and is structured like a western project with 4 key deliverables and 3 indicators for each. They are basic: setup resource centers for skills development (mostly agricultural), increase information sharing via technology, bring up the technology comfort of the local government employees and establish youth representative groups
My tutor for the local language Steven and I talked at length about how he has leveraged technology. If he represents how creative individuals can think about their future we will be fine. He taught himself technology and introduced the idea of using email for transfer of files (instead of putting it on disk and taxi across town). He laughed when I told him about the concept of “sneaker net” and called his “boda boda net”. Now he has his own business doing translation work he gets via email and he works at home. This is a radical idea here and one many can not understand. So if I look back on my career that puts me squarely in the early 1990’s back home. Because I started there I hope I can help them leapfrog over the limitations we had in the early days, considering the Internet only appeared in the late 90’s for business in Canada. I can understand how mysterious all of this is, but also understand the value of taking full advantage. I expect it to be overwhelming for them but considering they all use cellular technology, it might be an easier transition. The primary work in the north is brick making, iron work and agriculture,but because of the conflicts they have to rebuild the agricultural sector.
The cost of things is very low. Here they use a Ugandan Shilling, with huge bill sizes it takes some getting used to. But I am getting an idea of the value of the money and the cost of general things. 1L bottle of water – 800 shillings (.35 cdn), skirt or dress in local store 25,000 ($11 cdn). But of course I am living on just $200 month so it does not leave for luxury purchases. I will have a garden at my house, and I hear curry is common as the markets are all east asian so I can grow some of my own food and cook creatively. As well there is nothing to spend your money on in Lira, but lots of work to do. So overall it should be easy to keep in budget.
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