Sonrise Babies home

I may have spoken a bit about Damali’s new baby’s home- it is actually called Sonrise (I had forgotten). She is a good friend and fellow staff member of GIVE international with me. Damali started this baby’s home about 3 weeks ago, so like I said previously it is brand new and has nothing, except 9 children full time. She employs two women to stay the nights with her, and then about 4 others help volunteering during the day. One of the biggest things Damali and I talked about last week was the fact that she hadn’t yet taken her children in for HIV/AIDS testing, or gotten anything medical done. There is a free childrens hospital in town, but for some reason Damali is opposed to go there as she says the staff are terribly mean to children (I think this stems from when she herself was an orphan and was brought here) so she had yet to get any of the children tested; an extremely important thing to do as nearly all the children come from parents that have died from AIDS. Mainly, she was just terrified to find out.

Thankfully, I met an amazing guy from the UK named Alex who is staying at the guesthouse and was friends with my brother last summer here. He works at a school called Lordsemede Vocational in town, which is where a few of my friends two years ago worked. There is a health clinic attached to the school and Alex generously offered for us to bring all the children there for testing. So yesterday Miko, James and I rented a mutatu bus (local 14 person bus) and driver and picked up all the children and staff members, and brought them over to the Lordsemede clinic. Damali would not come, she was so scared and nervous to hear the results of her children, so she stayed at home and paced and prayed. Alex and our other friend India met us at the gate and up we went to the clinic. The lab techs stayed overtime to help us out and after about an hour, all 9 were done and tested. Alex went in to find out the news from the lab techs and came back to a very anxious me. I searched his eyes for some news as he tried to contain a smile and then just said, “They’re fine. They’re all fine”.

“Fine?!” I asked, “like, they all tested negative?!” He laughed and told me again and again, and we laughed and rejoiced with disbelief with all the mums, James, Miko, India and the techs. One of the mums called Damali and tell her excitedly, and then we all trooped back down the hill to the mutatu to take them home. We passed around the sheet of paper that said the kids names and next to that, the word negative. Ha!

Alex and India came back with us to Sonrise to meet Damali and see the home. She met us at the gate and tried to contain her excitement, but every few minutes she would run up to me and whisper in my ear , “I can’t believe it. it’s a miracle. Considering their backgrounds..this should not be possible.” We took some group photographs outside to mark this day as a wonderful, truly miraculous day. Finally, the crew of us left and took some short cuts walking through the villages to the main road to catch a boda into town for dinner.

As we sat around a table at Baraza waiting for our dinner, we raised our ice cold Nile Specials to a very momentous day in all our lives.

you are most welcome back to uganda!

Finally, I am here.

It took far too many flights and layovers and I officially hate flying.Minor detail and price to pay for being in Uganda again. In the last week I have re-discovered my love for this country.

I arrived Tuesday afternoon into a sweltering 30 degree humid world where time doesn’t matter and cold beer is dirt cheap. I was picked up by my Ugandan co-worker Emmanuel and we drove to Kampala where I met up with Dennis, whom runs Adrift Rafting (GIVE international is partnered with them). After picking up my cell phone, getting some notes and info from Dennis and saying hi to the Adrift staff, we drove to my hometown of Jinja, about 2 hours west? Of Kampala. I passed out the entire drive. That evening I met my first two volunteers, who got here a few days before me. James is from Chilliwack, (of all random places to be from..) and Miko is from Surrey. So, that’s pretty funny. We have mutual friends all over the board (James knows Shantani and Stephen and a few others from theatre, Miko used to work with the West’s at Camp Charis.) they are 23 and 26, super chill and good to hang out with, so we have been doing lots of visiting. My next volunteers come on Monday morning (a family with two younger boys) and then the week after that I’ve got three girls (20/22/32). It’s going to be a busy overlap.

The next few days Emma took me around Jinja to all of the newer placements we have for volunteers that I haven’t seen yet from two years ago. There are some exciting things going on, but lots and lots of help is needed. Some of these placements are:

Home of Hope (Tentpeg Ministries)- a home for disabled and abandoned children. This is shattering to your heart and soul. Most children have Cerebral Palsy, and other things I don’t know what they are and can’t pronounce. There’s no toys and not many blankets. There are beds with mosquito nets, thank goodness. They have a few old ratty wheelchairs that were donated, most kids in them just sit in them in the same room all day long. There’s barely any money- so the most basic medicine is a struggle.

Damali’s baby home- Damali is a wicked 23 year old Ugandan girl who was raised in Good Shephard’s Fold orphanage (one of our placements) and Ryan, my boss, has known her since she was a kid. Now she’s decided to open her own babys home (what orphanages are called). She has rented a house, and had donation money to get some bunk beds. That’s about it. She has maybe 15 children and 5 staff with her helping. The biggest thing is money, as it always is and there is no money for medicines or toys, so there is the cement floor for the children to play on, or the grass outside. We are arranging to take all her children into a clinic for HIV/AIDS testing as that hasn’t been done yet either.

