BAREFIELD hosts a 6km family walk and fun run this Friday to raise funds for a Clare group travelling to Uganda on a humanitarian mission.
New Quay native John Conroy will lead twelve Clare based volunteers to Uganda on the humanitarian mission in July. They will volunteer with Hospice Jinja which is a facility established to assist with palliative care, assist on educational training children with special needs and mainstream children in a primary school with an enrolment of 1200 childre.
They will also coach gaelic football and hurling at Africa’s newest GAA club, Nile Óg Cusacks which Conroy helped to form. Fundraising efforts will also be undertaken by the group to help with the construction of a new dormitory to cater for 100 deaf children at Walukuba West Primary School.
The volunteers making up this years team include Enda Collins, Michelle McNamara, Maire Lynch, Hillary Davis, Aine Quigney, Melissa Purcell, Joanne O Donnell, Ger Keane, Lucy Galvin, Josephine Ryan, Emma and Dominic Regan.
Ahead of their trip, Frank and Siobhain Landy from SweetnGreen Café have very kindly sponsored a fundraising 6km family walk and fun run taking place in Barefield village on Friday (April 4th) at 7.30 pm.
Since 2017 over 50 volunteers from Clare have raised in excess of €275,000 for charities based in Uganda. All flights, daily expenses and living costs are paid for by the volunteers themselves with all donations going direct to those most in need of support and assistance.
John explained, “Our big fundraising goal this year is to fundraise €25,000 euro to help construct the building of a new dormitory for 100 deaf children. Plans have been drawn up with the building due to begin in mid-June and to be complete by mid-September. The building will be built on the grounds of Walukuba West Primary school in Jinja and is also home of Nile Óg Cusacks G.A.A. Club”.
Within the Jinja district, there are over 100 deaf children who cannot access education however the construction of this new building will change this. “Special needs children in Uganda have many challenges, with a lack of educational resources and lack of teacher skills and also this often brings much shame to the family having a special needs child within the family, often times the family believe the child has evil spirits and might resort to witchcraft to take the evil from the child,” John outlined.
Volunteers have a busy summer ahead and will be dividing their time volunteering with Hospice Jinja, teaching deaf children ,supporting and guiding teachers in the classroom and coaching future stars in Nile Óg Cusacks GAA Club. The GAA club was formed last July, initially coaching Gaelic Games began with a group of 30 deaf children but now this has spread throughout the school of 1200 and indeed the plan is to extend the games to other schools in the district. Training takes place three afternoons per week with the first official game planned to take place next month.
He said, “We are in regular contact with the G.A.A. in Croke Park and receiving good support and guidance from Robert Frost from Clare GAA and plans are in place in the coming weeks to have the club as the first officially registered club in Africa. Last October, Gaelic Football and Hurling were registered as part of the Ugandan Official Sign Language dictionary and this is the first time Irish words were used as part of (USL).We brought the thirty kids to the Irish embassy where Ambassador Kevin Colgan launched the two new sign words in Uganda.
It’s an exciting time for the growth of Gaelic Games in Uganda, with a population of 50 million and half the population under 15, the potential for growing the games are huge. We are hosting ten sports students from D.C.U. this Summer who will be concentrating on coaching the children”.
Hospice Jinja provides a palliative care service to a population base of four million people in the Busoga province, the Hospice improves the quality of life of patients and their families facing the problems associated with life threatening illnesses. In most cases, it is a home-based hospice care. The team relieve their pains and other symptoms and help them live to their last day in peace , comfort and dignity
John is urging people to come out and get involved in the Barefield event and show their support for the work that is being undertaken in Uganda. He said they are very grateful for the phenomenal support received over the years.
