This is a farewell... things are wrapping up, and with tears in my eyes I am starting to say good-bye. Tonight we have a farewell dinner with our family, tomorrow we move out, and Thursday morning we leave at 5 am for Rwanda. It has been an incredible semester, and I thank God for the opportunity that I have had to be here and get to know so many incredible people. Every time I say good-bye people ask when I am coming back to Uganda. Most of the time I just stay silent. I want to come back, that much is for sure, but if it will ever happen is definitely not a for-sure thing. God knows best, I smile and sometimes say. Leaving is always bittersweet, though, and I am excited to see all of you. I won't have Internet after we leave for Rwanda, but I'll be home May 7. I see you all then, with pictures and stories galore :)
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Of warthogs and elephants and Easter bunnies
Last week we had a last IMME hurrah… complete with pizza, ice cream, and Princess Bride. I laugh every time I watch that movie, but I have never laughed harder than when someone used the slam “you warthog faced buffoon.” Definitely funnier when three days earlier you saw too many warthogs to count and had them come and stiff your tent while you sleep at night. That was our experience at Queen Elizabeth.
The weekend before, after a crazy long drive down to the park in southwestern Uganda, we got to see not only warthogs but elephants, hippos, water buffalo, cobs (antelope-like animals), a lion, and even a leopard on our safari. The leopard was sweet, the elephants (especially the baby ones!) were amazing, but my favorite part was the hippos… not all of them, but mainly just one—a little baby hippo that was born just five days early. Five days old! It was sooo cute… well, as cute as a hippo can be.
For the whole drive down there, and for the majority of the safari, the same group of us was piled in a jeep with our awesome driver Ronald. We called ourselves “Team Ronald” and decided we had the best driver in Uganda… so we did awesome things for him like writing him a song and saying “Yay Ronald” and screaming and cheering every time he conquered the rocky roads that look completely un-passable. We couldn’t really tell if he truly liked it, or if we were the most obnoxious Americans he had ever met, but he always smiled, so big that you could see it in his eyes through the rearview mirror.
The craziest part of the weekend was not necessarily the safari itself, but our experience camping. In Africa. With all of those crazy animals that we had just seen. I was chilling outside staring at the moon as I read my Bible, when I heard some of the craziest noises. Just as I was reading Psalm 50:10, “For every wild animal of the forest is mine, the cattle on a thousand hills I know all the birds of the air, and all that moves in the field is mine,” I heard a large cat noise. No joke. It was killing something, because I also heard the sound of an animal dying. CRAZY! At that moment Michelle and Katie came running up from behind me, scaring the crap out of me. I thought I was going to be eaten. And that was just the beginning of our night. After all of that, I decided that it I felt a little (not much) safer inside the tent, so we all hide in our sleeping bags from the noises outside. Shortly after, they continued. The warthogs came, sniffing around our tent, sticking their noses right up against the fabric, and making noises as ugly as their faces. A little while later, an elephant. No joke. Elephants are cool, but not when you think they might stampede through your campsite. Its not over though… a while later in the night came a hippo, plodding up from the lakeside and walked right by our tent. It is good that every wild animal of the forest is God’s I am thankful that all that moves in the field is his…
I have tons of pictures, but don’t feel like spending my whole day fighting with the Internet… I’ll be home in three weeks. You can see them then.
This past weekend we had an Easter celebration with our family. Our sister came over, with our three “nieces,” who are super cute, along with William and Eva joining us from Kampala. After the Easter service Sunday morning we had a giant feast with TONS of food. I played with Patricia, Tracy, and Belinda (our nieces) with a little tub of yellow playdough that I brought with me from home. Patricia, the oldest (about 12), loved running her fingers through my hair, braiding it and styling it until she said I was “fit for the cover of a magazine.” They were so cute. It was weird to be away from family at Easter, but I was still surrounded by my new family here. Even more, it was great to be away from the consumerism of America, where Easter wasn’t just about the Easter bunny. It was great for Easter to be completely about resurrection and new life, and about celebrating the life that we have been given with friends and family.
Happy Easter!
The weekend before, after a crazy long drive down to the park in southwestern Uganda, we got to see not only warthogs but elephants, hippos, water buffalo, cobs (antelope-like animals), a lion, and even a leopard on our safari. The leopard was sweet, the elephants (especially the baby ones!) were amazing, but my favorite part was the hippos… not all of them, but mainly just one—a little baby hippo that was born just five days early. Five days old! It was sooo cute… well, as cute as a hippo can be.
For the whole drive down there, and for the majority of the safari, the same group of us was piled in a jeep with our awesome driver Ronald. We called ourselves “Team Ronald” and decided we had the best driver in Uganda… so we did awesome things for him like writing him a song and saying “Yay Ronald” and screaming and cheering every time he conquered the rocky roads that look completely un-passable. We couldn’t really tell if he truly liked it, or if we were the most obnoxious Americans he had ever met, but he always smiled, so big that you could see it in his eyes through the rearview mirror.
The craziest part of the weekend was not necessarily the safari itself, but our experience camping. In Africa. With all of those crazy animals that we had just seen. I was chilling outside staring at the moon as I read my Bible, when I heard some of the craziest noises. Just as I was reading Psalm 50:10, “For every wild animal of the forest is mine, the cattle on a thousand hills I know all the birds of the air, and all that moves in the field is mine,” I heard a large cat noise. No joke. It was killing something, because I also heard the sound of an animal dying. CRAZY! At that moment Michelle and Katie came running up from behind me, scaring the crap out of me. I thought I was going to be eaten. And that was just the beginning of our night. After all of that, I decided that it I felt a little (not much) safer inside the tent, so we all hide in our sleeping bags from the noises outside. Shortly after, they continued. The warthogs came, sniffing around our tent, sticking their noses right up against the fabric, and making noises as ugly as their faces. A little while later, an elephant. No joke. Elephants are cool, but not when you think they might stampede through your campsite. Its not over though… a while later in the night came a hippo, plodding up from the lakeside and walked right by our tent. It is good that every wild animal of the forest is God’s I am thankful that all that moves in the field is his…
I have tons of pictures, but don’t feel like spending my whole day fighting with the Internet… I’ll be home in three weeks. You can see them then.
