Uganda Blues

I've been helping out at the church holiday club this week, and we've been looking at who the world was made, is now broken and will one day be fixed again when Jesus returns.

I believe that God created the world, something that I don't think I'll ever grasp. God created everything from nothing. He created all the beautiful views I saw in Uganda, he created the animals of the Savannah and the ones (mainly birds) that live in my back garden. He created the Universe, from the stars I can see at night to the galaxies hundreds of light years away. And created it as a backdrop for his greatest creation. Human beings. Me and you.

And when God created it, the world was 'very good,' but the world isn't anymore. We suffer from natural disasters like floods and famines, and as human beings instead of caring for the world God created, we're destroying it. Global warming, deforestation, poverty. All words we're familiar with, all words which we are the cause of.

Despite seeing amazing sights in Uganda, I also saw such brokenness. Kaara was a lovely place, and crime was low but the reason behind this fact, the people of Kaara would stone a criminal to death if their crime was severe enough. And likewise, when I look beneath the initial loveliness of a memory, I also can see brokenness. I have many happy memories of walking up the steep slopes of the valley with the children, but it was a daily walk for them to collect water. I have memories of Francis, who lost his Father to Aids. Liz spoke of the greed of some men, in their desire to gain more money selling too many of their crops so their families wouldn't have enough to eat. I remember seeing beggars on the street, children going without an education and hearing about arranged marriages and polygamy. All things I oppose, and yet are powerless to prevent. Despite living in a beautiful world, we live in a broken one. Whether you believe in God or not, you can not deny that something is wrong with this world.

And despite seeing such pain, I have a hope. Not a wishywashy hope that one day something will change, but a knowledge. I believe that Jesus will one day return, and when he does he will create a new heaven and a new earth in which the world's brokenness will be fixed. And this knowledge keeps me going, that one day Jesus will wipe every tear from our eyes, one day death will be no more, one day poverty will be a word of the past because one day, Jesus the King of Kings and Lord of Lords will return. 

Some of the Diocese's work in Kaara

The people of  Kaara, like many in the Diocese, lived on the top of the hills. Which to British person seemed rather bizarre as we live in valleys. However, just as we live in the valleys to protect ourselves from the elements, the Ugandans have a perfectly good reason to live at the top of the hills. The land in the valleys is more fertile, so they live on the top of the hills on the less fertile land. Naturally though, this presents some problems especially for water collection. So, the KDWSP provided the people of Kaara with several options to collect clean water.

The protected spring:

At the bottom of the valley, near to where we went to play football. The KDWSP have protected a spring allowing the people to collect clean water without needing to worry that it may have been polluted by animals or faeces.

The spring that we went to collect water from looked like this:

As you can see, the water is tapped from the ground, thus ensuring that it is clean and therefore safe to drink.

Whilst the people of Kaara, had this spring and therefore access to clean water all year round, because it was at the bottom of the hill it wasn't possible to tap the source and bring it to the people through a gravity follow system, as the KDWSP had done successful in other areas as the water had to go up!

The photo below hopefully will give you an idea about how far people had to climb up from the spring. We  lived very close to beginning of the path down into the valley, so many people had a long walk once they'd reached the top.

A photo taken from the spring, back up the valley to our house.

As it wasn't possible to construct a gravity flow system, the KDWSP needed to harvested the water falling on Kaara in a different way...bring on the water tank!

The household water tank

Our tippy tap

The KDWSP provided the household of Kaara with a 4,000 L water tank for UDX 250,000 which was a quarter of what it would cost if they didn't go through the Diocese. However, the KDWSP required the household to have several sanitation items:

1. A good toilet
2. A 'shower' facility (we had a bucket and a cup)
3. A drying rack for washing up
4. A tippy tap - a very clever device with was small jerry can with a hole in it. Thus allowing you to pore water out and wash your hands. 

How KDWSP provide for families suffering from HIV/Aids

However, families which tested positive for HIV/Aids recieved a tank free of charge from the Diocese. We visited two women who had recieved tanks through the project, both had lost their husbands to Aids and were left with children to look after. To make matters worse, neither of their husbands had been able to build a house for them so they had been left at the mercies of their families-in-law for a house.

The first women we visited was living with her Mother-in-law (whose house the water tank was attached to) however she had been given so aluminium sheeting by the community and was building herself a house next to her Mother-in-laws.

The second women we met story in also included in the link below (she's the second woman.) And as you can see in the below picture, the Diocese decided that her house (right house) was too old to have guttering added to it for the water tank and as the woman was having issues with her brothers-in-law who wanted to her to leave the house, KDWSP decided to construct the structure of a new house with a roof (left house) on the land she did own. 

