CWB – Uganda Autumn 2011

By Veronique

After three days and four nights in Tororo, it is time to depart and head to Jinja. The Rock View Hotel with its leaking ceiling, lack of hot water and 3 (available) dishes menu shall not be missed. But the Rock View School with its beautiful setting, its focus on high moral values (various messages are posted on trees all around the compound like “Virginity is healthy”, “Work is not bad”, “Practice good hygiene”) and some very enthusiastic teachers will have provided the team with the perfect introduction to coaching the CWB way in Uganda.

When reflecting on our few days of coaching, a few comments from the teachers came back to us. When bowling, one of the teachers told the children: “Keep the bowling arm straight, you are not trying to shoot at mangoes”. Another one when telling a boy off said: “If you do this again, I will take you to the head master, he’ll tie you to a tree and hit you with a stick until your head burst” (Allan’s children watch it!!!).

After checking in at the Paradise in the Nile, we gathered on the terrace for lunch and to enjoy the view of the Nile. Just like in Tororo, lunch which was supposed to take 20 minutes and turned out to be 60 Ugandan minutes!!!

The afternoon was spent with Peter who runs the Adolescent Development Support Network (ADSN) centre in Jinja which welcomes teenagers from 8 in the morning until 5 in the afternoon. There they can receive some counselling, learn a skill,…

Peter was very keen we looked at some of their projects as I work as a volunteer for Street Child Africa (SCA), a UK based charity which supports ADSN. First, Peter took us to visit a child headed household, Street Child Africa has been supporting for a number of years, on the outskirt of Jinja. There, we met the young boy who is looking after his sick mother who has HIV/AIDS and who also is epileptic and his 2 young brothers. It was a very emotional and humbling visit for all of us and for once I was lost for words….

Peter also took us to a vocational centre where they provide single mothers with a skill like hairdressing, tailoring, which will enable them to get some income. There we met one of the mothers who has been supported by Street Child Africa and who is part of the apprenticeship programme. We then went on to look at her house and newly built bathroom and latrine. They are a household of 12, she is HIV positive, has 5 children of her own and is an aunty for 7 orphans.

Finally, we went to a group of women, most of them HIV positive, who are part of an apprenticeship programme and produce very colourful Kikoi (sarong), wonderful and colourful beaded handbags and necklaces. The beads are individually made by hand, by skilfully rolling a triangle shaped piece of magazine or newspaper. A remarkable craft!!!

Two hours later, we said our goodbyes to Peter and got back to the hotel where poor Hannah received some sad news: her mother was taken to hospital with a broken femur. We send her our best wishes for a prompt recovery.

CZECH:

Cesta z Tororo do Jinja byla dlouha a roztrepana. Nakonec jsme pristali v nasem hotelu a dokonce okusili i bazen. Pozdeji nas Veronique zavedla do chudinskych ctvrti, kde jeji charita pomaha lidem, kteri jsou infikovani HIV/AIDS. Smutne, ale stalo to za to. Jednoho dne si jedno z tech deti privezu domu…..

Hi, Richard here, tutor for the project. Who are the others?

Michael, project leader. Having previously been with Michael on CWB projects, we operate as a well oiled machine. If it works it’s down to me, if it doesn’t it’s down to him to place the blame, usually Veronika.

Veronika, Mike’s wife, acceptor of all blame. Again a veteran of CWB projects, our nominated water and malaria tablet monitor. You are bullied into taking on vast quantities of water and tablets. I also use Veronika as the sunshine monitor. She’s the first to start working and reports on how hot it is for the rest of us in the shade.

Veronique is our red wine monitor. Not saying there’s a problem but was seen taking out a bottle to the field in place of her water bottle. Seen today with two bottles!! Using her calm and serene personality she insists on visiting the kitchen at the hotel in the evening to gently persuade the staff to pull their finger out or else. Excellent coach, great rapport with the kids.

