No Relief for Relief Workers: Humanitarian Aid Work Raises Risk of Depression and Anxiety

No Relief for Relief Workers: Humanitarian Aid Work Raises Risk of Depression and Anxiety

The honest truth!

Spiritual Reflection

Dear Father,
Thank you Lord, for not leaving me nor forsake me. Though I do not deserve them your grace and mercy never left me. Though it seems like I go from one fire to another and things seems to be piling on top of each other, you constantly send good Samaritans my way. You give me strength to get through each day. You give me friends to vent to, who supports and motivate me. You give me great family that constantly supports me. You provide and protect me. When people are having things stolen from them you add to my blessings. The more my sins pull me away from you the more you pull me closer. I’m here today because you kept me. I’m alive today because of your continuing grace and mercy. Thank you for helping me push through. Thank you for the people you place in my life and thank you for the peace and joy. Lord I have no right to ask for more but I dare to ask because you are all I can truly depend on. Please help me with the rest of the year I have left. Help me with my thesis/practicum. Help me to see the good things and be more positive instead of dwelling on the negative. Lead and guide me and be the light that illuminated my life. Lord please do not leave me alone to my own device. Bless me enough so I could not depend on the world but not too much that I start to take you for granted. You are my pillar, my peace, protector, provider, comforter, and the one who makes the impossible possible. I lay down my life at your feet, use me for your will however as you wish. However, please be gentle with me for my faith is little. Lord, guide me and please show me your will for my life. Whatever I might have forgot to ask you for please Lord forgive my forgetfulness and grant them. Thank you Lord, thank you father.

Oh No, Bed Bugs!!!

One week after I got back from the States, I got bed bugs. I think I know where I got them from but I was not happy about it at all. I soaked every piece of clothing I owned in hot water and soap. Hired one of the local ladies to help me was all the clothes. Whatever could not be washed went out into the sun. I used soap and bleach to wash down my bed frame and mop everywhere with it. I had nothing to wear for 2 days but I’m now BED BUG FREE!

One Year Already???

May 22, 2013 marked my 1 year in Uganda but July 26 was our 1 year anniversary as official PCVs. Most of us had mix feelings. Surprised that we made it to 1 year, surprise that it went by so quickly, interesting that Uganda has now become our “home”, and afraid that we may have not done anything to show for our time here. Some of us were excited to start thinking and planning for what to do with our last year in service, start planning for after service vacation, and about what we are going to do after service. Mixed feelings but excitement is winning.

Visit to the States – What a Shock!

I went to the U.S for a visit for the first time during my service for 1 ½ weeks for my best friend’s wedding in Kansas. When I started my service, I had no intention of going to U.S until my friend called to tell me she is engage and I’m her co-maid-of-honor. When I went home, I didn’t really go home. My family lives in Maryland and my friend live in Kansas where the wedding took place. Therefore, I bought a ticket that allowed me one day layover in MD so I could see my family and head out the next day to Topeka, Kansas. To my surprise, I really like Kansas. The wedding preparation was hectic but I had a fantastic time planning and participating in it. P.S I absolutely love planning events. It was great seeing my family and spending some time with my mom who came to KS for the wedding.

During PC trainings and from the returned PCVs, I have heard countless of time that we PCVs go home they tend to have a hard time adjusting to home. Needless to say I had some rehabilitation issues. Among different cultural shock and experience there was one situation that stood out to me most. While I was in Kansas, it seems that I had more to say to my friend’s fiancé, who is in the army and have being stationed in Africa before, than my Sri Lankan best friend. Though we both grew up in a developing country, her fiancé understood my daily stress, i.e. long bus ride, using latrines, peeing in the bushes, cold shower, hand washing clothes, etc., than she does. It would be quiet interesting to see how next year would be when I officially move back home.

On my way back to Uganda, I had a one day layover in Dubai. Though hot and humid, Dubai was fantastic. Went to the Dubai mall – biggest mall in the world with 1,200 outlets, went to the tallest building, and the biggest hotel in the world with the cheapest room being $2000 per night. To top it all off, Emirates airline bump me up to business class without my knowledge until I checked in. All in all it was a blissful short but perfect holiday.

Visitation from the Gorillas

Three days after my birthday, I took a one week vacation with Lori, another PCV, to go visit Eric, a PCV that is 14 hour bus ride away. We visited him as well last Christmas. Aside from the 14 hour uneventful bus trip (thank God), it was great to be among friends and just vent, laugh, watch movies, cook, and kill and de-feather a chicken. The highlight of the trip was that we saw a big pack of gorillas past through his front yard. It was cool to see the parents or big gorillas and the babies. I guess I now know why people get excited to do gorilla or chimp trekking and visit national animal parks. Cool to see animals at their natural habitat.

