Happy Easter from Uganda

Happy Belated Easter from everyone in Uganda!!

The S.A.L.V.E. children were all happy to be back at the Bugembe home to celebrate the Easter weekend, although they all had a lot of work to do with plenty of homework to help to prepare them in the lead up to their exams in a few weeks. They managed to put aside a few minutes for us in their busy schedules to share some chocolate with us, which went down very well. Today though its back to school and lots of revision!

We decided to spent the holiday back in Kibuye village celebrating with some friends! The setting was slightly more traditional than the Easters we are used to at home. We spent our time cooking an Easter feast of rice, sweet potatoes, greens and meat over the fire, and taking long walks around the beautiful village setting. We managed to bring a small bit of our traditions to the Easter celebration though by bringing some Cadbury’s chocolate with us!

Earlier in the week

We were excited to help to launch a new community education initiative. S.A.L.V.E. has chosen to work in the area of Mafubira (which some of S.A.L.V.E.s research last year identified as an area that a significant number of the local street children might have come from for many reasons like poverty or abuse) where there are many people very eager to see change and improvement in their area and in their circumstances. We are hoping that S.A.L.V.E. will be a positive influence in the area and will help facilitate people eager to help themselves. In our first meeting, our main aim was to assess the needs and interests of the community. Ideas came both big and small from the participants. We are looking forward to our next meeting this week and are hoping to see some of the many ideas take off in the coming weeks and that in time this will lead to less children from the local area ending up on the streets in the first place.

We are really pleased that by the end of the week, we had picked Richard from the streets again and brought him to the local transit centre. The whole organisation got together to decide what the best next step for Richard is. Like so many children who have lived on the street and come from very unsettled backgrounds, Richard has a lot of trouble adjusting to settled life. We are hoping that with enough time, patience and loving care, we will still be able to work with Richard and continue to keep him on the programme and ensure that he has every opportunity for the future.

In other news

Last weekend saw a historic 4-0 victory of Uganda versus Burundi in the national stadium in Kampala. The interns took up their front row seats and enjoyed watching the football drama play out. Despite the stadium being quite empty and bare, there was plenty of atmosphere and the Ugandan victory ensured that there was lots of singing, dancing, conga lines and chanting taking place! A small taste of the football fever that will hopefully be taking over Africa before long when the World Cup descends. Even though Uganda is not participating, people here are very excited about the build up to the event.