Abukloi Starts Classes

Today was our first long day of teaching and interviewing teachers. We got up at 6:15 and left the school at 6:15PM.  We did interview 5 teachers and now have a slate of 4 teachers to offer contracts to, all university graduates.  We gave out the rules, of which one is to be on time to school or you cannot attend that day.  We will lock the gate at 8:00 which is when school begins.  This morning only seven showed up by 8AM. Hopefully we will have better luck tomorrow. On Sunday we visited a Leper Colony, oh! such poverty. No one should have to live like that. The leprosy has been arrested, but still they are shunned by the community. Ellen. president of  the Board of Directors for Abukloi came with $4000 dollars from her United Methodist Church. Father John from the Catholic compound bought $4000 worth of food for them and hired a truck to deliver it. We went with Father John in his vehicle, what a ride. It stormed the night before and so the roads were flooded.  However the people were so happy to see us and toured us around their village, even showed us their school which they made. They grow their own food and are sponsored by the Catholic Diocese of Rumbek. I will tell you the ride out was horrendous, but we did make it in one piece.  A little boy about 3 took my hand( his name was Ahaserous) and never let go until we started passing out packages of cookies to the 100 plus children living in the colony. Oh the children were excited, cookies are such a treat.  Fifty -five families live in the colony. As the country becomes more educated, hopefully these people will be accepted.  We felt bad eating our rice, liver, beans, and cabbage when we returned to the Catholic Compound. Poverty, like we have never seen before. They danced and praised the Lord for bringing such wonderful gifts from the white people of America.  May we always be as thankful and as faithful believers as we met Sunday. All for now, blessings from Rumbek  Bev and Marg.