Counterpart and Best Friend

         Close relationships are not formed easily, especially here.  There are many factors that make this challenging – language barrier, differing cultures, pre-conceived notions, etc.  I thought for international women’s day, what better time than now to honor my counterpart and best friend in Uganda.  Meet Fausta – a nurse, mother, wife, daughter and the person I am lucky to call my best friend here In Uganda. 

Our friendship did not develop over night, of course, but after 7 months of living in my community we have become very close, spending nearly every day together.  It has taken me some time to see her in this light, but just this past week I realized how much I admire her as a person.

         This past month has not exactly been easy for me.  Ive had some issues at my site, which I wont go into, and Fausta has been here for me throughout.  Unlike most Ugandans who show zero emotion when you are upset and crying, Fausta sat by my side as I cried and talked me through it.  I was in shock to see her respond to my sadness in such an un-ugandan way!

         This past week my gas tank, which I use for cooking became finished and I had no way of cooking anything – even boiling my water or milk.  I live an hour from town, which is where I need to take the tank to get re-filled.  Trying to transport this huge gas tank using public transportation would be absolutely miserable, so I had to wait until I could get a ride with someone from my village.  Fausta made sure I had food to eat every day for lunch and dinner, always inviting me to her house.  She even boiled my milk and water for me in the mornings!  She is the reason I have not starved this week! And she has done all of this on top of caring for her 2 year old daughter, working every night at the health center for night shift, spending the days digging in her field to start growing food (which is not easy! I tried it out this week!), while also going to the health center for our outreach and clinics this week.  She cooks using a charcoal stove (called a sigiri), has to walk some distance from her home to fetch water because she has no running water and washes her dishes outside using the water she fetched.  Try washing dirty dishes without running water – not fun.  After realizing how much she does in a day, I felt so bad by the end of the week, as if I were a burden to her.  I told her this and how grateful I was of her help.  She said to me, “life is not easy and life has not been easy for you this week.  We are the same.”  But we aren’t.  At the end of the day I don’t go home to no running water or charcoal stove, I don’t have a screaming, crying 2 year old to care for and I don’t have to fetch my water every day.  Although I was a bit frustrated about not having my stove this past week, it gave me the opportunity to spend more time with Fausta and see how strong and hardworking of a person she is and how life is not easy for her.  Another volunteer said to me this week “you and your counterpart are so close.”  This made me realize how lucky I am to have such a strong friendship with someone in my community.  I am so thankful for this.  So if you are reading this, I just ask that you take a moment to think about all the women in this world who struggle each day and try to be thankful for the luxuries you have and that they may not! Happy international women's day!

How most of Uganda cooks