Kasangati-Buyinja

This is an especiallly exciting morning for some in our group. They are meeting their sponsored children for the first time. Four of the children arrive at our hotel at 8:30 a.m. It’s interesting to observe, as each experience is different. Some children are outgoing and smiling from the time they walk in the door. Others are reserved and quiet. Sponsors also each have a different personality, but I am impressed with the patience that each one of them displays this morning.







After some get to know each other time, we all board two vans and head for Kasangati Child Development Center in Kasangati-Buyinja, 9.5 kilometers north of Kampala. What a great experience. Four staff augmented by volunteers oversee 270 children. That’s an amazing ratio. The real surprise is how well the children behave and how organzied they are. As everywhere we have been in Uganda, they are extremely warm and friendly.

On the road from Kampala:








At the child development center, it’s remarkable to see such joy, especially when you consider that most adults are unemployed and the average wage is five dollars per month. They also battle HIV and Malaria.









We observe classes and a dance program by the children. A smaller group of us venture into the neighborhood for some home visits. Our first is to the home of this grandmother. She cares for her HIV positive grandson whose parents have died. She makes her living by selling vegetables she grows out of a small stand that she rents. We stop at another home where they are taking preventive steps against malaria using mosquito netting. These are tiniest of dwellings. The grandmothers part of the building she lives in is no larger than six or seven feet square.
We have a wonderful time with the children throughout the day. They are so affectionate and playful. They prepare a lunch for us with the usual staples of matooke, groundnut sauce, and rice with the addition of whole fish cooked and cut up into parts - head, tail, and all, fish soup, chicken, chicken soup, and cassava.

After some more photos with the kids, we depart for the hotel. At 4:00 p.m., we walk to a handicrafts market for some souvenir shopping, then have a nice dinner together. I have boiled goat, which is my best meal of the week. Tender goat meat in a stew with spices of coriander and chilis.

We are packing up tonight to leave Kampala early in the morning. My hotel roommate is meeting his sponsored child, we will visit the Compassion national office, then board small planes for northern Uganda for a river safari in the afternoon. As you can imagine, I’m pretty excited about this!

I’ll post some photos now, then more later. There are many, many, many from today. Don’t forget to visit www.compassion.com!