Work Hard, Play Hard

Work Hard...

Our second wave of volunteers has arrived, which puts us at a total of 18 people in the house. It's a bit tight, but luckily we all get along. Our volunteers are good hearted and hard working, so we've been able to get a lot of work done.

The Orphanage

Towards the end of May, our team visited Dan Wagidoso at the orphanage he founded, Community Child Development Orphanage. He explained a number of challenges they face at the orphanage, largely due to a lack of funding. He asked if there was some way we could help him to start an income generating activity that would help him fund the orphanage, even after we left. 

After a lot of discussion and asking Dan what he felt would be most beneficial for his orphanage, we decided to help him to expand his garden. Dan already has a garden which he uses to produce income for the orphanage, as well as to feed the kids. But he expressed a desire to expand it so that he'd have more food for the kids, and even more income. He just didn't have the manpower to plant a new garden with 25 banana trees, 25 matoke trees, 500 coffee plants, and several rows of maize and beans. We loved this project idea because it tackled two issues in one project; it would provide more food for the kids, and more income for the orphanage. We got to work planting the garden, and now we're almost finished. 

I gained a new respect for Ugandan farmers. Digging holes in the clay is hard work!

Dan also told us that the orphans learn about geography in school, but most of them had never seen a map of the world. When the teachers teach about different countries, they often have to try sketching the countries on a blackboard.

We solved this problem by painting a world map on one of the walls on the school. Since Dan is an artist, he drew the map himself, and we painted it. 

The teachers and kids were stoked to have this new tool to learn about world geography!

Blood Drive

One thing I've never realized is how vital blood is for doctors to do their work. Women in labor lose a great deal of blood during child birth. Kids suffering from malaria often need blood transfusions. For doctors, blood is like a medication, and currently Ugandan doctors are facing a blood shortage.

We decided to partner with the local blood bank to put together a blood drive to help with this issue. It was a lot of work to organize this event, but we ended up having 101 donors come and donate a total of over 36 liters of blood. It's said that the blood from one donor can save three lives. Dr. Benjamin, the manager of the Blood Bank, told us that they have never seen that kind of turnout at the location where we held the drive. 

We loved working with the staff at the Mbale Blood Bank to carry out this life saving event.

Immunizations

Immunizations are critical because they protect children from contracting horrible diseases like Polio, Hepatitis, and many others. The Ugandan government has recognized the importance of immunizations, and they have mandated that all children receive their immunizations before age five. If parents don't get this done, they can be taken to jail.

The problem is many parents live in remote areas and they have to travel great distances to the nearest health center to get the immunizations. This is very expensive for the parents, many can't afford it.

We decided to partner with a local clinic, Joy Hospice, to do immunization outreaches. So far, we've given over 100 immunizations, and we're just getting started. 

Nutrition Outreach in Kyemula

After meeting with one of our partners, the Foundation for Development of Needy Communities, we identified a rural village, Kyemula, that was in great need. This village had a variety of health issues. We decided to do an outreach, but first we wanted to understand what would be most helpful for the people. So we created a health survey and went home to home, asking a variety of health-related questions, trying to pinpoint the biggest health challenges the people face. This is Amber Davis, one of our volunteers, asking questions to one of the locals.































After compiling our results, we realized that basic nutrition was a huge issue in this village. The people ate the same foods each day, foods that were carb heavy, but their meals were lacking in fruits and vegetables. We decided to do a multi-phase project where we would first give a workshop about nutrition, then we would return and help the people plant new crops into their gardens to help them diversify their diets.

The workshop went very well! We asked Milton the village leader to invite 40 people, and we had 39 in attendance. Mobilizing a community is very challenging, and we were very impressed with Milton's leadership and with his ability to gather his people. We went back the following week and planted four new crops, onions, cabbages, eggplants, and tomatoes into nursery beds. The villagers loved watching us dig and get dirty with them. 

The people were very grateful for our visit, and even more grateful to add new crops to their gardens.

Village Savings and Loans in Kyemula

We were so impressed with Milton, and with the people in Kyemula, that we decided to start a Village and Savings and Loans groups there. The problem with people that live in these rural villages is they often don't have access to a bank. They struggle to save their money, and to take out loans to start businesses. We partnered with Pathways Development Initiative, a local Community Based Organization that helps villages, to set up the VSLA. 

We had 30 people show up to our first meeting, the exact number that we wanted for the group. 

