“Go local
and dance with
the world
as it really is”

April 5th, 2012

Wanna be a weekeeXplorer?

Hey, folks!

We want to take Weekeego to the next level and we want to invite you to make part of it!

We introduce you: WEEKEEVENTURE, a chance to turn normal holidays into a meaningful journey!

WeekeeVentures are group expeditions to amazing destinations. Instead of planning all trip details alone, weekeeFan can participate of an experience carefully prepared by WeekeeGo based on our three pillars. Our value proposition is offering participants:

»   weekeeLocation: discover incredible places

»   weekeeProjects: interact with social themes

»   weekeeInsight: absorb local taste

»  +network with people from all over the world with similar interests

–

How do you feel about it?

WANNA BE PART OF IT? BECOME A WEEKEEXPLORER!

We look for someone that deeply knows the destination and its culture, traditions and richness

For more details: http://migre.me/8xHpF

Don’t hesitate to get in touch with us!

weekeeTeam (info@weekeego.net)

February 8th, 2010

The Adventures of Amanda at Nshenyi Village

weekeego’s note: These are excerpts of some blog posts Amanda made during her stay at Nshenyi Village in July 2007. Most of the posts are pictures and videos. We encourage you to take a look at them, they are awesome.

Cutting Matoke by Amanda

Nshenyi Adventures- Cutting Matoke (Bananas)

The main staple food here is matoke which is basically green bananas that are peeled, steamed and mashed into a gooey, mashed potato like consistency. It is rather bitter and sometimes dry, but I like eating it with beans or some kind of sauce and then it is pretty good.

Nshenyi Adventures- Making Butter

Step 1: Shake the milk
Step 2: Spin the gourd so the solids sink to the bottom
Step 3: Pour off the liquid, (which then is left for a few days and prepared into a pudding which is a delicacy), and the solids are prepared as butter.

Volunteering at Oreteti

Gemma and Lesikar Founders of Oreteti

So I am now in Arusha and am having a very good time. I am staying at the house of Gemma Enolengila and her husband – Lesikar Ngila. I have helped with a Junior Youth session, and an English class for some of the local children and JY.

On Saturday, I went on a 2-day safari to Lake Manyara, and then to Ngorongoro National Park.

The trip to the Lake Manyara National Park took about 2 hours, but the scenery was beautiful, and the time quickly passed while talking with our Maasai guide, Emmanuel. The diversity of that National Park is impressive – it has elephants, giraffe, baboons, blue monkeys, lions, hippos, stalks, flamingos, zebra, buffalo, wildebeest, eagles, and leopards, to name but a few. Unfortunately, we were unable to catch a single glimpse of the elusive leopard – or chui in Kiswahili.

We left that National Park in the evening, and went to our campsite where we would be overnighting. It was the nicest campsite I have ever been to. The 2 man tents had space for 2 single beds and room for possessions, the bathrooms had several proper toilets, showers, and to my surprise – running hot water. The food was prepared by one who was accompanying us. We had barbequed goat leg, soup, fruit, pancakes, rice and sauce, tea, etc. and it was a real feast.

weekeego’s note: This is an excerpt of Erfan’s blog posts about his experience volunteering at Oreteti, take a look at his blog for the complete adventure.

Uganda Lodge and the Ruhanga Community Development Project

For the last week , we have spent time at Uganda Lodge through the Ruhanga Community Development Project. This, as many of you know who contributed to our fundraising efforts, was the primary reason for our visit to Uganda. We were devastated that our time here was cut short, mostly by the delay in our purchasing the car in Kenya and a dedication to meeting others on a time frame later in the trip, but we were happy to have been able to make it to the Lodge at all this month. For those of you who don’t know, we stumbled upon this project via Lonely Planet’s Thorntree forum and Ann Macarthy, who is the UK Ambassador and the lifeblood of this project, got in contact with us to give us more information on Uganda Lodge. We found out that it was in it’s infancy, and that she fundraises in the UK to develop the project further each time she comes to Uganda. Uganda Lodge is owned by a man by the name of Denis Kasiba Aheirwe, and as a local in the area, also identified the need for a development project for his local community. Ann and Denis teamed up and the Community Project was born- the community development art and crafts centre and computer room having recently been finished. You can read more on this project on our ‘Volunteering’ page.

