Drugs, Alcohol and Mini-Skirts - A Survey of Ugandan Youth

In my endeavor to create an Aids Education Program that is relevant to the Ugandan youth (age demographic 14-23), I constructed a 13 questions survey about Sex, Culture, Christianity and Aids. Hardly intended to be scientific at all and really just a survey of Christian youth, it still gave me a glance into the perspective of Ugandan youth. And honestly, I really wanted to determine if the church had adequately addressed these sensitive issues with their youth. I was encouraged to find that ALL believed that sex outside of marriage was a “big deal.” And furthermore, that their Christianity was the largest determining factor in their decisions about sexual relationships. Some of the things they wrote down were…. helped equip me to resist the devil; helps to overcome temptation; to live morally well; I learned to abstain until marriage, kept me safe from sexual immorality; that I am a temple of Christ and I need to protect it; I love my Jesus more than anything; taught me to relate with opposite sex in godly manner; Helps me to keep my thoughts pure; It provides boundaries for me; I know God will honor a pure life; Christianity has provided me something bigger to look forward to – that’s heaven.

And, worthy of special note…. “The Church taught me to only have one wife.” This is not a response you would find on any survey taken of American youth!! However, that is reality here. I have often asked a teenager how many sibling they have, and to get an answer of 25 is completely normal! (The woman are reading this thinking… that is not humanly possible!) But, this is because a man will have several wives, sometimes one in each village he travels too or he keeps one on Tanzania, one in Kenya and one Uganda. (Now you, men, are thinking… I’m moving to Uganda!) However, the Uganda Christian church is constantly battling this tradition of multiple wives. For example, when someone gives their life to Christ and decides to join a church, which wife do they keep? What happens to the children of the non-wife? These may seem like obvious answers on paper, but the reality is that sorting through the nature of these familial relationships is no easy task to communicate and implement.

This probably gives you the perspective Africa/Uganda seems like a backward, if not morally weak society. But, the lens of the cultural perspective is always relative. When I asked the Ugandan youth their impression/opinion of the United States Culture, the majority of responses were that our American Culture "is bad because it’s where mini –skirt (half-naked styles) came from and are practiced.” That it is “bringing bad things into Uganda like prostitution, taking drugs and putting on mini skirts.” Now, I must admit that having mini-skirts, grouped in with such sins like alcoholism, drug use, and promiscuity, made me chuckle a bit – and still does – hence the title of this Blog. Nevertheless, morality here is not determined by your family relationships, rather, your morality is demonstrated by your modesty. The fact is that morality is probably found somewhere in the middle, but it is interesting how the culture affects where the emphasis falls.

Now to be fair, not all of their perspectives were mentioned our problems with mini-skirts. Other responses were…

• It’s relative; it has brought the gospel, sent missionaries, equips church leaders, enhances values, but it also encourages immorality via pornography, homosexuality and divorce.
• They should change some of their behaviors and lifestyles, like the movies they put out and other people copy
• The worldly people are totally destructive, but those that know God are really compassionate
• American Christian culture is perfect
• American Parents are so busy that their children do whatever they want to
• I don’t want to judge them because they are people too - with struggles

Now to the main topic – that which is my motivation behind the survey – that of HIV/AIDS. And the dialogs confirmed that contrary to our youth’s experiences in the United States, ALL youth in surveyed personally knew at least one person dying of AIDS, and many knew more than could be counted on two hands. I asked how Aids affected the lives of these people, and some of their responses were: They have no hope for tomorrow; hopeless; unhappy; they are always sick; they have unanswered questions; they all died; they cursed God before dying; hated their lives; makes them miserable; they have given up on life and don’t care if other people catch it.

Despite the cultural differences, Ugandan teenagers face the same struggles as American youth. All the Ugandan youth said that a lot of their friends or acquaintances at school (this is both high school and university level) are already sexually active. Furthermore, the majority admitted to being tempted or also received peer pressure to engage in sexual encounters. This is not surprising, really. The same Satan that is out to kill, steal and destroy in America is at work here too and he employs every means necessary to do so.

If you’ve made it to the end of this long Blog, I’m impressed and honored to keep your attention for so long.

Going to the Hospital

We attended a special service at Bwerenga Church (on Hope Village Property) on Sunday night. During worship, a two-year old boy napping on a mat on the floor, started convulsing. My first thought was that he was having a nightmare, but when I went to him, I realized he was having a seizure. It last at least 8 minutes, while the church prayed and we turned him on his side and put the end of a spoon in his mouth to keep him from choking on his tongue. When it was done, you could see he was burning up with fever so I carried him outside, and Elizabeth Iverson went to find the parents and get her car keys. The service continued on, and we took him and the parents to the hospital.

The hospital is nothing we would find, even in the ghetto, of our country. Cement walls and floors, with open windows for ventilation. The children’s ward was a room of 17 metal cribs. Moms bring food and a mat to lie on the floor next to their children’s cribs. No chairs, no mattresses, no TV, no mosquito nets; just a lot of waiting and a lot of silence. Another mom let me pray for her little baby with asthma.

Turns out that our young patient, Cerabu, had Malaria and his temperature of 105 is what caused the seizure. I have a picture of this young boy because just the Sunday before, he spent the entire service on my lap. It is to God’s glory that we were there! No one that attends this village church has a car and, who knows how the boy would’ve made it to the hospital if we hadn’t been there. Thankfully, he stayed just the one night at the hospital and was able to go home the next day.

