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on Sabrina and Geoff Slide in Kamwenge (Uganda), 16/May/2009 19:00, 34 days ago
Sabrina wanted to let you know that she does the washing too!Next week Justine is doing the washing and cleaning for us. She works at the hotel next door and is glad to earn some extra money.2 weeks gone and the highlights of this week are:Sabrina went out with district health team to clinics in the north of the district to deliver bikes to village health workers, as well as condoms and drugs. She visited 6 clinics, leaving the office at 11 in the morning and getting home at 7.30 in the evening! The vehicle had seen better days and had a cracked windscreen where the bonnet had come open and smashed against it. It overheated twice during the day and lunch was matooke and groundnut sauce at a small café deep in the bush.Kees and Freddy, two Dutch VSOers from Fort Portal, a large town about 1½ hours drive away, came to visit us and brought some luxuries that we cannot get in Kamwenge. These were weetabix, ribena, processed cheese and long-life milk. It was good to meet people in the same situation as us and compare notes. They have bought a little RAV-4, which is a first-time sold Japanese import. It is 4 wheel drive and very useful but apparently the paperwork took twice as long as expected – bureaucracy is the same everywhere!Sabrina attended a meeting between the district health team and two UNICEF officials who closely questioned the staff about how they done against their targets and how well they had spent UN money. Good to know that there is close follow up of donor funds.Sorting out health questionnaires for when we go into school. We had a late meeting until about 9.30 one evening as we had to get the draft sent to Kampala for approval by 9 the following morning.We attended a workshop for local councillors on water run by the Department for Water Development. Many interesting facts came out as well of lots of background information that will help us to be more focused on our health promotion work. We learnt about deep boreholes, hand dug wells, ordinary and improved springs.Each borehole and well is expected to serve 300 people, and each spring 150 people;At least 30% of households have no adequate sanitation;Only 70% of water sources are functional at any one time;The community that benefits is expected to contribute about£66 towards the total cost of a £4500 deep borehole and similar proportions for the cheaper types of sources;There are many challenges to increasing the number of sources, including:-Low understanding of the relationship between water, sanitation, health and hygiene;Sanitation not seen as a priority by decision makers;Cost of initial investment seen as too high by low-income families;Lack of locally available materials;Lack of adequate and regular water supplies in the right places;Competing demands for limited family resources.We really feel that we have made good progress this week in terms of our understanding of the culture and background issues which will help us when we are out working with schools. We are also being recognized and greeted by colleagues that we see around town as well as learning some local language– well ‘hello’, ‘good afternoon’, ‘thank you’ and ‘goodbye’!!