This is Jjaja (pronounced judge-ah meaning grandmother)Faith. Jajja Norah came for a visit with us and as she walked into the house, she said here is my husband (although everyone laughed at her silliness, the case workers told me of their concern about Norah's mental health). Faith is raising her 3 grandsons. Her daughter died of AIDS. The father of the children works in Kampala but cost of rent, food, leaves little left to send for the children. Faith tends a garden but cannot grow enough to sell any at the market. She weaves baskets (as seen in the picture) to also sell at the market.
This is Jjaja Norah who lives with her daughter. We were taken into her house - 20’ ceiling, small window 10’ up, smelled of wet clay, dark and damp. Little Norah is very frail…..she had had a transfusion about a month ago in the hospital. She is 4’6”, maybe 80 lbs. She was all dressed up sitting on her mattress on the floor. Developing bed sores. The issue is that even though she lives with her daughter, her daughter forgets about her. Edith and Sarah (the case workers) helped Norah stand and using her walking stick, we went outside. Part of Ugandan culture is that instead of saying yes, they will hum and raise their eye brows. Imagine, listening to 5 women inside this high ceilinged home humming all together using their own pitches in agreement. The sound was pure Africa amd so hauntingly beautiful. Jajja Norah has buried all her children but one.
Jjaja Eloise lives with her daughter and 2 grandsons. Eloise and Faith are sisters. Norah is their sister-in-law. ROTOM has given her a goat pictured here. Eloise is sponsored by a couple from Canada – Bill and Maureen. She asked me to say hello to them. Really happy to see us. Eloise’s daughter provided a beautiful mat for us to sit on a bench while they sat on a gunny sack on the ground. When Jajja Eloise's young grandson came home from school he greeted us by kneeling down as a show of respect. Also as the daughter handed one of the case workers a cup so that she could have a drink of water, she put herself in a lower position to give the cup to her. ROTOM serves the elderly that have no family due to AIDS or live with family who cannot care for them. They offer health care, food drop off, fellow-shipping once a week which includes a healthy meal, making baskets that they can sell at the market. ROTOM has given some of the senior a goat to tend….in order to give purpose to their lives. Each week a care worker will take 3 seniors to the doctor. The seniors in the ROTOM program each receive a card so that if they need to, they can go to the medical clinic and using the card, get the treatment and medicines they need and ROTOM pays the bill once a month.
This is an amazing ministry that spreads the Hope of the Gospel through meeting the needs of these isolated seniors. If you would like to sponsor a senior or make a donation to ROTOM - http://www.rotom-uganda.org/
Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. James 1:27
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