APRIL NEWSLETTER 2020

Hello Everyone!

Greetings from Miryante Orphanage. We really love you all and we appreciate all the support that you are rendering to us despite COVID-19. All the children are safe, healthy, and they are praying for everyone all over the world. On the 12^th of April 2020, we celebrated Easter day which was really fun, although we weren’t able to celebrate mass as usual. The Easter celebrations came along with a lot of food such as plantains, rice, meat, pork, fish, peanut sauce and soda. After lunch the children watched movies such as The Passion of the Christ.

During this long break from school, Uditah Komuhangi, one of the students that graduated from Miryante Vocational School, used this time to teach the other children how to make African baskets and also how to make different designs of girls’ dresses. Below are the photos:

The gardens are doing very well this season. The temperatures are a bit high, but with the help of our children, we are able to mulch all the vegetable gardens and use the drip irrigation system. Our harvests are very good. We are also looking at extending our vegetable gardens to five acers since they are nutritious and provide great food for the kids. Below are some pictures of our gardens and the harvests.

We have also managed to donate vegetables weekly to families who are in need of food due to the COVID-19 lockdown in the community.

The tailoring class with the help of their instructors are making face masks for all the children to use before school opens.

On the farm, our cows are doing well. We have routine medical checkups for all of the animals which is done every two weeks, and the animals are sprayed for flies and ticks every Saturday:

Thanks very much to everyone who is endeavoring to help us to meet our basic needs. We would be completely nothing and nowhere without you, especially during COVID-19 season. May God Bless All.

Kate Namanda

We are devastated to share that Kate Namanda passed away on April 25^th, 2020 at the age of 13 after a long battle with Leukemia.

Kate was born on June 5^th,  2006. Her mother passed away and her father left the family in 2014.  Kate came to Miryante on the 30^th of November 2018. Kate came to Miryante via a referral from the doctors at a hospital in Fort Portal where she had been left. Her family had been unable to care for her. When Kate came to Miryante her health was very poor, but she soon improved with medical care and love from the other children and staff.

It was amazing to see Kate’s condition improve with time and we were so happy to have her with us.

By April 2019, she  was able to start home schooling from Miryante and she was very happy when she got a sponsor. She enjoyed making drawings for her sponsor. Schooling gave her hope and she had the dream of becoming a fashion designer in the future.

She also demonstrated an unshakeable Christian faith while at Miryante.  We as staff were so proud of her development of friendships with the other children. Besides that, Kate had a passion for drawing and coloring pictures, reading stories books for other children, and cooking.

Unfortunately, because of the cancer, Kate had to spend a lot of time in the hospital during her time at Miryante. We want to thank everyone who has been there for Kate, especially her sponsor. It is because of this sponsorship that we were able to cover her hospital bills every time she had to be admitted. We also thank the caregivers that stayed with her while she was admitted in the hospital on and off for almost the entire year. We also thank her fellow children that accepted her and welcomed her in Miryante community.

While in the hospital, Kate drew photos to send to her sponsor when she bed-ridden:

Kate was survived by her brother, Joseph, who is living with their grandmother in the village.

 Kate died on April 25^th  2020 at 8:30 pm.  On the morning of 26^th/ April/ 2020 she was buried at her grandmother’s home in the village. The village where Kate was buried is called Mukarama in Kyegegwa district.  Below are pictures of the burial.

We are going to miss Kate terribly and the joy and happiness she shared with all of those around her. MAY HER SOUL REST IN PEACE.

Hello Everyone!

Greetings from Miryante Orphanage and School. We really love you all and we do appreciate all that you are providing to us. The children are safe and healthy. Due to the outbreak of the Corona virus disease 2019 (COVID -19) the president of Uganda ordered closure of schools on 20^thMarch 2020 across the country in attempt to prevent the spread of the virus. We managed to pick our children from boarding school at King Solomon secondary school, St. Thomas primary, St. Peter’s technical and St. Augustine Butiiti Teaching College. We brought them back to the orphanage and we also sent students from outside who were attending Miryante technical school back to their homes.

