Mzungu, Bye

*Originally written before leaving, but because of power-outages and flight changes, it couldn't be posted until today.

Life isn't fair. I understand that now. Sometimes you will put in more that you will get out. Sometimes you will find that your time-limit has been cut short. Sometimes you will face unmovable, unjumpable, un-deconstructable (indestructible would be the word, but that doesn't start with 'un') brick walls that separate you from your goal.

I'm being sent home early. The Ugandan government has declined my visa renewal, and I leave Friday morning. Shrinking my final moments here from 3 months to 2 days feels so surreal. It really hasn't set in yet. I just feel rushed. I don't really have that many loose ends to tie up, I just need to say my goodbyes to so many people. Some I won't be able to say that to. Like Bangi. Bangi has become one of my best friends here, but I will never be able to properly say goodbye since he is away until next Wednesday.

I guess I'm not that upset about being forced to go. It actually kind of feels like a weight lifted from my chest. For the past few weeks, I have had my visa situation in the back of my mind, nagging, never quite letting me focus on anything else. Even though this is probably the worst way it could have ended, any sort of resolution is comforting. I don't feel like my work here is unaccomplished or incomplete. I know that I tried to make the most positive impact on these kids as possible, given the obstacles we had to face. I'm proud of our work here. Even though there is still so much more to be done, I know that there will be others to fill my shoes when I'm gone.

For my last couple of blog posts, I was planning on making some lists. Just something light: What I'll miss, What I won't miss, What I will never take for granted again. That all seems tacky now. I know what I'm going to take away from this. I know the experiences and lessons I will never forget. In light of recent events, it's clear to me that I have been so lucky to even have receive them in the first place. I know the kids smiling faces and the my time with them will be something I will miss. I know I have helped some of them, even if it was just by being a friend when they needed it. I know the things and people that I am going home to, and I know the comfort I will feel then I get there. The only thing I can do for now is appreciate my final days. After all...

"There's nothing up ahead that's any better than it is right now."
~Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

Drastic Times

The last week has been chaos. I went in on Tuesday to pick up my passport from the immigration office which I had left there the previous week to get my visa renewed. Long, exhausting, frustrating story short, the Commissioner of Immigration has retained my passport, refused to extend my visa, and declared that if I don't get a plane ticket home by Friday (as in this Friday past, the 29th), I will be fined $30/day for each day that I stay here after that. Luckily, we have made some phone calls and found a lawyer who should be able to get my visa renewed. At this point, however, I'm still not sure if this will work. I just want to know one way or the other what is going to happen.

To make everything even more complicated, there have been riots recently in Kampala. The opposition party leader who lost the recent election is still crying about it and has been doing everything in his power to use his supporters to create chaos under the guise of protesting commodity prices and inflation. News Flash: Prices are increasing worldwide, not just in Uganda. Corrupt as the president and the NRM party may be, they don't really have too much of a say in the matter. So basically, the riots have just been ignorant young people who just want something to lash out about.

Rest assured, I am safe in Ndejje. Everything is as quiet as ever here. The closest thing we've had to riots is people cheering and hanging from the windows of passing taxi vans and drunk people spouting gibberish about Museveni, the government, and gas prices as they stagger along the dirt roads. I don't think the people of Uganda will be organized enough, or motivated enough, to pull something off like their North African counterparts. Then again, I've learned never to make the mistake of ruling anything out here.

And Now for Something Completely Different...

Sometimes it gets hard to fill empty time here. Outside of reading, listening to my iPod on random, and incredibly small talk with locals in their broken English and my broken Luganda, there isn't too much else to do. So, I've started to become creative. Like making lists. Here's one for you guys. A lot of time went into this one, and there were quite a few Honorable Mentions.

Top 5 Guilty Pleasure Flicks
(Based on a sliding scale of "How much I enjoy the movie" and "How guilty I feel while watching it")

5.) Predator: Jesse Venture plays a serious role in it, so there is a limited threshold for how good the movie can actually be. However, the sweet noise the predator makes while he stalks people totally makes up for it. That, and he can see in infrared.

4.) Terminator 2: Judgment Day: I'm not so much embarrassed that I like this movie as much as I'm embarrassed by how much I like this movie. I'm also not sure about how I feel about the fact that there are two Schwarzenegger films on this list.

3.) The Notebook: I don't even feel that guilty... That's just plain good storytelling if you ask me.

