Halfway through

Written May 23rd


It is coming to the end of our 5th week in Uganda. I can’t even believe I’m almost halfway through my time here. It’s a bit heartbreaking for me but at the same time I am so proud of what I have accomplished so far and truly pleased at how well I have adapted to this life here. I had been preparing for the worst and going over one of the Uganda Project booklets wondering when my “honeymoon phase” will be over, waiting for that dark depression to come. But nothing has really troubled me and it’s great. Preparing for the worst must have helped me in a way because I have had an amazing time here and I don’t even want to think about leaving. I have tough moments at practicum and moments where I miss my family but I have not once said to myself, ‘I want to go home’, which is exactly how I expected to feel for my first week here. When that didn’t happen, I then assumed it would happen my second week or third week but nope, I am still going strong. I just keep thinking of how much I need to cherish every moment here because soon enough I will be back home and I will have no way to capture life in Uganda other than with my photos and memories.

Today at practicum we did a bit of case sharing as a group before going out to the field. I was prepared to talk about a case that has stayed particularly close to my heart from my first day. The girl’s name is Josephine. We have visited her and her grandmother many times now; luckily she is very close to our centre. The sad thing is that there never seems to be any improvement and often times I feel things are getting worse for her. I wanted to share my observations of her case but we ran out of time after talking about Teresa’s case of another young girl named Bridget. We had to go out to the field and this time we visited a Day Care/kindergarden school and a primary school called Veronica’s Primary School. We had originally thought we would find 2 or 3 children there with disabilities but ended up meeting 11. Some had problems with vision and hearing, one has osteomyelitis, others had mental challenges or other physical challenges. It was an interesting day and I really enjoyed seeing the school. The kids were all crowding around wanting to know what was happening. Sometimes I feel like an animal caged in a zoo here because everywhere we go it feels like we are on display. It will be interesting going home and not getting all of that attention; not having every single child I pass yelling “bye mzungu!”