The social department also came up with the Easter holiday programs to help us manage the children and to make them busy around the orphanage during this time until the situation normalizes for them to go back to school. This program runs from Monday up to Sunday and these activities include prayers from their dormitories since the government has told us to avoid social gatherings, school book revisions, cow grazing, rabbits and goat rearing, planting vegetables, slashing the compound, digging in the gardens, and football every evening. This has helped our children learn more skills and helped us as management and caregivers to manage them and keep them occupied throughout the holiday. Regarding health, all our children are okay and we sensitized them about the coronavirus so that they are aware on how to prevent the spread of the virus. We are also in touch with children under the guardianship program to know if all is well with them. Since public transportation has been banned in Uganda, we have been limited on our movements, however the government has allowed us to check on the children in the guardianship program, especially those on medications. We have been given permission from the government to use a car to travel to their homes. We supplied 50kgs of maize flour to each household during the quarantine period.

Below are the photos of the children at Miryante occupied by different activities and food given to guardianship program  :

Under the agriculture department, our crops are yielding and we have plenty of vegetables, plaintains , cassava , potatoes, pumpkins  and greens as show below:

Under the farm our animals are doing great

We have managed to balance the diet of our children with the milk and different foods.

Thanks everyone for the support especially during such times when the world is at war with the Coronavirus.

Hello Everyone!

Greetings from Miryante Children’s Home and school. We really love you all and we do appreciate all the love and support. All the children are very well and prepared for the new term. They are eager to join classes for the new school year. Below are the updates of pictures of our children getting ready for the new term.

Schools opened on 27^th of January 2020. All of our children are in back in their respective schools including the children who just joined the first year of secondary school.

We congratulate Ninsiima Christine upon becoming the president of Miryante Girls Club and Nyangoma Jacinta for becoming the choir leader of Miryante. They both joined St. Peter’s Technical School last year to acquire a national certificate in fashion and design. They have been really exemplary students and inspired other children to work hard at their technical education.

We have also included remedial classes in our everyday activities for the little children in grades 1-3 that come back from school by 1:00 pm. We noticed that some are very slow in class and they needed extra classes to catch up. This is now compulsory for them.

The photos below show children playing after remedial lessons. 

On 28^th February 2020, we received a team from Crutches for Africa. This is an organization based in the USA. The team donated a number of mobility devises to people with disabilities in Kyegegwa District. These mobility devices were distributed to the community at Miryante.

The team came along with Returned Peace Corp Volunteer named Sue. She once served in Namibia, Zambia and Kenya. When we gave her our background and experience with Peace Corps, she requested to spend one night at Miryante and meet the children. This was fun for her to be entertained by the children. The following morning before she left, she taught the nursery class and the interested pupils.

Animals and Gardens

 Under the agriculture department, we managed to plant various vegetables this season and some are ready to be harvested like kale, pumpkin, eggplants, avocado etc. Our children are having plenty of vegetables, which is nutritious for their bodies. The agriculture department has really played a very big role in managing all these gardens and all the animals.

Harvests of avocado and pumpkins

0n 29^th February, we were finally connected to the grid and received electricity for our home and school. This is the greatest achievement so far this year by the government of Uganda. We had waited for this power for over 6 years and we had even lost hope of getting it at one point. The whole site is now full of life.

Every two weeks we visit the children under the guardianship program to see if they are attending school and also to check on their well-being at both school and home. We have new children that have joined the program to make a total of 28 children. We thought it could be wise if we visited all the children twice a month. Below are some of the pictures of our children in their schools some with their new friends like Kato and Insingoma.

Technical School

The enrollment this year is promising. We have 104 students in the school including those doing crafts this year. In addition, the performance from last year was good. In the Uganda Business Technical Examination, we had one distinction and nine credits. In Directorate of industrial training, we had 22 students that sat for the exams and we are still waiting for the results.

Thanks very much to everyone that endeavors to see us grow daily.

Miryante Management

Hello Everyone!

Greetings from Miryante Children’s Home and school. We really love you all and we do appreciate all the love and support. All the children are very well and prepared for the new term. They are eager to join classes for the new school year. Below are the updates of pictures of our children getting ready for the new term.

Schools opened on 27^th of January 2020. All of our children are in back in their respective schools including the children who just joined the first year of secondary school.

