one of the families that we visited on Thursday this week - the grandmother cares for 4 children (only 3 present in photo) and their tiny home is behind them.
3 of the children are forced to sleep at the neighbours house because they cannot all fit.
Dan the orphan co-ordinator is on the left of the family and Wanda the field officer for Bisiu area where the family are situated is on the right.

first meeting with Robert who I sponsor

it was worrying to find out that his family is in a bad way because the house he, his mother and his siblings have been living in belonged to the grandfather who recently passed away. in Uganda the male relatives come to claim the land and house and all possessions when someone dies - their law states that women cannot inherit.
BCC had the same problem when Sam Wandendaya the founder died and we had to send over a team of Aussie men to convince his brothers that Bushikori belonged to the Australian supporters not Sam so they could not claim it all.
building for Robert's new home on a seperate plot of land had begun but lack of funds have meant only the walls are currenlty complete - making the situation much much harder is that the community are persecuting the family, stealing chickens and maize and even defacing the half built house because they do not think they should still be living in the deceased grandfather's home. suze and I had a meeting and decided that we would use some of the boyle christmas fund to help put a roof on their new home and get it livable so they can get away from the hard situation they are dealing with.

spices for sale at market

innards - awesome
I was wondering how many cows you need to get this quantity of stomach and intestine?


close up of what you get for your money....there is still some good half digested grass in there


beer, straight from a petrol bottle to you!! this guy was desperately calling us over so he could show us how he was drinking his beer through a hose from an old petrol bottle

dried fish - this isle at the market had about 30 stalls selling these dried fish - it stank to high heaven

Mbale from the rooftop of an indian restaurant Suze and I've eaten at couple of times - we went for lunch on our second day with the Duffields and their friend Bex and then last night again with Steph and Laura. really the restaurant is two floors down at ground level but they have this concrete rooftop with amazing views so we prefer to sit up there - the food takes a terribly long time but gazing at the 270 degree views fills in the time

upstairs at Naralis with Laura and Steph - we knew Laura was coming from Tanzania with a friend but I was totally shocked to see the face of someone I knew with her!! Steph and I were in a bible study together for a year when I lived in Clifton Hill, the last place I thought I would bump into her again was Mbale!

I can't get enough of these meat stands by the side of the road, they look so awesome, and it is how everyone buys their meat (town of 50,000 and no butcher shop - go figure) you walk up, the person selling the meat machetes you off a bit, wraps it in a banana leaf and off you go. simple as that

ha ha - today we were the honoured guests at a farewell party for the graduating class at Oxford High School. due to our field commitments we arrived at 4:30 (proceedings began at 2) unaware that the event was quite so formal - we were ushered (very late) into the center of a hall that had about 150 people jammed in & many more outside pressed up against the windows watching and listening to the proceedings....3 massive armchairs sitting empty in the center of this room waiting for us to fill them - we felt so bad that they had been sitting there empty and waiting for us for 2 1/2 hours! we had been just told to just come, that it would go from about 2 till about 7 and had assumed that it was just a casual affair. oh no no no - we listended to an hour of speaches then we both presented certificates to the graduating class and then were expected to eat a meal with the other 3 honoured guests and the school principal before it would be polite for us to leave!! to add interest we were had to eat with our hands - a first for both of us that we did suprisingly well considering it was meat, rice and a whole lot of broth!