This summer I had the opportunity to go on a volunteer trip with an organization called Child Initiative International (CII). Child Initiative International is a non-profit that supports six locations in Uganda, Africa, all of which are schools and three double as orphanages.
Since January 2014, I have been working with CII as their head of graphic design and online marketing. The chance to work with an organization to the extent that I have been working with CII was completely unexpected. I first heard about CII from a co-worker who just moved into the area from Illinois. She casually mentioned CII several times before I started asking questions about it. Eventually I found myself talking to Pastor Phil Klikas, the CEO of Child Initiative International, and filling out a volunteer member application.
The trip came as a surprise, too. I didn’t think I had been in the group long enough to have the chance to go with them quite so soon, but I was soon being told that I could raise money to go on the 2015 trip to Uganda. After sending letters, raising money, trying to remember to pack everything I needed and a blur of flights, the team of Pastor Phil, a member named Shirley, and I finally arrived in Uganda.
It was the middle of the night when we arrived and we were greeted by Pastor Steve Kimbowa, CII’s main contact and head of the Rock of Joy School in Uganda, and Allan Mbabali. Pastor Steve and Allan acted as our guides and drivers during the trip.
The next morning was much the same as every morning following. We’d wake up around 6 or 7 am, have breakfast, and wait for Pastor Steve and Allan to come pick us up for the day.
The first day was spent exchanging money and having maintenance done on the CII van with a new set of tires. Later that night we visited Rock of Joy with a delivery truck carrying 2,000 pounds of flour, sugar, rice and beans for the 382 children at the Rock of Joy School.
Driving through the city was one of the most perplexing experiences in Uganda. There are no speed limits but many speed bumps, which people may or may not pay attention to. Through watching drivers I understand there are no rules to driving either, no right-of-way laws, or at least no one seems to care about them just like they deliberately do not follow road signs, the few that there are. There are also no rules to pedestrians, people, including lone children, walk in and out of traffic not paying attention to drivers. Fortunately, I did not have to see any of the consequences you can imagine so frequently happen.
One of the most fascinating, and terrifying, things to watch is how the laws of physics appear to be non-existent. Little motorcycles everywhere called boda-bodas, used as taxis, zoom in and out of little spaces that you wouldn’t think possible; 1980s Toyota vans, also taxis, crowd the roads and somehow manage to squeeze through spaces that look impossible while also squeezing an impossible amount of people into them. The amount of stuff Ugandan people can manage to put onto one boda-boda is astounding. As Pastor Phil had said, they are masters of Tetris. I literally witnessed a boda-boda going down the road with a set of furniture on the back. A set! A dining table, a chair, and a couple other pieces.
Which brings me to our task on the second day, to get beds to the CII school that is surrounded by what I would call the jungle, or what Pastor Phil said was “in the middle of the bush.” Uganda has terrible storms, and Grace Children’s Home was subject to one that landed a tree right on top of the boy’s dormitory, crushing all their beds. Luckily, no one was in the building at the time and the dormitory has already been partially fixed.
We hired a dump truck to meet us at Rock of Joy where the beds had been stored. Slowly, we had people stack 16 bunk beds into this one dump truck. Somehow they managed it with no one getting hurt and none of the beds breaking.
While the truck was loaded, I walked a tour of the school. Rock of Joy is well developed and has mostly brick and concrete buildings. One of the concrete buildings is in bad need of interior repairs and paint and exterior paint as well. Allan has started a painting and home repair business, hiring graduates of Rock of Joy, so CII gave him the funding to repair the building as needed.
There are two buildings built with wood planks that need to be replaced with brick and concrete in the next two years according to government inspectors. The concrete delivered on the first day will help start that process to show that they are making progress. A proper kitchen needs to be built, there is a cooking furnace that works well but the walls and floor around it need to be replaced and a concrete floor is needed.
After the bunk beds had finally been stacked on top of the dump truck we had more supplies to get before heading to Grace Children’s Home. Of course these supplies were also being stacked onto the same dump truck. By the end there were 16 bunk beds, 32 mattresses, and 2.5 tons of concrete in one truck.
The drive there through thick trees on a somewhat-there road was interesting enough, but the best part was seeing the kid’s reaction to the truck of beds coming down the road. They were so excited that they helped unload the beds and carry them into their dorm.
Grace Children’s Home was beautiful. Abraham, the head teacher and Pastor Daniel’s son, does wonderful landscaping and has made a small bridge that crosses a stream that begins at their well and a garden area. I got to see their pigs, ducks, and what was left of their chickens. Last year during a funeral that everyone attended, the school had about 230 chickens stolen. Every child at this location is an orphan, there are no families to pay for them to attend, so what they already have is how they take care of themselves.
The concrete brought in will help start a barrier wall to prevent the theft of more animals but more importantly, it will prevent the theft of children. One of the biggest problems in Uganda is human trafficking and Grace Children’s Home is dealing with this issue first-hand. Last year traffickers came through the trees that surround the school and took a young boy. Thankfully the boy was found and returned but the traffickers were never caught. The wall and gates will help protect these children from this happening. We are hoping that the wall can be built over the next year or so.