This past weekend we had an Easter celebration with our family. Our sister came over, with our three “nieces,” who are super cute, along with William and Eva joining us from Kampala. After the Easter service Sunday morning we had a giant feast with TONS of food. I played with Patricia, Tracy, and Belinda (our nieces) with a little tub of yellow playdough that I brought with me from home. Patricia, the oldest (about 12), loved running her fingers through my hair, braiding it and styling it until she said I was “fit for the cover of a magazine.” They were so cute. It was weird to be away from family at Easter, but I was still surrounded by my new family here. Even more, it was great to be away from the consumerism of America, where Easter wasn’t just about the Easter bunny. It was great for Easter to be completely about resurrection and new life, and about celebrating the life that we have been given with friends and family.
Happy Easter!
Thursday, April 2, 2009
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
It's been a while
Hey guys! Dad has gotten on me for being MIA for a while, so I figured it was about time to try and update this thing again. It’s been kind of hard to get on the Internet much lately. Things are generally winding down here—we only have only 2 more weeks of classes, a week of finals, and then we leave for two weeks in Rwanda learning about the East African Revival and the Rwandan genocide. As far as other excuses for not letting you all know what is going on, Internet was down for almost a week, and I’ve had some general computer problems due to the fact that it is nearly impossible to escape Africa without a virus attacking your computer. But anyway… here’s the latest scoop in Mukono:
Two weekends ago was one of the most impacting weekends we have had since we got here. We took a trip to Luweero, a district about 2 hours north of here, to visit some Ugandans who are doing some great ministry, and “Jesus Cares,” a ministry that cares for families affected by HIV/AIDS. It was definitely an incredible weekend.
Early Saturday morning we met Ruth, the daughter of the couple who started the “Jesus Cares” ministry. Together, the couple and their 4 sons and daughters have created a ministry that cares for 6 families who are some of the worst struck with HIV/AIDS. Most of the families are child-headed households, where both parents have been lost to the disease leaving one of their kids, sometimes not even 15 years old, to care for the younger brothers and sisters. In two of the families the mothers are still living, but both women are HIV positive and one is bed ridden. The other mother we had the opportunity to meet. Ruth and her family provide things like milk, eggs, bread, and more to the families, along with counseling for the kids affected and fun VBS-type. This is where we came in…
All day Saturday we got to play with the kids in the 6 families (about 30 kids altogether) and another handful of kids from the neighborhood (probably another 30). While the ministry of “Jesus Cares” was originally intended just for those families affected with HIV/AIDS, they realized that people in the village began looking at the kids who came on Saturdays and seeing them as the “AIDS kids. Sadly, there is a huge stigma associated with being HIV positive. To help solve that problem, the family decided to invite all of the neighborhood kids too.
When we first got there we sang some songs for the kids, and then a few of the girls sang some songs for us too. Just after we divided into four groups (Alpha, Omega, Peace, and Unity) with all of us mixed in. I found myself in the awesome “Unity” group, filled with 25 awesome kids and about 6 of us. Pretty much all day I sat with this beautiful girl on my lap, who loved to pet the hairs on my foreign arms. Sadly, I never actually learned her name… she told me several times, but all I could manage to pronounce and remember was Na________. But while I may have forgotten her name, I will never forget her.
So with our groups, we led some crazy, fun, and goofy competitive games between the four groups. Most of them involved relay-type activities, but my personal favorite was the matooke-peeling race, which I found myself involved in. Haha at least I had some practice at rural homestays! As I kneeled, peeling my 7-ish banana, all of the kids suddenly crowded around me. My hands were shaking, but it was SO funny. They were screaming, cheering, and chanting, and suddenly I realized that some people were saying, “You are Baganda. You are Baganda.” Haha. After being here 3 months and often feeling like I really don’t belong, I don’t think there could have been a more incredible compliment! There were many other awesome competitions involved in the day, and we tried to keep the energy high with our chanting and cheering. It was so much fun. After lunch each of the 4 groups performed a traditional Baganda dance and song that members of our group had taught us earlier. That was definitely interesting. Let me tell you what… Baganda dancing has lots of hip action involved. It was probably one of the funniest things we had seen. When it all was over, Unity came out victorious, and we congratulated our kids before getting back on the bus to drive back to the guest house. The whole day was great, and I pray that we brought encouragement and joy to them, as much as they did to us.
Something I still am inspired by is the fact that this whole ministry is run by one family. When Ruth came to talk to us before we left to go meet the kids, she explained how she works full-time in Kampala and comes home every weekend to work with her family and the “Jesus Cares” families. The other incredible part: the program, including the support of the 6 families is funded by the members of this one family giving their 10% tithe to the ministry. That to me is amazing! Is that not what the church is all about… in Acts it says that there were no needy among them. What if that were true for the church today? If we all took our offerings to the Lord seriously, could it happen?
Saturday night we said good-bye to the USE students who live on campus, and all of us in IMME went back to the guest house to meet Father Gerald. Father Gerry is an incredible man of God who has more compassion than any other person I have ever met. It was so amazing to hear the things that God is doing in Luweero, and Sunday morning we got to attend mass at one of the congregations in his parish. The service was all in Luganda and pretty much impossible to understand, but it was still incredible. You could see the joy in Father Gerald as he ministered to his people.
Its been quite a while now since coming back from Luweero, and a lot has happened here, but I am realizing now how long this has gotten, so that will have to be saved for another day. Things are definitely winding down, and we are getting incredibly sad at the quickly approaching day when we have to say good-bye to our families. This weekend we’re headed to Queen Elizabeth National Park and Game Reserve for a weekend of camping and a safari, the next weekend is Easter, and the following weekend is our last in Mukono before heading to Rwanda. Crazy!
