A Cause for Celebration

Yesterday we had at the village the opportunity to celebrate with Ooee Luke on the occasion of his 24th birthday.

Luke has been here at the village since July last year - I think he is looking into permanent residence. In that time he has made a number of good friends and they were invited to join with us for a party.

Luke purchased some special food, including Matooke, Beef, 2 Chickens (prepared for cooking by the boys) and sodas. Anne made a pair of chocolate cakes complete with the required number of candles and the mamas prepared the food.

When we gathered there were 63 in all. A delicious meal was served up, followed by the cake and the sodas, then the children were given the opportunity to wish Luke a happy birthday. Many of them took the chance to speak up, in english of course, and testify of the great friend that Luke has been to all of them. After the children, many of the adults also wished Luke a happy birthday and thanked him for his friendship, especially his good mate Farook. Luke was really moved by it all.

Clearly he has had a big impact on the lives of the children and also others from the community.

Happy Birthday Luke!!

Singing "Happy Birthday" as the cake arrived

Enjoying a Soda

Luke distributing the birthday cake

Peace, Jackie and Prossie from next door performing an item.

A few new faces

Here are a couple of the new kids, enjoying watching the computer

This one is Rachel, She is the second youngest of 5 sisters.

Here is the ever smiling Joshua. We collected him on Wednesday from a village about 50 kms east of here.
And this is Maliko, who came in on Monday.

One Week In

32 kids are a whole lot more joy than 16, but also a whole lot more interesting, adventurous and hard work.

14 children arrived last weekend and then one on Monday and another on Wednesday. Since then there have been times of outfitting them all with new clothes and shoes, trips to medical clinics for treatment and then all of them for testing, enrollment at the local schools (we have one secondary student) and preschool, and lots of time just getting to know them and watching all of the mischief they get up to. Some are learning rapidly the ‘rules’ whilst others it is going to take longer for. Without exception, they are all excited to be in the village and part of a new family.

The houses are gradually being set up - the new cooking stove is finally ready for use and tables and benches have been made to make the dining experience possible in two separate groups. Tomorrow we should get the solar lights up and running - very important since we are still without power after more than 2 weeks. When the lights finally come on I’m sure the new children will be quite surprised.

The integration of the old and the new kids has been amazing. After the initial infatuation and treating the smallest kids as toys has worn off, new friendships have been made and there has been no indication of any disharmony between the two groups. The experienced kids are very helpful in explaining things and helping their new friends.

It has been a bit of a shock for the two mothers, Rose and Persis. They are coming to terms with the work involved in caring for 8 kids, but with the support of the other mothers, Agnes and Loyce, they are getting on top of it.

Some things that have been highlights of the week:

• The smile on Maliko’s face on Monday when Ivan, Luke and I collected him from the Kikaramojo slum. Mailko is the boy who we couldn’t get on Saturday because of the recent death of his mother. He has been amazing all week and is so enjoying the comfort of the village.

• The sight of children playing on the swings - a simple little thing but probably the first time for most of them.

• One new girl sharing her new clothes with another who we hadn’t been able to get enough dresses for.

• The way that all of the kids have participated in the nightly devotions and singing.

• The kids discovering that they don’t have to hide away some extra food in case the next meal doesn’t come.

If you are not yet a sponsor of the village, please consider it. There are sponsorships available for the two new houses. Check out www.hopebuilders.org.au

New Kids Are In

This will be very brief (haven't had power for the last week and still don't), but 14 of the 16 new kids arrived in the village yesterday to much excitement -the others will follow soon. A long day in the bus was spent collecting them, and this was followed by a clean-up and the giving out of new clothes, then a fabulous welcome supper of Rice and Beans, followed by sodas and lollypops.

We prayed for the kids and robert gave one of his great welcome speeches, and the whole of the village sang worship songs and prayed together.

It was one of those really, really, special times.

The week that was

Despite all of the hype surrounding the presidential elections coming up next Friday, which includes more posters than you can imagine posted on any object in sight that either does or doesn't move, and streams of trucks with music and propaganda blaring travelling past the village, we did get some work done this week.

Around the village, the children have been at school for a couple of weeks now and are well settled in their routine. Rose, Shamina and Ibra started their pre-school this week, so the village was very quiet in the mornings. Once the children come home they have lunch and then get stuck into their homework, so it is very different to holiday time.

On the building front, work started on building that is currently being called Mission House. This is a mzungu style house being built on a block about 1 km down the road, which will house teams when they come over and will possibly generate some income at other times. We will move into it as well, freeing up the admin building to do what it is designed for. So far we have dug the foundations in some very hard ground,and as I write, the workers are laying the bricks that will support the concrete slab floor.

If you are wondering about things you could be praying for the village, please consider the new mothers and children that are to come into the village soon, and also for the release of the container of materials sent from Australia which is held up waiting for a document from the finance ministry here that at the moment is more concerned about the election than us.

