This is the blog for Rhona and Bobby Hogg's VSO experience in Uganda. In August 2008 we applied to do VSO and, following an assessment day in London last October, we were accepted as volunteers . Because of the strong Scottish links, we had set our sights originally on Malawi where we spent a week in June 2008 but joint placements are difficult to find and in February we agreed with VSO to open up the search. At the end of March we were delighted to be offered placements in Kampala, Uganda. We are to work for a HIV and AIDS initiative called Reach Out Mbuya (http://www.reachoutmbuya.org/) where, we hope, Rhona's community nursing experience and Bobby's IT experience will prove useful.

We are due in Kampala on 18th September and have committed to spend a year there. We are very excited about the prospect of living in a very different part of the world and working with Ugandans who, from many reports, are fun to be with. We expect there to be many challenges but our stay in Uganda should be immensely enjoyable.

We are indebted to VSO for giving us this opportunity. Our preparation, including 2 training courses in Birmingham, has been excellent and we are confident about the in-country support that we will get from VSO in Uganda. I understand that it costs VSO around £15,000 to support each volunteer. If you would like to make a donation to support our placements in Uganda please visit the Just Giving site through the link opposite.

Thursday 26 November 2009

Eight weeks in


Rhona - 25/11/09
Last week we had our second in-country training course now that we have had a chance to get started in our placements. It is great meeting up again, especially with those who are up-country and came back to Kampala for the week. As expected, there is a mixture of feelings about placements, and we feel really fortunate to have such a well-structured and well-resourced organisation and to have been able to slot into our roles so quickly, especially as we are just here for one year. Some people have gone to organisations who have simply no money at all to do anything, in some cases even to pay their staff who have been waiting for their salaries for a few months. Some organisations are only interested in getting money from the volunteer and assume that the volunteer will arrive with money, laptop for the organisation etc.  One couple are staying in a very remote area, Bwindi Inpenetrable Forest, and are living in a house with no water or electricity. They also share the house with two others. They are near a “trading station” where subsistence farmers sell some surplus, perhaps three tomatoes or a few bananas. Their nearest food shop is two hours away by very rough track. They have no fridge so cannot keep food. However, the location is magical and they are working in Bwindi Community Hospital which another VSO volunteer, Paul, has transformed over the past three years. The website is worth a look.
Another woman is doing a short-term assignment in a remote area for eight weeks. She is a social work manager and is writing a proposal for a district during a secondment supported by the Welsh Assembly who seem to send people all over the developing world to carry out short-term very focused work.
Many of us are in Kampala, with the rest scattered to the east, west and south. The war in the north seems to be stopped and many people who have been displaced are now returning. VSO is planning to work in the area and are particularly looking at community-based health, so any public health nurses or district nurses would be welcomed.
Although it is recognised that young organisations with few staff require volunteers to do some hands-on work, the main aim of placements is capacity-building within organisations. A few people are working only at a strategic level.
On Wednesday evening we had a dancing session, with a dancer who performs at the cultural arts centre and a band of drummers. It was great fun and very energetic.





 
 






























 We had some good evenings eating and drinking and then said fond farewells to some people who we won’t see again as we are all finishing at different times.
On Sunday I was at a meeting of discordant couples (one HIV+ve, the other –ve) who had taken part in an eight-week intervention from March – June. They look at protecting the negative partner, disclosure to family and friends, supporting the positive partner etc.  We were doing follow-up questionnaires six months after the intervention finished. They are all continuing to meet in small more local groups. The counsellors who ran the intervention completed the questionnaires with about thirty couples. It ran all day, with a stop for lunch. 

 
Kampala has been “a chilly 23ยบ” and there was an article on the fashion page of New Vision about winter outfits to cope with the cold conditions, including boots and body warmers.
I now have a  young Ugandan woman working with me, she has just finished an MSc in public health in America, has come back to Uganda and is looking for some experience before applying for jobs. It is great having someone to do the more hands-on work on the studies that are on-going and I can look at more strategic issues, such as research governance and building research capacity and strengthening links with academic institutions.
We are going to Jinja at the weekend to celebrate Bobby’s birthday by visiting the source of the Nile and staying at a nice lodge. It is our first venture driving further afield than Entebbe, and we are ready for a bit of exploring before our guests start coming. Hamish and Morven leave for their African adventure next week and we can’t wait to meet them off the bus from Kenya on 22nd December.
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