Project
Ugandans Fight Against Sugarcane
How sugarcane reshaped Uganda’s farmland, food supply, and culture
My time in Uganda was the longest I’ve ever spent on a single reporting project: eight full weeks devoted to one story.
Initially, it sounded like more than enough. But once I arrived, I realized how long it really takes to begin to understand the nuances of a place as an outsider. I found that context was something I had to absorb by living alongside it.
Some of my most important learning didn’t happen while taking notes in a cane field or combing through legislation at my desk. It happened in the in-between moments. Each morning on the back of Innocent’s boda boda, as he ferried me to the office, our short conversations—about his life, his dreams, sometimes about mine—gave me a lens into the world I was trying to understand.
At home, my host family’s patience as I stumbled through Luganda phrases opened doors in conversations with farmers who spoke only a little English. A joke or greeting in their language softened the space between us in ways my notebook never could.
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I learned to value the walks through Jinja’s dusty streets, the small talk with market shopkeepers, the casual conversations that had nothing to do with my story but everything to do with grounding me in place.
By the end, those moments were what gave my reporting its depth. They made the difference between writing about Uganda and, in some small way, writing from within it.
