Thursday, June 28th

Ndejje University was hosting a going away part for us SIUE students on Thursday, June 28th. We had some small gifts and thank you letters for those who worked so closely with us throughout this last month. One of the special members of Ndejje staff was the IT guy named Paul. He became emotional when we were saying thank you and gave him his gift. He thanked us for always being human and flexible. He said that is a hard thing to come by in people, especially travelers. He followed up by saying that anywhere we went, we will assimilate just fine. To me, I was remembering at orientation on one of our first days being here, an administrator was saying that to be a social scientist, you must work with ease in any part of the world or in any field. After hearing Paul’s remarks on one of our last days, this means that we were successful while we were here abroad! The next hard good bye was going to be to Peter who works in the kitchen. He was always concerned if us Americans were eating or not. He feared that we didn’t eat enough, so he always made sure that we had a steady supply of rice which was always a hit with the American girls. Paul messaged us to say that he hoped we would keep the same attitude anywhere we went because he loved the way that we composed ourselves. At first I didn’t think that it would be hard to leave, but it was getting harder and harder to think about leaving the closer that it came. At the going away party, there were many guest speakers and some speeches were tear-jerkers. We ended on a high note by Dr. Cathorall and Dr. Brady being honored with traditional Ugandan dresses and paintings of Uganda. Then us students got keychains painted in Uganda. We had tea and sodas and a quick snack while we mingled and said some more good-byes. After the party, I went back to my room so I could start packing up some things and getting together the things that I wanted to donate. I had a lot more to donate that I had previously thought! When my group went into the community and met the two children that needed help so that they could go to school that year, I was not able to donate any money at the time due to the US director’s instructions. I was sad about not being able to help them at that time, but Patricia said she would take all the things that I wanted to donate to this family so they could still benefit from my presence. This made me feel much better and the US directors were okay with this! After organizing my donations, I met up with some girls in the market. We went to our usual chicken and chips stand and had a drink. There was this adorable dog and cat in the bar, so we kept feeding them chips and chicken and some pieces of bread. It was nice to see dogs and cats that were not scared of humans. It seems like the animals are treated much better here in Ugandan than how I saw animals being treated in Panama. It’s crazy that we have been here for a month now and some of these cultural comparisons are just now coming to mind. Anyway, we had a good time in the market as usual! Besides the dog and the cat, we had a couple of kids hanging around with us. They loved having their pictures taken (with their parent’s permission, of course) and they laughed and laughed at Snapchat filters and they got to try chewing gum. We went back to campus and everyone hung out on the balcony again and listened to music and hung out with some of our Ugandan friends. We were trying to squeeze as much quality time in as possible before having to say good bye! P.S. I am so jealous that all of the Ugandans can dance so well. Even with extensive teaching from multiple people, I still can only do the chicken dance at best.

Wednesday, June 27th

We had our last team meeting on Wednesday, June 27^th. Mica and I got up early so that we could print off all the research hand outs and the scripts we had created for HIV/AIDS and rubbish/compost pits. We printed at least one hundred pages and it costs less than four US dollars! We called a meeting after lunch so we could hand off all the information for the group to carry out the sensitization and demonstrations in the community for us. Mica and I treated the group to ice cream and sodas to celebrate our group collaboration throughout the last couple of weeks. It was a rough start, but we finished strong! The group was FINALLY on the right track talking about other community projects that they could do considering they were social workers and community developers. They talked about domestic violence, drug and alcohol abuse and agriculture/poverty correlations. It was nice to look back and see that while this month had its highs and lows, Mica and I could teach them about needs assessments, data analysis, planning and implementing. These skills will help them to finish field work this Summer as well as in future field work. I didn’t have anything to do after this meeting so I went back to my room and decided to take a nap. It felt nice not having any field work/homework hanging over my head! I ended up sleeping for three and a half hours while some of the other girls went to watch a faculty versus student soccer game. I was hoping to catch up with the group before they went into the market for dinner, but I over slept. No chicken and chips for me today! After dinner on campus, I made coffee for my friend Patricia and I then we went up to the third story balcony to play UNO with some of the other girls. I didn’t think this plan through too much… a super long nap and a huge cup of coffee so late into the day/night was not a good idea. I was so energized when everyone was settling in to go to sleep. I ended up washing a huge bag of dirty laundry by hand and hanging it to dry in my room. This kept me up until at least 1am and then I watched some TV show that I had downloaded on my phone until I finally came down from my caffeine high. I learned my lesson with that one!

