Nairuba

GGood morning sweet peas!!! I hope this post finds you all well.
I was in such a rush on the last post that i forgot to tell you all that i have had a new name bestowed upon me by my supervisor and counterpart. It is Nairuba. It is the name given to a womyn born into the water clan in Busoga kingdom. It is my supervisors clan and he tells me that "everything needs water, it is essential to all growth". So, that is fitting for my role here. let s hope that i actually do aid in growth here, both of my commuity and myself. This is my 3rd week at site and I am filled with feelings of exitement, frustration, and over all, juts being overwhelmed.
This week and the next are filled with meeting other "organizations"/groups in my community. It is all well and good, until the inevitable is said to me: "We have very high expectations of you. Very high hopes." Then, i start to freak out a bit. I have high hopes for myself, adn those of you who know me best know that i am my worst critic and am usually very hard on myslef. Well, that has not changed here. But, I have come to realize one important thing. While these people have such high hopes and expectations of me, I feel the sam about them. And i telll them this. I am here to aid in growth, to "advise", to befriend, and to survive in this ambiguous gray area which the Peace Corps has placed me in. and i willing and able to do this. But i desperatly wish for the people of my community to realize that I want them to have high hopes and expectations of themselves, not just me. We can get no where if the only person who has expectations placed on them is moi.
So far i have visited about 10 "briefcase" organizations: just people who have mobilized themsleves into small groups witht a common goal, but which have made lttle to no progress towards that goal. So, my org has brought me to them and thanks to the wonders of Ugandan miscommunication (which will never fail to amaze me) I show up to thse groups merely thinking that i am meeting more mof my community and introduing myself to them, and they think that i have come with goddamn santa claus. SO far i have been asked to provide: AIDS med's (ARV's, naviropine, etc), housing, markets for their handcrafts, money for: orphans, youth who cannot afford to stay in school. Also- bicycles, chickens, seeds, "technichal training" (whatever the hell that means b/c when i ask them training on what, they just give me this look as if to say " well, whatever you think is best!"). I have been asked to provide ugandan students with american donors to keep them in schoool, etc. And i sit there listening intently to them while at the same time thinking in the other half of my brain, what???? shit.
Also, the rising food prices aroud the world are effecting us here. My lords family is having a difficult time buying food, the groups i have met are having ahrd time \s feeding their families adn those who go to makret are selling their food for almost nothing at all just to mkae some sort of profit. It mkes me not want to bargin at market and just give them money that i think it is worth so as not to make them sell it to me for less. And in america? we have too much food, so much so that we can have fast food restaurnts that give us too much, so we do not eat it an through it away. Oh!!! its all so frustrating!!! An d while i know that i have little money, lets face it people, i have more than those in my commmunity (besides maybe those who work for the district/govt in my town who are... too much (to put it kindly)-i will write more on their ways later).
Needless to say, we all have much work ahead of us. I will not be short of it. But first, we have to work on a new way of thinking. Such as, i cannot just provide everything, we have to work hard for it. And this will all take so much time. But time is what we have (if only we could all be on time, we could make better use of it).
I already lamented to my father about the gap in communitcation between the sexes here as well. It is an awful shame for me to see. But simply a different culture with a different attitudes towards how women should be treated by men. Which is to say, men dont talk to women, dont look at women often (well, i am differnt b/c i am a muzungu so unfortunlatly they thhink they can say anything and look however they wish at me). But when daniel and i are about town together, they automatically assume that we are married. and this can work for and against me. it offers some sort or protection, but i cannot often get men to carry on decent conversations with me. They think they will be disrespecting daniel by addressing me, so they look at him and ask while pointing at me "what is this ones name? what does this one do?" Well, we can eventually steer the conversation so that i can be included, but it is a struggle.
My home is coming along. I have been given free reign by my landlords to do whatever i wish to it, so i have hung pistures and even drew my dove tattoo on the wall. My lords say it looks very "amrican" in the house now. I have also succeeded in stuffing myself stupid with chocolate that i receved in the care packages. I am working on my loss of privacy. even though i hve my own home now, everythng i do can be seen thru the windows which remain ever open to i can catch a breeze through me humble abode. Night is best when i can wrap myslef in my net and sleep, however, if i stay up too long with the latern i invite a whole world of bugs into my home with me. I have a few geckos livig me (thank god b/c they help rid my house of bugs) and my counterpart is getting me a kitten!!! I think i will name him/her Virtue Bowie (an ode to both jon and mary), i think that will be good, yeah?
Ok, well i have much more to say, but i have little time. most of all, i wish for you all to know that i am happy.
Everyday has a moment of struggle, but, like common says, it is a beautiful struggle.
Peace out