As we had lunch in a wood gazebo-like hut, which was beautiful, we handed out Jenga games and giant checker games on rug mats. Pastor Phil explained that these can be used as teaching tools and they can recreate them to sell and make some extra income. I played checkers with Pastor Daniel. It is really weird to think about, that I played checkers, a game I always played when I was young, in a hut in the middle of a forest in the middle of Uganda, Africa. He had never played before and seemed to really enjoy it. I lost...barely.
Sunday was the next day. We went to church at Rock of Joy and spent the day with Pr. Steve and his family. I met Allan’s wife and two-year-old daughter. Allan was very proud to show Shirley and I his home. It was a small square room, a bed in the corner, a couch, television, and cabinet. It was small but compared to other homes I had seen in the village it was very nice and he had a right to be proud of it. Sunday is always a day to relax and visit with the kids and families during the trips. It was a good thing too, the next day we were headed to the locations that were the furthest away.
Monday we had about a three-hour drive, with a stop at the Equator to do some touristy photos. We visited two schools this day, Jireh Primary School and Alpha Learning Center. Concrete was a big expense during this trip and so were unexpected repairs on the van. Having six people and 1,000 pounds of concrete in one van driving a barely-there road seems to have consequences on the van’s functionality.
We were invited to taste the water from the well that provides water for the school and the surrounding villagers and it surprised me how much it tasted like bottled water. This is a great thing to have for these kids and to share with the villagers as most people in the area drink dirty water that could have thousands of diseases in it. Jireh also provides schooling to the children of the community that they otherwise wouldn’t have in their area.
We visited the piece of land that CII bought two years ago to become part of the Jireh Primary School. A common practice in Uganda is to make bricks from the soil and use concrete as a mortar. There is already a pile of bricks built up on this land that will be a new classroom within the next year. The land also has quite a few mango trees that can feed and fund the schools. Allan decided to be a mango hunter and climb one tree for us and get us some mangos. We left the school to head to Alpha Learning Center with a large box full. Fresh mangos are so much better than anything I have ever bought from a store.
Alpha Learning Center is the newest CII location and the least developed. Classrooms were built using wood poles and elephant grass and had dirt floors. Even though this isn’t a great condition for kids to learn in, these children are so excited to be there to learn. Alpha Learning Center has some blackboards and supplies but there is a lot that needs to be done yet. We left them some funding to get more school supplies for the kids as well as the concrete to begin rebuilding the wood and grass structures. They do have a clean water well in this area too and more families are sending their children to this school because they know they will get clean water and food.
On our way back we visited the farm that CII purchased a couple years ago. It was dark by the time we arrived so I didn’t get a chance to see the whole farm but it is pretty substantial in size. Currently, there are about 10 acres of corn, one acre of potatoes, two acres of Cutie orange trees, and several mango trees along with some goats. Last year CII bought a tractor, now what we need is a barn so the tractor and tools can be locked up. Also about $4,000 is still needed to install a well and pump irrigation system. Another challenge is monkeys, they come in and destroy crops, not always eating anything, but just vandalizing. No one wants to harm the monkeys so the best solution might be getting some farm dogs to scare them off.
Tuesday we visited a neighborhood within Kampala where the Tom & Jan Kindergarten is located. We spent the day helping Pastor Phil do a favor for Bishop Herbert by fixing their churchs’ sound system. By the end of the day it sounded great.
Tom and Jan is well developed but there is still work to be done. The pit latrine, which is what most of the schools have, needs to be replaced with flushing toilets, a better cooking area needs to be built and the children’s playground equipment needs to be repaired. There has already been a renovation of the original classrooms that were on the property and it looks great. A three-classroom addition was built not long ago and the interior needs to be finished. Once this is finished the plan is to put another addition in place. With the funding CII left for the interior classrooms to be finished and the addition to be started, it will be exciting to see how far they come next year.
Wednesday brought us to the last school, Remnant Christian School. Remnant is the most advanced location that CII supports.
When we arrived at the school we had a huge welcoming from the students. They had set up a singing program for us in their cafeteria area that was adorable. About an hour later we left to have lunch with Pastor Lawrence and his wife and little son.
During the program there were two little girls, no older than five maybe, in the front row that kept waving and smiling at me, when we left the building they started fighting over who could hold my hand. Eventually, I had to have an older student translate that I needed to go but I promised we would come back. Unfortunately, we went to tour the location to see what had been done and we never got a chance to go back. I have pictures of them so I am hoping I can pass them along to Pastor Lawrence so I can get a message to them so they know I didn’t forget.
The night before Pastor Lawrence had stopped by our hotel to pick up some funds to purchase a cow right away in the morning, before anyone could beat him to it. He ended up with a two-year-old Holstein and a calf, to be used to give milk to the school. We put everything in place to build a corral and shelter for them, as well as gave funding to purchase a pump for the well.
