Thank You!

To everyone who has donated to our trip; glasses, textbooks, childrens books, toys and games...I would like to send out personal thank you notes when I am back in the states. But for now, a thank you from Africa for helping to make our trip successful and rewarding is in order.

The textbooks have been donated to the Busoga University library. As many of you know, the students here are not fortunate enough to have their own textbooks. They must share the books within the library that is next to the nursing classroom; they are not allowed even to check them out for a weekend. The books that we have donated will help their education immensely. It seems that their curriculum includes significantly more learning from lecture format and clinical experience than our primarily lecture and outside reading format in the US. I know that they will learn so much from the resources that have been donated to their library.

The curriculum also incorporates dance and song into all of the programs. Yesterday, the nursing students presented for us a poem written about the meaning of the White Dress that the nursing students here wear (it wasn't all that long ago that nurses in the US wore the white dresses), a skit about the "sexual network" and the spread of HIV, a song that they wrote as a thank you, and then some traditional African dancing and singing. The dancing here is just part of their culture; they dance beginning at a very young age when they still are little children in the villages. Each area has a specific traditional dance, so the students that are from further away from the University, even Kenya, know additional traditional dances according to the tribal culture of each region. I did get to join in the dancing, and one of the students put the special wrap around my waist. Although I cannot shake my hips like they can (I don't think my pelvis is supposed to move in those ways!) it was so much fun to try, and the students just loved my effort.

The 500 pairs of glasses that were donated were given out during the Vision Screening and Outreach day on Thursday of this past week. Out of all of the students that we screened, we referred 14 of them to the optometrist for additional follow up. The optometrist was also in attendance that day, so she did follow up screening the very same day. Although none of the children needed glasses, there were several adults that did receive glasses. I do have pictures of some of them trying them on for fit and to verify that their sight was indeed improved. The remaining glasses were left with the optometrist. She is the only one in the entire region, serving 500,000 people. The glasses will be given to those that are in great need. What better gift to leave behind, than the gift of sight?!

We also gave suitcases filled with medical supplies to Iganga Hospital, and the clinics that we visited. The supplies that we brought included some medications, Kerlix gauze, many bulb syringes, gloves (which are hugely scarce here), baby blankets, stethoscopes, blood pressure cuffs, syringes and some clothes for the newborn babies and the pediatric unit.

The students at the schools received school supplies; crayons, paper, pencils, and various games to play. The blind children had their own pile of supplies including braille games, toys that made sound and books that were braille.

We also donated a laptop computer to the Busoga University Nursing Lab, which did not have a computer before we arrived; thank you to LW for her own personal donation of this laptop. We have also given out countless pairs of sandals and clothes, such as little girl dresses to various children here, including the orphans at the Babies Home.

Each donation is so greatly appreciated, and I feel very lucky to have been a part of something that will leave a lasting impact. Although some of the gifts are more temporary and will break or be used until they no longer can be used, I think that by being here, we will leave more permanent gifts of friendship and ambassadorship. The biggest "thing" that we are leaving behind is our representation of the United States, as students, nurses and caring individuals. I hope that we have left behind a very positive image of our country and our profession. Thank you to all who have helped us give such a lasting and important gift.

To my colleagues at work; I am so looking forward to and also very honored to be joining a profession that is so highly respected. It is because of people like you, that our profession is so highly esteemed. I can't wait to be a Nurse.

Love you all. Have a blessed Sunday. xo