Celebrating Clean Water the Masaka Way

Here we are four months into the Masaka Water and Sanitation / Hygiene project and it is finished.  We originally met with the Masaka District Chief Administrative Officer on July 22 and immediately started on the project.   Four months later we are celebrating the completion.   It was a perfect project, well organized and very successful.

Friday was the celebration to hand the project over to the community.  We expected a big turnout and we weren't disappointed.  We estimated that there were 5,000 people in attendance.

It was a beautiful day and when we got to Masaka there was a crowd of school children waiting near our hotel to escort us all to the ceremony.  It was quite a parade with a band even.

We, the donors were to arrive at 11:00 AM to report to the hospitality room (Head Mistress Gertrude's office) of St. Bruno's school.  We took 4 missionaries with us along with Ssimbwa.

Elder Deal (USA), Elder Steeb (So. Africa), Elder Davis (USA) and Elder Chiromo (Zimbabwan)

Madame Gertrude, head mistress of the school and a lovely lady, greeted us, had us sign the guest book (we have signed it every time we have gone to the school) and we were formally welcomed to St. Bruno and given a token of appreciation. 

Madame Gertrude stated that they wanted to be a model school for Masaka District and getting a new latrine, a water catchment system and Hygiene and Sanitation training had put them on the right path.

Elder and Sister Barlow were dressed in the traditional Ugandan dress.  Out fits appropriate for such an occasion.

We were escorted out onto the school yard where tents were set up and there was already a crowd assembled to greet us.  There was a great cheer when they saw we were wearing the formal Ugandan Dress. 

Gomezi and Kanzu, the formal Ugandan clothing.

There were parents, school children, district/sub-county/ Parrish officials and the celebration began.  Very conspicuous were the Hygiene and Sanitation Shirts worn by all those who participated and became team leaders and facilitators for the program.  Each is designated as a Hygiene and Sanitation Specialist, written on the back of their shirt. 

Teachers who became trainers for the Health and Sanitation training prepared a song about what they had learned.  Note church logo on front with HEALTH AND HYGIENE SPECIALIST on the back.

These H/S Specialists are over 750 people committed to reaching each village member with training on how to improve family health and sanitation and the best use of the new water sources.

There was singing

and dancing

and speaking

The Chairman LC III, Kyannamukaaka stated in his speech:  "It is a great pleasure that today we are witnessing the role of the good Samaritan in improving water and sanitation coverage in Masaka District.  . . . the organisation (the church) has identified the extreme cases of inadequacy  , , , the goal of 100% water coverage cannot be achieved without the partnership of the civil society.  This is a Godly task which we applaud as a basis for improved lives and transformation, hence poverty reduction."

and singing

and dancing

Costumes are always bright and colorful with a band around hips with fur, feathers and anything that shakes accenting the movement of the dancers.

and speaking

The Catholic Priest, Rev. Fr.Mukwaya RC/PP said that the church was doing what the Savior said we were suppose to do quoting Matt 25:35-36, For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in: Naked, and ye clothed me:
He said the worst disease of Uganda was selfishness.  Today we witnessed a very unselfish act of kindness.

There were certificates for all the team leaders of the Health and Hygiene training and keys to each latrine were given out to the schools (very official). 

Pres. Richard Okello, Branch Pres. of Seeta branch spoke and gave the PR speech for the church.  Elder Barlow told the crowd about the humanitarian efforts of the church and where the humanitarian funds come from.  He introduced the missionaries and explained that they had come in response to the questions from many of them who wanted to know more about our church.  He told them that after the ceremony they would be there to answer any questions they might have.  He spoke about the cooperation from the district and the village in making the project successful and how everyone working together had been able to accomplish great things in just 4 months.  Some of the schools serviced would have had to close if they didn't get adequate latrines for their students.  He reminded the beneficiaries that the springs, the washing stations, the latrines, and the school rainwater catchment systems now belonged to them and that the church would only ask that they take good care of the gift and do all they could to maintain and keep the systems working well. 

