It's been a while since I have blogged. I have been frantically trying to figure out what I am going to do at the nursing school.. The computer teacher has me booked in for 3 days of computer classes where I teach. That will be the blind leading the blind. She is suppose to give me a tutorial on what they are to learn in word office and word. Problem is the power is not on so there is no class and I can't be instructed either as I don't have those programs on my computer. Then I am trying to see where I can be most effective and least exposed to infections on the wards. I am trying to do Nutrition, ENT Eyes, and Pediatrics at the administrations request as they say it is a mess in Peds. Meaning children are dying from Malaria, hepatitis, pneumonia, dehydration, and worms. So, I have the books home to read up and try and understand how to stop the spread. The women here do all the work. They dig in the garden, sell the veggies, have the babies, do the house work and wait on the man that often is unemployed and won't do the woman's work and what $ she brings home for food for her own family the husband gets and drinks away. It is the way it has been in this area and if a wife leaves the husband the children are his. The men also don't get tested for AIDES and threaten there wives if they do or if there children go on anti retro viral s as then people will know that they have he disease and will be ostracized. The woman’s group that Toms works at have found strength by coming out and banding together and the group is funded for teaching reading and writing along with business skills so the women know how to handle finances. I think there are over 400 with maybe 84 of them were men.
They have a large acreage that they plant and sell the produce in. They have acquired another piece of land and have some livestock that they hope to expand to get a cow or two. They have broilers (skinniest chickens I have seen)& goats, now. The new land is down by the river. Last Saturday Tom and I went to plant a sample plot of all he seeds that I took with to see what will grow here. On our way home a man Tom had met the week before stopped him and started talking. Ugandans like to talk so I kept riding my bike to the shade and waited. After a while I called him to see if he were coming. Seems the guy that stopped him had been digging (turning the soil for a garden is what digging is ) down by the river for the witch Dr that lives next to NACWAL. A python grabbed him and was crushing him. He called to his friend and was able to bite the snake, which slowed I down but the friend ran over and cut the head off the snake. The witch Dr wanted the skin and the meat so they had skin it and were drying the skin and cooking up the meat. Tom was like, “sure you are”. So, the man takes Tom to see. He had large bruises on his arms and the skin was drying in the sun still wet. The head I guess was laying there too. So, my great thought that we could irrigate the crops that would go in on the new piece of land that is acquired near the river will not be put in place by me. I won't be the one going down there to dig... Another man here said that snakes don't like pigs so rather then cows maybe some free range pigs would be a nice addition with the skinny chickens and pure breed goats. There are a lot of Muslims here so pork is not grown with in the city limits and is not butchered in city limits either. Interesting that religious views and beliefs are important enough here that they are adhered too. My battery is almost gone so I will close. No power again in Uganda but the stars are brilliant and the malaria carrying mosquitoes are hungry.. NIGHT Marc