Tuesday, June 26th

I had my second to last team meeting the morning of Tuesday, June 26^th. Mica and I met with our team at 9am again. Some members were only a little late this time, so we got done with the meeting a lot sooner. We went over the program that Mica put together for the community after we leave. Our field team is to educate them on how to properly care for rubbish pits and how to start and care for a compost pit in addition to the rubbish pit. We first had to explain the difference between a rubbish pit and a compost pit since this idea is completely foreign to our group members. Good thing Mica and I had information for them that we planned to print out and hand off to them before we went so that they can study more. Afterwards, I finally caught up on all my homework so I could just chill in the evening again. I watched a lot more Netflix until I had run out of downloaded shows. I heard some of the other girls were going into the market for chicken and a drink, so I tagged along. We always have a great time when we go out together in the market. On the way back, I rode on the fastest boda of my life! Come to find out, the drivers think that they will get more money if they drive faster. It made sense now why my driver was passing all of the other drivers. When we got back to campus, we took tea in the dining hall and hung out with some friends until it was time to call it a night.

Monday, June 25th

After this busy weekend, I took Monday, June 25^th to try to relax a little bit. This was my one-year anniversary with my boyfriend. I was upset that I couldn’t be home to spend the day with him, but I had a meeting with my field work group in the morning at 9am so I couldn’t mope around all day. Mica and I were there on time and kept waiting and waiting for the other members to show up. We waited until 9:30am for only a few members to show up. Other members showed up at 9:45am and then almost 10am. Ugandan time is real and you are reminded of this almost every day. One of the speech pathology students that hasn’t been in a field work group with us was sitting in on the meeting since she had nothing else to do for the day. She later mentioned that she was so frustrated with everyone being late, but we were not. She said that Mica and I made jokes about them finally deciding to show up, but we were not rude like she would have been after waiting on everyone for so long. We told her that since it happens so often, you can’t even be made anymore. You just continue with what you came to do originally. We were meeting to go over the HIV/AIDS program that I had put together for them to educate our community on. We worked together to improve my program so it was better catered to Ugandan culture. It was nice team collaboration! Some had questions for me so they could better understand before presenting this information to the community after Mica and I were back in the US. After the meeting, we had another meeting with Dr. Saidah, the dean of social sciences, and a professor to go over the final reports and decide what our case studies were going to be. Since these meetings took longer than I thought they would, I didn’t get anything else done. I even missed lunch by a couple hours. I was starving so some of us went to the market for some more chicken and fried (yes, I am addicted). On the way to the market we saw the cutest thing ever, but I couldn’t take a picture of it. There was a baby sitting in a water jug with the top cut off. There was a string attached to the water jug and the baby’s older brother was pulling him along behind him. He had a stick tied to the other end of the string so when his hand got tired, he could put the stick in front of his legs and when he walked, the baby was still being pulled in the jug behind. (I’m sorry if this description is confusing. I really wish I had a picture!) After dinner, I texted with my friend Patricia. She was asking me about the number of piercings that I have. She told me that a lot of piercings are frowned upon in Uganda. She said that the only reason why she has her ears pierced is because of the number of kidnappings when she was a child. It was believed that kidnapping was a product of witchcraft and if a young child had poured blood, they would not be kidnapped. This is why young girls got their ears pierced – to pour blood and be protected. I thought this was so interesting! I finished the night off by binge watching Netflix in my bed while procrastinating on my homework (sorry, not sorry) until I fell asleep.

