COMPASSION- Guest Blog, written by MAF supporter, John Butterworth

Showing Compassion to sponsored Ugandan boy, Bwambale

Long-time MAF supporters John and Jan Butterworth spent two weeks in Uganda in August this year. They went to see Andrew and Liz Parker and their children Esther, Ben and Joel whom they have supported when they were in South Sudan and now in Kampala. In the second of three blogs John tells of meeting Bwambale.

Besides visiting the Parker family the other reason we went to Uganda was to visit a nine-year-old boy we had been sponsoring for five years.

Through the international charity, "Compassion", we had been supporting Bwambale to ensure he has a basic education and regular medical check-ups.

Now we were going to meet him and his family at the project in the remote west of the country, only five kilometres from the border with the Democratic Republic of Congo.

At 8am on Monday, August 27 our driver and guide, Ham, picked us up from the Makindye Country Club, a lovely hotel on the edge of Kampala where we had stayed for our first week.

As he drove us in his minibus to Fort Portal and our hotel for the next two nights, he told us Compassion has 293 projects in Uganda where they look after 95,000 of the poorest children.

It was our first trip outside the capital and the tarmac roads, some built by Chinese money and contractors, were surprisingly good and much better than the pot-holed streets of Kampala.

It was interesting to pass through the lush green countryside and the towns full of mobile phone and hardware shops, plus stalls with locally grown fruit and vegetables for sale. We also saw the poorer side of life with children herding cattle, families collecting wood and people selling charcoal.

As we approached Fort Portal the landscape became more mountainous and more beautiful with banana, mango, avocado trees and coffee, tea and cocoa plantations on either side of the road.

Late afternoon we arrived at our modern conference and wedding hotel built only seven years ago. But we were surprised how few guests were there. Also there was no safe box in our room, plus a limited menu and no filter coffee in the restaurant – even though we had passed hundreds of coffee trees on our journey there. However, it was a pleasant stay with comfortable beds, good wi-fi, lovely gardens and bed and breakfast all for £20 each per night.

The following morning we set off on a two-and-a-half hour journey over the mountains to Compassion Project UG-256 in Bundimbuga district not knowing what to expect.

In the town we met Philip from the project as we wanted to buy some food for the children and Bwambale’s family.

It was only a corner shop but the owner enlisted the help of a mechanic waiting in the queue to go and fetch sugar, rice, bread and 250 lollipops from nearby stores to fulfil this unusual grocery order.

After a while the shopping was put in boxes and we were off with Ham and new passenger Philip for the half hour trip up a very bad sandy and rocky road.

As we turned the corner at the top we were overwhelmed to see 250 children all in tribal dress singing and dancing and going wild at the sight of our minibus. Their faces were covered in chalk with words of welcome written on their foreheads and out of the crowd stepped Bwambale to greet us.

What a welcome – the children greet us, singing and dancing:

The children then changed into their bright red school uniforms and we joined them and the staff in the church.

First meeting – John and Bwambale

 Although the building was basic with no glass in the windows the service was full of joyous African singing, dancing and praising God. The head girl gave a short sermon in English and Swahili before some pupils recited Biblical memory verses.

Afterwards the children were ecstatic to be given the 250 balloons and lollipops and we had enough left over for the villagers and the children looking in through the open windows.

Up in the air – the children enjoy their balloon gifts:

It is incredible that in the 21^st century in this remote part of Uganda there are no mains electricity, no TVs, computers and wi-fi. Even more amazing our translator Ham said some villagers had come specially to meet us as they had never seen a white person. Some of the children even asked whether we had red or white blood.

Showing Compassion – the project at Bundimbuga:

Next was our second breakfast of the day as we ate cows’ liver, plantain (fried bananas), eggs tomatoes and peanuts. Then Bwambale joined us in our minibus for the 15-minute ride to show us his two-roomed home and to meet his mum and dad, gran, aunt and uncle plus an older brother and sister and a younger brother.

His parents, who worked away in a cocoa plantation, had come home for this special day and very movingly they thanked us for our sponsorship and said what a difference it had made to Bwambale and the family.

Our presents to the family, including a Bible and a rucksack for Bwambale, were well received. Then we were shocked to be given gifts in return – a basket for Jan that his mum had made and a straw Ugandan hat and a football that Bwambale had put together for me out of banana tree fibres.

Later Jan was given a smart green and yellow beaded evening bag which one of the girls at the project had made.

Finally, I was taken outside where many villagers joined the family who presented me with a home-made wooden scooter. I had a go on it, much to the amusement of the crowd, before I presented it back to Bwambale asking him to look after it for me until I next came out to see him.

On his bike – Bwambale’s family present John, complete with his Ugandan hat and football made from banana fibres, with a wooden scooter they had made him:

Back at the project there was a lunch feast waiting of plantains, matoke, rice, cassava, chicken, beef, peanut sauce, watermelon and pineapple before we were shown Bwambale’s school and medical reports and a booklet with all the letters I had written to him.

Afterwards we were asked to plant a ‘Jan and John Umbrella tree’, with Bwambale’s help, to mark our visit before I played football with some of the children. Our final honour was to watch the project’s football final and to present a splendid trophy to the winning team, which I was delighted to see included Bwambale.

It was humbling to see none of the players had football boots; they all played bare-footed on a rough piece of ground with makeshift goalposts. Two minutes into the final a shot brought down one of the crossbars and there was a short delay while a new branch was found.

After a packed day it was time to say an emotional farewell as all 250 children sang and danced and followed our minibus down the track.

Everyone was so grateful for us coming – but the honour was ours. We learnt so much from them and were humbled to see all that they did even though they had so little.

The project has been going for four years, yet we were only the second sponsors to go and visit the site.

Some Compassion sponsors of other projects made it to Kampala and the children were brought to see them in the capital. But the visitors missed so much not seeing remote Uganda and the youngsters at school and in their homes.

It costs us £25 a month to pay for Bwambale’s basic education and medical checks, a small amount to us but it meant so much to Bwambale and his family.

As a journalist for 44 years I have been fortunate to have had some amazing times and experiences. But this day visiting Bwamble has to be one of the most unexpected, amazing and humbling days of my life.