Benny + Finn's chocolate matoke crisps
Ingredients
*4 or 5 very green (unripe) bananas *Sugar
*Flour *Coco powder *Margarine
1. Peel matoke (plantains) then slice lengthways and cut into chips
2. Dust with a mixture of flour + sugar
3. Fry in hot margarine until golden
4. Coat in more sugar and coco powder
5. Serve cold or hot. Offer to the locals, who should nod in appreciation and then probably spit out when you're not looking.
The first time I saw the illegal practice of the beating of a school child was on a visit to Mahonge primary school on the slopes of Mt. Elgon. I was watching a teacher teach the alphabet to a nursery class in the shade of a small tree, instructing the class one by one to come up to the front and read the alphabet aloud. If the young child misread the alphabet or a member of the large class misbehaved they were instructed to lie down and then were given a quick whip across the back of the legs with a twig by the teacher. When I first witnessed this I was a little shocked, but only by how backwards the custom of corporal punishment is compared to our culture and not by the act since the child simply rubbed their side and returned to their seat seemingly unworried by their maltreatment (However, later that day, the headmistress lifted a rock to a naughty pupil threatening 'I will stone you!' - I assume she was joking (?)). That was only a few weeks into my time in Uganda and now my experiences of corporal punishment have certainly been widened. A week back I was sitting in 'Seed Time' primary staff room, marking, when I heard a girl screaming her head off in pain in the next door class. The girl's cries went on for five more minutes getting louder and more painful to listen to until I couldn't bare it anymore and I went outside to find out what the hell was going on. The p1 teacher had one of her pupils by the arm viciously beating her all over her body with a cane as she writhed on the floor, howling in agony. The headmaster stood outside the classroom and as I approached with a shocked face he merely chuckled saying 'She has been stealing a jotter'. It gets worse. Later that day while teaching p5 English I saw through a gap in the classroom divider, pupils systematically beating one another with sticks under teacher instruction. I found out later that the pupils had taken a test and those who had failed were beaten on the floor by their own peers, until crying. It seemed simply unbelievable to me that these impressionable p3 pupils were being instructed to be violent towards each other while the teacher looked on bored. Being a new teacher and slowly gaining respect I couldn't interfere but it was hard to nothing but keep teaching over the rising noise of crying children. These teachers, who I'd felt nothing but respect for up to this point, now were seriously down in my opinions.
Other than what I've just described, my time spent teaching at 'Seed Time' primary has been really enjoyable. There are some real characters in my classes like a tiny p2 girl called Esther who is so overly confident that when I ask one of the shy pupils their names she'll quickly jump in and answer for them. I am learning as much as the children are, how to be a better teacher and when to mix strictness with banter. Isaac a p5 boy learnt the error of his ways when shouting out in my class 'Teacher, teacher, this boy is laughing at me because my mouth, it is sore', 'Well maybe it wouldn't be if you didn't speak so much!', laughter ensues. One school time activity I don't know whether I'll ever get used to is school lunches. My friends at home know how much I used to complain about the quality of Turriff Academy school canteen meals (+ portion size). Let me just say for the record that TA meals are heavenly compared to what I now eat. Lunch at 'Seed Time' consists of (surprisingly) massive portions of pocho (a solid mass of maiseflour described by a fellow volunteer as tasting like soil) served with chewy kidney beans and spinach. Yummy. Never again will I complain about my mum's cooking!
Recently while in a matatu-taxi ride back from Mbale with Finn I witnessed a tradition of the local Bagisu tribe, that will be happening more and more regularly coming up to December - the circumcision ceremony. Our matatu drove through a crowd of approx 100 people parading down the road and dancing feverishly to the beat of a drum, while one boy dressed in animal skins and feathers, his face coated in ash, swayed in the middle of the crown in a trance. The guide reads that 'Bagisu boys of age 16 to 26 as a rite of passage to manhood parade the streets for three days before being stripped below the waist in front of a group of family and friends. They then must hold their arms out rigid in front while they are publicly circumcised. If the boy screams out during the one min op, he is branded a coward in the eyes of the community'. Sounds swell. A young mother with child squished into the front seat of the matatu with me tells me excitedly about the tradition and how they even circumcised dead men before burial. I guess it explains how whenever I go I'm asked if I'm circumcised, I just hope they don't ask me to join in.
