Uganda Village Boardgame Convention 2025

Gulu, Uganda

£3,245

Target: £5,500

We have raised 59% of our target 59%

44 supporters

30 days left


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Aim: Bringing the best boardgames to the rural children of Northern Uganda, while at the same time encouraging them to be wildlife champions

1751015002_1751015001870.jpegLast year's convention was the best yet, with hundreds of gamers coming together to play games, from the simplest to the hardest, as well as learning about other countries, with our international citizenship focus.  This year, we have a new strategy to focus on wildlife co-existence, since the children in Omoro district live amongst a wide variety of wildlife, yet they currently are advised that the wildlife are a nuisance or a source of food, rather than have an equal right to live and go about their business unimpeded. This means that we will be peppering some outdoor wildlife games and activities in with the boardgaming.

Running this Convention is uniquely challenging.  Few adults in Uganda know how to play any boardgames, so we rely on our young people to teach the games we have to the children that come.  This year we want to reward our youth boardgame teachers a little for their efforts by giving them a T-shirt that will help identify them as teachers, but also be a memento for them to remember the event.

Last year the feedback was better than any previous Convention, so we want to build on the areas where we excelled and do more of those activities.  For instance, the most popular area was the mini-tournaments, so we have acquired a lot more smaller games that the children can learn quickly and perhaps win themselves a prize.  Prizes are very important for kids in the rural areas, as they can build self esteem.  In addition to the tournaments we will be bringing in more of the same activities, with a few new ones:

Roleplaying Games

Many kids here in Uganda love to play roleplaying games, yet there are very few that have learnt enough to be GMs, so this year I have invited three of our past roleplayers to come and GM some roleplaying events for us.  Lat year's "defend the village" event was well received, hence our moving to some real roleplaying.

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We play Pathfinder, Pathfinder 2 and 5e and have on occasion run Starfinder and even WFRP.  Last year we did a simplified miniatures game on one of the Battle Systems dioramas, but this year we feel we can offer small roleplaying adventures, not just battles and perhaps even run an RPG tournament or three!

Indigenous games

Almost every young person in Uganda knows how to play omweso, which is a game like mancala, but with more dishes.  They usually play digging pits with their hands and using stones, but each year we run a special tournament where 200 or more of the attendees take part, with a view to winning their own  omweso set.


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Mind games - chess, draughts, othello

Chess and draughts are very popular in Uganda, with many clubs playing, but othello was something new we introduced last year very successfully, so it is back this year with an othello tournament.

Card Games - whist, rummy, hearts, learning bridge

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We held a brilliant whist tournament last year, having trained the children how to play the day before.  

Gateway games

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Wildlife and Science games - Atiwa, Ark Nova, Earth, Photosynthesis

Earth was very popular during the Convention1751015203_1751015201868.jpeg

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Atiwa is a new game we have been learning for this year.  It teaches that bats can help farmers expand the number of trees in their orchards.
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Nusfjord also a very popular game in the Convention

Tournament games

No pics taken from last year, but we had a range of games that were quick to learn and quick to play that we could include a lot of children in.  We also included some longer games with many players like Dragon and Flagon.

Word games

We have just a fewword games that we play, one of which of course is Scrabble

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Mega games

This year we played an 80-player version of Pioneer Rails, which had been donated by Dranda Games.  AGain we taught the game the day before and then played it the following day as a mega-tournament.

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Wildlife activites

In 2025, we started a partnership with IWCN, the International Wildlife Co-existence Network.  Where were are located is a wildlife corridor between Murchison Falls Wildlife Park and Kidepo, so often wildlife will escape either park and move to the other one.  The culture is that these animals can be hunted, though this is illegal in Uganda.  Our work amongst children is to discourage them from hunting, which can be very dangerous, and encourage them to learn more about the animals and birds living in their neighbourhoods.

During this event, we will be running daily activities alongside the boardgaming, which will introduce the ideas of wildlife coexistence to the children attending.  For example:

1. Animal footprints matching 

2. Nature walks 

3. Habitats models 

4. Story telling in the evening about wildlife 

5. Drawing animals competitions 

6. Planting pollinators friendly gardens 

7. Test on endangered species 

8. Making bird feeders 

9. Making insect hotels 

10. Wildlife documentaries

Budget

Food for 500 people for four days - £2000

With this money we can cook some treats as well, like passion fruit juice and popcorn.

Transport for children to come to the event and go home afterwards - £1200

This really is a difficult logistical exercise, as the children come from the remotest of places in Omoro and other districts.  We will also be bringing up a contingent of boardgamers from our centre in Kampala.

T-shirts for 100 youth trainers - £350

These will identify the boardgame trainers, so children can approach as them to teach a game.  Every youth trainer will have a minimum of ten games that they can teach

Prizes - £200

We will be providing prizes for all of the tournaments, including the indigenous game Omweso

Mosquito nets - £250

Our mosquito nets are insufficient to handle the Convention this year, so we are planning to buy more

Medication - £100

The Convention takes place in the middle of the rainy season, so malaria is extremely likely to be prevalent during the four days of the event.  One dose is about £1, including Paracetamol, so we need to buy at least 100 doses.

Games purchase in UK - £800 

I was able to buy about 60 new games at Games Expo this year for the Convention and we are already learning many of them in advance.

Games shipping to Uganda - £600

Shipping prices go up every year, but we have still been able to ship over 100kg of games across in advance of the Convention.

TOTAL COSTS BEFORE STRETCH TARGETS: £5500

Boardgame Outreach Work This Year

Chrysalis has spent much of this year focusing on boardgame outreach and visiting Primary Schools with our own secondary school students who teach the younger children the games we are likely to play at the Convention, so the they will have some games that they know how to play before the event.  Those visits have been incredibly successful and we have been able to introduce hundreds of new children to boardgaming with these Saturday afternoon events in schools.  As a result we are going to continue to operate these, adding more schools to our Convention partner list.

You might like to see the enthusiasm of these children in action at this video link

If you would like to support this outreach work, then let me know at [email protected]

More videos about the Chrysalis Secondary School here.

About Chrysalis Secondary School

Chrysalis is a secondary school in rural Omoro a large district abouyt 20km to the south of Gulu in Northern Uganda.  Our aim with the school is to provide the highest quality education we can at the most affordable price possible, helping disadvantaged rural children achieve their potential.  Only 7% of rural children in Omoro make the step to secondary school and even fewer finish their schooling all the way to A level, so we want to make sure that students at our school have a enjoyable and memorable time while at our school, while also performing well academically.  As a result we 24 clubs that take place run by our teaching staff including the boardgames club.  At the school we also have sports facilities including a 400m track.

If you would like to sponsor children at the school, then please contact me at [email protected] for more information about this.  We are constantly in need of new sponsors, to help bring the school to sustainability.


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Keep what you raise – this project will receive all pledges made by 11th August 2025 at 10:03am


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