2.) Sweet Home Alabama: This one really brings out the whiskey girl in me.

1.) Mean Girls: I can't quite figure out why, but I love this one. Ask Tony Prekop. We can go back and forth quoting this movie all night. And we have, actually. Ask Michaela Mack...

"There are things that drift away like our endless, numbered days" ~Sam Beam

Holy Days

First term is already ending. Hope P.S. just finished their exams this past week and will be getting the results next week. Which means that we will be starting a new schedule for the youth center during their break. This term has flown by with only a few hiccups. Thankfully, we now have a regular schedule for the youth center established for when school is in session. That was the hard part.

It is hard to believe that there is only about a month and a half left for Courtney, Heather, and me in Ndejje. Hopefully, we will be able to have a good number of kids from the community at the center during holiday. We will have the youth center open from 1-5 pm, Monday-Thursday. The children will be welcome to come for reading, art, games and puzzles. We will also hold trainings from 3:30-5 for any of the children that are interested. We might try to divide our time up into shifts so that none of us get burnt out. We have been told not to have Saturday trainings over break because many of the children will be expected to be home for chores at that point.

We are all trying to make the most out of our remaining time here. Courtney has been active helping teach an English class that is being run by one of the SWB coaches in Kampala, and Heather has been putting some final touches on some aid projects she has will some of the local families. I'm trying to help Jacques from Hope P.S. establish some sort of sustainable agriculture program for some of the refugees in Ndejje to take part in to try to generate some income. The days are numbered, and there soon won't be any left.

Kids Helping Kids

This is long overdue, but I want to take the time to send a special "Thank You" to some amazing young people who have helped out with the Soccer Without Borders program in Ndejje by sending supplies for the Ndejje Youth Center. When I was back home for Christmas break, I stopped my my old elementary school, Hales Corners Elementary, to talk to my first grade teacher's class. While I was there, I started talking to one of the guidance councilors about talking to the 5th grade class about volunteering. Both classes were great to talk to and were so excited to learn about Uganda, the people there, and the work being done for them.

After talking to the students, they decided that they wanted to help the children of Ndejje by collecting school supplies and different puzzles and games for the youth. They also drew pictures for the Ugandan children to show them some things of what life is like for them in the US. All of the Ndejje kids were excited to find out about winter in Wisconsin. They were all really interested in what a 'snowman' is!

I can't say enough about what it means for people so young to try to help other people their own age who are in need. Too often, people don't realize they can help those less fortunate than them until later in life, and by that time they have wasted a lot of valuable time. That is why I want to thank every student in Mrs. Glick's 1st grade class and the entire 5th grade at H.C.E. for their contribution. I hope that it is just the start of many life long volunteer-careers! I can't wait to see you guys again when I get back in June!

Until then,

Adam In Africa

Pressing On

Things have started to look up. Slowly but surely, we have begun to establish an after-school program that is acceptable for the Hope P.S. administration. We have the schedule, now it's just a matter of working out the kinks in implementing it. The term is almost over, so we really only have one week left to work with the kids before break, but at least break will give us time to inform all of the teachers on how the new schedule will work for 2nd term and to make sure that they support us. That means having them actually promote the program rather than threatening to beat the kids if they come to the youth center after school.

As my time here starts to draw to a close and my future inevitably creeps up on me, I have started to think about what to do when it gets here. I feel my mindset has changed drastically since this time last year, along with my priorities. I don't want to go home and fall back on old ways. I'm afraid there is nothing I can do to stop it, but at least I can maybe try to hold on to a few pieces of the new me.

I want to continue to live simply. Cheap food and entertainment. I want to keep my mind active. Now that I don't have class everyday, I will be responsible for that on my own. Playing Zelda doesn't count. I want to keep reading books and not let myself waste away in front of the television for hours and hours each day. I want to start appreciating the time I have with my family. I don't want to be an absentee big brother anymore, especially since Bryan will be going off to college in a year and a half and starting his own life. Stuart needs someone to tease him about his weight, too, so that he will keep doing his Wii Fit. I'm perfect for the job.

There are still 2 months left in my time here, but that time will crawl by quickly. It took over a month to feel like I was settling in here, 5 months to establish an after-school program, and nearly 8 months to discover that I can buy chicken and chips (fries) right here in Ndejje and that I don't have to go into town for it anymore. I know I still have plenty of time to accomplish things with SWB, but it really is starting to feel like the home stretch. My biggest fear is that I will come home with regrets, feeling like there was more I could have done but didn't.