On January 22nd, 21 of our children were confirmed by Bishop Robert Muhiirwa Akiiki at Migongwe Catholic Church.

Guardianship Program:  

Uganda government is pushing to transition orphans from institutions to foster care. At the beginning of this year, we placed more children under the guardianship program, bringing the total number of children to 27.  Before the children joined their guardians, we made a baseline survey to make sure the children will be safe in the homes and we interacted with guardians in a meeting. This program has been welcomed since it was a policy from the ministry. In this program where we monitor the children’s progress, provide counseling and guidance, and give them scholastic materials, bedding, clothes, school fees, and food. We also conduct educative programs with the families such as agriculture and animal husbandry as shown below in the photo:

Donations:

Manapack rice!

We received a donation of 66 boxes of Manapack rice from Feed My Starving children from the USA. This is one type of foods that our children were introduced to four years a good and they enjoy it so much. We always receive the same packs after every quota.

The food has all the body building nutrients that help our children grow healthy.

We were also grateful for another donation of 160 sport shorts received from Manoj and Ritu and Mrs. Laura and the Patel family that has really blessed us the children.

 Under the Farm:

Our cows are doing very well and so far with 10 baby calves being welcomed to the world. This has multiplied on the liters of milk that we receive everyday for the kids.

Under the agriculture department. We have planted various vegetables like pumpkins eggplants, kale, spinach, carrots and passion fruits. So far we have planted 3 acres as shown below.

Thanks very much for having us at heart!

Miryante Management

DECEMBER NEWSLETTER 2019

Hello everyone!

Greetings from Miryante Children’s Home. We such a wonderful festive season with a lot of eats and drinks. Our Christmas celebrations started as early as the 20^th of December. It was also the first of its kind to have local people support our children here. Vision Fund Uganda, a local micro finance group affiliated to World Vision, visited us with a number of gifts for the children and the staff. These included: loaves of bread, sugar, salt, soap, cooking oil, rice, toilet paper, T-shirts for the staff, and also a cake that we all shared with everyone.

Christmas did not stop with the World Vision’s donations. The excitement increased when all the children were able to make selections with the help of the caregivers to pick out underwear, belts, shoes and clothes for Christmas. Thanks to all our donors that helped us to make it colorful.

On the eve of Christmas. Our children helped to peel matooke and Irish potatoes.

The day started with breakfast for all the children before going to church.

The children couldn’t wait to go to church with their new clothes as shown in the photos below:

  The children help to decorate the church as shown above.

We had a variety of food for our Christmas meal which gave the children a chance to choose want they want. We had rice, plantains, cassava, potatoes, groundnuts sauce, fish, beef, pork, spaghetti and sodas as shown in the photos below:

Trip to the Zoo

The Trip to Entebbe Zoo was so much fun! The children said it was the best trip ever. We started our journey at 3am in the morning and one of our children, Sunday Clovice, led us in prayer to bless our journey. The children were able to see different animals that was very exciting. They especially liked the baboons because they had similar names to theirs.   The children later had their lunch and later we drove to Entebbe airport and the kids were able to see some airplanes though they remained in the bus as they observed them take off. We later started our journey back a bit early. We had our last stop over in Mubende along the high way for: roasted meat, cassava, bananas, and chicken. As shown Below:

Photos showing children looking the eldest tree at the zoo

The carnival was also fun. The little children had lunch before they started their journey and at the carnival they had a dancing competition and eating competition as seen below:

Photos for children with their faces painted:

During this long holiday, we came up with a holiday programs where children had sports and games after their daily work.

Thanks to everyone for the wonderful support! We wish you all a happy 2020!

Hello everyone!

Greetings from Miryante home and school. We love you all; we do appreciate all the love and kindness you do share with us by providing to us all the basics that have enabled us to keeping running for all this period. All of our children went on their holidays from school on 29^th of November 2019. The majority of our children performed well on their exams and were promoted to other classes. Some will be joining the technical next year. Below are photos showing students of King Solomon boarding school offloading their luggage as they came back from school.

We also take to the opportunity to thank Laura and the husband Ambrish who always come around almost every weekend to spend time with the children. While here, they do advise us on the technical things to be done to help the institutions run and also sharing love with the children.