Last weekend my partner Finn abandoned me for the highlights of partying on down at the Sese islands. No, really he was invited to a party by his uncle and I (being the bore I am) decided I couldn't be bothered with the 14 hour trip for one night of luxury and so stayed home all by myself in the far east of Uganda for four whole nights! And on the first night while awkwardly sitting alone making my tea, a pair of local mice decided to make their home in our accommodation (oh joy!). So for four nights I was haunted by mice, scampering around my room at 3 in the morning, knocking things over and generally being a nuisance. However, one mouse is definitely down after eating one of my poison coated chapatis and then appearing Monday morning rock solid lying beside the wash basin. Only one more to go (?)
So I've been in Uganda for exactly 8 weeks now and nothing much has changed. I may not have worn socks in a fortnight and I probably smell pretty grim but I'm comfortable where I am and I'm very much looking forward to the next few months.
Over and out,
Benny.
Friday, October 29, 2010
Monday, October 18, 2010
'Trying to fit in'
Books Read
Life of Pi - Yann Martell, The White Masai - Corrine Hoffman, Warlock - Wilbur Smith, A long way gone - Ishmael Miller, White Fang - Jack London
Foods eaten
Pumpkin fritters, potato cakes, egg fried rice, weetabix, chapati, matoke, mandas, samosa, avacado + tomato salad, rolex, poached egg, salami pizza, pumpkin curry
Letters Written -6
Blog Entries Written - 3
Being a 'white boy' in an entirely African community is a daunting experience. We were told to expect that we would be gosspied about a lot of the time and subject to the scrutiny of everybody who saw us or had heard of our presence in the village. Since Ugandans tend to spend every waking minute of the day sitting outside (for being inside during daylight hours prompts for questions from worried neighbours regarding your health) this means being constantly on guard - the way you dress, your understanding of their culture and the social workings of the community. I remember recently being laughed at as I walked home and almost wondering why (although the very presence of any mzungus is enough of a reason for laughter) until a man across the street shouted and made an action suggesting I pull up 'ma breeks'. The culture also is to be very much respected, you must always greet everyone you meet with a complicated, and often awkward, handhake. You must never drink or smoke in your community. People will ask you 'How is the day, how was this morning, how are your family, how is the house?' You are expected to have a religion too, being athiest is odd and agnostic simply impossible. Women do things, men do not - The female teachers will fetch chairs for the staffroom break, do not attempt to help (suprisingly easy to adapt to this). If you hurt yourself other people will apologise to you with a sympathetic 'Sorry, sorry, sorry...'
Attempting to fit into this community, which is so different to my own, is as to be expected quite tricky. Attempting to speak the local tribe language, Lugisu, eases this separation of cultures but at the same time gives more reason for hilarity. Apparently there is nothing funnier on god's earth to a shopkeeper or stall owner that me saying to them 'Endweala deekee' (One egg) or 'Tchirano mandas' (Five bread balls). As you say Wanyala (Thank you) and walk away you can hear him attempting through fits of laughter to tell his neighbour about he mzungu who spoke Lugisu. My grasp of the language is unfortunately pretty pathetic - I can greet in the various ways, apologise, thank and count from 1 to 10. Its good when you know the names of the local street foods or that foketo is an avacado. Buying goods from a stall is one of the main reason for learning the local language since being in a rural town with little access to the outside world the local grasp of english is poorer than that of closer to Kampala. Guess that means they wont understand 'Stop bloody staring at me' then.
I was told soon after arriving in the country that people will overcharge you because of your skin colour. However, I don't feel cheated of my money when charged 100Ush (approx 2.9p) for a freshly picked avacado or 1000Ush for a kilo and a half of irish potatoes or even 9p for a crispy chapati. I splashed out a bit on 16,000 for a kilo of weetabix when in Mbale, but thats a necessity for surviving a year in Uganda in my eyes. Living off 4,100Ush or 1 pound 20p a day in pay is suprisingly easy when not travelling, but sometimes you have to go over budget to get that must have chopping board you've been dreaming of.
