This week's Update!

Friends and Family, we have had a great week! We are still loving it here in Mbale, and we are excited about all of the projects we are involved in, and the opportunities we have here. 

Here’s our update:

 Richard:

Life in Uganda has been amazing. The people are amazing, the weather is nice, the scenery is beautiful, and the projects that we are working on are exciting! Devin and I have been the project leads putting together a 2 day business seminar. We have been working with a local NGO named “God’s Mercy” which takes youth in the Muluku area and trains them in things such as furniture making, hair cutting, door to door sales, etc. After much negotiation, we arranged for the business seminar to take place this coming Friday and Saturday at a local venue that we convinced to significantly reduce the cost of using the meeting room and providing lunch. Each day we will have about 60 participants. The first day will consist mainly of youth participants and the second will consist of slightly older men interested in business development. We are really excited for these business seminars because we are designing them to be the kick-off event for future business trainings that we will have at the church every Wednesday and Thursday from 6-730pm. We have WAY too much material to teach in just a one day training, so our goals are to give the participants just a few business basics and to get them excited enough to continue coming to our Wednesday and Thursday meetings that will be held weekly thereafter. We just have so much going on, and we’re so excited! We talked to a local radio station which has agreed to put announcements on the radio advertising when our weekly trainings will be. It will be a big deal! Also, we are going to go into their recording studio and record business seminars in 30 minute segments for them to play on the radio as a series. How cool is that?? We are not exactly sure how we are going to structure that, but I’m thinking that Devin and I will set it up as a discussion format with 2-3 Ugandans. So we would have a structured discussion in which we teach business principles through our discussion. We are really looking forward to the potential that is in that. As far as our weekly business classes go, we are also excited because we have met some really awesome Ugandans that we think could potentially continue to teach the business classes after we come back to the states. One guy’s name is Julius and he is a stud. He went through the God’s Mercy program where he learned door to door sales. After going through the program, he started a business selling books to schools, and it seems that he has done quite well for himself. The biggest reason why this is so awesome is because all of the businesses here are exactly the same. There is a huge lack of creativity in the business scene here in Uganda. You can drive down the street and see business after business and each is exactly the same. I talked to him for a long time last week as we were walking around Mbale, and he had a lot of good insights. We will be having him as a guest speaker at our seminars and our plan is for him and some other like-minded Ugandans to come to all of our trainings and be able to take over teaching after we leave. There is a HUGE need for business education here. We are very excited at the impact we can have.

Another exciting thing is that I am finally getting my ultimate frizbee club going. One of the things that has been holding me back has been trying to find a place to implement it that really has a need. There is a slum called Namatala that is right outside of Mbale where I have decided to implement it. This slum has many needs. One of the big problems of the slum is that alcoholism is quite high because there is nothing for people to do there. I am working with an NGO called “Child of Hope” that works in Namatala. I ran my proposal by them to organize an ultimate club for the youth that will meet twice a week and play games. He liked the idea as it would give the at-risk youth something to do. I am excited to be doing this also because I feel like there are a lot of things that I could do with it. In addition to just doing ultimate twice a week, I can combine it with education, or service, or whatever I want. It’ll be good.

There are many other exciting things that we are doing but I don’t have time to write them all! You will have to stay posted for more updates! Anyway, life is amazing here. I am soooo glad that we are doing this!!

Marissa:

On Monday, I was finally able to get my suitcase back!!!! After a week of wearing the same 2 shirts, and borrowing people’s skirts, I finally have my OWN clothes to wear, and my own shampoo, my own medicine, etc.  I am so grateful to have everything again!  Getting my suitcase was an all day affair – one of our country directors, Whitney, was nice enough to spend the entire day with me, just getting my suitcase.  We left in the morning, and drove four hours to Kampala in a very crowded, hot, stinky taxi (I believe there were 20 people in a van that was meant to carry 14).  When we got there, we were able to get to the airline office and get my suitcase without any problems (which was kind of refreshing, since everything here takes longer than expected), and then we got right back on a bus and drove another 4 hours back to Mbale.  It was long, but it wasn’t too bad, because Whitney and I got to talk to each other.  I really enjoyed bonding with her and getting to know her better.  On Tuesday, I had my first official full day of work here in Mbale, and I really enjoyed it!  I went along with a sanitation outreach group to a school called “Child of Hope,” where they taught the kids there about hand washing.  It was fun to be with the kids – they are so cute and friendly, and always happy to see us.  I love them!  When we first walked in, the kids just flocked to us, and I had so many kids holding both of my hands, and when they ran out of room on my hands, they started stacking up my arm.  It was so cute. 

Me and a few other girls got together and put together some survey questions to ask about women’s health.  We plan to ask these questions in the villages that we visit, to get an idea of the health needs of the women there. 

Richard and I and a few others went and visited the city of Bugobero to look at a school that a member of our church – Stephen – started a few months ago.  It is named the “Liahona Education Centre.”  They were in need of some serious help – we don’t know if we will be able to help them yet, because they have a lot of needs.  They need to have 200 students, but are only able to teach 60 right now because of the size of the school.  They have the walls built for a few more classrooms, but no roofs for those classrooms.  So, they need corrugated tin for the roof, plaster for the walls, and wood for the desks - it is going to be very expensive, this is why we don’t know if we can help them yet. 

            Another project I am excited about is we are learning some Ugandan crafts, and we will teach some women who have no income how to make and sell them.  So far, we learned how to make some paper beads – they are everywhere here in Uganda.  I think they will be really easy for the women to learn how to make.