Photo by Eva-Lotta Jansson

As the mother of soccer players (both of whom are now too old for schoolboy sports, but never too old for pickup matches wherever they can find them), I read a story in the New York Times today that made me smile. “Joy that lasts, on the poorest playgrounds,” said the headline. It was about soccer—the universal language for love of a ball—and a new kind of material to play it with: PopFoam.

It was a story about an entrepreneur driven to develop PopFoam soccer balls for kids in some of the poorest parts of the world, where a ball is often just something that can be made to roll, even if it’s more oblong than round.

How many times have I witnessed that joy the headline heralds? It’s one of the thrills of any visit to the field I have ever taken  for Oxfam—to catch sight of a game on a patch of rough earth, on the foundation of a ruined house, beyond the mud walls of a compound. Plumes of dust billow at each bounce of the ball, feet flying after it. No shoes? No one seems to mind. The ball is all that matters.

 A whoop. A score.

And the game goes on. Read the rest of this entry »

In western Ethiopia, where my in-laws live, the iPhone is the hottest new accessory. Because few people have access to a network that would allow them to go online, most treat the smartphone simply as a phone—while still appreciating its usefulness as a handy, easy-to-grab camera.

I thought of those rural iPhones this week when I read Glenna Gordon’s excellent Guernica magazine article, “The Hipstamatic Revolution.”  Gordon profiles Peter DiCampo’s Everyday Africa project, a Tumblr blog featuring iPhone images from photographers all over Africa (including Holly Pickett, who recently took some stunning photos for Oxfam in Senegal).

Though some claim that shooting with an iPhone trivializes the subject matter, Gordon argues that these spontaneous photos are revolutionary in their very ordinariness, presenting neither stereotypically negative nor idealized positive scenes of Africans’ daily lives. And because the photographers use popular retro-cool filters like Instagram and Hipstamatic, the images convey a nostalgic quality recognizable to anyone with a smartphone of their own.

Photo: Liz Lucas/Oxfam America

“Using the iPhone to photograph Africa takes the political act of representing a place whose ‘otherness’ usually allows it to be a repository for our stereotyped narratives,” Gordon writes, “and instead renders them in the same color palette as yesterday’s summer afternoon BBQ.”

You can see that quality in these 2011 photos by former Oxfam staffer Liz Lucas, who used a Hipstamatic filter to photograph women using fuel-efficient stoves in Darfur, Sudan. Though they were taken in a camp for displaced people, Liz’s shots don’t convey sadness or conflict; instead, you see the small, familiar details, like the movement of a woman’s arm or a curl of smoke drifting through the sunlight.

So if this is the Hipstamatic revolution in Africa, I’m all for it. And with camera-phones in more and more people’s hands, I hope we’ll keep encountering these everyday images from all corners of the continent.

OxfamBuzzList is a new blog series about the movies, books, blogs, TV shows, music, and more that have Oxfam staff and supporters talking. Please leave a comment, or offer us your own contribution (400 words or less). E-mail Andrea Perera, Oxfam America’s Web Editor, at aperera@oxfamamerica.org.

The stories, said Ismail, are in their eyes.

Ismail Abdalla Algazouli is an Oxfam colleague in Khartoum, Sudan, who spoke to me recently when he returned from a trip to the war-torn state of South Kordofan. He is a security officer whose job is to ensure the safety of our staff, partners, and programs, and in South Kordofan—where  there is fighting between the government and rebels, between nomadic herders and Nuban farmers, and between Sudan and its new neighbor, the nation of South Sudan—his role is crucial.

In Sudan and South Sudan, gathering leaves and unripe fruit from the laloba tree is a desperate measure for people who have little else to feed their families. Photo: Alun McDonald/Oxfam

No bullets were flying where he visited—the  eastern part of the state, where an Oxfam partner is  launching a program to aid families that have fled the violence. But from the looks in their eyes, he said, he could see that people were suffering. Many were afraid to talk about what they’d seen and what they’d lost, because the communities are fractured and unstable: they fear that whatever they say could make them a target of one side today or the other tomorrow.

 What’s more, erratic rains and the disruptions of armed conflict have resulted in poor harvests, so for those who don’t have the means to pay for it, there is little food available. Ismail watched as people gathered unripe fruits of the laloba tree—inedible unless you boil them well—and the wild um medeako—a grape-sized fruit so sour you don’t eat it unless you have to.  Ismail tried, but as he said, “I could not eat even one.”

