Letters from Esther

So, Last week as we were finding a new place to live, and helping one of our volunteers to get healthy so she could go back to America, i was feeling a little bit stressed :) ok a lot bit stressed. It seemed that all the things i was trying to do weren't helping and i didn't know if I had to energy to keep going. Not to sound dramatic, i was just tired, emotionally and physically. But like everyone does, you just pick yourself back up and keep walking.  And as i thought about the things that happened and the stresses in my life i looked at the incredible people around me. And thought about the things that they go through on a DAILY basis.

I was talking to a woman that I get my pictures printed off at almost every week, I walked in and we did the usual hello, how are you? I'm ok how are you? but this time instead of saying im fine i said " life is ok, really stressful but it will be ok." to which she asked the details and i told her. Not thinking that i was trying to throw a pity party but it kinda started sounding that way and i was given the proper sympathy. When i asked her how she was she said. I'm ok, i prodded her to find out why she was just ok, and not fine. to which she casually mentioned the two of her brothers got into accidents and are in intensive care in Kampala.... i obviously felt horrible for talking about my problems and yet  the way she told me about her struggles it was so matter of fact. with no need for sympathy. It was just a fact of life. I realized just how much struggles a typical Ugandan goes through and once again was humbled by the strength of the people here. I sit and complain to anyone that will listen about my petty struggles and frustrations, while the people here who are really struggling keep quiet, and work hard to provide for their families. They have such an inner courage that amazes me and they don't even realize it!

Such a cute model :) 

Sweet Simon, i caught him making his own kite.
 He is such an incredibly happy kid,
who can always put a smile on your face and heart!

I was in church on sunday and an 18 year old girl wrote this letter in my notebook. She was one of the few that didn't know all of my stresses and frustrations, but i think somehow she knew... it goes like this.

Beyond the horizon, you hear a horn calling from a far awaking you to a new sense of responsibility. Sincerely you feel your bones are too weak to stand and as you continue thinking a few words cross your mind from an old song once sung. 

"Set your heart towards danger, Set your mind towards victory. 

Step follows Step

Courage follows Courage "

And then a new strength awakes you and there you are cammy, the Journey does not matter it is the first step that is the hardest.

One of the MANY non finished homes in Mbale

How does an 18 year old have such wise words? This instantly calmed my heart and it has been something that i think about each day when i start to feel overwhelmed. This wonderful girl Esther knows about trials, knows about struggles, and most importantly, knows how to keep going. That is one of the precious gems about the people here. No matter the struggles, not matter the stress, or fear, or heartache, They know how to keep going. and that gives them the strength they need. So I am going to try and keep the same code. To keep going, not matter the trials, no matter how hard the road. it will turn out all right in the end. 

Laundry Day

He wanted to make sure he was in the picture. Such a sweet kid!!

Only source of water for the Bunabuyoka Village

Mzungue Give me Money.....

So, the past few days i have been spending a lot of time with our HIV Support Group. Let me give you the background of this group because i don't think i have yet. When i was here last year with Kara and Holly and we did the HIV testing day, (if you have read my blog before im sure you read that post) well, having the aftermath of trying to follow up with everyone that tested positive proved to be much harder than i had anticipated and we struggled a lot. So what holly, Kara and I decided was that we would create a support group. This was towards the end when we were leaving so we just got to have a lot of meetings about it and weren't able to really get the support group up and running.
Well, since holly stayed behind miracles have happened. We have officially begun our own support group called HIV Aids Support Network Namatala or for short HASNN. When i got here this year Holly have finally just registered the group and so we have been having meetings, we started a SACCO which is a savings and loan program so that the woman can start saving their money and then do micro-loans... its AMAZING!!!!! we had a meeting a few days ago where the members asked if they could sign their children up for a SACCO too because they want them to have a better future. It has been fabulous and i have loved it! we had another testing last saturday and it was great! we had 200 people come and there were 13 people that tested positive, but because we have the support group it is a good thing that they found out because now they can take care of themselves and make sure that they can continue to have a bright future!!!!! Its the greatest!!!!!

Some of the HASNN executive board members and Holly!

