The colours of life

I had a fascinating conversation with John Njendahayo the other day about colours. It turns out that as far as he is concerned, he only knows the colours red, black and white. He can see all colours, so isn’t colour-blind  at all, he just doesn’t know their names.

This was a really intriguing concept for me, as John isn’t exactly uneducated. He started in a rural primary school in Uganda, but then moved to the city and got ‘spotted’ by a local headmistress of a ‘slum’ primary school for his academic potential, and as a result was funded through the rest of primary school (which goes up to the equivalent of our year 8 or 9 at secondary school).

Another turn of fortune led to him getting sponsored to attend a boarding school in Wales, and as a result he got educated through to passing his A levels. And if you bear in mind that John is Rwandan by birth, and his brothers were fighting for the Tutsis in the Rwandan genocide at the time of John sitting his A levels, then his academic prowess is even more clear.

John returned to Uganda after he had completed a degree at Liverpool John Moore University, and continues to be involved in bringing an educated mind to all the work he is doing, including developing sustainable energy solutions for a range of users.

So, for John to not know his colours was, in my mind, quite odd to say the least.

We chatted on and gradually the reasons became clear for this significant gap in his knowledge.

Having grown up in the country and started his education at a rural primary school, the resources available to the teachers were minimal – black and white text books, blackboard and white chalk, and a red pen for marking. Thus John learnt red, black and white.

What about all the colours around him in the countryside – the green of the leaves on the tea plantation, the colours of the flowers, the school uniform colours etc? Apparently it was all just referred to by name, or by location, and not by colour. And if a flower was described by colour, it was also described as ‘the third one from the left’ or ‘the middle one at the back’ or ‘the one on the tall tree’ etc – never just by it’s colour. And thus John grew up not knowing the names of the colours that were all around him.

As our conversation continued, we discussed how he hadn’t picked up the names of colours later on in his education – when he was in Wales or at University: “I didn’t do subjects that happened to require that knowledge, and like before, there never happened to be a need to identify anything just by colour. Everything had a name, or some other form of description that I could identify with, and so I just never had the need to learn”.

Apparently this particular gap in knowledge is quite common among those who have grown up with a rural education. The resources used are still very much black, white and red, and if the parents don’t know the colours then they can’t pass the knowledge on to their children.

Some have had to learn due to the work they do eg the Acholi ladies who make beads and jewellery have a very good knowledge of colours – they even know the difference between maroon and mauve – but they have had to learn that in order to be able to be successful in their business.

Obviously there are ways round it, eg John has taken to using a camera to photograph items that he wishes to purchase in a particular colour, or to order paint etc. He doesn’t feel confident to just ask for an item based on the colour name alone, and if he can’t physically pick it out, but has to order it, then he always shows the salesperson a photo of the item to ensure he gets the right one.

For many others, they just get by, seeing colours but not naming them. I guess it would be worse to know the existence of so many colours and not be able to see them, but it still feels like a bit of a shame to be deprived of that aspect of descriptive language.

A fascinating extra insight into life over here, and for me three points to take away:

1.     How fortunate we are to have such a colourful education system in the UK, with so many vibrant and stimulating resources available to us, and our children, as they learn

2.     When working with children from these more deprived education systems, don’t assume that a basic concept like colours is known

3.     Don’t ask John to buy you anything based on colour description alone – who knows what he might come back with!

(and yes, John has approved the posting of all aspects of this blog!!)

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Chisomo Street Kids Project, and any other Zambia tidbits that occur to me whilst writing!

Am on the flight from Lusaka to Nairobi, final destination Entebbe (Uganda) and a final couple of days of project visits / trip preparation / time with Natalie before returning to UK.

It’s certainly been a fascinating time with Aaron and Josephine these past few days – seeing the work of Chisomo, and just discovering the different facets of Lusaka a little more.

Like any developing city, there are some parts that feel very westernized and wealthy – not least the brand-new shopping malls with no end of high-end shops, and eating-places. Those are the places not to frequent too much after spending time with street kids, or talking about lack of finance with people serving in such a self-less way. The cost of a burger takes on a new meaning when viewed in terms of how many meals it equates to at the drop-in centre – not that I ate any burgers I hasten to add, but still the prices made me feel very uncomfortable. However, at the same time it was nice to be able to treat Aaron and Josephine to a meal that is a very rare treat for them, and that in itself is a thought-provoking point.