                                                                                           

The two houses, KDWSP constructed the one of the left as her initial house was too old.

The women know only needs to fill in the walls with mud and the house construction will be complete. However, Liz said that she was so weak that she didn't have the strength to collect the water from the bottom of the valley to make the mud so she was waiting until the rainy season to finish her house.

Please click here to go to an article written about this lady, and other work done by KDWSP to help support families suffering from HIV/Aids.

The Institutional water tank: what we did!

This was the water tank that we were working on, a large tank which collected water of a community building, in our case the Church, for the community. Whilst the KDWSP provided some of the materials and the expertise, in our case Geoffrey an engineer, the diocese expected the community to provide basic materials, for example; sand and water and the manual labour, which included us.

The following pictures will be of us, constructing our tank, and some explanation about how. It was the same method used to construct the household tanks, and the diocese trained up men from the community with expertise in how to build them, so when we left they aim to construct another 22 household tanks before the raining season started (so around a month.)

The foundations! A hole was dug and the filled in with large stones, then smaller stones, then sand followed by pouring water over the top and adding more sand!

The base! The framework of the water tank was constructed out of wire,  and  we then passed cement with stones (aggregate - I think is the proper term) inside the tank to form the base and strengthen the foundations

The outside of the tank had chicken wire wrapped around it and was then covered in large plastic bags which had string wrapped tight around it.

The inside of the tank then had two layers of cement applied (we were only allowed to help in the second layer)

The plastic bags were then removed from the outside and stored for later use.

We attempted again to help withe cementing, like the inside  the outside also got two layers.

The roof! Like the tank, the roof was first constructed from wire, here's the team  attaching large wire sheets together.

The wire roof was then covered in the plastic bags which were sown onto it, before being placed on top of the tank. The wooded post you can see going into the tank helped to support the roof as the cement was added.

The roof was a one man job, carried out with what appeared great ease by Geoffrey.

A hole was then dug for the taps.

And steps, a wall and a drainage pipe was added.

How the tank looked when we last saw it. 

Hope you've enjoyed seeing those shots and seeing how the tank was constructed. What amazed me was the ease that the tank was made, nothing was too fancy or hard and yet it still does the job brilliantly! No high tech machinery was used, and if they needed something, something was constructed to be that something.

Meeting Francis.

For those of you who have ever witnessed my artistic talent, you'll know it's limited. God has blessed me with many gifts, but the gift of drawing is not one of them.  But, I decided anyway to try and draw Francis, a little boy I met in Kaara. Why? Partly because, I don't want to post his photo all over the internet and partly because I had a rare artistic desire.

Not surprisingly the image below does not represent him physically in anyway, but it also represents him and his story perfectly. This could be any African boy (or girl according to some of my friends), of any age, he's doesn't strike you as unique and yet  he touched my heart the first time we met.

In essence, Francis's story probably belongs to so many other boys (and girls) who live in Africa.

Collecting firewood.

The first time I met him, he touched my heart.

On the first Sunday we were in Kaara, we as a team were invited in the afternoon to go and play football with the local men, so off we trundled down the valley to the pitch along with lots of children. When Liz saw Francis she told him off for not washing on a Sunday. And once she said it, I realised that whilst most of the children were clean and in their Sunday best, some, like Francis were covered in dirt and wearing rags. But, that was as far as my thoughts went, I didn't ask myself why this was.

After playing football for a while, I decided to sit down with Liz and naturally got surrounded by children fascinated by a 'Musunga' (white person) they wanted to touch my hands and arms, play with my hair, wear my sunglasses, use my camera...the list in endless. Francis somehow managed to sit right next to me, despite the shoving and pushing of the children (mainly around my hair) and their constant chatter to each other, he sat quietly looking up at me with a face of joy  and contentedness as he held one of my hands tightly in his two. And he was happy, just to sit and hold my hand. He wanted nothing more, and when I took my hand away he waited patiently until he got to hold it again.

It touched me that, he had to little, he was dressed in rags and had a dirty face, and yet all he wanted was to sit by me and share the afternoon with me. 

The second time I met him, he broke my heart.

The following Saturday, Liz took us on a tour of Kaara, visiting the homes of people where the Diocese had helped to provide 4,000 L water tanks. The last two homes we visited were of women suffering from HIV/Aids and the Diocese had provided the water tanks free of charge. 

On our way back home, we were walking along the road when we ran into a group of children walking in the opposite direction carrying firewood. The oldest was probably five or six whilst the youngest was only three. All of them were carrying as much wood as they could, and among them was Francis. Once again he was dirty and dressed in rags. But then Liz said something that shocked me, "This is Francis, he's the son of the women we've just visited"

This was why he was dressed in rags, his mother was too ill to work and so they had very little money. And this was also the reason he was so dirty whenever we saw him, despite having a water tank it was currently empty and it was reaching the end of the dry season and his Mother was too ill to collect enough water to wash him. It broke my heart. Francis, the little boy whom had touched my heart was in more poverty than I had imagined. 