International Development Worker – The Struggle

If you have being following my blog you would have read that I have been having issues with the organization that I was posted to by PC since I started my service. Let just say I am having the real experience of working with an international organization in a developing country. To bring you up-to-date in order for me to do my job at this organization I will need to ride a boda-boda (that is the local motorcycle transportation that all the locals use as transport). The PC Headquarter in Washington, D.C has a rule that says PCVs are not allowed to ride a boda or it is an automatic 1-way ticket back to the States. For PCVs othaot are in this kind of predicament, PC Uganda has something called a boda waiver where the PCV and their organization apply for a waiver so that the PCV can use a boda to do his/her job. Unfortunately, I couldn’t apply for that waiver because my counterpart, who has a company boda, does not have a license. PC Uganda Country Director came to my organization in November 2012 to talk to my supervisor and ask him to get the organization to pay for my counterpart to get a license. PAUSING AND DIGRESSING…

One of the things Uganda is famous for among the PCVs is that they have a “yes culture”. Basically, a Uganda would rather say “yes”, “I agree”, “okay” to your face even when they feel the total opposite or when they are not going to what they agree to. This becomes a nasty shock to PCVs and any Westerners when they find out that what is needed to be done is well…not done. BACK TO THE STORY…

As you might have guessed, this is September 2013, almost a year later and my counterpart still do not have a license and I’m still not doing any field work. Since August 2012, I have being stuck in the office typing papers like a secretary…actually a secretary have more responsibilities and a dignifying job than what I’m doing. I have been voicing my concerns and bugging PC since July 2012 abut this organization and yet I’m still stuck here while other PCVs have been changed to their second and third organizations. P.S this is why I have not post anything in a long time because I have been hesitant about saying anything bad about my organization and PC but these is all part of international development work experience so it needs to be recorded and I did promise to you all I will tell you the truth so there you go.

In addition to the boda issues and not doing field work, you may ask “isn’t there anything you can do in the office aside from typing papers?” No, not really. You see at my work place the monitoring and evaluation team go to the field, do what they need to do, record all the information, and bring the paper work to the office to type. Since I’m not doing anything, I help my counterpart with typing his papers. Though we have two cars it is not accessible for just one person to use – that is why the organization gives their workers boda-boda to use. I reported my concerns to PC July and October 2012. Our director came to my organization November 2012 to speak with them. I reported again in January, April, and July 2013 and ask PC to remove me from there and give me another organization like they do for other PCVs. Sigh, I give up! I get the picture. For some unknown reason to me PC is not giving me an organization change (well they didn’t verbally tell me that but I’m reading between the silence that their answer is no). Now it is too late for me to get a new organization so I’m stuck. One of the higher-up PC staff told me to continue to work got the organization that they gave me and also do a secondary (that means do something else on the side or work with an additional organization). Here is what I have to say to that suggestion:
1) No, when I signed the PC contract it doesn’t say it is MANDATORY to do a secondary project so I shouldn’t have to result to that to have a successful service.
2) Why do you give other PCVs an organization change and refusing mine?
3) I did start a secondary project – teaching at a local high school until my supervisor at the organization called my PC Program Manager (PM) that she doesn’t want me to do a secondary (which is strongly encouraged by PC) and without my consent, the supervisor and PM agreed that I would not do a secondary so I had to stop the high school program.
4) I am a PC Master Internationals Volunteer; PC signed an agreement that I can use my PC service for my thesis paper for my MPH program. If I’m not doing anything at work, what I’m I suppose to write about?
5) I am a VERY FRUSTRATED PCV and no PC is not all that bad (honestly), it’s just that there is 1 bad apple in every batch and my case is that 1 bad apple in my PCVs cohort.

Current solution? Since I cannot leave my organization, I am working out a secondary with another organization WITHOUT LETTING my current organization know about it and I’m informing PC that I do not need their help any longer. I will contact them if I need them. As for my thesis, I have other PC activities that I will write about (thank God). I just wish I could have done a real public health project with my organization but oh well…

A note from my loving Dad

Yes Baby, you are right, you are no more a student, you are a professional, now in a market place selling yourself by showing or proving who you are. Whatever challenges that you are facing, those challenges are the tools to your success. Take those challenges one by one and think of the solution to all of them, “problems solving”, and it is part of leadership trait.

I want you to “Dare To Dream” and working on these 5 tips: Dedication, Responsibility, Education, Attitude and Motivation.

. Dedication: Always committed to any assignment or project that you are working on, and
devote your time for it.
. Responsibility: This is a state of accountability, that is, you are going to accountable or
responsible for something. That means you have to do things right, you may get help you
may not, it is a must for you and you have to do it right.
. Education: This is an informative experience that you are getting, and that is the reason why
you are out of your base, to gain more, to demonstrate what you know and abilities to train or
educate others.
. Attitude: This is to show or proof your capability of doing or handling matters. Your
appearance, your physical posture, your utterances and your manner of interaction to people.
. Motivation: Your have to keep your interest in what you are doing. Something made you to
be where you are now, you are not just found yourself in Uganda. Whatever that activate your
emotion, you have to keep the reason.

When you dare to dream “nothing is impossible” and you will see the clarity of life by understanding the whole things. Keep your faith and it will make you strong. We are praying for your success and it will comes to pass.

