Articles by Megan Yarberry

We’ve now finished our 2nd training, which took place at Mama Kevina Comprehensive Secondary School. The school was established 2 years ago by a couple of (Ugandan) Franciscan nuns, Sister Clare and Sister Margaret. The primary 3 populations among the students: children affected by the war in the north (including “invisible children” and child soldiers), those affected by the flooding that affected ½ the country last year, and AIDS orphans. The remaining are just plain poverty stricken, or have other, more personal disasters.

The school is secondary, meaning for high school aged kids (although because of interrupted studies, the students range in age from 12 to the early 20s). Because most of the kids will never get a chance at college, the sisters focus on vocational programming. Some Dutch philanthropists organized the building of a bakery, including lots of industrial machines, although the power to run these machines is unlikely, so some enormous wood stoves have been constructed in the back, which will probably see a lot more use. The sisters also hope to offer tailoring, basic computer skills, and some other things, and as a matter of course the students do agriculture (had just planted sweet potatoes, beans & corn) to supplement school food (most students are boarders), and are making the bricks to make the new dorms and school rooms.

The students are full of personality, although some seemed a bit disconnected, and some – as the sisters say – are “a bit cheeky”. They have a reputation for being very good at music (which we later had opportunity to see), and were extremely well-disciplined when they needed to be.

The student body has grown far too fast to keep up with, as the sisters are soft hearted, and as you can all imagine, there are many hard-luck stories around here. The dorms are absolutely packed: 3 story bunk beds set a foot or so apart, & not enough mosquito nets.

Making things even more difficult are the rising prices: food prices have shot up recently (a global phenomena particularly acute in places like this), as have costs for things like mattresses and mosquito nets.

We trained only 12 people this time: 5 are healthcare workers including 2 from the school (Charles, our country facilitator for RMF projects in Uganda, and Immacilat, the school nurse), 2 from the psycho-social ward at St. Anthony’s Hospital in Tororo (their boss had signed them up after seeing our work at the refugee camp), and 1 from Mella clinic – a rural clinic where a staff of 4 sees 500 patients per day. The other 7 people trained were teachers and admin at the school, and they were trained only in ear beads (ie no needling involved) and also in yoga.

I did the training for the needling portion, and Beth taught yoga to the other 7 and the students. I often heard grand hilarity from the bakery (which had a huge open room ideal for teaching yoga to a large group) when Beth was working with them. Most had never seen or heard of yoga, and although the sisters seemed occasionally befuddled by it, some of the teachers – male & female – and all of the students seemed super excited by it.

We offered acupuncture treatments to the students twice, and asked them to write down some of their thoughts. They reported big improvement to their sense of well-being, being more relaxed, and great improvements in sleep. I didn’t realize the full significance of this until I interviewed some of the children one-on-one. We had asked the sisters to arrange for us to talk with a few of the students in order to get a more thorough history & picture of what they’d been through.

The first boy I talked to was from the north. I’ve read a lot about the civil war that’s been happening for the past 20 years in Northern Uganda – the atrocities, the damage to communities – but it was a completely different thing to sit down with one of the people and talk about his experience of it.

The rebels had killed his father when he was 6, after which his village was moved to a camp where sanitation, food, and shelter were abysmal. School was interrupted for 2 years, after which the kids were taught under trees in communal areas. Invasions from rebel soldiers were ongoing, and when he was 18 (in 2006) he and many of his friends and one brother were abducted by rebels. He was forced to carry 50Kg (120lb) bags of salt on his head for days and nights at a time with no food or water, and beaten with spears and sticks to keep up and shut up (showed me scars). His brother wasn’t able to keep up, and was killed in his presence. He himself was forced to kill a few of his friends to “prove” his loyalty, and to prevent being killed himself. He was forced to fight against government soldiers, given a gun, and probably drugged. During one of these skirmishes he escaped, and was later found by gov’t soldiers and returned to his mother in the camp. There he was befriended by Patrick, a seminary student who also works for the school (who has been taking care of Judah during our long work days), and brought to the school.

The other students we interviewed had equally horrific and/or tragic pasts. All of them said sleep was difficult, interrupted, a lonely time for them. One girl said she woke in the night, imagining her bed had turned into a hole in the ground and she was being buried. Another said that when she woke her tears were falling “without my knowing”.

All of them also said that since receiving the treatments, they had slept well, “like when I was a child,” sleeping through the night and waking rested. A couple of the girls said after their first yoga session that they hadn’t felt so good and safe since before their parents had died (these 2 were AIDS orphans).

The Ten Commandments movie download On the last day we presented certificates to the trainees, and the students performed songs and dances for us for over an hour. The music went from traditional dances & songs to gospel, to songs written specifically for Beth and me. It was extremely moving, totally beautiful. I’m very much looking forward to sharing pictures with folks when we return!

