3rd Day of Thanks&Giving - Education

I had one goal before I had children - to finish my bachelors degree. Whether it was fate or perfect planning on my part, I brought my oldest son, Corbin, home from the hospital the same day I received my diploma from Brigham Young University. As I had planned since the age of 14, I studied International Relations and was well on my way to saving the world. My education has not only given me a broader perspective of the world, but it has given me oppportunities to serve and grow in ways I never would have imagined. It has allowed me to travel and teach and share with others my passion for community development and poverty alleviation. It has made me a better mother and a more productive member of society. I am so thankful for education I have recieved and am so grateful that my sons will have many of those same opportunities. I hope we do not take for granted all the knowledge that is available to us.

All around the world, there are millions of children who do not have the opportunity for an education. Many do not even have a place to call home. In El Salvador, I had the chance to work at a home for street boys. I could not believe how young some of them were - and before coming to this home, they were expected to provide for and take care of themselves, literally on the streets of a large city. Many of them had been abused and that is why they chose to live this way instead of going home. Most of them had been involved with crime, drugs, violence, street gangs, or all of the above. This home helped integrate them back into society by putting them back in school, giving them vocational training, and most importantly, giving them the emotional support and confidence they needed to progress with their lives. I am so grateful to those who help make this happen and who see more in these boys than the menacing label society would put on them.

In Uganda, there is a similar organization. Though new and fairly small, they are having a profound effect on children that others have forgotten about. They are The Youth Outreach Mission. It is run by a few young men, who after completely their university studies, have decided to return home and do all they can to help the less fortunate in their communities. Volunteers of HELP International have had the opportunity to work with them for a couple years now and have had tremendous experiences. I mentioned them previously here, but that was just one small part of what they do. To see more, check out their blog here, and just remember that it is amazing that they even have an internet presence. This is true grassroots efforts making a real difference in the lives of Ugandan street children. These guys are amazing - so motivated and dedicated. They are very inspiring!

The Faces of Africa

Gandhi in Africa?

Yes, it's true. He was big there, too. But why exactly do they have a memorial dedicated to him? I'll let you ponder that while you check out these beautiful pics of the day we took a boat out to see this monument at the headwaters of the Nile - "The Source" they call it, where Nile and Lake Victoria meet. It was gorgeous. (It's an interpretive dance, if you can't tell, about the flowing river and swimming in its nice cool waters. I'm pretty sure the boat guy we hired, who was taking the pictures, thought we were seriously crazy. But he said he totally got it.) And there you have it, Gandhi is still floating throughout Africa on this magnificent river. Bet you didn't know that.

Shake your booty

One of the organizations we work with has created a dance group that performs traditional dances at weddings, etc to earn money for school fees. One afternoon they treated us to a private little performance. It was awesome. All the dances consist of shaking your hips/booty the entire time. I was sweating just sitting there, and they were dancing like that for almost an hour! It was really fun to see. Some of them played drums while others danced, and then they switched - they really did have alot of talent. Afterwards, they made us put on the hairy butt things and tried to teach us how to dance. . . I think it was a good laugh for all involved.

As an aside, this performance was taking place in someone's "yard", and so the music of the drums echoing off the adobe house drew quite the audience from the neighborhood. These kids were the cutest . . . The older sister was trying to get her little sister to put some clothes on while the brother was trying to get them to be quiet and quit drawing attention.

Finally the big sister puts lil sis on her back and brother tries to help. Useless, they leave for a few minutes . . .

and return with at least a skirt on the little one. They were so sweet.

Gettin' dirty

In Uganda, as in most developing countries, women cook indoors or semi-enclosed over an open fire. Obviously, this poses a great health threat to her, as well as the children she is likely caring for at the same time.

One solution that is spreading around the globe is called Adobe Stoves, or Lorena Stoves, or I'm sure there are other names for it. I helped build stoves in Guatemala as well and think it is one of my favorite projects because it is simple, cheap, can involve the recipient, and it has such a huge lasting impact on the entire family. Cooking over an indoor open fire is equivalent to smoking how many cigarettes a day? Anyone? (Click here to find out.)

Part of the stove project this year was actually doing assesments of the stoves built by volunteers last year. So far, we have seen fairly good results. Women are using less fuel, which saves money and time. The stoves are more efficient, which means they can cook more than one thing at once, so the meal is ready sooner. One local told me that one major problem is that meals take 2-3 hours to prepare over a fire, and many times children will fall asleep before they eat, thus contributing to the malnutrition problem that already exists. He also told me that women are more likely to boil their drinking water like they should now that they can have more than one pot going at a time. In our interviews, many mothers said they saw an immediate reduction in their children's health problems, saving them even more money on the costs of medicine - and can you imagine the long term effects! No wonder the life expectancy is so low if everyone is smoking before they can even talk.

So the day I was there, we worked on a couple different stoves that were at different stages. Each time you do a step, you have to let it dry for a few days, so it is a process. But it is so inexpensive. And the real plus is that they locals easily learn how to do it and can then in turn, teach their neighbors. We put a chimney on two of the stoves, which means they will be ready for use the next day. Exciting!

We also worked on a large stove that will be used to feed children at a boarding school. The volunteer women are literally cooking all day long to feed the 100+ children a little bit for each meal. This is where they currently do all the cooking.

It was a challenge to build a stove big enough for those huge pots, and I think this will be a first for us, so hopefully it works. (This is our volunteers showing how much room we need for the pots.)So the foundation had been built previously and the day I was there, we were working on filling and forming it with bricks and clay.

The good part about these stoves is that most of it is made with free or easily accessible materials - homemade bricks, banana stalks, dirt from ant hills (yes, they are huge), clay, etc. For this particular project, we had to collect the clay from a local stream bed, which was just a quick jaunt through this squishy, enchanted forest. A couple of men dug it out, put it in these difficult-to-manage bags and we assembly-lined it back to where we could put it in a wheel barrow to walk it over to where we could mix it. It was good to get my hands dirty, well and my feet, and clothes . . . It was good. I was glad I wore bugspray. And yes, in Uganda, the women wear skirts or dresses everyday, no matter what they are doing. Hence, we do too.

So what's it like over there?

Green and beautiful . . .

A place to call home . . .

Micro-entrepreneurship at it's best . . .

Market Street . . .

Just doing life . . .

Weird, creepy crane things that liked to hang around town . . .

Does that answer your question? And yes, there is lots more to come.