How can tourism develop Uganda? Podcast interview
How can tourism help Uganda achieve a middle-class economy? ON Uganda podcast interview
Regular Diary of a Muzungu readers know how much conservation, Uganda travel and digital marketing rock my boat so I was honoured when podcast host Aggie Patricia Turwomwe invited me to chat about these subjects and more. The interview gave me a chance to mention some of my favourite organisations: Conservation Through Public Health, Uganda Wildlife Authority and the brilliant free hospitality and tourism training app from the Ukarimu Academy. Oh yes, and my favourite new glitzy Kampala café, Cafesserie Arena Mall!
“Word-of-mouth has morphed into Digital Marketing” podcast interview with Charlotte Beauvoisin
ON Uganda Podcast – UG’s investment podcast – is dedicated 100% to demystify paradigms through its three segments; On Reports, On Sectors, and On Marketing with an aim to become a tool to help Ugandans achieve and thrive in a booming “MIDDLE-CLASS ECONOMY.” Listen along to understand what fuels the wheels of our economy!
Charlotte ‘Nagawa’ Beauvoisin is a writer and trainer that delivers agile and scalable experiences with digital across East Africa. Nagawa writes the award-winning blog Diary of a Muzungu and has contributed to the Bradt Uganda Guidebook, Lonely Planet, Fodor’s Travel, The Daily Telegraph and Horizon Guides.
In this 36 minute podcast interview, recorded in December 2021 in Kampala, Charlotte takes us through:
- The Uganda tourism landscape
- Her start in marketing
- Building capacity for Uganda Wildlife Authority game rangers
- Tourism marketing tools
- Conservation and environmental issues
- Policies that favour/ hinder the tourism sector in Uganda
- GOLD: How the tourism sector can help Uganda achieve a middle class economy.
PODCAST DISCLAIMER from ON Uganda. The views and opinions expressed in the episode are those of the guests. They do not represent or reflect the official position of the ON Uganda Podcast, so we do not take responsibility for any ideas expressed by guest during the Podcast. You are smart enough, take out what works for you.
Listen to this episode on Google Podcasts / Anchor / Apple
Do you enjoy listening to podcasts?
Do you like the English accent? 😆 I’d love to know which podcasts you follow – seriously.
Interview with UK’s woman & home magazine
The power of volunteering: an interview about life as a conservation volunteer in Uganda
Once upon a lifetime ago, I left my 9-5 job in London to volunteer with the Uganda Conservation Foundation. Volunteering with VSO (Voluntary Service Overseas) was the passport to an incredible life. It’s a story I’ve been blogging about ever since…
I’m thrilled that an interview about my life in Uganda featured in the UK’s woman & home magazine (October 2021) and Woman Magazine (July 2022).
“Approaching Entebbe Airport, bright orange sunshine filled the plane. I felt like the sun was rising over Africa and my new life. I was a little nervous and very excited.
In London, I had a corporate job and a long-term relationship, but the end of the relationship reignited my dream of visiting Africa.
I didn’t know anything about Uganda beyond Idi Amin, Lake Victoria and mountain gorillas, but I had a feeling I might stay longer than my two-year placement …”
Charlotte Beauvoisin, Woman Magazine | woman & home magazine
Read the woman & home interview with Charlotte in Uganda here.
The warmth here in Uganda – like the people – envelops you in a hug and makes you want to stay forever…
Charlotte Beauvoisin, woman & home magazine, October 2021
woman&home is on sale in UK shops or online
Do you enjoy reading Interviews? Read more Interviews with Charlotte Beauvoisin here.
Mandela and Me. A homage to Nelson Mandela
Mandela and Me. A homage to Nelson Mandela
This time last year, I was too sick with Malaria to pay homage to Nelson Mandela.
Crying over his obituaries made me feel even more sorry for myself – but I owe Mandela so much.
South Africa politicised me. It was the Anti-Apartheid Movement of the 1980s that made me decide to study politics at SOAS (the School of Oriental and African Studies) at the University of London. That made real my desire to come and live in Africa, a dream it took me too many years to fulfil.
Mandela was freed while I was a student at SOAS. We couldn’t wait to celebrate his freedom: just a few weeks after his release, the Awesome Man Himself appeared onstage at the now defunct Wembley Stadium – to thank the world for helping secure his release, and telling us to continue exerting pressure for the end of Apartheid.
‘Free… Nelson… Mandela!’ We sang for the thousandth time … and there Mandela was, in the flesh.
How British pop song helped free Nelson Mandela.
Top Ten Songs About Nelson Mandela
It was around this time that I made my first enquiry to VSO (Voluntary Service Overseas). “Call us again in a few years,” they said – I had little work (or life) experience – and I shelved my plans to volunteer in Africa.