Two weekends ago was one of the most impacting weekends we have had since we got here. We took a trip to Luweero, a district about 2 hours north of here, to visit some Ugandans who are doing some great ministry, and “Jesus Cares,” a ministry that cares for families affected by HIV/AIDS. It was definitely an incredible weekend.
Early Saturday morning we met Ruth, the daughter of the couple who started the “Jesus Cares” ministry. Together, the couple and their 4 sons and daughters have created a ministry that cares for 6 families who are some of the worst struck with HIV/AIDS. Most of the families are child-headed households, where both parents have been lost to the disease leaving one of their kids, sometimes not even 15 years old, to care for the younger brothers and sisters. In two of the families the mothers are still living, but both women are HIV positive and one is bed ridden. The other mother we had the opportunity to meet. Ruth and her family provide things like milk, eggs, bread, and more to the families, along with counseling for the kids affected and fun VBS-type. This is where we came in…
All day Saturday we got to play with the kids in the 6 families (about 30 kids altogether) and another handful of kids from the neighborhood (probably another 30). While the ministry of “Jesus Cares” was originally intended just for those families affected with HIV/AIDS, they realized that people in the village began looking at the kids who came on Saturdays and seeing them as the “AIDS kids. Sadly, there is a huge stigma associated with being HIV positive. To help solve that problem, the family decided to invite all of the neighborhood kids too.
When we first got there we sang some songs for the kids, and then a few of the girls sang some songs for us too. Just after we divided into four groups (Alpha, Omega, Peace, and Unity) with all of us mixed in. I found myself in the awesome “Unity” group, filled with 25 awesome kids and about 6 of us. Pretty much all day I sat with this beautiful girl on my lap, who loved to pet the hairs on my foreign arms. Sadly, I never actually learned her name… she told me several times, but all I could manage to pronounce and remember was Na________. But while I may have forgotten her name, I will never forget her.
So with our groups, we led some crazy, fun, and goofy competitive games between the four groups. Most of them involved relay-type activities, but my personal favorite was the matooke-peeling race, which I found myself involved in. Haha at least I had some practice at rural homestays! As I kneeled, peeling my 7-ish banana, all of the kids suddenly crowded around me. My hands were shaking, but it was SO funny. They were screaming, cheering, and chanting, and suddenly I realized that some people were saying, “You are Baganda. You are Baganda.” Haha. After being here 3 months and often feeling like I really don’t belong, I don’t think there could have been a more incredible compliment! There were many other awesome competitions involved in the day, and we tried to keep the energy high with our chanting and cheering. It was so much fun. After lunch each of the 4 groups performed a traditional Baganda dance and song that members of our group had taught us earlier. That was definitely interesting. Let me tell you what… Baganda dancing has lots of hip action involved. It was probably one of the funniest things we had seen. When it all was over, Unity came out victorious, and we congratulated our kids before getting back on the bus to drive back to the guest house. The whole day was great, and I pray that we brought encouragement and joy to them, as much as they did to us.
Something I still am inspired by is the fact that this whole ministry is run by one family. When Ruth came to talk to us before we left to go meet the kids, she explained how she works full-time in Kampala and comes home every weekend to work with her family and the “Jesus Cares” families. The other incredible part: the program, including the support of the 6 families is funded by the members of this one family giving their 10% tithe to the ministry. That to me is amazing! Is that not what the church is all about… in Acts it says that there were no needy among them. What if that were true for the church today? If we all took our offerings to the Lord seriously, could it happen?
Saturday night we said good-bye to the USE students who live on campus, and all of us in IMME went back to the guest house to meet Father Gerald. Father Gerry is an incredible man of God who has more compassion than any other person I have ever met. It was so amazing to hear the things that God is doing in Luweero, and Sunday morning we got to attend mass at one of the congregations in his parish. The service was all in Luganda and pretty much impossible to understand, but it was still incredible. You could see the joy in Father Gerald as he ministered to his people.
Its been quite a while now since coming back from Luweero, and a lot has happened here, but I am realizing now how long this has gotten, so that will have to be saved for another day. Things are definitely winding down, and we are getting incredibly sad at the quickly approaching day when we have to say good-bye to our families. This weekend we’re headed to Queen Elizabeth National Park and Game Reserve for a weekend of camping and a safari, the next weekend is Easter, and the following weekend is our last in Mukono before heading to Rwanda. Crazy!
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
I battled the Nile... and WON
Wow. What a crazy weekend. Really, I just have no idea where to start. We traveled as a group to Jinja (the source of the Nile where we spent a weekend toward the beginning of the semester) for some Nile adventures... a.k.a. white water rafting and bungee jumping. It was CRAZY. Really, there is no other word.
I had been rafting before in the States, but I am pretty sure it was nothing like this. We opted for the all-day class V rapids, which is kind of strange to think that the Nile, which is incredibly calm in some areas, has class V rapids. But let me tell you, it does, and they're intense! After a grand 5-10 minutes of orientation (no joke, it was the shortest orientation ever... and most of it was consumed with giving us life jackets and helmets... but those are pretty important, so its all good) the 25-ish of us and another 15-ish other people piled into open trucks for the drive from our hostel to the river. Then it was time for organizing into rafts-- our raft, "team henry" (Henry was our awesome Ugandan river guide) consisted of Laura, Megan, Tim, Kelsey, and myself. Pretty sweet raft if you ask me.
The river was flat at first, and we got a little bit of still water practice before attacking the rapids. We learned all the commands from Henry-- easy forward, backpaddle, hard forward, lean in, and my personal favorite, "GET DOWN!" We also got a few more words about saftey on the river, including about the safety kayaks that followed us all the way down the river. Nathan, a guide in a different raft, was showing us how to grab on to the kayak if we ended up getting rescued. He showed us a handle on the front of the kayak and said, "don't pull this handle." We looked at him, some people a little confused, and he explained by saying, "if you pull this [insert guide's name here... I can't remember] will not like it. His cover will come off and he might not be wearing any clothes" Haha even though all of the kayaker's were wearing pants... but it gets better. Allie, stop reading. This is PG (maybe PG 13?) rated. Then he said, "and you will see his black mamba and be jealous. You don't want that image for the rest of your life." Yeah... our guides made the trip entertaining :) Seriously though, they were the coolest.
