Sometimes, in life, things happen serendipitously. This is how I came into contact with Natalie Angell, Co-founder and Executive Director of Shanti Uganda. I just happened to be copied on an email that had nothing to do with me, in which Natalie talked about her involvement with Shanti Uganda, and I knew right away that I wanted to talk to her. This is what I love about podcasting – it gives me an excuse to email strangers and ask to have a conversation with them.
So what is it about Natalie that compelled me to talk with her? It’s all about the Shanti Uganda Society, the non-profit group that she helped found. It started with a vision to bring healing to communities in Uganda experiencing trauma, through yoga and conscious birth. 
Northern Uganda has been ravaged by war, and the people there are still dealing with the effects of that. It touches all aspects of their lives, even decades after the fighting has stopped.
Shanti Uganda’s biggest project is the Birth House, which opened last year. Through the Birth House they offer educational workshops for midwives and traditional birth attendants, as well as preventative care, birth supplies and assistance for birthing women. They’re also working hard to reduce HIV/AIDS transmission rates from mothers to their babies. But that’s not all Shanti Uganda does. They many other initiatives, including supporting HIV-positive women through their Women’s Income Generating program. They have a very practical approach, and they’re empowering people to make their own lives better. I am really inspired by what they’re doing.
There’s really a whole lot more that I haven’t mentioned here. Shanti Uganda’s work with teen girls, their commitment to ensuring that all of their projects are locally initiated and supported, and their efforts to ensure that all of their positive change will be self-sustaining are amazing. If you’d like to hear more, or find out how you can support the work that Shanti Uganda does, I encourage you to listen to the podcast, or visit Shanti Uganda online:
If you’re as inspired by what Natalie is doing as I am, you’ll want to catch my podcast next week, when I speak with Madeleine Shaw, the founder of Lunapads. Together with her partner Suzanne Siemens she will actually be traveling to Uganda with Natalie next January. She has helped to support Shanti Uganda’s work for years, as well as doing her own work to improve life for girls in developing countries through her Pads4Girls initiative. If that sounds like your thing, subscribe to my podcast and make sure you don’t miss a thing!
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Just so you know, Shanti Uganda is not located in Northern Uganda. It is not in an area that has been ravaged by war at all and it is really a shame that they are using the war in the northern uganda as propaganda for their clinic.
The people in the North are starving to death, have little access to any sort of maternity care, and and are indeed traumatized. The rest of Uganda was never touched by this last civilc war, still has access to their agricultural land for farming and are generally much better off- so just say you built a clinic in Uganda. Don’t use the war and Northern Uganda to make it seem like your work is more important. Its misleading and makes you seem like you are making the women out to be worse off than they are- which is what white people tend to do to raise money in the name of Africans. An embarassment.
Many thanks for your concern and for reading about our work in Uganda! No, the Birth House is certainly not in Northern Uganda, we are in a village outside of Kasana in Luweero District. I don’t believe Amber’s blog posting mentions anything about the Birth House being in Northern Uganda, nor does Shanti Uganda claim to work there.
Unfortunately, if you ask any of our staff, or the women we work with, the long-standing war in the North as well as the Bush War of the 80s (which was centered in the district where we work) have most certainly impacted them and taken the lives of family and friends. That said, our focus is not solely on the impact of the war. The Birth House was built with the community in response to a need for safe, empowering maternal care.
Shanti Uganda does not embellish women’s stories “to raise money in the name of Africans,†nor do we “use the war in Northern Uganda as propaganda for [our] clinic.†We are, however, a collective of Canadian and Ugandan women working towards our goal of improving maternal health and the well-being of those affected by HIV/AIDS in Uganda.
Be well,
Natalie Angell-Besseling
Executive Director – The Shanti Uganda Society