But Lusaka also has its fair share of ‘downtown’ – potholed roads, crazy traffic, bustling markets, excess of street hawkers, rubbish everywhere, pulsing energy, high-volume banter, seedy shops, Manchester United and Chelsea fans everywhere, and minibuses that only go when they are twice as full as they need to be – that’s the side of Lusaka I feel more comfortable in!

But let me tell you about Chisomo Street Kids project, as that was the real reason for being there. I’ll try and keep it relatively brief, but there’s a lot of angles to it – maybe I’ll save some for another day.

Chisomo (which means grace in the local language) was set up by Aaron and Josephine in 1991 as a result of a personal challenge they felt the number of kids that they were seeing on the streets of Lusaka. Initially, they did outreach on the streets – chatting to the kids, hearing their stories, giving food and drink, and generally getting a better understanding for the plight of the kids and the reasons for them being on the streets in the first place.

From there came a drop-in centre, that provides a safe place for the kids to go during the day – to get a meal of beans and rice or nsima, to wash themselves, and their clothes, to have a sleep where they won’t be disturbed or told to move on, and to have someone to talk to. Some of the kids also express the wish to get off the streets, and so that option is discussed and further steps taken as appropriate – finding the family, working with them about the possibility of the child coming home, and helping to prepare the child for that step.

Returning to family life isn’t straightforward however; living on the streets means living with a new set of rules – survival rules – and to transition from that straight to family life can be one step too far for both the child and the family. And of course there is also the issue of why the child left home in the first place – did poverty force them out, in which case can the family afford to have them back; did death of the parents leave them as orphans, in which case are there wider family members who would consider taking them in but in a positive way, not viewing the child as cheap labour; did the introduction of a step-parent to the family result in the children of the previous parent being forced out, or was it an abusive family etc? So many possible reasons why the child ended up on the street, and so many reasons to counsel the family and child through before a successful reintegration can be expected to take place.

Some of this counseling takes place whilst the child is attending the drop in centre, but the next step for the child to take on the road to reintegration is to spend time at The Shelter – kind of like a half way house, where the children live in more of a family like environment. It’s a residential place, and the children have to do their bit with the daily chores – making their bed, washing their clothes, keeping the place tidy, and just generally getting back into the way of being part of a family environment. The children also go to school whilst at The Shelter, helping them settle back into the education system, catch up with their learning, and be in a better place to cope with going to school when they return home – an expectation of all reintegrated children.

It was lovely to visit both the Drop-In centre and The Shelter, and see the work going on there. Unfortunately a reduction in funds coming in has meant that the numbers that Chisomo can cater for has dropped, so neither place was as buzzing as they would like to be, but Aaron, Josephine and the staff keep on going – doing what they can to support the street kids, and give them the opportunity to change the trajectory their life was on.

Another angle to the work of Chisomo is the preventative focus – targeting families in particularly vulnerable areas who have children at risk of going onto the streets, and working with the women to set up self-help cooperatives. In these groups the women get training in life-skills, health and hygiene, parenting and business skills. The women then get help in setting up small – scale businesses, and developing a savings scheme that they all pay into as able, and oversee between them. The children also get access to a range of workshops, including the value of education, life-skills, and various other aspects of why not to go to the streets.

This is a really powerful angle to the work of Chisomo, and the staff have found that not only are there less kids running away to the streets from these targeted communities, but also the success rate of returning street kids staying at home is higher, as the families have a better capacity and resilience.

So, that’s the work of Chisomo – all birthed in a desire to be the hands and feet of Jesus, caring for widows, orphans and vulnerable children. I’ll write another time about the issues they are facing as a result of disjointed and poorly thought through government demands (sounds familiar!?) but thankfully that isn’t deterring Aaron, Josephine and the rest of Chisomo staff, who soldier on regardless. Thank you Lord for them.

In Zambia (written on Monday)

I have now travelled down to Zambia for a few days as my African adventure enters its final week. I’ve never been to Zambia before, so am excited to be here, and to add another country to my list of ‘been there’s’!

But the main reason for being happy to be here is that I get to meet another CRED partner and to visit, and learn about another inspiring project.

