Redemption Song Foundation hard at work!

Selfie of myself and Moses, a Twa child, on the way to his first day at boarding school with his best friends!

I have been remiss about blogging but busy in Uganda getting the Redemption Song Foundation (RSF) off the ground. Things are going great, but there's only one of me, and so much to do! Please check out the RSF Facebook page, for ongoing photos and stories of our work on the ground, with the Batwa (Twa) "forest pygmy" population around Bwindi Impenetrable National Park and other marginalized and impoverished communities. We are now officially approved as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, so any donations are tax deductible. Join us in Giving Hope by Building Healthy Communities and Sustainable Ecosystems! We have a women's artisan co-op -- you can order products via commenting on the Facebook page and they'll be shipped to you after payment is received! Check below for all the people-clothing, hungry child-feeding, getting kids in school-doing, hope-giving, basket-weaving, income-generating, latrine-digging in preparation for house-building and classroom-building we are doing with the photos below (or on the Facebook page).

Mutwa (Mutwa is the singular of Batwa or Twa) child Beckham, who I adore! You will recognize him as the "face" of the Redemption Song Foundation on the website, and RSF Facebook page, and one of the 2 kids who really inspired my move to Uganda.

Beckham and his brother Shivan -- such cutie pies!
 My latest two articles:

• The WASH Approach: Fighting Waterborne Disease in Emergency Situations. To report this story, Wendee Nicole visited two refugee settlements in Northern Uganda, Arua District’s Rhino Camp and the settlements of Adjumani District. She celebrated Global Handwashing Day 2014 with dozens of young children at Rhino Camp. Environmental Health Perspectives Jan 2015 plus many of my images! PDF version here
• Is the Human Cost of Saving Gorillas Too High? Forest dwellers known as Pygmies were evicted when their homes became national parks a generation ago. Now they're fighting back. My feature published at Take Part on Nov 25 2014 plus a photo gallery of my images: Up Close & Personal with Endangered Gorillas.

At the Redemption Song Foundation, I have been busy...
Giving boys and girls a safe and fun place to play (my yard!).

Building the 5th grade (primary 5) classroom at the Rugando Parents School, starting a "classroom sponsorship" program & giving hygiene packs for girls who menstruate so they don't drop out of school.

Giving kids' shoes for school, and...

clothing for boys and girls (dress here and many others donated by Made with Love).

Feeding hungry kids,

Including some who were left alone, who were way too young to be left alone...(and playing with my two sweet kitties, Amashemererwe and Rokundo)

Washing kids (with warm water!) or giving them a place to clean (in the shower here), if older.

And trimming toenails and fingernails to help prevent "jigger" infestations.

Starting a women's artisan coop which pays women directly a fair price

and raises additional money to be spent as the coop decides.

Getting kids in school, including these three wonderful Batwa ("pygmy") boys, who I am so proud of. They started Bishop's boarding school yesterday, and had dropped from school altogether before this.

Helping parents enroll their families in health insurance, and getting kids to the hospital for care, like sweet Beckham...

   

who has an unusually large belly, full of worms. And we had him treated for malnourishment a few months back. This is him on the way, they stopped to bathe in the river (I know, I know... old habits die slowly)

And facilitating the Batwa men and community to build a pit latrine,

 

and covering it so kids don't fall in,

So this young boy Moses (far left) and his mom don't have to live in a stick teepee, hopefully by the time the rainy season comes in March. Join us, we welcome donations and need volunteers who are good at ... updating websites, starting a Mail Chimp newsletter, running the RSF Twitter feed, doing accounting or just working with Excel spreadsheets with financial info, and much more!

I've been productive!

  The Habinyanja family group of mountain gorillas in Bwindi Impenetrable Park, Uganda. Notice the green lips! I guess mountain gorillas like their lipstick green. :)  Photo Copyright (c) 2014 Wendee Nicole

Check out my first Mongabay blog post Reporter's Journal: The Forests of Uganda, posted today! I have pieces coming soon at Animal Planet Online, CBS Smartplanet.com, and Environmental Health Perspectives from my Uganda Adventures, but in the meantime several other articles on other topics have come out:

• Pig Poop Power: Scaling up waste-to-energy technology could transform the hog farming industry. Discover Magazine, Mar 2014. (the full article will not be online until May).


• BMW's Big Bet on Carbon Fiber. How carbon-fiber technology is transforming the auto industry, starting with the uber-cool BMW i-3! Solutions Journal (Rocky Mountain Institute). Spring 2014.


• A Question for Women's Health. Chemicals in Feminine Hygiene Products and Personal Lubricants (may not be safe...). Environmental Health Perspectives. PDF version. Mar 2014.

Postcards from Uganda

I've been in Uganda more than a week and just wanted to post some of my favorite photos. I will give more information about each later, but... chimpanzees, mountain gorillas, the incredible Batwa (forest pygmy) Experience, and the sad state of their children at their homes, now, 20 some years after being evicted from Bwindi Impenetrable Forest.

Mongabay Prize for Environmental Reporting!

Ferns in Oregon. Copyright © 2013 Wendee Nicole

I'm thrilled to announce that I was awarded the first Mongabay Prize for Environmental Reporting! You can read the announcement here: Prize exploring the next big idea in rainforest conservation announced

The prize sought proposals to explore the question of "What's the next big idea in tropical biodiversity conservation?". After a two-month application window and a month of deliberations, this week an independent panel of journalists, conservation practitioners, and tropical forest specialists selected environmental journalist Wendee Nicole as the first recipient of the Mongabay Prize for Environmental Reporting. 

Nicole's reporting will examine the wider topic of innovation in tropical biology conservation, with focus on polycentric governance in Uganda and Peru. Her work will center around the late Nobel Prize-winning economist Elinor Ostrom's theories of polycentric governance and decentralization: putting power in the hands of locals. Nicole will spend time in both countries, interviewing on-the-ground actors and looking at the struggle to combat poverty while preserving shared resources like forests and biodiversity. In the process, Nicole will produce a series of articles on what's working and what's not in the world of forest conservation.

The 6-month, $20,000 grant will allow me to travel to Uganda and Peru to report on projects that exemplify polycentric governance. Though that's a mouthful, it is a very important and exciting concept. Ever heard of the "tragedy of the commons" where people are thought to always act selfishly and therefore deplete a common patch of land, such as the classic example of livestock overgrazing? Ostrom reviewed myriad real-life scenarios as well as conducting her own behavioral research and found that sharing a commons does not always end a tragedy. Rather than taking power away from local people and putting it in the hands of a national government, she found that giving local people a say and allowing them to have an influence on rules related to managing a forest, grassland, a fishery, or public health will allow sustainable management of that common good. It's cool stuff, and as my last post on "Mini miracles in Chattanooga" mentioned, I felt like I knew a trip to Uganda to see mountain gorillas and report on the amazing work of Conservation Through Public Health (CTPH) was destined after I ran into Dr Gladys (CTPH founder) at the Society of Environmental Journalists conference.

Here's a link to my bio and project info on the Mongabay Special Reporting Initiative Fellows page. I can't tell you how thrilled I am that I will be traveling to Uganda to be face to face with mountain gorillas within a few months!! I have been rereading George Schaller's Year of the Gorilla and need to get another copy of Dian Fossey's Gorillas in the Mist because mine is falling apart.

I just returned from a week in Oregon, and will post some photos from my trip soon. First I still have a post from a visit I made to DC in October. I'm getting behind on my blog!