19th November 2001
UNDER AFRICAN SKIES, behind bars!

Hello and the very best and warmest greetings to you all, which includes Christmas and New Year. Bliadhna Mhath Ur (Gaelic)

I’ve been asked by AIM to write an update about life and living here in Kampala and the first thing that’s happened is the electricity has just gone off! This is a regular occurrence, but apart from the inconvience with cooking I like the relaxing candlelight. I hope to send this out as an e-mail too, so if you receive an edited printed duplicate via AIM, you’ll know why.

I first of all want to send my heartfelt thanks to so many lovely friends who have written, encouraged and most of all prayed, this is worth more than I can say, thank you and please continue.

Next, I do have a lot to say and yet I’m not sure what to say! I have so many, many blessings to be thankful for, and also some very real challenges. I’ll start with the blessings.

BLESSINGS
After an uncertain time 3 weeks before I left the UK, I and AIM became convinced that God was leading me to a different kind of work than the original assignment at Kisiizi Mission Hospital, in Uganda. God said that He takes the desires of your heart and He really did with this change. I am now working with a Ugandan Christian work with street children, called An Open Door (Rev 3v8).

For those who do not know me too well may not realise that I have always loved Paediatric nursing, and especially the very special, needy and vulnerable group of children that carry the title ‘Street children’. I used to work in a mission hospital in India some time back and the plight of many children there has always stayed on my heart, particularly an anonymous child in Calcutta. There are many ways that I could share with you about my love for these kids, yet I should tell you about my 75 kids here in Kampala.

The Open Door ministry (see end of letter for Objectives) here has been developing since 1996 with a group of Ugandans Christians reaching out to children on the streets, they prayed for a home for them and God provided a place in January 2001.

Our vision is for a Christian home that will raise children safe and well off the streets, knowing the Lord. No two children have the same history, though many have known rejection, abandonment, violence and abuse, some are orphans from AIDS and are themselves HIV +ve, some young ones we just do not know anything about their background. Their ages range from newborn to 14 years. When they are with us, we see them as special unique individuals that God has blessed us with the privilege of sharing their lives.

I will share a little about 2 of our children; Emmanuel was found newborn at Christmas last year (hence the name) in a plastic bag on a rubbish dump. He was brought to Open Door very unwell, but he is now a thriving happy wee boy, who has the most adorable eyes and longest eyelashes. Many babies are found unwell, possibly the reason they are abandoned. Just last week we had 2 new teenage boys, 1 of them, Isaac had been before with his friend David, but Isaac felt he could not stay and went back to the streets. David stayed and he is a lovely guy, he helps with washing, cooking and with the younger kids, he gave his testimony a few weeks ago and as they would say in Glasgow “It would bring a tear to a glass eye”. Please pray that Isaac and his friend would settle and stay, and that David would be a good example to them, and they would not be a bad example to David or the others.

CHALLENGES
Now the challenges are actually included in the blessings! The children already have my heart and I do love being with them. Yet their health needs can seem so huge. As the only trained health worker in the team of 15, it’s a challenge knowing where and how to start. There are the obvious immediate priorities for those that are very unwell and need hospitalisation, and there are wounds that we try and manage there. But there are many other needs, such as malnutrition, malaria, scabies, HIV and TB. At the moment I’m trying to do a ‘Health Needs Assessment’, so please pray for that. Apart from the physical health needs, there are mental health issues from being ‘on the street’ for any length of time, many have been victims of abuse and violence that are unimaginable to many of us.

DAY-DAY
I’ve been in Uganda just over 2 months now, and life has been full, busy and changeable. My usual day starts leaving home around 730,spending 9-12 Mon-Fri doing language (Luganda) studies at the guesthouse. I would never have believed how tiring this brain-strain would be, but I am learning thanks to a great Christian teacher, Herbert. (Pray that my language ability would increase, it’s so important to communicate with the team and these children in their own language, especially for relationships to develop)

My afternoons are variable, mostly spent at the Open Door home, I’ve had to spend some time at the Ministry of Health trying to get my Ugandan Nurse Registration sorted out, which happened on Friday!

Sundays, I try and keep free, and I’ve really been enjoying a local church here, All Saints. They have a very lively and enthusiastic praise worship time, the sermons are usually clear and simple.

To explain my opening title, I really love night skies and stars but our homes have to have bars on the doors and windows. Security and safety is a concern worldwide, especially in these days. Here in Uganda there a lot of robberies and thieves, some armed. Within our borders there are some inter-tribal problems, and our neighbours of DR Congo, Sudan, and Rwanda continue to have conflict areas.

So to return to the beginning, I do have a lot to be thankful for, I do love many parts of being here, and sharing in this ministry. I know for sure this is where I am meant to be, and yet there are some very real challenges to living and working here.

For COMMUNICATIONS please continue to e-mail marsali@infocom.co.ug and for snail-mail AFRICAN INLAND MISSION, PO BOX 4008, KAMPALA, UGANDA. If I don’t reply as soon as I would like, please forgive me, I am trying. I do love to hear what is happening everywhere else, it does help me too, to step back from ‘street kids’ for a wee while, which is healthy!

MUKAMA AKUWE OMUKISA - GOD BLESS YOU

LOTS OF LOVE MARSALI

Rev 3 v 8 "I know your deeds. See, I have set before you an open door that no one can shut. I know you have little strength, yet you have kept my word and have not denied my name".

OBJECTIVES OF AN OPEN DOOR UGANDA
(Registered UK Charity No 1040311)

• To remove, rehabilitate and resettle street children and street families, so as to build their self-sustenance capacity.
• To implement the Children’s Statute concerning fostering and adoption
• To empower and encourage the family unit and the extended family, by coming alongside with subsidies for school fees, housing and medical services
• To strengthen the capacity of the community to cater for the vulnerable children particularly the street children
• To integrate and re-integrate street children into mainstream education
• To offer basic education to street children, slum children and mothers
• To sensitise marginalized communities on the essence of education and accessing available opportunities
• To improve the standard of living amongst the urban poor
• To build the capacity of an Open Door to be able to develop programmes that could address the problem of street children in a sustainable manner
• To research, advocate and lobby government and other agencies to change attitudes towards street children and develop new

MUCH LOVE MARSALI