With the donation of air miles, Jane is off to Uganda.

Wow...game on...I am coming to Uganda in October for 3 weeks. The purpose - all things i.HUG. I have my own ideas about things that must be done during this time but it would be really helpful if you could email me and let me know if you can think of anything that really should be done so then I can begin planning and hopefully maximize on my time there.

Looking forward to seeing you Paddy Daddy and Ronald brother!
love Jane

Come and see

A captive audience for Paddy in Congo.










Paddy and Mark during Paddy's visit last year. Notice Paddy beating Mark at Scrabble.





I'm surprised about how many people are interested in going to Uganda. Already, six people have expressed interest in making the trip. I think this is a great idea, much for the same reason as Paddy mentions in an e-mail to Jane:

Hello jane

Thanks for the call you sounded good and well. Now about the issue of the school I believe some people can easily understand the picture when they get a chance to come to uganda. Someone said people who are born blind never believe in the light--reason being they have never seen it.

People born in great abundance can not figure out what’s on the ground until they get an opportunity to come and see, then they will change their thinking when they see the need. We are not responding to the call of the government we are responding to the need of humanity....

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As we move forward, we need to figure out how to integrate visitors in a way that will benefit the community and volunteers alike. I, myself, am looking forward to going sometime next year and stay at Jane's place!

We have neighbors!

Congratulations on the opening of the Childlife Network Centre!



A former local has organized the funds and this new building has opened in Kabalagala!

Paddy, who runs programs for needy children on the weekend, tells us that it provides a place to hold these programs (they started getting charged where they used to hold them.) In particular, he hopes that it will enable children to have a place where they can get counseling and help.

For the opening of the center, someone sponsored a meal and another person sponsored 60 t-shirts.





Paddy with the kids

While i.HUG will focus on education, this centre attends to what Paddy calls "the parenting role" for the neediest children in that area.

Participatory Development

So, this week we have been thinking deeply about making the SEEDS school sustainable. Some of the questions that we have been reflecting and researching are:

How will we ensure that this project really belongs to the people that it has been set up for?
What steps will we take to make sure that the project is going to be sustainable? How do we give the community ownership?
If this week was to have a theme it would be 'participatory development', this is defined as "a method that assists communities (including local people, the government and NGOs) in their collaborative design, implementation and evaluation of projects." I take it to mean that i.HUG needs to be in collaboration every step of the way with the people of Kabalagala to ensure that the SEEDS school will one day be run and managed entirely by Ugandans.

So, this week has seen much conversation with a number or experts in the field ( academics in the field of development studies, Ugandans who live in Kabalagala)

Nikki, our i.HUG volunteer sent me some notes about participatory development . I think this is great stuff:

"So good participatory development is about empowering. It is linked with distinctive behaviours, attitudes and approaches. "We" are not teachers or transferors of technology, but instead convenors, catalysts, and facilitators. We have to unlearn, and put our knowledge, ideas and categories in second place. Our role is to enable others to do their own appraisal, analysis, presentations, planning and action, to own the outcome, and to teach us, sharing their knowledge. The “others” may be local rural or urban people, women, men, children or old people, or members of an organisation or group. They are often those who are weak, marginalised, vulnerable and voiceless. They then do many of the things we tend to think only we can do. “They can do it” means that we have confidence in their capabilities. We “hand over the stick” and facilitate their mapping, diagramming, listing, sorting, sequencing, counting, estimating, scoring, ranking, linking, analysing, planning, monitoring and evaluating. Many practitioners and trainers consider the term Participatory development should only be used for processes which empower"

This week has been challenging but in such a way that we are becoming more and more rooted!

Bushwacked!

In England, the teachers and kids at the Hardlow School were busy working to raise money and really make a big difference in Africa. Back in New York, the folks were pitching in to do their part as well.

"Bushwacked," the party put on by Spring Street Sessions on behalf of i.HUG, was held on July 4th on a rooftop in Bushwick, Brooklyn. Yours truly was tending to cocktails, while fellow Board Member and Last Year's Model front guitarist Mark Right, lugged up stage equipment six flights of stairs. It was a blast...and everybody pitched in to make it happen.

Janelle, performing with Mindspray, gets there early to help set up.

Roland gets hungry, and ends up becoming grill master for the night (until Brian took over!)

Oh no! There's still so much to set up!

And if the skies over NYC can just hold off on their rain...



But everything moves according to plan. And by the time I look up, Last Year's Model takes the stage and rocks the house!



That's me...i.HUG happy!

Go Hardlow! We're so proud of you!

The idea of mini-fundraisers came out of necessity. We were ready to start raising money, but we didn't have our 501c3 yet. Plus, we had essentially no experience with large-scale fundraising. So we said, why don't we just start out small.

We began with what we knew how to do--motivating the people around us, and around them, to do something--anything--with the idea that small steps make up the journey. Have a dinner party with contributions. Set up a murder mystery game with a $10 buy-in for charity. Organize a kickball game with a $20 kick-in for our charity. These mini-fundraisers would also be a way to organize people and spread the word about the project.

The "English Project" was our first fundraising effort. The idea was to touch base with schools in England that Paddy had visited on his trip, and make them active members in getting our school in Kabalgala off the ground.


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Board Member Mary Dicker reports from the ground:

Just come back from the i. Hug shoot out at Hadlow School. It was really lovely. The year 6 had organised it all, am sure they will have raised more than we asked for. They made their own sponsor forms and had i.Hug posters everywhere and on their backs! Then all the children bought a drink and biscuit for 20p.

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Can you imagine those children organizing the whole fundraising effort? I feel so proud of them! I hope they understand how far that money goes!

Game on!

See this rainbow over NYC? It was shining just for us this week.

We received an extremely generous personal donation from a new supporter. This donation, on its own, enables us to open the school. It's happening! Game on!

I e-mailed Paddy and we were writing back and forth about the idea of vision, and how vision can transfer from one person to another. And to me, I just keep thinking of how our little project grows stronger when another person sees the vision, and this is such a case in point. Paddy read me a phrase that said "Without vision, the people will perish." I think it is from the bible. But it sent shivers down my spine because it shows how important it is to communicate what we are making happen. And I feel slightly humbled by the heros around me.

We're official!

Yesterday, in between folding loads of laundry, i.HUG received their 501c3. We're official! And that's months ahead from when I thought we would get it!