Finn and I finally fixed our project and are now working full time at a very local primary school. The benefits of being involved with local children so closely are vast. Girls in P2 skip past chanting 'Master Ben, master Ben' rather than the dreaded mzungu. The local shopkeeper Juma tells us his son enjoyed the class and everyone (since the rumours have obviously spread) has something to say about teaching or a new project we can do. The classes vary from teaching six year olds how to write numbers to Area = L x W with P5. Kids sing a welcome song every time you enter the classroom and get fully involved when impressing their mzungu teacher, jumping from their seats, hand in the air screaming 'Teacher, me!' at every question. Joint PE lessons are something unexpected - try controlling a game of stick in the mud with 200 children.
Two weeks ago all twenty one of the volunteers went to Kampala to meet up and discuss their projects. It was a very busy weekend - we all went swimming, Finn and I went to a karoke bar ('Man in the mirror' will never be the same again), I managed to KO my foot jumping a wall (although an X-ray in Mbale proves its not fractured), I bought a guitar, ate chocolate and even applied to Uni through UCAS (but not to a Kampala Uni as some on facebook came to believe). Being dropped off in Kampala city center by a taxi is a crazy experience. The traffic is so badly congested that everyone simply walks between vehicles and you get a crush of traffic, pedestrians and people trying to sell shoes through the car windows. Kampala is a world away from the quiet life I've been living in rural Lwakhakha. In Kampala the women have hair, you can buy cheese from the supermarkets and they use two eggs instead of on in their rolexes - so I'm not complaining. However I did get a strange, uncomfortable feeling being surrounded by home comforts (like takeaway pizza and light switches) and all the white people too.
6 weeks has definitely been a turning point for me in terms of working at a new school and getting used to the idea of staying here by making plans for the futurue. In November we've made plans to visit other volunteers in the west and even go white water rafting down the Nile. I've even bought a PO Box so if you wish you can write to me, I'd love to receive some letters. Speak soon.
Lot's of love from Nile computers, Mbale.
Ben Hunter,
PO Box 1342,
Mbale,
UGANDA
Life of Pi - Yann Martell, The White Masai - Corrine Hoffman, Warlock - Wilbur Smith, A long way gone - Ishmael Miller, White Fang - Jack London
Foods eaten
Pumpkin fritters, potato cakes, egg fried rice, weetabix, chapati, matoke, mandas, samosa, avacado + tomato salad, rolex, poached egg, salami pizza, pumpkin curry
Letters Written -6
Blog Entries Written - 3
Being a 'white boy' in an entirely African community is a daunting experience. We were told to expect that we would be gosspied about a lot of the time and subject to the scrutiny of everybody who saw us or had heard of our presence in the village. Since Ugandans tend to spend every waking minute of the day sitting outside (for being inside during daylight hours prompts for questions from worried neighbours regarding your health) this means being constantly on guard - the way you dress, your understanding of their culture and the social workings of the community. I remember recently being laughed at as I walked home and almost wondering why (although the very presence of any mzungus is enough of a reason for laughter) until a man across the street shouted and made an action suggesting I pull up 'ma breeks'. The culture also is to be very much respected, you must always greet everyone you meet with a complicated, and often awkward, handhake. You must never drink or smoke in your community. People will ask you 'How is the day, how was this morning, how are your family, how is the house?' You are expected to have a religion too, being athiest is odd and agnostic simply impossible. Women do things, men do not - The female teachers will fetch chairs for the staffroom break, do not attempt to help (suprisingly easy to adapt to this). If you hurt yourself other people will apologise to you with a sympathetic 'Sorry, sorry, sorry...'
