Eastern Ugandan Recipe: Malewa

Eastern Ugandan Recipe: Malewa

written by Rogers Muduku of MAPLE Uganda

Malewa is smoked bamboo shoot which is dried for preservation. These bamboo trees are a special kind and grow in the wild in eastern Uganda around Mt. Elgon. They are harvested when still young and soft. Malewa (smoked bamboo) forms the major ingredient of the Malewa /dish.

Origin: Malewa originated from Eastern Uganda in the Bugisu sub-region (area occupied by the Bagisu Tribe people) in the Mt Elgon region.  It was originally eaten as food and later it started to be cooked as a sauce when mixed with ground simsim (sesame seed) or peanuts. Malewa is a traditional sauce for the Bagisu people and therefore forms a major part of ceremonies in Bugisu e.g. Imbalu (circumcision), traditional weddings as well as any Bagisu family regardless of where they migrated too.

It is typical to find some pieces of Malewa in the store of a Mugisu family regardless of where they stay. A case in point is my family (parents). They are Bagisu who transferred to Kampala and Entebbe a long time ago where they have stayed since. But I remember, while growing up; we always had some pieces of Malewa in the House. And my Mum would prepare it once in a while.

It is a delicious sauce when prepared well. Actually some people eating it for the first time might think they have eaten pasted smoked fish.

Ingredients for Malewa dish:

• Malewa (the smoked bamboo shoot)

• Water

• Soda ash (locally made by sun drying Matooke/Banana peels and then burning them to form ash) or Rock Salt or Baking soda

• Salt

• Peanut paste

Preparation: Malewa is boiled in water to clean it (or soaked overnight to make it softer before cleaning it) and then the joints (which stay hard even after the boiling or soaking) of the shoot are cut off leaving the middle parts (which become softer after boiling or soaking) are cut into smaller pieces. Rock salt or Baking soda or Soda Ash is added to the boiled malewa to make it more tender. Finally peanut paste and salt are added and the sauce is simmered to acquire taste. The malewa sauce is served with either Matooke (Cooked green bananas), Cassava, Sweet potatoes, Rice or Posho (some kind of bread like meal made from Corn flour).

STEP BY STEP PROCESS WITH IMAGES BELOW:

Above is a picture of the Young bamboo just after harvesting it.

This picture shows how bamboo(malewa) looks like when you get it from the market after its smoked and dried.

Malewa

What you do first,

Cover it with water and boil it for about half an hour or Soak it overnight, pour off the water.

Then:

You cut off the joints, where the bamboo is hard. The soft middle parts are what you’ll eat.

Now that you have the good part,

cut it into smaller pieces, rinse, and boil again for about half an hour, but this time with water and about ¼ tsp. of baking soda or Rock salt or Soda ash.

Finally

You rinse the bamboo off again and add it to peanut sauce. 

Then its ready to serve.

ENJOY!

MAUREEN NAMUNSI’S SHOP FOR WOMEN’S GOODS

MAUREEN NAMUNSI’S SHOP FOR WOMEN’S GOODS

Maureen opened and is currently operating a shop which deals in cosmetics and women accessories. She was able to rent the shop with the money she saved as a member of Namunsi “N” village saving and loans association. 

Capital

To rent and the establish the shop she invested two million uganda shillings, part of which went to pay rent and the other she used to purchase starting stock; but this was not enough. 

But as luck would have it, her mother Nakaboke Beth (also a member in one of the savings group in the Namunsi area) saw her puzzled daughter and offered her the needed money.

Break through

Within a short time her stock emptied, while more customers started flocking to her shop. This can be credited to the location of the business. Her shop is on the main road and which makes it accessible for customers. 

Diversification

Maureen has also added different items in the business to meet the demand for customers, like clothes, shoes, perfumes, and other suggested goods. She explains, “I study my customers thoroughly and am always keen on taking advice from them. Using the feedback has helped so much in growing my business. I make sure the place is tidy, my service is efficient, and I treasure my customers.”

Regarding her salary, Maureen noted, “I have no specific salary. At the end of the month I restock and pay all the bills and what I realize as the balance is what I spend on myself and the family as well as savings in the Namunsi “N” village saving and loans association group. I am patient, I save some money in the savings group because I have future aspirations that I need to reach [she says this with a bright smile] and also, Sacrifice is one of the lessons I have learned.”

