Not much has happened...

Not much has happened since I last blogged, so I’ve written mainly about things I’ve missed out in the past.

I haven’t written about discipline here yet I don’t think, and it is an important part of my experience so I’ll describe it a little. Children are hit with a stick fairly regularly. From what I’ve heard from past volunteers it is not nearly as bad as it was, but still shocking to see. A few days ago I walked into P1’s classroom, and the teacher was caning three children. I think my face showed my distaste because she stopped and came over to me where I was standing in the doorway. I asked what the children had done, and by the sound of it they had just been unable to answer a question. They were all in the back row which was probably one of the problems – it is obvious when you’re both teaching from the front and observing from the back that the back rows often don’t take part in the repeat after me parts of the lesson, which is most of it. I told the teacher I wouldn’t come in if she used the stick because I thought the practice was horrible and pointless, and she (miraculously?) said she’d never do it again. I said ok, and took the stick off her. I have the stick in my room, and have tried it out on myself and it really hurts! Later that day in the same classroom I confiscated a stick from a girl who was using it on a classmate of hers. I’ve also watched and then stopped a girl being chased by a teacher (who turned out to be her mother) and then beaten for not wanting to go and get her lunch. The same teacher has beaten and hit kids whilst I’ve been teaching, but now that I’ve got upset with her about it I don’t think it will happen again – it better not. I’ve seen plenty of other children hit to varying degrees of harshness, and it never stops being upsetting.

I am very, very out of touch with what is happening in the world! There is a television at the school but it has poor reception and the news channel has little international news. Occasionally someone buys a newspaper, but they’re mainly in Luganda.

So apparently Gadaffi is dead? It has been interesting being here with all the Libya happenings as Gadaffi had close ties with Uganda and visited regularly. Apparently he was in love with a princess of one of the kingdoms or something, and there are a few of those huge poster board things with a picture of him, you know, the ones that tend to get destroyed during an uprising and the media love it so you see them everywhere. Gadaffi did something stupid every time he came, angering one minority group or another but he kept coming.

There is some discontent with the government here, and the Headmistress and Director think that after Somalia overthrows their government, there will be an uprising here if the president doesn’t change before. Museveni’s mother was from Rwanda, so during the time of political unrest in Rwanda, the government welcomed Rwandans with open arms. Luckily they are cattle herders rather than farmers so don’t compete for land with the locals, in fact the locals welcomed the milk and meat. They’ve maintained this way of life and although remained separate from the local people, until recently they got on fine. Now, Museveni has sensed the unease of the Ugandan people and has started to get worried. He knows that the Rwandans will remain loyal to him if anything happened, so has recruited them into the army and promoted them to high positions with high pay. In some areas you can see areas of grazing land with the distinctive round mud huts thatched with grass, but each hut has a big, luxurious (by local standards, not ours!) brick house next to it. As you would expect, the Ugandans are a little annoyed and resentful and the mood is tense. There have been many strikes by teachers (government schools only so I haven’t been affected) and lecturers, and plenty of anger at the corruption that accompanies the exploitation of oil that has recently been found in the western region. And inflation is a huge problem here – for example five months ago 10 tomatoes cost 100 shillings (around 2p), but now you get one tomato for 150 shillings. Sugar now costs something like five times more than it did, and some schools no longer buy sugar because it is just too expensive so the children have a diet that is really much too low in sugar. Fuel has gone up too, and the Director, who is a Headteacher at a government school 2 hours away, can only afford to come home once a week, and that is at a push.

I’m writing this at the hostel I mentioned before – Masaka Backpackers. I am the only person staying here which is sad but I’ve had a good day. This morning I taught my last normal lesson. The children have end of year exams from tomorrow, so no teaching. After exams they have a few days of hanging around the school being bored before being sent home for the holidays, so I’ll do some intensive IT/library teaching then – assuming it is sunny and the solar power can cope of course! Apparently around 10 children will be left behind at the school – the ones who have no family, or their family cannot support them. I plan to do some creative, fun things with them which will be good, if only because of the small number! I also plan to go to Murchison Falls National Park, in the north west, for more safari-ing.

It was pouring with rain when I was ready to leave the school this morning, but got a little better by the time I’d found a boda to take me to the matatu (minibus-taxi) stage to go to Masaka. The matatu was almost empty, but we carried on to Masaka anyway – it felt luxurious! The main aim of the trip was to get out money from an ATM, and good old Barclays made it a successful trip (very relieved!). I then went to the café I took Teacher Enock to a while back, and had a delicious lunch (pancake with guacamole and salad, cinnamon rolls) and took advantage of their free wifi. I’ve just finished my supper at Backpackers – spaghetti with vegetable sauce, and even some slices of cheese! It was really good, miles better than the spaghetti (‘macron’) back at school. The atmosphere here is very friendly, all the staff welcomed me when I arrived and are very helpful. The downside is that there are a lot of mosquitoes, I’d only seen about three (I’m as surprised as you are, I have had more than three bites though) before this evening and I’ve seen and heard plenty now! I think I’ll retreat to bed and the mosquito net fairly soon. Tomorrow I’ll do a bit of shopping and use the internet a little more, and then get a matatu back to Kyotera. Another nice break from life at the school.