Bead Sale in Iganga

Today the women came from all over the district of Iganga to sell their beads to BeadforLife at the bead sale. While the day itself was mostly uneventful, there were some interesting bits.

Can you tell which chicken got hit?

In a seemingly unrelated note (yet totally related), I really needed to do laundry this morning, so at 7:30 I was outside filling two large tubs with water. Unfortunately, some of the women had already started to set up their things outside where I had to do the washing, and I began to realize that I was going to have a rather large peanut gallery watching me do my laundry. It’s not that I would be intrinsically embarrassed about doing laundry in front of other people at all, except that even my coworkers make fun of Karen and I when we do laundry because they know we aren’t used to washing everything by hand. Instead of just having one or two ladies teasing us, I had about eight women just sitting their staring at me as I attempted to get the spots of mud off my white jacket. One woman even had the guts to walk up to me, and just stare as I continued to wash everything. I greeted her hoping she was just looking to say hi, but she mumbled something back and then just kept standing over me. It was stupidly nerve-wracking, and now I have slightly soapy clothes because I just tried to get all of it done as fast as possible. To make my whole laundry experience more stressful, they beheaded both the chickens from last night right across the yard during my time out there. No, I did not watch, but yes, I ate chicken at lunch. Call me heartless, but I felt I owed it to the chicken we crushed yesterday to savor its life’s work after all we had put it through.

Once the sale actually started, I worked with Phoebe to manage the health exchanges for the women. Basically, we had three products the women could exchange either beads or money for that all related to health. We offered subsidized deworming medication for as many people as lived in the family, NutriPacks (high-calorie fortified peanut paste milk for malnourished children), and mosquito nets. Part of our job was convincing the women that these were worthwhile things to spend their hard earned money on. Most of the women were pretty receptive to the products, but some of them, Phoebe basically had to guilt into buying the deworming meds and mosquito nets. It is really important for the long term health of everyone in the family to get these goods, but sometimes the long term benefits don’t seem all that exciting in the short run.

We gave out a maximum of two bright green mosquito nets per person and explained that they really needed to use them for the purpose of preventing malaria – nothing else. I’ve never seen colored nets before, and I asked why they weren’t white. Phoebe said, “So that they are more like to use them for what they are supposed to be used for,” which really didn’t make any sense. “How would the color make them less likely to use them to catch fish?” Phoebe responded that the major problem out here in Iganga with the white ones was not catching fish, but rather, women would make clothes out of them…like wedding dresses. Now the color choice made a lot more sense.

A little boy about one year old ended up sitting on Phoebe’s lap for awhile during the exchanges. Many of the beaders have little children that they bring with them. The smallest ones are just wrapped tightly around the mother’s back with a piece of fabric, while any that are old enough to walk just run around wherever.

Baby got back 

Phoebe plopped this little boy (wearing pink pants and shoes) on my lap and asked me to hold him while she went to go ask someone a question. He seemed very wary of me initially, but mainly wanted to play with the NutriPacks. As fun as that game was, I nipped that one in the bud before he managed to open any. I decided to walk around with him and we even worked on waving at different people sitting around the office. Hoping to get a break, I eventually brought him around to where the other intern was working figuring that Karen would probably like to play with him anyways. The moment I put him in Karen’s arms he began to sob big tear,s and as soon as I grabbed him again, they stopped. Karen needed help organizing something, which required me to use both hands, so I set this little boy on his feet next to me, but he just clung to my skirt and started motioning his arms upwards, ready to be picked up.

Love that look of surprise!

The other women laughed as I eventually gave in because I saw that he was about to cry again. As soon as he was back up in my arms he completely stopped whining. I was feeling so loved and important, and then all of a sudden he was leaning out of my arms with his wide open towards someone else. A beader had come up to me, and I guess I was holding her baby. I asked her what his name was – “Genius.” Strange name, but he was pretty ingenious about getting me to pay attention to him, so I got to give it to the kid.

At the end of the day I sat with the inventory team to help count bracelets. Collens, the head of inventory, scooted her chair back a bit at one point, and all of a sudden, this horrible and horribly familiar squawk came from below her seat. I jumped back in my chair as I saw another bound chicken on the ground below Collens’. Apparently, she had just spooked it and it decided to make the world know it was unhappy. Collens saw my grimace at the noise and asked me, “You don’t like chickens?” I like chickens, I just had a bad experience with one the night before. She just looked at me weirdly and continued counting.

As per usual, we walked into town to go get food for dinner after work was over, but this time we noticed two new signs we’d missed before. Iganga High School is located on the road to the market, and a lush green field meets up with the road where all the kids hang out before and after school. While we’d seen the field every time, we just noticed a sign planted in the ground near a big tree that says, “Avoid early marriages” and another one a few feet away that reads, “Don’t accept gifts.” Kind of creepy, but probably wise advise in Uganda.