Goal

Maureen expressed, “I also achieved my goal of completing my bachelor’s degree. I was previously forced to pause my studies due to the fact that I got pregnant through my own negligence. This was a lesson to me because I got pregnant when I was young and did not know anything about motherhood. I forced myself into early marriage which caused me suffering and torture. But I am now happy, for I was able to go back to school. Thank you to Maple Microdevelopment because it’s because of them that I have been able to save money to start the business, but also I got some loans from the group to pay for my tuition to complete my degree.

Challenge

The challenges I now face in the business include people who want credit sales, and the ever–rising prices of commodities and scarcity. But in all, I am able to deal with them since am focused to succeed in my business.

Mrs Masawi's Clothing Company

Mrs. Masawi’s Clothing Company

Mrs Masawi is a mother of 5 with 4 dependants, who has successfully built a business by being a member of a MAPLE savings group. She is married to a man who did not believe in women working because he believes that when women start making money they become irresponsible and disrespectful to their husbands. It frustrated her very much to see her husband have to carry the entire financial burden for the family. From the money the husband left for taking care of the home, she begun putting aside some money which is categorized as a “akasente ke kyikyala” literally translated as money for a woman.

She decided to join one of the savings group which MAPLE formed, where she received training on business skills. In the second month of saving she acquired a loan of Ugx 200,000 to follow her passion to start a business that sells new born baby clothes. She met with the suppliers and bought a few items but she did not have a place/space to operate. She opted for hawking; she went to maternity wards with permission from the hospital heads and could sell her products there, but this limited her sales and she started door to door marketing her products. Her business kept growing and later she opened a shop in town with baby clothes. Later on her clients stated demanding for teen clothes, in addition to women and men’s wear, increasing her clientele. She acquired another loan from the group amounting to Ugx 3 million with the retained earnings of 4 million. These where the two methods she used to finance her business.

However, it has not been smooth all the way, says Masawi, “Operating a business has lots of challenges. Convincing my husband to let me work was a job of its own. It took a lot of convincing and abiding by his rules as a married man. Business also has its lows; there are times when it is very slow, bad debtors which affects capital. But this has not stopped me because business is my passion and I am not ready to give up anytime soon. Nevertheless, the business mentorship I received from MAPLE has helped me in running my business. I can now comfortably manage records and accounts smoothly. My business worth has grown from Ugx 200000 to Ugx 15 million.

I have always wished to be able to support my husband by trying out a small business to fill up the free time, and I am glad my husband granted me the opportunity to work. We are a happy family and he actually supports me to be an active member of the savings group. He has also encouraged his friends to encourage their wives to work and also be part of saving groups to ease on the financial burden which is always left for only the men in the homes.” In addition to that, Mrs Masawi now employs some youth in the shop that help in sales, marketing and delivering of the products and she pays them on commission basis.

Wise Words on Community Development Work from One of Our Own!

As part of our close work with Ugandan communities to develop sustainable, locally managed economies, MAPLE also focuses on making access to clean water sustainable for the communities we serve.  Grace Burleson, a graduate student of mechanical engineering and anthropology at Oregon State University, has served as a field intern for MAPLE in Uganda on three different occasions.  In this article, Grace offers sage advice to all organizations and communities working on this important issue.  We are grateful for her work and for her guidance.    https://www.engineeringforchange.org/long-term-project-planning/

TERREWODE, MAPLE, AND SOAP MADE BY FISTULA SURVIVORS IN UGANDA

By Ron Severson

As director of MAPLE Microdevelopment, I recently returned from a one-month visit to MAPLE’s field offices in Uganda.  This was my seventh visit since MAPLE started operations in Uganda eight years ago, so being there with Ugandan colleagues and friends is beginning to feel like a second home.   While much happened during my visit, this blog entry focuses on MAPLE’s growing partnership with TERREWODE.  A Ugandan NGO founded by Alice Emasu, TERREWODE focuses on preventing obstetric fistula, identifying and treating girls and women who have suffered fistula, and restoring survivors to lives of dignity (Check it out! http://terrewodeug.org/). MAPLE is partnering with TERREWODE to help fistula survivors develop sustainable income generating opportunities.  We are starting by building a business, together, to export handmade, all-natural goat milk soap made by fistula survivors in the Teso sub-Region of Uganda to Italy.  More on that later in this blog entry!

