Samisisi, Santanda and Namenya

The last three villages I visited. Since last year, the boy in the green T-shirt from Namenya has grown more than 10 cm.

Cassava root, which is a staple food during this time of famine, can be seen in some of the photos. They’ve only been eating cassava root once a day for about 2-3 months, but even their cassava reserves are depleting. The famine will last until January or February of next year. The root is first melted in the river, which is now mostly sludge, then dried and ground by hand to make a kind of polenta flour, which is then boiled for hours to make it edible. It has a very unpleasant odour.