Uganda

Click here to view this photo book larger

THE BOOK

To see the book better, click on the link directly under the book where it says 'click here to view this photo book larger'. From there, click 'view photo book'. Then, before you push play, in the top right corner of the screen click the one page mode, and then click on the 'options' button. Adjust to a slower speed, change the background color to black (it helps when reading the text), then close out of the options, put it on fullscreen mode, push 'play' and enjoy!!

Yay for fast internet!! I'm now able to update on my entire trip!!

I'm now home. It's a bittersweet feeling. I was ready for a warm shower, for a pancake breakfast, and perhaps for a porcelain toilet but I was not ready to leave the people and life I had there in Lugazi.

Oh The Love

I've been so wonderfully and excitingly busy these past couple of weeks. Lately, the Town Council here in Lugazi threw our crew of 12 HELP International volunteers a small celebration to thank us for all we have done for their town. We have been so lucky to have the Town Council as a strong support in every project we've done. They gave a few speeches, brought in some drinks and food, and then we all jumped on the dance floor; including the mayor who was hilarious to dance with. Why are Africans so incredible at dancing?
Also, I've been working on helping some local women with minor disabilities to create a soap business. It's been such a good experience for me to learn all of the technicalities of building a business. We only have 9 days left to finalize it, get a building, perfect the soap, create a design, establish management, and to throw an opening celebration in the marketplace to make it known. No worries, it'll be done. Melissa and the town council are helping.
My disabilities class went soooo well this week! They are becoming so hopeful and are improving in their speech and agility. I've been doing home visits all morning with some local teenage girls who are so funny and awesome. We've designed goals with the parents for them and their children and are bringing in another organization from Kampala to give medical examinations and build us equipment that we need for the children on Thursday. Some of these parents don't even know what disability their child has. So I'm really excited for that event.
Also, we finished building a stove at the hospital yesterday. Yet another mud fight. While I was stomping clay, I stepped on something sharp and found a small pocket knife sized blade in my foot. I pulled it out-and it wasn't bad, I think my callouses saved my life. Thank goodness for walking tons. Then I joined some nurses for some delicious passion fruit juice that one of them made. I love these people, they are such hard workers with a desire to help their community. And I love their culture--they value relationships to the fullest extent. I have so many best friends here already! Enjoy the picts--there are plenty more to come!
P.S. oh and Please donate! Your money is already helping me make a huge difference here, I'm so grateful to be able to serve with the help of your generosity! I'm doing all I can to make every penny count. THANKS SO MUCH!! donate at www.help-international.org

Oh Rwanda

I'm in Rwanda for the weekend for a small break. Today we visited a few memorials from the genocide that occured here in 1994-it's so crazy to see the recovery that Rwanda and it's people has made in such a short time. I was at a restaurant here last night and began talking to one of the servers there. He's 18 years old and only spoke French and a tiny bit of English. So it was pretty interesting and fun to use my French, after spending a while talking I asked him how many brothers and sisters he has. It was hard to understand, but he said something like "ehh...j'ai une tante et un oncle..." "I have an aunt and an uncle..." So I asked him again about brothers and sisters. He was really hesitant, but then he asked me if I know about the genocide that happened. And then he told me that both of his brothers were killed by their neighbors who they used to be friends with until the huge political uproar between the hutoos and tutsi tribes. He also said that his mother was killed, and he didn't tell me about his father. He was only 3 years old, but he remembers. He didn't want to talk about it anymore, and I asked him if he has told many people his story. He said that he doesn't ever talk about it because everyone else has been through the same things so people talking to each other only brings back the pain that they are trying to forget. And he said it's especially hard to forget because the Hutoos that killed so many of their friends, neighbors, and even family members are still here. It's pretty hard on both ends; those asking for forgiveness, those trying to forgive, and those still holding on to hate.
He's such a cool kid. I can't help but look around me and know there are probably many of those people involved with the genocide. So so so many were killed in horrible ways.
Well, on that happy note....I'm having an awesome time, learning new things everyday, and am grateful for more and more things everyday. We are so lucky to live in America.

"Obama the real African hero!"

The people here are crazy about Barack Obama. It's hilarious, people ask me all the time "Nyabo, how is Obama doing?" or "Oh...have you heard of Barack Obama?" I usually say, "Oh yes, we are Obama's children!" haha
Lately, I have gone fishing to some islands with some locals and ventured through some forests and met some villagers who have never seen a white person before. It was incredible. And...I have been working at the hospital, in the labor and delivery department...and the infectious disease area, teaching HIV sex ed classes, and have been really into the disability project. A ton of travel, talking, business, etc.
We are meeting the Ugandan president, Museveni, next week. I hear so much from the common uneducated people that he is a good man, but from the educated leaders who i talk to a lot have whispered stories to me about how incredibly corrupt he is and how the ugandan government is one of the most corrupt nations in the world. I can believe that.
Ok, hope to write again soon! Going to build a fruit dehydrator with some local children.

