Daisy, Villages, Cats, and Goats

We spent a few days last week talking with a bunch of the Suubi women and visiting their homes, and I have to say that every story I hear amazes me more than the previous one! One of the women we talked to last week was Daisy, and before talking to her, I never would've guessed that she's been through so much in her life. She always presents herself as fairly well-off and never asks for anything for herself, but always conveys the needs of the other Suubi women. She and her family moved to Jinja from the north in 1986 because of the war, and they were able to move into a large, nice house in town. Her husband had a really good job, and it sounded like they were living a really comfortable life. I don't know how long they lived like that, but one night, men with guns showed up at their house and told them they had to get out. She, her husband, and their 6 kids lived outside on the porch for a week until the men came back and made them leave. They were able to find a place to live in a village 5 or 10 minutes outside of Jinja. Their house is in decent shape, but it's pretty much one room divided into a sitting area and a sleeping area. Her husband lost his job, and still hasn't gotten another one, so Daisy makes the only income for the family through Suubi and a small vegetable stand in a local market (she's with Dillon in front of the stand in the picture). She has been able to send all 6 kids to school by applying for FINCA loans (FINCA is an organization that gives micro loans to people in third world countries). What really amazes me about Daisy is that she lost everything, but she has made a life for herself - she's the secretary of the FINCA chapter in Jinja, she built the vegetable stand in the market, she's sent all of her kids to school, she teaches the Luo literacy class and helps translate for the English class for Suubi, and all of the women in Suubi respect her so much! I think she's the perfect example of how someone can overcome adversity and make a life for themself!

This past Saturday, we took Patrick (our night guard) to the viallge where he grew up, and where his father still lives. The village is called Pallisa, and it's about a 3 hour drive northeast of Jinja (it's really close to the Kenyan border). The picture of the field was somewhere close to Pallisa during the drive...the landscape was really pretty. I've spent a lot of time in the villages around Jinja, but this was a totally different experience! There is a small town near Patrick's land, but his land is really remote. After playing with the kids and watching the adults, it seemed like they were all really happy and very content with their lives there, which is not the case for many of the people living in villages close to Jinja. I think the difference in happiness must come from the fact that people in rural villages own and farm land, and can survive on the crops that they grow, but people who live in villages close to town cannot own land and have to buy all of their food. Not only this, but school fees are insanely more expensive in town, and most people have to pay rent for their homes. Patrick said numerous times that he would much rather live in Pallisa than in Jinja, and almost all of the Suubi women have said that they would love to move back to their villages in the north where they can own land. Being from America where there is constant pressure to get a job and make money, it was kind of hard for me to understand why someone would want to live in the middle of nowhere where there are no jobs, and they would have virtually no source of income. After visiting Pallisa, I can now see why people would want to live like that, though! Western cultures have come into places like this and tried to "make them more like us" by creating cities and towns, so now people think that they need to move to the city to get a job and make money. The problem is that there aren't nearly enough jobs, so people move to towns and end up being much worse off than before. It's kind of overwhelming to think about because it's such a huge problem and there is definitely not an easy solution!

When we left Pallisa, we loaded up one of Patrick's goats in the back of our van and set out on the 3 hour drive back to Jinja. It smelled pretty nasty by the time we got home. Mrs. Goat hung out around the house for a couple days, but then Patrick, Dave, Dillon, Josey, and Daniel (Patrick's son) killed the poor thing yesterday for lunch. Rachel, Stevi, and I chose NOT to attend the actual killing, but we enjoyed lunch!

Some exciting news...we found a kitten yesterday walking around Walukaba, so now the Suubi volunteer house has a cat (which will be great once she weighs more than .25 pounds because we kind of have a mouse problem). Stevi, Renee, and I are really excited about it...everyone else thinks we're crazy. It's probably only 3 or 4 days old, and it was just lying in the middle of the road by itself, so we couldn't leave it (I'm sure everyone that knows me can totally picture how the whole scenario played out. "Guys, we can't leave it! It's so cute and small! We have to take it home."). Sooo, we're feeding it via eye dropper, and hoping that it survives:-) I know you're all going to be on the edge of your seat wondering how little Snoopy/Splinter/we haven't really come up with a good name yet is doing, so I'll definitely keep you updated.