HOMEWARD BOUND!!!

KAREN:

Our Uganda experience is now officially over! Eight months, 33.5 weeks, 235 days and we now find ourselves homeward bound as we sit in Dubai airport waiting for our connecting flight onwards to Manchester. It's quite a culture shock to be in such an extravagant and immaculately clean environment after the simplicity of Uganda...and constantly being covered in a hue of orange dust!

Uganda is a phenomenal country and our experience has far exceeded our expectations. To have the opportunity to work at Gulu Regional Referral Hospital (GRRH) has been a true honour. The hospitality of the Acholi people has been remarkable as we were always welcomed us with open arms! We have been proud to call Gulu our home and make so many friends both from the local and the international community. After 22years of civil war in Northern Uganda and being subjected to so much suffering, loss and poverty, you could expect much sorrow, oppression and negativity. Instead the people are the most upbeat, happy and friendliest individuals we have ever met, contented by the simple pleasures in life. They are a true inspiration!

DEBBIE:

The last 8 months has been filled with such a fantastic range of adventures, professional learning and personal development. Our work was intense and at times very difficult but our whole experience at GRRH was one that we will treasure for years to come. There were many extremely sad and demanding days but our spirits were raised so much by those few patients who against the odds survived. Simple procedures and processes proved to be complicated due to the lack of resources and huge number of patients on the ward but this meant that we felt even more proud of all of our achievements. We developed such strong relationships with the hospital staff and found it interesting to learn about our colleagues' lives and stories of living in Gulu during the war. As Karen has said, the people that we have met are all so inspiring and it is hard to believe the suffering and hardship that they have been exposed to. We are very proud of the work that we have done at the hospital and feel that we have made many lifelong friendships.

Leaving Uganda has caused us to experience such a range of emotions. We are both so very excited to see all our families and friends! We're also feeling saddened that this incredible experience is now over. We had both always dreamed of working in Africa and having made that dream a reality has been amazing. Leaving friends and the ever changing international community behind in Gulu has also been difficult but we now have future opportunities to visit these great friends in some beautiful places around the world. In the last few days in Uganda we found ourselves soaking up the sights and sounds even more and trying so hard to capture those special details that we just can't let ourselves forget, for example: the vast sky that is full of cartoon-clouds, the ever smiling faces of Ugandan people as they greet you, ten thousand people trying to fit into an 11 seater matatu (minibus), the sight of someone tucking into a plate piled unbelievably high with pocho, rice and beans, the buzzing, social activity of the market place, the way people carry 30 kilos on their heads like it's no big deal, the way that the children look at you in awe when you walk past them because they've never seen a 'mzungu' (white person) before....the list goes on and on and on.

KAREN:

We hope you have enjoyed following our journey and that our blog has brought you all closer to Gulu and to Uganda and to the reality of life in a developing country. We sincerely thank our families for their endless love and support and for sharing in our smiles, our tears, our adventures, our trials and our tribulations. To all our friends and colleagues - we thank you for the ongoing support, emails and messages which have been hugely appreciated and encouraging, particularly after a difficult day at work!

...photos to follow once once we are re-united with a decent internet connection back home!

So from Uganda, and from the Gulu Girls it is officially over and out!