We have managed to come up with holiday programs to keep the children busy around the home. These programs run from Monday up to Sunday and these activities include; fellowship every Thursday, revision, watching movies, cow grazing, rabbit and goat rearing, planting crops, slashing the compound, digging , tailoring and knitting, football every evening and other games. This has helped our children learn more skills and it has helped them to keep busy since they are occupied throughout the holiday.

We received 60boxes of manapack rice the food that all the children enjoy most. This food is a miracle working food with all the nutrition boosters in it.  

Education:

We have just finished the school year and all our children worked hard to be promoted to other classes. Most of our children in primary school and secondary school passed highly in grade I and some grade II.  In addition, at the technical school, our children are performing very well especially in practical work and they have learnt many skills in different courses. We held an academic meeting at the orphanage, announced the children with the best performance, and encouraged others to add more efforts in their studies where necessary.

Since our vocational school is the only one registered with a centre number for national exams, we hosted students from Wekomiire vocational school to take exams at our school.

Our technical school closed on 23^rd of November. We did a stock take before all the departments handed over their respective departments to go for holidays. Below are photos showing machines and other tools before they were stored.

Donation of sewing machines:

 We received a donation of seven electrical sewing machines from Uganda Association of Private Technical Institutions. These machines will be put into use next year.

Due to the hailstorm that destroyed almost all our crops and vegetable in October, we wrote to the Office of Disaster at the district that later received a donation of rice. As Miryante Home we were given 300kgs

On 21/11/2019, we held an internal health check program where our nurse first sensitized our children on hygiene measures, nutrition awareness, sanitation and later screened our children for malnutrition.  Below are photos of children being measured using MAC (Measurement of Arm Circumferance).

Under agriculture, we have replanted our vegetable garden that was washed away by a heavy hailstorm in October. We have planted a number of vegetables like kale, green paper, carrots, pumpkins, dodo, eggplants and tomatoes. Below are photos showing the garden

Thanks very much to our dear donors for the wonderful contributions towards Miryante Orphans Home and school. By your support, we exist.

Hello Everyone!

Greetings from Miryante Home and School. We really love you all and we pray for you every day to have life. This month has been filled up with visitations to our 35 children that are attending different boarding school. This started on October 6^th and went up to the 27^th of October. We visited our children in King Solomon Kyatega, Kiganda High School, St. Thomas, and St. Peters’ technical school.  The children’s performance was promising, especially for the senior four candidates. They also looked happy and healthy; we gave them scholastic materials like pens, books, pencils etc and other things like fruits and juice as shown in the pictures below:

We also received different donations from the Patel community which has been a blessing to our orphanage. From Prime Impex and Sawan Zakharia, we received dozens of books, pens, and reams of paper. From the Patel Family we received Diwali biscuits, and from Manoj and Ritu we received colorful t-shirts. The children and the staff feel blessed to have such nice people around them.

Gardens and the animals:

We received a very heavy hailstorm that washed away almost all our gardens including the banana plantation, cassava, beans, maize, all the vegetable gardens. The office also sustained some water damage, including to the electronics such as phones and computer that are kept there for charging. We also lost three of our calves. Above all, we thank God that no lives and structures were lost.

Thanks for your prayers and support, Management.

SEPTEMBER NEWSLETTER 2019

Hello Everyone!

Greetings from Miryante home and school. We really love you all and we are grateful for the support that you render us.

Schools opened on the 16^th of September 2019, and all our children are back to school in their respective schools (King Solomon Secondary School, Kiganda High School, St. Thomas, Miryante nursery school, Miryante vocational school).

Photos below show children posing with beautiful smiles after receiving their scholastic materials and ready to go to school! 

Photos showing some of the school requirements that were given to the children:

Photos showing children under the guardianship program receiving scholastic material for school:

Guidance and Counseling

Report from our counselor indicates that our children’s’ behavior has greatly improved since when they first joined boarding school. According to her, she no longer handles cases concerning bad behaviors.

Her report also indicated that the children are able to interact/seek help from the counselor through sharing the problems they face in their daily lives and finding immediate solutions to their problems.

Children’s hygiene has greatly improved as well as daily supervision of every dormitory.

