This text was written in 2007 by Noah Liberi. He was 20 at the time, his only formal education being a rural secondary school in Bukinda, Kabale. But he would read a lot and condense the wisdom of life into the following paragraphs that open the story about Teach Inn Uganda that we will publish in weekly instalments. You can learn more about Teach Inn and Noah in Miha’s Blog.
Allow me first to present and introduce to you with humility and uttermost heartfelt gratitude, the Teach Inn Uganda initiators.
Deirdre Bounds, “the mum” according to her colleagues
Deirdre Bounds was the founder of i-to-i, an organisation that uprooted ignorance, poverty and suffering, and planted literacy and awareness in different parts of the world.
Deirdre was principled according to how she contributed ideas. It is very hard to judge a book by its cover but for Dierdre, I must say that her outside told the inside. She loved work and was always very happy and impressed when she saw everything working out positively successfully.
She really liked people who worked for progress and prosperity, unlike people who just want quick money and do not focus on the future development. She did not for sure like mean and money oriented people because, to borrow a leaf from her words …
“Oh! No! Come on!! Just to wait for only two hours! … Only two hours!!!!” said Deirdre when she was surprised of a man who did not want to sell his Irish potatoes before he felt money in his hands. She had gone there after being informed by the man’s wife of how there were around ten bags of Irish potatoes they wished to sell off.
She was a lady one could say was a quick learner and good at imitating. She liked dancing the traditional dance but instead she danced “waltz” (American ancient dancing style). She was like a football striker “warming up “ to enter the football pitch for the game – she flew up and down, side by side as she smiled.
Deirdre had enough respect for culture for she was seen dressed in a grey wrapper skirt, something rare to find “a muzungu” (white person) interested in doing. She always tied her hair with a bandana cloth just to stop the hair from congesting around her face.
She liked the afternoon sunshine, seeing the stars at night, the campfire, morning mist and she truly liked enjoying morning tea.
Deidre made use of her expensive phone. She was never seen holding a radio call, though there was a forest of mobile radio calls used among her colleagues. She once communicated on her phone for almost four hours, and she was seen doing this seated in the Camp Master chair.
Seb Bishop
Seb Bishop was a president of “MIVA” back home. He was more of a volunteer who was seen holding a hoe and participating in the levelling of the ground where a store was to be built.
During the cutting of trees to use in setting up the building, he was seen holding a panga cutting down and falling the trees. The tree he cut was big and heavy, but he felt he should carry it himself alone. While carrying the tree he slid every moment as if dancing (Reggae music), he fell down every minute but kept holding the tree tight like he was playing a Rugby game. Because he was determined to bring the tree to the site, he did not even take a break.
Seb was a quick learner who loved work as well as to work and wished to see the fruits of his work.
He was a man who could make a good monitoring officer and a good farm manager as well. He was expected to be coming from side “A” but appeared from side “B” when supervising the workers one day. He was mobile.
He laughed when need be, he did not often wear glasses and once he wore them, he looked more of a film star.
He liked to see people work seriously and encouraged serious use of minds. If it meant payments, he would pay for the work done and he could surely appreciate any work done. Seb Bishop would say: “You will be paid after every three days, if you don’t work for all the three days, you won’t get paid for any of the days.” He paid for every day worked and out of courtesy he gave bonuses too. He thanked everybody when giving the payments for the work done and encouraged them to keep the spirit up.
Seb could make a good Speaker of Parliament for he was good at holding meetings. He held immediate meetings with colleagues when a question arose to be discussed upon. An issue that would take an African a whole day talking about it, he would resolve it in minutes, not even an hour.
He liked jokes and loved to wear his jeans. He did not like hearing being called “Sir” because he was not yet a Sir. He believed one was not a Sir until married. “Are you married? … Marriage needs ample time to think about and women are …” Seb Bishop was heard saying when having some conversation with a technical man.
We could credit him a social man and not a social misfit because he liked talking with different people without prejudice and reservations.
Tony Callaghan
When we talk of Tony, we truly mean Tony Callaghan from Wigan, the founder of Yesteryear Pubs.
He was a big and a better man who sounded big. He did not wear glasses; maybe his face was allergic to shades or he tried to avoid the expenses of buying glasses everyday because he loved to laugh wild which created big wrinkles like humps on his face which couldn’t accommodate glasses.
He loved deep conversation with young children and liked to give them gifts and presents. He was seen on the first day of teaching by the first volunteers, giving out gifts to the children who had turned up for school, saying “Hullo children, these gifts you will get were sent to you by the children of St Teresa’s Catholic Primary School Up Holland Lancashire England. If you would wish to write to them, do it and they will surely like it.”
Tony was seen ever wanting to feel the weight of his bag on his back. He felt standing upright whenever his bag was on his energetic back. Though old he was able to carry it any time but everywhere. Maybe he had to carry his bag to stop backache, a common problem for people of his age?
He was a man who had managed to reach at least his life expectancy. He liked playing childish games with his fellow members and with himself. He was seen tying balloons all around his body parts and swayed his bums along the road heading to church for the service.
After participating in smearing the store with mud, he and Seb Bishop were seen chasing Dominic, another entrepreneur, according to them the lazy “bxxxxrd”, scaring him with their hands covered with mud (mud is the product of a mixture of water and soil).
He liked to hear strange but true stories from local men. He was surprised to hear from one local man “I am seven years in marriage and with six children and I still need to have more children, not a child”.
He respected the English way of living. For example, he demanded the removal of burglarproofing from the windows of Teach Inn Uganda. “It is easy for a thief to break in when there is no burglar proof,” one local man said to Tony. Tony answered: “We are English and we want to live the English way… In case of fire…”
Tony was ever attentive to anything, he directly saw and observed anything with a keen eye and used his mind seriously. In fact he made use of himself but sometimes gave excuses that he was not good at digging and did not know how to hold a hoe handle properly because of his age. But I think age had nothing to do with knowing how to hold a hoe handle…
On the other hand, Tony was good at any work needing only one hand. He could do other works like hanging the wall charts and pictures drawn by children of St Teresa’s Catholic Primary School, hanging door curtains using nails and a hammer. A hammer has a short handle which needs no big effort when nailing, it can be held with one hand and another hand can hold and clear the place where anything is going to be hanged.
Otherwise Callaghan was a courageous and brave man who could go to a war and be successful in peace not in pieces.
text: Noah Liberi