The project that I will be visiting is the Chisomo Street Kids project in Lusaka, the capital city of Zambia, and tomorrow I get to see the different aspects of their programme. But today has been about travelling down here (a slightly tedious mix of early initial flight, waiting for connecting flights, delays and long visa queues) and then having the chance to just get to know Aaron and Josephine Chilunjika, the founders and key workers of Chisomo. And what an inspiring couple they are.

Aaron used to work for Scripture Union here in Lusaka, and Josephine was a secretary for the Reformed Church, when they both felt challenged by God to do something about the increasing number of street children that they were seeing in the city. Aaron initially asked SU to see if they would support him in this new initiative, but he was turned down. Undeterred, and determined to follow what he felt was God’s calling on his life, Aaron resigned his job, and started the Chisomo project. Soon afterwards, Josephine resigned from her job so that she could work with the street children alongside Aaron.

Chisomo has been running for approximately 20 years now, and over the time Aaron and Josephine have gone from just meeting with the children on the streets, to opening a drop-in centre, to having a residential shelter for those kids who want to go down the reintegration route. After tomorrow I’ll be able to give a lot more detail about it all, but suffice to say it is amazing to hear how much they have achieved along the way.

One of the other aspects of their work has been the preventative work – tackling the cause of the street kids problem, rather than just addressing the outcomes. In doing so, Aaron and Josephine have identified some groups of women in vulnerable neighbourhoods and worked with them to skill them up and get them working as co-operatives. Through equipping and empowering, these ladies now run less chaotic lives, and the children in their care, have more stable and loving homes, that they don’t wish to run away from.

All of that on its own is very commendable and inspiring to hear about, and it has been lovely being with this couple today. But I’m not doing them full justice unless I also mention that amidst all of the above, Aaron has also trained for church leadership and now pastors a church of 300 members; and both he and Florence also run leadership training workshops for churches, youth leaders etc.

None of this brings them a salary – their various roles are all done on an expenses-covered basis, but all are in areas of such deprivation that there is no spare money to pay a salary. So they live by faith, trusting God to provide their every need – and He does, time after time after time.

At one point I asked Florence if they have any children, and she confirmed that they have 4, and 1 grandchild. 2 of the children are still at home, but that doesn’t mean it is only 4 mouths total that they have to feed. Aaron is one of 7 children, and during the life of Chisomo, 3 of his brothers have passed away. In Zambian culture, when a parent dies, the children automatically become the adopted children of the next male, and as a result Aaron and Florence have 21 extra children that they are responsible for. They haven’t had them all as dependents at the same time, but there was a time when there were 20 of them (I think!) living in the same 3-bedroom house!

An absolutely amazing, faith-led, Godly couple, who live each day as an offering to the Lord; trusting in His provision for their needs, and receiving from Him as He provides. It is so inspiring to be able to spend time with people like this, and I am so looking forward to seeing what tomorrow brings, as I walk with them for a couple of days.

And the rain, rain, rain came down, down, down

April in equatorial Africa is the time when the short rainy season is supposed to happen, and a few times since I have been here we have had some impressive thunderstorms in the night. The talk has often included reference to the weather, but mostly to note that the rains haven’t been as much as they should be, and the farmers might lose a harvest if the rains don’t come soon and water the seeds that have been planted.

Yesterday morning it started raining at around 5.30am, and it poured down for a good hour plus – the impact on me: I didn’t get up and go for a run at 6.15am (the only time to consider running as it is too hot any time later than that). Everything else happened as planned – we visited the Acholi quarters to discuss team visits to them later in the year, Natalie and I got all the things done that we wanted to in the afternoon, John and Sophie’s washing lady got the washing done and hung out to dry, the sun dried up the dirt roads so everywhere was accessible. Nothing more impacting on me than missing out on a run (and I don’t think my body minded that too much either!)

Today it started raining at around 5.30am again, and as I write this at 7.30am it is still going strong. Result – for me I’ve missed another chance for a run, but I still have a dry place to rest, I still have breakfast waiting for me, I still have clean dry clothes to put on (even if the ones washed yesterday are getting another rinse due to being left out on the line last night), and getting to church is OK as we can go there in the car.