We also practiced fun things like tipping the raft rightside-up for when it gets flipped and attempting to get back into the raft once you are in the water, which believe it or not was the hardest thing we learned. Our final test... swimming (or rather floating) through the first class I rapid. Luckily we all survived :)
We all jumped (or rather flopped) back onto the raft to get ready for the big ones... which we conquered like we were professionals. One of the rapids that we went on was called 50/50 (meaning you have a 50% chance of flipping), but we were literally the only raft that didn't tip. We told Henry that they needed to re-name the rapid to something like 95/5. Really, we were a little disappointed-- they were great fun and got our hearts beating rather quickly don't get me wrong, but as we watched ALL of the other rafts flip upside down, we wondered when it would be our turn. But it was coming...
A while down the river we went on this intense rapid and flipped completely over... exactly what we had been hoping for :) But during the time I was in the water, I wasn't exactly smiling. It was so intense. I really have no idea what happened... we flipped over, I was under the raft at some point, and then an undercurrent dragged me from under the boat and I was under water. During our little safety talk at the beginning of the river they told us that downtime in the Nile is about 10 seconds... meaning you could stay under that long (but probably not longer) before the life jacket brought you to the top. So there I was, under the water, feeling the weight of the rapid all around me, my lungs already starting to burn. Anyone can hold their breath for 10 seconds, I thought... 10 seconds isn't that long. I started counting... 1...2...3...4...5...6...7... the first 7 seconds went by pretty fast and I thought, "I can do this"... 8...9... suddenly the last 3 seconds felt more like 3 minutes... and then I felt the top of my head surface, and I flung my face out of the water to gasp for breath before getting dragged back under and pulled further downstream. Funny thing? I loved it. Well, maybe not around that 9th second, but afterwards I did... when I was back in the raft. Before we went, some people who had gone before told us that this rafting trip was one of the scariest things they had ever done... and that they seriously thought they would die. All we could say was: "yes! lest do this!" Haha. We have serious thrill issues.
Our other flip was a little less terrifying, but definitely fun. The good part was that I held on to the safety rope around the raft the whole time so while there was still a lot of getting thrown around, I wasn't under the water for near as long... and I didn't have a long swim fighting the current to get back to the raft. That was nice. We lost Tim on that rapid though... but a Kayak picked him up and put him on another raft until we got far enough downstream to meet up with them.
So all together we tackled something like 12 rapids, 4 of them class V, and it was one of the most fun things I had done... until the next day...
Sunday was bungee jumping day. Crazy. I went bungee jumping. On the Nile. Ahh! When we first got to the tower, I was terrified, and pretty sure I would chicken out if I didn't pay quickly. Once I gave them my money there was no going back. We all climbed up to the top, and I watched a few people go in front of me. Before I knew it, it was my turn. The man who ran the company was Australian, and luckily his voice had a way of calming my nerves (hurray great accents!) He asked me if I wanted to hit the water and I replied "yeah," sounding way more confident than I really was. "You sound pretty sure of yourself," He replied, "Want a lot of water?" "Uhhhh... maybe just an average amount"
I stood on the scale and the figured out how much rope based on my weight and I sat on a little chair while they wrapped my ankles with a towel for comfort and a strap to hold me to the bungee cord. As a Ugandan man tied me up the Australian, Jack, explained a few things... "When you hit the water, make sure your hands are in front of you and your head tucked in. If not, its a guaranteed two black eyes" Ouch. That didn't sound fun. Feet tied together tightly I jumped to the edge of the tower... and SLOWLY lowered my hands. Before I knew it he was counting down from three and I had no time to think before jumping face first off the edge.
It was an exhilerating and thrilling experience... really there are no words to explain it. You feel like you're flying and falling, all at the same time. Suddenly my hands hit the water, but it wasn't enough warning, and my eyes were still open. I plunged into the Nile up to my ankles, and then was jerked back up, contacts swirling in my eyes (thankfully, they stayed in my eyes... and my shirt, which I thought for a second was going to get left in the Nile, stayed on my body). After bouncing in the air several times I got lowered down into the raft where two more Ugandans untied me and paddled the raft to the edge. Defintely the experience of a lifetime... and I'm alive to talk about it :)
I have a video of my jumping experience... but sadly it won't load... maybe another day!
I had been rafting before in the States, but I am pretty sure it was nothing like this. We opted for the all-day class V rapids, which is kind of strange to think that the Nile, which is incredibly calm in some areas, has class V rapids. But let me tell you, it does, and they're intense! After a grand 5-10 minutes of orientation (no joke, it was the shortest orientation ever... and most of it was consumed with giving us life jackets and helmets... but those are pretty important, so its all good) the 25-ish of us and another 15-ish other people piled into open trucks for the drive from our hostel to the river. Then it was time for organizing into rafts-- our raft, "team henry" (Henry was our awesome Ugandan river guide) consisted of Laura, Megan, Tim, Kelsey, and myself. Pretty sweet raft if you ask me.
The river was flat at first, and we got a little bit of still water practice before attacking the rapids. We learned all the commands from Henry-- easy forward, backpaddle, hard forward, lean in, and my personal favorite, "GET DOWN!" We also got a few more words about saftey on the river, including about the safety kayaks that followed us all the way down the river. Nathan, a guide in a different raft, was showing us how to grab on to the kayak if we ended up getting rescued. He showed us a handle on the front of the kayak and said, "don't pull this handle." We looked at him, some people a little confused, and he explained by saying, "if you pull this [insert guide's name here... I can't remember] will not like it. His cover will come off and he might not be wearing any clothes" Haha even though all of the kayaker's were wearing pants... but it gets better. Allie, stop reading. This is PG (maybe PG 13?) rated. Then he said, "and you will see his black mamba and be jealous. You don't want that image for the rest of your life." Yeah... our guides made the trip entertaining :) Seriously though, they were the coolest.