Setting out is complete and the digging commences.

Digging done, hard core is put into the trenches.

A sugar cane break (smoko) I'm becoming African!

Why we are here

Today I paid my second visit in a week to a village called Masese III or Kikaramoja. The purpose of the visit was twofold. Firstly it was to take two of the children, Doreen and Grace, back to visit their Grandmother who had been looking after them before they came to Village of Hope. Both of these girls are quiet, and so it was interesting to watch how they would handle the visit. They were very keen to go, but when they arrived they seemed very uncomfortable and took a long time to warm their grandmother. Neither of them were quick to go off in search of old friends either. Both of these things were in stark contrast to last weeks visit when we took some of the other girls, admittedly slightly older girls, to the same place. Eventually Grace and Doreen managed to break through their reticence and away they went and we had to track them down when it was time to go. These visits are an important part of allowing to keep an understanding of their history and relationship with what family they have. We take some photos that they will be able to keep and to share with their families.

The second part of the visit was to confirm the names and ages of some of the children who will form part of the next intake. I found a lady whom I met last week with a little english and she took me off to locate the children in question. They were not immediately to be found, so after waiting for a while, I managed to meet two of them, the youngest two, and then we gave up and returned to where Anne was waiting with Doreen and Grace’s grandmother.

I went off to find Grace and Doreen so that I could take a photo of them with their friends, and was approached by a man. He pleaded with me to look after two more children, not his he assured me, and introduced them and their mother to me. He was concerned that these kids were about to reach school age and had no hope of getting to school if they were to stay in that village. As sad as that sounds that a mother would be prepared to give up her kids to what they see as an orphanage so that they could be educated, that was a clear measure of the despair that pervades this particular village. If we could, we would love to be able to do something for every child, and adult, who live in that place. I was given an article by one of the ladies last week in which the village was described as “the shame of Jinja”.

Just before we were about to leave, a lady arrived with a whole bunch of kids in tow. She turned out to be the lady, possibly an aunt, who was caring for the 5 children in question. These children lost their father to illness and then their mother was electrocuted. The aunt caring for them has three children of her own and is quite young. She has very limited resources to care for her own children, let alone five more. Two of the children had obviously large bellies, the tell tale sign of malnutrition. We managed to get all of their names and ages, and as we returned to the Village of Hope, we felt a new sense of urgency to get everything needed in place to be ready for the next intake of children so that these new kids that we met could come and find some hope in their lives also.

The scary part is that there are many, many children all over Uganda like this, and we can only scratch the surface. But if you can help or contribute in any way, please do so that we can keep scratching.

Doreen and Grace with their 'Jadja' (grandmother)

What's been happening?

The slab for the next house is now complete. Last Thursday and Friday a team of very hard working young men mixed and poured all of the concrete for the slab. Alas, they were not able to call on a truck like this one . . .

(image from www.constructionphotographs.com)

but they had to do it much harder. A couple of guys mix it all - first the two types of sand are piled up on the ground, then bags of cement are poured on top.

This is then shifted to another pile several times to mix the ingredients. Then the pile is spread out and the stones are spread out on top. Finally, water is added and then the hard work really begins. A hoe is used to push and pull the mixture to get it thoroughly mixed, then its loaded into wheelbarrows

and pushed over the rough stones in the foundations to the spot where its required, tipped out

and spread by a couple more guys.

We had a team of about 8 on Thursday, including yours truly (who spent the day pushing a wheelbarrow) and then only a small section was left to be completed by a few guys on Friday. Now its all done and dried out, ready for the bricks. Some of these workers, particularly Nick, David and Charles have been very much a part of village life whilst we have been here and are becoming good friends. Maybe soon we will tell you more about each of them in a post.

Actually the slab is likely to wait a while before any bricks are laid on it as there should be a container arrive within days containing the roofing for house 5, so those trusses will be made up on the slab where there is a nice, flat surface. Again getting the container released is proving slightly elusive, although there are few of the dramas associated with last years effort. Just waiting on a letter of exemption from the Finance Ministry, but with elections due in 3 weeks, getting someone to write and sign the letter is a tad difficult in the midst of all the campaigning.

The children are readying themselves for the return to school next week. All of the uniforms have been brought out and tested for fitting and any required repairs done by our resident seamstress ("the wife" - thats how she has been referred to on several occasions by others when introducing us or talking about us.) They have also muscled in on several of our Skype calls with friends and family at home - so if you would like to meet them, give us a call on Skype, we're usually available at lunchtime here or about 9.00pm EDT.

The next group of children are almost ready to move in. We have a couple of minor things still to do on houses 3&4 and then in a couple of weeks the village population will double. Everyone here is looking forward to that day very much. The current children in particular are often talking about how they will be able to help the newbies.