Clement Saturday

Everybody in Yambio seems to be called Clement. Usually with an Italian-sounding surname thanks to the influence of Catholic missionaries.

I love it when someone tells me that someone who I'm enquiring about is 'at the garden'. It provokes images of sitting care free on a swing made of twisted flowering vines, not eking out a subsistence living by tilling the soil to plant maize.

An urbane chap who lives near our compound, called Clement of course, has been trying to persuade me to develop community fish ponds at our project site, based on a model that is working well with a community group in Yambio. It's important to think about the appropriateness: people in Yambio are much better educated and able to adopt a new initiative and crucially are closer to markets for fish. I visited the fish farm today and it appeared to be working smoothly and with good benefits for the community members. The suitability assessment for our remote project site will remain ongoing.

Other parts of the day were occupied by spider dodging and writing letters to the National Security office to be able to buy fuel at the cheaper non-black market rate. Driving home from dinner it was remarkable how much the evening atmosphere has changed in Yambio since the first time I visited. By 8pm six months ago the streets would have cleared, leaving an eerie silence, and now people are fully in party mode. This behaviour is the best indication of greater peace and less political turmoil in this region of the country.