Sunday, June 24th

Pictures: Top Left: Sign for Ngamba Island. Top Middle: Chimp begging for more food by sticking his hand out. Top Right: Three old man chimps sitting in a circle making funny faces. Bottom Left: Me sleeping on the boat while getting drenched in the waves. LOL. Bottom Middle: On the overlook seeing so many chimps waiting for their snacks. Bottom Right: The group listening to the vet talking about chimp’s care.

For Sunday, June 24^th, we were supposed to do service work by painting a health clinic. Unfortunately, the painting supplies were never orders. Our alternative was to go to a chimpanzee orphanage on a secluded island. I suddenly was not sad about the lack of service work once I heard that was the new plan. I was so excited! I loved visiting the babies’ home/orphanage the first week. We took some of our Ugandan professors and team members to go on this journey with us since they volunteered to help us paint beforehand. We all had another early morning to catch the tourist bus in time. We drove for about two hours to Entebbe where the boat would come get us to take us to the Ngamba island to the chimpanzee sanctuary. We waited for a very long time for the boat to arrive. We were told that there was a restaurant and a bar to wait at, but it was so early and they were still closed. When the boat finally came, we were told that it was an hour-long ride across Lake Victoria to the island. I was so sick of waiting around and being stuck in a bus by then, but it paid off! We showed up and there was coffee with real milk for us. I have been going through withdraws so that drink was the first peak of my day. We were briefed before going to see the chimps. This island is very eco-friendly by practicing sustainable measures like solar power, rain water collection, composting toilets and recycling/composting cans next to the normal trash can. In their gift shop, they sell handmade gifts and those proceeds support the families who make the goods as well as other health care and education programs in surrounding areas. The man went on to tell us more about the chimpanzees. He told us that the chimpanzees like to escape, so if that happens and they chase us or show any aggression, run to the lake. Chimps don’t swim so they will back off if you’re in the water. Also, one of the chimpanzees really liked to throw rocks at visitors, so we had to watch out for this and turn our backs if it started happening. This was unsettling, but he continued on with better news. Apparently, this island is home to forty-nine chimpanzees that had been rescued from all over the world over the course of the last twenty years. Many of them were rescued from the black market and people who kept them as pets. There were three baby chimps that were born in captivity. This is because the female chimpanzees have birth control implanted into their arms. Fun fact: They use the same contraceptives that are used for humans. Three females have managed to take the implant out of their arms and then got pregnant. The female that got pregnant first gave birth to a baby girl. When this baby girl got older, she then took her implant out and had a baby chimp. It must run in the family! The other pregnancy came as a surprise as well. Normally chimpanzees do not reproduce until they are considered “adults” which is about twelve years old. One of the chimpanzees had not had birth control implanted yet since they didn’t think she would get pregnant, but she ended up getting pregnant at age seven. Since she was still just a “teenager,” she didn’t care for her baby. Other older chimps wanted to be mothers so they all fought over the baby until he was so badly injured that he had to live in indoor captivities for three years. These chimpanzees are polyamorous so they are unsure who the father is, so all the females want to play the role in raising the child since the fathers are not present. When the injured baby was integrated back to the forest with the rest of the chimps, he was accepted quickly but he wasn’t used to hustling for his food. This young man now chooses to live in captivity so he can continue to be hand-fed every meal. There is one other chimpanzee that lives in captivity day-in and day-out as well. This is because when they attempted to integrate him into the forest with the rest of them, he didn’t surrender to the alpha male so he was not accepted. At night, all the chimpanzees in the forest are lured into captivity to sleep indoors with these two others. They do not want the chimpanzees to sleep in the forest because they would need to make beds either on the ground of in the trees. If all the chimps did this every night, it would destroy their sanctuary island in a couple of years. Once we were done with briefing, we went to a series of platforms on the edge of the forest to see the chimpanzees. They were all waiting at the fence waiting for us to feed them. To help the sanctuary, you can pay 20,000 shillings (equivalent to about five US dollars) to feed to chimps. Of course, I took the opportunity to do this. When we threw the fresh fruits and vegetables to them, they surprisingly did not fight over the food. We learned that some chimps do not compete well at feeding time due to hierarchy. Some would have food in their hands while still raising their hands and waiving to get your attention to give them more. If the food drops of the concrete ledge/wall, some chimpanzees use sticks as tools to pull the vegetables into the forest for them to eat it. One poor old man chimp was sitting at the edge with a stick and he is described as “the worst tool user ever” since he could not pull the vegetables in to save his life. Others were very good tool users. Some were left-handed and others were right-handed. Some took the guide being distracted with us visitor as an opportunity to try to escape. They got large sticks and tried to lift the electric wire fence to squeeze through. This is successful for some, but they were caught by the guide before they could complete their mission. He told us that the monkeys are so smart that they learned they cannot use a wet stick to try to escape because then they get shocked. They know to only use dry sticks near the fence. We got to see two of the baby chimpanzees that were running around and playing, too. It was so cute! I loved every second of it. Too bad once the feeding was over, the chimpanzees were done with us and decided to go back into the forest out of sight. We went next to visit the two chimpanzees who live in captivity all the time. The tour guide even held one of their hands through the gate. We were told not to get too close since they were not used to us and they might throw unpleasant things at us, if you catch my drift. We went to the on-site vet next. He told us that the chimpanzees are care for pretty much as if they are humans. They use human contraceptives, get their blood, stool and urine sent off to human labs for testing, get immunizations against common human diseases and they have medical records just like all of us. Chimpanzees can even get HIV although they have their own strain. Last stop before we went back on the boat was lunch. Man, this was so good! I keep saying every outing that this was the best food that I have had since I’ve been here but I really think that this meal topped the rest of them. It was veggie spaghetti with a rosemary tomato sauce. So good and yet so different from American spaghetti besides the noodles themselves. We got on the boat and had the hour ride back. We stopped midway through for the boat driver to point out that we had crossed the equator. There’s a first time for everything, right? When we got back to the island, we stopped for a drink and listed to some music before heading back onto the bus for the long drive back. It was yet another long day this weekend, but it was so worth it! This was my favorite day that I have had in Uganda yet!