We also practiced fun things like tipping the raft rightside-up for when it gets flipped and attempting to get back into the raft once you are in the water, which believe it or not was the hardest thing we learned. Our final test... swimming (or rather floating) through the first class I rapid. Luckily we all survived :)
We all jumped (or rather flopped) back onto the raft to get ready for the big ones... which we conquered like we were professionals. One of the rapids that we went on was called 50/50 (meaning you have a 50% chance of flipping), but we were literally the only raft that didn't tip. We told Henry that they needed to re-name the rapid to something like 95/5. Really, we were a little disappointed-- they were great fun and got our hearts beating rather quickly don't get me wrong, but as we watched ALL of the other rafts flip upside down, we wondered when it would be our turn. But it was coming...
A while down the river we went on this intense rapid and flipped completely over... exactly what we had been hoping for :) But during the time I was in the water, I wasn't exactly smiling. It was so intense. I really have no idea what happened... we flipped over, I was under the raft at some point, and then an undercurrent dragged me from under the boat and I was under water. During our little safety talk at the beginning of the river they told us that downtime in the Nile is about 10 seconds... meaning you could stay under that long (but probably not longer) before the life jacket brought you to the top. So there I was, under the water, feeling the weight of the rapid all around me, my lungs already starting to burn. Anyone can hold their breath for 10 seconds, I thought... 10 seconds isn't that long. I started counting... 1...2...3...4...5...6...7... the first 7 seconds went by pretty fast and I thought, "I can do this"... 8...9... suddenly the last 3 seconds felt more like 3 minutes... and then I felt the top of my head surface, and I flung my face out of the water to gasp for breath before getting dragged back under and pulled further downstream. Funny thing? I loved it. Well, maybe not around that 9th second, but afterwards I did... when I was back in the raft. Before we went, some people who had gone before told us that this rafting trip was one of the scariest things they had ever done... and that they seriously thought they would die. All we could say was: "yes! lest do this!" Haha. We have serious thrill issues.
Our other flip was a little less terrifying, but definitely fun. The good part was that I held on to the safety rope around the raft the whole time so while there was still a lot of getting thrown around, I wasn't under the water for near as long... and I didn't have a long swim fighting the current to get back to the raft. That was nice. We lost Tim on that rapid though... but a Kayak picked him up and put him on another raft until we got far enough downstream to meet up with them.
So all together we tackled something like 12 rapids, 4 of them class V, and it was one of the most fun things I had done... until the next day...
Sunday was bungee jumping day. Crazy. I went bungee jumping. On the Nile. Ahh! When we first got to the tower, I was terrified, and pretty sure I would chicken out if I didn't pay quickly. Once I gave them my money there was no going back. We all climbed up to the top, and I watched a few people go in front of me. Before I knew it, it was my turn. The man who ran the company was Australian, and luckily his voice had a way of calming my nerves (hurray great accents!) He asked me if I wanted to hit the water and I replied "yeah," sounding way more confident than I really was. "You sound pretty sure of yourself," He replied, "Want a lot of water?" "Uhhhh... maybe just an average amount"
I stood on the scale and the figured out how much rope based on my weight and I sat on a little chair while they wrapped my ankles with a towel for comfort and a strap to hold me to the bungee cord. As a Ugandan man tied me up the Australian, Jack, explained a few things... "When you hit the water, make sure your hands are in front of you and your head tucked in. If not, its a guaranteed two black eyes" Ouch. That didn't sound fun. Feet tied together tightly I jumped to the edge of the tower... and SLOWLY lowered my hands. Before I knew it he was counting down from three and I had no time to think before jumping face first off the edge.
It was an exhilerating and thrilling experience... really there are no words to explain it. You feel like you're flying and falling, all at the same time. Suddenly my hands hit the water, but it wasn't enough warning, and my eyes were still open. I plunged into the Nile up to my ankles, and then was jerked back up, contacts swirling in my eyes (thankfully, they stayed in my eyes... and my shirt, which I thought for a second was going to get left in the Nile, stayed on my body). After bouncing in the air several times I got lowered down into the raft where two more Ugandans untied me and paddled the raft to the edge. Defintely the experience of a lifetime... and I'm alive to talk about it :)
I have a video of my jumping experience... but sadly it won't load... maybe another day!
Thursday, March 12, 2009
sipi falls-- the beauty of Creation
After our rural homestays we met up with everyone and some of the honors college students at UCU to stay at a little "resort" for debriefing and to see Sipi falls. It was BEAUTIFUL. We went on a hike that lasted pretty much all day to see the waterfalls, including climbing on the mossy, wet rocks to get behind them. Sooo much fun!
Laura, Megan, Nichole, and I.
The waterfall was sooo amazing.
Yeah... this one I'm not sure about ;)
At the second waterfall that we went to there was a little place up the stream to go swimming. It was soooo cold, but very refreshing.
Probably the coolest swing I've ever seen... the view was AMAZING!
I decided to take advantage of one of the only days I wasn't wearing a skirt... and climb a tree :)
Laura, Megan, Nichole, and I.
The waterfall was sooo amazing.
Yeah... this one I'm not sure about ;)
At the second waterfall that we went to there was a little place up the stream to go swimming. It was soooo cold, but very refreshing.
Probably the coolest swing I've ever seen... the view was AMAZING!
I decided to take advantage of one of the only days I wasn't wearing a skirt... and climb a tree :)
Monday, March 9, 2009
pictures!
My sister, Phyllis, in Kapchorwa town.
One day Phyllis and I walked in to Kapchorwa town, which was about 6-7 Km. from our house... a long but BEAUTIFUL walk. On the way home we got followed by all these kids who really wanted their picture taken.
Once upon a time... I killed a chicken.
Jeremy with our neighbor, Esther.
My sister, Rachel, finishing up plucking and cleaning the chicken (that I had just killed)
The sweetest stove I've ever seen. It was built up out of the same dried cow dung mixture as the whole kitchen hut. The green banana leaves in the right pot are wrapped around the matooke.
