Ruth II

So today was an odd day but I feel like I learned a lot. Beckie and I drove our neighbor Ruth (for her story see 4/25: Ruth) up to Lira so that she could get her birth certificate to start the process of getting a real job. She is out of work right now and practially squatting in a shell of a building next door. The house she is in has no doors, no windows, no fixtures (not that there is any power anyway), no water. And that is her and her nine month old son's home. Anyway, we are trying to find a way to help her and this seemed to be the first step. So we drove her north nearly 2 hours to her family's land. She has not seen them in more than two years so in addition to getting the papers she could do some catching up.

Well, this is the deepest “bush” I've been in yet here in Uganda. We were miles off the beaten path- or more literally were were only on a beaten path. We left the paved road, then left the dirt road then left the two track and passed over some land that possibly had never had a car on it before. We were introduced to several of the family members and I quickly lost track of who was who's son and who followed whom but all I really needed to do was nod and smile. (This was a different language than Ateso so honestly I didn't even try to follow the conversation.) We got a little tour of the land and 3 of the family homes and then Ruth said that we needed to go get lunch to provide for the group. This didn't really surprise us- Ruth, coming from the city has to show that she is “wealthy” and coming with two white people means she is REALLY well off (no matter how far from the truth it really is!). So we headed back to the path, back on the two-track through the bush to the nearest “trading center.” Where were found NOTHING to buy. No rice, no beans, no posho, no onions, no tomatoes, nothing. We could get a little curry powder but I had nothing to use the spice on. So we headed to the neighboring trading center. And... you guessed it... nothing again. None of the above list that are considered staples here.  So, now we've been driving around about 45 minutes to find food after driving two hours to get here. The tiny “shop” ( I put that in quotes because it was nothing more than a shack with some things to buy) did have salt and flour. So we paid way to much for them and headed back to Ruth's. I was thinking that with the little bit of cooking oil we had in the car we could make chapati- a common flat bread in Soroti (picture a tortilla). So we got back and gave the food to the woman of place (women do ALL of the work here....) But we managed to figure out that this was going to be our project.... I'm going to have to figure this cultural thing out eventually because usually guest are given the red carpet treatment and they wouldn't dream of having us do any work. But today was different. I don't know if it was because this was a different language group so different norms or if there were so few women around to do the work or they didn't know chapati or because Ruth was family or if they just wanted to see what would happen to the white girls under pressure. So Beckie and I did the best we could. We asked for warm water and something to mix in. Beckie mixed the two kilos of flour (with her hands) the salt, water and oil and we made little balls. But then they needed to be rolled out. So I headed off to find Ruth. After much searching and some rearranging the flat lid of the water jar was given to us with a plastic mug. So we “rolled” out the bread. Then I asked for something like a skillet to cook on. I was given a big aluminum pan. I headed over to the cook house- the cooking fire is kept separate from the rest of the place, across the compound from where we mixed up the dough. I'm not sure how to describe my next 45 minutes- lots of smoke, a very deep pot with oil in the bottom, too much fire and my hands trying to cook this bread. And not even a charcoal fire- sticks, uneven heat, the whole nine yards. No pot holders, no spatual, no plate for the finished ones. As I type tonight I'm still feeling the burns all over my fingers from the oil, wrists from the pot and forearms from the fire. And at one point I had tears running down my face from the smoke so couldn't see a thing. I had snot running from my nose from this cold I've had and the smoke and I was sweating so hard it was dripping into the cooking fire. About 18 chapatis later the lady helped me get the fire to stop smoking so badly. She also found for me a long spoon to try to flip the bread but then after watching me struggle just did it with her hands- forget the stupid spoon. Anyway, as life here goes, by this time there were about 20 kids around (none in school) and many adults to greet Ruth and just see the entertainment so we split up the bread we had made and called it lunch.

 I really enjoyed the day but it all just reminded me of how hard life in the village is. This family had a lot of land and so a lot of crops but that really means a lot of land to dig by hand to plant, weed and harvest. By hand. Back breaking work in the equatorial sun. As substance farmers- they won't make any profit from their work. Just survive.

They can't afford to send their kids to school, besides it was a FAR walk, it felt far for me and I was in the car! They are dependent on the rain with no safety net. (In recent years there has both been drought that wiped out crops and then floods that also wiped out all that was planted.)They practically never have lunch. They had a lot of corn, some potatoes and some young rice plants. A field of casava and a mango tree. And they will live on that. I'm hungry but they were quite happy with their flat bread. And now Ruth has her birth certificate and we made home without problem. Seems like a good day.

The woman who took pity on me and took over the cooking of the bread.

Beckie "rolling" them out with a mug on the lid of the water jar.

Some of the kids that enjoyed the chapati.