Saturday, June 23rd

The national wood ball tournament was here – Saturday, June 23^rd. We had to be on the bus by 6:30am to make it to the stadium outside of Kampala by 8am registration. We rode with the rest of the Ndejje wood ball competitors. It was about to be a long day! We arrived and realized that we didn’t bring any of our equipment with us. It was still locked in Mrs. Lillian’s office. We hoped that she had brought it with her. When we spotted her, we approached her and told her what happened. She was disappointed but managed to find two spare mallets and some wooden balls so we could still compete. We waited inside of the stadium for everyone to arrive and to figure out how this tournament went. All these young school kids were showing up in their matching uniforms with wood ball equipment. We thought that was our competition since we were told to wait in there. How embarrassing would that have been?! Luckily, we were just in the wrong place. We went outside to our fields to compete with the senior ladies. They were so much better and more professional than we were. The competition was real. Good thing we didn’t expect to rank well anyway (haha). After registration and practicing a bit, we went for the opening ceremony. It was so long but there was some good entertainment. We saw a group of Ugandan males who were drummers. They had these huge drums sitting on their heads while they played. They danced, too. There was another group that had females and males that were dancing with head dresses and tambourine-sounding shoes. We also saw Mrs. Lillian honored for her untouchable wood ball skills and ranks. After that was done, we went to compete with our teams. We found that the USA and Canada teams we were previously split up into were split up again. We were playing with total strangers whose skills were much more developed than our own. We were also playing the same challenging course that Mrs. Lillian was playing. After playing that first course made up of twelve different gates/goals, we played another round. This round was just with us Americans, so that was much more entertaining. We finished quickly so we waited in the stadium for them to announce the winners. USA came in second to last place – whoo-hoo! When we left the stadium, there was a camel just hanging out by the bus…  Always expect the unexpected in Uganda! By this time, we had been gone for at least thirteen hours. We still had a two-hour bus ride back to campus. This was the longest day I have had yet. I was never so happy to go to sleep in my dorm.