Jeremy with the balloon that I had just given him. He played with it ALL day and cried when it blew too far down the hill to reach :(
I thought that this tree was awesome! I wanted to climb it, but my dad didn't really like that idea.
Jeremy and a neighbor, Vince, enjoying the pop rocks that I brought. They were so cute! The would shove a pile in their mouths and then run around the yard yelling, "pop pop pop pop pop!"Friday, March 6, 2009
Kapchorwa
Sorry it has taken me so long to actually get an update on here! It has been a crazy week coming back to life at UCU, and for some reason posting to the bog hasn’t worked out with the Internet either. But I am crossing my fingers that it works today!
A week ago we piled into vans to start the 5 hour drive to Kapchorwa, a rural village in the Mbale district towards the East. It was a week I will never forget, and a week that is not easily put into words on a blog. Everyone in the family that I stayed with was really nice, but the week was still hard and made me miss all of you and my family in Mukono more than I ever could have imagined. My Dad, Patrick, was great—he actually talked to me, asking questions about America and sharing cultural stuff about Kapchorwa. The only problem was that he was gone working a lot of the day, and I was left at home. My Mom’s name was Violet, and she was also very nice. She had just had an operation for goiter, though, and was still recovering, so I didn’t really have very much of a chance to get to know her. My little brother was one of my favorite people in Kapchorwa. His name was Jeremy, and he was 3. He didn’t know any English, but that didn’t even matter much. All day he would say “Liw-a-beff, choo,” which translated means “Elizabeth, come,” and so I would follow him random places around the compound. I also had two “sisters,” who were actually my Dad’s nieces that were around to help out while my Mom was recovering from the operation. There names were Rachel and Phyllis, and they were both about high school aged. Sometimes they seemed talkative and we would talk and laugh, but most of the time they just talked in Kupsabiny to other people who stopped by for a few hours.
A few crazy things that I did in my week that I NEVER thought I would do/ a few things I could have imagined but were pretty interesting anyway…
1. I slaughtered a chicken. For those of you who are weak in the stomach skip the details and go down to the next bullet… but for those of you who are interested here’s a little bit more. I literally stepped on its feet and its wings and sawed off its head with a dull kitchen knife. Sick. I never thought I could do it, and my family thought it was REALLY funny that I was so scared. But I did it and I even helped pluck off the beak and feathers at the end.
2. I ate the gizzard of the chicken I just killed. That was interesting too. It wasn’t too bad, just a little too chewy. They always serve the gizzard to guests. Hospitality is huge in the culture, and I am pretty sure that if chicken’s had ten gizzards they would still give them all to the guest. I thanked God in my prayer for dinner that night that he made chickens with only one gizzard.
3. I ate. A lot. Like more that you could possibly imagine. Remember the part about being really hospitable? Yeah, that definitely came in to play with the food. My family served me sooo much food all the time, and I would try so hard to eat it because it would be really rude to refuse. Sometimes I wanted to cry when they put food in front of me! After I would eat a huge meal, my dad or sister would ask, “I add you more?” But sometimes it wasn’t even a question, it would just be, “I add you more” period. End of discussion.
4. I helped “smear” our kitchen hut. Houses/ huts in Kapchorwa were generally made out of mud and dung. So I guess every once in a while as upkeep you have to re-smear the floor of the hut. This consisted of hiking up the giant hill that our house was on to the cows and collecting some nice fresh (still warm) cow poo, mixing it with some sand-type stuff, smearing it all over the floor, and waiting for it to dry. Definitely an experience I will never forget! The amazing thing is that once it is dry it doesn’t even smell.
5. I carried things on my head. Lots of things in fact… well, mainly just two—jerry cans of water and matooke (aka giant bushels of plantains). As far as the water goes, I would go with one of my sisters nearly every day, and most of the time 3 or 4 times a day to walk about 20-30 minutes up and down this big hill to get to the well for water. It was definitely tiring, and they wouldn’t even let me carry the biggest jerry can! As far as the matooke… my dad, like most in Kapchorwa, grew lots of matooke, a lot to feed the family but some to sell also. One day it was really windy and the wind was knocking over all of the trees. “Come, we go,” my dad said, and I followed him to go and harvest some of the matooke so that it wouldn’t fall off in the wind. We chopped at the tree until they fell and carried them to the road on our heads. They were going to take them all to Mbale to sell.
6. I listened to the radio 24/7. This was definitely something I did not expect, due to the fact that there was no electricity, but my family LOVED the radio. It began blaring at 4 or 5 in the morning, and usually didn’t get turned off until 10 or 11. (I don’t think my family ever slept). The music was definitely interesting… my favorite sequence consisted of a song in Swahili, Point of Grace, Lion King, and Kelly Clarkson, all in a row. No one but me thought it was funny.
7. I milked a cow. I wasn’t very good at it, but I had several times to practice. We milked our three cows twice a day, which provided enough milk for #8.
8. I drank the same amount of tea that got thrown into the bay at the Boston tea party. Ok, this might be a slight exaggeration, but I don’t think it is by too much. Literally anytime was tea time in Kapchorwa! (The milk mentioned above is because African tea is different than we think of in the States. It is loose tea leaves brewed with milk an tons of sugar). One day I counted how many cups of tea I drank…. 9! The main reason that you always drank so much is because every new home you visited served the guests tea. The day that I drank 9 cups of tea happened to be the first day that I was there and my dad paraded me around to visit nearly all of his family.
9. I talked American politics. This was kind of interesting, because I honestly don’t talk politics that much even in the States, but in nearly every conversation (at least with the men, not so much with the women) it came up. It was kind of funny the range of knowledge that these men had about America. Some of them knew more than I honestly did about the election; others of them asked me if Switzerland was close to where I lived in America.
