Our director Stano Bielik writes directly from Uganda.
James Gihoma Ntakiruti came to Uganda years ago as a refugee from the Democratic Republic of Congo. He told us, „Life in the refugee area at that time was terrible. I decided to change that“. He learned to read and write and later went to school in the capital Kampala to study education.
Unlike many young people who, once they get to the city, never return to the camp, James came back and, with friends, founded first a kindergarten and later a primary school and an organization YOUTH Initiative for Development in Africa - YIDA.
Today it is a top-rated school. More than three hundred children go to the kindergarten and another two hundred to the primary school. When we arrived at the school yesterday afternoon at five o'clock, we were surrounded by dozens of cheerful children playing with the teachers after school. They didn't even want to go home from school because they were comfortable here and were really happy even with full bellies. In fact, YIDA is the only school in the camp that also provides a hot lunch for the children. Because with an empty tummy it is really hard to learn and for many children it is the only full meal during the day.
„Muzungu - muzungu!“ (that's what they call white people here), they called out to us, and they all wanted to touch our white hands. Many children saw a white man for the first time in their lives.
And what do we really want here? We are helping them solve a prosaic need: To build latrines with septic tanks for the children. Hygiene and health are closely related - the most common diseases here, apart from malaria, are diarrhoea and stomach problems. These are mainly caused by poor hygiene and poor diet.
In addition, we are starting a sponsorship programme to support children who are orphans, semi-orphans or come from disadvantaged families and would not be able to attend school without support. You too can adopt your schoolchild remotely and give a particular child a chance for an education. We will put more about the program on our website after our return from Uganda.
And not to forget the most important thing: giving children a hot meal every day is really a thing worth supporting. That's why we plan to support the children's diet with vegetables from our ADRA farm.
Thank you for going along with us in this.
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