May 7, 2005

Everyone,
Yesterday we arrived at the brick yard #1 (we now have a second brick yard starting near another camp) and started removing the fired bricks from the kiln.  We had 1,000 bricks, but only 300 were usable.  We were covered in brick dust and then loaded them into the truck that had just unloaded another batch of rice hulls.  We then took the bricks to Erute Camp.  The crowds formed as we showed them how to make the stoves.  Next, each of us had our own team to teach how to assemble them.  After 3 hours we had 42 stoves built and had trained them how to operate them with just small bits of wood!!!!  YEA!!!  Finally, a feeling of accomplishment.  Everyone is praying for rain for the crops, and we're praying for a dry spell just above the 2 brick yards.  :-)
 
On the humanitarian side, we took another 2 babies to the hospital with malaria, severe diarrhea, and dehydration.  This is a total of 7 babies.  The camps we are working with are closer to town, so the medical units have moved on to other camps and our camps are falling in the cracks.  The hospital is overrun with kids and their families must camp out under the plumeria trees for shade for days at a time while the kids are treated.  Today we met with the District Health Director and pleaded with him to get some medical attention back into the camps.  As you can imagine, with 40 camps in Northern Uganda, this is not a problem solved overnight.  He's promised to help and we'll see what our impact can be in the next 2 weeks.
 
One of our team, Adelitus, is a Medical Officer from Tanzania who lived next door to our team member, Christine Keller, who was in the Peace Corps 2 years ago in Tanzania.  He is helping to diagnose the worst cases so we can take them to the hospital for treatment.  It's not a long-term solution, but you can't help but do a little bit where we can.  He showed me how to diagnose malaria: yellow in the under side of the eye lids and the palm of the hand is yellow too.  Another sign is that the baby no longer will suckle.  He can also prescribe medicine which is so cheap here.  Hard to believe some will die for lack of the $2 it takes to buy the medicine.
 
Today we spent time at the brick yard to redo the mix of clay to rice hulls or sawdust and see another clay source.  So on we go.

Chuck