Chilli Children

I had a day off blogging yesterday. Once again we have all been everywhere together today, so please see Barbara’s at darton2soroti.blogspot.com for details of school visits. My highlight today was the visit to the North Kigezi Anglican Diocese offices to talk about their work with children with disabilities. They are wonderfully supported by another UK based Christian charity, which is called Chilli Children because one of the brilliant things they do is help poor families to grow chillies as a cash crop, which the project buys from the growers. We were generously given more than an hour to talk with the occupational therapist/manager, a lovely lady called Evas. She confirmed our impression that most people locally have very little understanding of the nature of various disabilities, she is the one who will assess them and advise on what kind of help they need, whether surgery, education on life skills, learning therapies to do at home, income generation, etc. When the project has enough funds it supports children to travel to hospital for any needed surgery. The nearest adequately equipped one is at Kisizi two hours away, where we plan to go tomorrow. However some children need to travel as far as Mbale, more like two days travelling, if they need major orthopaedic surgery or shunts for hydrocephalus. We do seem to have a lot of spina bifida, hydrocephalus and microcephaly in this district; it probably has a nutritional basis. Evas suggested ways in which Global Care and they could work together, which was really the purpose of our visit today, so we will have some ideas to put to GC when we get home.

It was quite noticeable in schools that we saw hundreds of children today but hardly any with a visible disability, though we met some deaf children. Access to school is very limited if you have problems getting about. There are few special needs teachers in the country and teachers generally are disgruntled and often not at work because their pay is too low to live on and they are trying to make money somewhere else; there is no enhancement for special needs and no incentive to come and work in remote areas.

Some of my readers know that I have a limited diet due to food intolerance / allergy, and while I hate to make a fuss about this here, I do try to stick to it or I will not be well enough to do what I have come for. As a result the last three evening meals have been chicken and cassava as the town has more or less run out of fish, which I was alternating previously. Mealtimes are enlivened by persistent harassment from an admittedly nice looking ginger cat. It has a remarkable tolerance for physical violence, I have discovered.

If you enjoy reading the blogs, please also visit GlobalCare site for more information and stories about Uganda and the other projects.