Hey everyone...I realize it's been forever since I posted to this blog, but I just wanted to give my faithful readers an update on life after Uganda. I got home in May and went to Milligan right off to see some good friends graduate. From Milligan, I went home to Kentucky. But over the first month I was home, I travelled A LOT. I went to Myrtle Beach for a Bachelorette party, to Milligan for a wedding, to North Carolina for a wedding...you get the picture. I've finally reached the age when a lot of my friends are getting married and starting families--it's crazy!! I'm certainly not at that stage in my life yet. I'll settle for being a late bloomer :)
After travelling nonstop for so long, it was nice after the first week of June to settle in at home in Kentucky. I really enjoyed spending time with family and friends this summer, getting plugged back into Capital City (my home church). The summer was restful for me. I worked a little as a lifeguard at the YMCA, but mostly I just invested in relationships, which was what I had been doing in Uganda for four months. Over the summer I had some minor instances of reverse culture shock. Some things I struggled with were seeing all of the media violence: movies, tv, video games, etc. I hadn't seen any of this in four months, so it was hard at first. The American food made me sick for a couple of weeks while I adjusted back to how processed and heavy everything here is. I also missed my family in Uganda a lot--after living with them for so long it was hard to suddenly be so far away. But there were plenty of things I enjoyed having again, mainly running water, hot showers, baths, etc.
In July, I did a SportQuest mission trip in Indianapolis with some good friends from the States and from Belgium that I have worked with in the past. It was good to be involved in some service after having a pretty lethargic summer. I had a really refreshing time serving with my Christian brothers and sisters and hope to see them again sometime in the near future, though I'm not sure how...after SportQuest, I went to Idaho with my family for a family reunion (so it was travelling again!!). The reunion was great--God has blessed me with a wonderful extended family.
Finally, in mid-August, I returned to Milligan after being away for around 8 months. And things have certainly changed. Most of my close friends have graduated and moved on, and Abby, my lovely roommate, is abroad in Egypt this semester. I miss her dearly! I'm living in the dorm on freshman row (pretty literally) so I'm surrounded by new faces. It has been a challenge for me this semester to find friends and live in community. Uganda taught me the value of organizing life around community above all else, but I am having to find community in unexpected places since my previous community has mostly dissolved. But God is really working through this with me and I'm growing.
I've had the worst of reverse culture shock in just the past few weeks. Coming back to school forced me back into an "American schedule" full of class, homework, work, and activities...without very much left over time for friends and family. In Uganda it was hard for me in the beginning to adjust to the lack of "structure"...but then I realized that I had time for people. In America now I'm resisting falling back into such a busy routine. I had a break down during week two of classes here. I've been slowly putting things back together since. Obviously, I can't quit everything and just roam around and find people to hang out with...but I have pulled back a little and am trying to really invest in activities that are important to me and let all of the sideline stuff go. Yes, class is important, but I am trying to balance class/homework with the time to rest and enjoy social activities. It's a hard balance to find, but I am doing it. And I am also trying to spend as much time as possible every week in worship, scripture, and prayer. I'm realizing that making my relationship with Christ primary helps put everything else in perspective.
So that's life. I have two semesters of school left, and then I am looking to take some time off to do some missions...then probably I'll go into grad school. But I am not overly concerned with the future. I'm confident it's in God's hands and he'll show me where to go when the time comes. So why worry?
Monday, September 21, 2009
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Very Much Needed Update: Less than a month in Uganda to Go! :(
Dearest friends. It’s been too long since my last update. In fact, I really should be doing other things than writing this right now…but it’s high time I let you know what’s going on in my life. I’ve had recent internet troubles with crazy African computer viruses. Viruses here are more frequent and potent then they are in the US. Lucky for me I have an amazing computer engineer dad who helped me fix my computer over the phone/through email from another continent. How cool is that? I now have internet access and my computer seems to be virus free. That means I can at last update my blog. So here goes.
I went on a safari this past weekend. It was a bit disappointing, but I still had a decent time. The coolest part was seeing some elephants really close up and risking my life riding on top of the jeep. Yep, I climbed out of the window and on top of the vehicle…while it was moving at a fairly high speed on African dirt (and bumpy) roads. After about twenty or thirty minutes on top of the shaky luggage rack, I decided I had tested my guardian angel’s patience enough for the day and resigned myself to just sitting on the window sill with half of my body in the car and half out. The whole experience reminded me of when I was a kid and my dad used to threaten to tie me to the roof of the car if I didn’t shut up…after the safari, I think that could be kind of cool.
School is SUPER STRESSFUL right now. It’s kind of funny. The entire Ugandan culture seems to be against stress—everything here is so relaxed and chill and there is no strict schedule…but then all of a sudden it’s finals week and I have due dates that I have to keep and everything is happening at once. I have four papers due between Monday and Wednesday this coming week. I have begun three of the papers, but not the one that is actually due on Monday. So I need to think about doing that. The papers are for African Literature, Missions, African Traditional Religions/Christianity/Islam in Uganda, and Reading the New Testament in Africa. On Friday I have a slideshow presentation/speech. Then the following week I have a final exam and paper due in our class called Faith and Action. So this week had been one long paper-writing experience. I have never had four papers going simultaneously, so this is a new balancing act. We are still attending lectures this week, so time is limited and I am still trying to spend time with my family. I’ve given up sleeping and have begun to wake up at 5 am to have time to myself to write. It’s quiet and I’m more awake early in the morning than late at night. I am drinking coke and eating chocolate like crazy right now. It’s not healthy. But I’ve already gained a bit of fat in my tummy (since we have dinner at 10 every night) so I figure what the heck, I’ll just lose all of the weight when I get home. I can’t wait to hit the gym and the swimming pool again.
Today is Good Friday. So Happy Easter to everyone. I have one lecture and then will probably attend a worship service with my mom. It will all be in Luganda and probably kind of boring, but I’ll just read my Bible or something and try to follow along. After service, it’s back to the books. I really want to have my papers finished by the end of today or at least mostly finished so I can have a relaxing weekend with my family. I only have two weeks left at home which is super sad! This weekend I am cooking a meal for my family. It’s something we’re required to do. I’m supposed to cook an American meal. I think I am going to attempt spaghetti. It could be interesting. Spaghetti, garlic bread, maybe eggs? (don’t exactly go with spaghetti, but this is Africa right?). If dinner is a complete failure, I am going to fry bananas for desert, so maybe that will at least be a hit. We’ll see how it all goes.
