oh, sorry sorry!

it`s been a while since my last post. unfortunaly the internet was off for more than a week. even more unfortunaly is, that it was the week with the most interesting things happening since i`m in uganda. now it is a little bit hard to remember everything, but i`ll try. last thursday, may 12th, the swearing in ceremony for president museveni took place at kololo airstrip. but much more people attended to the return of besigye, the opposition leader, who was in nairobi for medical treatment (he was blinded because of pepperspray and teargas). he arrived in the morning in entebbe and drove on entebbe road to kampala. it took him more then ten hours to get to kampala, normaly it is a 45minutes cardrive. caroline and i took the puplic holyday as a chance to go to the botanical garden and the lake victoria hotel`s swimming pool in entebbe. so we met besigye on his way to kampala. the streets were filled with people waiting for him and he was surrounded by a huge crowd of celebrating people. hundrets of bodabodadrivers where cruising on the street, and as i was to scared to take pictures of besigye (because he was surrounded by police and military as well) i took a picture of a celebrating bodabodadriver.

when we saw besigye it was an as peacefull as impressive moment. later on there was a lot of violence, but it is still not easy to find good informations. please check www.echwaluphotography.wordpress.com/

the following saturday christan, dorthe, tage, florence and i were guests of honor at the wedding of teacher maria. weddings are quite different here then what i am used to from switzerland. endless speaches mixed up with traditional dancing, loud popmusic out of a big PAsystem mixed up with an overmotivated master of ceremony (to our international quests: you look toooooo smart this evening) and african food mixed up with soda but no beer or wine. but people where all dressed very nice. 

even the little ones.

on tuesday florence took christan and me to an election party of rosemarie (i can`t remember the last name) who was elected as a new member of parliament. again there have been endless speachess but it was quite interesting (when somebody was talking in english, mostly they spoke luganda). rosemarie, for example, said: religion does not matter in politics! this was quite impressive as there where five pastors attending the party.

on friday thirty kids (or better: youngsters) from a school in kampala came to participate on the kids of africa sportsday. after a morning filled with running and playing the visitors performed some traditional dancing. a lot of bumshaking is normal for this kinds of dances and it was quite funny to see the youngest kids of KOA trying to imitate the dances.

i wanted to upload a wunderfull panoramapicture of a sunset, but it is much to big... maybe facebook will do it!

kleines rechenbeispiel

zugegeben, es ist nicht des schweizers art, öffentlich über sein geld zu reden (sollte es aber irgendwie doch werden, siehe neuste juso-initiative). doch hier folgt ein kleines rechenbeispiel um aufzuzeigen, wie krass die unterschiede zwischen der sogenannt ersten und dritten welt sind.

momentaner umrechnungskurs: 1 CHF ist 2`717.97 UGX (uganda-schilling)
ein durchschnitlicher tageslohn beträgt etwa 3000 UGX, also etwa 1 CHF.
eine wohnung (15m2) kostet etwa 60`000 UGX, 25 CHF pro monat.
eine cola (33cl) in einem restaurant kostet 1`500 UGX, 0.5 CHF.
100 gramm parmesan (importiert) kostet 19`000 UGX, 6 CHF.
ein stück land (100m2) kostet 3`000`000 UGX, 1`074 CHF (wer sich land leisten kann, ist reich, sehr reich).
ein kind an eine uni schicken kostet 1`000`000 UGX, 358 CHF pro jahr (bachelor/master system).
ich besitze momentan 2`800 CHF, 7`610`310 UGX, bin somit hier superreich.
heute habe ich muzungu-food im wert von 70`000 UGX, 25 CHF eingekauft, also für so viel geld, wie ein durchschnittlicher arbeiter in 23 tagen verdient (wer arbeitet in der schweiz für unter 20 CHF pro stunde?).
mit meinem geld könnte ein ugander 362 wochen, 7 jahre, leben.

wenn mich dann ein solcher ugander zum einkaufszentrum fährt (zugegeben, eigentlich holte er die tochter des direktors von der schule ab), hinterlässt das in mir ein leeres gefühl, eine gewisse schuld. das geld, dass ich für ein bisschen käse und cola ausgegeben habe, hätte ihn drei wochen ernährt.

ach ja, das wollte ich auch noch vorrechnen: wenn du 3`000 pro tag verdienst und deine miete 60`000 beträgt, arbeitest du 20 tage pro monat für deine wohnung. bleiben also noch 10 tage für essenwaren, und die sind auch nicht gerade günstig. ich habe es noch nie geschaft, unter 30`000 UGX einzukaufen.