Kids at Uganda Lodge by Kate and Ben

Uganda Lodge itself operates as a bar and meeting place for locals, and accommodation place for visitors. We had heard mention of other events like video nights and functions being held in buildings onsite (a big open area where we did our morning yoga!), but were given the impression that these haven’t happened for a while – though they hope to get them organised more regularly. We stayed in one of the bungalows – of which there are four on the property and it was perfectly lovely. It was a big room, with a double bed and a big double mosquito net that protected us from the many insects in the area (drawn by the light – not many places in the area have electricity), and a small area off to the side that was set up as a shower. Unfortunately no toilet down that end of the property yet, but a perfectly good long drop further up towards the road. As funds permit, Denis is in the process of constructing a toilet right next to our set of two bungalows at the lower end of the property. People also camp – we had one group come through while we were there: Stuart, Fiver and Merryl, and their perfectly fantastic Landrover Defender on an overlander trip from South Africa to Germany. We have since run into them again, all because of our meeting at Uganda Lodge.

The setting of Uganda Lodge is fantastic – most of the staff are wonderful, and attend to your every need with a smile amidst the stunning rolling hills of the area. Denis took us both on a hill climb not long into our stay, and it truly demonstrated how amazingly beautiful Ruhunga is. There isn’t much else in the area for potential visitors, but it is on Kabale Road, on the way to the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest and the mountain gorillas and makes for a good rest stop on the way.

weekeego’s note: This is an excerpt of a long post by Kate and Ben about their experience in Uganda Lodge. Their blog is full of amazing stories of their adventures in Africa, we encourage you to check it out and get inspired!

Lost in Ohrid by EBBF

Photo from Lost in Ohrid website

When Katerina Vasileska first came to EBBF’s annual conference a few years ago she was on a mission: to attract socially-responsible businesses to the fledgling Republic of Macedonia. She tells the story:

How I started was that I came to the EBBF Conference in 2007 and shared my idea of attracting socially responsible businesses to Macedonia. Some EBBF members came and asked how they could help me in my mission, and so we began to consult on possibilities.

Now, after one year, and with a lot of help from Pippa Cookson, Ton Creemers and Onno Vinkhuyzen (all EBBF members), I have established my first company, “Lost in Ohrid”. It is an eco-tourism company, which uses the homegrown guides to give visitors a real feel for the town, traveling by bike, visiting fisherman on the lake, eating in a traditional restaurant. As a part of my work, I also implement small projects that are aimed to help village people with whom I cooperate for my tours. We’ve helped some farmers purchase milking and honey-extracting equipment, and supplied bicycles for girls in the villages.

Ton Creemers has also established a MCC (more compassionate company) in Macedonia aiming to help unemployed people to find the right job for them. Pippa Cookson is giving free English lessons to people who can not afford to go to courses, and that has been very helpful as Ohrid is a tourist center and the English language is very much needed.

So we are all trying to “walk our talk” with the engagements we do in our lives and businesses everyday.

weekeego’s note: This is an article originaly published by EBBF here.

February 3rd, 2010

Teaching English at Bulungula

Three years ago I went to teach English to the locals of a remote village in the former Transkei. I was 54 and a tad old I thought to be having a mid-life crisis which symptoms included nothing more dramatic than a restlessness, a constant shifting about in the seat of my oh-so-comfortable existence.

I lived 6 months of the year in an idyllic provençal village in France and the other 6 in another idyllic village Kommetjie, 35 minutes from Cape Town. There was no epiphanaic moment, my goals were clear and simple: I wanted to go back to teaching and where better than somewhere in Africa.

I did an online TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) course and still on the computer two months later, I answered the phone and it was my brother calling from what he described as a spectacular place in the former Transkei and he knew I would just love it. I googled the place – wonderfully called Bulungula – and read their site – and they needed an English teacher with a TEFL diploma.
I was teaching there 6 months later.

Bulungula Lodge

Bulungula is a back-packers lodge set on the Wild Coast and was started by a visionary genius, Dave Martin. I don’t use these words lightly. The Lodge is affiliated to the local village of 800 inhabitants so remote, so poor that they have no electricity, no running water. The village is only accessible via a donkey track.