Ok. I am officially out of things to say for the time being. I need to write papers so I can enjoy my last weeks with my beautiful family. Oh. Wait. I’ll share a poem with you. This is a poem I wrote for my African Lit class. I really like it. It’s untitled at the moment.
Bye Mizungu, Bye Mizungu, Hello Madame
Bye Mizungu, Bye Mizungu, I love you
I walk the streets to the chorus of small children
And grown men, equally immature and
Enthralled with my white skin
The children are innocent products of misguided upbringing
I say “bye” back to them and marvel that
Goodbye has become the most common greeting I receive in the village
The men are unfortunate products of Hollywood stereotypes and African dreams
I ignore their comments as I feel my face flushing with embarrassment
Bye Mizungu, Bye Mizungu, Hello Madame
Bye Mizungu, Bye Mizungu, I love you
It’s an anthem to my whiteness as
I swim through a sea of blackness
Wishing for just one moment I could have the relief of blending
I treasure moments when I hear someone in the village calling my name
I never realized what a gift it is to have a name and to be called by it
For it is recognition of shared humanity to call another by name
It makes me more than a mizungu in the street
More than white skin and an American woman
I am careful to call people by their names
For Africa has taught me to love my name
Bye Mizungu, Bye Mizungu, Hello Madame
Bye Mizungu, Bye Mizungu, I love you
Superficial greetings I will rise above
By sharing my name and learning yours
By recognizing the human in you more than the color
I will overcome upbringing and Hollywood
And though I may never blend on the streets
In Africa I will discover an identity far beyond white American woman because
I will make myself at home and you will be my family
Misguided children and unfortunate brothers
And you will know my name
And I will smile when you say it
I went on a safari this past weekend. It was a bit disappointing, but I still had a decent time. The coolest part was seeing some elephants really close up and risking my life riding on top of the jeep. Yep, I climbed out of the window and on top of the vehicle…while it was moving at a fairly high speed on African dirt (and bumpy) roads. After about twenty or thirty minutes on top of the shaky luggage rack, I decided I had tested my guardian angel’s patience enough for the day and resigned myself to just sitting on the window sill with half of my body in the car and half out. The whole experience reminded me of when I was a kid and my dad used to threaten to tie me to the roof of the car if I didn’t shut up…after the safari, I think that could be kind of cool.
School is SUPER STRESSFUL right now. It’s kind of funny. The entire Ugandan culture seems to be against stress—everything here is so relaxed and chill and there is no strict schedule…but then all of a sudden it’s finals week and I have due dates that I have to keep and everything is happening at once. I have four papers due between Monday and Wednesday this coming week. I have begun three of the papers, but not the one that is actually due on Monday. So I need to think about doing that. The papers are for African Literature, Missions, African Traditional Religions/Christianity/Islam in Uganda, and Reading the New Testament in Africa. On Friday I have a slideshow presentation/speech. Then the following week I have a final exam and paper due in our class called Faith and Action. So this week had been one long paper-writing experience. I have never had four papers going simultaneously, so this is a new balancing act. We are still attending lectures this week, so time is limited and I am still trying to spend time with my family. I’ve given up sleeping and have begun to wake up at 5 am to have time to myself to write. It’s quiet and I’m more awake early in the morning than late at night. I am drinking coke and eating chocolate like crazy right now. It’s not healthy. But I’ve already gained a bit of fat in my tummy (since we have dinner at 10 every night) so I figure what the heck, I’ll just lose all of the weight when I get home. I can’t wait to hit the gym and the swimming pool again.
Today is Good Friday. So Happy Easter to everyone. I have one lecture and then will probably attend a worship service with my mom. It will all be in Luganda and probably kind of boring, but I’ll just read my Bible or something and try to follow along. After service, it’s back to the books. I really want to have my papers finished by the end of today or at least mostly finished so I can have a relaxing weekend with my family. I only have two weeks left at home which is super sad! This weekend I am cooking a meal for my family. It’s something we’re required to do. I’m supposed to cook an American meal. I think I am going to attempt spaghetti. It could be interesting. Spaghetti, garlic bread, maybe eggs? (don’t exactly go with spaghetti, but this is Africa right?). If dinner is a complete failure, I am going to fry bananas for desert, so maybe that will at least be a hit. We’ll see how it all goes.
Ok. I am officially out of things to say for the time being. I need to write papers so I can enjoy my last weeks with my beautiful family. Oh. Wait. I’ll share a poem with you. This is a poem I wrote for my African Lit class. I really like it. It’s untitled at the moment.
Bye Mizungu, Bye Mizungu, Hello Madame
Bye Mizungu, Bye Mizungu, I love you
I walk the streets to the chorus of small children
And grown men, equally immature and
Enthralled with my white skin
The children are innocent products of misguided upbringing
I say “bye” back to them and marvel that
Goodbye has become the most common greeting I receive in the village
The men are unfortunate products of Hollywood stereotypes and African dreams
I ignore their comments as I feel my face flushing with embarrassment
Bye Mizungu, Bye Mizungu, Hello Madame
Bye Mizungu, Bye Mizungu, I love you
It’s an anthem to my whiteness as
I swim through a sea of blackness
Wishing for just one moment I could have the relief of blending
I treasure moments when I hear someone in the village calling my name
I never realized what a gift it is to have a name and to be called by it
For it is recognition of shared humanity to call another by name
It makes me more than a mizungu in the street
More than white skin and an American woman
I am careful to call people by their names
For Africa has taught me to love my name
Bye Mizungu, Bye Mizungu, Hello Madame
Bye Mizungu, Bye Mizungu, I love you
Superficial greetings I will rise above
By sharing my name and learning yours
By recognizing the human in you more than the color
I will overcome upbringing and Hollywood
And though I may never blend on the streets
In Africa I will discover an identity far beyond white American woman because
I will make myself at home and you will be my family
Misguided children and unfortunate brothers
And you will know my name
And I will smile when you say it
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
Luweero Weekend
Hello everyone! Sorry my weekly update is a little late in coming. I usually try to post over the weekend or on Monday, but our internet has been down for the past several days. It was frustrating for a little while, but then most of us realized how much more time we had to do other things when we weren’t glued to facebook…funny we come to Africa and the facebook trap still ensnares many of us. I try to limit my internet time to just checking email, facebook, and updating my blog, but it’s such a temptation to waste time online. So we had a break from the chains of the internet, but most of us were happy yesterday to put them back on. It’s good to be able to communicate with friends and family back home. Maybe I’ll be able to upload a few more pictures. I have fallen drastically behind on that, but the internet just doesn’t move fast enough.
