Soroti Hotel

So I have now been on my maiden voyage!! I went to Uganda!!<br><br>Luckily, for my first mission, I was sent to collect a young Swiss girl with malaria. It sounded as though she was really quite sick before, but was getting better by the time we arrived. Thank goodness!<br><br>We landed on this grassy airstrip - with the attention of the ...

Hello Friends and Family! It has been a few days since I was able to send you all an update, but I am doing incredibly well and I am absolutely loving this country and the people who live here. Over the past week or so we have been very busy! I had a humbling experience that will go down as a "completely African" day. Myself and two of my team members took three children from the orphanage to visit their families deep in the bush of Central Uganda. We rode in the back of a pick up ...

Hello everyone, This is the last of this series of entries. We have found our way to the YWAM base here in Soroti, and it is great. The people are beautiful, and very happy. Today we are having an orientation to set up our plan for the next few weeks. We have had incredible hospitality and the city is great. There are very few vehicles and most people just use bicycles. The team is ...

We push on from Jinja this morning and head towards Sipi falls which is a famous waterfall close to the Kenyan border. We reach there in the early afternoon after a stop in Jinja to food shop. As we are out of campsites for the next few days and in the wilderness there is no meat to be had and so we have to raid the market for a assortment of veggies to see us through the next few days. It is my ...

Last week, Nicole and I finished conducting our interviews and said goodbye to the TPO staff in Soroti. We went to Obuku camp and also said our final goodbyes to the volunteers that helped translate our interviews, as well as heard some final pleas from women in the community to return in the future and spread awareness about their situation not only with regards to the LRA, but the Karamajong situation as well. It was strange ...

Just a quick entry to let you know that we've finished with the survey portion of our research project! We managed to interview 202 individuals living in either the IDP camps or nearby villages (104 and 98, respectively). Our goal was to finish on Monday, but not surprisingly, we weren't able to go to the field on Mon due to the truck's mechanical failures, etc, etc. Apparently, we still haven't gotten used to Africa time (as opposed to muzungu, white person, time ...

Hey y'all. I am posting some pictures of the IDPs at the camps we've been working at, as well as some other pics. Nicole will write a more detailed entry later. But, just so you know, we will be finishing up our field work today, having completed about 204 surveys on alcohol-related behavior, its affect on sexual behavior, and ...

I just want everyone to know that this is the third time I've tried to write this blog. So, if it seems skimpy on the details, I'm soory. I'm hoping that this time, the electricity won't go out again. This past weekend, Nicole and I stayed in Soroti and worked on Saturday as we planned to get ahead of our research schedule. We stayed in that evening to cook dinner and read by candlelight. At some point in the evening, we suffered a tragic loss ...

So I've decided that Ugandans are pretty much the most polite people I've ever met. Whenever we arrive at a camp or village, everyone comes out to greet us, shake our hands, and welcome us. We then have a mini meeting with the chairman of the camp/village, the "mayor," and other respected elders. Then everyone stands up to formally introduce themselves and tell us that we "are most welcome." We sign a dog eared visitors book ...

So, some people have asked if we actually have gotten any work done. We haven't written about our work before because it is kind of depressing and repetitive. But, for those who want to know, we've gotten about 60 surveys filled out. Our study has changed a bit. The Museveni government is trying to get people to resettle in their villages because they feel that it is now safe for them to return to their homes without the threat of ...