Jan 18, 2012
Hi all!
We spent 8 nights on the Family Empowerment - Canaan Farm with our beloved friends and director Richard, nurse Suzan and baby Abigail Angoma. Also, with our good friends and interpreters, escorts, right and left hands and all around great help...Young Richard, Denis, Geoffrey, Jackson, Bosco, young Bosco and more! It was great to see the ladies again in the women's empowerment group. 5 returned for our village healthcare worker refresher course (Alice, Jennifer, Keti, Evelyn, Christine) and what started with 3 new ones, quickly grew to 7 new people, including two men! Kampala village was represented, as well as Apopo's daughter from Palebec village north of Kitgum. The previously trained group started off by teaching the "pig story" to the new students! Brenda organized this all! We missed Leigh immensely, especially since Suzan threw away all of the previous posters and teaching flip charts thinking Leigh was bringing over new and better ones! Leigh saved the day by sending us the certificates to be copied (we forgot to bring them!)Thanks! All the ladies sent a warm greeting to Ja Ja (Carol) and Sara!
Training topics included:
Vital signs and first aid: Brenda, Jessie and Melissa
Hygiene and Cleanliness: Nadine
Handwashing: All
Latrines and sanitation: Sam
Wounds and burns: Melissa
Nutrition: Nadine
HIV and STD's: Jessie
Diarrhea and oral rehydration: Brenda
Malaria: Nadine
They were fantastic and real sharp! Others were in the tailoring school and making paper beads to sell for their income generating projects. They have some great new things made! We can't wait for you to see them! Lives are improving through these gift sales that keep on giving!
There was also a lot of activity around piping the water to the clinic, kitchen, bath house and latrines from the new solar deep water well. Tom Osborne traveled over in Sept to over see this project and we got to see the fruits of his labor and fundraising for this incredible project! The tap stand was completed by the time we arrived. People were just turning on the tap and drinking cups of water!! Already the farm had added a box and outlet for drip irrigation of a large garden plot! Richard finally was able to use the irrigation pipes he brought from Kenya years ago! These were the only vegetables growing in dry season, along with the other garden irrigated by the pilot smaller solar well! We added a plan to irrigate the banana, pineapple and passion fruit orchard behind the kitchen also! Toward the end of the week, we had showers for the first time ever! Cold water showers but with great water pressure and it was all gravity feed through pipes in ground trenches! We added sinks at the latrines for handwashing too! Hard to stop once it all got started...the water accessibility was so awesome! Can you imagine cooking and bathing and washing without having to haul water?? Well you all reading this probably can, but for those who walk far to fetch water and for those who simply prayed for tin pots to boil the muddy pond water, once upon a time, 5 years ago...this is a miracle!
The guys did an incredible job setting up the solar power for clinic as well. I had to shut my eyes when they were on the roof and climbing the tank tower!! At least some of the time they were tied off! Other times all I could see was Stu's legs in the air as he fished for frogs that climbed in the new water supply tank! Then there was Sam welding with some kind of makeshift glass shield he held up and on the roof no less! How we lectured on safety! Good thing we had some climbing monkeys! Melissa was begging Kam to tie off! Ty was the ring leader and master mathmetician giving orders from the makeshift ladder! The good lord saw all through with out a hitch. The only injury was when Stu stumbled out the back of the truck and twisted his ankle! In the midst there were a couple trips the ugandans made to kampala for more supplies. They also were on hand to help out in every way possible and learn all they could!
Plans went from A to____, but not quite to Z! This included moving the big sink from room to room in the clinic 3 times!! The bricks and mortar demolition team (gals) helped out the poor guy re-doing it and even cleaned up the mess! We are happy with the room plan now and have a plan for the lab in place and more! It also included the inverter smoking out and making the decision to get a new bigger capacity and better one! (Bill don't be shocked when you see the accounting!). Then the float switch warped when the tank lid was off in the sun...thus all over again and at 1 am the guys were trying to fix things before we had to leave! All took it in stride though and it went smooth! The team worked great together! What a blessing and gift they have been! (I can tell these stories now as the team is almost home safely while I am still in Uganda and finally have internet access!)
The following posts are excerpts from the team and a few highlights while on the farm! Thank you to all those at home who made this possible through prayer, financial assitance and faith!
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