politics, prostitution, and a pen

I was smiling for the greater part of yesterday because almost everywhere I looked, Ugandan newspaper headlines celebrated Obama's nomination. As a result of the news, I was stopped multiple times on the street by people who were curious about my opinion of the man and US politics. One woman asked me why the American people are more sexist than they are racist; another man wondered whether it was safe for people to be projecting their hopes and dreams on an inexperienced politician. Most people were excited by the potential for profound policy shifts from a man who can find Kenya (and probably Uganda) on a world map. I'd like to think that the fact that people are paying such close attention to American politics--before the general campaign is even in full swing--can't be a bad thing.

Yesterday, I also went on a site visit to a part of Kampala's red-light district, and sat in on a focus group discussion among a group of commercial sex workers, their "aunties" (the brothel owners and bosses), my coworkers, and a program funding consultant from Toronto. The experience put me on sensory-overload and even as I write about it now, I expect to have trouble extricating my thoughts. The sex workers, who prefer to be referred to as "moonlight stars", had all completed an extensive peer educator training session. They were responsible for going back to their respective communities and educating their colleagues about disease transmission, safe practices, sound family planning methods, and their individual rights. In the middle of the discussion I was left wondering, what rights could they really claim as their own? Prostitution is illegal in Uganda, and law enforcement officials are far from sensitive to their lifestyle. Regardless of what international declarations will claim, are their rights really secure? Sadly they likely are not, but I still think it's important for the women to understand the concept of unalienable human rights. I would think that such mental empowerment is essential to developing the internal motivation to ultimately demand a better life.

I learned that becoming a peer educator was seen as somewhat of an honor among the workers, and that they really enjoyed the training sessions. I was surprised at how open the discussion was: no one (except perhaps the woman from Toronto) seemed afraid of causing offense or asking too much. I had a hard time reconciling my feelings about the "aunties," and our decision to work with them. It turns out that these women act as gatekeepers, and if any of our efforts are to permeate the target population, we have to work through them. The "aunties" spoke very articulately, and I found it slightly bothersome that I couldn't help but like them. They also seemed to be very interested in me, my age, and what I was doing with my life; I'm inclined to think it was because the majority of their workers were around my age, give-or-take a few years. After the session, they said a prayer for me, and invited me to come back soon. I'll try to take them up on it.

I'm in the process of reading some papers on maternal mortality, and community-based reproductive health services. Apparently, surveyed households were chosen by the following method: "the direction to follow was selected by tossing a pen in the air and following the direction where it pointed. The starting household was the one nearest to the starting point." I'm fairly certain this is how I'm going to perform all my future studies. I might just use it to make all life choices from now on.

Finally, I just noticed that the time of my last posting was at a ridiculously early hour (and decidedly uncharacteristic of my normal diurnal habits). I think it's worth noting that whenever I travel, regardless of how long I'm away, I keep the clock on my laptop set to the time at home. It's fairly irrational, I realize, but for some reason I get this twinge of disloyalty if I try to change it. For clarity's sake, Kampala is seven hours ahead of Eastern Standard Time.