Attempting to fit into this community, which is so different to my own, is as to be expected quite tricky. Attempting to speak the local tribe language, Lugisu, eases this separation of cultures but at the same time gives more reason for hilarity. Apparently there is nothing funnier on god's earth to a shopkeeper or stall owner that me saying to them 'Endweala deekee' (One egg) or 'Tchirano mandas' (Five bread balls). As you say Wanyala (Thank you) and walk away you can hear him attempting through fits of laughter to tell his neighbour about he mzungu who spoke Lugisu. My grasp of the language is unfortunately pretty pathetic - I can greet in the various ways, apologise, thank and count from 1 to 10. Its good when you know the names of the local street foods or that foketo is an avacado. Buying goods from a stall is one of the main reason for learning the local language since being in a rural town with little access to the outside world the local grasp of english is poorer than that of closer to Kampala. Guess that means they wont understand 'Stop bloody staring at me' then.
I was told soon after arriving in the country that people will overcharge you because of your skin colour. However, I don't feel cheated of my money when charged 100Ush (approx 2.9p) for a freshly picked avacado or 1000Ush for a kilo and a half of irish potatoes or even 9p for a crispy chapati. I splashed out a bit on 16,000 for a kilo of weetabix when in Mbale, but thats a necessity for surviving a year in Uganda in my eyes. Living off 4,100Ush or 1 pound 20p a day in pay is suprisingly easy when not travelling, but sometimes you have to go over budget to get that must have chopping board you've been dreaming of.
Finn and I finally fixed our project and are now working full time at a very local primary school. The benefits of being involved with local children so closely are vast. Girls in P2 skip past chanting 'Master Ben, master Ben' rather than the dreaded mzungu. The local shopkeeper Juma tells us his son enjoyed the class and everyone (since the rumours have obviously spread) has something to say about teaching or a new project we can do. The classes vary from teaching six year olds how to write numbers to Area = L x W with P5. Kids sing a welcome song every time you enter the classroom and get fully involved when impressing their mzungu teacher, jumping from their seats, hand in the air screaming 'Teacher, me!' at every question. Joint PE lessons are something unexpected - try controlling a game of stick in the mud with 200 children.
Two weeks ago all twenty one of the volunteers went to Kampala to meet up and discuss their projects. It was a very busy weekend - we all went swimming, Finn and I went to a karoke bar ('Man in the mirror' will never be the same again), I managed to KO my foot jumping a wall (although an X-ray in Mbale proves its not fractured), I bought a guitar, ate chocolate and even applied to Uni through UCAS (but not to a Kampala Uni as some on facebook came to believe). Being dropped off in Kampala city center by a taxi is a crazy experience. The traffic is so badly congested that everyone simply walks between vehicles and you get a crush of traffic, pedestrians and people trying to sell shoes through the car windows. Kampala is a world away from the quiet life I've been living in rural Lwakhakha. In Kampala the women have hair, you can buy cheese from the supermarkets and they use two eggs instead of on in their rolexes - so I'm not complaining. However I did get a strange, uncomfortable feeling being surrounded by home comforts (like takeaway pizza and light switches) and all the white people too.
6 weeks has definitely been a turning point for me in terms of working at a new school and getting used to the idea of staying here by making plans for the futurue. In November we've made plans to visit other volunteers in the west and even go white water rafting down the Nile. I've even bought a PO Box so if you wish you can write to me, I'd love to receive some letters. Speak soon.
Lot's of love from Nile computers, Mbale.
Ben Hunter,
PO Box 1342,
Mbale,
UGANDA
Thursday, October 7, 2010
'Eh, Mzungu!'
One word means the same thing in all the 100s of East Afrian languages.
'Mzungu' [Meh-zun-goo]
It means 'white man' or 'stranger'. When you walk down the dusty red road in Lwakhakha the excitement of seeing a white boy is too much to control for many Ugandan children. There will be one little black girl standing a few feet from you, a ravenous joy in her eyes, her arm outstretched, finger pointed directly at you and then she will scream with all the power in her lungs that dreaded word. 'Mzungu!' Then the children will come running - from out their houses, the shops and every nook and cranny in the street - a great herd charging like wildebeast right at you. There is nowhere to run. Each and every one of them will want to shake your hand, touch your legs, hug your knees and each without fail will ask 'Mzungu, how are you?'
