About Me...About Uganda

I have never been to Africa before. It's good to know that for my first visit I'll be going to "The Pearl of Africa's Crown" as Winston Churchill once described it. Uganda is a landlocked former British colony in eastern Africa that after achieving independence in 1962, had a rocky start as a fledgling country, first under the dictatorship of Idi Amin and then Milton Obote. Since 1986 though, Uganda has achieved relative stability and economic growth under a multi-party democracy led by Yoweri Museveni.

There are almost 35 million people in Uganda. Most are farmers under the age of 25, growing the country's major export, coffee.  The good news is that unemployment is only about 5 percent and three out of four Ugandan families live above the poverty line. The government has worked to provide decent infrastructure (for example - 100 percent cellular coverage) and regulation (raising producer prices and other "farmer friendly" reforms). The bad news is that a child born today in Uganda can expect to live an average of just 53 years. Perhaps that's because there is only 1 doctor for every 10,000 Ugandans. Or perhaps it's because 16 percent of Ugandan children under the age of 5 are underweight. Or perhaps it's because there is a "very high" degree of risk for Malaria, HIV/Aids, Hepatitis A, Typhoid, and a host of other nasty diseases. These issues are what I have spent the last year of my life learning about in Trinity College Dublin's Development Practice Program.

Being a college student for the past year has given me an opportunity to learn, and has also fed my desire to "level the playing field" between the developed world and the developing world. But more than that I am convinced that there is innovation in Uganda and other African countries that the developed world can learn from. The use of Information Technologies is one example. Kenya had a mobile payment application (M-Pesa) well before the US or Europe. We talked about it...we marveled at it....but did we ever stop looking down our paternalistic noses and ask for help in applying that innovation to the developed world? Not really. We're still figuring it out - paying millions to Silicon Valley startups to reinvent the wheel.

From a personal perspective I'm trying not to show that same hubris but some days it's hard. Being a "mature" college student for the past year I have had to acclimate myself to the realization that I'm often the oldest person in the room with the least amount of subject expertise. It's character building. I used to get paid a lot of money for my knowledge, and my job in the defense industry afforded me the opportunity to work with some incredible people; but most days I felt like I was pushing the same rock up the same hill. Now I earn very little....just freelance work that I'm trying to grow into a proper business (actually more of a social enterprise) but it's a different rock and a different hill every day. And it's exciting. I started technobility.org in 2013 because I wanted the freedom to choose my causes and follow my passion. I wanted to make helping others a full time career. Our vision is "A better world, one byte at a time" and we achieve it by using IT to create a snowball effect of small impacts that add up to a big difference.  And the best part is that I still get to work with incredible people.

And here is an incredible looking bird...the African grey crowned crane, the Ugandan national bird.

I really hope I get to see one of these up close when I'm in Uganda.

This is the red and black thorn spider

I really hope I never see one of these up close in Uganda or anywhere else.

I am really looking forward to spending two months in Uganda, and I'll be updating this blog regularly with stories of my adventures. This summer I will be based in Kampala, working on two projects for CDRN and Camara. If you're interested in more details, check out the Our Clients page of technobility.org. I hope, as the official Ugandan tourism website promises, to be "captivated by its beauty, overwhelmed by the friendliness of its people and intrigued by all that Uganda has to offer". I also hope to learn more about technology's role in Ugandan development, and perhaps find some unique innovations that could help other countries. More than anything though, I hope these two months will provide clarity, purpose, and maybe even change my life yet again.

Oh Uganda, Land of Beauty (National Anthem)

Oh Uganda! may God uphold thee,

We lay our future in thy hand.

United, free,

For liberty

Together we'll always stand.

Oh Uganda! the land of freedom.

Our love and labour we give,

And with neighbours all

At our country's call

In peace and friendship we'll live.

Oh Uganda! the land that feeds us

By sun and fertile soil grown.

For our own dear land,

We'll always stand,

The Pearl of Africa's Crown.