They were anxious to start this new group. We purchased a large metal box, which would act as their mobile bank. The people meet each week, and bring 1000 Ugandan Shillings (about 40 cents) to deposit into the box. As the amount of money within the box begins to grow, the people can start taking out loans from the VSLA to start businesses. They pay the loan back with a certain interest level, and over time the value of the money within the box begins to grow. 

The people will be meeting each Thursday to deposit money and take out loans. We will be meeting with them to make sure everything goes smoothly, and to teach them basic business and financial principles. We helped them to democratically choose a Chairperson, a Box Keeper, two Money Counters, and three Key Holders. 

We are working on a number of other projects; girls empowerment, latrines, income generating activities, and many more!

Play Hard...

Rafting

We've been extremely busy, but we have tried to find time for fun. A few weeks ago we went as a team to the Nile River and went white water rafting. Class five rapids! Some of the biggest I've seen. We flipped a few times.

I learned quickly that the river was in charge. I tried swimming, but the Nile took me where it wanted. Luckily we had pro's that were able to gather us up and get us back into the raft.

Bungee Jumping

Bungee jumping has been on my bucket list for a long time, but it's always been too expensive for me to do in the U.S. We found a place to do it here for fairly cheap. Free falling 140 feet was an incredible experience. 

Jumprope

While we were visiting a medical clinic, we had some extra time to wait for the taxi. So we pulled out the jump rope and played with the locals.

The people here get joy out of the most simple things. They have so little, yet they're so kind and fun. They're humble. I learn so much from them. Love them so much!

The Crew is Here

Moving In

We found a house, signed the contract, and hired two solid guards to provide security for our compound. The next step was to move into our new home. 

Moving was quite the process. We moved 25 bunk beds, 30 mattresses, and a ton of other items. We didn't know when we rented our house that we were just down the street from where all of our things were stored, about a thirty second drive. Huge blessing! This saved us a lot of time while moving. Elder Halladay and Elder Mukustwana saved us! They devoted a few hours to help us move; they also provided the moving truck. 

Laundry

Since all of our things had been in storage for almost a year, we did a lot of laundry. I don't know how many mosquito nets we washed, but it ended up being two buckets full. We also washed a tote full of mattress covers. We used our friend Saleh's washing machine and dryer, but with the power going on an off, laundry took a "good minute" as Jess would say. Finally at about midnight, we finished the laundry and hopped on boda boda's to head home. Baker, one of our great friends, decided he wanted to be in the picture. Love that guy.

Jess and I worked together to get the house in order before our volunteers arrived. Jess organized and cleaned, I moved and fixed things, and in some cases broke things! After a lot of work, we got everything ready for the crew. 

UNHCR

Jess and I left for Kampala early Wednesday morning, 5/14/14. I had an interview with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugee's (UNHCR) office at 2:00PM. 

One of my greatest passions is serving the refugee population. These wonderful people were forced to leave their countries of origin due to no fault of their own. Several people from Sudan, Congo, Somalia, and other countries have crossed the border into Uganda to seek asylum. I've worked with refugees for over three years in the United States in two different refugee resettlement organizations, but I've never had the chance to be involved in the resettlement process overseas. With a lot of help from my friends in the refugee community, I was able to arrange an interview with Heidi Boehner, Senior Resettlement Officer in Kampala for UNHCR. 

I had a great meeting with Heidi. She was very kind, and is going to try to find an extension office where I could work one day per week conducting interviews with asylees that are seeking refugee status. I'm keeping my fingers crossed, I would love to help UNHCR while I'm here in Uganda!

The Crew

After I finished my interview, we took boda boda's from UNHCR to the taxi "stage" as they call it, then we took a taxi to the taxi park in Kampala. I've never seen so many taxis in my life! People everywhere, taxi's everywhere, and we had no idea where we were going. 

A random guy, without us even asking, told us to follow him and he'd lead us to where we needed to go. He walked with us for 15 minutes until we safely got on the right taxi to head toward Entebbe where we'd pick up our volunteers from the airport. 

Someone tried to pickpocket Jess. One of her zippers on her backpack was opened, and the lining inside her pocket was pulled out. Luckily, she was smart and didn't put anything in her outer pocked. I've considered putting a poisonous snake or spider in the outer pocket of my back pack, so if a thief tries to pick my pocket he'll have a surprise awaiting!

We arrived to Entebbe late Wednesday evening. Our first volunteer arrived at 3:00AM Thursday morning, another came at 9:30AM, and three more came around 2:00PM Thursday afternoon. Jess took this group and they started the five hour trip back to Mbale.

