Crowdfunding campaign about to open

In the end we have chosen Ulule, an European platform that allows content to be published in different languages, so we will have all contents (video and texts) in an English version and in an Italian one. I do mind that we can't have one in Swahili though... We are just waiting, impatiently, for the platform to put our project online and then we will publish the link for you to check out our campaign. See you soon! In the meanwhile some pictures about the presentation yesterday in Florence!

                      
Foto di Sabrina Masoli


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Preparing the crowdfunding campaign

We apologize as we have left the blog to itself in the last 10 days or so. We were very busy preparing the crowdfunding campaign and shooting the pitch video was much more difficult than planned. As a documentarist, I ask people to be real and expose themselves in front of a camera, which means in front of anybody. Generally, a documentary really works when it manages to get inside a person, feel his/her humanity, grab his/her inner secrets, frailties, flaws. Well, having to be in front of the camera this time, I realized how much I am asking from people. It has been difficult, but it was also liberating in the end. And now I feel an even stronger connection with the people whose stories I want to tell.  I am sure that this experience will be precious when I will be in front of them again trying to capture their emotions. We will be online with the crowfunding campaign very very soon now. Thanks for following us.

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For those in Florence...

On the 30th of October we are meeting you in the city centre. It is an event organized by three leading women associations based in Florence. On this occasion we will present the documentary, ourselves, show the inedited trailer and explain the crowdfunding campaign. An anthropologist of the Univertsity of Florence will also give a brief speech about women and taboos in the world. 

Hoping to you see there!!

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Update on production

Countdown to crowdfunding starts. Shortly we will start a campaign on Indiegogo, an International platform, choosing the option all or nothing. This guarantees all supporters that their money won't be waisted. If we won't raise the amount set (which is the bare minimum needed to get to the next and most urgent stage), then all supporters will get refunded. If we get more, then we will do things a bit more comfortably (which means suffering a little less, and assuring better quality to our work). In the lucky event we should get much more, we will commission the entire series of drawings which are part of the documentary and carry on with production. So we count on your support, and if you can't give directly, you can still help by passing it on. There will be little rewards for the various contributions. If you have something to suggest, please do (we may consider it, we have a few more days to go). Thanks. In the meanwhile we are waiting for something very special to be published from Kampala. And if you haven't seen yet, have a look at this introductory video.

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Women in Ugandan society

Fifth article introducing you to culture and geography of Lake Bunyonyi.

All over Uganda, women are subordinated to men, despite the huge social and economic responsibilities that women have in many rural Ugandan communities. Women started to engage in politics in the years of independence, when they tried to obtain laws concerning marriage, divorce and inheritance, especially in regard to property rights and custody of children. But during the seventies and eighties, each small progress was destroyed by the violence which raged in the country. Social and economical degrade and the lapse of public services and infrastructures reduced access to schools, hospitals and markets, making life conditions for women even tougher than ever before.

In the last part of the eighties, Museveni’s government worked to eliminate gender discriminations in politics and official practices. The number of women in parliament has increased and since 1976 the Ugandan Association of Women Lawyers is providing legal services to women defending their rights in case of divorce, separation and widowhood.

However, in rural communities with low access to education, very few progresses have been made towards equal rights. Land is vital in the culture of local communities as they get from it their entire livelihood. But traditional roles have completed transformed in the last decades. Men have no more bushes to clean nor huts to build. As a consequence, it is women who interact with the land on a daily basis, while majority of men is unemployed and not taking responsibility for the care of the children.

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Meeting you in Florence

Hello, who is in Florence on the 30th of October is invited to attend an afternoon event where we will introduce the project, screen the unseen trailer and present ourselves. We will publish the program soon.
Stay tuned.

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Hanging out at Mrs M.

This inspires me to push beyond my limits and do all I can to get this documentary made.

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How I ended up in Uganda

The very first time I went to Uganda, I wanted to go to Malawi, really. I had been dreaming of Malawi for a long time, seen pictures of that beautiful lake which looks like a sea, heard amazing reports from travellers. I was seeing myself sitting by those golden beaches talking to Malawian mzee about life and the universe, quite naively I must admit. I even wrote my dissertation in Human Geography on Malawi, with the intent of doing research on field. Life had other plans though, like often happens. I had to postpone any travelling arrangements, for a health problem. So I wrote my thesis without going there. About the fight between little Malawi and the huge World Bank on the ongoing discussion "Free Market versus State Intervention", which Malawi won at that time, subsiding their farmers. But that’s another story.