The chief guest Hon. Member of Parliament For Bukoto and Speaker of Parliament of the Republic of Uganda Edward Kiwanuka Ssekandi called in the middle of the program to say he would not make it due to a special session in Parliament so he was represented by Hon. Member of Parliament Hon. JB Kawanga of Masaka Municipality.  He gave a wonderful speech.  It is election year and he is running again for Parliament but he never mentioned the election but instead focused on the generosity of the church and the actions of the communities.  He told the group of his visit to Salt Lake City and how impressed he was with Utah.  He explained that when our church came to Utah it was a desert and now it was a beautiful, lush city.  This transformation was because of hard work and people investing in their community their time and talents to make the city what it is today.  He admonished the people that they should follow this example and work hard to transform Uganda into a prosperous, beautiful place to live.  He thanked the church for the extent of the project incorporating the needs of all facets of the community including girls in school and mothers(girls bathrooms in the latrines), women in the community (clothes washing stations) and the "remarkable contribution" of health/sanitation training, the elderly (family latrines for the risk population) and the gift of clean water, the "Gift of Life."  He was touched by the effort the church went to to work with the district in accomplishing its goals.  The district budget is limited and is never enough to accomplish what needs to be done but because of the gifts given the district would be able to show great strides in meeting the goals of 2010.  He reminded everyone that maintaining the gift was their responsibility and not to waste this great gift. 

 When you are out in the villages looking at the schools and springs you will find the trained village facilitators in their official shirt designating them a Hygiene/Sanitation Specialist.  We had a man ask us if we would give him a shirt and we told him he had to get the training and agree to train at least 10 families to be able to wear the coveted shirt.  He shrug and said that is what his wife told him when he tried to get her shirt.

It was a bit of a surprise to us that each speaker expressed an appreciation of the health and hygiene training and the value it was to the community.  They appreciated the organization of the program and how it was rolled out to the community.  We actually only took 4 trainers to Masaka and they  trained the sub county and village health officers to train and monitor the village facilitators in the training of each family in the three sub-counties we worked in.  Again we were overwhelmed with the emphasis put on the H/S training and how much they valued it.

Hon J.B. Kawanga at one point turned to Elder Barlow and asked several questions about the church.  He wanted to know if we believed in the Bible and Elder Barlow was able to explain some of the things we believe in.  He offered to bring his Honor a MoTab album, and some other literature of the church if he was interested and he said he would appreciate that very much.  Hon Kawanga has a reputation of being a very spiritual man with great integrity. 
The MP dedicated and cut the ribbons on the latrines (they were locked up when finished waiting for the turnover ceremony before they could be officially used.)  We will visit him in Kinshasa and take him the promised material.

Hon. Kawanga was invited to cut the ribbon on the new latrine , symbolic of all the latrines in the project.  He also opened the tap of the rainwater catchment system.  The tank was almost full of rainwater.  These tanks will be the main source of water for the 15 schools.

He dedicated the beautiful spring and clothes washing station.  This particular protected spring serves four villages.

We returned to St. Bruno's for dinner, matoki, beef, chicken steamed in banana leaves, rice, ground nut sauce (pureed peanuts), and pumpkin. . . Oh and the choice of coke or orange fanta, always.

After eating, the celebration looked like it was just getting started as the band was rocking out with at least 1000 school children dancing on the field.  It looked like a mosh pit.  We didn't care. 

We walked right out in the middle of them and danced with the kids.  The music was loud.  The kids were having a great time and they loved us wanting to dance with them.  Kind of hard to dance in a kanzu and a gomesi but we still had a great time.

As we left the elders had opened the back of their truck and right there in the shadow of the Catholic church and in the yard of St. Bruno's school they were handing out Book of Mormons and explaining the principles of the gospel to many people.  They gave out 84 Book of Mormons, all that they had, and a case of Plan of Salvation pamphlets.  Uganda is very tolerant  of religious organizations and do not tolerate bashing of any religion.

Elder Steeb, Elder Chiromo, Elder Davis, Elder Deal, Ssimbwa

Farrell had us all go for dessert at the hotel and held a meeting to report the highlights of the day.  The Elders were pretty pumped about the interest in the church and had set 7 appointments for the next day before they left Masaka.  There are a few members of the church in Masaka but no formal meetings are held and right now there is no plan to send elders into the area to proselyte.   The church is growing though and who knows,  maybe it won't be long before the interest is so great that the only thing to do is start having church in Masaka.

What a great day, a culmination of hard work and a lot of fun.  The hygiene/sanitation team said they had never had so much fun as they worked with the people of Masaka who were so receptive and willing to work to make the program successful.

