Hello from Soroti, Uganda!
It's been a long time since my last blog, so I'll try to catch up on what's been going on. Things have been going non stop since I arrived at the end of January.
There's a great book that was recommended to me to read called "When Helping Hurts". For those of you who don't like to read, or don't have time to read, it is available on audible.com and I highly recommend it. Anyway, I like to think that many of the things I do here are with that in mind. Uganda is no longer in an emergency state. They have had peace here since 2006. Other than the usual crimes you would see in any country, it is safe for me to travel anywhere in Uganda. One needs to be aware of his surroundings just as one would anywhere in the world. With this in mind, I try very hard not to do anything when there is a capable Ugandan there who can do it.
There's a bore hole (water well) that is down right now. I got the phone call this morning asking me to come fix it. It would probably take me about 20 to 30 minutes to fix the well. I've been told that it has been broke for two days now. The problem is, there is a man in the same village that has had as much training in these bore holes as I have had. He is very capable of fixing it. His number is engraved in the concrete surrounding the bore hole. Why don't they call him?
In Uganda, the unemployment rate is around 65%. People here seem to look to the government or any non profit to fix their problems. I forget who said it, but it has been said "that a government big enough to provide everything is big enough to take everything". That's not the case here. Ugandans are very free to do what they want and go where they want. I simply believe that the over 10,000 registered non profits here in Uganda have created an atmosphere of why should we do it when someone else will come and do it for free. I don't want to be a part of that.
A typical water well drilled by a truck here in Uganda cost between $6,000.00 and $8,000.00. The hand dug wells using the Water4.org process cost about $1400.00. Now, it is a shallow well that is designed to serve about 100 people, but we can drill 5 of these for the cost of one of the others. The cost of repairing one of the deeper wells could almost pay the cost of hand drilling a new well using the Water4.org method. Getting a kit to from Water4.org cost $5,000.00 plus another $2,800.00 to get it here to Uganda, but once it's here, you can use it to drill over 50 wells. I think their testing showed around 80. After that, you do some maintenance on the equipment with the help of a local welder, and your ready to go again. So, for $7,800.00, you have a nice business startup for about 10 Ugandans. This brings me to my next point.
Gulu, Uganda is about 3 to 4 hours away from Soroti, Uganda. Bob Goff, the author of another great book called "Love Does", also available on audible.com, started a school with the help of others called Restore. In either 2010 or 2011, Pros for Africa visited Restore, and brought with them a kit from Water4.org. It was a very high profile trip. KWTV Channel 9 was along to document what they saw and did. It was a great trip and they did a lot of great things. Now, with that same kit, 10 young men from that school went on to dig 12 bore holes in 2011, but zero in 2012. Water4.org asked me to visit those young men and see why production stopped. I have now made 3 such visits as I get to know those young men.
From what I can tell, the jobs just stopped be handed to them. None of those 10 young men took the initiative to look for more opportunities to drill more wells. The kit itself belongs to Restore. Restore has never denied them access to the kit. Those 10 young men can use it at anytime. It's just that no one ever took the imitative to go and sale another bore hole.
It seems they are just waiting for someone to tell them where to go for the next job.
Why? Why are they waiting? Why is the other village waiting on me to come and fix their bore hole? I believe it's because it's what the other registered 10,000 non profits have done in the past. They have simply just done the work when Ugandans were quite capable of doing it. If someone else is going to do it, why should they do it?
A generous donor has bought a kit for these young men. A mission team from Harrah, Oklahoma was kind enough to bring the kit with them to Uganda saving the $2,800.00 cost to get the kit over here. I now have that kit here in my possession. I've told the young men that I have it. We have made a deal. If those same you g men will dig 12 bore holes this year, as they did in 2011, they will be given the kit. They will have their own booming small business. Will they do it? I don't know, but I hope they do. They need marketing help, but we started by having some business cards made. I'm limited by the cost of fuel and the cost of hotels while going and staying in Gulu, but I will continue to travel there when I can to work with them on marketing and growing their business for success.
The generosity of others always amazes me. How someone half a world away could just give $5,000.00 to pay for a future for some young men they have never met just blows my mind. I don't take that lightly either. I will do everything in my power to make sure that his generosity Is not wasted. Just as I will fight to make sure that the contributions that those made for our farming project are not wasted. I want results!
On another note, I was honored by the visit of one of my co workers at Advanced Air Specialist. He spent his vacation time and money to come and see what I was doing here. Thank you Steve Welch for taking your time to see what has become so important to me. Thank you to the rest of my co workers for everything you do on a daily basis to keep the business profitable and operating smoothly. I love you all. You make me being here possible through all your hard work.
Please keep me in your prayers!
Tom Cox
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