Friday, June 22nd

Picture: As you see on the helmet, this boda driver is “certified safe” according to UBER, unlike some of the drivers that we have had… Keep reading and it makes more sense.

We finally had a break the morning of Friday, June 22^nd. Many of our group members slept in, but I decided to get up early to go to main campus to work on homework. We had another public lecture with Dr. Cathorall in the afternoon. Through this field work with us Americans and the Ndejje students, we realized that the Ugandan students didn’t know how to do proper research since they didn’t have to do it for school until now. Dr. Cathorall’s lecture was to teach them the proper sources to use to find the information that they want. I was so shocked that some of the students didn’t know how to do a Google search on the desktop computer. I think the lecture went well since all the Ugandan students seemed to catch on at the end. They were finding great sources! After the lecture, we had our last team dinner at Dr. Cathorall and Dr. Brady’s guest house. Surprisingly, the doctors weren’t too mad at us from the night before. I was relieved. I thought it was going to be so awkward. Since it was Dr. Cathorall’s birthday, her son and husband came to Uganda to celebrate with her. We got to meet them over dinner. When they came, they brought seven boxes of Kraft mac and cheese in their suitcases. When the girls found out we were having salad and mac and cheese for dinner, they were so ecstatic. We haven’t had like any dairy, let alone cheese, since we got to Africa and all of us were deprived of fresh vegetables. Two of the girls even started crying. It was cute and sad at the same time, but you would only understand if you were three weeks into this trip. For dessert, we had pan-fried lemon and chocolate cakes (there was no oven) and the two birthday girls had candles in theirs. It was a true celebration! After dinner, we had to leave before it got dark again. We walked to the main road and waited for six bodas to arrive to take us back to campus. Dr. Brady and Dr. Cathorall have a gate keeper named Saturday. Saturday came with us to help us flag down the drivers. There was one boda driving down the road like a mad man! He had his legs flying off each side and kept dragging his feet off of the boda. He then turned around like three times in the street and we thought he was going to drop the bike. It was so crazy to see. Saturday approached the driver and made him prove he could drive properly and wasn’t inebriated. Then, Saturday brought the man on the boda over to us and the man drove two of our members back home. The girls who rode with him said that he wasn’t that scary of a driver once they were on the bike. He was just way faster than the rest of the drivers. We think that this driver was too short for the pedals since he had troubles stopping. I saw a driver that I was familiar with so I jumped on the bike quickly. Lord only knows the other drivers that could have rolled up after seeing the first man’s driving skills. We all made is safely back and almost everyone went straight to sleep since we had to be up very early the next morning.