Ok. So last week absolutely flew by. I really don’t remember any major happenings. Mostly I just attended class and hung out with my family. I made some no-bake cookies, read a good book, and began plans to direct a skit. The skit is for a worship service that our studies group is in charge of leading. It’s a campus wide service, so we’ll have an audience of several hundred people at least. I’m directing a skit to a song by Lincoln Park that I learned on a missions trip a few years ago. It’s interesting to be in the directors rather than the actors role, but I am enjoying it. We’ve had a meeting/rehearsal and are having another this week…so far so good. I think it’s going to go really well. Performance day is one week from yesterday! It’s an exciting opportunity to lead a campus worship service and minister to our fellow students.
This week the pace is beginning to pick up as far as school goes. I counted the days today and realized I only have 25 days before the school semester is finished and we leave for our Rwanda trip. That’s crazy! In that time, I have some 3-4 papers to write as well as several projects. I need to get kicking on some of these assignments, so I am going to try to get myself motivated this week to begin working towards finals. Maybe the internet needs to crash again…It’s hard to motivate myself to do school work when all I really want to do is hang out with my friends and family here. Time is short and I am realizing how much more important people are than homework, thought my profs might not accept that excuse. At any rate, finals week is stressful every semester, no matter where I am (Uganda or the US) and I always manage to get through it. It’s good to keep things in perspective
This past weekend was potentially my favorite class trip we have been on. We travelled about 2 hours to a town called Luweero. It’s a fairly rural area. The purpose of the trip was for us to speak with an Anglican Bishop, a Catholic Priest, and to see a ministry called Jesus Cares. The clergymen were amazing examples of what missions to one’s own people can look like. They love their people so much, and they suffer with them a great deal too, but the love of God is revealed all the more through this suffering. Luweero has a high percentage of the population affected by AIDS. Although I’ve been in Africa now for nearly 3 months, it’s been easy on the college campus to ignore the reality of AIDS. It’s not something that people talk about very much—it’s often a taboo topic, like everyone likes to pretend it doesn’t exist. There is still an issue of stigma, so even people with HIV-AIDS often try to hide their status.
The Bishop and the Priest both talked openly about the reality of poverty and AIDS in the area. When we asked Father Gerald, the priest, how he responded to so much pain and suffering, his response was simply “Sometimes there is nothing you can do; all I can offer is to be present with my people.” He’s so present with his people that he declined an offer to study for a masters degree in the US to continue working in the parish. That’s true love. I don’t know very many Ugandans that aren’t dying to make it to the US, and yet he would rather hold dying babies and preach at funeral services than leave his people for the opportunity of a lifetime. I have a lot to learn about true love and compassion.
Jesus Cares is a ministry for AIDS victims run by one Christian family. It’s two parents and their four children. The parents, who are both teachers, saw a need in their community and decided to meet it. They and their four children (all adults) each contribute 10% of their salary to the mission. They have 6 AIDS families that they care for currently. Three of them are single mother households (where the mothers and most children have AIDS), one is a family of AIDS orphans run by a grandmother, and two familiers are child-headed households where an older sibling cares for the younger. In the six familes there are 25 children, and 17 of them have AIDS. We traveled to a house on Saturday where we met with the family who runs the missions as well as the families they minister to. They invited children from the village to join us, so there was a total of around 80 children there. We couldn’t tell which children had AIDS and which didn’t, which I thought was excellent. Our sole purpose was to play with the kids. We divided into four teams called Alpha, Omega, Unity, and Peace. Each team had about 8 white students and 20 children on it. Then we played games in the yard for 3-4 hours. We did relay races and funny games. One of the adults marked points for the teams. My team was Peace (ironic considering my Luganda name means Peace) and we got second place, which was cool. We served lunch to the kids (it made me think of my cafeteria job at Milligan) and then the children on our teams taught us traditional songs and dances which we performed for each other. It was such a good day. Probably my best day in Uganda, just loving kids and acting like one myself.
On Saturday evening we were free for a bit and some friends and I went tree climbing. I haven't climbed a tree in years! It was a lot of fun. My friends were surprised I could climb so well--they said I climbed like a country girl, so I guess I did Kentucky and Tennessee some justice. I am one of the only southern girls in our group. After climbing, we found some strange green fruits on the ground--they were round and about the size and weight of a softball...then we found a stick about like a bat. So you can imagine what we did then. It was kind of like a homerun derby except when you hit the fruit really hard it busted everywhere. So we had a blast and mostly ended up covered in this bitter, sticky fruit juice.
Well…that’s about all of the exciting things about my recent days in Uganda. I’ll have another update for you soon. Prayer requests include: all of the students as our time winds down in Uganda and finals approach; our families who host us and that our remaining time with them would be blessed; my sister-in-law Prose who recently had a baby (Tendo Israel)—just for her and the baby’s health; this upcoming Sunday when I am teaching Sunday School to around fifty 7-9 year olds, that I will get my lesson worked out and God will help me relate it to them; that I find my Bible, which seems to be missing since this weekend. Thanks everyone!
--Danielle
Ok. So last week absolutely flew by. I really don’t remember any major happenings. Mostly I just attended class and hung out with my family. I made some no-bake cookies, read a good book, and began plans to direct a skit. The skit is for a worship service that our studies group is in charge of leading. It’s a campus wide service, so we’ll have an audience of several hundred people at least. I’m directing a skit to a song by Lincoln Park that I learned on a missions trip a few years ago. It’s interesting to be in the directors rather than the actors role, but I am enjoying it. We’ve had a meeting/rehearsal and are having another this week…so far so good. I think it’s going to go really well. Performance day is one week from yesterday! It’s an exciting opportunity to lead a campus worship service and minister to our fellow students.
