Robbert was the first victim, and he was just doing so well, gaining, happy and playing.. He is feeling miserable now. Chickenpox might be a normal childhood sickness for many of us, but for malnourished children with a low immunity, it can be a killer. When I heard in the morning, a couple of days ago, when I arrived in Amecet, that we had 3 children with chickenpox, my heart almost stopped. And my mind went back to 2005, when we had a chickenpox outbreak in Amecet. Many children got it and also some of the aunties. Two children died because of the chickenpox, both children were HIV+ and new in Amecet, they were very, very weak and this sickness was just too much for them.

We have a steady flow of people who come at our door for help, some come to ask for transport money back to the village. They were admitted in the hospital and discharged, but no money anymore to travel back to their village. Other people come for reading glasses, which we receive to give out to people. Sometimes people come for help to buy medicines which are prescribed by the doctor and there is also a group of mothers who come with their child who is suffering from hydrocephalus  (water in the head). Sometimes the heads are huge and very heavy to carry. The mothers are struggling so much, they come with the baby to Amecet for help, it is very hard to carry the child, they have to be very careful with supporting the head, which is too heavy for the neck. 

Sarah was the first baby, who was brought, she was born 2 months too early and her weight was only 1.1 kg.  She was laid in our new incubator, which we just received from a Dutch foundation: Verenigde Hoop. We had to feed her by a NG tube, because she was too weak to drink.. She is now 9 days with us and she is doing good, she has gained a little and looks alert.  Sarah was born by a caesarean operation and the mother died, due to multi organ failure after the operation. The very sad thing was that Sarah was part of twins, the other baby was a still born and already deteriorated when the baby was taken out. Sarah was brought from a hospital, by ambulance.

In the blog of two weeks ago, I wrote about baby Paul, who was abandoned by his mother. And how one of the local leaders, the situation used to get richer himself. We had been hanging posters around the area and one of the uncles recognised the baby on the picture.

When the rains are coming, people start to plough  their gardens.... After a couple of months of drought, the land is dry and sandy, but even after one good rain shower, the new grass is coming out and when you thought that there was nothing growing, it was all dry and soil, you are every time again so surprised what there is all hiding in the ground... The ground is green again and the plants are growing....

The story starts with the picture of this cute little boy... We called him Paul and we think he was around 6 months old. On March 6, we received a phone call from a police post in the village. They had found a baby in the bushes, near the trading centre of the village. The villages are often very stretched and they mostly have a small centre, where the police has a post, where a couple of small shops are and where often also a very small market is. They found the Babyboy, laying in the bushes. The social workers hopped in the car to go and pick the baby.

We had a team building day, yesterday in Amecet. That is always a puzzle, because we can never close the place for something like that... we have the children in the house and we always have to care for them.. So we organized it at 12 o'clock noon till 3 pm. We fed the toddlers a bit early, so they went in bed for their after lunch nap at 12 and we started our programme.

This is a picture of Simon, one of our former children, he came years ago in Amecet, sick and malnourished. After some time, he was re-settled with his grandmother, we kept checking on him from time to time. Now he is with the help of our Tante Suus fund, learning how to repair motorcycles. he will be able to get a living, while he lives in the village. 

Emmanuel, or Emma as he is called here, has a new mammy, who loves him already, she wants to care for him and she wants to raise him as her son!!

After having been working here for almost 28 years, I still see and experience things or situations I can hardly believe......

The 3 little girls are almost the same age, the left and the middle one are from Triplets, their third sister is still with the mother, the right child is 2 weeks younger and her mother is only 16 years old. They are all from November 2023, so they are are around 1 year and 3 months old. They should be walking and talking, instead they can hardly sit by themselves. 

Meet Zoya and Zarah, they are part of triplets. Their sister, Zarida, is the middle one of the three. We know the three already for a while. they were born in Soroti hospital on 14 November 2023. That means that they are now 1 year and 2,5 months. We have been asked to see them when they were maybe 3 months old. The mother is single and only 20 years old. That time she lived in the home of a good Samaritan, who felt for her. The 3 little girls were very small and especially two of them were very tiny. They had been born 3 months too early. We could have helped that time by taking 1 or 2 of the girls to Amecet for a while. But the grandmother came and was very hostile to us, she believed that we would sell the girls.... So we just explained what we do in Amecet and offered to bring some clothes, soap and milk formula as supplement, because the mother could not breast feed the three girls.