focus groups, movies, fried stuff

One of the projects I’ve been working on is developing focus group discussion questions regarding food preparation and supplementary feeding for children aged 0-2. I developed the questions and got feedback from the staff both here and in Mubende, and this past Thursday and Friday, I went into the field with the staff to hold our first focus group discussions and test out the questions. Obviously I don’t speak Luganda, so I basically introduced myself and then observed, but I’m very glad that I was able to observe the process. As the discussion is going on, one of the staff members takes notes in English, and then afterwards, I look at the notes and compile them. Our goal is to get an idea of the knowledge gaps that exist in the community, so that we are able to develop our education materials and interventions accordingly. It would be a waste of everybody’s time and resources to, for example, develop a cooking demonstration that shows women something they already know.

This weekend has been nice, as we’ve had power almost constantly. I’ve been watching a lot of Everwood (I brought the DVDs from home). While I was packing, I wasn’t sure how many DVDs to bring along, but I erred on the side of bringing too many rather than not enough. I have to say that I’m glad I brought as many as I did. I’m also going to buy some the next time I go to Kampala. It’s just nice (when power allows) to be able to veg out and escape by watching a movie (or several, as we tend to do on the weekends). On Friday Jessica and I watched both Center Stage and Center Stage 2… we’re kind of on a dance movie kick. We watched Save the Last Dance last week.

To try something new, we bought potatoes from the market, and yesterday we cut them into chunks and fried them, like chips. Luckily, as we were starting to make them, Beatrice came into the office, and helped us out. They turned out really well. Then she bought some green bananas and prepared them for us – peeled, thinly sliced, and fried. They were really good.. kind of like dried bananas, but not sweet. Yummm. I guess anything fried is usually good, right? Oh, and let me just say that bringing a large container of Lawry’s Seasoned Salt from the US was one of the best moves I made. We put it on both the potatoes and the green bananas. It tastes good on everything, and it’s been great to have here, since spices here are few and far between, and often not as flavorful as I’m used to.