Our little team of 3 has now landed safely here on the coast of Kenya. Today is our first full day off in weeks of working roughly 7am-10pm, so we’re maximizing with pool and beach time, catching up on mail, and looking forward to pizza for dinner after weeks of mostly Indian and African food.

We left Uganda Friday night, accompanied to the side of the rode that serves as Tororo’s bus station by Charles, Sister Clare, and a gaggle of the Mama Kevina school girls. It was nice to have the company since the bus was 1.5 hrs late. We spent the time talking about the week, but also learning & teaching games with the girls, eating roast corn, watching the roadside traffic & community, like the chapatti lady and her kids at work & play.

The bus finally arrived and we were loaded on with tears and hugs. Within an hour we’d reached the border, where everyone has to deboard & walk between checkpoints across the no-man’s land, getting exit stamps for Uganda, and entry stamps for Kenya. By then the sun was setting in its usual brilliant oranges and reds reflecting off dramatic cloudscapes, so the rest of the ride was in darkness. Much of the journey felt a lot like riding a greyhound bus through a pot-holed construction site at high speeds, overtaken and being overtaken by other lorries and buses, with occasional traffic going the other way. A thrill a minute, though Judah says we only lifted onto two wheels once, and at least we didn’t hit any wildlife.

A total of 12 bone-jarring hours later we arrived in Nairobi. We caught a taxi to the airport in the dawn hours (great time to be on the road in the capital as otherwise one can crawl along at a snail’s pace through the horrendous traffic there), with no ticket and no real idea if there were flights to Malindi, our next destination.

We got lucky and
found a little commuter airline leaving in the next few hours. Had some food, brushed teeth in the domestic terminal bathrooms, tried to call my contact on the coast, who I’d not been in direct contact with for some worrisome amount of time (unsuccessful).

In the waiting area I talked with an elderly white woman who’d grown up in the Himalayas, daughter of a British shipping line owner in still-colonial India. Her family had moved to Kenya after WWII, living quite the lush life I’m sure. She met & married her husband here, and later moved to France to live out their golden years. He had recently become suddenly paralyzed, & died within a few days. That was a month ago, and she was just now returning to spend her final weeks/months/years in Kalifi on the Kenyan Coast. It was very much like talking to an anachronism, as she was all about colonial life and mentality.

The flight was about an hour during which Judah and Beth slept, and I read the African news magazines in the seat flap. We descended over palm & mango trees and thatched roofs in sight of the coast to a charming teeny airport in the middle of the green. We hadn’t arranged for a hotel, so the only taxi driver in sight listed some possibilities & drove us through town (“ there’s the private Muslim hospital, there’s the post office, this is the Lamu/Mombassa road”) to where he thought we might stay. It had gorgeous grounds (plumeria and bougainvillea are plentiful here), a play area for the kiddies, luxurious pool, stables, bikes for rent – looked fantastic after our digs in Uganda which were lush by local standards but still limited on power and hot water, and in the middle of a dusty town. Unfortunately, the hotel was too steep for our very limited budget (around $75 per night for a double). We sadly refused a room there, and walked across the street to some cottages we’d spied on the way in.

The price was much more within range, but the place was a bit spooky: the front gate had a padlock, the pool was murky & bug-filled, there was an old Indian man who regarded us steadily and silently all the while we were walking around. The rooms were pretty spacious, but pretty dirty (Judah found a cockroach in the fridge), and pretty oppressive feeling. Beth and I looked at each other thinking “eew, this place is creepy” but saying “yeah, I guess we could be here for a while and maybe change rooms when we have more time to look for something nicer?”

Judah, bless his soul, said “ let’s look at one more place; I saw something a bit further up the road.” So we trudged out with the taxi driver (who was walking with us as we figured things out, his car still loaded w/our belongings back at the first hotel), and along the road until we saw a place called “the African Pearl.” It was also set off the road, had beautiful grounds, a nice pool, thatched roofs on all the buildings, vine-woven hammocks and swings hanging from the big mango trees, murals of lions & elephants on the walls. “Ah well,” I thought, “there’s no way this place is in our range.” But after some negotiations, we accepted a large room w/lanai overlooking pool and grounds, including breakfast for about $8 more per night than the spooky place, so there we are, living in the lap of what feels very much like luxury to us at this point in our trip.

I was able to reach my contact for the Omari Project this morning, and he’ll be picking us up to take us to the rehab center in the morning to start the next training session. This is the place that Nina (TCMCH student) and I visited back in December, and I’m looking forward to seeing how they do. It’s one of only 2 sub-saharan drug detox centers, and I think the NADA protocol will be a great tool for their toolbox.