There has been also a great improvement in the children’s academics.

On the 14^th of September we had a farewell party for our horse trainer Mr. Aman Kumar and his wife Meghan who left the country. In their speech, they expressed how Miryante has been the best and hospitable home for them. Other speeches followed and we later had a meal that was prepared by Aman and the wife.

We also take this opportunity to thank the Dresbach family that donated a number of books and sweets to our children. This excites our children the more, they feel they are loved since there are people who think about them. 

Under the agriculture department, we have planted various crops like 1 acre of kale, beans, more sweet potatoes, more banana stems, chia seeds, pumpkins etc. Below are some of the photo showing  nursery beds with different types of vegetables to be transferred later to main garden:  

A photo showing a garden of kale near the kitchen:

Photos showing paws, maize, beans and pumpkins plants:

Our banana garden is so productive. We are able to harvest at least 4 times in a month:

Thanks very much to everyone that is contributing towards our success! 

Hello Everyone!

Greetings from Miryante Home and School. We really love you all and we do appreciate all that you’re providing to us. Our children went on school holiday on  the 16^th of August 2019, and their performance was really promising compared to first term’s performance. We managed to come up with holiday programs to keep the children busy around the home. These programs run from Monday up to Sunday and these activities include prayers, revision, watching videos, cow grazing, rabbit and goat rearing, planting crops, slashing the compound, digging, and soccer matches every evening. This has helped our children learn more skills and has also helped us as management and caregivers to handle them since they are occupied throughout the holiday.

Education:

The performance of our children is really promising. Most of our children in primary school and secondary school passed highly in grade I and some in grade II.  Also under our technical school, our children are performing very well, especially in practical work. They have learnt a lot of skills in different courses. We held an academic meeting at the orphanage and announced the children with the best performance and encouraged others to give more efforts to their studies since they are left with one term to be promoted to other classes.

 On the 15^thof August we celebrated 10 years of existence as Miryante Orphans Home. This was sponsored by Father David. Stanbic Bank also made for us a cake and gave us 240 plastic bottles of soda. This was also their love month as a bank , and when we wrote to them they welcomed the idea of sharing love with us since it was their love month. We are really thankful   for the great love you show to us as Miryante and the community at large. We had a great meal of matooke, rice, meat, groundnuts, fish, greens etc. Later we cut the cake and they also enjoyed the music. Thank you Father David and Stanbic Bank for making our children smile. Below are the photos:

We are also happy to inform you that Father Erineo was able to trace the bag of donated clothes from Ohio and the airlines found it. Thanks very much Mama Karla and Papa Rich for the clothes. The children really loved the beautiful colors. Below are the pictures of the bag and the children on the clothes.

In the same month, we attended training on how to use menstrual caps. This training was conducted by our Peace Corps Volunteer, Alex Rausch before she left. These were donated to us by one of Laura’s friend called Lauben.

CHILDREN’S HEALTH!

About children’s health, this month we have had over 25 children suffer from Measles and 2 suffering from tuberculosis. This has been very expensive on our side. Several times the kids have been admitted to the hospital. Kindly keep praying for us. We also managed to get a medical technician who is partly working with us since it’s a government requirement for all the children’s homes in the country. Because of the medical personal that we have hired, this has helped us to limit on the number of kids that needed to be admitted to Kyegegwa and Mubende referral hospital. They are now being treated from here at out sickbay. He has also improved on the order in the sick bay as you can see from the pics below with the charts on the wall, the new beds, and the mosquito nets on the beds. The government also has a plan of immunizing all the children in the country by the 19^th of Sept 2019.

We have also expended on our offices. We have got a new block for the counseling department since they needed privacy, and the Social workers department since it was also a recommendation by the Ministry. Therefore, we had to improvise one of the boy’s dormitory that had very few children. We combined them with the other children. We now have six Dormitories 3 for boys and 3 for girls.  

Our volunteer Alex Rausch left on the 12^th of August after 3 years of service. In her speech, she expressed how it’s very hard to leave people that you have lived together with as a family. After her speech, she awarded us a certificate from peace corps. Other speeches followed, and we later had a meal and a dance till late.

Thanks to our donors for making this all happen!