For some reason we are unable to access our research blog website from out here, so here is our first blog post...

Kate

It's Friday morning and we have officially been in Uganda for a week! Everything is a bit slower today after a "stress management" session that lasted until 4am involving beers, dancing, a fabulous yellow fishing hat, and goat. Lots of goat. To describe this week is quite a hard task-it's a cross between jumping into a geography textbook and a promotional video for comic relief or save the children. There is a strange juxtaposition between the incredibly beautiful scenery and the absolute level of poverty here. At a meeting we attended the response from the villagers to a shortage in cooking oil at food distribution was "we will die". That being said there is an awful lot to be hopeful about. Base camp consists of a variety of institutions each providing food, education and healthcare under the broad supervision of the Office of the Prime Minister and the United Nations High Commission for Refugees. We have felt so welcomed into the base camp 'family' and there is a sense that everyone genuinely cares for the refugees and wants to improve their situation.

Kyaka II actually covers a huge amount of land (around 81 squared km) with villages scattered all over- some well over a few hours walk from base camp. There is little or no electricity in most, and as the refugees aren't allowed to build permanent structures most houses are mud huts with earth floors and a few benches for furniture. We have been attending meetings this week at each village on the topic of food distribution and education. As muzungus we have attracted a lot of attention from the children and seen some very surprised faces as we bumped by in the base camp jeeps.

There is so much to say but I think that's all for now. Also I will end up talking about the toilet situation which rivals the Glastonbury porter loos after three days of festivaling! KNT

Jessica

I can't believe that a week has gone by already...! After spending our first weekend in Kampala attempting to negotiate the rather complicated and multifaceted Ugandan research bureaucracy in order to get the relevant clearance that we needed, we have now spent our first few days in Kyaka II and have been welcomed so warmly into the 'Kyaka Family'. Windle Trust have taken us under their wing and we have spent the week darting around in camp vehicles attending village meetings, a graduation and even a stag party...!

Education-wise, the governmental Universal Primary Education act combined with a significant effort from NGOs means that Primary Education is well-covered in the settlement, however fees and household duties significantly effect daily attendance (one primary school has over 900 pupils, but on a day-to-day basis only 600 pupils attend). The Finnish Refugee Council offer classes for adults to learn functional English, Swahili and basic literacy to help those who find themselves unable to communicate with their native Congolese French or Rwandan tribal dialect. Secondary education, however, seems to fall into a gap. There is only one secondary school in the entire settlement and only 12% of children who complete primary education continue into secondary. Even less complete Senior 4 and this applies even more to girls who often end up staying to help at home. Parents are frustrated; one mother at one of the meetings we attended explained how there are no opportunities for her daughter who she has financed to complete her secondary education. Her second born she will not pay to do his A Levels for she simply does not see the point. Windle Trust sponsors 73 students at the secondary school and 5 university scholarships, however they admit that secondary education is 'a real problem'. A lack of resources is leading to a lack of motivation, except for the lucky few who benefit from scholarships and have moved on to Kampala to complete their education.

Being back in Kyaka II is amazing. Yesterday I bumped into two students I taught last time I was here, including Lizah, the captain of the netball team I coached. Next week we hope to spend some time with them in the Youth Centre, where they spend a lot of their time aswell as getting better acquainted with the secondary school. We will do a few more interviews with Base Camp staff and mid-week we plan to go to Kampala to interview the Kampala-based Windle Trust staff.

Now, to Fort Portal where we are spending the weekend before another busy week in Kyaka II! JHJ

Robyn

So we are officially more than a week in and looking forward to another weekend exploring the pearl of Africa. It was a happy delay to have to stay in Kampala last weekend whilst waiting for the Ugandan Research board (UNCST) to approve our research in Kyaka. So while we had the time we took the chance to go and explore the capital a little, with the help of a local expert. On Saturday we wandered around town, with our first stop at the Gadaffi Mosque. Contrary to popular british opinion, Gaddaffi is seen is quite a positive light in Uganda, or Kampala at least. And the mosque he built in Kampala is a vision; with beautiful cream walls and latticed windows, it is easy to understand why many people might be thankful to him. That said, I am at least happy to be away from the mosques in Kampala, or rather out of earshot of the 5am prayer call that assailed us every morning. When you are half asleep and hearing these strange chanting noises it is a little, well, unsettling to say the least.
But that wasn't all Kampala had to offer; they say do one thing every day that scares you, and for Kate this was easy to do when confronted with our first boda-boda ride. These vehicles are one of the fastest ways to nip around town, as long as the idea of riding on a motor cycle with no helmet in raging traffic doesn't bother you too much. Ugandans are clearly accustomed to a lack of lanes, traffic lights, pedestrian crossings and general driving etiquette, so they embrace this experience, taking along wardrobes, bananas and all manners of things with them for the ride. We however were slightly less at ease with the squeezing of three people on one bike, ruck sacks, rugged goat-ridden side streets and general vehicle turmoil that is Kampala. But we survived. And in all honesty, despite the fact that (when thinking logically) this is probably a pretty dangerous way to be transported, it is exhilarating and so, so fun.

Digressions aside, we ended up at a beach on Lake Victoria, the Entebbe side, which was very interesting for want of a better word. We went through a metal detector to get into the beach, then past another security point with armed police, and ended up in this giant courtyard type area with loud scary-explicit rap music blasting out of massive speakers. I am failing at finding the words to explain what it was like, but just picture a beach with essentially club music blaring at 3pm in the afternoon, people rolling in sand in sheer delight (totally oblivious to those around them), swimming in all of their clothes (which is apparently the done thing) and generally having a massive lakeside party. I don't think (up until that time) I have EVER felt so white and British.

To make a bit of a change from such a hectic atmosphere (and to make amends for all of the carbs we had been eating) we spent the next day at the Sheritan hotel to go swimming and to buy lunch with actual vegetables in. It was a really chilled day, and topped off by visiting a lady that knows Kate's gran for dinner. Juliette - the lady in question - works for a really interesting organisation called CINI (Children in need institute), which she encountered in India and brought back with her to Uganda. It works with women to provide pregnancy-related services, so delivering babies, contraception, nutrition and health information and other such services. The office is open 24/7 and outreach teams go to poorer villages to help mothers there who can't get into town. We had a gander at the office and services and it was so heart-warming; the rooms are all painted well, which Juliette said was important to keep the children happy, and it was so clean and just generally amazing. We then went on to go to dinner with her, and talked about some really interesting things, like terrorist attacks in Kampala (which I had never even thought of as a thing), Ugandan history, and also how cute her children were. It was generally a lovely evening, and we all came away from it with such a warm feeling that a stranger can invite you into their lives so openly. And this is one thing I have come to realise about Ugandan culture - it is open, friendly, undiscriminating. People talk to you, without having a motive for it, they just want to say hi. And people are very generous. They will help you when they can, invite you out after having known you ten minutes, and not invite you out of a sense of obligation, but out of genuinely wanting your company. Which makes settling in here so much easier. It is no wonder Jess wanted to come back.

Since that was unexpectedly long I will stop here, but that is by no means all there is to say about our time here so far. We are off again today to go to Fort Portal, so stayed tuned for more updates on our Ugandan cultural awakenings. RM