When I could finally travel, it had to be Malawi, but I wanted to find something to do there. Don't like much travelling in Africa as a tourist. After knowing from my Ugandan friend that the word mzungu originally means “someone who roams around aimlessly”, I understood that it is probably why. Ok, searching on the web for something clever to do in Malawi, I saw a picture of this dreamlike place. Didn't have a clue where it was, but it was definitely love at first sight. It didn’t even look like it was part of this world, but in case it was, I had to go there. If I was very lucky it could even have been Malawi. It turned up to be Uganda, region of Kigezi, district of Kabale, Lake Bunyonyi. I found an association there, Edirisa, contacted it and was asked to work on a documentary to promote craftsmaking. Great and clever enough. Got a little camera and went, dying to see that beautiful place. It didn’t let me down. Even if it was hard, at first. Sitting by myself in my hut with just candle light at 8pm - and one match only on the first night -, heavy rain falling on the metal roof, mud all over the outside which made toilet trips out of question, nothing to munch on, and Teddy the dog – sadly not longer with us –barking loudly and excessively at the moon. Not to mention those freaking African dolls sitting on a shelf and staring at me. “Breath”, I was saying to myself!

I breathed. In every possible way. And went back for more.

By Laura Cini

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Akampene's inhabitants today.

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Introduction to Punishment Island

Now you can also watch the video with Italian subtitles.

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Women of Akampene

Judged without a trial.
Condemned to capital punishment.
Died of starvation or drowned.
Saved as free merchandise.
Mothers of babies never born or never lived.
Isolated and stigmatized.
Never helped.
Never listened to.
Never searched for.

Mrs M singing

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Punishment Island, by Comfort Abemigisha

This is an example of the drawings that will be used in the documentary to illustrate the tragic events that took place in Akampene. Comfort Abemigisha, Ugandan young emerging artist, living in Kampala and author of this drawing, will take care of the art work.

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Little clips revealing some of the experiences of the disowned women

Grace abandoned by her brother

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The lake: trap or asset?

Today around twenty communities overlook the lake with a total population of around 100.000 inhabitants. Life seems to have a quiet and peaceful pace, which twice a week is accelerated by the market of Rutinda, a tiny village, yet principal centre of the lake. Rutinda can be reached from Kabale, the main town of the district, by private car, boda-boda - a moto-taxi driving crazily - or a couple of hours walk along a winding and scenographic country road. Rutinda, a small fishing village with some local bars, is not particularly attractive nor interesting, but becomes lively on market days - Mondays and Fridays - with a multitude of colourful canoes arriving since early morning from all the different sides of the lakes for buying and selling fruits, vegetables and second hand clothes.

The lake is essential to life and survival of its inhabitants, despite the fact that there is not much fish. Data on the lake depth are uncertain and vary depending on the sources. For some, it is the second deepest lake in Africa. According to Paul Ngologoza, an eminent historian and politician of the region of Kigezi, before 1919 in Lake Bunyonyi only the encere, a type of edible frog, lived in the lake. Although this is unlikely, the lake has never been inhabited by large quantities of fish, being oligotrophic. Probably, the immediate depth doesn’t create the ideal habitat for the survival of species that live in shallow waters, such as the Tilapia or the Nile perch, which lived in the river before it became a lake. During the colonial era great efforts were made to supply the lake with fish. According to Ngologoza, the biggest dates back to 1927, when the district commissioner sent the order to manually carry a certain amount of fish from Lake Edward to Lake Bunyonyi. Initially, the experiment was a success that made commercial fishing proliferate. But then, in the early '50s, for reasons that remain unknown, the fish died in mass, to the point that "the lake was covered by floating bodies of dead fish."

