Being thankful

It is American Thanksgiving tomorrow. If I celebrated this, I know it would be my favourite holiday. Not as commercial as some of the others perhaps. Just time to be with family and eat LOTS! Sounds great!

Today, my class at school visited their community development link. It was there first visit to the Cheryl's Children's Home, the project that this year group support.

As every community development link, both sides should be able to learn and grow from each other, rather than just a handing over of money or gifts. But, I have learnt, these visits for children in International (or Prep) schools can be quite difficult. From large houses, cars, classrooms, filled with belongings that we forget we want, to empty, dark shells of buildings. No wonder some children feel awkward in the basic surroundings; wide eyed, quiet and too shy to meet new buddies. 

However, today was not like that at all.

The older girls and boys at the home, led my pupils on guided tours of the Home and chatted to them with ease. My pupils soon felt more relaxed and soon the building was a buzz of laughter and high pitched happy squeals. Songs were sang, lunch was shared and genuine friendships began.

Some of the children at the Home shared their story of how they ended up being in care. Honest and harrowing, but their stories all had a happy ending middle end-of-the-beginning; all were thankful for the help they had been given, thankful they had been found and are looking forward, to a bright future. Dreams were shared, hopes of  being pilots, teachers and nurses.

Everyone in the room was thankful. Thankful that the children in the Home were now getting the love and care they deserved.  Thankful for the love and care we have around us. Myself; thankful for the loving, understanding and supportive (the BEST!) family at the end of a phone, friends that make the journey through life much more fun, the education I was given to get me where I am, the job, the car, the shelter, the luxuries and comforts that we take for granted, a full belly (!), a healthy body that can run (half!) marathons and help calm my mind during yoga and thankful for the love I have been given to share with others.

What are you thankful for?

PS -I think I need to start up my 3BTs (3 Beautiful Things) again.

Wisdom

I know I haven't blogged in ages, (then two posts in one night) but I haven't been sure where to go with my blog and what to share.

At the moment I feel like my body is porous, open and sensitive to the world around me. The news today of the death of the Kenyan runner and that the Air France black box has data on it that is still intact (Can you believe it!!!???), has left me all out of sorts, shaking my head and wiping tears away. My running buddy shared sad news of his and I received a wedding invitation from my best friend Jo (happy and excited tears, but a pang of desire to be with her) made me blue. I think it has just been building up.

I know I should give myself a kick, but heartache is the worst. Comparable to tooth ache I think. This throbbing pain that comes in waves that can't be seen. You forget how painful it is, until it is time to visit the dentist.

Words of wisdom comes from all different directions, (the Oprah magazine is a good source!). Running helps... and change is good. But today I missed my run as I was busy on 'project dining hall' (a future post) and I am tired. So today, I am sad.

I had figured it all out last night with a friend, but I had forgotten it by this morning, damn that white wine...!

Something has to give

Over dinner, quite some time ago, I became involved with a conversation about time. Now that we have music to download, i-pod shuffles to set, Facebook accounts to check, e-mails to write, Twits to make (whatever!); there must be something or someone that loses out?
Do our friendships suffer for this?
Is time in techno-land taking us away from the reality of relationships?
One guest stated that his commute  in London gave him  time to do all his 'tinterneting'! Fair enough.

But something surely has to give or do we just stay awake for longer?
Mmm no, anyone that knows my sleeping habits(bro, Tania) knows that I am no night-owl!

Running is usually time where I can catch-up with friends and have a gossip.
I don't own a TV, I don't clean (a perk of living abroad, one that I will not easily give-up) and I don't have a long drive to work. So, maybe I gain a bit of extra time on the clock by living in this time zone!

Therefore, how did I still not manage to finish my book-club book for this month!!??

My excuse is that my version of Faulkner's "As I Lay Dying" did not come with Cliff notes!

Last night, as I tried to skim-read the remaining 20 chapters (!), I realised I wasn't willing to miss out on an evening in the American South -so I went to our meeting anyway; wearing my pearls and cardigan, I drank iced tea, ate cheese grits and soda dread ...and talked about... the cover! "Do you think the horse symbolised death?"

So -I found my thing that I lost!
I am now going to step away from the computer and get out my Orhan Pumak novel!

One Love

I was having coffee today with a Ugandan friend and we started discussing the 'One Love' campaign in Uganda.The "One love" campaign has got the country talking about fidelity within relationships. We started talking about if people were more likely to have affairs here; (I can only use Uganda in my discussion as I live here) or if it is the same problem all around the world.


Our discussion became heated and he suggested I write something about this in my blog; I am still not sure whether I will be able to do this debate justice, but I will share some thoughts.
The 'One Love' campaign encourages people to "Get Off the Sexual Network" , in very simple and straightforward language, aiming to reach a wide audience in the country. It is blunt and provocative; Get off or die ; being a phrase used in local newspapers. One advert shows a dying man, ill, having "eaten his side dish" (!), a euphemism for a relationship outside a marriage.
So why is moral campaign needed here?
Statistically 1 in 4 men in Uganda will have slept with the same woman.
Scary stuff. So....
Is this unusually high or the norm for every part of the world?

Well- I really don't know that answer to this. I did try to search the Internet; you usually find all the answers there...but funnily enough 'infedility statistics" didn't come up with many results!
I think it seems that more people are unfaithful in Uganda. There are many reasons for this:

One is that Kampala is a bit of a fish bowl, so everyone knows everything; there are no secrets or hiding places. Maybe people are better at hiding their secrets in other parts of the world! What is the saying..."don't pee in your own backgarden"-very appropriate for here!
Another reason is the rising disposable income in Uganda. It is joked that here that the more money a man has, the more erections he gets. Quite a thought!
And the other, more controversial reason, is because it is more "acceptable" here to have "side dishes".

I don't want to generalise, but this is what I have seen here..and this is my blog! I am speaking of male/female relationships because... this is Uganda after all. I have spoken to Ugandan friends of mine, males and females, and for many it is just the norm that the male in the "relationship" will have other partners. This is just part of life. It may not be what the female would like to happen, but is accepted and part of the deal. Men and women are not equals in life or in the relationship. I can't even say that it is because of lack of respect, as I really don't think that that would be true, it is just the way it is.

Maybe I am naive and this happens all over the world, but I don't think it happens to the extent that it happens here in Uganda. I can't think of any morality campaigns that I have seen in the UK, encouraging fidelity. The 'One Love' campaign is not about encouraging the use of condoms but encouraging serial monogamy. The sexual health campaigns in UK are generally based on giving young people information about protecting themselves. In Scotland at the moment they are encouraging you try the 'beer goggles' test, to see things which are not obvious at first. The fight against HIV in Uganda is a world success story, but there are (a high estimate of) 1.1 million people living with HIV in Uganda; teenage girls are more worried about getting pregnant than catching STDs. Perhaps Ugandan should start a different type of campaign.

Is there an answer? Well-I can't remember the question..can you!!??

Is this a problem every country faces? I think the idelity campaign "One Love" just makes you more aware of what is going on around you.Maybe Ugandan needs a new sexual health campaign; one that doesn't give men (sorry-men!) the idea of having "side-dishes". Just like when you teach, you don't say, "now don't eat the play dough" -duhhh, now they will eat it!!

Some say the campaign is not working because it has been oversimplified. It has been successful getting people talking though!

What do you think?