Love you,
Dad

Travel in Uganda: A PCV Adventure

On December 17th, Lori and I decided to travel from my town, Fort Portal (West region) to Bwindi (Southwest region) to visit two fellow volunteers, who are out in nowhere and by themselves, for eary Christmas surprise. Below is a little snipet of the account of our journey. Enjoy

Written on the 28th of December, 2012 by Lori Cleveland

Up at 0430 to catch a matatu from Fort Portal to Bwindi. We knew it would be a long drive, but we wanted to share some Christmas spirit with Eric and Mary who are based extremely far away from anyone in a tropical forest. Surprise, surprise the taxi leaves early – 0545. The driver promises to take us to Mbarara via Kasese. Stop to drop off, stop to pick up, stop to drop off, stop to pick up. And on and on it goes for 2 hours. We can see a police check point ahead when the matatu stops, turns around and the conductor says, “everyone off, you ride boda.” The cacophony starts and we chime in yelling, “We can’t ride bodas!!” But nothing works. We get out in the rain with our backpacks and bags; one older woman with a large rolled-up mattress and 2 bags and one man with 3 large coils of wire-resigned to walking or bodas. We start walking. “Hey look, there is a man sweeping off his roof in the rain!” About 2 miles later, wet and alternating between whining and laughing we are picked up by a large truck and the wonderful gentleman takes us another ½ mile to the taxi stage.

In Kasese we pick up our second matatu for the 5 hour trip to Mbarara. Trying to sleep as he stops to drop off, stops to pick up, swerves to avoid potholes, stops to drop off, stops to pick up and swerves to miss bodas. It doesn’t even phase us anymore, pretty uneventful leg of the journey.

1. In Mbarara searching for another ride to Kihihi (pronounced cheeheehee as I discovered, after much laughter by the locals, when I tried to explain where we were going.) Matatu it must be with more stops to drop off, stops to pick up, swerving to miss the goats, and a sudden squeal of breaks with a rapid swerve to miss the cow that stepped into the middle of the road – Dumb cow!! Arriving in Mbarara the driver stops on the side of the road, tells us to get out and run to the bus across the road who is going to Kihihi. As we grab our things, he starts yelling at the bus driver to wait because he had a couple of muzungus who are coming. Buses are much more comfortable, you know. But I guess they didn’t want to wait the 2 minutes it took for us to get out of the matatu and left without us. What happened to Uganda time?? Hence, into our third matatu for our trip to Rukungiri with a promise to continue on to Kihihi (uh, oh – another promise?)

Partway into this trip someone loads 2 chickens into the matatu…right under the seat in front of me. Now you have to know that I am wearing sandals. One of them, with his legs tied, slid around on his belly with every turn, bumping into my leg. The other, after shifting positions multiple times and making me squeal as his feet scampered over mine, finally settled down on top of my foot for the rest of the trip. If he/she lays an egg, do I get to keep it?? Does it make you feel better if I tell you I was wearing socks? Whew!

Two hours later we arrived in Rukungiri and pulled into a taxi park that was empty with the exception of 2 cars, 1 matatu, and 2 pick-up trucks. Didn’t look to promising (there’s that word again). We got out at the conductor’s request, and then began the gesturing and yelling because we had already paid to get to Kihihi. The conductor took us to a pick-up truck and told us that it would be our ride to Kihihi. Oh, joy – we’re definitely sitting in front -We are still wet fish out of water, don’t really want to be fish IN water! Since I really needed to pee before we left, I visited the local latrine for 200 shillings. It’s too bad that the money is not used to improve the latrine – that was the worst one I have ever seen. There is a benefit to wearing a skirt! Imagine dropping my pants while trying to keep the pant legs off the floor – LOL!

About 20 minutes later a bus pulls in on the way to Kihihi. WooHoo! We grabbed our things and ran. Unfortunately, we could not find the conductor of the matatu to forward our ticket to the bus, so we paid an extra 10,000 to get ourselves to the next destination in as much comfort as possible. This leg of our journey included about ½ mile of winding road with a cliff on one side. The road, as in most of Uganda, is poorly maintained with ruts, bumps, and crevices. So, the bus sways right and left as it hits the ruts, passes over large rocks, and bumps into crevices. As it sways right I am praying that it gets out of the rut fast enough before it sways right over the edge! God’s blessing we made it safely to Kihihi where we were met by Reverend Bernard who drove us the last hour to Bwindi. What a calm ride compared to the rest of our journey, although he did have to swerve to avoid a few goats. Arriving just after dusk – a meager 14 hours later, we are met by Eric with smiles and hugs.

You Have Been Lost

Written on December 20th, 2012

In Uganda, when someone has not seen you for a while, meaning two days or more, they tell you that “you have been lost” as in you have not been around. I felt like I have been lost from my blog and readers, and for that I owe you all my apologies. Its be a very long roller coaster ride since the last time I wrote, more lows than highs but at the end of the day each experience teaches me more about myself and helps me to be grateful for the support system I have around me. People I can turn to when I need to vent, which I seem to be doing a lot of, I don’t like bottling things inside. The next few blogs are not necessary in chronological order but they are events that have occurred since the last time I wrote. Mwebale muno mukusoma (thank you (plural) very much for studying/reading).