This week the pace is beginning to pick up as far as school goes. I counted the days today and realized I only have 25 days before the school semester is finished and we leave for our Rwanda trip. That’s crazy! In that time, I have some 3-4 papers to write as well as several projects. I need to get kicking on some of these assignments, so I am going to try to get myself motivated this week to begin working towards finals. Maybe the internet needs to crash again…It’s hard to motivate myself to do school work when all I really want to do is hang out with my friends and family here. Time is short and I am realizing how much more important people are than homework, thought my profs might not accept that excuse. At any rate, finals week is stressful every semester, no matter where I am (Uganda or the US) and I always manage to get through it. It’s good to keep things in perspective
This past weekend was potentially my favorite class trip we have been on. We travelled about 2 hours to a town called Luweero. It’s a fairly rural area. The purpose of the trip was for us to speak with an Anglican Bishop, a Catholic Priest, and to see a ministry called Jesus Cares. The clergymen were amazing examples of what missions to one’s own people can look like. They love their people so much, and they suffer with them a great deal too, but the love of God is revealed all the more through this suffering. Luweero has a high percentage of the population affected by AIDS. Although I’ve been in Africa now for nearly 3 months, it’s been easy on the college campus to ignore the reality of AIDS. It’s not something that people talk about very much—it’s often a taboo topic, like everyone likes to pretend it doesn’t exist. There is still an issue of stigma, so even people with HIV-AIDS often try to hide their status.
The Bishop and the Priest both talked openly about the reality of poverty and AIDS in the area. When we asked Father Gerald, the priest, how he responded to so much pain and suffering, his response was simply “Sometimes there is nothing you can do; all I can offer is to be present with my people.” He’s so present with his people that he declined an offer to study for a masters degree in the US to continue working in the parish. That’s true love. I don’t know very many Ugandans that aren’t dying to make it to the US, and yet he would rather hold dying babies and preach at funeral services than leave his people for the opportunity of a lifetime. I have a lot to learn about true love and compassion.
Jesus Cares is a ministry for AIDS victims run by one Christian family. It’s two parents and their four children. The parents, who are both teachers, saw a need in their community and decided to meet it. They and their four children (all adults) each contribute 10% of their salary to the mission. They have 6 AIDS families that they care for currently. Three of them are single mother households (where the mothers and most children have AIDS), one is a family of AIDS orphans run by a grandmother, and two familiers are child-headed households where an older sibling cares for the younger. In the six familes there are 25 children, and 17 of them have AIDS. We traveled to a house on Saturday where we met with the family who runs the missions as well as the families they minister to. They invited children from the village to join us, so there was a total of around 80 children there. We couldn’t tell which children had AIDS and which didn’t, which I thought was excellent. Our sole purpose was to play with the kids. We divided into four teams called Alpha, Omega, Unity, and Peace. Each team had about 8 white students and 20 children on it. Then we played games in the yard for 3-4 hours. We did relay races and funny games. One of the adults marked points for the teams. My team was Peace (ironic considering my Luganda name means Peace) and we got second place, which was cool. We served lunch to the kids (it made me think of my cafeteria job at Milligan) and then the children on our teams taught us traditional songs and dances which we performed for each other. It was such a good day. Probably my best day in Uganda, just loving kids and acting like one myself.
On Saturday evening we were free for a bit and some friends and I went tree climbing. I haven't climbed a tree in years! It was a lot of fun. My friends were surprised I could climb so well--they said I climbed like a country girl, so I guess I did Kentucky and Tennessee some justice. I am one of the only southern girls in our group. After climbing, we found some strange green fruits on the ground--they were round and about the size and weight of a softball...then we found a stick about like a bat. So you can imagine what we did then. It was kind of like a homerun derby except when you hit the fruit really hard it busted everywhere. So we had a blast and mostly ended up covered in this bitter, sticky fruit juice.
Well…that’s about all of the exciting things about my recent days in Uganda. I’ll have another update for you soon. Prayer requests include: all of the students as our time winds down in Uganda and finals approach; our families who host us and that our remaining time with them would be blessed; my sister-in-law Prose who recently had a baby (Tendo Israel)—just for her and the baby’s health; this upcoming Sunday when I am teaching Sunday School to around fifty 7-9 year olds, that I will get my lesson worked out and God will help me relate it to them; that I find my Bible, which seems to be missing since this weekend. Thanks everyone!
--Danielle
Monday, March 16, 2009
Weekend in Jinja: Rafting the Nile and Bungee Jumping
Hello Everyone!!
I hope you had an amazing weekend! My weekend was one of the best so far. The USP (Uganda Studies Program) students planned a white water rafting/bungee jumping trip to a town called Jinja (where we’ve visited before, but for class reasons). We left on Friday afternoon and went to a hostel in Jinja. It was surprisingly nice. The beds were comfy, the rooms weren’t too crowded, and we were practically the only group there. 26 students went on the trip. We were a mix of students staying in host families and students staying on campus, so it was a good opportunity to hang out with some people I haven’t really gotten to know this semester.
We arrived on Friday night and had dinner and hung out in the awesome bar/hang out/pool table room. Dinner was super good, and then we just chilled out. Chilling is a very American college student thing to do, especially when you live on campus, but living in a host family this semester hasn’t left very much time to just “chill” with my friends. It was really relaxing and liberating not to have to worry anything or anyone. Early Saturday morning we got up and had breakfast. It was toast, eggs, pineapple, watermelon…I was in heaven!
After breakfast we headed out to the Nile River to begin our day of rafting. We split up into groups of 5 and 6 and each group was sent to a raft and a guide. Our guide’s name was Paulo. He was a world championship kayaker and rafter, so quite the professional. This was comforting considering this was most of our first time white water rafting, and we were going on a grade 5 trip, which means we were starting at the highest level. Nothing like jumping right in. After some basic training, which consisted of learning some of the commands Paulo would be shouting at us and learning how to get back in the raft/help a friend get back into the raft, we were on our way. We conquered twelve rapids in all; several of them grade 4s and 5s, with a couple of grade ones and twos or threes. It was awesome and terrifying at the same time.
