Youthworx East Africa Campsite

Visiting the Campsite by crossing a small part of Lake Victoria - Pastor Florent from Burundi in the blue jacket	CAMPSITE UPDATE - Dec 09 East Africa is ‘enjoying’ a mild El Nino effect. I have chosen mild on the authority of the chief Met Officer in Entebbe who described it thus on TV yesterday. Believe me it does not feel mild when you wake up in the night with rain crashing into the tin roof, lightening filling the sky and ears overloaded by thunder.
Sadly El Nino has also visited the campsite. The heavy rain has softened and waterlogged the ground and this, along with strong gusts of wind brought a tree down through the meeting shelter roof This will be temporarily fixed this week and a long term solution can wait till the dry season when we can harvest papyrus again. The El Nino could continue through to February 2010.
The huts built in the campsite grounds with campfire in the foreground.	On a more positive note: Publicity for the campsite is ongoing and many groups are showing an interest in making bookings. Also YEA will be running its own camps over the long vacation just coming up. These camps are called “Going Deeper” and are for leadership development for youth.
The bases and guttering are in place ready for the water tanks. The 3rd hut is being plastered and we hope to finally get the decker beds into the huts before we get into the busy season. Please pray that our resources stretch to finish the urgent repair work and for a good number of bookings in the coming holiday season. We are also beginning to look at what outdoor pursuits/activities we can bring into the campsite over the next year.

Progress at times seemed slow as prices have risen, new ideas have been explored and workmen employed. However, the site has since 2008. The meeting area was completed, which created a shaded, waterproof area for eating and meeting. It would still benefit from a fine screed flooring.
	The brick built huts were roofed and equipped to sleep 6 in each. Then have been plastered. The next stage is to add sleeping platforms.
When there are too many visitors for the huts we will continue to use the large tents and develop more huts as we are able.
	As part of the camp there is an area for games. Some of the young people at Bognor Baptist Church raised money for sports equipment.
As the camp is by the lake swimming is possible and, now that CIST have kindly donated life jackets, it is an activity that can be enjoyed by all.

October 2007 - update and photos from Cormell and Margaret Truelove visit.

Despite the rain there has been a lot of progress on the dampsite - oops slip of the finger - campsite! Ian took David, Miranda and Derek Cormell and Margaret Truelove to visit the campsite on their way to Entebbe airport.
		Some local children befriended Margaret.
Miranda didn't really fancy using the toilets!!! Maybe when they're finished and have nice seats!!		some progress in Dec 09, but the seat is still a dream!!
		But would she be tempted by the showers?!
David and Margaret look as if they will......
The Meeting Hut and Kitchen Store areas have been built and will be thatched by local craftsmen.
This is the area where the 10-man tents will be permanently sited.
		There is a local bore hole which the camp can use to access clean water.
This field will be for sports. Hannah Lex - age 10 from Bognor Regis Baptist Church - did a sponsored bike ride to raise money to buy sports equipment for the site. She was given enough money to buy a large 'parachute' for games and to pay to level an area for football and to supply the goal posts. We hope to add more equipment in the future.
		It is hoped that the site will be ready to open its 'doors' or 'flaps' maybe, to groups from December. The Lex family hope to be visiting Kampala at that time and to attend an opening ceremony. As money becomes available we hope to build some log cabins for more secure accommodation. This is going to be a great resource for the youth of Uganda and beyond.

August 2007 - an update from Collin Muwonge:

The campsite is located in Entebbe at the shores of Lake Victoria and just like in England its been raining really heavily over the past two months. The water levels have gone up in the lake unlike in the past months when the water levels were really low..
The campsite ground is partly made up of rocky sandy ground which could also pose a slight challenge when building.

I have been going over to the campsite by road with our team of volunteers (mainly Sena, Nicholas, Dennis, Katumba, Prosper and Ray). By road its roughly 40-45km one way..The volunteers would then stay there for 2-3 days and I would return to Kampala to take care of other work. They would then return using a hired boat which roughly takes 30-40 minutes on the water.

As of today (09.08.07) we have cleared the campsite area of bushes. It was mainly a slightly bushy area but all the place has been cleared and made ready for building.This took us about 5-6 days.

After the clearing, the building areas have been identified and measured off, ie the places where we are going to build the cabins, meeting areas, kitchen and store.

The first structure that we've had to build is the toilet and bathrooms structures. This was hard work as the place is slightly rocky but as of today we've nearly finished building the toilet structure. The toilet is going to be pit latrine so this meant that we had to dig 20 feet under (for those of you who have seen a pit latrine) - this was a very hard job. We actually had to hire some of the local villagers to help with this..

Also the foundations for the bathrooms have been dug and built in and the next step after this is to build the actual bathrooms' structures which will take 2 days next week. This means that the campsite could be available for use without cabins next week. End of PHASE 1.

In the next phase - PHASE 2, we will be embarking on the actual building of the cabins and the meeting area. This will be a big job as we have to build 6 cabins and a large meeting area for 40-50 people.This should start in the next two weeks after we have decided on what materials to use to build. After these structures are in place the campsite will be ready for use, but not fully complete, hopefully by December this year.

We have been well received by the village locals and are actually trying to build relationships with them. The boys play football with them in the evenings after work. When the campsite starts to be fully operational we are talking about doing evangelism and outreach in the area as its mainly non Christian. The locals think they will benefit from having a church planted in the area so maybe that’s something we will look into. They will also greatly benefit from sports activities. In addition to that we will also carry out some youth work in that area, especially health communication on HIV/AIDS as its a big need there.


Budgets
We are strictly keeping accounts for the money that’s been sent over and this is something the volunteer team has had to do. Of the £829 sent over - we have roughly used £550-600. This has been largely used on buying and transporting building materials like sand, bricks, building implements, transport for the team and their upkeep while there, buying cement (this has greatly become very expensive over the last 2 months from paying 19000shs per bag to paying 25000shs per bag), paying wages and allowances etc.

The cost of everything has gone up as a result of new taxes being introduced by government, so the cost of building one cabin will also go up. We had originally planned to spend 500 pounds on each cabin but it may rise to roughly 800 pounds.

Challenges
-The increased taxes on everything have meant that the costs for the building of the campsite have gone up.
-The campsite being out of town means that it’s hard getting the team of volunteers to be there long enough to finish off work because they have other commitments in their families, church etc
-Also the transport and upkeep costs involved mean that we can’t afford to go there daily and yet it’s necessary and would help move the building work more forward.

Thanksgiving
-We thank God for providing us with such beautiful campsite land.
-We thank God for the work both the teams in England and around the world and the one in Uganda are doing. It’s tremendous.
-We thank God for how far He's brought us in building this campsite.
-We thank God for everyone who has chosen to partner with us in building this campsite in prayer, in giving financially etc We will never know how much this campsite will do in bringing glory to His name.

Thanks and God bless you all.

We will try to put some photos here as soon as possible.

Please keep praying for the rest of the money to come in and for all involved in the building work.