Winds of Change are a'blowin

About the time my prospects for people to partner with on projects in my area dried up like the dusty red soil in the dry season sun, the country director for the Peace Corps talked to an organization in need of a water/sanitation engineer and thought of me because she knew things weren't going anywhere at my site and I was invited to Uganda to work with water and sanitation projects anyway. The country director called me a week ago Friday when I was up on Network Hill and asked if I wanted her to persue this other assignment for me, but she didn't know much about it yet. By Wednesday it was decided that I would be moving. The organization had seen my resume and they wanted me to start ASAP.
Oil has recently been found at Lake Albert and now there are oil company shillings available for community support projects and this organization is partnered with the oil company. I talked to the head of the org on the phone, a South African chap, and he said there was a fishing village that was an imminent cholera or typhoid outbreak waiting to happen and he wanted me to go live there, design an appropriate latrine system, introduce it to the community, and get all the people to build and use them instead of the beach front they have been utilizing. After that he wants me to improve the water supply as the village currently has very poor water quality. He expressed urgency at getting the project going very quickly. I thought to myself, "Um, sure, I took care of situations like that all the time in the states, no problem." Actually, in the states, I just sat in a cubicle and played on the computer. It's easier said than done to do what he is proposing doing, as there are many factors involved and behavior change doesn't happen overnight. He described it to me as "a hell of a challenge" and there would be a lot of responsibility placed on me requiring flexibility, innovation, hard work, and in tough conditions. Sounds like a peace corps assignment to me, although this will be a somewhat atypical assignment.
He also said I would have the oil company's resources at my disposal. Also, an old peace corps volunteer from way back got on the phone, as he's been working for this organization short term, and he told me that he would love this assignment if he was younger; it's exciting and has lots of potential. I do think it has potential to be a good opportunity to make a real, visible difference and could be exciting and fulfilling; on the other hand I might get in over my head in crap, pun intended. Many PC assignments involve a lot of ambiguity, slow movement projects or ideas, and no way to see the long term difference you are making, but with this it may be easier to see improvement, if successful.

So, I will leave my mountains and farmers in Kabale district for a lake and fisherman in Hoima district; my life of leisurly drinking soda at the shop and working a few hours a week to hitting the ground running working hard on something I'm not quite sure how to go about accomplishing just yet. I will move across hemispheres; from the Southern to the Northern hemisphere (does that mean I will go from winter to summer?), and to an area that speaks a different, but somehow similar, language than I have been learning from the beginning of training.
The associate pc director who placed me at my site originally was planning on coming out to visit anyway because I have been complaining for a couple months about not having good prospects for people to work with, so when she came with a SUV, I loaded up all my stuff (took me about an hour to pack everything I have) for her to take to Kampala. I have said goodbye to the people I have met and the friends I have made and I will go to the PC office in Kampala Monday, then off to my new site, assuming the red tape is cut and the site can be evaluated by the PC in good time.

The other day I was walking with my friend Albert (who is a Ugandan about my age studying to become a doctor but lived just behind my house as he works at the health center for now), and we were talking about the recent developments with oil in Uganda. I told him that I thought oil would change things, but I didn't know how or if they would be changes for the better or worse. Little did I know that the changes would very soon impact me so directly.


You will have to bear with the posts on this blog, as I have limited internet time and don't usually proofread or fix mistakes. I'm in africa, work with me. :)