Home away from Home

Last night was our last night in Mbale, so we went out for a house dinner at our favourite restaurant La Casa del Turista. The house has been pretty settled the last month or so and we’ve all got on very well but now June and I are the first to be heading home.

It’s been so interesting living with people from different countries, backgrounds, professions who are all here for varying lengths of time but bound by the common thread of settling into life in Uganda. Sharing stories of all the things we’ve seen and done, separately and together, has helped us all to prepare and adapt to the situations we find ourselves in.

The Final Countdown

So its my final week! Had to smile this morning, started my Monday as the rest of the placement has gone – amending my plans! We’d planned a staff training session on my updated Employee Appraisal Form/Process for Tuesday afternoon but Davis’ schedule has changed so first thing this morning he asked if we could do it this afternoon – I shouldn’t have expected anything different! Apart from missing my English Breakfast Tea and Biscuits (even I know I need treats to keep staff interested), I had everything ready so rolling with it I agreed. Being prepared and flexible is one of the biggest lessons I’ve learned here!

Apollo popped in for an end of placement meeting with me and Davis. A, general chat about how things have gone, any issues / challenges, what could be improved and if there are opportunities for future placements here. All pretty constructive I’m pleased to report, so I feel there has been benefit to both sides, not just my own development. I’d hate to leave knowing I hadn’t achieved what had been agreed, or that the work hadn’t quite been what was useful to the teams here.

This afternoon an all staff lunch was arranged that lead in to my training session on Employee Performance Management! (I was warned I’d end up doing something unexpected on this placement!) 20 staff turned up and we discussed why we need individual performance management and the personal qualities needed to ensure objective and consistent performance assessment. I then took them through my updates to their previous process before assessing a series of examples in groups and sharing together at the end. Feedback was positive and the groups were engaged in the discussion and exercises, fingers crossed it’ll be put to good use after I’ve left!

Everyone here has been so welcoming and patient with me as I’ve found my way around and got to grips with life here. I’m not looking forward to saying goodbye, its even harder when they say they are used to ‘us’ leaving them.

Sign here please...

I've lost count of the number of Visitor Books I've signed since I've been here!

Everyone has them, in town and in the rural communities. They demonstrate to donors / sponsors who is coming to see their work and why. There is also an element of accountability for staff and partners who move around regularly to show that they were where they said they were!

The end is in sight

Well its all going rather quickly now! We only have two weeks left so I'm starting to look at tying up pieces of work, getting final comments / amendments ready to hand over final versions / complete staff training before we leave.

At BRDC this means I have now drafted the following

• Board Charter
• Board Meeting Terms of Reference
• Management Team Meeting Terms of Reference
• an updated Staff Performance Appraisal Form 
• Community Based Training Team Monitoring Database

At Mbale CAP this has meant so far

• Reviewed Reporting Timetable and sent forward a proposal for 2018 onwards
• Updated Website content
• Staff Profiles
• Partner Profiles
• Social Media links
• Developed Case Study Template and Guidance note for staff to use in their reporting and future promotional material
• Gathered Mbale CAP brochure material

Still more to do...hope I can fit it all in!

Source of the Nile

Last weekend June and I went down to Jinja, a town famous as the Source of the Nile river. It’s here the world’s longest river starts its three month journey from Lake Victoria heading north through Uganda, South Sudan, Sudan and into Egypt before finding the Mediterranean Sea.

Jinja is about half way back to the capital Kampala so a popular weekend trip for those who want to get out of the city as well as those in the East looking for something different and not too far away.

We stayed at Nile River’s Explorers Camp which was just what we needed after a few weeks in Mbale, a bar, chips and six nations on tv! Friday evening we took a guided boat out on the river and it was great to get up close to some more wildlife! June is my bird guru – over twenty years visiting family in South Africa she can spot the colour of its plume before I’ve even found the right tree! I think we saw about five of a possible eight types of Heron, plus African Fish Eagles, several species of Kingfisher, Egrets and bonus Red-Tailed Monkeys, a rather enjoyable couple of hours while the sun was setting.

Saturday we went Whitewater Rafting – a first for me, and possibly the last. Am glad I’ve done it, but I’m not sure the constant worry of flipping out of the boat is quite worth it for six hours. Thank goodness we only flipped once, and I’m pretty sure that was done on purpose! (You know, for the ‘experience’) It was still a fun day though, and the jumping in and out of the boat was much more at my own pace.

We had a look around Jinja on Sunday before heading home. It seems much more geared towards visitors than Mbale, a lot more relaxed and Sam, it’s definitely up there for our favourite type of shopping!

Chapati 101

Chapati are quite the snack here in Uganda. I'm getting a little bit more addicted every time I have one, although i'm not sure my waistline will thank me for it!

We had a lovely colleague Anna from Size of Wales visiting last week so Thursday evening quite out of the blue she extended her own invitation to learn how to make chapati to us - I didn't need asking twice!

Prepping the portion sizes!

Abdul (must find a picture of him)  our ever so reliable taxi driver, was taking Anna around last week and knowing how much a fan we were becoming of these local treats invited us all to his mum's house for her to teach us how to make chapati.

It wasn't dissimilar to making welsh cakes, mix it all up by hand, portion out, roll to the size you want and cook on the hot plate. It's just knowing the right ingredients and the local 'knack' to give me the confidence to have a go. Future team meetings be ready!

After our lesson, Abdul's family had cooked rice, beans and beef for us to go with our chapati attempts so a true Ugandan feast! Everyone has been so kind and looked after us so well while we've been here, it'll be hard to leave.

Recipe:

1 kg Flour

0.5l Water

Salt

Lard

Ghee / butter

Fingers crossed I can recreate these when I get home - Anna we're going to have to practice for our lunch date!!

Hot plate - under supervision!

The .2 second rule

Getting around isn't quite as straightforward as I'd hoped. Yes there are plenty of transport options but the standard of infrastructure and care / attention of drivers isn't ideal so we stick to walking or a private taxi. Motorbikes, or boda bodas are the most available but there have been three fatal accidents since we've been here so I am steering clear.

Some general observations in the first few weeks

• our 2 second rule seems to have been replaced by the .2 second rule as I'm sure we overtook several cars and bikes with inches to spare!
• you drive on the left, but you can drive anywhere in the road, often weaving from left to right to avoid potholes / oncoming traffic etc. 
• Matatus (taxi buses) can hold an infinite number of people!
• there is one road for everything...that is bicycles to container wagons and huge trucks, its a little hairy walking to town on times!
• you can get anything on the back of a Boda ...ANYTHING. My favourite is currently a bed, must try and get a picture before I leave!
• to borrow Owen's phrase from Lesotho, we also have a 'Jesus bar' in the minibus so named due to the number of times he gets a mention on the journey!

You're never quite sure what you're going to pass

Its not always smooth sailing