Fistula is a birthing injury that occurs when a hole forms between a women’s birth canal and rectum or bladder, often leaving her incontinent of urine and feces.  In wealthier nations obstetric fistula has nearly been eradicated.  Yet over 200,000 women in Uganda currently suffer from this condition, and those who do are often ostracized due to misunderstandings about the causes and treatability of the condition. The causes of obstetric fistula are many and include inadequate access to medical care and illegal practices of child marriage still occurring in some villages, but these and other causes mostly arise from realities associated with living in poverty.

TERREWODE is the leading organization in Uganda dedicated to eradicating obstetric fistula.  Together with other organizations, TERREWODE is transforming the lives of girls and women, not only through prevention, treatment, and rehabilitation but also through advancement and increased enforcement of the rights of girls and women—the right to avoid childhood marriage, the right to attend school, the right to medical care, the right to own land, the right to make a livelihood.

MAPLE Microdevelopment is devoted to assisting families and communities achieve financial self-sufficiency through education and entrepreneurship.  We are not a health services organization.  Yet, anyone from a family or community that struggles economically knows how difficult it is to separate issues of health and well-being from economic empowerment.  Entrepreneurial businesses often fail if a person or a family member becomes ill.  At the same time, strengthening the capacity to generate income and to support others can also strengthen one’s dignity.  This is particularly true for fistula survivors in Uganda, which makes TERREWODE Uganda and MAPLE Microdevelopment Uganda strong partners.  In its core areas of expertise, MAPLE can assist the women served by TERREWODE to build and manage sustainable sources of income.

For almost a year, now, TERREWODE and fistula survivors who live in rural areas in the Teso sub-Region of Eastern Uganda have been working to start a goat milk soap project.  When Joni Kabana, a photographer from Oregon, visited TERREWODE and gave Alice Emasu, TERREWODE’s founder and director, a gift of goat milk soap from a ranch near Spray, Oregon, Alice immediately said, “We could do this ourselves!”  

Since then, much has happened, and this blog entry will not do justice to the full story.  Let it suffice to say that TERREWODE received an initial grant to obtain and raise milk goats, that fistula survivors are now rearing and milking those goats, that Dardi Troen, a designer and soap-maker from Portland, Oregon, helped train fistula survivors to make beautiful, all-natural soap with goat milk and local shea butter, that students from Oregon State University’s Humanitarian Engineering Program tested the soap under various conditions and production processes, and that MAPLE Microdevelopment is now working closely with TERREWODE to design and implement a viable business plan to empower fistula survivors and their communities.

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I experienced some pretty amazing things in relation to this project during the month of July.  Together with Rogers Muduku, our country director, Hyacinth Walimbwa, MAPLE field officer, and Chris Kuhn a UO grad and intern, I visited TERREWODE in Soroti, Uganda, twice for several days.  It’s an ever-inspiring place with ever-inspiring leaders, management team members, trainers--and particularly the fistula survivors themselves.  During our first visit, TERREWODE was conducting a two-week rehabilitation program for fistula survivors whose surgeries had not yet succeeded.  While the first surgery for women who suffer this condition often succeeds, TERREWODE is expanding their outreach to serve women whose surgery has so far been unsuccessful.

It would be difficult to imagine a more resilient group of people anywhere in the world than the women involved in this session.  Some of them had received no treatment or support for 20 years or more; others were still teenagers.  Most had lost a child during birth; others had a child with them.  The women were sharing their stories, supporting one another, learning to manage the physical, social, and psychological dimensions of living with fistula, crying and laughing together, gaining skills in income generation such as baking, weaving, tailoring, and making soap, and participating in drama and song as a way to express themselves and raise awareness in their own villages when they return.  All were emerging from isolation into a community made strong through shared experience and a shared commitment to end fistula, forever.

We also visited a village, where fistula survivors and solidarity groups sang, danced, and performed a drama for women attending the two-week rehabilitation session.  While the women connect strongly with each other at TERREWODE’s Reintegration Center in Soroti, it means a lot to them to meet other women who have returned to their villages and have been able to reestablish strong, dignified livelihoods.  At the end of the performances, the two groups of women met and embraced.  After that, everybody danced.  (Yeah, even me.  That’s what you do, and no one judges you on style points.  Good thing in my case.)  These outreach and introduction sessions constitute one of the many ways TERREWODE forms a network of supporters dedicated to eradicating obstetric fistula and respecting, even celebrating survivors of this condition all across Uganda.

