It was a cloudy afternoon at around 2:30pm at school when I decided to call up one of my classmates for a short interview. We sat opposite to each other and she was so excited to know which kind of conversation I was going to engage with her. She just kept on looking at me while posing with her hand on her cheeks with a funny smile, lifting her eyebrows up and down. We both put on light sweaters. Mine had a white color with a star at the center and love written in blue color, while hers was made of thread in both grey and white color yet feeling cold. I then went on interrogating her ” what do you think can become your future career and why?” She took a second, breathed in and out and responded, When I was a child, I use to see people in my community suffering, some of them could spend the whole day laying on a mat in the grass, some could have heavy cough that would last for months that my mum always kept me far away. I use to see some of them even out of their body flesh that the ribs could appear clear. I used to wonder ” why all this?” People survived from agriculture and they couldn’t die of hunger. One night I decided to follow my mum in her room, I found her seated on the bed, silent as if she was deeply thinking. After noticing that I was there, she looked at me wondering what I came for. I just asked her “mum, why is everyone not okay outside?” They are all sick, she responded, but can’t cater for health service. People say that money is a bad master, but it provides us with wealth and is a source of our happiness on earth. Poverty smells bad, but here in this place, we don’t have money that’s why nothing works here. The community is using herbal medicine to cure what they don’t know. Doctors who are important people in the community are rare where there is no money and their absence is still remarkable. For all these people to be cured we need doctors, she added. I started growing up with the idea of becoming a nurse because I believed it could help me save the community from health ignorance. With time as I kept on growing till I learnt so many other advantages of becoming a nurse. She said: -It earns a lot of money which can probably change my family’s standard of living. -It enables one to understand better the human body including when everything is right or wrong. -It enables one to know which medication to take, when, how and why among others. -When she was done with her story, I couldn’t figure out which word could be worth to be said out to her. I just saw how her eyes were shinning of tears, and only a blink of an eye would make the tears shade off her eyes. So impressed I was, I hugged her to give her comfort and went on curious asking her “how did you feel expressing yourself?” She said, “honestly it at first went hard for me because no one ever asked me such a question and I never got a chance to talk about it up to now. I feel good now and I wish I had more chance of this kind.” A new experience was gained and it was so inspiring listening to how life experiences have the power to motivate passionate young souls detecting a life career. I wish my friend becomes the nurse of her dreams.
refugee
Deep Observation
For this piece of writing, students practiced their observational skills. Students were instructed to to do the following: Choose a place in your home, neighborhood or surrounding area where you can station yourself for a half hour in order to conduct a deep observation. This should be somewhere that is familiar to you and where you spent time regularly in your everyday life. There should be activity and social interaction in this place. However, this activity is based solely on your observations and you should refrain from using any interview techniques. Your goal is to collect and interpret information about this space through participant-observation and then to construct a narrative on what you have observed. This is your chance to start thinking and seeing like an ethnographer! Step 1: Take notes and observe the activity in your chosen space for approximately 30 minutes. Use all five senses to take notes on everything that is happening around you. These notes will inform your narrative. Gather enough data to allow for some reflection and analysis. Be descriptive! Describe the scene, paying attention to all sensory perception. Indicate when you observed the space (i.e. time of day). If it seems useful, draw a map of the setting, indicating the position and movement of persons. Observe the following kinds of things as you take notes: -Describe the setting. -Who is present? Who is absent? -Look for structure: are the people differentiated from each other? Does someone appear to oversee the space? -How do people interact with each other? -Do there appear to be spoken or unspoken rules that dictate behavior in this space? Step 2: Write up these rough field notes into a narrative with full sentences describing the details you have recorded. Here you will set the scene of your observation and you might even add a layer of analysis and interpretation about what you have observed. The above questions will help shape your analysis. In writing your summary and interpretation, try to avoid judgements in descriptions (i.e. ugly building, cute child); also avoid descriptive words needing background knowledge or a particular set of assumptions (i.e. ‘middle-class couple’). Instead, try to describe your seen as though your reader will have no insight into what you have observed. The length of your writing is up to you and will be based upon the depth and detail of your observations. This will be shared in tomorrow’s class.
Isaya
I just took my small moment to observe how beautiful our world is and to be grateful to the creator who did all this. I took my backpack, my yoga mat, my silver bottle filled with water, a rope and my can. I dressed in black boots, a training trouser and t-shirt with the hoody on top. I was ready to go and start my beautiful adventure. I left home at around 7:00 am and thank God for the protection I walked to a place called Nakibeach which took me 2 hours to reach. I didn’t need transportation because it was near so I decided to foot until I reached. Nakibeach is a place Near Lake Nakivale where we finds good grasses and is very safe, it is used for refugee outings and relaxing times especially those who does meditation it is beautiful for it. It had no name until in 2018 when refugee DJs had organized a party and baptized it a name of Nakibeach meaning that it was now a refugee owned beach. When at Nakibeach you can witness beautiful things and those are the things that I went to see so that I can share with you today. At Nakibeach you feel alive again through fresh air coming all the way from our mother nature which is not affected by anything like smoke or carbon. It is calm where you will only hear how water is moving from Lake Nakivale and maybe the other noise comes from birds. You can as well see the mountains from the other side of the lake and see even how beautiful they look. I do love to come to the lake because it tells me that it’s my responsibility to care for our mother nature again.
