Getting Organized

Tonight in our steering committee meeting, planning for the upcoming semester really got rolling, here is an update of what we discussed:
1. Finishing the constitution for ROTU/BAP
2. Contacting possible board of directors and writing up letters to them and listing their responsibility
3. People’s responsibilities as committees and VPs.
4. The communication of BAPers outside webmail.
5. Finalizing the general BAP report.
6. Fundraising dinner
7. Paintings from Uganda
8. Raising public awareness: Daily Item, Bucknellian, and other local news?
9. Faculty Presentation
10. Rotary clubs/churches presentations
11. A new face for the Website
12. Gulu walk on the FRONT page on Bucknellian
13. Public Safety Bikes
14. T-shirt for the Gulu walk

In addition to this meeting, the individual committees met this week and are working on their separate tasks using the newly interested members from the Bucknell Campus. People from every year came out to our interest meeting last week and we are already seeing that they will be a ton of help!

BAP LOVE

Getting Closer and Closer

Once upon a time, it seemed like ages to the time we begin BAP project. But right now, its just a week to Uganda. Abhay keeps me updated on the remaining days because its on his gmail status. I am currently preparing for my ILTM presentation for Wednesday and i can not wait to be done so that i can only think about BAP.

It seems like the BAPers in Uganda are having too much fun to keep us updated regularly. I hope their parents dont freak out if there is nothing posted on the blog for a few days. The interesting thing is that the current BAPers are in Kabale, which is the next to Rukungiri-my home village. I havent been there in years, i only wish i was there with them so i could visit my home town.

We had our second meeting with Kevin, Abhay, Janice and DeeAnn. We talked extensively on how to transfer funds to Uganda for bicycle purchase and the sort. We also talked about the survey and i thank Abhay among others who have put alot of time in editing the BAP survey. This is a great tool because we can use it in any country we decide to work in.

Please keep in touch with us as we travel far and beyond.

Muyambi

Anticipation

Neither am I as expressive as Colin, nor am I as succinct as Nicole in my blogging. Nevertheless, I’ve always enjoyed writing and poetry, despite becoming an engineer now, and I had actually written my personal statement to Bucknell in verse. Please note that I am in a habit of usually writing long sentences. Erika, I will remember to bring ear plugs.

Even after graduating, I still feel very much part of Bucknell since I returned to campus almost a month ago and this is very much home for me now since the past 4 years. My parents came from India for graduation and we traveled around the country for 26 days. I went to New York, DC, Lewisburg, Atlanta, Houston, Vegas, San Francisco and Yosemite National Park. Coincidentally, 26 is the same number of days I get to spend in Uganda and the vicinity. But both these travels will be diametrically opposite.

Most of us don’t desire too much uncertainty in life, and I usually fall into that category. But inspite of all the planning our entire group put in over the past year, a lot remains to be determined. Indians have always had an interesting connection since Idi Amin’s days, when he asked all the Indians to vacate the country within 90 days, and I’ve been reading a lot about that. Nicole, I am ready to make the plunge and attempt to create change as well, and hopefully our families will learn to be okay with that. I wish I was able to make it to DC for ‘How it ends’, but I wasn’t able to because of my small business consulting job. Although to make up for that, I did bump into Meghan a couple of weeks ago at a friend’s Masters Thesis defense, and it was an ‘Oh Heyy’ moment for sure.

I see Muyambi and Kevin every now and then on campus when we sit together to make plans for the applications and the survey, and operationalizing this project has been more difficult than I had imagined. We discuss how we want people to pay back these loans, and whether the bicyles will benefit them enough for them to pay it all back because we want this project to be sustainable. Strangely, even though a monthly repayment amount of 5000 Ugandan shillings is only a number to us on an application form we are designing, it might mean the world to the man or woman at the receiving end of this loan. I’m really glad to be putting in time and effort into the application forms and survey, because finally things are coming together for me. I will probably doing similar work for the next year or so, because I am headed to work for a microfinance research organization in India (Center for Microfinance) doing project management and field work for them right after Sophia and I finish exploring central and eastern Africa.

Janice, Dee Ann, John, and Professor Wooden have been fantastic with their comments and help. Even though this is entirely a student project, their assistance has been invaluable.

All the people leaving in a couple of days – good luck!! Can’t wait to see you all

-Abhay Agarwal