Tanzania with Mama Nora

We've been staying in Usa River, Tanzania, a small community on the road between Arusha and Mt Kilimanjaro. One of

www.canassistafrica.ca 's projects, Mama Nora's Orphanage, is here. So we've been visiting Nora and the kids for the past week. You can read more about this amazing woman and the kids at the CanAssist website under "Current Projects."

This is Johnny, who loved the monster finger puppet Virginia gave him. Johnny is deaf and doesn't speak. He was left at Nora's door several years ago. He's also HIV+. Nora is great with him. They communicate in sign language and starting in June, Johnny will be attending the local school for the deaf.

The little gal beside him is named Miracle. She is a little pumpkin! When she was brought to Nora, she had a hole in her skull (still visible). Unable to care for her, her parents had tried to take her life. Under Nora's care, she has become a bright, healthy little girl. She's an energetic soccer player when we head out to the neighbour's garden with a ball!

Ugandan Lodges

The foyer of Mweya Lodge, Uganda: we had a flat tire near this lodge and had to stay two nights! It was positioned high on a ridge at the end of a peninsula between two lakes. In the evening, we took a boat trip with a guide through the Kazinga channel that connects the lakes. The bird-watching was incredible. Along the channel were Nile crocodile, cranes, storks, elephants, hippos, fish eagles, bee eaters, kingfishers and buffalo. We enjoyed the trip so much that we did it the next day too. Virginia is turning into a bird watcher/photographer. Stay tuned for some of her bird photos.

Lovely Lodges in Uganda

The Ugandan lodges were the most beautiful we stayed in. I'd say the one shown above was our favourite. A good way to end a trip! The photo above is the thatch-covered tent we stayed in at Mihingo Lodge, half-way between Kampala and the place where we went gorilla-tracking. There is a viewing platform at the front looking down over a large plain and Lake Mburo. The bathroom is screened on three sides for the best views ever! You feel as though you're sleeping in a treehouse and you can watch the sunrise from your bed. French-press coffee was brought to your tent before breakfast. It was heaven.

Baby Gorilla Antics

The youngest gorilla in the group was a real entertainer. He did all kinds of flips around the bamboo pole and then would run back to the big silverback and watch us from there.

Apparently the gorillas spend most of their day in one place, eating leaves, sleeping and grooming each other. They make a circular bed of leaves and branches each night to sleep on. We saw two of these as we were walking through the forest. We were about 3500 metres up in the National Forest, on the lower slopes of one of the mountains in the Virunga Volcanoes chain. Diann Fossey conducted her research at a higher altitude on the Rwandan side, coming down to get her smokes and food supplies in the town where we stayed.

We were just astounded at the gorgeous scenery and friendly people in this part of the country. They asked us to tell our friends all about them and their park, which is much well less known than the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest Park. People hike here more often because the gorillas there don't move to other countries and travellers can book far in advance. However, the hiking is apparently much harder there.

More gorillas

This gorilla is taking his time responding to Ginny's questions about hierachical structures among Mountain Gorillas.

This was our first glimpse through the bamboo forest of one of the three silverbacks in the group. This was the most senior and the biggest!

Our closest relatives!

We hadn't planned to do the gorilla tracking in Uganda because we'd heard that you needed permits months in advance. But our driver, a soft-spoken man named Sinani, told us that we could hike in another national park where you can get permits the day before if the gorillas are on the Ugandan side of the border. (When they cross the mountains into Congo or Rwanda, hikers can't go out. Okay by us!) So he called a friend at that park who told him the gorillas were on the Rwandan side, and there was space available on March 9! We couldn't believe it. Only 8 people a day are permitted to visit the gorillas in one group for one hour. This is one of the young males in the family group of 8 that we observed: 3 silverbacks, two young ones, one female, and two young males.

Ugandan Highlights

Sunday, March 13





We're in Usa River, Tanzania, not far from Mt Kilimanjaro, staying at a Danish-designed centre for Development Studies. It's like being in a mini-IKEA village! We're the only "wuzungu" or white people here. There's a real buzz in the air at every meal in the dining hall...people from all countries in Africa discussing education, agriculture, aid, property rights, etc.

