Making a difference in war on want

With the country wallowing in a depressive succession of job losses and wage cuts while half the county is submerged under a deluge of smelly water, it seems there was never a better time to leave.

And if by leaving it means you are enriching the lives of others as well as your own, then volunteering abroad might just be an option to inject a whole lot of enthusiasm into your world.

This is exactly what husband and wife team Larry Joyce and Jo Price did when they spent a year as volunteers in Uganda with the UK charity Voluntary Services Overseas (VSO). Larry, an accountant, and Jo, a nurse with the Bon Secours Hospital, have just returned to their home in Galway after working in what the UN have listed as one of the world’s 25 poorest countries.

Larry worked with a local charity serving the HIV and AIDS community called Health Rights Action Group, where he taught management and organisational skills and was involved in fundraising.

Jo worked in the Kibuli Muslim Hospital in the capital Kampala as a nurse tutor and supervisor. Here, she taught student nurses and qualified staff basic hygiene practices, how to care for wounds and the best way to treat burns. She also instructed them in how to react in life or death situations.

“Conditions were very, very poor. There were lots of burns injuries, particularly in children. People here cook on open fires everywhere, only one in ten people in Kampala have electricity so people are burning candles and using kerosene lamps so children often get injured,” the Dublin native explained. VSO organised the work and the accommodation in an apartment, which Jo likens to the old Ballymun flats – except here there was often no electricity or running water. They were also the only whites in the area.

For Larry, working in a third world country was a whole new experience, but with three grown-up daughters he was at a stage in his life that he wanted to do something new and give something back. Jo, on the other hand, was a volunteering veteran, having spent a year in Sudan in 1984 with Concern, and travelled three times with the Galway charity Irish Friends of Albania, which sends surgical teams to mainly treat children with burns.

The couple raised €4,000 for charity before going. Once there, they also became involved with two local orphanages. One was the Nsambya Babies Home in Kampala, which cares for orphaned, abandoned and displaced children from birth to six years old. The second was Action to Support Orphans and Disadvantaged (ASOD), which helps up to 70 orphans, aged 13 to 18, from the slum areas by providing shelter, hygiene and medical assistance, access to education, recreational activity and guidance counselling.

Now they are home, they plan to continue to support these two charities and will be holding various events to raise the much needed funds to keep the orphanages open. The first was a table quiz organised for last night.

The couple found the experience overwhelmingly positive.

“I know there’s a lot of aid going astray, but when you get there the level of poverty is huge. In Uganda I was able to make a real difference, we felt so useful, which we don’t always feel in our normal lives,” Jo reflects.

“Ugandan people are wonderful, they have a real joy for life. It was such a fantastic experience. Also the weather – it was 26 degrees every day and hardly any rain. Larry is actively looking for a job in the development aid sector. He felt to be there hands on, you can actually help to change people’s lives.”

They plan to repeat the experience, this time in a different country where their skills will be no less valuable.They have have nothing but the height of respect for the VSO, which carries out a very thourough vetting procedure. The whole process of getting accepted onto the programme can take a year. Training is provided, where volunteers are presented with scenarios they may encounter to gauge their reaction.

Jo recalls that when she volunteered with Concern there was very little training, but then she was young and more up for the hardships of life.

One of the people working with them was a journalist from Holland, whose main task was to raise awareness of corruption and how to best deal with it.

“You do see some things that are really terrible, particularly in the medical field. Some people couldn’t cope with it. But I think it’s something everybody should do. It’s great for the older person, they have experience of life and probably get better respect out there. I found this experience a lot better now than when I was younger.”

For further information about fundraising and the VSO experience contact Larry on 0872564129 or Jo on 0877716651.