10. I was present. This, really, is the biggest thing that I did. Looking at all of the above things, it looks like I did a lot with my week, but really, when it comes down to it, life in the village (especially during the dry season like it was when we were there) is far slower than life in America or even in Mukono. There is an African proverb that says, “Presence is the debt that we owe to each other.” More than anything, this is what I learned in Kapchorwa, and while it sounds incredibly easy to sit and do nothing but just “be present,” I learned that it is one of the hardest things to do. Some of the time we chatted in English, which was GREAT, but most of the time my presence in Kapchorwa consisted more sitting than chatting—either because they all spoke in Kupsabiny or because we just sat without even saying much of anything. More than anything else, this is what made my time in Kapchorwa so difficult. It is hard to be so close to an incredible community while being so far removed from it. During my time that I was missing all of you so much, I was praying hard as well—thanking God for all of the relationships he has given me.
I tried to upload pictures... only three worked. Hopefully I can get the others up here soon!
My Mom, Violet (left) with one of my Dad's mom's (center, explanation-- my Dad's dad was polygamous), and a neighbor (right)
My little brother Jeremy with my Dad, Patrick, in the cave that was behind our house
A week ago we piled into vans to start the 5 hour drive to Kapchorwa, a rural village in the Mbale district towards the East. It was a week I will never forget, and a week that is not easily put into words on a blog. Everyone in the family that I stayed with was really nice, but the week was still hard and made me miss all of you and my family in Mukono more than I ever could have imagined. My Dad, Patrick, was great—he actually talked to me, asking questions about America and sharing cultural stuff about Kapchorwa. The only problem was that he was gone working a lot of the day, and I was left at home. My Mom’s name was Violet, and she was also very nice. She had just had an operation for goiter, though, and was still recovering, so I didn’t really have very much of a chance to get to know her. My little brother was one of my favorite people in Kapchorwa. His name was Jeremy, and he was 3. He didn’t know any English, but that didn’t even matter much. All day he would say “Liw-a-beff, choo,” which translated means “Elizabeth, come,” and so I would follow him random places around the compound. I also had two “sisters,” who were actually my Dad’s nieces that were around to help out while my Mom was recovering from the operation. There names were Rachel and Phyllis, and they were both about high school aged. Sometimes they seemed talkative and we would talk and laugh, but most of the time they just talked in Kupsabiny to other people who stopped by for a few hours.
A few crazy things that I did in my week that I NEVER thought I would do/ a few things I could have imagined but were pretty interesting anyway…
1. I slaughtered a chicken. For those of you who are weak in the stomach skip the details and go down to the next bullet… but for those of you who are interested here’s a little bit more. I literally stepped on its feet and its wings and sawed off its head with a dull kitchen knife. Sick. I never thought I could do it, and my family thought it was REALLY funny that I was so scared. But I did it and I even helped pluck off the beak and feathers at the end.
2. I ate the gizzard of the chicken I just killed. That was interesting too. It wasn’t too bad, just a little too chewy. They always serve the gizzard to guests. Hospitality is huge in the culture, and I am pretty sure that if chicken’s had ten gizzards they would still give them all to the guest. I thanked God in my prayer for dinner that night that he made chickens with only one gizzard.
3. I ate. A lot. Like more that you could possibly imagine. Remember the part about being really hospitable? Yeah, that definitely came in to play with the food. My family served me sooo much food all the time, and I would try so hard to eat it because it would be really rude to refuse. Sometimes I wanted to cry when they put food in front of me! After I would eat a huge meal, my dad or sister would ask, “I add you more?” But sometimes it wasn’t even a question, it would just be, “I add you more” period. End of discussion.
4. I helped “smear” our kitchen hut. Houses/ huts in Kapchorwa were generally made out of mud and dung. So I guess every once in a while as upkeep you have to re-smear the floor of the hut. This consisted of hiking up the giant hill that our house was on to the cows and collecting some nice fresh (still warm) cow poo, mixing it with some sand-type stuff, smearing it all over the floor, and waiting for it to dry. Definitely an experience I will never forget! The amazing thing is that once it is dry it doesn’t even smell.
5. I carried things on my head. Lots of things in fact… well, mainly just two—jerry cans of water and matooke (aka giant bushels of plantains). As far as the water goes, I would go with one of my sisters nearly every day, and most of the time 3 or 4 times a day to walk about 20-30 minutes up and down this big hill to get to the well for water. It was definitely tiring, and they wouldn’t even let me carry the biggest jerry can! As far as the matooke… my dad, like most in Kapchorwa, grew lots of matooke, a lot to feed the family but some to sell also. One day it was really windy and the wind was knocking over all of the trees. “Come, we go,” my dad said, and I followed him to go and harvest some of the matooke so that it wouldn’t fall off in the wind. We chopped at the tree until they fell and carried them to the road on our heads. They were going to take them all to Mbale to sell.
6. I listened to the radio 24/7. This was definitely something I did not expect, due to the fact that there was no electricity, but my family LOVED the radio. It began blaring at 4 or 5 in the morning, and usually didn’t get turned off until 10 or 11. (I don’t think my family ever slept). The music was definitely interesting… my favorite sequence consisted of a song in Swahili, Point of Grace, Lion King, and Kelly Clarkson, all in a row. No one but me thought it was funny.
7. I milked a cow. I wasn’t very good at it, but I had several times to practice. We milked our three cows twice a day, which provided enough milk for #8.
8. I drank the same amount of tea that got thrown into the bay at the Boston tea party. Ok, this might be a slight exaggeration, but I don’t think it is by too much. Literally anytime was tea time in Kapchorwa! (The milk mentioned above is because African tea is different than we think of in the States. It is loose tea leaves brewed with milk an tons of sugar). One day I counted how many cups of tea I drank…. 9! The main reason that you always drank so much is because every new home you visited served the guests tea. The day that I drank 9 cups of tea happened to be the first day that I was there and my dad paraded me around to visit nearly all of his family.
9. I talked American politics. This was kind of interesting, because I honestly don’t talk politics that much even in the States, but in nearly every conversation (at least with the men, not so much with the women) it came up. It was kind of funny the range of knowledge that these men had about America. Some of them knew more than I honestly did about the election; others of them asked me if Switzerland was close to where I lived in America.
