Reader's Choice!

Every day in Uganda is a lesson learned, and I love sharing those experiences with you all on this blog! With three weeks remaining in my program it is really crunch time at work and I may make less frequent appearances here. I don't want to neglect all of you who have been following Mallory's and my own adventures, so I am wanting to know what you still want to know about Uganda. So much has happened, not everything has been translated into this blog, so if there are any topics or places you would like me to delve into please comment!!

Good News Bad News Time

Which do you want first?

Okay lets go with the bad - we will rip it off quick like a band-aid.

My grant was not funded. Whoops.

On to the good news!

Not receiving my grant has not totally offset my program. Surprised? So was I. That also makes me think that those FSD funds are probably going to be used for a program that needs it more. To be clear I said my program is not totally offset, but we are of course trying to scale back. As we speak (well as I type...) my supervisor is going over my budget to see where we can scale back and if they can contribute any more to our seminar funds.

The bulk of my grant was to fund a half day seminar in August, aiming to educate and empower all 250 plus members in their ownership and responsibilities as a part of Marusacco. This also is an avenue to debut Marusacco's new brand image and showcase our pilot program branded Village Savings and Lending Groups (VSLGs). Adjusting our program through trial and error, our training of trainers approach has saved us a lot in transportation and training materials. Revisiting our initial budget was laughable and we created a new to-do list including all the remaining expenses for the last three weeks of my program.

Remaining is to create advertisements for our market in two weeks, and plan for our empowerment seminar. Hopefully we can mobilize some funds for a tent, food, and transportation costs - but if not, well the show must go on.

Also these marketing and schedule details will need to come together quickly as next week I may be taking a quick trip across a border, which conveniently coincides with my expiring visa... Shout out to the incompetent immigration officer who gave me a shorter visa than I paid for, well done Nyabo.

Breathing a Sigh of Relief - The Last Savings Training

Yesterday was the final training in savings culture for my project. Along with some savings basics, like setting financial goals and budgeting, we also included a crash course in basic entrepreneural skills. Fred, a business lecturer from Busoga University, barked out concepts at our audience of mostly women. He even gave an example of a business being like a child - "If you take things from your business, it will be lame! What do you want with a lame child! You are embaressed of it! You even pray to God to take it away from you! Soon you will give birth to a child called business, and you must take care of it!"

You can't say he doesn't know how to get through to people! I'm relieved that the trainings are finally over - all the work that goes into visiting groups to mobilize, promoting the training, setting it up, and seeing that it all goes off without a hitch remind me of all the reasons why I'll never be an event planner. A couple of times throughout the day, my bubble burst - I had been up since 6 am, no one was listening to me, the venue hadn't cleaned out our presentation space, etc, etc, etc.

(Recording participants' box numbers)

At the end of the day, I was more than relieved to hand out the boxes to our members (about 40!) and declare the project all most done. The chairman and patron of our SACCO, George, must have sensed my tension because afterwards he brought me to a cool new nightclub in Bugembe and bought me a soda. He said, "Relaxing is so important! Sometimes you just work work work with no relief! You're lucky my leg is broken - otherwise we could go out dancing!"

The great thing about Uganda - when you're ready to throw in the towel and quit, there are always people there to bring you back up again. I can't believe I have only 3 weeks left!