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Also during this first visit, our MAPLE team engaged in several dialogues about the soap making project to map out the principles guiding this new business as well as the direct and indirect costs of producing soap, locally, and establishing a distribution channel, internationally.  We also took inventory of all materials currently used in the soap making project.  Of course, some of the soap will be sold or gifted locally, within and across villages, yet selling among neighbors does not produce the returns necessary to break long-standing cycles of poverty.  The same characteristics that make local soap ordinary and low-priced in Uganda also make it uniquely valuable in regions of the world where many people wish to use soap that is not mass produced, that is free of artificial additives, and that benefits others and the environment.

Visiting one of the villages where rearing and milking the goats is occurring was a highlight.  Partly the visit was made to understand the costs associated with raising goats, a necessary step to design a viable financial model and to understand issues related to scaling the business over time.  Yet, meeting the fistula survivors locally in charge of the project and seeing the fistula solidarity group members tend to the gardens, feed and milk the goats, and build onto the goat sheds to make room for new goats gave me a much stronger sense of the community-nature and potential of this project.  Children loved the goats, too, of course, and the kid goats (as the original goats are now reproducing at a fine pace!) love to sneak out of their pens if they can, frolic around with children from the village chasing after them, and play king of the hill on any nearby anthill.  

This particular village had four goats, two female goats, a male goat, and one kid goat.  The other female goat was pregnant with what must be twin goats!  The two female goats produce about five liters of goat milk a day.  That’s enough goat milk to make 800 1.2 ounce bars of soap, the unit size of soap needed for the current international market opportunity.  Some other issues also became more apparent during the visit to the village.  As the village has no access to electricity, the milk cannot be preserved very long.  When soap is being made centrally at the TERREWODE Reintegration Center in Soroti, it needs to be transported immediately.  We hope to resolve this issue by investing in solar refrigerators for each village involved, but have yet to test this part of the process.

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On the day before leaving Uganda, I met with Alice Emasu and TERREWODE’s financial directors, Lillian Awizia and Amudu David, at TERREWODE’s Kampala office.  The purpose of the meeting was to further develop the business plan, particularly the pricing model, the logistics of the pilot phase, and the long-term revenue projections.  While it is difficult to project future revenues prior to conducting the pilot, we all agreed that this is a social business.  Any decisions made must include the fistula survivors and must improve their health and well-being, strengthen their communities, raise awareness about fistula, and advance the rights of girls and women in Uganda—while also producing high quality soap.  We also discussed several possible ways that members of village solidarity groups for fistula survivors could participate in income generating activities as part of scaling the business over time.  Shea nuts grow naturally in the area.  Some community members could process the nuts into shea butter, thereby replacing the current cost of purchasing shea butter.

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Other members could be in charge of printing, packaging, and messaging for end users of the soap and for transport.  Still others could engage in complementary businesses: buying and selling of milk goats; selling surplus milk; bee keeping and honey harvesting (as bees’ wax can be used as a substitute for lye in the making of soap); building goat sheds; planting and harvesting of multiuse plants like ground nuts (the goats eat the greens while people eat and sell the nuts); buying and selling of veterinary supplies in hard-to-reach villages; training of fistula survivors and solidarity groups in other villages as the business scales.  Furthermore, we agreed that some of the revenues produced from this social business should go directly into the savings and loan funds managed by fistula survivors and solidarity groups to support new income generating activities, help pay school fees to keep youth (especially girls) in school past primary level, and cover transport to hospitals for women who experience complications in their pregnancy.  In short and in so many ways, this project can become much more than a cottage industry!

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I will close with the most recent update on this project.  Currently, women in five villages continue to raise and milk the goats, the goats continue to reproduce, and some fistula survivors know how to make beautiful goat milk and shea butter soap.  Alice Emasu and TERREWODE would like to ensure that women from all five participating villages can participate in the soap making process and earn sustainable incomes from this business as it grows, so TERREWODE is preparing to train new soap makers in the next test run of soap-making in Soroti.  This next test run is also necessary for making all process improvements to have the soap approved by the Ugandan Bureau of Standards for sales.  Dardi Troen is designing the packaging and Joni Kabana is drafting the messaging for the soap—as the messaging about eradicating fistula in this case is as important as the product itself.   This may include small weavings in a particular design made by the women themselves in their villages in combination with printing.  MAPLE has found an initial buyer for the pilot phase of international soap distribution—one of MAPLE’s own board members!  Cliff Johnson, co-founder with Eric Breon of Vacasa, a rapidly growing, worldwide vacation rental business (check it out https://www.vacasa.com/) manages the international markets for Vacasa.  He is interested in doing what he can, within Vacasa’s business model, to ensure that Vacasa has a positive social and environmental impact on communities.  He has agreed to purchase the pilot shipment of soap for testing in Vacasa’s Italian market.  Conducting this pilot will enable MAPLE and TERREWODE to establish an international distribution channel and will provide us all with the necessary customer feedback and data necessary for predicting demand and planning for growth over time.  Also, the MAPLE Uganda team continues their financial and market analyses to build and implement a viable business model, and we at MAPLE headquarters in Eugene, Oregon, have nearly completed the initial business plan based on field research in Uganda and international market research.