So close...

It feels like the setbacks never fail in Ndejje. Just when we think that we have established an after school program that can be successful, the locals who are supposed to be our support system here start to show that they don't understand why we are even doing the program in the first place.

The local director for Soccer Without Borders has been trying to help Courtney, Heather and me establish a good program to get kids into the youth center after school. We have a set schedule so that Tuesdays we have reading, Wednesdays games and puzzles, and Thursdays art. We have known for a while that it would be difficult to get students after school for a number of reasons: 1.) The concept of a youth center doesn't exist here, so people don't see it's value yet, 2.) Parents want their kids home for chores after school, and 3.) Many of the kids don't get out of school until around 6:30 pm.

Now, we understand that we won't be able to work with EVERY kid because of their parents' refusing them, and we are trying hard to address that, but we aren't getting any help from the locals. The local director and the Head Mistress (principal) of Hope Primary School have apparently been getting calls from concerned parents about where their kids have been after school and why they are getting home so late. We have tried sending home letters to be signed by parents so they understand what's going on. However, the calls keep coming. We have asked the Head Mistress to either give us their names (either of parents or the children) or have those parents call us, but she refuses to do either. How can we fix the problem if we don't know what the problem is?

The local director and Hope's Head Mistress have suggested that we limit the time we spend at the youth center with the kids so that we send them home at 5 pm. That literally would give us 15 minutes with the kids. They have also suggested that we start doing what we have planned for after school during the one hour a week that we spend in the classrooms with P3-P7. That completely defeats the purpose of our youth center. We have been here for 7 months trying to establish an after school program for the entire community, meaning getting kids for schools all over Ndejje to come to work with us, and they want us to throw that all away. We aren't here only to cater to Hope Primary School.

I've known for a long time that Ugandans are afraid of change and don't like new ideas. That's why they've had the same president for 25-going-on-30 years. That's why every restaurant serves the same five dishes in Ndejje. And it's why no one seems to understand, or even want to learn to understand, why Soccer Without Borders is here in the first place. Yes, it is hard work to establish an after school program. What we need is locals who are willing to do the heavy lifting, which is proving hard to come by. I don't care if that means Courtney, Heather and I will have to go to every kid's home and talk to their parents. I don't care if it means that we only get 30 kids who we know are able to come on a regular basis. It will all be worth it to know that we have established something that the kids can rely on and develop from. Now, all we need to know is which house we need to visit first.

The Poles are Closed

Sorry for the delay... We've been banished from Kampala for the past week+ because of the elections in Uganda. Normally, elections are a peaceful and sometimes even exciting time, but in Africa, they are usually cause for fear and caution.

The elections went off without a hitch, thankfully, and there has been no major violence in Kampala so far. The problem with elections here, is that opposing sides are pinned so fiercely against one another. The National Resistance Movement (NRM) has been the ruling party in Uganda for 25 years now, ever since the overthrow of vicious dictator, Idi Amin. Oh, and did I mention that Yoweri Museveni has been the President of Uganda for that entire time? Originally, he was limited to two 5-year terms, but he was able to extend the number of terms indefinitely by changing the constitution. Obviously, this isn't the most democratic practice, but the common folk of Uganda see it as a good thing, because he has "brought peace and prosperity for the people" and "he is the only one who knows how to do the job in Uganda" (Quotes coming directly from my imagination as a summary of what villagers have been telling me).

The opposition party doesn't exactly have it's act together either. The Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) is the strongest opposition, but is no where near as powerful as the NRM. Part of the problem is that it is a coalition party, meaning that it is made up of a union of smaller parties. Unfortunately, one of the fears or the people is that if the FDC were to get into power, the party members wouldn't share the same ideologies and doctrines, and the government would split, running in different directions towards different issues.

What it ultimately comes down to is money. The NRM controls the government and the national purse. Actually, the NRM spent 85% of this years national budget on political campaigns, and it shows. You can't walk anywhere in Kampala without seeing a yellow NRM sign or Museveni's face with his trademark farmers hat, since he's "One of the common folk". And surprisingly (kind of), the cities are actually the FDC's strongest voter bases. The rural areas just tend to support Museveni (M7 to his friends) because they are uninformed voters and fear that the country will fall back into war and obscurity if someone else is left at the helm.