My raft flipped over on three out of the first four rapids. I got hit in the face with the paddle, thrown so far from the raft that I had to have a kayaker come and rescue me, and pushed under the water so far that I ran out of breath before I could surface. The worst flip we had some of my teammates landed on top of me and unintentionally held me under for a while. That was the only time I was seriously scared. Otherwise, it was a lot of a fun and I would definitely do it again, especially since I know what to expect now. Some of the more fun parts were when we successfully made it down a waterfall going backwards, without flipping over, and when Paulo had us all stand on the edges of the raft, bend our knees a bit, and hold onto each other while he steered us through a level two rapid—and we actually held our balance! He said we were one of a few groups who had ever succeeded in doing this. We also had the opportunity between rapids to swim in the Nile.
On Sunday we went bungee jumping. I didn’t think I was going to go initially because they tied the cord around your ankles, and I didn’t know how that would affect my knees, but then when we were getting ready to leave, I found out you could use a harness to jump and I could actually go. I raced up the platform and asked if I could still jump. The guys working the platform said yes and immediately began to hook me up. I hardly had time to think or psyche myself up (or out)…so maybe this was a good thing. When jumping with a harness, you have to take a running start and leap out from the platform as far as possible holding the cord in front of you…if you don’t leap far enough (or falter and fall) or if you let the cord go, you will get smacked in the face with the metal karabiner. I backed up to the corner of the platform, and then heard “3-2-1 BUNGEE!!!” On 1, I took off running, hit the edge of the platform, and pushed off into the air. The platform was over the Nile River. It was around 160 feet high. The best part by far was the initial running, jumping, and flying. The fall itself was so scary. It was like roller coaster times fifty. But I am glad to have the experience. I knew if I didn’t go after finding out about the harness that I would regret it forever.
So that was my sweet weekend. I would love to raft again, and think I could probably talk myself into jumping again in the future as well. Time here in Uganda is winding down. I just want it to go slower! This is week ten of 16. We are travelling on an Aids trip to Luweero (a town a couple of hours away) this weekend, so it will be a rough trip. Then the first weekend of April we are going on a weekend safari (like 8 hours away!). I only have 3-4 weekends left with my host family, which is hard to think about. I am just now starting to feel like a true part of the family, falling in love with all of the people, accepting them unconditionally and feeling the same kind of acceptance. It will be hard to leave them. At the end of April, we are going to spend 1-2 weeks in Rwanda studying the genocide and doing some work with some churches. Then it’s time for a couple of days of debrief before heading back to the States. I can’t believe I’m already more than halfway through the semester and these last weeks are coming so fast.
Alright. That’s all for now. Sorry I haven’t been able to load pictures for the past several weeks. Internet here just hasn’t been working very well. It takes forever just to write emails and post blogs and facebook picture uploader fails every time. If I don’t get them posted while I’m here, I’ll post a bunch when I get home in May so you can see them.
I hope you had an amazing weekend! My weekend was one of the best so far. The USP (Uganda Studies Program) students planned a white water rafting/bungee jumping trip to a town called Jinja (where we’ve visited before, but for class reasons). We left on Friday afternoon and went to a hostel in Jinja. It was surprisingly nice. The beds were comfy, the rooms weren’t too crowded, and we were practically the only group there. 26 students went on the trip. We were a mix of students staying in host families and students staying on campus, so it was a good opportunity to hang out with some people I haven’t really gotten to know this semester.
We arrived on Friday night and had dinner and hung out in the awesome bar/hang out/pool table room. Dinner was super good, and then we just chilled out. Chilling is a very American college student thing to do, especially when you live on campus, but living in a host family this semester hasn’t left very much time to just “chill” with my friends. It was really relaxing and liberating not to have to worry anything or anyone. Early Saturday morning we got up and had breakfast. It was toast, eggs, pineapple, watermelon…I was in heaven!
After breakfast we headed out to the Nile River to begin our day of rafting. We split up into groups of 5 and 6 and each group was sent to a raft and a guide. Our guide’s name was Paulo. He was a world championship kayaker and rafter, so quite the professional. This was comforting considering this was most of our first time white water rafting, and we were going on a grade 5 trip, which means we were starting at the highest level. Nothing like jumping right in. After some basic training, which consisted of learning some of the commands Paulo would be shouting at us and learning how to get back in the raft/help a friend get back into the raft, we were on our way. We conquered twelve rapids in all; several of them grade 4s and 5s, with a couple of grade ones and twos or threes. It was awesome and terrifying at the same time.
My raft flipped over on three out of the first four rapids. I got hit in the face with the paddle, thrown so far from the raft that I had to have a kayaker come and rescue me, and pushed under the water so far that I ran out of breath before I could surface. The worst flip we had some of my teammates landed on top of me and unintentionally held me under for a while. That was the only time I was seriously scared. Otherwise, it was a lot of a fun and I would definitely do it again, especially since I know what to expect now. Some of the more fun parts were when we successfully made it down a waterfall going backwards, without flipping over, and when Paulo had us all stand on the edges of the raft, bend our knees a bit, and hold onto each other while he steered us through a level two rapid—and we actually held our balance! He said we were one of a few groups who had ever succeeded in doing this. We also had the opportunity between rapids to swim in the Nile.
On Sunday we went bungee jumping. I didn’t think I was going to go initially because they tied the cord around your ankles, and I didn’t know how that would affect my knees, but then when we were getting ready to leave, I found out you could use a harness to jump and I could actually go. I raced up the platform and asked if I could still jump. The guys working the platform said yes and immediately began to hook me up. I hardly had time to think or psyche myself up (or out)…so maybe this was a good thing. When jumping with a harness, you have to take a running start and leap out from the platform as far as possible holding the cord in front of you…if you don’t leap far enough (or falter and fall) or if you let the cord go, you will get smacked in the face with the metal karabiner. I backed up to the corner of the platform, and then heard “3-2-1 BUNGEE!!!” On 1, I took off running, hit the edge of the platform, and pushed off into the air. The platform was over the Nile River. It was around 160 feet high. The best part by far was the initial running, jumping, and flying. The fall itself was so scary. It was like roller coaster times fifty. But I am glad to have the experience. I knew if I didn’t go after finding out about the harness that I would regret it forever.