10. I was present. This, really, is the biggest thing that I did. Looking at all of the above things, it looks like I did a lot with my week, but really, when it comes down to it, life in the village (especially during the dry season like it was when we were there) is far slower than life in America or even in Mukono. There is an African proverb that says, “Presence is the debt that we owe to each other.” More than anything, this is what I learned in Kapchorwa, and while it sounds incredibly easy to sit and do nothing but just “be present,” I learned that it is one of the hardest things to do. Some of the time we chatted in English, which was GREAT, but most of the time my presence in Kapchorwa consisted more sitting than chatting—either because they all spoke in Kupsabiny or because we just sat without even saying much of anything. More than anything else, this is what made my time in Kapchorwa so difficult. It is hard to be so close to an incredible community while being so far removed from it. During my time that I was missing all of you so much, I was praying hard as well—thanking God for all of the relationships he has given me.
I tried to upload pictures... only three worked. Hopefully I can get the others up here soon!
Carrying Matooke.
My Mom, Violet (left) with one of my Dad's mom's (center, explanation-- my Dad's dad was polygamous), and a neighbor (right)
My little brother Jeremy with my Dad, Patrick, in the cave that was behind our house
Monday, March 2, 2009
I'm back
Well, I'm back in Mukono after a crazy 10 day adventure in Kapchorwa, a rural village towards the eastern border with Kenya. My time with my family was one of the hardest weeks of my life, but also one of the most incredible opportunities. I don't have time to tell you all much right now, though, because I am back at UCU and realizing that I am a little behind on all of the homework that I should have done before I left. (i.e. I have a pretty big history paper due tomorrow that I haven't started!) Sometimes I forget that I am actually in school while I am here. Anyway... I'll do my homework and try to get a post up here with stories and pictures in the next day or so.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
home sweet home
A while back I made a video tour of my house to show you all... but after trying three times now to load it I have officially given up. Sorry! Hopefully I can show it to a bunch of you when I get home. So intstead, here's a few pictures because they're easier to post.
For one of our classes, Faith and Action, we write short papers throughout the semester, designed to help process different things that we experience/ talk about. One that we wrote was about stereotypes about Africa that have changed because of our time with our host families:
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Sometimes when I walk through the streets I feel like I am in a fishbowl. “Muzungu! Bye Muzungu!” all the children scream with hands constantly waving, and I find myself wondering what all my white skin represents for them. Wealth? Prosperity? The Land of Opportunity? It is more than likely all of them. Can we blame the Ugandans for having stereotypes about Americans, though? Do we not have our own about them?
When I was preparing to come here, I always laughed at the reactions from other people. They all thought it was great that I was studying abroad, but their minds immediately jumped to Europe or some place like that. “No, I’m going to Uganda,” I would reply. “Uganda? Isn’t that in Africa?” Many would ask, “Are there even colleges there?” Can I really blame them for having stereotypes about Ugandans, though? Do we all not have images of Africa, shaped by things like relief commercials with starving children, malnourished bellies pushed out?
While my own stereotypes of Africa were not as extreme, they were still present. I had talked to a few other students who came to Uganda to study, which helped me to better understand what I was getting into. Even still, after living with my family for three weeks my stereotypes have already been shattered. Most of them were eliminated after just a few days.
Walking into my house for the first time, I was shocked. Instead of the few plain rooms that I was expecting to see, I saw a large, decorated, and brightly painted house. On the ceilings, I saw light bulbs; on the walls, light switches that worked; and on the floor in the sitting room, carpet. Much to my surprise I also saw separate rooms for bathing and the toilet, both inside of the house. I was quite happy, actually, to see that we do not have a television, but each morning I continue to find myself laughing to hear American music coming from the radio. Even more, there was a final surprise—the separate cell phones that my mom and several of my brothers use on a regular basis.
At the same time, though, I am realizing how much more we really do have in America, and how in many ways the stereotypes on both sides of the fence are at least partly true. I am reminded each day of how hard my family works just to do the daily tasks without the convenience of technology. Last week Laura and I were able to go home from school early in the afternoon to eat lunch with our family and help with supper. We ate at 1:30, finished clearing the dishes, and immediately began preparing the food for dinner, which would not be eaten for another seven or eight hours. My mind jumped to cooking dinner in my apartment, where after just an hour a meal that was once in a metal can or a cardboard box would already be in my stomach, where there was no smoke from a kitchen house to irritate my lungs and eyes, and where I could choose from an almost limitless selection of things to eat. Tasks that were once so simple—cooking, bathing, and washing clothes—now take up the largest chunk of the day without the convienences of a stove or running water.
I once asked my brother William what he liked to do, and he replied that he liked washing the dishes. While it made no sense at first, I am beginning to understand. I, like William, am learning to enjoy those things I once found un-enjoyable. I am learning that what you do, how you do it, or how long it takes is not as who you are doing it with. In the African dichotomy of modernity and tradition, God is teaching me to enjoy simplicity and cherish the small moments. One night we bopped a balloon around in our courtyard for hours, many nights we play the same card game over and over again, and most nights we sit around with little conversation and great presence, simply enjoying each other’s company. The most amazing thing is that I love these nights as much as I love any expensive form of entertainment in America, maybe even more.
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I have been so blessed by my family. The other day I was able to sit and take tea for a long time with Mama Robinah, and she shared a whole lot of her story... the faithfulness of God in her life is incredible. One thing that she said to me really stood out. "God gave me love for people," she said. I could not agree more. Our Mom has raised up something like 17 or 18 children-- not all her own, but you would never know. She pays for their school bills, keeps food on the table, and fills their lives with the love of the Lord. The calling of the Lord on Mama's life is profound-- the calling to be a mother, the calling to love and provide for her children the same way that God has loved and provided for her.
Tomorrow morning we leave for 10 days for our rural home stays, and I am excited to see what the Lord will do in our time there. God has blessed me with the opportunity to live with and know an amazing Ugandan family... now I get to have that opportunity all over again.
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