Mr. O'Neill Joins Team Uganda

Ottawa -- At the end of an intensively stimulating week of training with Mines Action Canada, I am set to become the latest to join the ranks of Team Uganda alongside Laura and Tyler (so far). The past few weeks have saw myself and Jordan learning much about the history of campaign to ban landmines and cluster munitions, as well as the various aspects of mine action programming (demining, survivor assistance, mine risk education, advocacy, etc). We had a great crew of interns in Ottawa, 9 of us in total. Jordan and I represented IPMP to the max.

I will be greeted upon arrival in Entebbe by sister Laura Macchione, for which I am most grateful. We will be bunking together in a lovely 2-bedroom flat in 'Bunga', Kampala. I will be working for Canadian Physicians for Aid & Relief (CPAR Uganda), essentially filling the role of a Project Officer. I am also told that I "will be taking the lead on organizing GuluWalk in Kampala this year"; allegedly the city's largest public awareness raising event of its kind in the country, and an event that is held worldwide on October 25th. I'll be contributing to as many of CPAR's different projects as I can, including some mine risk education projects, landmine/ERW survivor assistance, food security (the Moving Beyond Hunger project some of us actually worked on writing a sequel proposal to in semester 2 of IPMP), and others. Proposal writing, report writing, M&E, as many field visits as possible, we'll see what else.


One more thing: The campaign to ban cluster munitions (CMC), which has been steadily progressing for years, will culminate in the signing of the Oslo Treaty on 3 December 2008. I would like to urge you all to please sign the Peoples' Treaty to show your support -- it'll only take a sec and its worth your while. In the lead-up to Oslo, regional conferences are being held worldwide in order to keep the momentum up and maintain pressure upon states to sign on. The Africa-wide conference will be happening in Kampala 29-30 Sepember 2008, and I will have the good fortune of helping to facilitate it. I'm extremely excited about this as there are some heavy hitters on the bill!!

Finally, I'd like to formally extend an open invitation to all IPMPers to visit in Kampala and consider crashing at our pad. In fact I believe Laura is picking up a spare bed this weekend precisely for this purpose. I hope you're all feeling inspired, getting into new things and looking forward.

# # #

Your Other Blogs

One of my ways of keeping in touch with you, my dear friends, is blogging. This post is great and I read it as often as I can. But besides the IPMP blog, I also wanted to make sure that I have links to all your personal blogs. I know Ai, Anna, Corey, Ryan, Tyler all have blogs but I wanted to make sure I wasn't missing anybody else. So if you have a blog can you include the link as a comment to this post? I wouldn't want to be missing out on your news.
Thanks! KellyB xoxo

Resource for finding useful documents

I am randomly in charge of teaching stretching classes for rehabilitating torture victims and I found this document sharing resource in my search for Spanish documents on rehabilitative stretching.

Looks pretty useful so I thought Id share.

Becky

www.docstoc.com

Missin you!

Hey IPMPer's. Really can't even describe in words the feelings I have of missing everyone. It was sad to see the program come to a close, but the adventure has just begun. The possibility we have of maintaing a strong network with each other and really helping one another advance in this field is boundless!! I love that...

Posted this on my blog, but thought I would share it here as well. Hope you enjoy! :)

