International Relations

So not much has been going on work wise in the last few days; I’ve been taking half days to work on medical school applications. My co-worker who had her money stolen has been giving statements at the police station all day, not sure what they’ve been doing with the culprit. When I came back to the base yesterday around lunch, the guy was tied up and lying on the ground in our backyard, not more than a few yards from my room. I wasn’t actually here when the “disciplinary action” was taking place, but from what my co-workers tell me several men shoved a tire over his upper half so he couldn’t move and then he was repeatedly beaten with a stick (cained). One of the senior staff informed me that the culprit was about to have his ear cut off until the national director of YWAM stepped in.

On a lighter note, I was invited to the other side of town to have dinner with a group of volunteers. It’s always interesting eating with groups of people here due to the diversity of nationalities. The table felt a bit like the UN, considering that I was the only American and the rest of the table was made up of Australian, English, German, Swiss, and Ugandan. The picture above displays two of my hosts for the evening; Andrew, an Australian (who absolutely loves south park) staying at the St. Moses boarding school working with children and Barbara, a German with a background in social work. Their driver’s name is Joseph, he’s actually one of three guys that I use to get around since many Boda drivers don’t speak very good English and may try and overcharge you. Incidentally, I took that picture while riding on another while we were flying down a dirt road.

This week had been letting me see a few more aspects of our partner organizations around Jinja. Yesterday I had the opportunity to help out at the school of administration teaching Microsoft word. I realized after class that most people in the west really take for granted the skill required to simply operate computers. I was also impressed with the speed at which the members of the class learned in the course of only an hour and a half. Tomorrow I am going to spend some more time in the clinic, probably in the laboratory. Friday I’ll be going to visit another branch organization called Women At Risk (WAR), which specializes in pulling women out of the prostitution business.