But i had a very humbling experience a few days ago. We had just had a board meeting where our HIV board was hounding us asking when everyone was going to get their "appreciation" which means paid. They have been working for free as volunteers but we promised them that we would give them an appreciation until we found proper funding so we have been trying to hash out how we would do it and how much is acceptable and affordable by us and i was feeling INCREDIBLY overwhelmed and frustrated because by the end of the meeting we had still not come to a conclusion but everyone was getting frustrated so we decided to call the meeting and meet again the next day. So as i was walking out of the building i run into this woman who in a very quiet voice says "excuse me, can i ask you a question?" Now, i was feeling really frustrated at the moment and said " if you going to ask me for money i don't have any" yeah i know, really really rude, but thats how frustrated i was feeling. Immediately after i said it she was like "No, No, No, nothing like that. I was just wondering if you could get me connected up with the woman that do the beading because i want to be a part of that"
My heart IMMEDIATELY melted. How could i be so rude. i feel stupid even thinking about it right now. So i said, 1000 Shillings will be coming back in the summer and i can bring them to you to get connected with them because i don't have the ability to do it myself. She was so grateful! So we continued to talk and she introduced her self to me as Katherine, and she thought my name was hard so i just told her to call me Cam. And then she began describing how to get to her house, so that i could take 1000 Shillings there in June.

Ado, One of the beading ladies kids, I heard her speak english the first time yesterday and it was SO cute and clear! love her!!!!!!!

It was such a humbling experience to remember that the people i work with really don't have much and they are trying to provide for their families. And this great woman was getting out of her comfortable zone for her family in asking a Muzunge to get her connected with the beading ladies. I could tell she was a little embarrassed and im sure it didn't help that i was abbrasive at the beginning but the love for her family gave her the courage to talk to me and it has reminded me to remember why i am here and how incredible these people are! no matter how long i am with them every day they seem to amaze and surprise me! I am going to make sure to listen to what each person has to say before i jump to conclusions!

Don't know what to title it.....

UPDATE!!!!

Saturday i was able to see Suzan, She is a woman that lives in namatala and she was pregnant the last time i came here. She had her baby a few weeks before i left. So i went back to visit her, she is so sweet, I happened upon her when she was making food so she insisted that i eat with her. I wasn't hungry at all, and i try not to eat food in the slum for health reasons :) But i did accept the offer of milk because i didn't want to offend her. so i had milk she thought it was funny that i wanted it cold. she boiled hers. Which i think is much safer, but i couldn't imagine drinking warm milk. i remember the first time i walked pass her house, she called out to me and asked if i would be her friend. This is not uncommon, so i was like, yes, that sounds great. And somehow we started to become friends and now she was one of the first people that i wanted see. it is funny how friendships are made. 

On Sunday I was able to meet everyone at the branch again. It was so much fun. We meet in a new building and it is BEAUTIFUL!!!!! i think its one the prettiest churches. and its very big. i love it!!!! Pius turned his papers in on Saturday, so that is exciting! it was testimony meeting so it was great to be able to hear them share their testimonies. Some of them are so simple. I love it! and then there is also the Ugandan that gets up and preaches about something that no one really understands but he is speaking very loudly and then walk off and no one has any idea what he said but he defiantly had some passion :)  

Health Clinic meetings... awesome. everything is falling into place. i will be going up on wednesday. Definately more to blog about once i come back because i will get to see Joseph and also see out health clinic up and running... pics to follow for sure!!!! we have a cool rotating schedule. 5 stations. its a teaching clinic as well as a health clinic. We want to make sure they are informed about what they are getting treated for! So at the last station they are surveyed about what treatments they were getting, and their understanding of what that means. If they don't understand then they go back through the stations to make sure that they understand their treatments. This makes me so excited. Heatlh Education i think is just as important as getting treatment. Super Excited. Also, some AWESOME EXCITING NEWS We got a grant for the health clinic that will cover our medications! This is a huge blessing. Now all that HELP has to cover is the salaries of the employees. YAHOO!!!!!!!!!

So another thing that made confirmed to me that i love this place. I was walking in Namatala on saturday, to go and see susan and as i was walking i passed a woman and she screamed, CAM i was so excited! they remembered me. She then proceeded to make sure that she brought me back to their community and i realized it was a place where we had put a water filter last year!!!!. But it was great! they still remembered me!!!! I LOVE UGANDA!!!!!!!!!

Reunited and it feels so good!!!

As I was sitting on the plane from Amsterdam to Uganda I was in a somewhat awake state. Thinking about what it will be like to be back, how I'll feel, with questions like, will they remember me. Will I be able to be a leader with the new team when they don't even know me?  And then I hear a man behind me speaking about God and how you need to listen to him and preaching to this guy that doesn't know how to handle him because everything he says is contradicted by the preacher .
And the only thing I could think of after that.
Man it's good to be back. :) I couldn't get the grin off my face from that time forward  because it didn't matter at that moment how it was gonna go, what people were gonna think, because I was coming back and I knew my heart could be at peace again.

