To go, or not to go......?

I visit Uganda as a volunteer, but it seems to me that ‘volunteering abroad’ can have very different meanings.  And…. sometimes I’m challenged to justify spending money visiting a project rather than on the project itself.  If it costs trip fees plus funds to say, run a children’s camp, how do we know the local team couldn’t have found better use for that money investing it in local projects? 

Maybe the biggest problem is the difficulty in assessing the value of volunteer projects – how do you measure them? 

Is a camp judged ‘successful’ or ‘worthwhile’ if the children seem to enjoy it?

Or if the local staff say it is? 

Or if it means 160 children have good food for a week? 

What about less concrete outcomes of a foreign visit like communicating esteem or increasing international understanding? 

Do the parents have a say? Maybe its harvest time and the children are needed at home, or there’s a new classroom needed at a school or toilets, or a community garden, or more local staff to run a project…Lots of volunteer trips involve building or renovating.  Once I ‘helped’ paint a classroom.  I’m sure the local people repainted it after we left. They were perfectly capable of doing it themselves – and much better!  

How many times have you been asked to sponsor someone for a volunteer trip only to discover at least 75% of the money goes on funding trip costs?  

In 2008 we took a play parachute and helped local staff learn ways to use it. In 2015 it comes out most weekends for a community children’s club and goes to schools. Games have evolved to be ‘more Ugandan’ and it’s used for Bible studies and counselling.  Children’s eyes lit up when it appeared this year and it brought squeals of laughter.  Sometimes simple things make a trip ‘worthwhile’. In a culture where adults and children don’t have time to play together, I think that parachute has made a difference.  

At the request of local staff at different projects, the 4^th one went out this year (thanks Rachelle).

Actually I also have a different attitude if I think a trip will be potentially life-changing for the volunteer. After all, spending 2 weeks in Uganda 7 years ago took my life on a very different course, helping me understand the value of child sponsorship and of supporting local staff in sustainable community partnership projects.

The Internet provides seemingly hundreds of opportunities, not only for volunteering abroad, but also for ‘ethical volunteering’.  I think my thoughts align to some extent with the http://www.ethicalvolunteering.org/ guide.  Even better, the Global Care trips I’ve been on provided information and suitable answers to the guide’s 7 questions for volunteers.  Global Care works with local staff to identify suitable volunteer projects aimed at supporting sustainable projects.  We had good trip briefings, knew what was expected of us, and there was clarity about our own expenses - which were separated from camp costs.

However, I hope my love of Uganda and the people I’ve met, for the children we’ve sponsored over the years and for the staff who work with them, will never cloud my judgement.  I hope I’ll always ask ‘is this the right way to spend our money?’… and I’ll hope the answer will be ‘yes’!! 

Children being children

In my last blog I mentioned child sponsorship. So what’s my experience of child sponsorship? And what does Global Care child sponsorship look like?

We’ve sponsored children with Global Care for over 25 years.  We started sponsoring one girl, *Rachel, when she and our youngest son were both 7. They met each other in 2008 during a Volunteer trip to Uganda, when they were both 17.  We met Rachel again when we visited Rukungiri in 2013.  She’s married with a daughter and running a business selling grain. A real love has developed between my family and this Ugandan ‘daughter’ but we are truly humbled by the intense gratitude she shows us.At the camp we saw two children sponsored by  family and church friends.  

We met *Arnold when he was about 5. His father had recently been killed over a land dispute and his mother was struggling to look after her children on her own.  When we met him, we were shown his school bag which contained half an exercise book, a pencil stub, a razor blade to sharpen the pencil and a slice of potato for his lunch.  Arnold is now a healthy teenager – he looked happy and well and it was great to see him enjoying playing football with his friends like any boy his age. 

We also met *Babra, a shy 11 year old who was abandoned at birth on a neighbour’s porch and has suffered physical and emotional abuse.  She’s only in Primary 2 and struggles academically.  The family who took her in have suffered financially with the long dry season this year which has led to loss of income and consequently poor nutrition for the family. However, she attends school fairly regularly and gets a midday meal at school. As the week went on she came out of her shell and by the end of camp she was smiling and laughing with her friends and joining in with games and singing.  We are reassured to know that David, the Global care local children’s worker, watches out for the children. He knows if they haven’t been at school or if there are family troubles.  He knows every child by name.  He makes sure they’re fed and if they’re ill that they have medical attention.  Our Babra was not so shy with David!

We’ve had the tremendous privilege of meeting some of our sponsored children, and watching them grow and mature. In Rachel, we’ve see the outcome of having support for education and access to health services.  Several of the Global Care Ugandan staff were sponsored children themselves and speak very highly of the scheme and opportunities it gave them.   Having received so much they want to give back to the next generation of vulnerable children.

The camp provided an opportunity for sponsored children to have a week of ‘being children’. Away from the pressures and battles of subsistence living, of fighting for survival against the elements, struggling to endure in extreme poverty or with disability and disease, these children were able to simply have fun. 

They laughed at adults making fools

of themselves, enjoyed performing songs and drama, chuckled at the antics of the Mzungus (white people), played on the playground, and raced each other amid giggles and happy screeching.  

They were well fed with three meals a day including a variety of protein and vitamins as well as the inevitable piles of starchy food.  They were loved and cared for.  If they were ill they were given healthcare.  It was a tremendous privilege and joy to be part of this – and to see each child go home with a mattress a cup and a plate thanks to the generosity of our friends and family.

Our team saw sponsorship working in schools partnerships where schools buy land and provide the whole school with food for midday meals. Where new latrines have been built to improve sanitation and encourage girls to attend schools. Where building huts to accommodate staff encourages teachers to work at rural schools.  We’ve seen Global Care partnerships with local communities including projects as diverse as digging wells and providing protected springs, providing HIV counselling and testing, supporting the development of school buildings, and working with volunteer community health workers.

I am unashamedly promoting the work of Global Care because I not only have faith that it works, but I trust the people on the ground in Uganda and the team in the UK. Every time I visit Uganda (this was my fifth trip) I see something that involves a member of the local staff in sacrificially giving of their time – wanting above all to serve the children who they see as their responsibility.  Every time I go, I see more evidence of an organisation working to provide support for sustainable projects and enabling local communities to learn new skills or become self-sufficient.  We read so much negative press about NGOs in Africa, I want to shout for my Ugandan friends who clearly demonstrate that Global Care is good news for the projects it supports.

For more information on child sponsorship please visit: http://www.globalcare.org.uk/sponsor

*Names changed to protect identity