Thursday, June 21st

Thursday, June 21^st was a day for celebrating! We got up early in the morning and got all dressed up to go to Ndejje’s main campus in Kampala. Here, Dr. Cathorall and Dr. Brady were explaining to some university staff members what Public Health and Speech Pathology means in the United States. The professors seemed interested and had a lot of questions, especially in Speech Pathology. Dr. Cathorall began with Public Health and we had a demonstration from two of our seniors. For their senior project, they went to a memory care facility and oversaw the creation of an exercise program for the residents. The students did needs assessments at the facility with staff and residents. Then, they went to do more research on exercise for elderly and on memory care therapy. They decided to combine an exercise program with music therapy after learning that music helps with memory loss patients. They planned routines based only on songs that the residents knew and loved. During the demonstration at this lecture, we all danced to “Blue Suede Shoes.” It was so fun! After implementing their program at the facility, they did an analysis. They found that the program was sustainable, attendance increased and enjoyment rates increased. The only downfall of the program was the staff needed more teaching sessions because the songs were not all being performed right after the students stepped away from the implementation phase. I loved learning about this program! I also learned that Alzheimer’s is the sixth leading cause of death in the United States and of the top ten deadly illnesses/diseases, Alzheimer’s is the only one that can’t be prevented, slowed down or cured. After hearing Dr. Cathorall’s speech and participating in the senior’s demonstration, Ndejje staff said that they should implement these planning steps including needs assessment to help with their field work and to make their university “interesting and creative.” That is progress! Mrs. Deborah, a Ndejje partner who oversees programs for the deaf in Uganda, spoke next. She informed us of many things including “disability days” which included holidays in Uganda to recognize the blind, deaf and albinos but there is no day to recognize any speech disorders. She also told us that speech disorders in Uganda are attributed to family planning methods (the pill or coil), environmental curses, witch craft, genetic factors and malaria or measles. Furthermore, the government of Uganda does not require that those with disabilities be educated. There is no data or training materials on/for those with disabilities so those who are affected are often neglected and lack awareness of their existence and growth or exposure in social settings. Somehow, women with speech disorders still have children and a husband although those husbands will often have another wife and families. Dr. Brady spoke next and elaborated on speech pathology. This was very interesting as well! I learned what selective mutism was. Apparently, those who have this condition are very able to speak, they just won’t do it. I also learned about devices that are customized for those who struggle to communicate. One man could only communicate via blinking so there was a device created for him that allowed him to write a book! The Ndejje staff had so many questions including how they can help their students. They decided that they should carry out research and professional intervention including advocacy, sensitization, change in attitudes and recognition. What shocked me next was that the MC for the day publicly asked the audience of students and staff to raise their hands and identify themselves for having a language or social disorder. In the United States, this would not have been done.  That pretty much concluded the lecture. We took a long bus ride back to our campus and it was still light out when we returned. We decided to get together some of our Ndejje friends to meet with us in the market for fried chicken, french fries and a drink to celebrate one of our team member’s birthdays. We were having a blast all hanging out! Too bad it got dark so soon and someone called our professor to come to the market and escort us home before we were done celebrating. Dr. Brady came to us so fast on a boda that her hair was all windblown. She walked into the joint where we were and all I saw were people scrambling while frantically announcing, “Dr. Brady is here!” I ran out so fast to catch a boda back! It was nice to know that they care so much about our safety here even though we Americans were all quite embarrassed at the time. All our Ugandan colleagues could not believe what was happening. On that note, I called it a night after being escorted back to the dormitories.