Dave arrived in 2004 and established the Lodge on sound ecological principles-compost toilets, wind-driven power and a trust was founded whereby the local people had a 40% share.

Perhaps the rice-paddies in the hills of Northern Viet Nam can compete scenically with the Transkei-but it’s a tough competition: rolling hills of almost neon-green lawn as if it had been mown, dotted by thatched huts- the flowers of the landscape-painted in toothpaste turquoise or ochre and a tidal river ribboning its way through banked by giant euphorbias.

Bulungula People by Penelope Sachs

My teaching programme was to be for 6 months. The French have an apt Acronym to which I subscribe: BoBo- Bourgeios-Bohème or in South Africa-speak: a quasi-kugel with pseudo- Marxist/hippy leanings. In the beginning I found it tough.

On the comfort level, I wasn’t used to sharing anything-let alone a compost toilet; but I was hugely grateful that I had a special deal with Dave that unlike other volunteers, I had at least a hut to myself. It had a traditional dung floor and every now and then, a little mole would pop it’s head up. Cute moles and spiders make me scream. The ‘rocket showers’ terrified me as well. You had to light a wick at the base of a tin chimney which you had first soaked in paraffin; this combustion would result in small explosions and splutterings until the water had heated up. I knew I had to get it right because I was not going to run out naked shouting for help. I gave up showering and swam in the river. I also would never get used to early morning ablutions standing next to a strange man shaving. Of course in such a close knit community, such a poor community, the notion of privacy was alien. The kids felt they could walk into my hut whenever they felt like it. To try and get round this-without being mean, whenever I wanted to take a nap I pasted on my door a picture of me sleeping–my own Do Not Disturb sign. They simply ignored this and would walk in and watch me pretend to sleep.

On the social level, I felt old for the first time in my life. I could have been a grand-mother to most of the back-packing guests.

On the teaching level, I had 60 pupils and their names were nothing like Jade Emma or Wayne. I had to memorise their names-and all teachers know that you have got to do it quickly and especially when you don‘t have a common language- names like Kholikile, Makekwenkwe; Zithulele, Nozangile. (And sometimes after an initiation ceremony, the names would change.)

weekeego’s note: Read the complete entry to get more insights on Penelope’s discovery journey while volunteering at Bulungula.

Welcome to Enkutoto

Just three of four kilometres from Oloololo Gate is Enkutoto Village. On a slightly higher elevation than the Mara with views that stretch out as far as Iseiya and beyond, the village is part of the Mara Triangle Maasai Villages Association and is home to six families and their cows.

Wilson Naitawang' and Ben Ntaiya, who are from Enkutoto and are Committee members of Mara Triangle Maasai Villages Association by William.

Always welcome to having visitors at the village, Naitawang’ has been keen to show me around and gave me and Saruni a full cultural visit.

It was a couple of hours well spent, and a far cry from the stories tourists bring us from ‘the other side’, where villagers are desperate to sell you their wares because they often don’t see a penny that comes in from the entrance ticket. Just the other week, when I was putting up posters for the Mara Triangle Maasai Village Association over at Purungat (Mara Bridge), a visiting lady got quite angry with me when I told her how the system worked (or didn’t) on the Narok side and after spending two or three days with her tour driver she couldn’t entertain the idea that he might have pocketed the money.

Enkutoto have seen some great changes since the Association formed, and despite always having had tourists to their village, with the Association in place they now have had the chance to do the following:

Build a nursery for the small children of Enkutoto.

Pay for all school fees at local schools, for around 50 children.

Take persons who are sick to the hospital.

Dig a bore hole for the village (for water).

Develop a project of 12 Bee Hives; the honey is then sold to Kichwa Tembo.

They also have plans to send some of the young men to driving and guiding schools, to open up some wholesale shops at the local centres to sell beads wholesale and, they also want to buy a community owned car so that they can take sick people to the hospitals themselves if need be.

weekeego’s note: This is an excerpt from a post made by William in the Mara Triangle Blog.

Not much for many

The light-flies are swimming across my screen; the lake sounds like an ocean ; it feels more like an island here than part of a large continent called africa.