Compare that with the impact this rain will be having on the Acholi community we visited yesterday, where the alleyways between the little one-room, mud-wall, tin-roof houses will have turned from hardened sun-baked earth to a river of mud, mixed with rubbish and sewage. And where the tin-roofs will be showing their leaks in a very clear way.

The houses are homes to many, and as well as being sleeping quarters, in this weather they are the place where the children are confined with too little space and nothing to do, as well as where the mother tries to heat some water on the charcoal stove to give them a warming drink; hot open stoves and cooped up, bored children is not a good recipe – Lord may there be no accidents resulting in burnt or scalded children.

When any of them do go outside – to the loo, or to get water, or to run an errand etc, they don’t have a waterproof to put on, or decent shoes. They don’t even have much of a change of clothes when they get back dripping wet. Life in a rainstorm takes on a very different perspective for these people.

But my thoughts don’t only go to the Acholi people at this time. They also go to the street kids that I have worked with in previous years. These kids have no change of clothes, no roof over their heads at all, no charcoal stove to warm some water on for a hot drink. They shelter in doorways, or under old vehicles. Sometimes they’ll sleep in the massive ditches that act as drains and catch the run-off from the roads when it rains – Lord may none of them have been sleeping there last night, and if they were may they have woken and got out before being drowned by the deluge of water that now runs through all those drains.

The impact of the rain on those kids is big, especially when it continues on and they have a choice either to stay in any sheltered area they can find to stay dry but hungry; or to venture out to scavenge for food and get cold and wet but hopefully fill their stomach a little bit. What sort of a choice is that for anyone to have to make, especially a child of 8 or 9 who is on the streets simply because the new step-mother didn’t want any children in the house from the previous mother and so threw them out, or abused them so much they ran away (one of the commonest reasons for street children here is rejection of children from a previous marriage).

Of course the rain is needed – the farmers will be so relieved at this point – but my heart goes out to those I know of living just a few miles away, and for whom this rain has an impact so much more than just missing a morning run. Lord watch over them, and be with them in their time of need.

The day the baboon stole our lunch!

OK I admit it, this particular trip isn’t 100% work with no play - although I must admit that I feel so blessed to have such an amazing job that I wouldn’t complain too much if it was all work. Having Tim, Rozzie and Natalie around this week has meant that I have taken some down time to enjoy being family again, and it has been a really special time for us all.

After 3 days exploring projects and places in and around Kampala, Tuesday saw the 4 of us embarking on the 5hour drive to Murchison Falls National Park. The first 4 hours were pretty straightforward –leaving the city behind and finding the gaps between towns getting bigger and bigger, and the road getting straighter and straighter as there seemed to be no reason for it do anything other than go directly from one point on the line to another.

After 4 hours we reached Masindi – the gateway to Murchison Falls National Park – and that’s about all it can boast really. A pretty non-descript town and the point where you make sure you have enough fuel for the time in the park, and then wave goodbye to tarmac and embark on 42km of dirt road until you reach the actual entrance gate.

Theoretically those 42km should have taken 1 hour, and in actual fact they only took about 1.5 hours, thanks to the skillful driving of our wonderful driver Hakim. We’d been driving about 20 minutes when we came across a truck laden with freshly cut sugar cane that had got stuck right across the single track dirt road, and was well and truly going nowhere fast. It was one of those situations where you know there is nothing to do except sit it out – no alternative route, no tow trucks, just lots of locals giving thoughts on what to do, and one frustrated truck driver trying to dig the road up enough to allow the wheels to get some traction and escape.

After 30 minutes of watching the inaction from all angles, Hakim decided enough was enough and he wanted to get us to Murchison. And, with all the skill that he has when it comes to driving (and he has a lot), he managed to manoeuvre our vehicle through a space that really didn’t look big enough, over muddy ditches that had floored the truck, and back onto the road.

And so we got to Murchison Falls – named after some very impressive thunderous waterfalls at one end of the Park, who in turn were named after Mr Murchison who was president of the National Geographic Society at the time that they were discovered by a Mr Baker – explorer commissioned by the NGS back in times gone by (end of history lesson – I stopped listening to the commentary on our boat ride after that!)