I waited behind. We had one more volunteer come in at 10:30PM Thursday night, and the last volunteer came at 3:00PM Friday afternoon. We started on our way to Mbale, and made it safely home around 10:30PM Friday evening.

Our volunteers are amazing. Each of them has dedicated at least the next five weeks of their lives to serving the people in Uganda. They have several different interest, and they are very talented. 

We have a smaller group of volunteers this first wave, just seven people. Our next group will have over 20, but it's good to have a smaller group to start. We gave them some time to sleep, to get unpacked and to settle in, then we hit the road. 

Today, we took them to the Community Child Development Orphanage. The founder, Dan Wagidoso, started the orphanage a few years back. He used to travel deep into the villages in his area to search for banana fibers. He used the fibers to do his artwork. He graduated from college with a fine arts degree and he's a very talented artist. As he was traveling through the villages, he became aware of several orphan children. Many of these children had lost their parents to HIV, and they were alone. He started taking them in, because he felt that it was his "ministry". He's since adopted 100 orphans and he provides them with food, shelter, healthcare, and even education.

There is a waiting list of 200 kids in the community that need to get into the orphanage. Right now, Dan does not have the time or the money to expand his orphanage to serve those kids. He's asked our help to raise more income for the orphanage. He's also asked for our help to teach the kids English, computer skills, and a many other things. Before we left the orphanage, we snapped a pic with Dan and some of the kids that live in the orphanage.

Oh ya, one of my favorite moments of the week. We were on the bus going from Mbale to Kampala, and suddenly the bus stopped. Everyone started piling off the bus. We didn't know what was going on, so we stayed on the bus to watch what everyone was doing. We soon realized that the bus driver had pulled over so that everyone could relieve themselves on the side of the road. Men, women, and children walked off the bus, into some short grass, and started taking care of business. Gotta love it!

Laying the Groundwork

And we're off!

Meet Jessie Maughan. Together we will be managing over 20 volunteers to carry out a variety of development projects in Uganda. Jessie and I just finished our first year of the Masters in Public Administration program at BYU. We were actually on the same team in our first semester of the program, and we've become great friends. We weren't expecting to get paired as co-directors! We are a good team and we look forward to working together.

We've arrived

It was a long trip: from Salt Lake City to Houston, Houston to Turkey, Turkey to Rwanda, Rwanda to Uganda. Then a two hour car ride to Mukono, Uganda, followed by a four hour car ride to Mbale. Couldn't want to hit the sack!

Housing

When we first got to Mbale, our goal was to find a house within 24 hours. Eight homes and five days later, we found a house!

We had to find a place that would accommodate 20 volunteers, that was enclosed by a cement wall, that was within our budget, and that was habitable. In Uganda, the housing process is a bit different. They show you a house that's being renovated. Once you've committed to purchase the house, they finish the renovations and clean it out. You have to imagine what the house would look like if all the renovations were finished, and if all the dead cockroaches were cleared out!

Once we decided to buy the house, we sat down with Moses, the caretaker of the house, to negotiate the contract. We started low, he started high. We ended up deciding on a price of 1.4 million Ugandan Shillings per month. It's pretty sweet that you can find a house with five bedrooms, and four bathrooms for about $560.00 per month. We had a good friend, Saleh, with us the whole time to make sure we got a fair deal. Saleh has been a loyal friend to HELP International for years. We've been staying at his hotel while we waited to find a house.

We typed out the contract, saved it on a flash drive, went up the street to a printing business, printed it, signed it. Finally, we have a house!

Partnerships

HELP International's model of doing development work is to partner with local government and non-governmental organizations that are already doing good work in the community, and we assist them with their work. 

Our first wave of volunteers will arrive May 15, so we have about two weeks to form partnerships with organizations that do impactful work. 

So far we've seen several organizations. We visited the HIV/AIDS Support Network (HASN), an NGO located in the Namatala slum. Their mission is to provide support and counseling to people in the community that test positive for HIV. 

We visited Child of Hope, a Christian charity that produces a huge social impact for slum children and their families in Eastern Uganda through free education, healthcare and welfare. 

We also visited CURE Hospital. CURE has hospitals in 10 different countries. CURE Uganda is a specialty teaching hospital that treats the neurosurgical needs of children, with an emphasis on hydrocephalus, neural tube defects, spina bifida and brain tumors.

We've visited a number of other organizations, such as Mbale Regional Hospital, the Foundation for Development of Needy Communities, Namatala Primary School, Educate, and many others. These organizations are incredible, the people that work there are so pure and good.