So that was my sweet weekend. I would love to raft again, and think I could probably talk myself into jumping again in the future as well. Time here in Uganda is winding down. I just want it to go slower! This is week ten of 16. We are travelling on an Aids trip to Luweero (a town a couple of hours away) this weekend, so it will be a rough trip. Then the first weekend of April we are going on a weekend safari (like 8 hours away!). I only have 3-4 weekends left with my host family, which is hard to think about. I am just now starting to feel like a true part of the family, falling in love with all of the people, accepting them unconditionally and feeling the same kind of acceptance. It will be hard to leave them. At the end of April, we are going to spend 1-2 weeks in Rwanda studying the genocide and doing some work with some churches. Then it’s time for a couple of days of debrief before heading back to the States. I can’t believe I’m already more than halfway through the semester and these last weeks are coming so fast.
Alright. That’s all for now. Sorry I haven’t been able to load pictures for the past several weeks. Internet here just hasn’t been working very well. It takes forever just to write emails and post blogs and facebook picture uploader fails every time. If I don’t get them posted while I’m here, I’ll post a bunch when I get home in May so you can see them.
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Family, Twists, and Pizza!
Hello to the other side of the world!! This is my weekly update. Straight to you from the papisan chair, IMME quarters, Mukono, Uganda. Harry Potter fans, I hope that makes you smile. It reminds me of the letters addressed to Harry in book 1. Ok, sorry. That was a random moment.
I am doing amazing. This is week 9 and I want everything to slow down. I am a little more than half way, and I just want to relish every last moment. Last week was a good week. No matter how stressed I get with school work, it always gets done, or it doesn’t, and it’s not that big of a deal, and no matter how much this is a “study” abroad program, the abroad part is still way cooler than the study part. I really love living here. Sometimes I miss home, but God has given me the gift of finding a home here as well. I LOVE my family here. Spending time with them this weekend, I was just amazed at how comfortable I felt with them, how right everything seemed, how much they have blessed me by including and accepting me. It’s not easy to welcome a stranger into your family, but a stranger who comes from the other side of the world culturally, and who has a different skin color, who doesn’t speak your native language…I just see the love of God radiating through my family here. The Kingdom is global, praise Jesus, and all of us have family everywhere.
This weekend I finally broke down and went and got my hair done. By this I mean I had extensions and twists put in—twists aren’t quite braids, but they look really similar. It took around 7.5 hours. A friend and I traveled into Kampala (closest city, and capital of Uganda) and went to a salon. It was a bit expensive, but supposedly I can keep the twists up to 2 months, and I don’t have to wash my hair. It’s a little sad because I have beautiful, long, healthy hair right now, and the twists will probably cause me to lose a few inches, but washing long hair without running water gets hard after a while. Basin/bucket baths just aren’t the same as showers. So I am probably just going to get over the fact this might ruin my real hair…and enjoy the extra 15-20 minutes of sleep in the morning and NEVER having to worry about my hair.
In Kampala, we ate at the New York Pizza Kitchen, about the closest thing to American food I have had since coming here. I had pizza with green peppers and onions on it, and bottled coke, a chocolate milk shake and my personal favorite: FRENCH FRIES WITH HEINZ KETCHUP. Life just can’t get much better than French fries and real ketchup. They have this stuff called top-up here, but it’s not the same. So it was a good dinner on Saturday night and I was certainly a glutton. Hopefully I’ll get a chance to go to that restaurant at least once more before going home.
On Sunday, my family took me into the city again. We were visiting my brother’s wife, who is in the hospital after just having had their third child—it’s a boy!—and he’s healthy and happy and one of his names is Israel…the other is very Ugandan and I can’t remember it at the moment. But we had a good visit. I mostly occupied the other two children, who came along. Emma is 2 and Sharon in 8. They’re adorable and excited about their new little brother, but lets face it: babies just aren’t that entertaining after a while So we colored and played with my camera while all of the big people talked and played with the baby. It was a good day.
This week is shaping up to be a good one. My big assignment is a paper due on Friday, but it’s about Islam, and thanks to Dr. Farmer’s History of Islam class I took sophomore year, I have it covered. Other than the paper, business as usual: lots of reading I probably won’t do…it’s a good thing I didn’t go to college some place that’s always warm and sunny—it’s hard to make myself do any work when all I want to do is be outside or hanging out with all of the friends I am making here.
Ok. Thanks for all of the prayers and support! Looking forward to seeing everyone at home this summer. I’ll be back sometime in mid May. Hope you all have a good week!
And PS: Time doesn't change in Uganda. So I am now seven hours ahead of Kentucky/TN, nine hours ahead of Idaho, and ten hours ahead of Washington/Cali.
I am doing amazing. This is week 9 and I want everything to slow down. I am a little more than half way, and I just want to relish every last moment. Last week was a good week. No matter how stressed I get with school work, it always gets done, or it doesn’t, and it’s not that big of a deal, and no matter how much this is a “study” abroad program, the abroad part is still way cooler than the study part. I really love living here. Sometimes I miss home, but God has given me the gift of finding a home here as well. I LOVE my family here. Spending time with them this weekend, I was just amazed at how comfortable I felt with them, how right everything seemed, how much they have blessed me by including and accepting me. It’s not easy to welcome a stranger into your family, but a stranger who comes from the other side of the world culturally, and who has a different skin color, who doesn’t speak your native language…I just see the love of God radiating through my family here. The Kingdom is global, praise Jesus, and all of us have family everywhere.
This weekend I finally broke down and went and got my hair done. By this I mean I had extensions and twists put in—twists aren’t quite braids, but they look really similar. It took around 7.5 hours. A friend and I traveled into Kampala (closest city, and capital of Uganda) and went to a salon. It was a bit expensive, but supposedly I can keep the twists up to 2 months, and I don’t have to wash my hair. It’s a little sad because I have beautiful, long, healthy hair right now, and the twists will probably cause me to lose a few inches, but washing long hair without running water gets hard after a while. Basin/bucket baths just aren’t the same as showers. So I am probably just going to get over the fact this might ruin my real hair…and enjoy the extra 15-20 minutes of sleep in the morning and NEVER having to worry about my hair.