The photo above is the Travellers' Rest Lodge in Mgahinga, in the far SW corner of Uganda. It's the same place that Diann Fossey stayed when she needed a break from her gorilla studies. The lodge is in a small town called Kisoro, where we walked into a coffee shop on the main street and met the owner. She said, "You're from Canada? Not Nova Scotian, are you?" The young woman in the shop with her was from Hants County and went to Hants East Highschool. I couldn't believe it. She'd been teaching in Kampala, and married a Scottish anthropologist who works with the Batwa (Pygmy) people. Small world, for sure.

Photos from Rusinga Island

Here's Virginia speaking with some students in a secondary school on Rusinga Island. Their faces say it all!

Good-bye to Kenya

Hi everyone! It's the last day of February and we've been unable to post to our blog...internet issues here in Mbita. The photo loading seems to be the biggest problem, so we're posting sans pictures this time.

Tomorrow we catch the 7 AM ferry from here and then catch a cab back to Kisumu. We've decided that things look pretty calm in Uganda, so we're heading there to see some chimps and birds and visit Anna-Marie, whom we know from university days in Kingston. She's in Kampala. We'll be staying at the Namirembe Guest House, run by the Anglicans. From there we can make arrangements for visiting one of the National Parks. They have internet, so keep us posted!

We're sad to leave the wonderful people we've me here...not to mention the gorgeous view of Lake Victoria we have from our room and the 4:30 Tusker beer we enjoy each evening looking over the lake to Rusinga Island, where Mary Leakey found the bones of one of our earliest human ancestors.

Maybe we'll have better luck with photos from Uganda. Thinking of all our friends and family...Suzanne & Virginia

Little Stars and Kibisom

Update on Saturday, Feb. 19

We've been out of touch due to technical difficulties and a road trip, but we're back! Last week we visited a school called "Little Stars Academy," founded by Mama Benta to educate orphaned and destitute children. She started with 26 kids and only two years later has 272! We had the BEST time with the kids there. Everyone in the kindergarten group exploded from their seats when we came in. They laughed and sang and held our hands. The older students sang for us and one of the boys directed the choir with more panache than we've ever seen. That boys needs to study Music. He's standing to the right of the Music teacher with the white patches on his head. We'd love to get some instruments for this group of stars!

Mama Benta saw at the beginning that the children were unable to learn well because they were malnourished. So she asked Canassist to help her with irrigation of her shamba's (farm's) garden. Now she employs 3 men and is able to grow kale, spinach, potatoes and tomotoes even though there is a severe drought here. She supplements the porridge that is the children's main source of nutrition with these fresh vegetables, which means she spends less on food, so another spin-off is that she pays all the teachers on time (a rarity in Kenya). This year the school placed first in the district in test results. Isn't that amazing?

Here's Mama Benta (left) in front of the garden on the day we arrived. She assembled a group of village elders to meet us. One woman (right) demonstrated the hip shimmy to the McGill students.

Our visit to Kibisom: Community Group for Widows with HIV/AIDS and the little one-room school that they built for orphans and needy children (located at the far end of Rusinga Island)

We arrived in what seems to be the end of the world to find a small building situated in a shady grove of trees. "Welcome, welcome" a group of women repeated as they shook our hands and looked into our faces. Mama Esther, another amazing African woman , like Benta, started this centre and gave us a small look 'round, explaining each service that the centre offers . Women come here to get their health questions answered, hang out under the shady trees, do some crafts to sell, and watch the kids in the building next door at school.

Suzanne and I met these two lovely teachers at the school...beautiful....Lilian is in the photo. They are with the kids all day, teaching their hearts out. Of course the kids were adorable. I brandished a soccer ball and the kids shyly said thank you...so quietly mannered..But two seconds later they were out in the dust shrieking and kicking it around like crazy! We plan to go back to the school next week and watch Lilian and Iscah.. bring some new notebooks for the kids, pencils, chalk and some toys. The ladies seemed excited to have us there..said what fun etc... We are really looking forward to it. We'll do the shopping for the supplies here in Mbita then find a way back out there.... It may be on the back of a motor cycle or on bikes that I've asked Wilfred, my Kenyan waiter boyfriend, to scare up for us. Transportation is the main obstacle here as the dirt roads are sketchy, making 10 kilometers seem like 50.

