Health & Fitness
Lakewood Resident in Uganda: The Tororo Workshop
The Poultry Project adds another 30 participants in Uganda. Lakewood resident, and Poultry Project co-founder, Kelly Flamos shares her experience.
Over the past several months, the Poultry Project team has been planning an expansion of the project to other TASO branches. TASO counselors from the Mbale, Tororo and Soroti branches identified the most needy AIDS-affected children and visited them at their homes to conduct a baseline assessment survey. A total of thirty children (ten from each TASO branch mentioned) were selected to become new Poultry Project participants.
Tororo, a midsize town southeast of Mbale, lies near the Kenya border. Today, we traveled to TASO Tororo to meet the new participants and conduct their first training workshop. After an encouraging introduction from one of TASO Tororo’s doctors, the project veterinarian, Dr. Sakwa, led the children and their guardians in a participatory workshop on poultry management. Feeding, housing, hygiene, disease control, and breeding were the main topics. Eunice, a TASO Tororo counselor, spoke with the participants about record keeping and savings, dealing with fears and challenges related to the business, chair person selection and a general overview of the goals of the project.
Eunice said to the participants, “We are helping you start. Then you walk. Then you run. On your own. Then we clap.”
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Some of the children’s grandparents sprung from their seats, quickly followed by the rest of the participants and the TASO counselors, and they sang and danced a traditional Ugandan song. Two girls gave another performance (you could see that they’ve been practicing their moves) with two songs- one of welcome, the other gratitude.
While we were at the workshop, Joe and Peter and Debra (another TASO Tororo counselor) delivered coop materials to all of the Tororo participants’ homes.
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The new participants selected their chairperson, Tracy, and set their next meeting for May 31. They left the workshop with their new bikes and a commitment to their projects. Eunice reminded the group that the child (the TASO client that has lost one or both of their parents) is the reason why we are here. She said, “Whatever you do, first ask yourself, how is this benefiting the child?”
[Photographs by Lakewood Patch photographer Kevin Kopanski]