Wednesday, June 20th

Picture: I didn’t have a picture from this boring day, so enjoy the water falls again.

Well, the infamous meeting day had come – Wednesday, June 20^th. Mica and I had set the meeting for 9am to give everyone enough time to get out of bed. When we arrived, no one was there yet but our group leader. We waited around until 9:15am and decided to start the meeting with only the three of us. Mica and I heard from the leader what had transpired the day before. He said that he felt he was letting the community down if they didn’t do the labor projects, which we already knew. We said this was okay, and that they can do that while we research and plan these programs which is a requirement for our degrees. He agreed that he wanted the group to go to the fields to complete the jobs they promised while we planned the programs to turn over to them next week. When the meeting was over, three more group members showed up; mind you, it was 9:45am by this time. Continuing on, Mica and I went to talk about what we had to do before next week. Dr. Cathorall came to speak with us and explaining that we needed to change our mindsets. Even though she understood it was a constant battle to be on the same page, we had to work together as a team while we are here. She said she would call a meeting with the field supervisor, Mr. Mathias, and our group leader for later that afternoon so maybe she could change his mind since we had failed to do so. At this point, I didn’t know what to do about the project and was feeling very upset with the way things were going. I just want to do good for the community, but I also need to do well in this class. I was struggling to wrap my head around the possible outcomes, and I just wanted a concrete plan to follow for the remaining four days we had left with the team. The clock was ticking, so we didn’t have much time to keep going back and forth. I left to go talk to another Public Health senior to make sure that my mentor and I were on track still since I was feeling so in the dumps about it all. We talked while we made our way to the market. We were hoping the fried chicken and french fry stand was there, but it wasn’t. What a day! We went back to campus, and we noticed along the way that Ugandan’s definition of cold was so much different from ours. Many people were wearing winter coats when it felt so nice and breezy to us. When we arrived at the dorms, I ended up taking a much-needed mental break (a.k.a. a long nap). I woke up just in time to make it to wood ball and then we all tried to go back to the market to get the chicken and fries. It was our day! I found the coldest drinking water, the best chicken and fries, and I even got some new sandals to wear for the next day’s event (stay tuned for more details). The day was getting so much better. All the children who were in the market were getting excited like usual. They all jump up and down and scream “muzungu!” when we pass by. There was even a little girl along the way who wanted to just touch all of us, admire all our jewelry and to hold our hands. She reminded me of a story I heard a couple of days ago. Dr. Brady had an encounter with a little girl that was too cute not to retell! The little girl walked up to Dr. Brady and was examining her ivory skin. She then said, “chapatti,” comparing her skin color to that of the Ugandan tortillas. How cute! Anyway, since my project was so thrown off today, I decided that I had to do something productive for the day. I went to the health clinic and got 432 condoms to hand out to my community when the group gives out the information on HIV/AIDS. All the condom boxes have cards that demonstrate how to properly use this form of protection, and the instructions are translated from English to Luganda. It’s so nice that the university clinic could give away so many to help us keep our community healthy! I have also been talking to my mom who works for Monsanto to see about seed donations. I successfully connected her to our farming friend/ environmental engineer, Patrick, that we had met last week. I suppose today was not a total failure. I was still able to work towards a positive change for our community of Ggunda!

