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About Buturi

Like many parts of sub-Saharan Africa, Northern Tanzania has suffered from the twin disasters of AIDS and drought. Twenty-five years of AIDS has decimated the community, so that we tend to see the very young and old with the stronger, more capable generation missing. The older generation struggle to bring up their orphaned grandchildren. Buturi is a village typical of this situation.

The villagers are mainly Nilotic people, who migrated from Egypt and Sudan some five hundred years ago. They have their own language; Luo and also speak Kiswahili, the only generic African language. English and Kiswahili are the national languages of Tanzania, but few speak English in the villages. They are fishermen and subsistence farmers, typically living in thatched mud huts, without electricity and water. There is no safety net provided by the State, only the safety net provided by the extended family, which is becoming a broader base supported on an increasingly fragile inverted pyramid. The overriding impression for visitors to the area is one of struggle, sacrifice and hopelessness.