Michelle, fianceé of James, was in some trepidation of what was to come. A natural with children, she is now our crowd dispersal monitor. She runs and a couple of hundred kids follow, which allows the rest of us some peace and quiet. Her coaching is developing with bowling on the agenda for today. Quote for the day “Yusuf is a better coach than James”

Hannah, the charity executive is undergoing her first trip to see what happens on the ground. She has thrown herself into the coaching, batting, bowling and fielding. Except for a psychotic 4am scream in her room which woke up most of the hotel residents and scared the living daylights out of Veronique, she is enjoying the experience. Yes Hubby and kids, she’s missing you as well!!

Alan, our project kitty monitor. Would someone please recommend him to the Greek government as our reserves now exceed the Greek debt. Sooner or later I’m sure he’ll let us spend some. Alan bullies the local coaches/teachers into working with the kids. He is the only one who changes for lunch!!

Graham, our diplomatic ambassador has blotted his copybook by refusing to give the street kids CWB wrist bands. He made them sing him their national anthem and still refused. They called him a nasty man. He has experienced the hotel’s full vegetarian menu which has resulted in the same meal three days running.

James, Michelle’s other half. Changing Cumbria for Uganda has resulted in coaching numbers in excess of the population of Cumbria. Accusations of cheating in the game today between his team and Michelle’s will result in an inquiry tonight.

Yusuf, our UCA representative with us on the project. We have worked with him in Jinja for the last two years and are delighted to have him with us as he can interpret with some of the local kids. He is so polite he never mentions my snoring at night.

The morning was spent coaching the 5 remaining primary schools. The teachers took more and more control of the actual coaching so that we could take a back seat and mentor them. School cricket in Tororo is in good hands. Olive, our co-ordinator here, had arranged for 20 girls and 20 boys from the two closest schools to be at the ground for a tournament starting at 2pm. Ogutischool were a little late, but the participants from our host school turned up short of numbers and 40 minutes late. Never the less, a successful tournament went ahead and Mike’s team – the Lions team from Rock View Primary – were overall winners and received Tee shirts for their efforts. Mike would like it to be known (as he has history), that there were independent scorers.

Richard Davies

Czech:

Tri dny koucovani v Tororo jsou za nami.Dohromady jsme ucili asi trista deti a dvacet ucitelu. Zitra se chystame do mesta zvaneho Jinja, ktere lezi naViktoriinu jezeru, na Nilu. Dnes oslavime prvni mesto tim, ze Veronique a ja vypijeme lahev cerveneho a ostatni jsou verni africkemu pivu. Prochazka ve meste (Ja, Veronique, Graham a Mike) a po trhu. Potom Mike sedl na motorkove taxi a odfrcel. My tri ostatni jsme se prosli tech 5 horkych kilometru zpatky do hotelu. Ahoj a poslete nam nejake zpravy v okynku pod fotkami! Verca

A few photos from our first 3 days have been uploaded to flickr. Click the link below to see them…

http://www.flickr.com/photos/monkeyimages/sets/72157627694318005/

By Veronika

First day in Tororo, if you don’t count the long time that we spent avoiding the pot holes last night. We had a reasonably late start this morning; we were to leave The Rock View hotel by nine o’clock. Despite the luxury of being able to sleep until eight, James and Michelle still needed a personal wake up call. After a very short blame moment James established that it was Michelle, who messed up with the alarm clock.

Breakfast was a suprisingly good considering the dinner last night. We filled up on eggs and toast and bananas with pineapple and bravely boarded the bus. Joseph , our driver, was already ready and waiting.

Because we are in a town dominated by a great big rock, all places seemed to have ‘the rock’ in their name, little bit like an episode of Flinstones. We were looking for The Rock View school. We found it and the children found us. There are over 2000 children in that school and when they spotted us, they wanted to play. So we played and played and before the teachers turned up, we were feeling pretty hot and not in the least in need of a warm up.

Twenty teachers did have a warm up with James and the children found it hilarious, watching their teacher being bossed about. We spent the morning coaching the teachers how to field and bowl and they all had a go at coaching their peers.

In the meantime Hannah, Michelle and Graham walked to the town to get lunch for the rest of the team. We thought that they got lost, but suddenly we were greeted by the sight of all three of them bringing back bags of food. You do get thirsty in Africa, but we were a hungry lot also.

Graham was the mother and made a peanut butter or jam sandwiches for everybody. There is nothing quite like eating on a hot bus surrounded by hundreds of hungry children.