So elections are always a toss up... Kind of. The NRM won handily, with 68% of the votes, thus starting M7's sixth (and final?) term. Some think that Museveni will try to become the first president of the East African Community in 2017, if the position is established that is, giving himself a nice little retirement package. Who knows if this election is over yet though. Rumor has it that the opposition is still trying to stage a demonstration in the upcoming weeks. But don't worry. We've already hatched an escape plan including a military transport and a place to stay near to the US Embassy.

Training Fresh

The SWB-Ndejje Team has recently decided to go separate ways with our local staff member, Deo. Although he was a decent coach, all he was interested in was coaching a older boys team, a select team. He didn't practice, or even buy into, many of the Soccer Without Borders beliefs--equality for women, giving all ages equal practice time, making sure the kids have fun--and it showed in his actions both at training and at home.

Now we can start anew. We had our first training since his departure on Saturday, and it felt great. We were able to run the practice how we wanted to without having Deo sitting around doing nothing, bringing down the energy of the training, and frustrating Heather, Courtney and me. We also now have the opportunity to find a different local coach who understands that SWB isn't just about soccer--It's actually more about the education. We can find someone who will want to learn how to be a SWB coach, who will actually enjoy the kids. No more throwing out a soccer ball and sitting in the shade for an hour.

Although finding a new coach in Ndejje will be a daunting task, it is so much better than the alternative: Doing nothing, continuing to allow Deo to hinder SWB's teachings, and passing this problem off to the next set of interns. It may be hard to find someone who is motivated to become the type of coach SWB wants, there is no other way to show the kids here that they don't have to succumb to the norm. That they can change their life's course by changing their mind set and starting to think for themselves.

Sending Refugee Kids to School

A new school term has started in Uganda. Although this means that we will hopefully have more time to work with the kids since they will not be studying as much for their end-of-year exams, it also means that many of the children in Ndejje will not be able to go to school anymore. We have noticed that there are many kids in the area that aren't going to school yet, mainly because they can't afford the school fees for the term at this point. They are waiting for their parents to raise the money, IF they can raise the money, before going to class, which means that they are all getting behind in their schoolwork.

One of the great things about Hope Primary School, the school Soccer Without Borders - Ndejje has worked with most closely, is that they allow refugee children to enroll. Most of the schools in the area are funded by the government, which requires them NOT to admit refugee children. Although some school have secretly been letting refugees enroll anyways, Hope P.S. is one of the few openly accepting them AND letting them enroll at a nominal price. That being said, most of the children that we have seen "waiting" to go to school have been refugees.

I have talked to Jacques, the man who started Hope P.S., and he has told me that the fee for refugees to go to school for the entire year is only $30, or 60,000 Ugandan Shillings. I would like to invite anyone who is able to help to click on the link on the right hand side to donate. I can't help but ask when a child can get an education for the price of a night out or of a new sweater.

Thank you so much for your support. Anyone who does sponsor a child for the year, I will be sure to send you a picture of the one that you sent to school.

Back in Ndejje

Time moves fast, and life changes just as quickly. In what feels like only the time span of one day, I have gone from enjoying last laughs and a last supper with Sarah, Kyle, and Ryan, to mindlessly passing time in transit, to crying myself to sleep over homesickness, lovesickness, and anxiety about the next 5 months of my life, to peacefully watching the sleeping hills of Ndejje under the early morning moonlight.

I have never stayed up this late/woken up this early here in Uganda. Such a contrast. Probably the only time I will actually feel true quiet here. The moon is full, bright enough to write from. Although I do miss my home and the ones I love, I feel somehow rejuvenated in coming back. Recharged. Even if most of the sense of adventure is gone, I think that I am more focused, repurposed. I know the frustrations ahead of me and now expect complications and setbacks in everything I do.

Going home was a reminder of how lucky people in the West truly are. Even though Americans are falling left and right on to hard times, there is so much more opportunity for growth and education then there is here. Seeing how elementary school children are cared for and nurtured in our school system -- thanks largely to the teachers who actually care about what they are doing -- makes me want to work even harder to make a difference here. Maybe the older generations are hopeless, but the children aren't. Reeducation is often spoken in a negative light, synonymous with brainwashing even. But this is different. This is showing children that they don't have to grow up with the same backwards thinking as their parents This is grassroots social change at its finest.