Inevitable Horizon

Thoughts of the highest contemplation,
emotions flowing with mountainous sensation,
Democratic intention,
falling to the wayside at the onset of wars mention.
Bullets flying past baby’s bottles,
the jarheads’ adrenaline junkie fix at full throttle,
and all for resource gain,
for expanding the hegemonic geopolitical plane?
It’s a measureless shame,
and it’s all of humanity to blame.
Human rights violations at an all time peak,
so many silenced by force, with no voice to speak.
Liberties taken away with oppression as the beasts force,
a timeline of humanities history shows consistent remorse.
Each voice must be heard, for this world belongs to all,
Governments ears need to open, leaders listening to humanities call.
The golden age is nearing its long awaited appearance,
but in your own heart you must usher in its’ clearance.
Must embrace the loving nature that humanity has always intended to live,
must open the gates to your heart and soul and continuously strive to give.
Give in any way possible, for the nature of giving multiplies,
paying it forward lifts the veil of illusion from our own eyes.
We are on a path that needs positive reinforcement,
one that embraces unified cooperative endorsement.
One that places idealism at the forefront of visionary progression,
one that acts on realism, leading to widespread positive succession.
Each positive action forming the foundation for the golden age,
Beauty growing out of scars, universal love taking center stage.
Keep hope at the forefront of your outlook and intention,
And a world of peace and prosperity will gain its’ retention.
The stepping stones are being laid, the path is clearly paved,
The seeds of change have sprout, an action many have craved.
A new dawn is arising, the horizon of possibility is breaking,
Share of your heart, and take part in the World Peace staking.
Go now in peace and find yourself in a world positively evolving,
Spin your world of hope with others, and the reaction will continue revolving.

Love you all lots
Big Hugs

Olympics bring peace and love to Ulaanbaatar

Last time I hog-the-blog. Especially with my Olympic sentimentality. :)

So, July 1, 2008 was a pretty eventful night in Ulaanbaatar. We had ourselves a nice Molotov cocktail-throwin', political party headquarters-burnin', night stick-beatin', tear gasin', rubber-bulletin', live round-firin', election-denouncin', State of Emergency good time! I know some of you were worried about me, others were worried about me starting the riot. (Thanks to all for the emails and enquiries!) It looked a lot worse on TV than it was, as it was only contained to one square, but a few poor folks did get shot dead, and several hundred were rounded up by the po'lice. It wasn't nice, my parents nearly died of fright, and I was really glad to catch a ride out of the city the next day. [I didn't take the photo, it's stolen from AFP. I'm not stupid enough to go where the tear gas is.]

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Well, about 6 short weeks later, on August 14, 2008, judoka N. Tuvshinbayar won the very first ever Olympic gold medal for Mongolia. (That's him in white, putting on what looks to me like a fine kata guruma throw.) This time, the entire city went completely mad, but it was the best final night in Ulaanbaatar I could have ever hoped for.

The street party started in the evening with people ripping up and down the streets honking and waving flags - and getting completely drunk in the bars and patios and merrily singing heroic songs in enormous, joyous, wasted choirs.

I went out around midnight after I saw a huge crowd on TV in the same square where the riot had been - except before, precisely at midnight, the prez had called in the army and tanks rolled in - and now the prez and all his political friends and opponents were crying and dancing and yelling all kinds of patriotic things to the happiest crowd of people you ever seen. Complete strangers were hugging each other, high fiving on the street, dancing and singing together. True love. And there were many more thousands out for the party than had been for the fight.

I won't describe too much more in words, a few of my photos and videos should do the trick. One thing I'll mention, though: There were actually people shaking the hands of and high-fiving the cops who were stuck directing human and car traffic in the main street - whereas six weeks earlier, cops and protesters had laid on some savage beatings on each other in the very same street. Right on. Peace out.

Turn this one up to hear the singing!

FC: Beijing Olympics PART THREE

PART THREE: The Atmosphere in Olympic Beijing

... The 12-hour bus ride to Beijing, normally completely uneventful, was interrupted no fewer than 4 times by police boarding our bus and confiscating all foreign passports for check-ups. 2 of the times were within 20 minutes of each other, as if they didn’t have radio contact or something. I felt like we were convicts, and they were making sure we still hadn’t escaped off the bus since the last checkpoint.

The Olympic Green: How many "Do Not Enter" signs can you count?

In Beijing itself, the difference between now and June is incredible. For example, they’ve invested in a huge amount of bag x-ray machines, which they set up not only at entry-points to the city, but at every entrance of every subway station, of which stations there are probably about 100 or more, as well as at banks and other such institutions. What’s interesting to me, is how the first day I had that tense feeling I get whenever I encounter strong authority like that, but I just got so used to throwing my bag onto the conveyor 8 times a day, that I totally eased into the Olympic totalitarianism. I didn’t even care to look at the cameras. But everywhere all the security personnel, including at the Olympic Green, were extremely sweet and courteous despite doing this devil’s work. That’s what surprised me the most, I would never expect that.