CII is very proud to announce that Remnant Christian School is our first “graduate.” CII’s plan is not to keep supporting every location for as long as we can but to give them the tools they need to sustain themselves. Remnant proves that the hope CII has to give these schools and children a chance to learn and grow and take care of themselves is working. Pastor Lawrence has already been doing some work in east Uganda and looking into possibilities to have CII send the help Remnant doesn’t require in that direction.
Our flight didn’t leave until late in the night Thursday, so we spent part of the day doing the normal touristy shopping and sightseeing. We drove around until we could find somewhere that sold real coffee. Coffee is an export in Uganda so it’s hard to find anywhere. Breakfast every morning and every meal we had at a cafe or restaurant only had freeze-dried coffee, Nescafe. I will never drink that stuff willingly again until I’m back in Uganda and don’t have a choice. We found a coffee shop called Cafe Java that looked like it took everything from Dunkin Donuts and changed the name. It was wonderful.
While we sat there I people-watched, specifically the armed guards that had been wandering all over Kampala our entire visit.
In 2010, during CII’s trip there was a terrorist bombing in Kampala. During our trip this year the trials for that bombing were in progress, a month earlier the lead prosecutor in the trial was assassinated. I’m not sure if this was the reason for all the armed guards and anti-riot armored police vehicles that were out, that might have been normal.
When we finished our coffee we spent almost two hours driving around trying to find a massive sized billboard I had found one of the first days of the trip. I wanted to get a photograph of it; the reason it was so important was the public announcement displayed. We never found it; it had been replaced with something else, so I will describe it. It was very dark with a man shown from chest down, hanging, his feet not touching the ground, bruised and bloodied. Next to this image were bold, white words “TORTURE IS NOW ILLEGAL IN UGANDA.” A message from authorities notifying people that torture is now illegal, only now. In 2015. That is ridiculous and heartbreaking and I wish that I could have gotten a picture of that so people could understand that, yes, torture still happens in other countries. Enough that authorities have to put out service announcements just to remind people that it is illegal.
Before we left for the airport, we had what, could be called the mayor, give us permission to video tape while having a tour of the village that Rock of Joy was located in. CII is in the process of making a documentary; the 48 minutes of video taken of the village will be used in this documentary. Walking around the village and getting up close to all the things I only saw through the van window was devastating.
A huge problem is trash disposal. There is hardly any trash service in Uganda; I think I saw two trash trucks the entire time we were there. The village roads and alleys are too small or non-existent for trucks to get through. Most people burn their trash; anywhere I looked there were piles of trash burning. So much trash everywhere that plastic bags and bottles get tramped down into the dirt and become part of the ground. As we walked in the village we walked along small canals where water ran, I actually couldn’t tell if it was drinking water or sewer water, there was so much trash in it. Chickens and goats were picking around and eating out of large trash piles. This is especially bad if the animal gets a sickness or disease from eating out of trash and then the people eat the animal. Sicknesses that could come from this could kill so many people. What’s worse is that children were playing in these areas and possibly searching for food here too.
Housing is limited and what some people call homes in Uganda are small enough to be a broom closet here. There are people living in mud huts in the middle of a city right next to a concrete house. Homes are built so close together that they might as well be attached. There is no room for people I’m pretty sure some of the homes I saw throughout the trip were shipping containers put onto a concrete slab that works as a foundation. I know that many shops were made this way.
There is a huge disconnect in the way people live. There are people living well that have nice things and nice homes. In the same place there will be someone who is living in a mud hut and spends time being a witchdoctor. There are people who own mansions and nice cars in the same area where human sacrifices for religious purposes are still a real occurrence. None of it makes sense to me, how do some of these people act like there is nothing wrong here? This, and many more reasons, is why CII is in Uganda helping as many children as they can.
Notes on Returning From My Volunteer Trip
After getting back from a mission trip, apparently it is normal for normal to not feel normal. Got it? I thought I did, but not really. Pastor Phil had warned me and tried to mentally prepare me for what would happen and he did a great job, but it’s very different when you’re actually experience it.
Have you ever looked in a mirror that was completely steamed over? You can recognize yourself because you’re used to seeing it, logically your face should be in the mirror if you are in front of it, but at the same time you can’t really tell who it is or see distinctive features. That is the best way I can fit words together to describe what home felt like when I got back. It’s still a little foggy every once in a while and I sometimes still get angry when I realize how much stuff I have that I have no need for.
Even though I have only been on this one trip so far, the one piece of advice I can give to someone talking to a friend or family member that recently returned from a mission trip: Don’t ask them if it was fun, phrasing it like talking about a vacation. In my own experience that question was frustrating and hard to answer; instead ask about what they did to help, about the people and the culture, what kind of things still need to be done to help people where they had been. These questions have substance, they provide an outlet for the traveler to vent about what problems the people are facing and what their whole purpose of the mission trip was.
This was an amazing experience and I hope to do it next year too. If there is ever an opportunity to go on a volunteer trip, go for it.
If you would like to help or learn more about Child Initiative International you can visit at: www.CIIntl.org If you have any questions you can direct them to: https://www.facebook.com/Ciintl