God’s Gift Primary- this school is owned/run by a wonderful woman named Baby Justine, who works for GIVE international as well. Her and her husband got the piece of land with a small building on it for their wedding, and as they already had a place in jinja they decided to put a school on the property for the village children of kitigoma (about 10 min. outside Jinja). As a rural village school, there again is not money and Baby Justine pours everything she has (which isn’t much…) into it. the biggest thing right now is they have started building new latrine’s but ran out of funds half way through..so they are still using this old holes that has started pouring out everywhere, so they’ve tried to come up with a system of where you can pee/poo. There are about 100 children here.

New Victory primary- this school has a lot more than God’s Gift, but still isn’t a lot. It’s much bigger, and they have a huge field to grow their own maize and potatoes, and hoping that when they have the money they can grow beans as well, so the school will be self-providing for meals. About 20 of the students here are orphaned, so there is a small room with bunks where they sleep at the school. There are some construction projects that could be worked on that we are looking at, like putting in windows/shutters and finishing the new latrine’s as well.

Visiting all those and several others I didn’t mention has taken up the majority of my time. However, I have had time to visit Welcome Home, the orphanage I worked at 2 years ago. What a shock, to see how much the children and babies have grown in 2 years, how many have gone back to their families or been adopted, and the biggest shock of all. When all the toddlers came running out of the house to see me, one of the workers asked me if I could pick out Brenda, my favourite baby from 07 whom I saw from her most unbelievable near death state when she was dumped on our front step.. (check out some old blog posts to read about Brenda). The worker called for Brenda, and a chubby little girl came running up to me. This could not be Brenda- no WAY!! But it was. All the workers came around while we waited to see if she would have some recognition for me- and would you believe it- she did. It took a few minutes of her studying my face with a frown, and then like a light switch went off her face lit up and her arms were thrown around me and I carried her around for a good hour while I visited with the workers. It’s wonderful and truly a miracle from her state just two years ago. Amazing what can happen when you actually feed a child.

I’m unfortunately not staying at the guesthouse I was at last time and wanted to be in again, I’m at Zamo hotel (for those who know) which is right next door, though definitely not the same vibe as the guesthouse. However I have been over there for tea with Annette(the woman who owns it) and met some good people who are there, thank goodness..we had an epic Jinja night last night from Nile Reflections (formerly Ginger on the Nile) to Cool Breeze, and of course Sombrero’s… dancing till the early hours of the am.

Have I mentioned ever that a 500 ml beer is 2000 shillings, (roughly a dollar)?

I love my job.

an interesting thought on social change

photograph: lindsay seegmiller, ghana '08

"this year, north america will spend approx. 17 billion dollars on makeup. according to world bank and UN studies, it would only take 15 billion to feed every child and make sure one doesn't die from poverty every two seconds"

-craig kielburger, founder of Free the Children, the leading youth driven charity.

the 2009 debut

photograph: kettle valley tressle, summerland, bc. summer 2008. my feet. someone else' sweet graffiti.

"GIVE INTERNATIONAL is a Canadian-based charitable trust working in relief and development. It is committed to providing well-organized and well-researched volunteer placements for individuals willing to share their expertise within our health, education, and child development programs.
This is accomplished through placing our volunteers on projects where GIVE INTERNATIONAL has built strong relationships, and has been able to arrange the necessary logistics needed for a successful, meaningful, and safe placement."

i'm going BACK to africa!- something i've been waiting for since i left.

i am looking forward to taking the position of volunteer coordinator for give international this summer in uganda - leaving june 20th and returning september 8. thank you for coming here and following the journey !

if you are a volunteer, check out the links i have posted on the right hand side. they will give you some useful info on uganda stats and situations as well as options for things to do, places to go..

if you are wondering if there is a way you can get involved this summer with our programs, please check out the website that i have linked in the above paragraph for give, and if coming over isn't something thats possible for you, please consider partnering with us in purchasing a 'family kit'; which can be bought for only $50- which directly goes to buying a bed matress, mosquito net, cooking pots, soap and food staples for a family in need in a rural village- the best part is that myself and the volunteers coming over this summer get to be the ones to buy and deliver these supplies so you can see your dollars tangibly at work.make cheques out to GIVE international and either give it to me, or mail directly to GIVE in ontario.

wonderful. thank you for your support, please keep checking this site for upcoming information when i have a more insightful brainwave to write something interesting.... until then, be excited for things that are happening! haha weeeeeee!