And from that moment on you're an instant small-town celebrity. And it's not just the children who are interested in you, the adults love a bit of mzungu too - they'll hiss and snap their fingers to gain your undivided attention. Everyone will stare at you as you go to buy some eggs or an avacado from the local stall. Then the cry will go out from across the street, from a man sitting lazily on his motorbike: 'Eh, Mzungu!' - as if that alone is great conversation and merits a response. You feel like shouting 'Congratulations dim-wit, you've worked out the difference between black and white'. But instead you smile politely and shrug your shoulders saying 'Yes, yes, I'm white. What fun!'
It's now been over a month since I landed in Uganda's Entebbe airport, full of excitement and anticipation, and I think it's safe to say that I've settled in fine. Yes there are still a few things that surprise me like when the driver manages to squeeze one more person into his taxi or when the primary school children sing to you english nursery rhymes, but for the most part everything is now normal. Finn and I made ourselves feel more at home last week by giving the accomodation a tidy over and rearranging what little furniture we have. We bought ourselves tubs for storing food so that we could have a good selection of ingredients for cooking on our puny paraffin stove. And cook we did - pumpkin curry, pumpkin fritters, egg fried rice, Spanish omelette, potato cakes, chips and tomato salsa and my personal favourite - irish potato and caramelised onion mash with poached eggs. It's been a very veggy diet, but pretty darned successful for not even having a kitchen.
Finn and I have been keeping ourselves busy in the rest of our spare time. Finn is a massive football fan so we've been going to the local generator-powered foortball 'cinema' to watch Arsenal games. And when I say cinema I mean it in the loosest sense of the word - imagine 100 middle-aged Ugandan men and two skinny white boys crushed into a space no bigger than the average living room, transfixed by a tiny TV in the corner.
Other highlights of the past few weeks have included: hiking through the rainforest watching red-tailed monkeys before reaching the spectacular 'Griffin falls', paying to use a Mbale hotel swimming pool so as to use the first real toilet I've had in a month, learning to count to 10 in Lugisu, sampling the street foods in Lugazi, buying pots and pans in Mbale market, having a shower in a thunderstorm (see picture) and climbing the rocks in Lwakhakha to see the view stretch all the way out into Kenya.
And of course there has been the teaching project, what I came here to do. We've been having some problems with which school we're supposed to be teaching at but I'm sure things will work out in the end. The education standards seem to fluctuate massively - the headmistress of the primary school gave me the shock of my life when she told me she was 19 and had 3 college courses under her belt, yet two boys in my p6 class are only a year younger than me.
On Tuesday Finn and I finall walked the extra few metres from our accomodation, over the Lwakhakha river and into Kenya. It was exciting to make the crossing but the Kenyan side of town is almost identical to the Ugandan. One of the main differences was the bundles of clothes than lined the street. All the second-hand clothes that are donated through charities (or that clothes bin the Tesco carpark) end up being sold in Africa. I couldn't help but laugh when I saw an 8-year old girl measuring a pair of tight denim shorts against herself. On the way back I spotted a massive tree covered in what looked densley packed black figs. As I drew closer I noticed that the tree was host to 100s of bats that hung from every inch of the branches.
I've been getting on well with my partner Finn and in the evening we just relax, chat and play rummy. We share much, like an undying love for the simplicity of a chapati. Quote Finn on smoking - 'I'm not addicted. I ask myself do I need a cigarette and if the answer is no then I give myself one as a reward.'
Simply being in African is exciting enough without all the rubbish I've just written about. The satisfaction gained from walking twenty minutes to the water pump and back to collect water before washing is great. I still miss the luxury of my home in Turriff, but even that is slowly being taken over by the joy of living to the slow beat of Ugandan life.
Til next time,
Ben
'Mzungu' [Meh-zun-goo]
It means 'white man' or 'stranger'. When you walk down the dusty red road in Lwakhakha the excitement of seeing a white boy is too much to control for many Ugandan children. There will be one little black girl standing a few feet from you, a ravenous joy in her eyes, her arm outstretched, finger pointed directly at you and then she will scream with all the power in her lungs that dreaded word. 'Mzungu!' Then the children will come running - from out their houses, the shops and every nook and cranny in the street - a great herd charging like wildebeast right at you. There is nowhere to run. Each and every one of them will want to shake your hand, touch your legs, hug your knees and each without fail will ask 'Mzungu, how are you?'