Oli Malungi Nyo

Today, Melissa (our country director who is 25 and the most enthusiastic, responsible, and amazing person in the world) and I have been drawing out plans for a project we are going to start here in Lugazi that focuses on the mentally and physically disabled. Here, if you have a disabled child, it is looked at as a curse or embarrassment. It's so sad! An amazing man here who is a Cobbler, has only one leg, uses a walking stick for support but is amazingly agile and fast, is on a soccer team, and who is very involved and concerned about helping the children with disablitites walked and showed us about 7 different children in huts throughout the village. In each one, when we went in and sat on little wooden chairs we had to wait a few minutes for the parent to go into the back room in the house where the child would stay and never leave the house. Each of the parents were so incredible and so happy for us to even talk to them. We will be visiting each child a few times a week helping with physical therapy, baths, speech pathology, teaching school, helping to make them food, etc. Some of their legs were literally the width of two of my fingers put together.

I also need to decide what other projects I want to create here and help implement in the community that can be sustained even when I leave in a few weeks. Melissa says that each volunteer who was here these last two months has focused on one of their deepest passions and has found a and use for it. Hmm...there's so much that is needed here, and so much that I'm passionate about, but I do need to put my focus on only a few to make them effective. As far as my little projects go, I am teaching our cook how to read and how to braid hair, I am teaching a few men from church how to play the piano, and I am still helping build other adobe stoves, mushroom houses, and chicken coops.

Now I'm off to meeting with the town council about a building for a soap business run by physically disabled parents... <3

SO HAPPY!!!

Today:

-was covered in mud while building an adobe stove for a local family's, they thanked me and the other 3 volunteers who helped by feeding us AMAZING papaya.

-used a machete all day for different things (cutting sugar cane, bamboo, building house etc.) I felt really powerful it was great.

-helped build a bamboo house for a mushroom garden we are helping locals build so they can use it in town to make money. There's a good market for mushrooms.

-talked to an old lugazi woman with a tiny girl. her name's joy kauna. I didn't have much to give her because i knew she had no job and her baby has malaria, so i felt really bad...then i thought, wait a second..i have the gospel! so..she's coming to church w/me on sunday and i gave her some coins hidden in a bag of gummy bears so she can get a bus to make it to church. it's an hour away...it's against the rules to give money...but...yeah.


I'm loving it here, serving is the most wonderful thing in the world!

Mind Explosion

It's so odd to be sitting here typing on a dirt covered keyboard next to such technology as an computer with internet while surrounded by such poverty. I'm in a little store called 'Silda Internet Cafe' with 3 lime green dilapidated walls and it costs 500 shillings for every twenty minutes I'm on the internet...which is about 25 cents. It's always hard to tell what the exchange rate is here because apparently it changes everyday, based on what town you're in and inflation.

I went to church today at the local branch. It was incredible! Everyone was shaking my hand and it's funny when they shake hands here because they don't let go. Some people can have an entire conversation without ever letting go. I'm getting used to it, I kind of like how personal everyone is with one another. Always hugging, shaking hands, laughing, and they LOVE when us white people (we're called Mzungus) Muh-zoon-goos, try to learn their language, Luganda. Ah times up, love you all!

SUP LUGAZI?

I made it! Miracles do happen!

Sorry it's taken so long to post! I arrived in the small village of Lugazi late last night in a 'taxi van' packed with members of HELP (the organization I am here with). I'm in awe at how much these young college students are doing and how much they have impacted this little area of Uganda. Education and love is pretty much what is handed out, not money or food--it's a rule not to. I will have more time to write about specific projects I will be working on. They said they are excited I am here because they are in great need of people and help, and they said that I need to be ready for the busiest time of my life. haha I'm up for it, nervous...excited...amazed and how incredible everyone here working is, and the villagers! They are so gracious and loving. I have to walk to the village of Kampala now for a fireside that HELP is putting on for some local children and they will be showing us a traditional dance. I'm excited to learn it. oh, and today some of the girls gave me a dress to wear until I exchange my money to buy my own dresses and head scarves. Hope to update soon!!! Thanks for everyone following my blog and for your donations, they truly are appreciated, every penny goes a long way. <3 br="">
Sami

Three More Days

Wow, Uganda is just around the corner..or world in three days! And I still don't have the rest of the money :/ Miracles happen though, right? I guess we'll see. Otherwise, I created this imaginary suprastructure of my dream and passion in Africa...serving the world only through the keys on my laptop. Haha, ok, I sound neurotic and depressed, Don't worry! I'm Not! Still hopeful! and Excited!


I bless the rains down in Africa...