Well, Judah has been patiently waiting for me to finish to we can get that beach time in.

I’ve wanted to write sooner, but electricity is sporadic and our days are long and full, so here I am on a Sunday afternoon, ready to write.

It’s been almost 2 weeks since we left Hawaii. Took us 5 days to get to Tororo, Uganda, where the first trainings are taking place.

Judah & I flew from Hilo to Honolulu to L.A. to New York to London (where we took the tube to visit the National Museum of History during our 12 hour layover) to Nairobi.

In Nairobi we stopped over at the Abha Light offices, where I met up with my Real Medicine Foundation colleague Beth, and where Didi (who I worked with in December) got us organized, gave us a bit of a crash pad & repacking centre & refueling site before catching the late night bus to Uganda.

Beth had brought most of the training supplies, so had huge and many bags, which we wrestled onto the big, greyhound style bus that would take us on the 12+ hr ride across the border. We set off only 1 hr late, out of Nairobi and into the black African night. Judah and I entertained ourselves with i-pod stories and the occasional flash of village firelight.

Just before midnight, I felt the bus lurch and looked up in time to see the startled wide-eyed stare of a zebra through the front windshield before feeling a sizeable impact. The bus veered, and Beth & I both had visions of the bus rolling, screams, & glass shards everywhere. Fortunately, the driver kept us on the road, although one could feel that something was dragging (zebra? Part of the grill?) underneath us.

After some complicated back & forth, we pulled over to the side and most of the passengers piled out to see the damage. The front grill was completely mangled, and the radiator was leaking freely onto the tarmac. The poor zebra was a ways back on the side of the road, still warm, and almost unbelievably beautiful, even in death.

We stayed there, on the side of the road, for almost 3 hrs, until a replacement bus was sent from Nairobi (ours being inoperable). Around 3 am our replacement bus came. We monitored the transfer of our heaps of luggage, & rode on until the next pit stop around 4:30 am for refueling. I negotiated the obstacle course of cloth & snack vendors to brave the gas station’s public restrooms (floor level porcelain holes, a bit smelly, bring your own tp – some people had used leaves & other materials).

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After we’d all piled back on the bus, we were told we had to switch buses again – apparently the one we were one wasn’t expected to be able to make it all the way. We were fairly practiced at loading our luggage, and there was – by this time – a certain camaraderie between the passengers, so the transfer was made in record time.

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We revved up and trundled off down the almost unbelievably poorly maintained highway (really, it looked like a logging road that hadn’t been used in a decade, although huge transport trucks and buses competed for purchase on the best parts of the road).

As the sun came up and we drove through the rolling green hills approaching the border, I started seeing buildings reduced to rubble, charred buildings and fields, graffiti saying things like “Kibaki [Kenya’s incumbent president] must go.” I asked one of the other passengers who said that all the destruction I was seeing were the results of Kenya’s December elections, which were disputed, and the effects of which are still being sorted out.

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At the Kenyan-Ugandan border all the passengers have to get off the bus & walk across the border (maybe 500 metres) passing through the Kenyan & Ugandan visa offices. As with other crossings I’ve made, a fellow passenger took us in hand, showing us where to stop & which road to take for our documents, and helping deflect the snack, drink & money lending vendors along the way.

A few hrs later we arrived in Tororo, which was to be our base camp for the next 2 weeks. While Beth made a call from the curbside mobile phone services, Judah & I wandered off to get our first corn of the trip – roasted over charcoal stoves on the side of the road. One of the Franciscan sisters met us soon thereafter in a rented car which helped transport our bags to the Travel Lodge Tororo hotel, one of the nicest places in town (although I’ve only managed 2 hot showers – the rest being of the bucket variety, and the electricity is off fairly frequently).

We went straight on to Mama Kevina school, which was established and is run by the Franciscan sisters. The students were there to greet us, with drums, singing and dancing – very sweet, and very energetic. The kids have mostly come from the North of Uganda, where they were child soldiers in the military operations there (which have been mostly on-going for the past 20 years) or whose families were destroyed by these operations or by the flooding last year. Also at the school are AIDS orphans from this area.

Although the care and effort of the sisters is apparent, many of the buildings are yet unfinished (the school having been established only 2 years ago, and with scrambled together funds from various sources). The kids are packed into dormitories without adequate mosquito nets ( so malaria is obviously a big health problem for them, in fact the head teacher-nun had malaria our entire first week here). In a room probably 50 feet by 20 feet there are perhaps 25 3-story bunkbeds, and almost not one spare yard of floorspace. Hopefully, when the next 2 buildings are finished, the kids will be able to spread out some.

There is also a rather amazing bakery, as one of the emphases is vocational training for the kids (almost none of them are likely to go on to university, so it’s important to give them wage-earning skills).