As for the people of Beijing, maybe it’s because I lived in a regular residential area and took the subway all the time and avoided the nasty, jaded people I usually encounter near the hostels and other tourist spots, but everyone around was extremely cordial, welcoming, helpful, and kind. The amount of blue-clad enthusiastic youth volunteers that the city produced to help wayward visitors was really impressive. Yes, the government deployed all these people to work for the Olympics, but you could tell that they really wanted to be there and were so happy to help and to be nice to everyone. Just because of that, I see Jiang Wenran’s point about not lumping all the citizens of China in with their dictatorial and strategic politicians.

Everywhere people were completely elated to host the games as a sporting event – even if individually they knew that entire neighbourhoods had been razed and construction workers were cycled through like cattle if they happened to fall off the stadium roof. Some of you might be surprised that I scored myself a ticket to the Bird’s Nest. At first, I actually dreaded the fact that my Mongolian visa would expire at exactly the Olympic time, because I wanted to be as far away from China as possible during what I expected to be a hyper-patriotic, politically motivated wank-fest.

BUT I’m a confirmed Olympics fanatic since Calgary and Seoul ’88. Like most of these Beijing fans, when I watch the games on TV, I completely block politics out, because I just loooooove the sports. And that’s what I saw from the Beijing hosts. If you don’t care about this once-every-four-year event of sports you’ve never heard of, you might not get this, but the Olympics as a sporting event manages to change people. I can say that I didn’t have a horrible time in Beijing for the first time out of 8. :)

I can’t know right now if the x-ray machines and cameras and their thousands of operators will disappear next week (or after the Paralympics) – it’s hard to get rid of such an investment – I or others will have to go back and see. But if any of you ever go through Beijing in the future and you experience anything close to the security measures I just described, then you’ll know that Klein is right about the authority of the CCP tightening rather than loosening, because I hadn’t seen anything like it in the last few years. Here’s hoping.

NEXT TIME:

We go further back in time to my last night in Ulaanbaatar, when a male judoka won the very first ever gold medal for Mongolia. I’ll compare the street party to the street riot that scared a few of you, my dear friends, a month earlier. The Olympics *really* changes people. Can I post videos on this thing? I’ll try, they’re awesome.

------------------

P.S. I just lost a very expensive Olympic bet that said China would beat the USA in overall medals – I guess the patriotic propaganda machine and the child athlete factories weren’t as strong these last 7 years as I thought they’d be…

FC: Beijing Olympics PART TWO

PART TWO: The Man in Black (literally)

... In walks a completely plain-clothes guy (jeans, sneakers, black t-shirt, Harley-Davidson cap and zero identification, and also clearly a foreigner) and sits at the computer with my stack of dvds. He doesn’t ask nearly the inane questions as the uniformed guard, but still wants to know the history of the dvd, which I explain was just a gift to beat boredom in the countryside. “Well, this cannot enter China.” (Fine, take it, enjoy the story of the Taj Mahal.)

THEN he starts to look through our IPMP compilation CD (don’t worry Matt, he didn’t ask about your life story!) – just my luck he clicks onto some files about security in relief situations – you know, the usual: bomb threats, armed militias, etc. “Are you a member of a military?” (sigh. No.) “Well, this cannot enter China.” (sigh. This whole CD is just full of materials from my entire school year about every aspect of doing development work.) “And it’s really this dangerous??” (Yeah! Imagine a refugee camp during a war, of course it’s dangerous, we need to know how to stay safe!) He continues on to our fave Voluntary Sector Fund guidelines and very intensely asks, “what’s this??” (This is a fund where the Canadian government gives money for development projects abroad.) “And you think this is positive?” (Yeah! 100% positive!) He kept clicking around the dvd, and I had to also explain 1) the concept of Positive Deviance, 2) PRA charts from Fiji, 3) ToT, etc. I was really laughing inside at this point, but valiantly defending our profession at every turn – which I think convinced Mr. Mysterious to let me keep the CD, hurray!