On the whole, we spent a very good working day and everybody got involved in coaching and even mentoring! James was in charge of front foot drive, Graham was the technical model for bowling, Alan explained wicket keeping and Veronique demonstrated her legendary pull shot. Michelle spent most of her lunch break being stalked by little children, who enjoyed the Hokey Cokey, well, the shortened version anyway. Later on she guarded our kit against the mob, who were trying to get the balls and bats – by sitting on top of a big pile of bags and fending off the kids.

Four o’clock and journey back to the hotel. A few of us braved the swimming pool and as luck has it, it started to rain. That didn’t stop Michelle, apparently a water baby, who swam through the rain while the rest of us watched with cold beer in our hands.

Tonight we are going back to the famous hotel restaurant and have another go at ordering food.

Keep following us and hope to see many comments!

Veronika

CZECH:

Prvni den v Tororo, trenovali jsme dvacet ucitelu, kteri, se behem dne naucili, jak nadhazovat, palkovat, hazet a chytat. Rychly obed v autobuse, zatimco nas pozorovaly hladove deti. Vecer jsme nasli bazen a zacalo prset. Ted sedime v hotelove ‘restauraci’, ktera je uzasna. Pokazde, kdyz si neco objedname, behem deseti minut nam prijdou oznamit, ze to nemaji . Dobrou chut!

By Graham

Today the team were finally reunited in Uganda as James, Michelle, Veronique, Hannah, Mike and Veronika flew in to join Rich, Alan and myself who had arrived a day or more before.

There was no rest though as within approximately an hour of landing we arrived at the Lugogo Stadium in Kampala for a coaching session with the national U13 boys team. Despite there being some tired and weary bodies everyone chipped in and we had a great session.

There were some fantastically talented boys in the U13 team and they were all keen to learn more, including taking in the AIDS awareness messages the coaches dropped in. As well as the national team we started a gentle hit around with one boy who had come off the street to watch. By the end of the session there were 15 boys and girls all getting involved and enjoying a taste of cricket, some for the first time.

After the session we began a 3.5 hour journey to our next destination Tororo. After an hour or so we had barley got out of Kampala as we hit some unusually busy Sunday traffic. It wasn’t all bad though as it gave the team some time to take in the sights and smells of Uganda.

The newcomers were all struck by how green Uganda is. Field and fields of green, including sugar cane, chocolate and rice fields. There was also an incredible amount of furniture makers! If you ever need a new bed then Uganda is the place to get it. Hundreds of bed making shops lined the main road out of Kampala as we headed east. We also saw some great shop names, our top 3 included 1) the divine hand cosmetic salon, 2) god is able hardware and 3) trust in jesus electrician!

As for the smells they ranged from smokey fires to fresh rain and frying food to thick fumes. Not forgetting the bus horn telling the oncoming traffic to get back on their side of the road! The journey was a real sensory sensation and a great introduction to Uganda.

4 and a bit hours later we arrived at our hotel via a wrong turning which took us up, and then back down, the worst road in Uganda with constant pot holes!

The evening meal was a long time coming, with half the extensive menu unavailable. The chicken tikka masala had no chicken in it and was renamed old rough goat curry! Not to everyone’s liking but Mike whoofed his down. We will see how he feels in the morning!

Coaching teachers in Tororo tomorrow and Veronika will feedback on the day.

Thanks for following the blog!

Despite there being a heat wave in the UK we are all excited and packing bags in preparation for our flights on Friday and Saturday.

The team will all meet up in Entebbe on Sunday morning and then head straight to the Lugogo Stadium in Kampala for a coaching session with the national U13 girls squad!

Our first port of call after that is Tororo in East Uganda where we will spend 3 days.

Will keep you all updated. Next post will be from Uganda!

Only a week to go until we all take off for Uganda!

The team recently got together for the first time at a training weekend in Brighton. We have a great team with a good mix of experienced and new volunteers and we are all looking forward to an exciting project especially as we are visiting parts of Uganda that CWB have not been to before.

Whatever happens its going to be a great adventure!

The Uganda Autumn 2011 Team (minus Alan!)