And from that moment on you're an instant small-town celebrity. And it's not just the children who are interested in you, the adults love a bit of mzungu too - they'll hiss and snap their fingers to gain your undivided attention. Everyone will stare at you as you go to buy some eggs or an avacado from the local stall. Then the cry will go out from across the street, from a man sitting lazily on his motorbike: 'Eh, Mzungu!' - as if that alone is great conversation and merits a response. You feel like shouting 'Congratulations dim-wit, you've worked out the difference between black and white'. But instead you smile politely and shrug your shoulders saying 'Yes, yes, I'm white. What fun!'
It's now been over a month since I landed in Uganda's Entebbe airport, full of excitement and anticipation, and I think it's safe to say that I've settled in fine. Yes there are still a few things that surprise me like when the driver manages to squeeze one more person into his taxi or when the primary school children sing to you english nursery rhymes, but for the most part everything is now normal. Finn and I made ourselves feel more at home last week by giving the accomodation a tidy over and rearranging what little furniture we have. We bought ourselves tubs for storing food so that we could have a good selection of ingredients for cooking on our puny paraffin stove. And cook we did - pumpkin curry, pumpkin fritters, egg fried rice, Spanish omelette, potato cakes, chips and tomato salsa and my personal favourite - irish potato and caramelised onion mash with poached eggs. It's been a very veggy diet, but pretty darned successful for not even having a kitchen.
Finn and I have been keeping ourselves busy in the rest of our spare time. Finn is a massive football fan so we've been going to the local generator-powered foortball 'cinema' to watch Arsenal games. And when I say cinema I mean it in the loosest sense of the word - imagine 100 middle-aged Ugandan men and two skinny white boys crushed into a space no bigger than the average living room, transfixed by a tiny TV in the corner.
Other highlights of the past few weeks have included: hiking through the rainforest watching red-tailed monkeys before reaching the spectacular 'Griffin falls', paying to use a Mbale hotel swimming pool so as to use the first real toilet I've had in a month, learning to count to 10 in Lugisu, sampling the street foods in Lugazi, buying pots and pans in Mbale market, having a shower in a thunderstorm (see picture) and climbing the rocks in Lwakhakha to see the view stretch all the way out into Kenya.
And of course there has been the teaching project, what I came here to do. We've been having some problems with which school we're supposed to be teaching at but I'm sure things will work out in the end. The education standards seem to fluctuate massively - the headmistress of the primary school gave me the shock of my life when she told me she was 19 and had 3 college courses under her belt, yet two boys in my p6 class are only a year younger than me.
On Tuesday Finn and I finall walked the extra few metres from our accomodation, over the Lwakhakha river and into Kenya. It was exciting to make the crossing but the Kenyan side of town is almost identical to the Ugandan. One of the main differences was the bundles of clothes than lined the street. All the second-hand clothes that are donated through charities (or that clothes bin the Tesco carpark) end up being sold in Africa. I couldn't help but laugh when I saw an 8-year old girl measuring a pair of tight denim shorts against herself. On the way back I spotted a massive tree covered in what looked densley packed black figs. As I drew closer I noticed that the tree was host to 100s of bats that hung from every inch of the branches.
I've been getting on well with my partner Finn and in the evening we just relax, chat and play rummy. We share much, like an undying love for the simplicity of a chapati. Quote Finn on smoking - 'I'm not addicted. I ask myself do I need a cigarette and if the answer is no then I give myself one as a reward.'
Simply being in African is exciting enough without all the rubbish I've just written about. The satisfaction gained from walking twenty minutes to the water pump and back to collect water before washing is great. I still miss the luxury of my home in Turriff, but even that is slowly being taken over by the joy of living to the slow beat of Ugandan life.
Til next time,
Ben
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