Slummin It and Lovin it

Day three was amazing, just like the rest. I feel like this is already going by too fast!

I forgot some things from yesterday. I have been so focused on the amazing people here I have been forgetting to mention the projects we are working on. Up in the mountain village that we visited yesterday HELP was assisted them in organizing a Village Health Team (VHT), that goes out into the community to help teach them about health and refer them to the clinic when they are sick. We were able to make them some visual aids to help them teach the people in the village. Then later in the day our team taught the VHT’s about CPR, how to take heart rate and respiratory rate. It was such a magical experience. It seems so simple, but to them it was all new and very valuable information. We gave them the ability to not only teach but actually be able to help in emergency situations.

Today I got to sleep in which was awesome! I finally feel like I am adjusted to the time and well rested. I know you don’t care but I also got to skype with my wonderful boyfriend Andrew, which was something I really needed. We then went to an internet café called Chat N Chino, the guy who owned it lived in Texas for 6 years, so they have lots of American food. SO EXCITING!! I wasn’t too hungry so I just had a chocolate milk shake, it tasted like home.

Later on we went to the slum in Namatala. It was such an enlightening experience. We were there to teach a pre-natal class to the women. Today we taught them about the benefits of breastfeeding and how to solve some common breast-feeding problems. It was disturbing how little they knew about the subject and the lack of knowledge about pregnancy and family planning in general. You can tell how badly they want to learn and change how they live. They want their children to be healthy and they want to be able to control how many children they have. It was amazing to see how big of an impact it was having, being such an easy thing for us.

We took a tour of the slum. At first it was heart breaking seeing how little these people had. But as I continued to talk to the people and the children I realized that they lead much happier lives then many of the wealthy people in America. They are always smiling, and they are happy to see us. IT is really very heart warming. We also hung out around the school in the slum called Child of Hope. The school is a private school started by some people from the U.K. that provides the children with an education that would otherwise be unattainable.  The children were playing outside and it was so fun to watch. They do not have all the things we have in America, but they played harder and with more enthusiasm than I saw in all five years working at the elementary school. They made balls of plastics bags and drew hopscotch in the dirt. They danced and sang and ran around, smiling and laughing the whole time. I could not stop smiling.

At the school I met a ten year old boy named Egessa. His favorite game is futbol, his favorite color is red, and he likes the number 1 because he is number 1. He told me when he grows up he wants to be an electrical engineer. I was so thrilled to hear that he had such a awesome dream. But then he broke my heart. He said that in order to achieve his goal he was going to have to leave Uganda and that it would be nearly impossibe to be able to afford this. He wants so badly to go to school in the U.K. or U.S. so that he can come back to Uganda with a great education and help his people. Tears came to my eyes, I want to help him, I just do not know how. He has such a beautiful spirit. I am envious of the person he is, having grown up in a slum, with no money and being so virtuous at such a young age. He makes me want to be a better person. He asked me if I would come back and see him next week. I got the impression that no one had really ever listened to him talk about things like this. I will never forget this little boy and I hope that I may be able to figure out a way to help him reach his goal! It is not news to me that children are people too, but he just reminded me how wise and inspiring children can be.