Today only small amounts of African catfish and of the small but delicious crayfish live in the lake. But the other hand, the lake is the main supply of water. It supplies the whole town of Kabale for both domestic and industrial use, while many of the local communities take water directly from the lake. Its water is used for drinking, cooking, washing, irrigating the fields. But if the lake is essential to life in this corner of the world, it is often fatal. Canoe is the usual means of transport and locals are expert navigators since early childhood. Despite that, very few are able to swim. As a result, the annual rate of drowning is very high. After AIDS and malaria, it is the third cause of death for local communities. Today, local association Edirisa has built a swimming pool on the bank of the lake, where international volunteers give swimming lessons to children, hoping to partially solve the problem in the medium term.

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The ethnic group

Third article introducing you to culture and geography of the Lake Bunyonyi.

The ethnic group

Locals speak Rukiga, a Bantu language, and the ethnic group is that of Bakiga, a tribe that came here from today's Rwanda centuries ago. They were farmers mainly devoted to the cultivation of sorghum, peas, beans and millet. They distilled local beers from sorghum. The women took care of the work in the fields, while men cleaned the bush for agriculture and built the typical grass thatched huts. They were wearing skins of goat or cow. The Bakiga were described by other Ugandan tribes as "tough hard-working people." A marriage was a real contract between two families and the groom's family had to pay a dowry to the bride. In their culture, virginity before marriage was essential. Unmarried women who became pregnant were left in the forest at the mercy of wild animals, thrown in the lake from a cliff or abandoned on the tiny island of Akampene, also called Punishment Island.

Polygamy was the norm. Men who could afford the bride price could take as many wives as they wanted. On the other hand, it seems that both men and women were free to divorce. The Bakiga were organized in clans, which represented the highest authority. The leaders of the different lineages discussed the most important issues and when they could not solve disputes through dialogue, they passed to fighting, in which they showed to be fierce warriors (Edirisa, 2007).

Today 1.7 million of Bakiga in the region accounts for 7% of the total population of Uganda. They are Christians, divided between Catholics and Protestants. Muslims are a small percentage.

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Little clips revealing some of the experiences of the disowned women

Esther talks about her rape

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Life is fun!

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Geography

Lake Bunyonyi is a magical place which surprises for the rare beauty of its landscapes. The extremely ragged coasts feature intensely cultivated hills and a luxuriant tropical vegetation. The surface of the lake is dotted with 29 little islands with the peak of the Virunga volcanoes looming in the horizon. Bunyonyi, in the local language, means “place inhabited by many little birds” and in fact 200 different species live here. It is a young lake probably created by a volcanic eruption that around 8000 years ago blocked a river exit. The lake has a total area of around 50km2, but it is the centre of a wetland of around 180 km2. Lake Bunyonyi rises about 2000 meters above sea level, but some of the hills reach 2500 meters. The altitude assures a moderate climate, often cool after sunset, and a lower incidence of malaria. Free of bilharzias, crocodiles and hippos, it is one of the few African lake where it is safe to swim.

Lake Bunyonyi is situated a short distance away from the border with Rwanda, in the region of Kigezi and district of Kabale. The whole region, that occupies the South-Western corner of Uganda, is probably the most fertile and scenographic of the whole country. However, despite the landscape attractions, to most tourists the area is known almost exclusively for the closeness to the national parks of Bwindi and Mgahinga, where it is possible to see the endangered species of mountain gorillas. Therefore tourism is marginal, with the huge trans- african expeditions that stop here just overnight and a few independent tourists coming for a few hours walk from the nearby town of Kabale, the main centre of the Kigezi region, and last stop before Bwindi. Of all local attractions, the most popular is the guided tour of the Batwa Pygmies, a minority that has always been persecuted and discriminated. Today they have no land rights or legal access to the forest from were, being hunters, they were traditionally getting their sustenance. The Batwa Pygmies today perform for cash to tourists, which remains their only livelihood. Today there are organizations that protect them

from exploitation and discrimination.

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Performances in church

Little teaser about traditional african dance thath involves individual improvised performances

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Screenings for the craftswomen!

A screening an a laptop was arranged for women from Lake Bunyonyi to see the video documentary about crafts making, "Creative Women of Lake Bunyonyi" (DV, 28' 20120). This is the first time most of them were watching themselves. Not easy, as they come with canoes from different parts of the lake and there one can only rely on weak solar power for electricity. But Edirisa managed to organize that, somehow!

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