MARS HILL NEWS
by Tomi Henderson
The Mars Hill Rotary Club met on Tuesday morning, April 26, at 6:30 at the Aroostook Health Center.Rotarian Rena Kearney gave an update on “Summer,” the Chinese orphan that our Rotary Club sponsors. Summer is 11 years old and is in the fourth grade. She loves to read and learn English. We receive a periodic update, picture and letter from Summer.
The special speakers were Sue McCrum and Cindy Kilcollins. They spoke about the Missions trip they took to Uganda last year. Traveling as part of a Word of Life medical team, they spent a week working with the native people. Cindy’s daughter Amanda was also part of the team. They started their day with devotions before helping the team as needed. As a nurse, Cindy helped with triaging the people to see whether they needed to see a dentist or doctor. Amanda and Sue helped in the pharmacy, dispensing medicines as ordered by the doctors.
Located on the equator, Uganda has a year-round temperature of around 80 degrees. Around 52 percent of the population is under age 14 and only about 2 percent live to be over age 65. Almost half of the people are HIV positive and malaria and worms are experienced by most of the people. The lifestyles of the people are very different — with some living in very modern cities, while just a few miles outside the city limits many live in mud huts. Human trafficking is a problem in the county.
Half of the population live on around $1.25 a day, with coffee being the main export. The official language is English, although native languages were also spoken by some of the people they saw. They had interpreters on hand to use as needed.
The main means of transportation is motorcycles and buses, which both were very crowded. It was fascinating for them to see how many people could be piled onto a motorbike! With the country’s habit of driving like they do in England — on the left side of the road — Cindy and Sue were nervous when being driven around — especially as there was no speed limit!
While they were there to work with the people, they also were able to spend a bit of time on a mini safari and saw a huge number of zebras.
Sue and Cindy were amazed at how quiet and attentive the people were as they waited to be seen. Others from the team were witnessing to the folks as they waited. Although the medicines that they were able to hand out would help the folks for a while, having them hear the word of God and learn about Jesus would give them the hope of eternal life. Cindy urged everyone to take a missions trip if possible, as it will change your life.
Amanda is currently raising support and training for work on the mission field. She plans to return to Uganda as dean of women for the Word of Life school there in the summer of 2012. The Word of Life school in Uganda currently runs 10 weekly camps each year for children — six in the “winter” (two devoted to orphans) and four in the “summer.” Each week at camp costs $40 per child.
Tomi Henderson is the correspondent for Mars Hill, Blaine, Bridgewater and Westfield. She can be reached at 429-9126 or e-mail tomihen@yahoo.com.