Francis, who wanted so little, really had nothing. He lived in a run down house, without a Father, with a Mother who was ill, dressed in rags and helping to collect firewood to survive. I knew that something in Uganda would shock me, but I didn't expect the need to be so desperate, and yet so hidden. Without Liz telling me, I would never have known Francis's story, never had known his circumstance. 

The third and final time I met him, he filled my heart with joy.

The last time I saw Francis, I was in a bad mood. We'd been to visit the Butwa Tribe, which was fantastic however the journey had taken a lot longer than expected and I only had a banana for lunch and we'd run out of water a few hours previously. Consequently, I  was very hot, very tired, incredibly thirst and slightly hungry, however I also knew I was close to home and that made me happy that soon I could have a drink of water. 

As I marched along the road, on my own as everyone else was walking more slowly, I saw a group of children run out of the trees towards me, one of them being Francis. Despite wanting to keep going in my quest for water, I felt compelled to stay with them, because it was so obvious that's what they wanted. I don't remember what we did, they certainly didn't ask me to dance like the school children always asked us to do, but I stayed with them, waiting as Caz and then Anna caught me up.

And as I waited I realised, how much I should learn off them. They had nothing, and yet were so joyful. And there I was wanting a drink, and in foul mood because I was thirsty, despite knowing that in the house there would be clean water ready to be drunk. By the time time the other two met up with me, my mood had lifted slightly, because I'd realised despite needing a drink so desperately I had a lot to be joyful about. And I should be joyful for what I have not annoyed at what I don't have.

As we left them, we skipped off down the road, still hot, still tired and still very thirsty, but knowing that I have a lot in my life to be grateful for and that I should aim to be joyful even in times of  'suffering.' 

"Education is your life, Guard it well" Proverbs 4:13

Like in the UK, education is compulsory and free in Uganda up until Senior 4. Unlike the UK, pupils have to pass the year until they can move up, so for example we knew of a 12 year old girl who was in primary 3, our year 2. It is also difficult to make sure that the children do attend school, especially in rural areas. So many children leave school after completing primary school.

The local Primary School

Why?

Whilst the education itself is free, many of the schools are a long walk from their homes so if the parents can't afford for their children to board they have to walk it. Where we were staying in Kaara, the local secondary school was about 6-7 km away. That's a 12-14 km walk each day, on top of which you have a days learning and potentially chores to do when you finally make it home.

It's no real surprise to discover that children, especially girls, decide an education isn't worth it.

So, any other problems the children face?

There were probably three other factor a child had to face to in an attempt to get an education:

1) tiredness - before arriving at school, a child would be expected to collect water for the family. That could mean several  trips down the valley to the local protected (clean/safe water) or unprotected spring. Along with two of my team mates we attempted this trip down and between us carried back 40L of water in two jerry cans. It was very hard work and took us about an hour. We couldn't imagine then going to school. The children would also collect water again after school or do other chores around the house, like farming or collecting firewood.

2) the teachers - what! The teachers?! But yes, in Uganda the teachers strike, A LOT. According to Liz, the Ugandan woman we lived with, the teachers would often strike for a month at a time in attempts to get higher wages, leaving the children education-less. At the primary school we were closest too, the teachers often didn't come in on a Friday as they lived a long way from the school. Again leaving the children on the own.

3) parents - as many of the children's parents didn't receive an  education they therefore don't see the point in the children also going to school. How many times in your school career did the encouraging word of a parent, or their assistance with homework help you?

Whilst some parents do understand the importance of education and support their children. If you'd been in the shoes of these Ugandan children, tired from collecting water and facing a long walk to school would you have bothered? I'm not sure I would have if my parents didn't encourage or realise the importance of me gain an education.

So, what was the trip?

On the 3rd July 2012, I started my month long trip to Uganda as part of a Tearfund, Transform team. I was part of a team of six and we went out to support the Diocese of Kigezi (based in Kabale, southwest Uganda) Water and Sanitation Programme.

We went out for a month, and spent about three weeks of that time in the rural community of Kaara, where we helped to construct a water tank to the church. Which was just utterly amazing and I didn't want to leave!  The people in the community had so much joy despite having so little. Incredibly humbling for a middle class girl who has never had to worry about food, who has been encouraged and support in my education and had the chance to purse other activities in my free time. Luxuries the children out there rarely get.

For more information about the work of the Diocese's water and sanitation project check out: www.kigezi-watsan.ug