The Last One

I again apologize for the sparce postings this week. As I said earlier in the week, things have been slow in the clinic, and we have not gone on as many excursions. On Wednesday we went to Rugarama Hospital to do a garden workshop with some mothers of children in the malnutrition ward. We got to show them how to more efficiently grow vegetables at home so they can provide more balanced meals for their children. The technique we showed them allows between 20 and 30 cabbages to be planted in very little space, along with other local vegetables such as dodo (wild spinach). Below is a picture of the demonstration garden. This was a nice way to end the nutrition portion of the program; we got to see how some simple education could really help these women—and be a good garden project in the states as well!

Yesterday morning was our last day in the clinic. We got to see some patients, and later in the morning, we finally got to see KIHEFO’s new Maternal and Child Health Hospital, Kirigime Health Center. It has been ten years in the making, and just opened for out patient antenatal clinics this month. When it is finished, it will have over 100 beds—a HUGE achievement, as the local government hospital has only 3 beds, a pediatric wing, and out patient clinics. It will be the first Maternal and Child Health Hospital in Uganda. We got to see some of the mothers who were there for the antenatal clinic. The way KIHEFO has convinced mothers to get antenatal care is to provide free ultrasounds of the babies. It has worked well so far, and news is spreading fast around Kabale about the new facility. While we were there, we got to give a nutrition seminar to the mothers about providing balanced meals for their chidren. While I am sad that I will not be able to stay to see the continued progress towards a full opening of this ground-breaking facility, I hope that I will get to come back one day to see it in its full glory. Below are some pictures of Kirigime Health Center.

Labor Room of Kirigime Health Centre

Future Main Wards of Kirigime Health Centre

Another ward of Kirigime Health Centre

Today, to celebrate July 4^th here in Uganda, the other interns and I took a last trip to Lake Bunyonyi. We relaxed by the water, sang patriotic songs, and just sat and talked. We ended up running into some students who had left KIHEFO last week and were on safari, so we got to catch up with them. In the late afternoon, I finally decided to jump in the lake. It was beautiful and not to cold. Lake Bunyonyi is the deepest lake in Uganda, and the second deepest lake in Africa—it is 65 feet deep! All in all, it was a wonderful day. Below are a few pictures.

Rob, Amanda, Casie, Marnie, Adrien, and me
at Lake Bunyonyi 

Repping Michigan Kinesiology at
Lake Bunyonyi 

Panorama of the lake 

Casie, Adrien, and me at the lake.

It is hard for me to believe that my month here in Uganda has come to an end. While I know that this internship has been a very impactful learning experience, I also know that I will continue to learn from my time here in Kabale and my time with KIHEFO long after I leave tomorrow. There are things that I will not realize I learned here for a long time, but for now, I will give a list of 7 (my favorite number) important lessons I will take from my time here, both for my benefit and yours:

1.     Slow down. Really embrace every moment, and don’t worry too much about what’s past or what is coming. Live in the present, because otherwise you will miss so much of what life has to offer.

2.     Advocating for yourself is not selfish. In the real world, you have to go after what you want. If you ask the answer may be no, but if you don’t ask, the answer will never be yes.

3.     Passion isn't always easy. Just loving a subject or being passionate about a cause does not mean I will wake up every morning and love what I have to do that day. Some days are hard. Yet those are usually the days that you can learn the most from, so remember them.

4.     See work in progress everywhere. The hard workers, the doers, the hopers, the dreamers. They can be found anywhere and everywhere, and will inspire you when you need it most.

5.     Carpe Diem. This has become a motto of mine in the second half of my time here. Sieze the day. Live life to the fullest. Leave wherever you are with no regrets. You never know when-or if-you will be back.

6.     It is ok to look forward to going home. This is one that I struggled with at the end of last week. I have been away from home a lot, but this is the first time I ever actively looked forward to leaving where I was and going home. After reflecting on it I realized that I think it means this: if you look forward to going home, you know how much you love your family and friends,and are excited to be closer to them again. Remember this feeling when they are near so you don’t take them for granted, but until then don’t focus on missing them so much that you miss out on everything where you are.

7.     Be positive. Don’t let anything consume you except the power of positive thinking. Life is too short for that, and it is a waste of energy. Take the time to appreciate the positives in every day.

