Women & kids

There's a very obvious hierarchy in Ugandan society, not so much for me in my work environment, but in life in general.

Kids are right at the bottom of the social scale. They are expected to be seen but not heard, do as they're told without complaint or compromise and to defer to adults at all times. (Bet that sounds like a dream to some of you!)

When they're not doing chores, they sometimes make it to school. If they don't make it to school, they create their own entertainment or just roam the streets for hours unsupervised, playing with whatever they pick up from the roadside. That's obviously not to say that they're not loved, this is just the way it is here - probably like Wales at the turn of the last century - but this is far, far from a child centred culture.
(Meg, Cam, Jordan - bet you don't fancy being a teenager in Uganda!)

Boys have it comparatively easy. Even though they have to do chores as kids too, as they get older, they get more opportunity to socialise with friends.
For example, every night, a group of about 25-30 older teenagers / young men come to the hospital to play football on the lower field.

I've got to know one of them quite well by now (he was the one with the best English that was pushed, shoved and jostled over to ask me to move when I was unknowingly sitting in the middle of their pitch - to be fair, there aren't any goal posts so how would I have known?!) and when I asked if girls played netball or any other sport in the nights and if so where, he looked amused and replied with a wry smile,
"No. They must stay at home, cook and help with the chores."

I must have looked like someone had done a really smelly fart in front of me as he laughed at my reaction.

"This must be different to Wales I see?"

"Well. Yeah. Very different. If someone told me to stay at home and sweep instead of going out, it would be the last thing they ever say to me. Possibly the last thing they say.
My friends usually end up sweeping my kitchen floor and wiping my work surfaces when they come round."
(Diolch am hwnna Mand, ond ti rili angen gweithio ar dy OCD!)

So as you may have gathered, women aren't much higher up the social scale either although attitudes are changing, albeit excruciatingly slowly.

For example, if a young, fit and and able man was sitting comfortably on a bus, he wouldn't offer his seat to a woman, even if she had a baby strapped to her back with a couple of kids and luggage in tow.
Sue and Alex have experienced this inequality much more than me though as they're out in the sticks where these attitudes are much more prevalent.

Sue is treated almost with contempt by one of the consultants she has to work with just because she's a woman whilst Alex's gentlemanly behaviour of offering his hand to help a local lady cross rough terrain has got him his own stalker who wants to 'mix' and have 'cream babies'!

(This is on top of the local vet's kind offer to him - "I do you HIV test. If you pass, we find you a good, clean Ugandan woman. You choose who.")

Pretty much as soon as they hit their teens (again, more so in rural areas), girls are encouraged to marry.

I was talking to someone who lived in a very rural part of Mbale a few days ago who explained that many girls and women are very rarely allowed to venture further than a few miles from their village.

"So how do they find people to marry then?"
"They marry within the village. Or maybe the next village."
"And they find someone they want to marry? Even though there may only be a few hundred, maybe thousand people in that village?"
"Yes"

Seriously?!

In my lifetime, I've lived in Ponty, Pentre, Swansea, Bridgend, Cardiff Bay, Whitchurch and Tonteg and I've never found anyone worth marrying in any of these places - and I was living with a boyfriend in one of them!

Maybe I should move to Buginyanya and try my luck there...