My then-flatmate Holly was to move to South Africa with VSO before me – and is still there 15 years later. Visits to South Africa ‘close the circle’ for me: stays with Holly in Johannesburg give us a chance to relive our shared memories of Mandela’s release and our experiences as VSO volunteers in sub Saharan Africa. Spending World Aids Day in South Africa with her was another pivotal moment.
My pilgrimage to Mandela’s Robben Island cell was a longed-for moment.
Nelson Mandela spent nearly two decades on the other side of this metal gaol gate. Isn’t it uncanny how the outline of the African continent has emerged as the paint has chipped away? How many thousands of times did the key turn in that lock? The Robben Island tour (courtesy of previous Robben Island inmates who were incarcerated at the same time as Mandela and other heroes of the movement such as Steve Biko) is humbling beyond words.
Rereading Mandela’s obituaries, a few facts jumped out at me:
– He left power voluntarily, when his presidential term was up. He played by the rules, unlike so many African rulers who want to stay in power forever.
– Mandela stayed on the United States ‘terror watch list’ until 2008 “in time for the anti-apartheid leader and Nobel Peace Prize winner’s 90th birthday on July 18. Really? It just beggars belief now.
– Mandela visited Uganda on July 5, 1990, just five months after his release from prison. Mandela chose Uganda as the first African country outside South Africa to visit.
From student days drinking Snakebite in the ‘Nelson Mandela bar’ to SOAS, Johannesburg, Cape Town and Uganda, Mandela remains an inspiration to me:
On writing, he wrote to one of his daughters:
“Writing is a prestigious profession which puts one right into the centre of the world and, to remain on top, one has to work really hard, the aim being a good and original theme, simplicity in expression and the use of the irreplaceable word.”
Who can possibly count the millions – billions? – of people’s lives affected by this great man. RIP Madiba, the world remains a better place for you having been in it.
What effect did Nelson Mandela have on your life?
Free Nelson Mandela
21 years in captivity,
Shoes too small to fit his feet,
His body abused but his mind is still free,
Are you so blind that you cannot see?
I said: Free Nelson Mandela,
I’m begging you,
Free Nelson Mandela.
On the first anniversary of his death, feel free to share your thoughts.
5 Years a Blogger
Five years ago I first set foot in Uganda. (Is that all it’s been?) Thank you to everyone who’s been part of my journey.
I mean THANK YOU. It wouldn’t have been the same without you.
The Muzungu was first sighted in Namuwongo, Kampala. Posing here at my home-cum-office with Patrick, Enid, Simpson and Eva
“For better, for worse” and despite the occasional argument or misunderstanding, my rantings and frustrations, you have helped me pursue my passions for conservation, travel and writing. In different ways, you have helped me ‘live the dream’ and I am immensely grateful for that.
My life in Uganda has stretched me beyond compare, and sometimes I have failed – you or myself – but whoever said it was going to be easy?
Thank you for the support. Thank you for the trust.
Thank you for the opportunities. Thank you for the faith.
Thank you for the shoulder to cry on. Thank you for the advice, the criticism and the feedback…
Thank you for reading Diary of a Muzungu.
Thank you for subsidising my volunteer’s allowance!
Thank you for buying my Uganda Souvenir Maps.
Thank you for paying my electricity bill when I got cut off.
Thank you for killing the cockroaches so I don’t have to face my phobia.
Thank you for Baldrick.
THANK YOU for the nights out!
The nights in!
The belly laughs.
Thanks for believing in me.
WEBALE NYO. Neyanziza. [I appreciate]
Down in the slum, after the rain
A glimpse of life in Namuwongo ‘go down’ along Kampala’s railway track
Marabou Storks along the railway line in Kampala. Photo Achilles Byaruhanga, www.NatureUganda.org
The air is damp and heavy, the air is cool and last week’s fine, dusty marram earth is compacted beneath our feet. Limbs have been torn off the Pawpaw tree the other side of the compound wall and a single giant leaf, over four metres long, has been torn off the Palm tree. It lies there on the grass looking pathetic, no longer the majestic bough waving in the breeze.
It’s rained hard for the last two days. It’s a blessed relief for us all, although Baldrick’s been curled up in a tight ball on the doormat; he lives outside and the cold has got into his bones. He thinks nothing of stretching out in the sun in the heat of the day for hours: my Ugandan dog.
I decide to take advantage of the cool morning to go for a long walk and we take the short route down the path onto the railway line. It’s a sea of mud and empty cavera carrier bags. Water runs freely and collects in greenish grey puddles suffocated with plastic rubbish. The ducks are caked in mud and oil and the giant Marabou Storks peer down at us from atop the rubbish dumps.
I pick my way up and down the smooth marram pathway that winds its way between the makeshift shacks and public latrines. Here, all life happens out in the open, either side of the path: women deep fry cassava in big open woks just a foot from the main path. Children sit on dirty wooden benches next to open charcoal stoves, surrounded by plastic basins of washing-up, giant beaten aluminium pots of beans and converted oil drums brewing god knows what.
