#Anyoukarimojong KDF Valentines day 2015

The week of the ‘KDF Setting the Agenda and Food Security Conference’ is here! The office is buzzing with excitement as everyone is running around in KDF t-shirts, trying to do their best in the final mobilization and promotion of the conference. Teba is sporting the bright orange T-shirt through town today, and I will do my best to follow him, so at least we are visible in Moroto!

KDF Tshirts with the signature #Anyoukarimojong, get yours and promote KDF's vision for Karamoja

New T-shirts and quite a few laughs this morning

It is amazing to be part of a conference like this where the people who are organizing it are so passionate about the topic and the event itself. This isn't just a meeting about ‘Food Security’ as it is stated in our invitations, this is about Karamoja standing up and taking charge of their future. It is about making sure that every voice is represented and that every voice should be equal. Just because I went to university and have a degree does not mean that I necessarily know what is best for this region, often it is the people who stayed, the people who live off the land that have the most valuable information. KDF is trying to organize an event where everyone can come together and discuss the issues that are facing the region, in a way that is non-judgemental and hopefully constructive in creating a path further for KDF and Karamoja.

I have been lucky enough to work with all our volunteers in the last week and it has been amazing to meet all the different people, with such different backgrounds and professions, all coming together because they believe in what KDF is advocating for and are willing to take time out of their busy days to be part of KDF’s growing team of volunteers.

Some of my awesome volunteer models this morning, showing off the new KDF t shirts

Our Media team looking just a bit 'too cool' in their new attire

Join the fun as a KDF volunteer

My role in all of this at the moment is a bit all over the place. I spent last night with the media team of Vitalis and Mo2 trying to get our twitter hashtags going and looking for creative ways to get people excited about Saturday. As our meeting is held on Valentine’s Day there are bound to be some references to this, so although we don’t want to take the serious aspect out of the meeting, we need to play on some words when it comes to the day of love that we will all be spending with KDF. So maybe the KDF conference will be where you find your Valentine this year? At least you know I will be there!

KDF for Valentines? Love just might be in the air

This morning I met with more volunteers and worked a bit on our food budget before making some of our volunteers be models in the promotion of the KDF T-shirts that we will hopefully sell a few of during the conference. They will cost between 15 – 20 000 UGX which is about 7-8 USD? My math is not the best at the moment so excuse me if I am mistaken. They are the T-shirts in the pictures in this blog. So if you want to support KDF, get yourself a T-shirt!

If anyone is interested in joining us on Skype on Saturday I will be creating a group for that, so just let me know and I will make sure you are included. As we have limited data coverage up here we can’t really send the whole conference live, but we will try to find out what parts of the program on Saturday you find the most interesting and then we will have live feeds during the day, as well as having people updating you with pictures, videos and summaries.

Big smiles with the passion to match it

So as you can probably tell the majority of my attention at the moment is on Saturday and making sure that everything is in place, so I will now proceed to my third cup of coffee of the day and try not to get too overwhelmed by everything that is going on. I will keep you posted as we're coming closer to the meeting, and feel free to ask any questions, join us in person or online, Help us make this meeting a success, not just for KDF, but for Karamoja.