swiss people don`t sleep

kien is tiler. he came to kids of africa today to fix some brocken tiles, some of them in my flat. so we had a talk together and when i told him that i`m from switzerland the conversation turned strange:

kien: do you sleep in switzerland?
joh: ... ? noo, i sleep here, it takes eight hours to switzerland.
k: no, i mean, when you`re in switzerland, do you sleep?
j: in general?
k: yes!
j: ... yes, of course. why?
k: once, somebody told me that people in switzerland don`t sleep, they work always. isn`t that true?
j: no! i mean, we work a lot, i used to work ten hours a day, but afterwards, you need to sleep!

(different point of view?)

from border to border

Luganda (auch: Ganda) ist eine im afrikanischen Süd-Uganda verbreitete Bantusprache, die vom Volk der Baganda im Königreich Buganda (Zentral-Uganda) gesprochen wird.

das meint wikipedia zum suchbegriff "luganda". luganda ist, wie man gut erkennen kann, eine alte sprache und hat nicht jede entwicklung mitgemacht. somit fehlen für viele "westliche" gegenstände die begriffe, man hilft sich mit den englischen wörtern aus. dabei entstehen lustige anglizismen. zum beispiel "boda-bodas", die motorradtaxis, wurden früher als schmuggelvehikel zwischen der ugandisch-kenianischen grenze verwendet, waren also "from boda to boda" (from border to border) unterwegs. ein anderes wort, das im lugandischen wortschatz nicht vorhanden ist, ist "overtime" (wieso auch immer). wahrscheindlich gibt es noch tausende solcher begriffe, aber so weit bin ich mit meinem luganda noch nicht. ehrlich gesagt, ich kann noch nicht einmal richtig begrüssen (vielleicht liegts auch an der lehrmethode). doch wenn einem die ugandische begrüssungszeremonie im englischen lange vorkommt, sollte man der lugandischen besser nicht beiwohnen.

trotzdem, hier ein beispiel:

a: agafaayo?
b: ekyali.
a: mmmm.
b: agafaayo?
a: ekyali.
b: eeeee.
a: ab`eka basula batya?
b: balungi.
a: mmm
b: mmwe muli mutya?
a: gye tuli.
b: mmmm.
a: mawulire ki?
b: tetugalaba.
a: eee.
b: mpozzi mmwe?
a: naffe tetugalaba.
b: mmm.
a: weebale emirimu.
b: awo.
a: naawe weebale.
b: nkola.

verstanden?

one month!

even if it doesn`t fell like, it is the truth: i`m in uganda since 5 weeks. the time went by like a running train. now, there is some kind of a daily routine (but still everyday something special happens). but the workdays (as it is normal for workdays, i guess) look same to each other. getting up around 7.30am, start working at 8.15am, teatime at 9.40am, lunch at 2.00pm, calling it a day at 4.45pm (still all times are plus-minus some minutes). even food (at least lunch) looks more or less the same everyday, posho (maizporridge) with beans, or peanuts, or chicken, or porc, but at least posho is on every plate. what makes the big difference (at least to switzerland) is that when i get up, the sun kisses my face, when i go to work, people greet each other friendly (hello, how are you? i`m fine, how are you? fine! how was your night? great, how was yours? it was ok! how`s live? and on and on and on), when i go for tea, nobody complains if i sit 5 minutes longer (don`t do that in switzerland), around lunchtime it is mostly so hot that i melt down just by seating around, and in the evening it is warm enough to stay outside for a beer or two (thinking about that, i miss the "biergarten" in wohlen.... enjoy my friends!).
i think it was in my first post when i said that we will build a kitchen for my flat. yesterday evening we prepared dinner for the first time in my kitchen. but still there is no sink and some shelfs are not in the place they belong to. time just is a bit slower here. the answer to the question: how is work? mostly is something like: it is ok! we are moving, slow, but for shure! and that is just how it is, what can`t be done today will be done tomorrow (i really enjoy that, even if it isn`t very swiss).

but, as nice as it is to be here, it is hard to believe that there is some cracy stuff going on just a 45minutes cardrive from the village. last thursday five people were shot during the w2w-protests as the police startet to use live ammunition. the fact that the ICC started to monitoring the situation didn`t quite down the violence at all. for more information and pictures check this internetsite: http://echwaluphotography.wordpress.com/ and http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-13246913