Tuesday, June 19th

Pictures: Left: Free condoms at the hospital. Middle: Meeting in the conference room with the hospital administrators. Right: Sign on the fence at the hospital advertising free family planning.

We woke up early Wednesday, June 19^th to be at breakfast and meet Dr. Cathorall and the Ndejje staff who was accompanying us to Nakaseke Hospital. Here, we were going to take a tour and meet with the administration/staff to learn more about this government hospital. When we first arrived, we were taken to the HIV/AIDS area where consultations, testing and treatment was to take place. We learned that they typically use a form of ART (antiretroviral therapy) that is three drugs combined. If this does not work well or had negative side effects, they customize a prescription for that specific patient. After we learned more about HIV/AIDS, we saw the triage station where they checked patients in and determined if they were healthy or not by taking measurements and finding the patient’s BMI (body mass index). Then, we went onto the eye care ward. Here, they lack medical equipment to do advanced tests. They just have the chart on the wall with letter decreasing in size as you go down the chart. That determines your vision (i.e. 20/20 or not). They did however have new X-ray machines that were bought in 2015, so the staff was excited about that. The next stop was the maternal ward. There were lots of families waiting for consultation and treatment/care. We found that if a family is to pay 5,000 shillings, they can be seen right away by a medical professional. This is considered “private care,” because if you do not pay, you can wait up to three hours to be seen. The wait times used to be seven hours, but they have implemented new practices to keep the wait time low! If you pay the private care fee to be seen right away, you must pay for all the services and medications after that initial fee as well. The hospital said that these fees were still affordable if a family wanted to go that route versus public care (free/provided by the government). In addition to these stops, we saw the surgical ward, resuscitation room, more pharmacies and labs. In the surgical ward, we learned that male babies are not circumcised at birth. A father must give permission for this to be done, so if the father is not present, the mother will come back in a couple of weeks/months to have the procedure done. While it is more common to have babies circumcised, they do adult circumcision as well. This surgery only takes ten to fifteen minutes at this hospital! I didn’t know that surgery was that fast. We then went on to sit in a conference room with two hospital administrators, the head nurse and the pharmacy director. They spoke and told us a lot more about the hospital – some was like US care, but some was very different. Overall, I think that this hospital is making great strides for patient care! The pharmacist was very aware of policies regarding inventory control and patient care. He taught us that they use FEFO as a part of inventory control – First Expiring, First Out. I have learned FIFO (First In, First Out) at one of my previous jobs, so that was cool that they have the same rules like that. The pharmacist gave some statistics that said 72% of Ugandans are over an hour drive away from a public hospital and that 77% of necessary drugs were not available for patients in Uganda. That is so different from the US! It seems as if there are many hospitals in every town and many pharmacies that have almost anything you would need. If they don’t have it on hand, they will order it for you. At this hospital, there were 190 total staff members but only thirteen doctors and one surgeon! That also seemed a lot different than US hospitals. I feel like our facilities are staffed with more surgeons and doctors. Also, half of the doctors in Uganda practice in the capital of Kampala. That leaves not very many doctors to be dispersed around the rest of the country. Some more facts that I learned was that this hospital provides care for two million patients annually and over 70% of births are done by C-section here, yet the government only allotted 7.5% of the national budget to healthcare this year. That’s a lot of patients to care for and surgeries to perform with such a small budget! Last fun (but very sad) fact: This hospital is severely low on modern technology. While the staff seems to have modern knowledge, they do not have the tools to do their jobs. A majority of this hospital’s equipment hasn’t been serviced since the 1970’s and is still being used to this day. The hospital tried to install TVs to make the patients more comfortable but there was a huge power surge that ruined thousands and thousands of US dollars’ worth of equipment. No wonder the staff was so excited for their new X-ray machines! Now I understand. However, US health care and Ugandan health care both share the fact that the government will cover medical costs for low-income patients. We have Obama care which is government-provided, free health care. Uganda has a Minimum Health Care Package that is offered to all patients regardless of income; this includes free services at government hospitals. Also, the United States and Uganda both have tiers of health care facilities. They may go by different names, but all have pharmacies, first aid/clinics, and hospitals. There are different types of hospitals – some are more equipped or more accredited than some others. Both countries have other organizations that guide their practices such as the World Health Organization. This meeting was so enlightening, and I am so glad that we got to come visit! All the officials that I met with today seemed to have the patient’s care/wellbeing always the number one priority. For our group program that we are planning on HIV/AIDS, I needed a source for free testing. Now I can recommend this hospital to the community, if they are not already aware of it. There is free HIV/AIDS testing, treatment/medications, free family planning, free condoms and free circumcisions! Services like these are why public hospitals are necessary and why I say that they are making great strides here in Uganda! I can’t wait to add this newly found resource to my existing research on HIV/AIDS. When we got back to campus, we had wood ball practice and ate some dinner. Afterwards, we asked via text how the group did today without us in the fields. I found out that the eight group members who speak Luganda did not translate any interaction with community members to the other two group members who did not speak Luganda. This was upsetting that the whole group was not participating. Then, I found that the group built a plate stand for one of the community members after Mica and I gave them all the information they needed to do a community demonstration on how to properly compost and use a rubbish pit. A group member told me that they felt that they could not let this household down by not doing the physical aspects of a job that they had promised previously. We never promised this household that we would build them a plate stand. The group leader is so caught up on the idea that we cannot just spread knowledge and educate on health and sanitation. He keeps wanting to build plate stands and rubbish pits. Apparently, he thought that we promised this household we would do manual labor so the rest of the group followed his role. Mica and I have tried explaining for a week or more now that we are not here to do manual labor. We are here to help the whole community and to educate them on how to be healthier for the sustainable future. Just when you think the group is on board, we realize so quickly that we cannot jump to conclusions. I think that we keep having this misunderstanding partly because of cultural differences. The Ndejje students are used to the culture of Ndejje field work being manual labor and when we bossy Americans come in trying to change the whole project overnight, it doesn’t have time to sink in or to be fully understood before all of these major changes are made to the program. Mica and I maybe are talking too fast (we get told that Americans talk too fast a lot here in Uganda) or maybe we aren’t explaining ourselves clearly enough. I am not certain exactly where the breakdown keeps happening at with this group. We have a group meeting in the morning to see what happened. Mica and I are going to calmly seek to understand (while speaking slowly) to see WHY THEY KEEP DOING MANUAL LABOR AND NOT EDUCATING OR HELPING IN A SUSTAINABLE MANNER considering that none of us are taught in the classroom in to do this manual labor – we are all social workers, community developers, or public health majors. We will see what happens in the morning. Maybe we will have another break through. I really don’t know at this point.