Local farmer by Jessie

For now we are in Mozambique, volunteering at Nkwichi lodge and with the Manda Wilderness project, living in a hut near lake niassa/malawi and doing many things with the lodge and with the community projects, writing more stories, walking in the bush slightly scared of potential leopards, watching baboons jumping across trees above us ; trying to have enough time and space to properly write about time looking through overcrowded bus windows at lives of great inspiration and strength bumping by. but for now a few photos and a few notes from a couple of weeks ago.

weekeego’s note: This previous text is an excerpt of an introductory post of Jessie’s adventure in Africa, you can find the complete post in the blog here.

(…)

2. these weeks have been filled with sounds and smells, stepping backwards, stepping forwards, words and thoughts, writings and images; here in the manda wilderness (ghost forest); volunteering with the trust, working on projects at the farm, collecting bamboo (.3), carrying rocks, making paths, tightening bolts, banging hammers, chopping tomatoes, making chutney, making sauce, swimming in the lake, playing volleyball, sitting around fires, walking through villages to get information for writing articles on remote health-care, agriculture, and environment issues, working with the community trust by travelling to villages and having meetings (.4) about community problems and giving info on mining +’s & -‘s (mostly -’s)… thinking forward thinking backwards. Trying to research for a new body of work here, where to start? mostly feels like a long process of attempting to understand life here, how removed it is from my own, but also how normal everything has become.

(…)

weekeego’s note: Jessie’s blog is full of details and pictures of this experience in Nkwichi Lodge, take a look at the original post in the link bellow.

January 22nd, 2010

Leaving Kufunda

What made me cry the first moment I stepped in the garden of Mama Knuth (the landlady of Kufunda)?
What makes me cry now that I leave Kufunda Learning Village, right in the middle of a team day?

Community Circle - Photo courtesy of Kufunda

Last week, just arrived after a 20-hour trip, I cried for re-connecting with the bedrock of humanity. My body re-members, as it re-membered the ancient rhythm of the traditional, ceremonial mbira songs.

Now I cry for leaving these young, courageous women and men who live the ideas and principles of Life, in its enormity, difficulties and challenges. I and we in the West can learn a lot from them. It feels almost overwhelming, the experiences and the learnings…

These young Kufundees (people committed to the Kufunda community) do what I have always looked for: applying – here and now – all good individual and collective practices for body, mind and spirit; for people and the land; for their own community and beyond.

The plane is now leaving Harare and dark clouds are gathered. I see rain pouring down somewhere further away, and I do hope that rain will nurture the little personal gardens around the houses or huts and the communal garden in the middle of the village. It is the rain season, but in the eight days I was here I hardly saw more than a shower of a few minutes. Global warming and climate change is affecting us all…

weekeego’s note: The feeling of Ria speak by themselves about the amazing experience that Kufunda holds for its guests.

Grateful for their examples

James at Kufunda

Step in the Kufunda Learning Village. A group of a dozen passionate Zimbabweans working to demonstrate and teach self-reliance: Composting toilets ensure nutrients are not wasted but used to grow fruit trees. A substantial herb garden and processing room allow healing ointments and solutions to be made for their people who live with a 30% HIV infection rate. Bee hives bring offer wax for some of their ointments, and honey. A pre-school is getting a rammed earth building erected, and the teachers are taking care of the children admirably. There is a large kitchen with efficient wood-fired cooking facilities. The library boasts books on subjects ranging from food growing to geo-politics. Dwellings and meeting rooms have been made using earth bricks and local thatch. Permaculture style vegetable gardens and young fruit trees offer greater food security. And a local currency based on hours of time is being traded in their broader region.

With the environmental, social, political and economic landscapes changing ever more quickly, people everywhere are looking for ways to organise to meet our needs locally. The Kufunda community has made amazing progress over four short years, while simultaneously assisting half a dozen other communities in their country, to do likewise. The persistent feeling Kim and I shared was that we were being given a glimpse of how our society may look as cheap oil becomes a thing of the past, along with the artificial or temporary affluence it has given us. We are most grateful for their examples.

weekeego’s note: This is an excerpt from the article “Life, Money and Illusion” written by James Samuel. read the complete article by following the link to his complete entry.