This is going to be a VERY LONG entry as the next few weeks I'll be spending most of my time with the Batwa, so I thought I'd get all the information out in one post. Also, I'm having a tough time with weak internet getting videos to YouTube, so please forgive the low quality video - it's all I can load at the moment...
I have so many feelings right now regarding this place - amazement that I'm actually here, horror at the way these people are forced to live, and hopeful that I can make a difference. It takes 5 1/2 hours to hike from the nearest village to their camp, and then you arrive at the top to be heartbroken by how they live.
BATWA OVERVIEW: The Batwa Pygmies are not actually human beings so they can't be equal, but are actually more of a sub-species (because you know, they are smaller than other people).
Since they aren't human (read that with enormous sarcasm), they were often hunted like game animals in the forest and eaten, as some thought that eating their flesh conferred magical powers. Can you imagine living where your neighbors wanted to hunt and eat you because they thought you were magically delicious?
Okay, deep breath and more fact...
The tribe I'm with lived in the forests of Uganda, Rwanda, and Congo for thousands of years just collecting honey and hunting small game, but over the years they've become slaves in Rwanda, hunted in the Congo, and in 1991 the Ugandan government kicked them out of the forest because they wanted to create game reserves and a "conservation program" - even though the Batwa did NOTHING to destroy the forest...
So, they remain here... Kicked out of their land and squatters on someone else's property, and they can't go home, can't move forward, and are stuck in this hellish purgatory...
I told my guides that I wanted to take an assessment of the area to see what I could help with, and we came to a hut with a man inside that they said was over 100 years old. I learned that the owner of the land allowed him to stay in the hut in exchange for one potato a day - the farmer would harvest the potatoes and leave them in the hut until he could take them away, and this man could roast one potato a day to survive. His job at 100+ years old was to chase away anyone stealing from the garden...
 
He has been laying naked in there for nearly 10 years, and he asked if we could build him a hut in the Batwa settlement and carry him there so he wouldn't have to die in poverty. It felt like my heart was bursting inside me so it was a good thing I slipped and fell or I would have been bawling in front of everyone. His name is Kilembe (but I now call him the colonel - as in Sanders), and of course I'm going to build him a hut and carry him over to the village - we'll start construction on friday but I've never built a mud hut so wish me luck...
Here you have a group of people - not classified a humans - forbidden by their government to return to their ancestral land (they can't even cross the road), with no marketable skills, shunned by the community below just because they are small. They live on a tiny bit of land given to them by a group from Europe but they can't afford seeds to farm it, so just survive on one potato or a bit of porridge a day. I learned that the dream of the adults is to be able to provide an egg a day for their children to get protein, and they are basically stuck on this island in the sky with no way off and no means to progress...
Does she look like a sub-human to you?
They all wear horribly tattered clothes, so I started asking questions about their traditional dress, customs, etc. and I was told that their religion was based on forest spirits, but since they are forbidden to go into their forest - their religious customs are disappearing. I was told that they used to dance and play thumb pianos but they had all been sold years ago to buy food. They used to wear traditional animal skins but since it's illegal for them to hunt they can't wear them anymore. They used to collect honey in the forest, but once again - can't go in the forest. Everything was taken from them... EVERYTHING... Their food supply, their religion, their traditions, and their hope.
THEN you have a little community service group headed by my new hero Anthony Ayebare who became aware of their plight through an old Batwa woman that used to work for his mother, and when he grew up he wanted to help her so he built her a vegetable garden- where I took this picture of the two of them.
Anthony has been trying to help the whole Batwa community with his friends by starting a service organization, and honestly, they humble me to no end. In order for them to volunteer for this group, they have to hike 5 1/2 hours up hills to reach them, work through the day, and then hike back home - just to volunteer... If they have something for them - they have to carry it on their backs - and I think you'd be hardpressed to find anyone who works harder to volunteer for their outcast neighbors.
This is what I found when I got here, and now this is what I want to do...
If you can help it would mean the world to all of us, and if you never help me again or never read this blog again, please consider this community as my last request.
I understand that times are tough everywhere so I haven't been asking for monetary help the past few months, but now these people really need it and I have broken it down to small numbers hoping to change this entire community in a few weeks.
MY PLAN
With your help, I want to:
- Take care of Kilembe. I will personally build the hut, get some large bamboo poles and tie a sheet between them and have someone help me move him into the village. I'd also like to provide him with what he says he'd like - a plate, spoon, and cup, his own potatoes, and to get him some clothes as he's been laying naked on the ground for 10 years.
- Build a large chicken coop and buy 100 chickens to grant the wishes of the parents to provide an egg a day to their children.
- Clear land and buy seeds and seedlings to get their garden up and running (cabbages, potatoes, tomatoes, onions, spinach).
- Buy new dresses for the women.
- Buy 20 thumb pianos for the men to regain their music.
- Pay for the materials for an older Batwa man to build 20 traditional bee hives to place at the edge of the forest to regain their custom of collecting honey.
- Build benches in their school so the children don't have to sit on the ground.
- Cows. Yep, I'm asking for cows again... There are basically five Batwa villages in the area and no one owns a cow for milk - a cow or two per settlement could do wonders for the kids nutrition.
- Buy a motorcycle for Anthony and his group. They have more than earned the right to have help carry water up to their shunned neighbors.
So, that's my plan, and if you'd like to help with any of these things - click on that donate button - and yes, you'll get a video of the people receiving your gift at the end of the project...
Everything (except the dresses and thumb pianos) will help this community to become self-sustaining, but I also think that having the women feel good about themselves and for the men to play the music is important too...
- Chicken Coop (including the lumber, chicken wire, tin roofing, and all tools: $215
- One chicken is: $10
- Chicken feed for six months: $35
- Single Goat: $50
- A new dress purchased at a shop in town is: $15
(I priced them but didn't try them on - well, maybe one cause it matched my eyes)
- A thumb piano is: $15
- Material for one beehive is: $15 / With Bees $45
- Wood for a school bench is: $30
- A milk cow is: $285
- Chalkboard: $150
Thank you for your consideration, and from the bottom of my heart - every dollar helps... Once again - if you can't help at this time, please follow along to learn about the Batwa with me through the next few weeks...
BARTON
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Guerrilla Aid is a style of volunteerism - simply go somewhere and do something,
while teaching others to do the same.