In the meantime, my rabid jeep driver had been waiting with my fellow passengers for over an hour, which is basically enough to send one of these guys directly to the asylum. I was let out of the room to pay him and let him go – my original guard was actually quite dismayed on my behalf, and promised that they would take me where I needed to go when it was all over (And when would that be…?)

Back in the room, the secret agent guy had moved on to my summertime research – checking all my data on my flash card and in my notebook. I was “accused” with a sidelong glance of knowing Russian (is that bad?) because half the research in my notebook was in Mongol Cyrillic. Anyway, at that point, I think he had become so bored of dried up rivers and daily water usage, that when I happily offered to show him the accompanying faaacsinating photos on my camera, he just decided to wrap it all up, hahaha. Another guard came in with a bottle of water for me, they helped me stuff all my things back into my bags, and arranged an official van to take me to the bus station in town.

So I left the border in a minivan full of uniformed guards, one of their little kids, and the unnamed, unidentified special interrogator. We stopped on the way at an army base, and he got out and merrily strolled onto the premises with nought but a smile to the guards at the gate and the offending dvd in his back pocket(!). I don’t know what security level this guy clears, but I really felt like a VIP Terrorist. How this must have looked to the townsfolk when I got out of that van with all my stuff, with the border guards waving goodbye and telling me to have a good time in Beijing.

Basically, those 2 hours were a strange mix of crazy-scary and extremely courteous. I’d like to see these guys’ training manual for dealing with foreign suspects.

NEXT TIME: More security and more kind people in Beijing

Foreign Correspondence: Beijing Olympics

(I’m writing this one week later, safely from my so-not-police-state home of Toronto. A 3-part series on my Olympic security pitfalls.)

Foreign Correspondence: Beijing Olympics

There seemed to have been some debate over the listserv about if the Chinese government is using the Games as a way to strengthen its control over its subjects and is brainwashing them into ultra-patriotism, or if they’re making slow but good progress towards a more open society due to IOC demands, and if ordinary Beijing people are just out to have a good time. My personal first-hand opinion: a lot from column A, a lot from column B.

PART ONE: Border Detention Begins

I’d crossed the Chinese-Mongolian desert border 5 times previously over the last several years, always crammed into a jeep trying to get through the checkpoints and run over all the other jeeps as quickly as possible – always fun. The last time was just 2 months ago on my way to my internship. The worst scenario until now had been the power going out at the Chinese checkpoint a couple of years ago and being stuck in no-man’s-land between the two borders for 8.5 hours – we found ways of making that fun too.

Well, last week, I got out of Mongolia all right, but as soon as my foreign self set foot in the Chinese border building, I was immediately taken to a “special checking” room, where a very courteous border guard asked me to take EVERYTHING out of all of my bags (“don’t worry, the floor is clean!”) He flipped through every one of my books, checked every piece of underwear, and took a special liking to all the DVDs I had. Of course then came the expected questions about why I was going to Beijing, can I show them my Olympics ticket, my address at my friend’s house, my flight ticket home, etc. He flipped through my camera, but probably got bored of photos of Mongolian tree species and my director’s grandchildren. He didn’t check my laptop too much, just to see that it’s a real one and not a sneaky bomb. All the while, he was very nice and sweet and apologetic about how it’s Olympic time, and they have to do all this, and he hopes I can understand, and so on. Very weird combination of authoritarianism and considerate kindness.

But in the meantime, the dedicated DVD-inspector guard was hard at work at his computer checking all my files and videos. Suddenly, I get called over to see a BBC story about anti-American terrorism. “What’s this?” they ask. “I dunno.” I had honestly never seen this video before and was very confused. Then I clued in that it had been included as part of an anti-boredom-in-the-countryside video package generously given to me by a certain Mongolian classmate of ours :) I’d seen the excerpts from Ewan McGregor’s round the world motorcycle trip, the Discovery Channel version of Chinggis Khan’s conquest, the love story behind the Taj Mahal… But I hadn’t gotten around to this particular gem about Mr. bin Laden, et al.

