That's when the 15-year-old Ugandan girl is scheduled to undergo surgery on the burn wounds that disfigured her face and mangled a hand.

Six years ago, rebels at war with the government attacked her village in northern Uganda and set her hut ablaze with her in it. The sad truth is that Jennifer never again will look as she did before that fire.

But the skill of Washington-area plastic surgeon Craig Dufresne and the fine facilities of INOVA Fairfax Hospital in Fairfax, Va., should ease Jennifer's pain and improve her facial functionality. It will change how she looks on the outside and, most likely, how she feels about herself on the inside.

I profiled Jennifer, who speaks limited English, in an Inquirer series in May about the 20-year war in northern Uganda that targets children. Readers and I acted on the desire to help her by arranging medical treatment in the United States.

She arrived in Philadelphia on Dec. 24, accompanied by another subject of that series, a Ugandan saint to children named Abitimo Rebecca Odongkara. The Odongkaras came to Philly after fleeing Idi Amin's Uganda in the 1970s.

Not long after Jennifer and Odongkara arrived here, Dufresne performed surgery during which he implanted balloon-like sacks under her scalp and in her chest.

In weekly, outpatient appointments over the last two months, Dufresne has injected saline solution into those sacks, known as tissue expanders, to stretch the skin and make new tissue.

Jennifer's head with its extra tissue now has the high and rounded look of Queen Nefertiti in her royal headwear.

Dufresne said he would use the new tissue to move down her hairline, which was burned off in the fire. He will pull up the extra skin on her chest, kind of like pulling a blanket up to your chin, to repair wounds on her face.

I have been amazed by Jennifer's strength. Injecting the fluid into the expanders has been painful. Jennifer winces - and copes.

At home in Odongkara's Germantown twin, Jennifer is tutored in general studies and in English.

She goes out with Odongkara, Odongkara's son Aaron and his wife, Ana, to visit friends and family. Jennifer listens to music from northern Uganda and pops up to dance along.

On the best evenings, she calls her mother in northern Uganda, and they laugh in joy until they fall into chatter.

Jennifer will bring home to Uganda a love for reality TV shows. She gets a big kick out of the lousy singers on American Idol.

"I like them because they make me laugh," she said.

Jennifer was wowed at the recent blizzard. She took quickly to throwing snowballs, but wisely backed away laughing when I tried to get her to make a snow angel.

She has shown a flair for painting pottery and enjoyed a cooking lesson she got from two chefs.

Maybe it's because of her experiences, maybe it's just Jennifer's nature, but she is realistic about what will come of next week's surgery.

"I hope that everything goes well," she said yesterday through an interpreter. "I think it will look good, not like it was before. But better. "

Carolyn Davis is a member of The Inquirer Editorial Board.

Contact Carolyn Davis at 215-854-4214 or cdavis@phillynews.com.

ONLINE EXTRA

For stories and photos chronicling Jennifer Anyayo's experiences in the United States, visit http://go.philly.com/jennifer