Uganda Opens for International Adoptions

We found out while looking at some adoption websites yesterday that Uganda is now open for international adoptions! We spent the summer of 2006 in Uganda and spent part of each afternoon at Sanyu Babies Home, a home for abandoned infants (http://www.sanyubabies.com/). We loved our time spent there and were saddened to find out from our Ugandan friends that adoption outside of a blood relative is not something that is generally culturally accepted. There are 2.3 million orphans in Uganda...wow...that is a lot of kids in need of homes. Ideally adoption within the borders would increase, but any steps to get kids into families are good steps and I think that opening up international adoptions is a step in that direction!

The only agency we have seen so far to offer assistance in adopting a child from Uganda is Lifeline Adoption (www.lifelineadoption.org.). I'm sure there are others out there, but this is the only one we've come across online.

On another note about Uganda, you can link to information on the horrific situation of children in crisis in Northern Uganda and see ways to be involved in advocating for that part of the world through World Vision ( http://www.worldvision.org/content.nsf/learn/globalissues-uganda?open&lid=uganda&lpos=day_txt_uganda ).

Here are a couple of old photos from our time in Uganda! Wendy is so little!! She was 15-16 months old while we were there. The little baby's name is Hilda...she was one of the babies we often held and fed at Sanyu Babies Home.