So it was a long trip back to Mbale ad I was crazy tired from lack of sleep but too excited and full of adrenaline to actually go to sleep. Met my awesome team. And had a few meetings about the health clinic, stayed awake long enough to eats Sams food an then crashed and woke up 12 hours later. We have a million of meetings today and getting connected(yes Em I jut said that) up with my friends again. So I'll keep ya updated but the best news is......

I'm back and life feels balanced again... At least for the moment. :)

The aftermath

So sorry it has been so long since i posted. but in case you haven't heard, i am home and no longer in uganda. This is a topic that is hard for me to talk about, which is why the silence has ensured for so long. But i am ready to talk about the weeks wrapping up my experience living in one of the greatest places on earth. it was definately my first international experience but it will NOT be my last.

So, where to begin.... my first real reality check that i was leaving happened when we went to the Bunabuyoka Village. CFA had put together a thing called THANKS giving. It was a huge feast/celebration where we got to talk with the community leaders and express our happiness and joy in working with them and our excitement about the future of the health clinic. the meeting was a bit longer than i would have liked.... 2 hours too long :) but it was important to them and so that is why i tried to be patient. So after the meeting we all got in a circle around the clinic and prayed for it... it kinda felt like we were dedicating it, which was an experience in and of itself. After that we were able to plant a few trees with some of the community. which i was actually dreading cause  thought it would be weird, but it was kinda fun. that's when i think it first hit that i wasn't going to be coming back up to the village the following week...i was planting these trees and were not going to be able to see them grow at all...i had a somber moment or two. Then the best part of the day. We got to go into the school where the kids had picked banana fibers and had paint and we dressed them and made war paint on their faces and then they painted our faces. It was so fun because they were so excited to teach us more about their culture and i think maybe a little to see us mzungus with paint on our faces...
Then we had the best feast. literally felt like an American thanksgiving with Ugandan food and it was so incredibly good.

it was so incredibly hard to say goodbye to them. but i held on to the fact that i will see them again. it still hurts my heart a little bit to think about that last night. but i am working on trying to go back and so i am filled with hope about seeing the cute Joseph again.


One of the biggest things that happened what a few days before i left.... i got malaria... and was admitted into the hospital... just for a 2 days. it was a really not that bad. Malaira is just like getting the flu in the US. they know exactly how to treat it and you are able to bounce back pretty easily. One of the greatest part about getting spending my last days in uganda in the hospital was that the team all came and had their dinner in the hospital room with me. Only our team could make a hospital stay fun. we watched a movie and at what our cook Sam had made us. It was comforting to have the team there.

I was released from the Hospital Tuesday afternoon and went into a frenzie of saying goodbye to as many people as i could and then got a taxi wednesday morning and it is all kind of a blur how i was able to get home. i was on pain medication for the Malaria. But i honestly think it was a blessing. I wasn't ready to leave uganda, i wanted to stay. I didn't know how i was going to emotionally handle having to leave all of the people i have grown to love and care about. Having little time to say goodbye and not having the ability to fully process it helped me to be able to get on the plane. 

Cute Baby Cyrus!

Teaching the Pukani

Wild Hearts Can't be Broken..

Teaching Joseph how to dance! 

How can you not fall in love with these kids!

Joseph Joseph Joseph.... Cami Cami Cami! 

I don't know how to wrap up my experience of being in Uganda and i think its going to stay that way. because my experience with Uganda is just the beginning. There is no wrap up. just a start.

Auntie Cam

I was walking in Namatala the other day, just leaving Child of Hope. Its a normal day and i am walking down the path that i always take with children hanging on each arm when i hear the voices of 2 children yell in their sweet voices "Auntie Cam"! i turn around and there are two sweet girls sprinting down the path with their arms wide open running to me so that i can give them a big hug. Yeah, it was one of the most tender moments. no longer is it Muzungu.... it's Auntie Cam, and im at peace!

I know my status... and it was a long road to get there...

