Back in Uganda for my fourth visit to borrowers and prospective borrowers. Although I’ve been here before, I am still astounded by the deep and pervasive poverty. At the same time, this is a country of industrious, hard working people. Everywhere I go, I see people out on the street, selling something! People are in small shops, kiosks on the street, sometimes just an overturned cardboard box or egg crate becomes a table on which they display their wares. These are resourceful and tenacious people.
A reminder of this arrived in my email this morning from a lady seeking our help. She says: “Winning Women is a group of twenty-five extremely poor women who have come together to see how we can develop ourselves, family and community out of poverty. The group consists of single mothers, youths, married women and widows. Each has at least a small business, however, all is done on a minimal scale due to small capital. Our main objective is to come out of poverty, become self-sustainable, develop to be responsible parents and an example to the community.”
This story is typical of women in Uganda. They may have a small business but lack of capital keeps them from making a profit and making any headway against the poverty which defines so much of their existence and yet their goals are not just improving their lives in material ways, they also yearn to be better parents, better people!
My time here is short and I am visiting three groups while here to talk with them about how our program works and to see if it’s the right program for them. But I will re-arrange my itinerary and get to a meeting with this lady and her group and then try to determine if we can help them too. There is so much need and I am so grateful for all of you who support this work. We are all blessed by so much material wealth in the U.S. and we are also blessed with the opportunity to make a real difference in the lives of our less fortunate sisters and their families.
