"Cultured"

One of my friends said that I’ll be cultured once I get to Uganda. She meant it in the sense that I will be exposed to a different culture, but Google defines cultured as “characterized by refined taste and manners and good education.” I don’t think that’s what she meant, but I was definitely educated about Uganda on Friday!

Joe and I are conducting a social impact assessment for Tugende and trying to measure how owning a motorcycle improves the quality of life for boda boda riders. (Quick background: Tugende has a lease-to-own financing package that allows boda boda taxi drivers to own their own motorcycles after 14-19 months. These boda boda drivers currently rent motorcycles and pay most of their earned income back to the renters. Tugende wants to see if asset ownership improves the livelihood of its clients). While we broke down quality of life into concrete categories and formulated questions about these metrics back home, Joe and I have no idea what life is really like in Uganda. On Friday, we sat down with Peace and Edgar, with whom we constructed the questionnaire we will give to boda boda drivers. I learned so much about Ugandan people and their way of life from them.

Tugende Bike

Keeping time is not a thing; you have to tell people that a function starts 1-1.5 hrs before the actual start time or people will be very late. For example, the drivers were told that class starts at 8:30am this morning, and one driver walked in at 10:05. He was told to come back on Monday. It’s also interesting how certain people adjust to Ugandan time. For example, Joe and Huda are masters of Ugandan time after just four days while Sammi and I struggle with patience. There needs to be a balance between enjoying the moment and I probably don’t want to work where time is valued lightly.

In a family where both parents work, the husband and wife often keep their financial accounts separate because they don’t trust each other. The mother often pays for family expenses like school fees and food while the father pays for rent and other living expenses (or just spends it. Edgar and Peace do not come from typical Ugandan families so it's difficult to get concrete examples here). Responsible families have 4-5 children max, while those who don’t will “give birth like rabbits” (they have hilarious descriptions).

Living situations can be rough here. We were figuring out questions to ask about housing, and Edgar and Peace said that a room the size of our office could be someone’s sitting room, kitchen, and bedroom all at once. The bathroom is often outside, shared between 6 families, and sectioned rooms are starting to become more popular. The very poor do not have polished/tiled floors or ceilings, often sleeping on dirt floors and using tin sheets as the roof. It was hard to imagine what that looks like, but I saw it today. Perhaps this is what it looks like? 

House?

They have stereotypes of other Africans too! Peace said that Nigerians are known to leave their country for education and work, only to be deported back to Nigeria because they get involved in drugs and “silly activities.” They are dramatic and have crazy rumors which I’m still trying to figure out with they’re true. To a western, analytically trained mind, half of the stories they tell about supernatural forces make me wonder if they’re just messing with me because I’m a clueless foreigner. But if I believe the miracles in the Bible are true, why can’t other crazy stories be true?

That being said, witch doctors and witchcraft are definitely a thing here. We were discussing ways drivers could buy their own motorcycles, and Edgar said to get two chickens, cut off their heads, and sprinkle blood all over, and money will appear the next day. I thought he was joking, only to find out that witch doctors would give people money to do that. People even escape from hospitals sometimes to be treated by witch doctors. Kidnappings also used to be very common because families would take other people’s children to make sacrifices. Yikes.

On a lighter note, we ate Rolexes for lunch, and I was pleasantly surprised that chapati with egg tastes just like (a Taiwanese breakfast food). We also had local mangos, bananas, guavas, and passion fruit from the local market today! Bringing a fruit knife was a smart decision :) It's funny that grapes are in the "exotic fruit" section of the grocery store. Also, since we have to buy bottled water, it's crazy how little water some people drink. I drink about 3 liters of water a day (which isn't even that much), and some people get away with drinking almost no water... Interesting lifestyle differences.

Rolex

And it has been a fun weekend so far! Will post about it soon. Until then~