May 5, 2020
When the notification popped up on our screen, everyone in our small makeshift office stopped. Someone had donated $50.
To many in the Western world, fifty dollars might be the cost of a dinner out or a new pair of jeans. But here in Wakiso, amidst the fear and economic freeze of the pandemic lockdown, that notification wasn’t just money. It was fuel. It was validation. It was a stranger somewhere in the world saying, “I see you, and I trust you.”
We didn’t wait. In an emergency, speed is everything.
The Reality on the Ground
Right now, the price of basic goods is rising. When a mother in the slums has to choose between buying enough maize flour to feed her children tonight or buying a bar of soap to protect them from a virus she cannot see, she will choose the food. Every time.
Hygiene has become a luxury item. And that is a terrifying reality during a global pandemic.
Turning Currency into Action
Within hours of receiving that first $50, our team was at the local wholesale market. We didn’t buy fancy packaging. We negotiated for bulk, industrial-sized bars of blue laundry soap—the kind that lasts, cleans clothes, cleans bodies, and kills germs.
We managed to secure enough soap for 20 households.
Yesterday afternoon, we walked the paths of our community. We didn’t just drop off soap; we checked in on families. We visited households where we knew the primary earner had lost their daily wage due to the lockdown.
When we handed over the soap, the reaction wasn’t just polite gratitude; it was relief. It was one less impossible choice a mother had to make that week.
“In the hands of a mother protecting her family, a bar of soap is not merely a cleaning product. It is a shield. It is dignity. It is peace of mind in terrifying times.”
Radical Transparency
We want to be clear with you from Day One about how your money works. We are a lean organization. We don’t have high overheads. We are on the ground, living among the people we serve.
That $50 donation didn’t get eaten up by administration fees. It went straight to the wholesaler, then straight into the hands of 20 families. If the average family size here is five to six people, that one donation is currently helping protect over 100 individuals.
This is just the beginning. We have proved that we can turn generosity into immediate action. But there are hundreds more families on the path behind them who are still waiting.
If a single $50 gift can build a shield around 100 people, imagine the impact we can have together.
We have the team. We have the access. We just need the resources. Help us reach the next 20 families waiting for relief. Make a Direct Impact Donation Today
