Our Community: Meet the kids

Elias Stern

Click to see larger photo Elias and his brother Eden on the way to Uganda.

In July of 2006 I traveled to Uganda to visit our sister school. This was the culmination of my becoming a bar mitzvah last January. Realizing the tremendous needs facing our sister school and all that I have been blessed with, I donated all of the money that I received for my bar mitzvah to Positive Planet. I had the privilege of bringing nearly $11,000 to aid our sister school as well as two other schools whose situation was even worse.

During our trip we had many adventures, among them white water rafting on the Nile, gorilla and chimpanzee trekking, and many safaris. However, the most fulfilling and rewarding experience was to visit the children of the recipient schools: Saint Andrew Matale Hill Primary School, Kirumba, and Lwamaya Primary Schools. The time spent at each school turned out to be among the most profound experiences of my life. It opened my eyes to poverty that I had heard about but never actually seen. What I did not expect was that in the midst of all this poverty I found happiness, generosity and pride. I also did not expect that they gave me something greater than what I had given them ­ the realization that happiness is not at all material, that generosity does not depend on your ability but on your desire, that pride in oneself is inextricably bound with community.

As a community, we have been able to improve the lives of the 2,100 children that I met. There is still much more that we can do to make this world a better place for everyone. My hope is that we continue to do just that.