A man wants me to buy smoked dried fish.
“Salina ssente” I say – “I don’t have any money” – unwilling to open my bag in an area I don’t know and glad I won’t have to buy these fish that are covered in flies.
Two women hold a large piece of tripe over a bucket, one of them sawing it into two pieces. Muddy ‘Irish’ potatoes spill out of a sack onto the piles of black shiny charcoal.
To see a muzungu down in the slum must be quite unusual and I don’t hear the same number of greetings I get elsewhere. When I do speak, I’m aware many people don’t speak Luganda; many are refugees from northern Uganda or even further afield, South Sudan.
Wherever they’re from, the children still speak as one of course: “muzungu-how-are-you?” comes the chorus.
This is one of many walks that have taken me through the slum. It’s as fascinating as it is grim.
I used to live a stone’s throw away from Namuwongo ‘go down.’ The noise from the shanty town along the railway tracks was a constant backdrop to my life. I miss it. Here’s more about the terrible effects of the heavy rains on life in the slum
I was embarrassed recently to dispose my rubbish in Namuwongo slum.
And then there were three …
And so to work…
Last week was frustrating in many ways … I know I’ve hardly mentioned it so far with all the other excitement BUT … I am actually here to do a job too!
On Friday we let the junior member of staff go. Gladys (the projects assistant) has a lovely disposition but not one that favours working, taking the initiative or getting to work less than an hour late everyday! It’s disappointing but on a 4 day trip to visit the projects – WE’RE TALKING FREE SAFARI GUYS! – Gladys only asked 3 questions. And then didn’t turn up to work the next day. So, not much future for her in the field managing projects on her own when she has to take a day off after every trip… that was her first (and last trip) with UCF.
locust close-up one leg missing
Another frustration has been Angela ‘blood-out-of-a-stone’ the intern who we are helping with a final year degree research proposal. Every time I question her budget she looks at me as though she wants to murder me. That girl has such an attitude I want to throttle her … but then she gives us the sweetest smile …
We’ve been trying to address these issues while still chasing up (it’s all the vogue here) a number of house issues:
– Leaking shower
– Serious damp in my wardrobe – clothes still not unpacked after three weeks
– Fumigation
– Two diseased trees in the compound
Patrick, the Projects Officer, is very enthusiastic about everything but admits to hating paperwork. He’s asked me to help with his IT skills. He’s self-taught and I can see how I can easily help him work more efficiently and even start enjoying using technology. He’s very receptive to being shown anything new: I showed him how to print double sided – it was like pulling a rabbit out of a hat in his eyes!
Enid on the other hand, doesn’t seem to like change. She accepts the fact her email may take 30 seconds to send, and that when wireless doesn’t work all three of us have to use her PC. “That’s Uganda for you,”she sighs after venting spleen about the internet provider, the landlord, the owner of the property, the electrician … and I realise that as much as she is trying to enlighten me, she seems to be enjoying my frustration. When I suggest alternatives, she offers me yet another reason why so-and-so solution just won’t work “that’s Uganda for you.”
With all the other changes taking place, I’m not going to attempt to change Enid’s attitude directly. I’ll work with Patrick (who has asked me for IT support) and if he chooses to suggest to Enid she follows suit then that’ll be great. She’s an intelligent lady so I’m not going to push her. Although I had two long conversations with her about Sophie and felt we all agreed to let Sophie go, Enid may still feel threatened. Since the last volunteer left, it seems there’s been a lack of communication between the UK and Uganda, and motivation and morale are low so I think I should tread carefully now.
As we’ve been working out what to do about Gladys for the last fortnight, certain things have been left on hold. But now she’s gone we can get on building the team. I’m going to cook everyone lunch this week, we can all eat together, kick back and have a laugh and I’ll get a photo of us all.
There’ll be five of us for lunch: the house team of Eva and Simpson, and the full-time Ugandan UCF team of me, Patrick and Enid.
(The directors and trustees all work on a part-time voluntary basis and my remit is to improve communication and involvement there too).
I am fed-up
The ups and downs of life as a volunteer in Uganda
- No internet or office phone, nor promise from provider to solve it any time soon.
- Feeling fat.
- Sophie (junior) didn’t turn up to work, nor tell anyone she wasn’t coming in.
- Patrick isn’t in as his kids have all got malaria.
- Enid has been telling me about the frustrations of Uganda – inefficiency, protecting their jobs, saying sorry but not trying to address situation, refusing to give name of supervisor, not returning calls, blaming other people etc etc
- Simpson not here to cheer me up.
- The sun’s gone in!
- I have no plans (yet) for the w/end.
- Ken the painter didn’t understand me when I called to explain he needs to apply damp proof paint on all the walls inside the wardrobe (so I haven’t been able to unpack properly yet).
- It’s Friday the 13th which is cool cos maybe that explains everything?!Feel a lot better now I know why I feel pissed off!
