Name: Patricia da Silva
Location: Uganda
Report Title: Final Report
Report Date: 04/02/2010
The two week break was amazing! Not just because I got to see some of Uganda’s most beautiful places, but because it was the perfect time to reflect on all that we had done. Lake Bunyoni, Uganda- one of my favourite places Just before we were all due back on our placements, we attended a ‘mid-placement workshop’ where we got to share ideas and experiences of what our work had been like until that point and catch up with everyone. It was a really useful exercise because it enabled us to find out how other placements where getting on and share some best practice tips. We all went back to our placements re-energised and with plenty of advice on how to tackle the upcoming events we would organise. Once back in Buwaaya, I really wanted to connect with the youth and make sure that we were making a positive and long lasting impact, most especially because most of what we were teaching wasn’t new to them so the challenge was to make it relevant whilst keeping it interesting. The last few months were filled with lots of activities and then of course the necessary paperwork that comes with it. We held various workshops throughout the community, with the youths and adults and the main themes tackled were gender, domestic violence and responsible sexual practices. The video workshops were the more popular ones. We showed videos by a national partner organisation that were designed to highlight issues in everyday family life, for example gender inequality or domestic violence and encourage discussion around the topic. It was fascinating watching people’s reactions to deliberately volatile situations and then hearing the discussions that followed. My faithful Lusoga teachers -These little guys were lovely, they would knock on our door every Sunday to ‘teach’ me Lusoga! I learnt a lot from them. My real Lusoga teachers - These lovely girls actually tought me the basics of the Lusoga. Out of the events we organised, the one that had the biggest impact on me was the HIV and AIDS VCT day (voluntary testing and counselling). One of the underlying messages in all that we had been doing was to encourage people to be sexually responsible and to protect themselves from HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases. And we particularly wanted to encourage men to come forward and be tested because they have always been reluctant to be tested for HIV and a few shied away and didn’t want to be associated with some of aspects of our work. Overall the day went well, we invited The AIDS support organisation (TASO) to give some testimonies and perform a drama and we also invited the AIDS Information Centre (AIC) to do the actual HIV testing and counselling. It was one of those days that started off badly but ended really well!! TASO, who where the main act, had trouble getting to the village and even though we had spent the days before the event mobilizing people to attend, hardly anyone was there at the time we were supposed to start. We ended up doing some last minute mobilization and had a full hall by the time TASO turned up. Their performance was amazing. It wasn't just entertaining and inspiring, it was also thought provoking and I think that a lot of people will remember what they saw and heard. Over 200 people were tested and the day was deemed a success by the locals, to our relief! The VCT marked the beginning of the end of our stay. After that we just concentrated on finishing off our classes and the next biggest event which was also to be our last, the Handover festival. The idea behind the Handover festival was for us as a team to formally handover the responsibility and the activities that we had been running to key stakeholders in the community - to ensure sustainability and ownership really! I guess because of the stress we had with our VCT this came so much easier and naturally. The dance4life school group came together and performed a drama about teenage pregnancy and then performed the dance4life HIV and AIDS drill. It was a fantastic day and all the different organisations and local partners that we worked with came to see us off. It was also really emotional as it was our last event and it was when it finally sank in that I was leaving this place that had become home. Outdoor Assembly Working and living in a village full-time was hard but looking back, it’s the good things that have made a lasting impression and will stay with me. Also I really enjoyed what I was doing, so much so that I hope to be able to do it (or something similar) as full time job! Thank you to everyone who supported me whilst I was out there, the pep talks really helped. 
