A few years after I had left Uganda, I got the chance to return to Midigo for a few days. The trip was much more emotional than I had ever imagined. I remember visiting our house in Arua and break down into sobs. There was so much of my families life tied up in a relatively short period of time in Uganda.
Well, back to Midigo… I was there with some of my good friends, one of them Rob Frear, was walking through town with me. We began to hear a very odd, but familiar sound.
It was a diesel engine, running in the distance. It was familiar to us, but completely out of place in Midigo. No vehicles ever went to Midigo. There are no sounds of civilization there only natural sounds. Yet, we were sure we were hearing a engine.
The two of us walked through the village towards the sound of the engine. By now you have probably put it together that it was the maze mill. At the time though, that maze mill was completely forgotten by me. We finally found the small shed were the sounds were coming from, and stopped about 50 feet from it, wondering what it was.
“Yi-EEEEE” came bursting from the trees near by. Three of the original women, who were with me that night of Malaria and the next day pounding Cassava and finally when we delivered the maze mill years before, came running to me.
It was really only when they showed me the mill that it all became clear. They not only had kept the mill going, but hired an operator to run it. Hired watchmen to guard it at night. Built a nice shed with a concrete floor. Even more astounding they told me how they had saved up enough money to purchase a second maze mill. They were planning to install the second one in a nearby town.
You can not believe the joy! This was the first real evidence that my family and I had made a difference, a lasting difference. It turned out that there was even more that ha happened while I was gone, I’ll have to get to that on another post.
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