Well, then the fun questions started: 1) What country was this made in? (Well, they speak with British accents, so I guess Britain), 2) Do you know this guy?, pointing to Osama. (Of course I know him, everybody does!) 3) Where did you get this? (From a friend of mine in Toronto), 4) What is your friend’s profession? (shrug, I dunno), 5) How do you know her? (We went to school together), 6) What did you study? (International development), 7) What’s that? (sigh...), 8) What was your friend’s profession before this school? (shrug, I dunno. Wasn’t about to mention the UNDP). Well, this guy was getting nowhere with me, so they decided to turn the investigation up a notch.

NEXT TIME:
The Chinese border officials have to call in a special agent to deal with me and my video, and with IPMP!

Can we set up email alerts?

Bonjour tout le monde!

I am not too savvy with the blogging world, but I know that when someone subscribes to a blog, they can receive a notification email when there is a new entry posted.  As we are all members of the blog, rather than subscribers, I don't know if this is possible, but is there a way to set this up?

I would really love it, because I don't want to miss anything posted here, but sometimes I forget to check it ... 

Thinking of you all and hoping that you're all happy!  I'll try to update soon about what I'm doing for my internship.  Sully

 

Reminder:

People should update their locations on the IPMP World take-over Map, found on the right hand side of our lovely "Chickens of the World" blog. I think this is a cool idea, and will be interesting to see how we all spread out over the next little while.


Update on my situation: our visas/approvals on the Sudan side of things is just about to come through (this is a more complicated process that you would imagine), then we need to do the whole passport send-in drill. We are just about to finish our vaccinations (we got round one of the rabies vaccine, which has three doses, and is surprisingly difficult to come by), with the shots scheduled to finish up around 10th (ish) of September. We are likely looking at being in Khartoum for mid-September. So to kill off all this waiting I have been doing a lot of reading, watching Olympics, some camping/canoeing, and so on..... I feel a bit like my life is on hold, but things will get moving once the visas come in. We should all get used to "Hurry up and wait" if we are going to stay in this field of work.

Much love,
Tim.

Roosters!

Since we are on the topic, haha, I have a chicken coup on my property with the most annoying Rooster. Aren't they supposed to call at dawn? This thing crows (if that is what it's called) at every moment of the day..
Hope you are all well.
Just to get some discussion going, what is your favourite thing about the world?
Love you all

Puerto Iguazu, Argentina...Chicken Update

Speaking of chickens, I saw the biggest rooster ever this week in Yyryapu, a Guarani community here in Iguazu. (The Guarani are the local indigenous people in the area). It was HUGE....GIGANTIC...I didn't know roosters could get that big!! Just like the other chickens, it was wondering about. I wonder whom it belongs to...

How does the chicken know where it lives?

Colleen. I am glad you brought this mystery to the table for discussion. I have been asking myself the same thing. How does the chicken know it's way home? And how do you know if someone else were to take your wandering chicken and eat it? I have no idea. When I asked my colleagues, they said "When you buy a chicken, you just show it where it will stay and it will know." 

I have been told that when I go to the North, I might be given chickens as a gift. I will do an experiment and report back. I will show it where its home is, and see if it comes back!!!

Laura

Obruni, where are you going?

Akwaaba from Accra! I’ve been here almost two weeks and am getting settled in to my life for the next six months. Ghana has changed a lot since I was last here (4 years ago) but it is still full of warm and welcoming people. The currency has changed and this has proved to be a challenge for most people, including me. Everyone still goes by the old currency which was 10,000 cedis (¢) to the Canadian dollar but now it is 1¢ to the Canadian dollar. It is a pretty easy conversion but I am still figuring out how much everything costs in the new currency and often end up paying the “obruni” (foreigner) price for stuff. My bargaining skills are slowly coming back to me and I have mastered the Ghanaian reaction to overpricing ( it involves the hand clap and an outraged ABA!).