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The bakery building and industrial baking machines were donated by folks from Holland. Because the machines take so much electricity – obviously a problem here – the sisters are also building huge charcoal or wood ovens. One wall of the bakery (which is still under construction, and currently is used as a sitting/eating room for the sisters who live rather far from this site) is made of tile made by the people in Holland who were part of mobilizing money and resources for this project.

There are 205 kids at the school, and most don’t have any support from families, so the sisters raise money for their school fees (one has to register for national exams, there are book, pen, uniform costs) as well as for food. The 16 teachers have been basically volunteering for the past 2 years, and so it’s hoped to locate funds to pay them as well.

The students – besides being full-time students – also do the gardening (sweet potatoes, greens, corn, and other things. The students are also making the bricks that are being used in the new buildings – bringing water from a nearby stream, mixing mud and straw, putting them in molds, and drying them in the sun. Lots of work!

After a tour of the school & some passion-fruit juice in the sisters’ sitting room, Judah passed out & I began to hallucinate from fatigue (remember – this was the end of 5 days of almost constant travel – no time in a real bed). A taxi eventually came to ferry us back to our hotel through a full on thunderstorm. We had a bit of masala for dinner (there is a strong Indian influence in food and business here) before turning in for the night.

The next day we met Charles Naku, a counselor from PLAN international who has acted as our facilitator here. Under Plan’s aegis, we have been able to avoid a lot of the red tape that would otherwise have been required in providing services in a refugee camp. Charles has been amazing, easing our way, helping us know who to talk to & how to negotiate some of the obstacles inherent in this work.

We went out to the Mulanda transit center (a refugee camp of Kenyans who spilled over the border after the violence from December’s presidential elections there.) to have a look around, get oriented, and take steps to identify the people we would be training in the NADA 5-needle protocol.

It was a bit surreal to see the acres of UNHCR tents spread across the landscape. We met with the United Nations High Commission for Refugees representative, a woman from Holland named Yolanda (and later met with other folks from UNHCR, Red Cross, Save the Children, World Vision and other relief agencies working at the camp). We explained our mission, she asked some questions, gave us some advice, and we went off to meet with the camp’s block leaders.

Our original vision of training relief workers (from org.s like Red Cross etc.) to do this basic acupuncture protocol had changed somewhat since our arrival. We had learned that most of the refugees would be relocating to a more permanent camp several hours to the north (Kiryandogo camp) the following week, and that many of the relief agencies were pulling out. So we decided instead to train the refugee workers themselves, choosing those that had healthcare or counseling experience back in Kenya.

The camp was organized into 6 blocks = A,B,C,D,E & F. While the block leaders were notified and assembled, we met some of the other relief workers, including Miss Tororo, who was using her considerable charm & looks to mobilize support for various camp activities.

We met with the block leaders in an incomplete brick building – sand floors, & no windows. We gave them a basic description of acupuncture, a more specific description of the ear protocol we were proposing to teach, how we would like to select trainees, and asked for questions. A few brave souls asked some questions, but mostly there was an ominous silence. Charles proposed that we leave them to talk amongst themselves while he showed us around the camp, so off we went.

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The Hobbit dvd He showed us how the camp was organized, visited the volleyball & basketball courts, the playground (all dirt surfaces and very well used), and introduced us to some of the other relief agency folk. We sat and talked with Sarah from Save the Children for quite a while – she is a hugely dynamic woman with a remarkable ability to see the big picture, as well as the intricacies of working with such a population (many unaccompanied children, for example, who fled across the border and who are now living in child-headed family groups). She knew most of the passing children by name, and specifics about their situations.

We also visited the school – very bare bones by US standards to be sure, but with a lot of seemingly dedicated teachers (other refugees from Kenya) and headmaster. Charles found us there, and brought us back to meet again with the grop leaders, who had come up with some very interesting questions and concerns for us. For example, were the needles pushed all the way through the ears? Were there powerful chemicals on the needles that we were proposing injecting into their population? Were there religious implications with this treatment? What were Beth & my qualifications?

We took the questions one by one, explaining again the overall framework of acupuncture, and our goals for the training. Then Beth gave me a demonstration treatment so they would have an idea of how it looked. We offered treatment to them, and a few brave souls accepted.

As the first few block leaders received treatment and didn’t fall over dead, more requested treatment until we had needled most of the group. We all sat quietly for 30 minutes, answering the occasional question, and looking back at the many people looking in the open windows.

The mood had changed entirely by the time we removed the needles, and the block leaders were asking if they could be trained, as they really liked the effects of the treatment. We reiterated that we could only accept 20 trainees, and that we would give precedence to those with healthcare or counseling experience.