Having gone and checked out the Falls from the top, we went and checked in to the lodge where we were staying – very pleasant but clearly in the ‘off-peak’ season: we are the only guests, and the electricity only works from 5.30 – 7.30am and 7.30 – 10.30pm! But it has a pool, and is very pleasant, surrounded by beautiful grounds, with lots of small-scale wildlife to keep us entertained eg lizards doing press-ups (no joke), weaver birds competing for best nest, and an orchestra of cicadas.

Today (Wednesday) was our full day in the park, so we went off on a game drive in the morning. Hakim enjoyed the drive as much as we did, especially the moment when we found the giraffes – his favourite animal. We were really lucky to see loads of animals including elephants (plus babies), lions, giraffes (plus babies), warthogs (plus babies), hyenas, buffalo, hippo, and countless species of antelope (plus babies). Then there were all the different birds from bee-eaters to weaver birds to kites to hornbills to storks and eagles. And all in a land that was bursting into new life as the rains are just starting, and the dry brown is being replaced by verdant greens and succulent shoots on the plants; a very special time that we all enjoyed very much to say the least.

In the afternoon we went on a boat ride and saw more wildlife from a new perspective. That was fun, although the boat we were in did sit very low in the water and Frederick our boatman did have a tendency to let the engine cut out just as we were getting close to hippos (with their babies), or crocodiles. Fred would be enthusiastically telling us about some bird in the distance, and I’d be watching the nearby hippo or crocodile slip silently underwater, and spend the next bit of time wondering where the danger creature had gone, and if it was checking out the underside of our boat! But as you’ll have realized, we all came back safely and maybe I should give Fred more credit for knowing his job properly and being more in control of the boat than sometimes it appeared!

To end, the story that accompanies the title of this blog, as I suspect this is a story that will get bigger with every telling – so this is the true account!!

Between game drive and boat ride there wasn’t time to return to our lodge for lunch, so they had packed us up a boxed lunch each and we instead spent the free time at the much closer, very nice, and too expensive for us, Paraa Lodge. We availed of their free internet, had a soda each, and just chilled out, before eating most of our packed lunches.

Rozzie had left some of her lunch to eat after the boat ride, and it was sitting in a box on the seat between her and Natalie at the back of the MPV that we were travelling in. After lunch we drove down to the area where the boat rides go from. We had 20 minutes to kill, so Hakim parked in the shade, and we just rested in the car with windows and doors open due to the heat.

Picture the scene: Hakim had gone off to chat to some fellow Ugandans, taking the keys with him, Tim was in the front passenger seat, I was on the middle row, Rozzie on the back row, and Natalie standing outside by the single back door (one of those sliding ones that is level with the middle row of seats). We are all chatting when Natalie mentions a baboon is coming closer. Then it changes its mind and Natalie looks away but when she looks back it is coming closer again.

At that point she gets in the car and shuts the door, and Tim shuts his door. Hakim has the keys so we can’t close the windows, but to be quite honest it all happened so quickly that I don’t think we’d have had time to do anything anyway.

Suddenly the baboon is on the bonnet of the car, and seeing Tim in the passenger seat goes across the windscreen to the driver side, and in through the window!!!!!!! Tim is out of the car faster than you can say ‘get out’ and Natalie isn’t far behind, thus opening the middle door and providing an escape route for the baboon who is slightly alarmed to find himself inside a car with mazungus!

Not as alarmed as Rozzie and I who are trapped in the car as the baboon is between us and the door. The baboon looks at me, and I can’t remember what I do, but all I am thinking is ‘Rozzie is trapped in the back and I don’t know what to do but I really don’t want to upset this baboon or it could all get nasty’.

Thankfully the baboon decided he didn’t want to take me on in a fight (read into that what you want), and then, possibly prompted by Rozzie’s scream, decided to leg it out the door – but only after he had grabbed the box with Rozzie’s food in it from the back seat.

He was out the door with the box before the scream could bring any Ugandans running (although they did appear quite quickly after the event), and our final view of him was as he sat in the distance enjoying some potato crisps and homemade pancakes!

So, next time anyone goes to a wildlife park and sees a sign that says ‘keep windows closed’ – my recommendation is to follow the instructions. Thank you Lord for keeping us safe, but I’m happy not to test out the friendliness of any more baboons! Can definitely recommend Murchison Falls National Park as a destination in Uganda though – a wonderful few days away.