My organization, Credit Union Association of Ghana (CUA), is well established in Ghana and is doing great work with credit unions around the country. Everyone in my office has been so great at getting me oriented and slowly teaching me Twi, the most common language around the southern regions of Ghana. When you hear a bunch of people laughing it’s usually coming from my office where I am mispronouncing the words.

Accra has become a very expensive city. Everything costs much more then the last time I was here (comparable to Canadian prices in many incidents) and I think my little intern stipend might be stretched pretty thin, especially considering that there is a beach backpackers inn 45 minutes from Accra that seems like the most perfect place to escape to.

I can’t say I understand everything about Ghanaian culture but there has been one thing that I just can’t seem to understand – maybe you can help solve the mystery. For many Ghanaians, having enough food to feed your family is a daily struggle. However, I see chickens and goats roaming the streets without their owners. If I had one goat and one chicken I would be sure to keep those two close by. What if they lose their way or heaven forbid there is a goat napping? One minute it’s there, the next it’s gone. Are those animals similar to cats in that they will return because you will feed them? I see them eating on the street all the time and I am pretty sure they don’t have a problem finding food (they’ll eat anything). Everyday I struggle with this one and when I ask about it most Ghanaians giggle and think to themselves: “Oh Obruni….you’re so silly”. Has anyone seen this in other countries? I am pretty sure its more common then we think.

I am starting to make a list of funny signs I see but its hard to remember all of them. My favorite so far is “Sober Man Drinking Spot”. Says it all, doesn’t it!

On that note I will sign off. I’ll leave you with my address and phone number incase any of you feel inclined to call or write. I am a great pen pal and letters from Ghana can be so exciting so please send me your addresses and I will gladly start writing letters.

Colleen Berrigan
CUA Ghana Ltd.
P.O. Box 12148
Accra North,
Ghana
WEST AFRICA
027-165-9682

Colleen

Laura in Kampala....

So it is obvious this is my  first time posting. I tried to copy and paste into the box and it didn't work! Here is the second version of my original post!

I arrived in Kampala on Aug6th and have been thurst into the chaotic energy that this city has! Although I arrived in the evening I was in the office first thing the next morning!

I am here with the Canada Africa Partnership on AIDS Uganda (CAP AIDS Uganda). Although my official ICAD/CIDA job description is Program Development Coordinator, it looks like I will be filling the roll as Program Coordinator for a project being implemented as part of the EU's Northern Uganda Rehabilitation Programme. The project is called 'Promoting COnflict Resolution, Peace Building and Human Rights in Northern Ugandan and Karamoja Regions. The project targets youth heading HIV/AIDS or war orphaned families, local authorities, war returnees, widows & Agwata community dwellers. The main project activities will be vocational skills training, capacity building of our local implementing partner, training of local authorities on aspects of human rights and HIV/AIDS awareness within the Agwata community. As the Programme Coordinator I will coordinate the field office in Agwata and Kampala, providing lots of field travel. I will keep you updated as more details unfold. I am off to Agwata in the newly formed Dokolo district in the north next tuesday for the project launch, baseline survey and work planning!

I am staying with another CIDA Mines Action intern named Matt while I figured out my housing situation. I am happy to report I officially signed for a 2bedroom unit in the same compound! It is a 15 min walk from work. Kevin will move in when he gets here (he owes me SO many beers!). It is unfurnished at the moment, except for my bed ($123 for bed, mattress, pillow and delivery). NO hot water either. But hey....it's home!

I love hearing about what everyone is doing. It has been a tough adjustment here, and hearing from friends helps. I have only seen Tyler once as I don't want to catch his "Kampala flu". Although I am not convinced it isn't the "Canadian flu"!!!! Sorry Ty...just joking.

Post again soon. I might even see about making my own blog. E-mailing friends and family the same thing over and over is becoming tedious...and the internet is not guaranteed here!

Cheers everyone. All my best to those of you at home, and those of you whom are someone else, building new homes.

Laura

Hello from Kampala!

Zanzibar!!