Despite the constraints of war, Oxfam and our local partner have a chance to help. The work must move quickly to ease the suffering (already we have distributed seeds in time for planting), but gaining people’s confidence will take time.

What we need to do, said Ismail, is listen. “Sit longer, dig deeper, and build relationships of trust.”

Oxfam’s Skye Wheeler returned recently from a trip to a camp in Jamam, South Sudan, where refugees from conflict in Sudan are living in harsh conditions.

Among many other challenges, the first year of independence has seen the influx of some 170,000 refugees into South Sudan.  Fleeing conflict in Sudan’s Southern Kordofan  and Blue Nile states, these refugees continue to face crisis upon arrival, including water and food shortages.

In the height of the dry season I visited Jamam camp in Upper Nile state (South Sudan), where Oxfam is struggling against a harsh and unyielding environment to provide water and sanitation for 32,000 of the refugees from Blue Nile.  There I found people living in extreme difficulty - hardship that has worsened since these pictures were taken, as the rains have arrived in this remote part of South Sudan. Few have the shelter they need to adequately cope with the rains that also turn the ground to thick mud and will likely flood part of the camp.

 As well as trucking water to tap stands in the camp, Oxfam is building latrines and is working with both the refugee and host population of about 3,000 people to spread vital hygiene messages and raise awareness on how to identify, treat, and prevent the spread of waterborne diseases.  Oxfam is also stockpiling emergency supplies of water purification equipment, rehydration salts, and soap to help contain the spread of cholera if an outbreak happens. These refugees are entirely dependent on aid agencies. Oxfam delivers water and sanitation all over the world and conditions here are about as difficult as they get. (Read more about the Jamam camps and about Oxfam’s work in this emergency.)

Women set out to collect water

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Here is Jamam camp in Melut county of Upper Nile, South Sudan, which hosts some 32,000 refugees from Blue Nile in Sudan. The refugees that live here escaped the conflict between the government and the SPLA-N rebels that broke out September 1, 2011. Women and children spend a lot of time collecting water. These women on their way to the tap stands were really friendly to me and were laughing about something. There’s a sense of waiting in the camp that’s typical of refugee camps. There is no sign yet of the peace Blue Nile will need for these refugees to return home. Photo by Skye Wheeler.

Basic services, like improved water sources, are needed in South Sudan, which will become the world's newest nation on Saturday, July 9. Photo: Caroline Gluck / Oxfam

This Saturday, July 9, South Sudan will become the world’s newest independent nation. Below, Oxfam’s program manager in Sudan, Augustino Buya, offers his perspective on this landmark event.

Augustino Buya was born in 1954, in Terekea in the south of Sudan, two years before independence from Egypt and the UK. In 1984 he became part of a local community self-help organization, which was an Oxfam partner. In 1987 he joined Oxfam, working his way up to program manager, a post he still holds today.

“Saturday for me as an individual is going to be a historic day because I have reached it alive. And also for all southerners it will be historical: whoever has reached that day will be happy,” said Buya.

“What I hope for the future is that there will be no going back to war. That’s what I hope.

Second, that there will be unity of the South Sudanese people to develop their new country. And that there will be good governance for the development of the Republic of South Sudan. With good governance there must be priorities. The priorities must be basic services, such as schools and healthcare, for the common man and woman.

The third priority must be the development of agriculture, to have enough food locally. These things cannot be done without good governance and support from the international community.

…I come from a family which was not educated. I am the only one who had access to education. And when I finished my education I promised to help my family.

Before I had my first child I was helping my brother’s four children. Now I have six of my own: that makes 10. This made me be very careful with my work and be committed.

Three of my brother’s children have graduated with a degree or a diploma, and so have my two eldest. The rest are still in school. I hope the new South Sudan will be an opportunity for them, because there will be a lot of opportunities and chances. That is why I’ll be happy on Saturday, when I reach it alive, because it means that for the rest of my life I know the small ones will get an education and opportunities.”

When I visited Sudan a few months ago, one of the highlights of my trip was attending a block party thrown by and for members of Khartoum’s community of Nuba people. For those unfamiliar, the Nuba region is a very remote and mountainous land in Southern Kordofan.

