Home is Where the Malaria Hits

I have now been in Uganda for seven months! In some ways it feels like I just got here and in other ways it feels like this is home.

I can now navigate how to travel using taxis and buses. I can communicate at the market in Acholi to get my produce and I know what price I should pay. It was interesting when mom came to see what shocked her or what was abnormal to her, it really showed me how much I have adjusted, that I don’t see those things.

This summer we had six interns who came to do different things at RG. Three of the interns helped me organize our donations room so the children can receive clothing or shoes when they need them. Staying on top of who needs what is quite the undertaking. We have 140 kids who are all growing, playing hard and hand washing their clothes each week. It takes a toll on their small wardrobe. We also set up a new system of receiving clothes to hopefully help our childcare workers to have records of when kids get clothes.

After organizing all the donations we then take any clothes that are not useful to us, like size XXL shirts or excess of something and we have a sale that is open to our workers. This gives them a chance to buy clothes at a reduced price and RG is able to make a little money. So I will be organizing those items into groups and pricing things for the sale. We hope to have the sale at the end of the month. It is a big deal with our workers and they will line up well before we open. It reminds me of Black Friday!

I am also continuing to write curriculum for a lady who is working on presenting the curriculum to the First Lady of Uganda who is also the Minister of Education. It is called Roots to Fruits and it takes some American education ideas and melds it with the Ugandan education system to give a better education to Ugandan students. About ten schools have already adopted it for their 1st through 3rd grade classes. I am currently writing 5th grade English curriculum, it has been really fun to get to use some of my lesson planning skills again. Also knowing that this Christian curriculum could touch the whole country and possibly even several countries is really encouraging.

We celebrated the 4th of July to the best of our abilities :) I planned some craft projects for the Cessnun children, their dad is a doctor here, and even made red white and blue mac and cheese for lunch. That night all of the missionaries gathered for a potluck and we had hamburgers, hot dogs, potato salad, fries, and two desserts followed by trivia and a bonfire. It was such a fun day and a great way to celebrate my favorite holiday.

The last bit of news is after surviving for six months without getting malaria I finally got it! I had a headache Saturday (I never have headaches) and then, Sunday I was so tired. Around 4pm I started running a fever so I went down to the clinic and got tested and sure enough I had malaria. I started treatment that night and hopefully I will be as good as new by the end of the week. It was so funny to think of the last time I had malaria (in Memphis) and how hard it was to get treatment when I was in the USA with all the modern technology and yet here is Uganda it was as easy as a finger prick and three minutes later I was walking out with medicine.

Thank you again for all your prayers and support. Jessica

Prayer Requests

-Unity among the RG workers and missionaries

-Wisdom as I work with the teachers, I want to support them without making them feel incapable of their job.

-Health, Malaria free please!

Praises

-I have loved having the interns, it has been such a sweet community this summer

-The kids are getting what they need with the new system

-Uganda feels like home