Visit from Mother and vulnerable young women.

I have been blessed to have my mother come and visit Agnes and I for two weeks.
My mum will be staying with us here in our big home, and will be visiting our projects and helping volunteer where she can!
We picked her up last Saturday from Entebee. The whole journey started with us leaving our home at 8.30 in the morning and finally arriving back home 7.00 at night.
This is because the president of Uganda was arriving at the airport (the same time my mum flew in) and had arranged a big welcoming party.
Recently the prime minister of Uganda challenged the president, and was interested in top spot. The president fired him as a result (with no clear reason why ... but I think we can speculate) after all ... this is a democracy.
There was a bit of a scandal around it, so the presidents party arranged a big welcoming celebration as he returned from the US, to try and show that the president is still loved.
The funny thing is they have to pay people to come out, with free food and free petrol.
It was chaos to say the least, lots of boda boda (motor bike) drivers going crazy, some slamming down bottles of beer while weaving in and out of traffic.
Many of these people who come to these events are referred to as 'fly's', mainly due to the fact that they go wherever the party is. One day they may be at an event to support the president, cheering with joy, and the next day protesting against him. Very much a good example of the 'mob mentality'.
Luckily we got home ok after many hours.

My mother has spent some time visiting friends here, but also spending time with some of our tailoring girls, both new and old.
She has been helping Agnes run her class, and is doing a few lessons on the value that God places on them, as well as some parenting techniques.
Many of the girls are single mothers, who grew up as orphans, and they can be ignorant about a lot of things so they all have a lot of questions to ask my Mum (although sometimes she feel out of her depth ... especially when they start asking medical questions hehe)
We will also be visiting friends, and today she is helping do some reading for special needs kids at Jinja Christian School (thanks Ron and Anne).

Here at YSU we have really been struggling with some of the new tailoring girls. Many of them are living in poor conditions, and have a range of domestic problems.
We had noticed quite a few of them were not making it to class, and so we spoke to them all about it as a group, and then one on one.
Some of the girls were just not coming because they felt inadequate (especially in business class) so they needed both a bit of a warning to not waste their opportunity (seeing as many girls are desperate to do this course, we can get a few requests a week and have to turn them away due to a full class), but they also needed a bit of encouragement, that they are capable of learning.
But a few of the other girls have really struggled and have a very hard life at home. At the moment we are looking after four young women, all poor, abandoned, of a Muslim faith, and desperate to learn.

One young woman had moved with her family far away, and so couldn't get transport to come to class. We have taken this girl into our house to live with us, provided she does some work around the house.

We really feel for this girl, as she is very shy and has no confidence. You can tell she has often been the rejected one. When she came with her bags to our house to stay, her mother had sent her along with some money to help her (food, toiletries etc). She was sent here with her uncle, who we have dealt with before (a bit of a dodgy guy who was our landlord at our previous house). On arriving at our place the uncle took the money from her and left. So the money that her mother had given to help her, was stolen off her from her own uncle. And yet she was so quiet and had nothing to say about it. Many of these girls are used and taken advantage of like this.

We tried to lift her up, and tell her she would be fine here, that Agnes is around if she needs to talk to anyone. We had arranged a few chores for her that would cover her rent, food and some small pocket money, but had not yet gone through the list with her, only to find her early the next morning cleaning the house.
She had mopped everywhere, cleaned all the rooms, swept the whole compound, and even weeded all our garden beds! This was all done without being asked.
We have a feeling she is grateful of being taken in.

Another girl has had to walk from very far away with two children, and so we have allowed her to stay here two nights a week. I think she wants to stay longer though, because she ended up staying a third night haha.
These two girls actually stayed up till about two in the morning the other night, practicing on their sewing machines. But it was nice to hear their laughter coming from down stairs (even though as soon as you walk into the room, they put their heads down and go all quiet)

We also are paying the rent for two other girls in the tailoring class who are now living together. We get them to do all our washing at YSU once a week, and we also include food for the month as a part of their payment.
One of these girls had been abandoned by the father of her two children, as he had ran off with another woman and left her all alone. We found her when she was about to be kicked out of her home (one tiny room about the size of someones kitchen back in Australia), had no money, no way to get a job, and no family in the area to help her. A lot of the time woman like this have no other opportunity but prostitution. So she was so grateful to be able to get some small work with us, so she could be sustained while she finishes the tailoring course.
The other girl who is now living with her and sharing in the work and food budget, had been kicked out of her home by her mother (who wanted her to work and make money ... which is almost impossible for a young woman here, again unless you sell yourself). She told us that as a result she was staying with a friend very far away, but her friends husband would bring his mates home, and they would try and get sexual favors from her. If she refused their advances she would be kicked out of staying at the home.
To top it off, she has a young two year old daughter to look after as well.

So many of these girls are in desperate conditions, and so many of them are used and abused by men, and even their own families.
The amount of single young mothers here who are taken advantage of is really staggering.
It can be really tough trying to work out a system to take in and care for so many girls, but it is also a privilege. We feel very touched by their stories.
We also feel its important to get them to work. This actually helps bring some dignity to them, instead of handing out free money. Most of these girls want to work for the help they receive, because it makes them feel like they are valuable and can contribute as well. And we also want to be careful about creating a welfare mentality.

But it is very important to provide short term relief for these girls, as we try to train them up with job skills for longer term sustainability.

It is interesting how God can lead you in different ways. I always thought the YSU house would be full of young men, as I have a passion for mentoring young guys. We certainly still do stuff with a lot of guys, but it seems more and more that we are becoming a safe haven for vulnerable young women. Right now our house is full of these broken, beaten, rejected and abandoned young women. And if this is where God wants to lead us right now, I am more then happy and feel privileged to be able to show Christ's light to some of the most lowly in the society here.

I still do spend a lot of time with young men. Because ultimately investing in the young men will help the young women. Martin Luther King Jr once said:

"On the one hand we are called to play the good Samaritan on life's roadside; but that will be only an initial act. One day we must come to see that the whole Jericho road must be transformed so that men and women will not be constantly beaten and robbed as they make their journey on life's highway. True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it is not haphazard and superficial. It comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring"

We could take in more needy here then we could possibly handle, but in the end, investing in the young men, who seem to be so much of a cause of this problem, is essential. Right now in this context, the women are the beaten and robbed, and the young men are the Jericho road that needs repaving.

It really is a two way approach, but for now we are more then willing to act like Christ towards these beautiful young women, who God loves so much.

I'd like to leave you with a short poem that my church 'One Hope Community' posted on their facebook page recently. It beautifully sums up our feelings and longings 'for tomorrow'. For the deep seeded hope of redemption, for the ache of heaven, where God will "wipe every tear from their eyes" where there will be "no more death, mourning, crying or pain, for the old order of things have passed away". And this hope is our inspiration for the passion and drive that keeps us moving towards this beautiful eternal kingdom we all deeply long for.

You can copy the link below and paste it into your web browse.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHVRZ5R2UDY&list=UUTouaQl9t8VEmMai1gDxTpg