Eddie Mutebi, the water contractor, was also the general manager of the project in that he coordinated the project making the project run so smoothly and getting it finished in record time.  His organization, the UCDV Union of Community Development Volunteers constructed the springs clothes washing stations, SAMURON (two returned missionaries) constructed the latrines and hand washing stations.  Eddie Mutebi continues to amaze us as he grows and "lengthens his stride."  It was a great team, this Masaka team.  This was a great project, one we hope to recreate in other areas of Uganda.

These Ugandan women got a big laugh out of my Gomesi outfit so I made them take a picture with me.  The sleeves are puffed up to look like wings, and on me the sash kept sagging almost falling off and on the side is two yards of skirt accordion pleated and folded over the sash for stability.  Madame Gertrude kept coming up all day and readjusting my outfit to look proper and I just couldn't hold it all together.  Besides, for some reason a Gomesi just doesn't look as good on a Muzungu as it does on the beautiful Ugandan women.

SKYPE, don't leave home without it!

SKYPE is an internet program that allows you to make free phone calls and free computer to computer calls anywhere in the world allowing you to see and hear your family any time you want.  Well not exactly any time you want.  If you happen to be on the otherside of the world from your family there is a 10 hour difference which means you seldom call when it is convenient to either you or your family.  None the less, it is the salvation of senior missionaries all over the world.  Where ever you are serving, if you can get an internet connection you can call home and see your family, share important events, be a part of homeevening, listen to the primary solo or the talk that someone is giving in church that day, see Michaela in her baptism dress before the big event and then talk to her after the baptism and hear how wonderful her day has been.  You might even get a play by play of the latest game right from the players own mouth. (Our favorite was "well we lost but I was awesome.")

SKYPE can make for interesting conversations and interesting views.  Like today we were "SKYPEing" Rick and Rain Robertson.  It was 8:00 PM for us and 5:30 AM for them in New Zealand.  We had a great conversation with Rick who was up and dressed with his missionary tag on but Rain was in the shower.  Well, we are looking right into their apartment and Rick finally said, "Gosh, I hope Rain doesn't come out of that shower with just a towel on."  We decided it was time to sign off before we caught Rain  . . ."

Got to love SKYPE. 

SKYPE also has a great feature in that you can take pictures of those you are speaking to, usually unknown to them.



General Conference, everyone stayed in their pjs this morning.






  They just finished watching Pay-per -View "Fight Night. Do you think they got a little worked up? (can't believe our kids pay to watch fighting.)

Sometimes you get the whole family





Something seems to be pretty funny but usually we don't know what it is.

Sammy has become a budding artist and we get to view all her creations.  She is growing up and someone else is growing also.  We have Lincoln's height on a chart at home so we can see how much he grows while we are gone but no one has to tell us he is piling on the inches.  We can see that for ourselves.


We spent 6 months looking at the top of grandma's head until Keith finally went and got her a new webcam and now we can see her - we usually catch her in her PJs - caught her in a good laugh this time



 Michaela got new glasses and she is looking mighty fine.  She said that she now could see real good and only had to take them off if she wanted to do her famous backflip which means they are probably off as much as they are on.  She is our acrobat.

Oops!  sometimes the video has it's problems.  Some times the Ormsby's look like they are swimming under water but that doesn't obscure the bed head look we get as they usually SKYPE Saturday morning so they can brag to us about the wonderful Saturday breakfast they are going to eat with fresh berries and ice cold, real milk.

Lala likes to talk - likes to tell everyone else when they can talk. Eric shows off his latest experiments (he is in to science) or gives us a close up of his lizard or frog or painted turtle. We even get to see the gaping mouth from where the latest tooth has fallen out.

Some things never seem to change.  Grandkids are pretty funny or at least they think they are pretty funny.

What?



Something is wrong with those Levers.






 Weird?  Crazy?  What ever they are always good for a belly laugh and usually at least two or three.  Makes our day when the Levers bring it on.


 Hyrum must have pulled his tooth, or won his soccer game, or just thinks he is cool.



Em can get a little animated at times.



 Jaron's just got into Cub Scouts. He has his uniform and his Wolf book. 


He already has the Cub Scout motto down perfectly.

Well, that's our family.  Got to love SKYPE.  It is what keeps us connected.  Don't leave home without it.

Mildred Alene Dunn Barlow, the Volunteer of Volunteers!

