It feels impossible to sum the place or my experiences up but I'll give it a shot. 

When I first stumbled across Soft Power Health's website, I believed I understood the gravity and challenges of what Dr. Jessie was doing in Africa. The facts about Malaria were simply shocking and I was personally affected by what I read, both because of the subject of the facts and also by the action of this one person to reverse them. I emailed Dr. Jessie immediately and offered my help and by September of last year I left for Uganda.

  
I volunteered for little more than three months with Soft Power Health. It was three months truly immersed in Africa and the feeling that gave me is simply indescribable. I prepared the best I could for my first trip to Africa. I poured over history books and newspaper articles but what I couldn't prepare for was the unequalled hospitality I encountered. To come from New York City where you are virtually invisible to a place like Uganda where I was the recipient of so much unabashed kindness was a little jostling at first. Children rushed from their homes to offer me pieces of fruit or just smile massively and wave excitedly as I passed. They love to laugh. The adults would notice me coming to their homes and immediately bring a chair and place it in the shade without even knowing why I came.

I smile a little now at my reaction on one of those occasions when I first arrived. I was following up on Soft Power mosquito nets in a village called Mpungwe when we came across a group of young schoolchildren on the road. They arrayed themselves in a line, twenty or so, just to say " hello" and ask me how my day was. I accepted each of their hands and tried to conceal how strangely/wonderfully embarrassed I was and how deeply it moved me. They didn't single me out; Ugandans seem to treat everyone this way.

   
I also witnessed the difficulties of Jessie's project; there seem to be so many some days. I understood why she does it though, when visiting homes in the villages. To hear mothers and fathers say there has been no malaria for weeks is music to the ears and fills you with hope. There is so much to miss. The beauty of the landscape, the sounds of the Nile River while you lie in bed, the genuine warmth of the people, anything African.

 
I am grateful to Dr. Jessie for allowing me the opportunity to see the real Africa. I am forever changed for it. While I was in Uganda I read a book a friend gave me called "Mountains Beyond Mountains." There was a quote in it that sort of stuck with me and I think dares to try to sum the whole thing up:

"Never underestimate the ability of a small group of committed individuals to change the world. Indeed they are the only ones who ever have."

I suppose now in my own personally relative way, feel like a member of that small and wonderful group. - Jeff Trunell