In Kampala, we ate at the New York Pizza Kitchen, about the closest thing to American food I have had since coming here. I had pizza with green peppers and onions on it, and bottled coke, a chocolate milk shake and my personal favorite: FRENCH FRIES WITH HEINZ KETCHUP. Life just can’t get much better than French fries and real ketchup. They have this stuff called top-up here, but it’s not the same. So it was a good dinner on Saturday night and I was certainly a glutton. Hopefully I’ll get a chance to go to that restaurant at least once more before going home.
On Sunday, my family took me into the city again. We were visiting my brother’s wife, who is in the hospital after just having had their third child—it’s a boy!—and he’s healthy and happy and one of his names is Israel…the other is very Ugandan and I can’t remember it at the moment. But we had a good visit. I mostly occupied the other two children, who came along. Emma is 2 and Sharon in 8. They’re adorable and excited about their new little brother, but lets face it: babies just aren’t that entertaining after a while So we colored and played with my camera while all of the big people talked and played with the baby. It was a good day.
This week is shaping up to be a good one. My big assignment is a paper due on Friday, but it’s about Islam, and thanks to Dr. Farmer’s History of Islam class I took sophomore year, I have it covered. Other than the paper, business as usual: lots of reading I probably won’t do…it’s a good thing I didn’t go to college some place that’s always warm and sunny—it’s hard to make myself do any work when all I want to do is be outside or hanging out with all of the friends I am making here.
Ok. Thanks for all of the prayers and support! Looking forward to seeing everyone at home this summer. I’ll be back sometime in mid May. Hope you all have a good week!
And PS: Time doesn't change in Uganda. So I am now seven hours ahead of Kentucky/TN, nine hours ahead of Idaho, and ten hours ahead of Washington/Cali.
Sunday, March 1, 2009
A Week in Kapchorwa
I’ve been gone for around ten days now. I must admit, it’s good to be home, back with my family in Mukono, near the university. But it was a good week in Kapchorwa (I found out we were indeed going to Kapchorwa for the week, and not “Captura”). Kapchorwa is a rural region in east Uganda near the border with Kenya. It’s beautiful there. The point of the trip was to live the rural lifestyle for a week. So we were all placed in various host families to survive in the bush for a week, learning about the people and their culture. My family was from the Sabine tribe, and spoke Kopsabiny (potentially that’s spelled wrong). It was a difficult language to learn and I only picked up a few phrases. It was interesting to live with a different family after having had two months to adapt to my regular host family.
We left on a Friday for Kapchorwa, driving 6-7 hours before reaching our destination. They dropped us in our families on Friday night immediately. My family was Mama Miria, Papa Felix, and a sister Lillian. My parents had other children, but all were away at school. Lillian is their oldest child at 23 years old, but she is at home recovering from a bad car accident involving the notorious matatus (taxis that are like small minivans and carry up to 15-20 people). The matatu flipped over, killing all but 2 passengers, so my sister is quite the miracle. The accident was over a year ago, however, so it has been a long recovery. My family lives on a farm with chickens, cats, dogs, goats, and cows. They also have multiple pieces of land spread throughout the region where they grow bananas and matoke (in the banana family) as well as coffee and a few other things. Different families live on and take care of their various plots of land in exchange for food and school fees for their children. My family is considered quite rich in the region, because land and livestock are wealth.
Besides farming, my dad has a job in Kampala (the capital of Uganda, an hour from the university I attend) working as a security office for the President of the country! So he is in between the country and the city, but much prefers village life and is looking forward to a quiet retirement in Kapchorwa eventually. The cool thing is he will be going to Kampala soon, where it won’t be hard for me to visit, so I’m one of the few lucky students who will get to see their families again after the week long homestay.
I had a challenging week living in Kap. The way they live is very different from my Mukono life, let alone life in the US. The differences are hard to put into words. It’s really like two worlds. Life pretty much revolved around farming, receiving visitors, and paying visits. Often we would just sit quietly in the shade in the yard, not saying anything, just being present to one another. It’s hard not to be twiddling your thumbs (or biting your fingernails) in extreme boredom. Americans don’t know very well how to sit still. Sometimes visitors even came just to sit with us. We would drink milk tea (basically a lot of whole mile, straight from the cow, with a little bit of tea) and sometimes eat small sweet bananas. I spent a lot of time staring out at the landscape, watching the movements of the small and entertaining kitten who was around, and roving through all of the sociological differences between Kap and the US (I am doing my fieldwork while here…).
When we conversed, it was always fun. They would ask tons of questions beginning “In America, do you have…” and generally the answer was yes, but it’s different in some way. I assured them we do indeed have cats, dogs, cows, goats, farms, trees, and countless other everyday things in the US. Different worlds culturally, but same planet earth, and same humans created in God’s image, just with different skin colors. We talked about dowry, a tradition still much alive in Kap. In the old days, I would have been worth around 400 cows as an educated white woman. These days, I would go for 15-20. They were fascinated at how different marriage in the US is from their expectations. Female circumcision is only recently becoming less common—I found out my mom was circumcised, but not her children, and the government is trying to make the practice illegal all together because it can go very wrong and is often considered “mutilation.” But not everyone thinks it’s a bad thing, and it’s a longstanding tradition of their tribe that many old people are loathe to give up. One of the visiting men asked me what happens in America if a man touches a girl’s breast (yes, you read that right—I certainly had to ask if I heard right). Apparently back in the day in Kap it could start a clan war, and even now is considered a horrible offense. It’s rude in the US, but I haven’t heard of very many wars starting because a middle school boy stumbles and “unintentionally” grabs a girl…
I spent Friday night and Saturday with my family before becoming terribly sick on Sunday. During church I had to leave to vomit in the outhouse. I thought it was just because my family was seriously overfeeding me. For breakfast that day I had four pieces of bread, two bananas, two boiled eggs, two muffins, two slices of avocado, and two cups of milk tea, and every meal was much the same: me forcing myself to eat until I felt like throwing up, and then my mom exclaiming “Oh, but you have eaten very little.” Let me say, Ugandans certainly can hold their food. I wouldn’t recommend facing anyone here in an eating contest. At any rate, there I was, puking outside the church. Then came the diarrhea, and more vomiting. When the vomiting didn’t stop, I figured it was safe to assume it was something other than the food. After church (which began at 11 and ended at 2:30 and was a short service for them), they drove me home in our program van (puking out the window the whole way).