Have we ever told you how much we love our mother, Mildred Alene Dunn Barlow.  She has been a great example to us as she has served in so many ways and cared for so many people throughout her life.

She was the youngest child in her family and so at 89 yrs of age she is all that is left. Grandpa passed away in 2002 and since that time she has made the best of life trying to continue to serve “. . . like Lincoln would expect me to . . . got to endure to the end so I can be with Lincoln, ‘cause we all know where he is at now.”

This past year she was released from the Relief Society and asked to teach the 8-10 year olds in Primary. Now she is 89 and she has every right to expect that she might well desire to continue to read her scriptures every day, read her Relief Society lesson and her Gospel Doctrine manual during the week preparing to enjoy her Sabbath day of worship. But, no at 89 yrs she is going to teach rambunctious, a little wild, new to the church converts in primary (2 hours worth each Sunday).

Did she want to teach Primary? No . . . Will she teach primary and give it her best shot? Yes. She has had almost a year of teaching these children and this summer held a birthday party inviting her primary class to the church for a celebration with a theme of “The 13 Articles of Faith.” They played games, decorated cupcakes, made little treasures,, ate a lot of food and celebrated Mis' Barlow’s 89th birthday. She also gave them each a birthday present.

She use to drive to Atlanta each month and spend a week (a 4 hour drive) to serve in the Atlanta temple.  She finally realized that the trip was just too much for her and so she looked for other ways to be of service. She called Hospice and asked if she could be a volunteer having had service from them when her sweet Lincoln was so bad. She has joined the Bluebird volunteers at the Colquitt Regional Medical Center serving 3 days a week and volunteers at the food bank once a month.

This service has continued for the last 7 years. She is a favorite at the hospital, knows everyone and everyone knows her. She has worked in many areas (and I do mean worked some times as long as 8-10 hrs) and has been the chaplain for the volunteers for the last 2 years. This has been a great missionary tool as she gives them a rousing sermon each month at their meeting. No little thought from the Internet for her. She always focuses her message on how to improve, grow or serve better. There is always a challenge to her audience to strive for those Christ-like attributes she has tried to practice all her life.

Recently the hospital CEO, Jim Lowry told the volunteer’s president that he would like for the volunteers to be recognized by honoring the service of a volunteer every quarter and present them with a $50 check. A box was placed in the volunteers room where the volunteers could cast their votes for the honoree. Grandmother was selected for the award at their September meeting and presented with a check for $50. There are around seventy volunteers and grandmother felt honored.

Each year the volunteers make an annual donation of $10,000 to the Hospital Foundation. This donation is always given in honor of some community figure. Last year it was decided that the donation could be given in honor of one of the volunteers. . This is the second year it has been awarded to a volunteer. The award was to be announced in their October meeting and they were told that Mr Lowry would come to their meeting to make the announcement. When the time came for the announcement to be made the President said that Mildred Barlow had been chosen to receive the award. Grandmother said she could hear many of the volunteers around the table say 'she earned it'. The President noted how willing Mildred was to work where ever there has been a need and pointed out that she had worked in wound care, transport, pharmacy, front desk, gift shop, various offices and had served on second floor. She pointed out that for more than a year she had done all the filing for their former gift shop manger and that was done after she had finished her assignment for the day. Grandmother said that they made her sound real good.

Grandma said, “Mr Lowry complimented me first on my inspirational thought and prayer it was flowery...I think I am the first chaplain that has ever done anything more than read something. I felt, very loved. I will sit at the Founders table in the spring when we have the Founder’s banquet and be recognized with all the Founders. I am blessed to be honored for doing something that does even more for me. Life is good!”

That’s our grandma. We are just a bit proud of her. She is probably the only “Mormon” that most of her peers know and she is a great representative of the gospel and a great missionary ready to share the gospel with whoever shows an interest.

She is blessed. She always says she has nothing to complain about. She feels good, she feels loved, she has her volunteer work to keep her going. Well that and teaching primary for 8-10 year olds who ‘will not stay in their seats or stop talking or listen to a thing I have to say’ but every week they come back to get some more of that love that oozes from her every pore.

You are never too old for a little motherly advise.

Well, now I have told you. . . I love my mother (in-law).   I love her every bit as much as Farrell loves her, maybe more. I am sure she loves me more than she loves Farrell, at least she makes me think she does. Actually we could have a real argument over this as each of us children (and grandchildren) think we are the favorite, and . . .we probably are.