Overall I would say it has been a positive experience. I had always wanted to have a period living and work abroad and have been thinking of volunteering with VSO since the boys were small. This was the culmination of a long held ambition and mostly lived up to expectations.
In a lot of ways I was very lucky. I had the support of my husband, who also gave 2 years of his life to live in Uganda, and the rest of the family. The placement was well thought through by my placement organisation and I had a clear job plan and a lot of induction support. Many of my VSO volunteer colleagues were not so lucky and had to work hard in the early months to gain acceptance from their placement organisations and to design and then negotiate for their workplans.
We also had a UK income from letting the house so could afford to buy and run a car and pay for holidays in Uganda. This also covered 2 trips back home over the 2 years and has allowed for an easier transition back to life in the UK without the need to start work immediately. The VSO volunteering allowance is very generous by volunteer standards but it would have been very hard if we had both had to survive on it alone. I think it would be helpful to future volunteers if VSO were clearer about the realities of the in country allowance and the cost of living.
We were based in Kampala, which really helped with the adaptation. There were restaurants, coffee shops and supermarkets enabling us to have a lifestyle that was familiar and comfortable. We also had less health problems than some of the volunteers placed in rural areas.
The other VSO volunteers are amazing people. They welcomed us with open arms and quickly became like our extended family. We had wonderful evenings and days out with them and there was always a shoulder to cry on when it all became too much. We have made friends all over the world that I'm sure we will keep in touch with for a long time. We just need to find the time and resources to take up all the invitations we have to visit different places.
There were times when we had had enough and would happily have climbed on a plane home. Ugandan bureaucracy was a challenge and usually involved shifting lots of pieces of paper around. Buying and then selling the car was the most difficult and presented many bureaucratic challenges.
We missed our family and friends lots and also all sorts of things you just take for granted in the UK. Live theatre, train travel, Sunday lunches, the sea, drinking water straight from the tap and cheese! Living abroad for a few years makes you really appreciate the much maligned British institutions, the BBC and the NHS!
Did I make a difference? I think I did for the people I worked with directly, certainly they have said so. I brought new ideas and different ways of doing things. I focussed on encouraging the programme and finance people to work together and to appreciate the skills and experience each brought to the outcomes the organisation was working towards. I introduced grant reconciliations into the reporting template and taught both the finance and programme people how to prepare these and find any differences. But it is hard to say whether what I did made any direct difference to the ultimate beneficiaries, the people returning to their land, working to establish their rights and learning how to farm again after a generation living in IDP camps (internally displaced persons).
I gained a great deal of knowledge about development work in general and sustainable agriculture programmes in particular. I learnt how to adapt to live and work in a very different environment. I enjoyed running training courses for large and small groups and ran residential courses for the first time.
Yes I am glad I did it but I'm also pleased to be back home. We've slotted back into village life again as if we've never been away and have been busier over the past 2 months than we were in Uganda. I miss my colleagues and the other volunteers and I miss the warm evenings sat outside enjoying a meal together.
I've been trying to think which of the many many photos I have most sums up the Ugandan experience. I think it has to be the Nile ferry in the middle of the Murchison Falls National Park. Not always reliable but definitely an experience in the midst of beautiful countryside and surrounded by the birds and animals East Africa is best known for.
