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5: Visits to projects in Makeni |
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Friday, March 10, 2006 |
| [ Entry for Group 1
by: Anne Carney
| Entry for Group 2
by: Caroline Howe ] |
| 07.00 | Breakfast |
| 08.00 | Departure for Makeni |
| 10.00-10.40 | Arrival at Makeni, settling in at accommodation, meeting with Finbarr and Patrick |
| 10.40-11.40 | Office tour and projects overview: NPRDI, DRP, ENCISS, HAPP |
| 11.40-11.50 | Dividing into two groups (DRP & NPRDI), departure from Makeni |
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Annie Carney, a native of Princeton, NJ, was, during this trip, a freshman in Silliman College. She sang in one of Yale's all-female a capella groups, Proof of the Pudding, and thus, served as director of "kumbayas" for the flight from Gatwick to Freetown. She has written for the Yale Globalist, the undergraduate international affairs magazine, and the Yale Herald, the weekly newspaper. In the infinite spare time that Yale afforded, she enjoyed reading, running, and pseudo-relaxing. She majored in History.
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Caroline Howe was, during this trip, a junior Environmental Engineering major from Durham, Connecticut, where she grew up passionate about the environment and agriculture. She worked passionately on renewable energy and climate activism on a campus, state, and national level. While in Montreal at the recent UN Climate Negotiations, she became particularly focused on encouraging sustainable energy practices in the developing world and overall sustainable development.
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Group 1: Paki Masabong & Bombali |
| 12.20 | Meeting with the Paramount chief, Councilor & other chiefdom elders; brief discussion on project activities. |
| 13.00 | Meeting with project participants & observing wells, latrines, and disease monitoring in Makambay village |
| 14.00 | Lunch on outskirts of Mabando village |
| 14.30 | Visit to chiefdom farmer field school at Mabando village |
| 15.20 | Arrival in Masabong Thoron Village to observe Stepping Stones session by community peer facilitators |
| 16.15 | Arrival in Rogberay Village to visit nutritional garden and drying pad |
| 17.30 | Arrival in Makeni |
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After loaf of bread, a cup of tea, and a hug to George and the rest of the
Kabala crew, we piled into the CARE vehicles for an early start to Makeni. On
the drive, I dozed off to the lull of Sierra Leonean music star Father Thug's
melodic voice on the radio.
There was something moving about being in Makeni in particular because it
served as the RUF command center during this war. This created something of a
collision, between the people I met on our travels and the people I had
imagined from reading about this particular area's experiences during the war.
Because of the RUF presence, Makeni was apparently spared damage during the
war, at least relative to other areas. But the image I associate with our
first drive through the center of town was the overwhelming number of charred
house skeletons juxtaposed with recently erected, columned, one-story,
NGO-financed homes.
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Group 2: Tonkolili (Gbonkelenke & Kholifa Rowalla)
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| 12.30 | Arrival in Makenth, Gbonkelenke to observe fishpond, periodic market, and other food for work activities |
| 13.10 | Packed lunch |
| 14.15 | Arrival in Moyamba Mbombor to observe road rehabilitation, permanent market and one completed school |
| 15.10 | Arrival in Makong Korie to observe community farm and discuss with the community about present constraints |
| 16.20 | Arrival in Mayatha Village in Kholifa Rowalla to observe swamp and cassava plantation |
| 17.25 | Arrival in Makeni |
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| Farmers share their frustrations with
pest management in their cassava fields. |
After another debriefing in Makeni, we were overwhelmed by the vast quantity
of projects that CARE is working on in the region. Because we knew that
describing these projects in words can never truly represent the work and
energy that go into them, we were eager to visit the projects in the field. As
we climbed into our SUVs, we wondered whether these sites would show us the
true meaning of a "Rights Based Approach" and what the Food for Work project
has actually accomplished.
Before leaving New Haven, we had promised that we would leave the sites when
instructed and that we would do our best to stay as close to the schedule as
possible. But the schedule involved stops where people had been waiting for us
longer than we were able to stay with them and places so filled with
information and successful initiatives that we couldn't begin to answer all of
our questions. Combined with the smiles and faces of the people who were so
willing to share their lives and work with us, it was hard to do as we had
promised. At so many sites, there was so much to see and so much that these
villages were proud of and wanted to share.
After having seen the cassava be processed by community groups at many of the
other CARE sites, it was particularly exciting to see a cassava farm. The
scale of the plantation we saw was truly incredible.
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