Lastly, another MAPLE board member, Emily Myers, has developed a crowdfunding site through which anyone, from anywhere in the world, using any currency, can donate to support the pilot phase of this amazing project.  The site will be up from today, August 25, 2016, through October 23, 2016.  50% of the $3,000 target amount will go to TERREWODE and 50% will go to MAPLE, in both cases to help cover the costs of making this pilot successful.

So, if you do nothing else, please check out this crowdfunding site right now!  https://pozible.com/project/uganda-soap-by-fistula-survivors

Let’s help fistula survivors make beautiful soap, tell their stories to the world to help women everywhere, and earn income to support themselves, their families, and communities!

Thanks!

Ron Severson, Executive Director, MAPLE Microdevelopment

Photographs provided by Joni Kabana

Check it out http://jonikabana.com/ !

A Glimpse of Empowerment and Inspiration From Uganda

Written By: MAPLE Microdevelopment

Bernard, a shortstop for the MAPLE baseball team in Lira, Uganda, talks about his experience with school and baseball, what they mean for his life, and what he wants for his future.

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Question:

What is your experience with baseball? Do you feel you have come a long way?

Answer:

“I love baseball and this sport has changed my life mentally and physically, I know I have a lot to do to get better but I can’t stop or quit. I want to become somebody in the future and working hard with class work and baseball will get me there. If this dream came true I would put up baseball fields in my country and facilities for others to play in. I love to see a big impact from this sport in my country and my life. Thank you MAPLE for bringing this experience to us, I am proud to be involved.” Bernard

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Bernard goes on to talk about his love of Baseball, and the appreciation he has for his two coaches from MAPLE, Bernard and Mark:

"It is about two years now since I play baseball and I want to keep going. My first experience involved with baseball was last year in May when I went to the little league baseball tournament at the age of 10 with my teammates who made it there. I personally had a lot to do for myself from what I saw from the teams that came to the tournament and how well they played.  I looked at their level of play and said to myself, 'I will be the best I can be next year,' and this is still how I feel." 

"I feel I have gotten better physically , morally, and mentally which makes me stronger from last year. I celebrate my coaches Bernard and Mark for building this confidence in me. I thought I would never come this far, after wanting to give up and quit several times last year. This is a new sport to me.  I had never seen this game until last year when it was introduced to my school, and now it is my preferred and best sport in my life. I don’t know what will stop me, maybe if there is no one to keep me going...  I can’t stop thinking about baseball.  It has brought a smile and happiness to my life and my family for several reasons. Coach Bernard and Mark are my inspiration in this sport, they have been there for my betterment and I celebrate them always. May God keep them going as we enjoy our career with this great sport, for they are skillful and have got talent that we need to get better each day.   Thank you all."                Bernard

Bernard’s story of inspiration and empowerment is one of many. 

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Since 2008, MAPLE has been working in post-conflict Uganda to help build the dreams and futures of strong, intelligent, and motivated youth.  Through MAPLE’s Sports Training program for baseball and softball, children learn skills they need on the field and skills they need in life.  They learn about hard work, team work, discipline, and leadership.  In a country where nearly 50% of the population is age 0-14, the people of Uganda are depending on a capable youth ,with these skills and abilities, to raise its communities out of extreme poverty.

This story of success and empowerment is only one of the nearly 60 projects MAPLE can tell from Africa and South America.  

If you would like to hear more about other projects, or more about MAPLE and what we do and how we do it, check out the rest of our website, visit our Facebook page, or email us at info@maplemicro.org.     

With the continued help of our amazing supporters, volunteers, interns, and staff, we will continue to find community-based grassroots solutions help communities in Africa and South America achieve financial independence and foster well-being for generations to come.

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