Election Party in Kaabong

Since our last blog, we have been mostly eating beans and rice and getting stuck into some real work. MercyCorps delivered and installed machines for flour milling and nut grinding to a number of beneficiaries. Our role is now to make these profitable businesses. We have also started to make applications for bank loans for a number of other businesses through the MercyCorps loan guarantee scheme. Other than that, life has been all about finding something else to eat rather than ......................


One evening, we went to a local attraction called "Sliding Rock" - there's a clue in the name. The picture shows Alison making a daredevil move of sliding under Garry. There is only rock and no soft landings, so our first few attempts at a high speed descent on plastic trays resulted in too many injuries. We decided to go down at trouser speed instead. After sliding down the rock, we hung around for a while on the top, drinking beer and watching the sun go down.

This is the local cattle market, recently refurbished by MercyCorps. It is a huge success and now attracts all kinds of traders not just people selling cattle. This group is selling tobacco. As you can see it looks like a lump of mud or something nasty and no, we haven't tried it yet.

Alongside the cattle market, there is a commodity market which sells everything from football kits to animal medecines. The guy in front of the stall is a typical Karamojoan Elder in tradtional garb - skirt, bedsheet, hat and stick.

Football kits sold behind this young lady. She's practising her "on the ead son"

Three very fierce looking Karamojoan warriers. They are pastoralists and use the stick for guiding the cattle. The guy on the right, in his right hand is carrying a small piece of wood. They almost all carry this and it is in fact a stool, so when you sit down, you don't get ants in your pants (wearing skirts, we are not sure if they wear pants)

Chicken tonight? These three are selling the chickens that they are holding by their feet.

All the above people insisted on us taking their photos, but despite them always smiling, they don't smile for pictures (yet)

This is the area of the market selling cows and bulls.

This bit is where you buy goats. A goat is about 20 pounds and a cow about 100 pounds. The problem is you have to eat them all in one go as there is no refrigeration. We might buy a goat for the staff party barbie.

This is our training room. Alison is deep in conversation discussing business skills training.
We used to share the room with a dog and two chickens, but they have moved to Kaabong.

Alison went to the local jewelery shop

This is Bena on the right, Alison's personal shopper in the store, not quite Harrods, but similar to Ratners.

This is a Rolex. We walked into the office one day with one of these and a colleague asked 'do you like Rolex?' Garry responded with 'it's not a Rolex, it's a Swatch', thinking the guy was talking about watches. He was most insistent it was a Rolex and Garry insisted it was a Swatch. After some discussion, we found he was refering to the food that we were carrying. It is actually called 'rolleggs'. It is our favourite breakfast and is a chiapatti with two eggs fried and rolled up inside it, all beautifully packaged in a page from a school notebook.

More 'on the ead son' pictures. This is Masei, the owner of our local, he is wearing a cabbage leaf on his head as it is pretty hot sat in the sunshine.

The Night Out!

A posse we met up with one night at the local 'hotel'. We enjoyed a couple of beers with the gang and later went to Kotido's one and only 'night club', Planet 10. The favourite song is "Shake Your Waist'. Check it out on Youtube. It's definately number one in Kotido.

No pictures from the disco sadly! Everyone was really friendly, girls and boys alike. No-one was smoking or drinking, so no aggravation.

The groundnut paste machine being started for the first time. It was great for us to see something tangible (though the smoke).

Simsim paste (sesame paste). Tastes better than it looks and an expensive commodity round here. You can make all kinds of things with it, you can even add it to beans for an improved
flavour.

The happy owner and the local community.

Heath Robinson was here before us. This is actully the coolest/warmest thing we have come across so far. It is at the guest house in Kaabong. You lower the bucket, add hot water (the only place in Uganda where ther is any hot water), raise the bucket and treat yourself to a great shower. The hot water comes from a solar system in the garden.

This is our election party in Kaabong. A group of us relocated to Kaabong whilst the elections were being held. Great company and good fun. From left clockwise, Tim, Alison, Sam, Rolan and The Other One. There are 2 dogs at the guest house. One that used to live in Kotido, called Kooch and one stray, affectionately known as The Other One.

This guy has an amazing story about an incident during the Sierra Leone civil war. One day, we hope it will be published and could be made into a film (tear jerker). He is on the top of telecoms rock, the only place round there with a telephone signal.

A view across Kaabong, taken from the top of telecom's rock in the back garden.

The election was trouble free and we have moved back to our normal location in Kotido.

Hope you are all having fun and enjoying continuous electricity and (hot) running water!

Bye for now

Alison and Garry