I love that word...ZANZIBAAARRRR!!!

I know I had said I could do a trip before Christmas but due to flights, vacation etc etc I can't go until after my Kenya trip. I booked my ticket today and will be in Zanzibar from Jan.8th to 16th. I would love it if others wanted to join! I'll be there with another friend of mine from work and it's going to be a blast:-)

First IPMP meeting in Africa!

It seems like we were talking all year about ‘meeting up in Africa’ - This weekend it finally happened! As Kelly B and I are both living and working in Malawi, we were able to meet up this weekend when Kelly came in from Dedza, to Lilongwe where I am living. Did all sorts of ‘city things’ like use the internet, eat at Nando’s Chicken, and get Gelato ,and then we were lucky enough to be invited to a wedding of a friend of one of my co-workers! I’d say it was quite a nice wedding at the Lilongwe Golf Club, and there were loads of people there. No invitations necessary for a Malawian wedding – just show up if you know the bride and groom. We went for the reception part, which was the guests all sitting under a big tent, with the bridal party at the front, and the MC would call up groups of people to dance up to the front and throw money. It was all in Chichewa, so luckily my friend Elsie from work was there or we would have been a bit lost. The MC will say ‘all the friends of the bride come up!’ or call up the groom's parent's friends, and then you kind of dance up the aisle to the front and throw kwatcha notes into the air, that the bride or groom tries to catch in a big basket. It doesn’t matter what you throw, so it’s better to have a stash of 20 kwatcha notes rather than having only 500 kwatcha notes to throw.

The night before, on friday, I was invited out with my boss and people from work to go to dinner at a fancy Indian place. It was a really great dinner - like any fancy restaurant in Canada, but I couldn't helping thinking as the bill was paid that we probably just spent more than some people in this country could ever imagine seeing in their lifetime. Yikes. Went out afterwards with Elsie from work and her cousin and friend for a party night out in Lilongwe - this included 3 bars, many drinks and a 3am bedtime... phew! We did go to a concert though, which was a Malawian group called the Black Missionaries - very cool. Funky African reggae stuff. I think they have a CD so people should look them up! It's all in Chichewa though...

Spent sunday lazing by the pool at the hostel and hanging out with Kelly again, and some other people who are staying there. I have become completely addicted to a game called Bao. You may have seen it before - its just a wooden board all carved with spaces for marbles or rocks, and you go around the board trying to get rid of your opponent's marbles. It takes ages to play - a good way to spend a long, lazy evening. Don't worry if that makes no sense to you now. I will be bringing one home and you will have to learn how to play!

Saludos de Tegucigalpa

So its day three in Honduras and its starting to feel like home. Im not sure if I told you guys yet but Ill be working with COHAPAZ - the Honduran Committee for Peace Action - a small grassroots organization started by Honduras holistic physician and human rights activist, Dr. Juan Almendares. He also heads a clinic for victims of torture, an environmental organization and a free health clinic.

I am living with another Canadian intern from ACIC and we just found this amazing house in a jungle garden neighbourhood dubbed `cuidad perdida´ just a few blocks up a hill from the city center. There are mangos, grapefruits, avocados and possoms .. not that I want to eat the possoms - hanging outside my window all for about $100 a month.

If anyone finds themselves in Central America and needs a place to stay, Im at Calle La Fuente, Ave. Salvador Mendieta Casa 1632, La Leona, Tegucigalpa, cell phone # 504-9736-6663.

I think a lot of what Ill be doing is community gardening projects in the barrios outside of the city and maybe some projects directed toward youth to decrease gang violence.

I hope life is good around the world with you guys. Lots of love

Becky

creepy video from the field!

So yeah, this is me during jetlag craziness. Was in a very weird, restless mood so I decided to make a video to say hi. Turned out looking very creepy with my eyes... Had to stick to the traditional Indian accent :)

Hope you are all doing so so well and I miss you all!!

Mokwano (Love)

Ty

ps- hope to be updating a blog regularly. Not too sure how often though. www.seedsofhopeuganda.blogspot.com