We are looking forward to sitting with the widows and learning about thier days, finding ways to support Esther once we are back in Kingston, and playing with the kids. Apparently they will take us on a hike up a nearby mountain so we can see all of Ruisinga Island. Yesterday on an evening bird watch we spied a huge monitor lizard so Suzanne is not so keen on hiking....

Feb. 17-18
We were on the road for two days with our friend John Geddes, Director of Canassist African Relief Fund. We drove from our "base camp" in Mbita to a health clinic about 40 minutes away (over BUMPY roads in a car that had been used, we assume, to cart fish--some of which had clearly died in the back!). At the clinic we met with Karina, a nurse (shown with Virginia), and Justice, the local government administrator. They showed us the water tanks that http://canassistafrica.ca/ had installed as part of a water catchment system for the clinic, explaining what an incredible difference access to water had made to them. The next phase is to install the same system on a new building that the Kenyan government has funded. The little rural clinic sees 2000 people a month, with a high number of them suffering from malaria. They provide community education in HIV/AIDS, malaria prevention, and childbirth health-related issues. Now Karina says about 30 babies are born each month in the hospital, but they want to get that number to 100. The death rate for mothers and babies is very high in rural Kenya. These local nurses and community workers are incredible people. (The photos show the old clinic building/water catchment and Karina with Virginia.)

I think we've used the word "incredible" often, but words can't describe the impact that these amazing community workers have had on us.

Maasai Mara Wildlife

Week One in Kenya

On the Masaii Mara: This gal was watching a small herd of antelope. We were hopeful that she was going to spring into action, but she just eyed them, swished her tail, and lay down again with her cubs in the shade of a small bush.

We had three great days at a tented-camp style lodge with the warmest people you can imagine (the staff, not the other guests!). At the park gates is a Maasai school that Richard Branson of Virgin fame has funded. One evening we sat beside two teachers from the UK who were teaching there for two months and staying at the lodge. They said they always gave their box lunches to the Maasai teachers, who said, "Oh, chicken! I shouldn't eat it because I'm Maasai, but, oh well..."

On Feb. 11 we reached our first destination after a 6-hour bus ride, a 2-hour taxi, and a 30-minute ferry: Mbita, a fishing town on the shore of Lake Victoria--a Luo community in an area that has been very hard hit by the HIV/Aids epidemic. Five years ago, 38% of the population were infected. That number has dropped to 31% as a result of public education and the availability of free anti-retroviral drugs.

We met wonderful local people who work in their communities with widows, orphans and school-age children. One man began an eco-farm, another man helps "beach children" (like street kids, but they live on the beaches in the area), and two women began taking in abandoned children and others needing food and schooling. They are the most inspiring people.
We listened in as they spoke to the McGill students who are staying here in Mbita for a few days of their semester in Kenya and Uganda. (Our friend John Geddes from Kingston is their doctor for part of their term. The faculty ornithologist is named "Dr. Bird." Really. That's his name. We'll be doing a bird walk with him on Monday morning. This morning we saw ibis, kingfishers, fish eagles, hawks, and dozens of other birds from the shore beside the residence.)

Then two of the speakers, Mama Benta and Mama Esther, walked with us into town and through the market, where Benta asked for the vegetable cast-offs for her cow! We packed two sacks of stalks and stems, Ginny lugged a huge bag on her back to the delight of everyone watching (gales of laughter), and Benta hailed a motorbike (boda-boda) to carry them and her back to her school 20 minutes away!

Mama Esther helped us buy a cell phone (our first!) at a little stall and get it charged. These women are true forces of nature. We'll have pictures from their schools next week. Stay tuned!