On Monday, Emma and I would be making the batches of soap to bring to the schools for our July monitoring. The ‘May’ evaluations indeed became June, I was hoping to do three rounds while I was here, but have since learned that was too ambitious. 

Or at least that was the plan. Over the weekend Victoria contacted me to set up a meeting. And since she is so difficult to get a meeting with, I had to take it instead of helping make the soap. Then the time of the meeting was changed. And then one last change of the place of the meeting.

We were scheduled to meet at 10:30, so naturally our meeting started at 11:30. With only Victoria there to help translate, we went through line by line, the budget, timeline and the business plan allowing the ladies to converse and bring up their concerns. I had a nice round 10 items on the agenda that I needed them to at least be cognizant of, if not address. But of course the single item for them was the training, and when they will start.

Since that was what was motivating them to start, I acquiesced. I started to explain that the money they had been given was to help support them and also to begin the training, and thus was part of the budget. To keep this simple I called this “the little budget”, used for training, with the remainder being “the big budget” used to get their business off the ground. 

This seemed to work, however it brought up another concern, that I did not communicate at the present time. The money that was generated by the quilt auction was to be split amongst 10 women, and was roughly 7,000 USD. But only 7 would be participating in the business, which means the pool of money left to the business was actually less than their accounting. 

The ladies deliberating

Their next point of contention was the figure Mama Cave had quoted me at, they said it was too much, and the assistance’s fee was unnecessary, and her estimate for sewing machines was too high. A few women stated that they could be the assistance and help the remaining less trained women, and should be compensated for that. I again, did not want to disrupt the momentum of the meeting to point out that they would essentially be paying themselves, and thus further decreasing the remainder of the big budget.

Their solution was for me to go back and talk to Mama Cave, and get them a better offer. Fearing that the women were on a rudderless ship, I then had Victoria reiterate to them that I could not negotiate on their behalf, they needed to be with me when this conversation was happening, or this back and forth would go on forever. Hoping that someone would step up to steer the group towards making progress. I was disappointed as their silence spoke volumes.

I eventually got them to concede to coming to meet Mama Cave with me, and that I needed their input into making the business plan. Location scouting (I don’t live in Gulu, how can I decide where is a good location for a business?), pricing (how would I know how much to charge to for a school uniform or dress?) and marketing (its their business, how can I operate their website or social media?). These are things I can, and will to the best of my ability, guide them on, but at the end of the day the business is theirs.

I feel this lengthy meeting impressed upon them what would be required for the three action items to give them the remainder of the money and for their business to take off. However, with my time in Gulu coming to an end in 29 days (31 July), the ladies’ runway is getting short.