Children's Lives

                             Ugandan Children's Lives

This description of a day in the life of a Ugandan child is typical of the lives of the children of Kyabirwa Primary School.

The lives of Ugandan children are not that much fun. They aren't like those expected for children in the west. There's very little in their lives but work. Every day is much the same. Get up in the morning and work, work all day in different ways, work in the evening and then go to bed late. It would be good if the day started with breakfast, but it doesn't. Most children don't have lunch either. Supper is late in the evening after chores and before the next ones.

A typical day for a rural primary school child in Uganda

5:00 am   Wake Up, wash
5:15am    Go to collect water from the well or bore hole – may be half a mile or more away
6:00 am   Clean the compound at home, take the animals to graze
6:15 am   Most children don’t have breakfast. If they do, it’s bread and blue band.
6:30am    Start the walk to school (they may set off way before this as some

children have a 6 mile walk)
7:00am    Arrive at school
7:15am    Clean school compound and class rooms
7:40am    School assembly and prayers
8:00am    Go to class for lessons
10:00am   Break Time
10:30am   Lessons
1:00pm     Lunch break – most children don’t have lunch
2:00pm    Back to class for lessons
3:00pm    Classes end, start work in school garden, clean classrooms,

             compound and latrines
4:00pm    School ends, start walking back home
5:30pm    Take off school uniform and change into work clothes
6:00pm    Go to the well of collect water, get the animals back, collect

              firewood from the forests (risking snake bite), dig in the fields
8:00pm    Back home. Clean up and start home work
9:30pm    Have supper
10:00pm   Help to wash dishes, do the washing etc
10:15pm   Finish home work
11:00pm   Go to bed

So you can see that our children's lives are not what your children are used to!

Thank goodness it's not all hard. We can play!

Children and adults follow British football! Where someone in the village has a radio, they all gather round to listen to commentaries on British football matches. Most boys have their favourite team and possibly even a poster for Manchester United, Arsenal, Liverpool or Chelsea! They also pay a small fee to watch it on TVs at trading post communities. Ugandans are avid supporters of British football.

Even though they don't have televisions or newspapers, they have seen pictures and odd advertisements, film posters, perhaps even a flash of a television screen as they're passing some tourist hangout. So they do know that there's a wealthy world out there where people have undreamt of wealth and where of course, there perception is that there aren't any problems.

Despite all this, our children are remarkably cheerful. On Monday mornings, if you ask them how their weekend has been they will answer that it had been good because they had had more sleep, or meat to eat or that ‘nothing bad had happened’.

Responsibility for child care can start at an even earlier age than this. Children have to care for their younger siblings while their parents work in the fields or are busy with other work.

Maintaining the school grounds after school

After school, at weekends and in the 'holidays'
or when you can't afford school because you
don't have money for uniform, pens or paper.

    How do you smile when it's 10 o'clock at night
    and you're carrying 20kgs of water, 10 of which
    is on your head? 20kgs is an airline luggage
    allowance!

We do have fun sometimes!

Volunteer Uganda School

Kyabirwa Primary School near Jinja in Uganda