Uganda Luxuries

In the United States, having a maid, a cook and a tennis instructor are all indicators of an extravagant if not wealthy lifestyle. This is not so in Uganda. These services are the mechanism for which wealth is distributed here. The world simply does not run the same at all. Trying to incorporate our Western way of doing things is just not relevant to the economies or speed of things. For example, in the United States, almost every household has a washer and dryer and those with wealth in abundance (I say wealth “in abundance”, because here ALL Americans are wealthy in comparison. The simply fact that every child can attend school for free makes us a very rich society.) But, I digress, back to the topic at hand. A washer and dryer in Uganda would be neither normal nor a luxury – simply put, it would be irrelevant and unusable. Let me explain. Electricity (aka power) is not only expensive, but weak and inconsistent. Out of the three weeks, I’ve been here, I have been without power at least 50% of the time. And when there is power, it is hardly strong enough to heat enough water for a shower. Now let’s say that you have a generator to power your washer and dryer. Why would you pay an exorbitant amount of money to power those power hungry appliances, when you can pay someone to wash your personal clothes by hand for 5,000 shillings (translates to roughly $3 US Dollars). The cost for someone to sweep up my cement floors, beat out my rugs, and change my sheets is 3,000 shillings ($2). In the United States, we do not pay people to do, what machines can do for us. Most of the world does not function that way. The mentality in Africa, is why have a machine do, what you can pay a person to do. It is in this way, that the wealth trickles down the all classes of the society.

Living Missionary Style

And for those that are concerned that Sarah's adventure in Uganda is not so "missionary-like"... let me give you a true taste of missionary life....

Where's the Toilet....................................??

"Welcome to Uganda Sarah" - I haven't even been in the country 24hrs and this is where we stop to pee. All I got to say girls, is thank God I was wearing a skirt. And I had to use my backpack to keep the door shut, though it hardly increased the privacy. I truly believe toilets are the best invention. I do have a toilet in my room, but once you leave home, you never know what you'll find!



Where is the Power.........................................??

So I've gotten tons of questions about my living situation here. I am currently NOT living on the Hope Village property. Buildings still need to be built there! Right now I rent a room at Banana Village with the Iverson family, which is also where the CBC Storm Team stayed when they were here in July. I am feeling settled in and this is beginning to feel like home.... the only reminder that "this is Africa" is that I've only had power for about 30% of my time here (and thats now exaggeration)... according to Royce Iverson, it wasn't like this before I came!
But, here is a look at home.....




Next best invention, next to the toilet, is electricity (thank you Mr. Edison). I guess no electricity on Sunday is a pretty normal event here in Kampala since government will divert power to different areas of the country on a rotation system due to the shortage of it. However, on Monday we woke up without power still. Turns out the power lines were down (and still are), due to the huge thunder and lightening storm we had. Without electricity you can’t charge our computers or our cell phones, and since the power warms our showers, its been a cold couple of days! Basically to sum it up, since I have only had electricity for 30% of my time in Uganda, you essentially get use to it and adapt. If the power is on, you jump in the shower darn quick, whether you need one or not!

Malaria Mondays

Or so we call them in order to remember to take our weekly dosage of Mefloquine to protect us from Malaria. Side affects to these pills include sleeplessness and vivid dreams. It is definitely true that I remember my dreams in the morning more now then before taking these pills, when before I hadn’t an inkling of any dreams. Certain nights are restless, where you never fully fall asleep nor do you ever fully wake-up, leaving utterly exhausted the entire next day. If this happened too often I would stop taking the pills entirely.

The fact is that if you sleep under a mosquito net that you decreases the chances of contracting Malaria by 50%. And across Africa, you cut deaths by Malaria in children by 1/3. That’s why you hear about such organizations as www.nothingbutnets.com, which hopes to help every African child sleep under a net. Malaria medicine is great for a season, but you can not take it for a lifetime or it will destroy your liver and therefore is not viable for African to take their entire lives. Contrary to popular belief, there is a cure to Malaria. And taken within the first 24-48hours of noticing the symptoms, you have a 97% chance of a full recovery from Malaria. However, the problem in Africa and why Malaria is killing xxx number of people every year, is that basic health care services are often too far to reach for people that they rarely seek treatment for ailments and many times the cost of services is more then they make in a month even though the cure only costs about $10.

Infestation of Evil Spirits

As I was busy getting my internet business done, before my costly hour was up, at the ARA (American Recreation Association). They have a radio station always playing in the common area and the station was doing their regular news update on top of the hour.

I usually block out the voices, but the repetitive use of the words “evil spirits” kept interrupting my thought process. As I tuned in, the story unfolded as such. A Boarding School (these are VERY common in Uganda) in a local district, had after several attempts to remove the “evil spirits” that were plaguing them, had to shut its doors, until someone could come and fix the problem. Furthermore, accusations were being laid at a gentleman’s feet that he had been taking money from the school to help remove the “evil spirits” but that he had in fact invited more in. Several parents having heard of the “evil spirit” problem had already picked their children up from this boarding school thus sparking the shut down. Now this information was reported as fact on this credible radio station. No words like “supposedly” or “allegedly” were ever used, it was all reported in tone and verbiage of complete validation. To say the least, stories of the supernatural appear here every day. They are woven through people’s daily experiences; conversations over lunch, or over the water cooler at work and as already discussed reported daily in the news. Is this pure superstition or the things of the spirit more blatant and more bold in Africa? Are they present in the United States, but just hidden better -behind our luxurious exteriors and orderly processes?