The party featured a band composed mostly of percussive instruments, and featured a guitar-like instrument that resembled more of an electric tennis racket than the traditional Stratocaster or Les Paul models that I’m used to seeing. The music itself was a hypnotic and throbbing kind of polyrhythmic dance-rock—the type of sound that inspired albums like the Talking Heads’ Remain in Light. A dance troupe outfitted in wonderfully colorful and ornate clothing performed several dances, some imitating fight-battles, and others with obvious courtship overtones. Perhaps the most joyous dance of the night was the line dance, which turned out to be the Nuba version of a conga-line, and ended up involving a few hundred locals all snaking and dancing their way around the large, dusty block.

One of the party’s organizers who invited me and my Oxfam colleagues to the celebration explained, “It’s important for us to create events like this to make sure the Nuba culture is remembered, and relearned, and passed down to the next generation. The Nuba people are from a hidden place, and it’s easy to forget they are there. That’s why we like to make this loud noise. To let you know we exist and are important.”

It is those words I keep reflecting on as I read of the current situation in the Nuba Mountains, where violence against the Nuba people continues seemingly unchecked. Long-suffering as a result of Sudan’s 22 year-long civil war, the Nuba people will remain tied to Khartoum government as the regions adjacent secede to the new Southern Sudan state. I keep reading how the situation in South Kordofan might turn into “the next Darfur.” Having recently seen Darfur with my own eyes, I pray that this is not the case.

Here’s a video clip from that night at the block party in Khartoum…the night I learned without a shadow of a doubt that the Nuba people “exist and are important.”

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Oxfam America music artist relations coordinator Bob Ferguson recently returned from his first visit to Oxfam’s programs in Darfur, Sudan.

In the second of two multimedia blogs featuring photos by Liz Lucas, Bob talks about getting a closer look at the fuel-efficient Darfur Stoves­—a project supported by music fans and artists like State Radio—and learns how they’re changing women’s lives.

Watch Part 1.

Oxfam America music artist relations coordinator Bob Ferguson recently returned from his first visit to Oxfam’s programs in Darfur, Sudan.

In the first of two multimedia blogs featuring photos by Liz Lucas, Bob tells the story of his memorable encounter with a family living in the Al Salaam camp for displaced people:

Watch Part 2.

It’s official this week: the southern region of Sudan will secede from the north and form the world’s newest nation.

When I read the news out of Sudan, I always wonder how the latest events are affecting the people I’ve had a chance to get to know on my visits to Darfur. 

Maryam Gado’s daughter holds the hand of a public health promoter. Photo by Elizabeth Stevens/Oxfam.

Read the rest of this entry »

The road may be long, but across southern Sudan people streamed to the polls to cast their votes. Photo by Alun McDonald/Oxfam

Tomorrow marks the last day of a week-long referendum in southern Sudan that could conclude with the creation of a new country. Across the region, voters headed to the polls to decide whether the south should break from Sudan and become its own nation or stay part of a unified Sudan.

The day after voting started, my colleague here at Oxfam, Judy Beals, sent all of us a message about what is unfolding in Sudan—a historic moment for a country torn by decades of strife and civil war. It has particular resonance for Beals, whose family moved to rural South Africa when she was 5. Growing up as a white child in apartheid, hearing only state-sponsored media and attending government boarding schools far away from home, she said she was oblivious to the realities around her—until 1976, when she moved to the US and landed on an American campus just as the Soweto riots erupted, unleashing the anti-apartheid movement globally.

“Learning, for the first time, about the country I had grown up in was overwhelming, shocking – and the beginning of my life’s work,” recalled Beals.

Here’s the message she sent about Sudan:

Beginning Sunday, the people of Sudan voted on their future. Reading about that voting–the long lines, the stories behind every vote and voter, both in Sudan and among diaspora communities everywhere, including in the US–brought me back to April, 1994, when I spent the day at the State House in Boston, simply bearing private witness as South Africans of every race voted for the future of their country. Even now, it stirs such deep, visceral emotion–the incredibly powerful act of ordinary citizens voting for their own self determination. Not sure what else to say except how proud I am to be part of an organization that stands for rights, dignity, and social justice.