When i first got to the woman's health class and we talked about HIV i was completely unprepared. To be honest i didn't have enough time to help Kara to prepare the curriculum i was planning on having Kara talk most of the time. She did a great job and the class was really excited about the testing. The best part was she raised her hand and said, when can we get tested. We were so excited about that question because we had been mulling around the idea of having an HIV testing day. Having such a positive reaction made me excited to actually go through with trying to put together the testing day. One of the Country Directors Holly had worked with a an HIV agency or something and knew so much about it and so with the right motivation we set to work to make it happen. We taught the rest of the woman's health classes and talked with the Aids Information Center that would be giving the HIV testing, providing counseling, and treatment. All for free. This was very exciting. So about a week ago with just a week to go we had made "I know my status" handkerchiefs that we gave out as an incentive for coming.

The registration process to help us with the HIV support group...

These people were waiting for their test results.... I kind of know how they are feeling......

So on the day of the testing it went really really well! all of us that were working had decided that we would get tested to help the people feel more comfortable and we were also nervous that people weren't  gong to come so we thought that if they knew that mzungu's were getting tested then they might come.
And let me tell you it was a roller coaster of emotions for me. All the week leading up to it i was completely comfortable with it because there was no possible way that i would have HIV. but on that day i started to get incredibly nervous, i started thinking, i went to the hospital last week and got some blood work, they put a needle in me what if it was infected and now i am HIV.... i don't think i can handle that. or what if there was some other random way it was transmitted.... i started thinking of all of the possibilities of how i could come up positive. And i got so nervous i didn't want to get tested.
everyone that was working that day had all gone and gotten tested, and i felt so nervous in my stomach. But everyone kept telling me it was going to be fine and i should just go and do it. So i finally went in and was incredibly nervous.

We handed out some fun posters, condoms, a pamphlet and the awesome hankies.

Holly having the awkward counseling lady

They have you go to a counselor first and i felt so awkward as she was asking me questions like when the last time i had had sex was, and if i had a boyfriend, and how many partners have i had..... i am sure she thought i was lying when i told her i ahve had no partners and i don't have a boyfriend either. and i remember thinking... even in i did, i don't think i would have told her. she was a perfect stranger. So got through that incredibly awkward experience and then they sent me to the guy to prick my finger and do the actual testing. i sat there with the biggest butterflies in my stomach, i was even arguing in my head to calm down, i know i didn't have HIV. So we did the test, which when he pricks your finger KILLS i was not expecting it to hurt that bad. i have a pic of my reaction. But when i got the test back and it was negative, i was so relieved. i felt like a huge weight was lifted off of my shoulders. it was a great relief. and then i started thinking...

We really liked the hankie idea :) 

how would i have handled that if there were a possiblity of me being positive. first off i don't know if i would have had the courage to go. even with all the knowldege that i have gained in teaching about HIV and how its not a lie sentence. i still don't know if i would have the strength to go. It made me think of a few of the woman that we work really closely with that didn't have the happy announcement that i did that was negative. They were positive. There were two woman that i am particulaly attached to and it hit me. their lives are changed forever by this simple test. Something that takes 10 minutes can alter your life dramatically and i was bringing that change in to their lives. these two woman now have the added stress in their life to make sure that they get their treatment, which they have to pay for, which they don't have the money to do. And their sicknesses are taken more serious, they have to be more careful when they get a simple but on their hand, or if they scrape their knee they have to be cautious. Long were the days where they could be carefree in that way.

Her mother was getting tested and so we were glad to keep her occupied until she was done :) 

I went in knowing that there was no possible way for me to be positive and yet i almost didn't have the strength to do it. i commend the ones that came with the possiblity of them being positive, it took so much courage. They knew that it was more important to be informed and take care of it so that they could provide for their families and be around long enough to hopefully see their children grow up.
I know that some of the people that came were very very surprised when they found out they were positive, either because they were in a very stable marriage and their partner was negative when they got married and the results came back positive. which brings on a whole other set of questions.
or you are a mother that is working very hard everyday to provide for you kids and you are starting to get on top of providing for your children and then you find out that your positive.
We tested 317 people from the Namatala slum and only 12 people came back positive. Which when you look at the percentage that is less than 4% of HIV in namatala. But to the lives of the 12 people, their lives have been changed forever. My hope is that we will be able to continue to give them counseling and knowledge so that those 12 can be given the support that they need and be able to continue to be there for their children and live their lives to the fullest.

I was so nervous and i wasn't very good at hiding it....

i wasn't brave, that prick on the finger REALLY REALLY hurt.

I have a new respect for the strength it takes to be willing to receive information that at first will feel like your world is crushed, but then you pick yourself back up, remember the things that you have to do in life and keep moving. It really is better to know, even if the knowledge is scary. I don't think i could have comprehended just how much doing this HIV testing would effect my life but it has. And i am grateful for the experience.