In July I am joining a team to go to Uganda with the charity Mission Direct. We will be working on a project in Rukungiri finishing off a primary school, working on some dormitories and a housing project for orphans with AIDS. (I have included more about the project below, click 'read more'!) 

To raise money for this project I am going to be having a "poverty" week from 23rd-28th May in which I won't be allowed to use any electricity (i.e. no phone, no iPod, no laptop, no heating, no kettle, no fridge, no hairdryer, no lights, no shower etc!) and only £1.50 per day for food. (Don't worry I will be able to wash with cold water or water heated in a saucepan on the gas hob!) I think this will be quite a big challenge but I am hoping it means you will all like to sponsor me to do it!!! 

If you want to hear more about why I am doing this, please don't hesitate to ask :)

Thank youuuuuuu :) 

On July 3rd, a team of 7 people and I will be flying out to Uganda with a charity called Mission Direct. We will be going to join local projects in a southern district of the country called Rukungiri to help finish a primary school, to complete dormitories for a Mother’s Union Vocational training centre, and to help an orphanage for children with AIDS. It is so important to help the local projects that are already working there to enable them to continue work after we have left. 

The primary school currently holds 861 students, 637 in primary and 224 in the nursery; 253 of these are residents. Over 500 students who attend are orphans, often of AIDS victims. Some students have to walk up to 7 miles to and from the school, leaving and arriving home in the dark, walking in bare feet on dirt tracks. The class sizes are huge; sometimes up to 110 children. The project that I will be going out to help with involves building more classrooms so that the classes can be reduced, sometimes even divided in half, although as you can appreciate – 55 children in one classroom is still a lot! However the school still manages to achieve exceptional results, and are third highest achieving school in the whole country. 

The Mother’s Union Vocational Training Centre aims to provide skills training as a secretary and sewing or dress making for women aged 15-23 who would otherwise have no skills to help them provide an income for themselves and their families. Many of the women are orphans coming from the many surrounding villages and countryside. In order for the training centre to work, they have to charge the girls 30000 Ugandan Shillings per term (only £10!) but in reality most of the girls are not even able to pay this. The centre depends on charitable donations to pay the salaries of the teachers there, who often have to wait for wages if there are no sufficient funds available. They also depend on donations for books and stationary, and for equipment such as typewriters, computers, sewing and knitting machines, fabrics and wools. They are able to sell some of the goods made by the trainees, and those funds are put back into the system to help more of the young women. The project in July will build more dormitories, as the current ones are over-crowded, with girls sleeping in three-high bunk beds, no more than a foot apart. We will be working with local builders to complete 5 dormitories with 2 bathrooms which will accommodate 30 girls. 

As part of the project we will be visiting a Disabled Children’s Project which provides care for disabled, deaf, and brain damaged children, and support the parents and care givers to show that we care for their children (the general view in Uganda is that if a child is disabled, they are almost not worth bothering about). 

I will be covering most of the expenses for flights, accommodation, travel and food whilst I am there by myself, but in order for the project to run, a lot more money needs to be raised. The approximate budget for the projects we will be working on is around £27,500 all of which will be raised by volunteers.

Thank you so much for sponsoring and donating, I really appreciate it!

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