Thank you to everyone who has followed my adventures for the past month, and to everyone who has contacted me while I have been here. It means the world to me. I’ll be stateside in roughly 48 hours, and I look forward to catching up with everyone then. I started with a quote back in May, and I think I’ll end with one, because I like them so much. You all have seen this one already, but I  think it is the best one for the end of my time with KIHEFO, so I’m going to repeat it:

Go to the people: 

Live with them, 

Learn from them

Love them

Start with what they know

Build with what they have.

But of the best leaders,

when the job is done,

the task accomplished,

the people will say: 

“We have done it ourselves.”. –Lao Tzu

A parting gift from KIHEFO at our
farewell dinner on Thursday.

Canada Day

Today was my last outreach here in Uganda. KIHEFO does a monthly HIV outreach to a community group about a half hour’s drive from Kabale town, where we see HIV+ patients, see how they are doing on their medications, and provide them with a month’s worth of ARV therapy. There are almost 200 patients in this group, although today no more than 30 came to the outreach. We learned that one of the barriers to coming is hygiene. Many people feel ashamed that they do not have soap and water to bathe, and feel embarassed coming to pick up their medications. While there are many other barriers to healthcare here, this one seemed so simple to me that it really struck me. If soap were provided, or, better-yet, if people were taught how to make their own soap cheaply so that the soap could be more easily accessible, maybe more people would get their ARVs. In addition, they would have better hygiene, and wouldn’t get sick as often. This was a very concrete example of how interconnected so many issues are here. You cannot solve one without affecting several others.

Adrienne and I hard at work at the HIV outreach.

Anywho, this post is called Canada Day because, well, today is Canada Day. Our local coordinator here, as well as her two roommates, are Canadian, so we had a celebration at the KIHEFO compound. We had pancakes, hashbrowns, and bacon with maple syrup for dinner. It was all delicious, and a nice change of pace. Now I am going to watch the USA vs. Belgium game (or at least some of it, as it is after 11PM here) and tomorrow, we are going to do a nutrition workshop at a local missionary hospital.

Breakfast for dinner!

Sustainable Agriculture in Uganda

This week has started out much more slowly than the last three. While the days are going by fast, they are not quite as jam-packed as last week was, which is a nice way to end my time here in Uganda. However, it also means that my blog posts are likely to get less exciting. In any case, we started off the week with a day focused on sustainable agriculture in the developing world. We had a seminar in the morning, and in the afternoon we visited KIHEFO’s rabbit breeding project and a nearby mushroom project. Agriculture is something I didn’t know much about before I came here, and something that is definitely a huge part of Ugandan life. Many Ugandans are subsistance farmers, which has caused a lot of challenges as a cash economy has become more and more prevalent throughout the country. One thing I learned a lot about yesterday, and throughout this month, is the role of gender in agriculture. Here in Uganda, women do the majority of the agricultural work, but have little control over what crops they can plant and what they can do with the crops they harvest. All of the responsibilities of the farm are broken down by gender. One example of this is that all perennial crops are controlled by men. Women cannot choose to buy and plant those crops; they must wait for their husbands to make that decision.

In addition to the traditional fruit and vegetable farms, throughout this month we have learned about different ways to help find local, sustainable solutions to malnutrition in southwestern Uganda. Yesterday we got to visit KIHEFO’s rabbit breeding project, which is still starting up but has a lot of potential. Earlier this month, I helped revise and administer nutrition surveys in Rubira, a nearby village. Future volunteers will continue to administer these surveys in Rubira and in other villages to identify families with malnourished children. The goal of this is to be able to provide qualifying families with one male rabbit and two female rabbits to start their own breeding project so the family will be able to have protein to eat and have a more balanced diet. Eventually, the family could sell some of their rabbits back to KIHEFO, and KIHEFO could sell rabbit meat in town, which would help cover costs of the program. We got to see a program similar to this in the mushroom project that we visited yesterday. This project gives mushroom spawn to farmers, and the farmers grow the mushrooms. After the farmers grow the mushrooms, they can sell them back to the mushroom training center, where they can be packaged and sold. The profit from the sales of the mushrooms goes back towards funding the project. These two projects are local, innovative solutions to the malnutrition problem in Uganda that involve sustainable agriculture. Below are some pictures.

The future administration building for the rabbit project.

Some of the rabbits at the rabbit farm.

Kale in the garden used as rabbit food.

Solar dryers at the mushroom training center.

Mushrooms growing at the the training center.