Bragging Rights

My brother recently brought it to my attention that, according to my previous posts, I am a total failure. Although my efforts have been wrought with frustrations, I have managed to do something with my time other than place my thumb up my butt. Although at times it feels like the apex of my successes has been to dislodge my thumb from my rear (only to find it wedged up there again), I would like to share some of my small victories with the rest of you.

Fuel Briquettes: I’m not sure if the general public is even aware of this project, but Joel and I have been working on constructing charcoal alternatives comprised of local, biodegradable material. The briquettes consists of sawdust, shaved corn husks, shaved rice husks, decomposed grass clippings, and paper clippings. Although using Leatherman scissors to dice used paper into thumb-size pieces is not on my list of favorite past times, it is on Joel’s. Seriously. We then compress different combinations of these materials into donut-sized briquettes, which are supposed to be economic alternatives to charcoal. After several failures, we cooked our first meal of sausages and potato fries over our very own fuel briquettes tonight. Boo-yah.

Trash Cleanup: Upon the realization that I am not a hero and cannot save the world, I decided to implement, with serious contributions from my teammates, a community trash cleanup. I’ve been told that at one point Mbale was the cleanest town in all East Africa, but now it is littered with garbage and non-biodegradables, and we wanted to reinstate the allure and prestige the town once commanded. After three weeks of empty promises, frustrations, no-shows, confusions, failed meetings, sicknesses, and every other conceivable mishap, the day finally came. We gathered over one hundred community members to clean the streets, including political leaders, Rotary members, Rotaract members, high-school students, Mbale United Women’s Association, and some dudes hanging out with nothing else to do. Simico (local music company) donated a van loaded with some serious speakers that drove around bumping oldie slow jams along the lines of Blackstreet, Boyz II Men, Mase, Mariah Carey, R Kelly and many others while we swept the streets. Somehow, watching 150 Ugandans do the street sweep dance to “I believe I can Fly” really got to me. Single tear. We are now making headway on getting Coca-Cola to sponsor the next event, and the Mayor wants to shut down businesses throughout the entire town (of 80,000) to dedicate manpower for the event. Boo-yah.

I live in a house the size of your kitchen with 8 other people, no hot water, perpetual diarrhea, and I have not killed anybody yet. Boo-yah.

Conclusion: I am living the dream. I figured out, with the help of many brown-nosers, that in spite my best intentions, I will be lucky if I influence (positively) the lives of three people during my five months here. I have netted one influence, who is our grass cutter. Chris is a high-school student who pays his school fees with the money from his entrepreneurial endeavors, who immediately took an interest to the fuel briquettes. We are teaching him the tricks of the trade and will leave him with the press and mold kit when we leave to hopefully make it an income generating activity, which will also assist in slowing the Ugandan deforestation that is the current charcoal market. Living the dream, ladies and geeks. Living the dream.