Realising now that I've definitely left it too long to attempt to elaborate on everything we've done here this time on this blog. I want to leave it, but for Jane's sake I'm going to finish it - she told me to keep writing it so I shall. It's been a month since I last wrote on here, and we've now only got a week left, but unlike last time I can say that this time we'll have achieved everything we set out to do here.

We've been back to visit Nabaweiss and her children a lot (latrine family 1), and after a long process we've managed to set up a sponsership for the children at their local government school. Of her 6 children, 4 will go to the primary school and one will go to a private nursery (nurseries are never government-run here); the other being too young for school yet. We had to visit the school at least 3 times, as well as the nursery and the home of the nursery's headmistress, but eventually we were able to pay their school fees. Being government run, the school doesn't provide any stationary or exerise books, so we bought each kid a school bag with all their requirements (came to 80,000 - around 20 quid, for everything they will need for 3 months). School fees amount to 100,000 per term for all 5 of them (30 quid). So basically by 'sponsering' these kids, it's more about motivating them to actually go to school now they proudly own stationary and uniforms - you can't really call it paying for their eduation at 4 quid a term per kid. The mother has promised to send them to school everyday now that we have paid, and we've been a couple of times to make sure; before she kept them at home to help look after the youngest/clean the house/work in the fields to earn any little money they can (when we asked the children in the presence of their mother they did not tell us this - only when we asked to talk to the eldest child alone did she cry and tell us how much she wants to go to school). I'm still not sure the mother realises that they are children, not her workforce, and she definitely doesn't realise the importance of their education - but at least she's assured they'll be fed at school and won't have to worry so much about food procurement. The kids have been told to work hard and treat their things well, something which their mother hasn't really taught them, and I hope that from now they'll be able to realise that their lives do not have to be dominated by the extreme poverty in which they have grown up.

Speaking of latrine families, the third latrine has been completed and this afternoon we spent the final lump-sum of the fundraising money (thank you AGAIN all you lovely people, you have changed lives, we've seen it). We've got to know our third latrine family well this time, all 18 of them, and the contrast between this family and Nabaweiss' is quite stark. Despite their insanely difficult living conditions, which is obviously worsened drastically by their size, the head of the house (a lovely elderly man called Geresome) remains positive and hard-working, especially in raising his children. After using 1.3 million shillings (around 340 quid) to build their latrine, we were left with a million (260 quid) to use to help them with what they desparately need. We bought the following: 6 matresses, 10 blankets, 10 mosquito nets, 50kg rice, 15kg beans, 12kg porridge. We concentrated on food and nourishment because the majority of the kids have their ribs sticking out (they get maybe one meal a day, and if not they just have tea - as in, a cup of tea for their daily food) - so we've got them a s***load of good food which should hopefully improve their nourishment quite a lot. One boy is so skinny and weak-looking that we questioned his health, and were told he is often sick. The next time we visited them we bought a nurse for HIV-testing, but luckily we were told that his mother had recently been tested HIV-negative. Tomorrow we'll be taking them all the things we obtained, which I can't wait for, and I'll be sure to re-iterate that this money has come from our lovely friends and family in the UK.

Because we've been doing a lot of work with these 2 families in particular, we haven't been able to visit many new families on outreach (we have spent some time with bead lady though, who is awesome as ever, and has given us a month's worth of work teo take home and sell for her). However last week we did see a new family, one unlike any other we've yet seen in Uganda. A family of 8, 6 children, 3 of which are severely disabled with cerebral palsy. Being a poor family here with 6 children is difficult in normal conditions, but obviously these children need so much extra attention, as well as nappies, wheelchairs and specific foods; creating a massive financial impossibilty for the family. Yet in Uganda it is not only expensive to raise disabled children, it's also a curse. Disgustingly, the majority of parents to disabled children are utterly ashamed, both of themselves and their children, and many tend to literally hide these children away, keep them chained up or in kennels outside. As well as this, disabled children are often taken to witchdoctors, who will bless them/give them some herbal remedy to cure them. There's actually a witchdoctor whose 'clinic' is next to school, and quite a lot when we pass there on the way we see mothers taking their disabled children to see him. I still can't really take in this ridiculous information; out of everything I know about this country, what I've learnt of their treatment of disability is possibly the worst. Luckily, this family take their children as a blessing, and want to care for them (although the mother is mocked continuously in their village, and suffers from paranoia whenever in public because of that). Still, this desire to care doesn't mean the children are comfortable - when we visited they were just lined up in seats outside, and it seemed that this is what the children are left to do all day (they cannot go to school without paying a f***load for a personal carer, and even then most schools wouldn't accept them). With the kids having to stay at home, the parents do too, which obviously creates a vicious poverty circle of no job, no money, and you know the rest. Although the kids do have wheelchairs, we discovered they do not have a latrine which they can use. So being really into building latrines, and being totally overwhelmed by another impossible situation, Josh and I decided we'll be paying for a disable-friendly latrine to be built (not really sure how a hole in the ground can be made disable-proof, but Ugandans are pretty good are creating somethnig from nothing). At least the kids will be more comfortable, even if we can't really help with much else.

Still on the topic of latrines, a couple of weekends away we visited a district in the south of Uganda called Rakai (still on the topic of latrines purely because during that weekend I was forced to become an expert at using them - seriously, reading fest campsite toilets would be a treat compared). It's a very rural region, where CALM Africa was first set up, and they have 2 schools there (one secondary, one vocational). The trip included stopping at the equator and standing on the equator line, casually walking past the Tanzanian border, enduring the most horrifically hot 3 and a half hour church service (all in Lugandan, I honestly wanted to die), going to the house of the bishop of East-Uganda, staying in a farm in the middle of absolutely nowhere, and sleeping in a wooden box which moved too much every time we walked. 4 days away from any civilisation made me realise how much I need it (or maybe I just need continuous pepsi supplies); I was so happy to get back to our little house here with our local supermarket and an actual bathroom for washing rather than a room attached to outside latrines.

The poverty we saw in Rakai was absolutely unbelieveable - being away from any towns makes people's living situation so isolated and difficult. Plus the complete dryness of the area meant water is rare and reliable collection of water even rarer. One family, not nomads, lived in a grass hut which they'd built themselves 2 years ago. It was like something you'd see in a museum - "this is how people used to live hundreds of years ago". The poverty actually angered me, and made me resent Uganda for actually being in such a ridiculous state of difficulty - it felt like there could be nothing done to help these people, because there was just so much that needed doing for them, and if you did want to help them then where could you possibly start. At least where we are, peope in similar poverty are able to have access to civilisation and possible help.

Over the last month we've spent about half our time at Jolly Mercy. We've now painted 2 classrooms which look lovely. Teaching is the same as ever, P2 class have now filled up an exercise book of 'English Grammar' taught by me which is probably all wrong, but at least they're learning something (if I'm not teaching their teacher will just write an exercise up and fall asleep). I'm a total pro now at using chalk on blackboard.

Tomorrow we're going on safari for 3 days, and after that we've only got 4 days left here. Hopefully we'll be able to oversee the start of the fourth latrine's construction - apart from that, we've already completed everything we came to do this time, so I'm actually ready to come home (although I will of course be devastated again to leave). Really can't wait to see everyone, miss you miss you miss you.

Big love

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