Floods, Frustrations and Families

Things here are going well. Since returning back from the UK we have had new energy and drive to step our work and area of the project up to the next level. So things have been exciting as we look towards the potential that this amazing place can still get to. In other areas we have been feeling the frustrations of life in Kampala. The roads here can send the most placid of drivers into fits of road rage. We are about to go away for a long weekend with friends, to Lake Mburo, where we hope to see zebras and other wild animals, for a welcome break and chance to rejuvenate. Can’t wait! That’s a great thing about living in Uganda- there’s always somewhere amazing to go!

Our struggles and challenges are minimal compared to so many peoples’ lives in Uganda, particularly at the moment. We have been inundated with text messages from many of you asking whether we were ok with the floods in Uganda and across Africa. Thank you for your concern, we are fine. The floods started about 2 weeks before the news reached international audience affecting many countries all the way across from Kenya to Nigeria. Many people’s homes and livelihoods have been ruined, which many people around the world, including the UK are all too familiar with at the moment. The difference here is that families depend on their land for food, it could be well into next year before they are able to produce food for themselves and to sell. What is most sad is that a few days before the floods arrived the Ugandan Government announced that that they were able to start closing the many IDP camps as people were beginning to return home as the fighting had died down. They now have to re open some of them to house and feed families from the floods.

Uganda is really getting geared up for CHOGM (Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting) which is being held in Kampala in November, the Queen and heads of state along with 4000 other visitors are expected to arrive for a week of chaos. A Ugandan colleague was amused that the UK we are hosting the Olympic Games in 2012 and preparations are well on the way, in Uganda we are hosting the biggest meeting there has been here in about 8 weeks time and preparation has only really just got going. Roads are being torn up and re-laid left right and centre. We just wish the Queen or Gordon Brown were visiting our project so our road (which people back home would pay good money to drive on for an ‘off road experience’) would become nice and flat and maybe even tarmaced!

I’m sure we will tell you lots more about this as the time gets nearer. With the great opportunities this event will hold for Ugandans it also will cause many problems for others. Life for the street children will be very hard, owners of property that is not up to standard along the main routes around Kampala will have them removed and the extra funds going to improve the infrastructure in Kampala, although much needed, will mean that other areas, education, health, social welfare will receive less. I’m sure the same will happen in and around London for the Olympics but probably a lot more subtly and hopefully more sensitively!

On a more positive note we have had a mass exodus of resettlements this month. 15 boys have left Tudabujja to rejoin their families and go to school. It always calls for celebration and total joy to see the boys heading back to families where they belong, to see the life as street child left behind them as they look forward to a new start which we all need from time to time. This transition is almost always very difficult and requires great bravery from the boys and skill and wisdom from the social workers. If you pray, please pray for the boys as they make the shift into family life.

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