Author Archives: Victoria Nalongo

BKU welcomes Vicky Cromwell to the BKU family.  Vicky is a teacher at Glenelg School in Abu Dhabi.  She will be spending ten days here and plans on spending a lot of time with the children and teaching English to local residents.  She also has brought a box of school supplies for the kids.

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Namuli Sharwua was brought to her paternal aunt after the death of her father from HIV in 2007.  Namuli had been attending school in her home village which is located near Masaka, but after coming to live with her aunt she was turned into a house maid.  By a stroke of luck, Victoria’s daughter Angel rented from a room from Namuli’s aunt while she was at the University.  Angel found out that Namuli was made to be a house worker, and that she really wanted to go back to school.  In 2009, Angel connected Namuli to Victoria and Bright Kids Uganda and Namuli was sent back to school.  Unfortunately after 2 years out of school Namuli felt out of place with her much younger classmates; she decided to attend vocational training in the field of Culinary Arts.  She recently graduated with a final grade of a B+ and is now working as a hotel cook in Masaka, which is near her village so she can care for her elderly grandmother:  CONGRATULATIONS NAMULI!!

Victoria traveled to Kampala today to pick up a donation of shoes from the American International School in Abu Dhabi.  We received 2 boxes, with all different kids of shoes.  Some look very sturdy, so Victoria decided those should go to the children who play “football!”

Bright Kids Uganda Entebbe Home received visitors from Water Gods Way.  An organization devoted to bringing clean water to the people of Uganda.  BKU would like to thank Water Gods Way for their donation of a Bio-Sand Filtration system.  We no longer have to boil the water to make sure it is clean for consumption, we simply pour our well water in the top and get clean drinking water out of the bottom.

The new volunteer house is almost finished! Complete with solar powered lights and it’s own bathroom, the volunteer house is a nice getaway within the compound for volunteers and interns.  Currently it has a set of bunk beds, but more beds are going to be added. There is also a meeting room with a couch and table for the volunteers to meet and hangout.  As of now, a few of the interns and volunteers have opted to stay at Banana Village down the street because of lack of space at Victoria’s.  With the construction and completion of the new volunteer house, volunteers and interns will be able to stay close, and all funds will go towards BKU and the children. As yet another one of BKU’s sustainable projects, the volunteer house will be an effective source of income, as well as a convenient and afforable option for volunteers and interns! Monica, Lindsay and Ruth of the GPE team from FSU will be the first volunteers to stay in the house, as they are moving in at the beginning of next week upon completion.

Just last year, BKU started yet another sustainable project in which chicken broilers would be sold in order to generate income for the children. In early June, 500 chicks were bought and immunized for this project, and the broilers that were already here were deemed big enough for eating and selling. On June 16^th, 30 broilers were sold at 10,000 shillings each, generating a grand total of 300,000 shillings! This project is already proving to be a very lucrative project for BKU, and we look forward to seeing more sales in the very near future!

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On the afternoon of June 15^th two social workers from the local police station arrived at Victoria’s house.  The social workers explained that they might have found Hassan and Abbey’s father and they would like the boys to accompany them to Kampala for DNA testing.  For those of you who do not remember Hassan and Abbey arrived at BKU last June (Click Here to see the news article).  Hassan, who is now 9 years old, was apprehensive about going with the social workers, but was very polite.

Update:  the boys left on June 15, 2012, but haven’t returned to Bright Kids as of yet (date: June 19, 2012).   Upon calling the social workers for an update, Victoria found out that the supposed father is an important man here in Uganda and would prefer if the DNA tests were performed outside the area.  As a result, he is paying for Hassan and Abbey to be flown to South Africa for testing.  Bright Kids Uganda is concerned for the well being of its two sons, but hopes that they have a loving father to go home to!  We will keep you updated!