DAY 6

Surprise surprise we started today at 6.30 so a bit of a lie in!

The first stop was at the KCCA (Kampala City Centre Authority) offices as seems to be common reoccurrence to be introduced to the leaders of any area.

First stop was to Kwampe slum area;

The scenes we found were moving on a massive scale, with people here are living in absolute squalor. It became too much after seeing children as young as 2 and 3 building dams in the water running through the area, this was nothing better than sewer water and reminded me of my own children building dams at the beach.

The problems in this area are massive, no clean water, no drainage system and living in absolute poverty. Words cannot describe just how bad this place really is!!

The reoccurring problem is the flooding every time there is a drop of rain the water from the surrounding hills floods the whole area, peoples houses, walkways and the few toilets which are located here. This leads to cross contamination of sewerage and drinking water as all the fresh water is from natural springs. The water is not very clean at the best of times but this situation is exasperated when it floods. The floods are not the same as the flooding which occurs in England as this is a daily occurrence in the rainy season.

Next we visited a post intervention area where WaterAid have been working alongside the local community and council to provide an innovative solution fresh water.

Previously vendors would have a tap installed (very very expensive), but then charge 5 times the price of the water to the community members. So they have provide Pay As You Go taps;

They have also upgrade the rain water drainage;

But this does not come without its problems as just a few hours before our visit a mother and child fell in and unfortunately the mother did not survive. 

PLEASE HELP www.wateraid.org

DAY 5

Today was a day of travelling 7 hours!!!

On the plus side we had our first break since we arrived and it was an hours boat trip to the source of the Nile!

DAY 4 WORLD TOILET DAY

First For today was a trip to Amuria clinic;

We started off in the maternity unit and the Conditions were not good!!

As there were not enough beds lades with their babes in arms were laying on the floor, the floor was not to clean as there is a lack of staff, also there were chickens running in and out all the time.

Upon chatting to the staff I found out a few surprising (but not in a nice way) facts;

·        In child birth woman are only given paracetamol for pain relief

·        There are no incinerators for the placenta so they are cast them in a pit

·        Women have to walk approx. 3-5km to get to the clinic.

The good news is that all immunisations are free and for one day a week woman can come and protect their child.

We then moved to the school;

Were we had a brief tour which included their borehole and the toilets (one of which had been upgraded by WaterAid already;

We then moved into the classroom which was packed, 114 children in a class!!!

We had a taste of the English lesson which was being taught and with this amount of children, I was amazed at how controlled it was!!

Then we spent some one to one time with the kids, they are so happy and full of life , which is amazing as the environment is not that great!

Next was the world toilet day celebrations which consisted of allot of speaks, a few were from some distinguished guest’s; The Ugandan Health Minister, The Ugandan Minister for Disaster and District MP. This was intermingled with dance and presentations from the children

Day 3

Today we have visited an after intervention village, our hosts today were David and Sabina who are sister that they live with their elderly mother.

WOW what a difference!!!!

The time created by not needing to collect water is amazing, previously it would have taken 6 to 7 hours to collect water, now it only takes ½ an hour!!

You only have to look at their land to see the difference, everything is well maintained were as the previous days village was very overgrown and not well maintained at all.

This gives the people of the village a real chance to not only provide food for themselves but also to have enough to sell and also sell the seeds.

The family we visited stored the extra for a rainy day, a trip to the doctor, school bills ……….

The activities we were involved in today were;

Building a Tippy Tap (I got to cut wood with a machete!!), for use after using the toilet, hygiene is key!

Collecting water using the newly installed pump

Milking a cow (who would have known this could have been so difficult)

We were then provided with breakfast for all the help we gave, this consisted of freshly picked peanuts fried with salt.

The surprising fact of the day was the sustainability of these developments, once a well is installed an operation and maintenance committee is formed and they decide how much too charge each house hold in the district to use the well in order too cover any breakdowns and maintenance. After a year or so if the money is not spent it can be loaned to other communities and charge interest, this creates a revenue for the community for future developments.

DAY 2

A day with a village without interveton;

Early start 5.30!!!

The group with which I was placed was Fiona and Gillian and the family we visited was Samuel and Sabrina along with their 2 children.

The jobs we helped the family to complete were;

Ploughing the field (with an ox and steel plough)

Tilling the field with hoes and hands (weeding the bean field)

Fetching the well water only half a kilometre and believe me 20 ltrs over this distance I 35 deg heat on your head is very tiring, the drinking water well was 3km away and luckily they had enough already for the day(not used for drinking only bathing and washing dishes)

Sweeping the yard sounds easy, but first I had to go to the bushes to collect more braches to make the broom, then a good hour of sweeping in the hot sun!!

Luckily now it was time to prepare dinner and apparently the men sit and talk while the women prepare and cook and todays speciality was freshly slaughtered chicken (normally meat would only be eaten once a week on a Sunday)

Next was a visit to a community school;

The children then showed us how they once a week had set fire too the loo in order to disinfect;

The surprising fact of the day was that the school was setup, built and ran by the village members, they built the building bought the books and all contribute to paying the teachers, impressive stuff!!!

DAY 1

Travel to soroti;
Allot to see, but all from the car widow I'm afraid, we did stop at a local super market, which had an armed guard;

We also saw some local transport;

The road was reasonable for most of the way but did turn a little rural nearer the end;

We also learnt tonight what we are doing tomorrow, more of that in a future post...........

And the adventure begins

After touchdown at 11pm and clearing both immigration and ebola health check we boarded the bus. Within the First 10 mins it became apparent that the headlights did not work!!! Tine to change transport.

After an hour another bus came and we continued our journey and within an hour we were at our hotel (2.30 am) a quick bite to eat and off to bed!!