Uganda - January 23, 2011

Today began with the GUW volunteers doing different things. Those who had stayed overnight with their families in the "Day in the life. . ." experience were still with those families until mid-morning.

The two volunteers responsible for training the locals in the use of the grinder had a review session and graduation photo.


Two volunteers, including Cammie Beattie from St. John's (substituting for one of our medical people who had had to return home on a family emergency), did training for the community health care workers. They used the covered overhang waiting area of the clinic, which proved again the value of the design which incorporates a lot of outside space that is protected from the sun. At the end of the training certificates were awarded.


The remaining three of us from St. John's went back to the clinic to get the tiles, created by St. John's parishioners, properly affixed to the clinic walls.

We had realized yesterday that a different technique was going to be needed since the tiles were glass and the mortar planned to be used wouldn't work. Bob Horn and Jennifer Kinkead had headed for town yesterday to purchase a better product. Thank goodness what they had bought worked well. The three of us had no problem getting the tiles up within the time we'd been allowed. We taped them temporarily to make sure they stayed put until dried.


Here is the set of four tiles I designed and paid for. Because I wasn't going to be in church on the day they were being painted, I asked someone else to do the execution (probably better than mine would have been anyway).


After the tiles were put up, several Kayoro residents who were in the building for training or just because they stopped by (the clinic is becoming something of a community center, well located on the major road to Tororo, the nearest "big" city). They were very interested in the tiles and what they said and appeared moved by the fact that they had been made by St. John's parishioners and sent to be in the clinic.


Below is a link to a slide show that shows all the tiles that are now in the clinic. (If it doesn't show up in blue, it will have to be copied and pasted into the browser line.)

https://picasaweb.google.com/SSailors119/ClinicTiles?authkey=Gv1sRgCOCyqoXD9ZvC7wE#slideshow/5570930462127089186

At 1 p.m. everyone at the clinic was picked up by the bus to join Mary and the others to meet two other GUW groups. More on that in the next blog.