I was half carried to our yard, a short distance from the road through a matoke tree field. There I lay on a mattress in the shade of a tree, looking out across the landscape, and it could have been picturesque except for the vomiting and frequent trips to the outhouse part. I also had a bad fever. Just about that time four of my American friends and their host families decided to pay us an after-church visit (there’s a nice view of a waterfall from my family’s land they wanted to see). In the African tradition, they set up lawn chairs around my mattress, and about 15 people sat around to chat and watch me throw up. Even some of our chickens and dogs were interested, though more for the vomiting part (yummy) than the chatting. I was what I guess could be called “sick in style,” though sick in a very different way then I have ever been sick in the US. Here, it would be rude to leave a sick person alone.
My family took excellent care of me. Truly, I love the culture here and how well they care for one another. I’m coming to love community and communalism. It’s the love of Christ and the church in action. No one is ever left out. So being sick here (now twice) has given me a special appreciation for the African culture and family. My mom even pulled a mattress into my room and slept over, waking each time I began to be sick again. I vomited for around 12 hours, and had the fever for 48 or so. I didn’t become fully well again until Wednesday. And being well is always such a blessing after being sick. On Wednesday and Thursday my family took me out walking as much as possible (sometimes 6-8 miles at a time) to see their property and visit friends in the area. It was incredible! I loved every minute of our long walks, talking, enjoying the land, meeting random villagers. I took a ton of pictures, some of which I will post on facebook in the next few days for all to see.
Ok, this has really possibly been my longest post yet. I could say so much more, but will save you the time of reading it, and me of writing it. I better begin to do some homework…we are back to classes this week after a nice break, and have lots to do! I’m at the half-way point of my experience here. This is week 8 of around 16. Time is going by so fast and I am learning so much. I miss many of you from home. Thanks for praying and thinking of me!
We left on a Friday for Kapchorwa, driving 6-7 hours before reaching our destination. They dropped us in our families on Friday night immediately. My family was Mama Miria, Papa Felix, and a sister Lillian. My parents had other children, but all were away at school. Lillian is their oldest child at 23 years old, but she is at home recovering from a bad car accident involving the notorious matatus (taxis that are like small minivans and carry up to 15-20 people). The matatu flipped over, killing all but 2 passengers, so my sister is quite the miracle. The accident was over a year ago, however, so it has been a long recovery. My family lives on a farm with chickens, cats, dogs, goats, and cows. They also have multiple pieces of land spread throughout the region where they grow bananas and matoke (in the banana family) as well as coffee and a few other things. Different families live on and take care of their various plots of land in exchange for food and school fees for their children. My family is considered quite rich in the region, because land and livestock are wealth.
Besides farming, my dad has a job in Kampala (the capital of Uganda, an hour from the university I attend) working as a security office for the President of the country! So he is in between the country and the city, but much prefers village life and is looking forward to a quiet retirement in Kapchorwa eventually. The cool thing is he will be going to Kampala soon, where it won’t be hard for me to visit, so I’m one of the few lucky students who will get to see their families again after the week long homestay.
I had a challenging week living in Kap. The way they live is very different from my Mukono life, let alone life in the US. The differences are hard to put into words. It’s really like two worlds. Life pretty much revolved around farming, receiving visitors, and paying visits. Often we would just sit quietly in the shade in the yard, not saying anything, just being present to one another. It’s hard not to be twiddling your thumbs (or biting your fingernails) in extreme boredom. Americans don’t know very well how to sit still. Sometimes visitors even came just to sit with us. We would drink milk tea (basically a lot of whole mile, straight from the cow, with a little bit of tea) and sometimes eat small sweet bananas. I spent a lot of time staring out at the landscape, watching the movements of the small and entertaining kitten who was around, and roving through all of the sociological differences between Kap and the US (I am doing my fieldwork while here…).
When we conversed, it was always fun. They would ask tons of questions beginning “In America, do you have…” and generally the answer was yes, but it’s different in some way. I assured them we do indeed have cats, dogs, cows, goats, farms, trees, and countless other everyday things in the US. Different worlds culturally, but same planet earth, and same humans created in God’s image, just with different skin colors. We talked about dowry, a tradition still much alive in Kap. In the old days, I would have been worth around 400 cows as an educated white woman. These days, I would go for 15-20. They were fascinated at how different marriage in the US is from their expectations. Female circumcision is only recently becoming less common—I found out my mom was circumcised, but not her children, and the government is trying to make the practice illegal all together because it can go very wrong and is often considered “mutilation.” But not everyone thinks it’s a bad thing, and it’s a longstanding tradition of their tribe that many old people are loathe to give up. One of the visiting men asked me what happens in America if a man touches a girl’s breast (yes, you read that right—I certainly had to ask if I heard right). Apparently back in the day in Kap it could start a clan war, and even now is considered a horrible offense. It’s rude in the US, but I haven’t heard of very many wars starting because a middle school boy stumbles and “unintentionally” grabs a girl…
I spent Friday night and Saturday with my family before becoming terribly sick on Sunday. During church I had to leave to vomit in the outhouse. I thought it was just because my family was seriously overfeeding me. For breakfast that day I had four pieces of bread, two bananas, two boiled eggs, two muffins, two slices of avocado, and two cups of milk tea, and every meal was much the same: me forcing myself to eat until I felt like throwing up, and then my mom exclaiming “Oh, but you have eaten very little.” Let me say, Ugandans certainly can hold their food. I wouldn’t recommend facing anyone here in an eating contest. At any rate, there I was, puking outside the church. Then came the diarrhea, and more vomiting. When the vomiting didn’t stop, I figured it was safe to assume it was something other than the food. After church (which began at 11 and ended at 2:30 and was a short service for them), they drove me home in our program van (puking out the window the whole way).
I was half carried to our yard, a short distance from the road through a matoke tree field. There I lay on a mattress in the shade of a tree, looking out across the landscape, and it could have been picturesque except for the vomiting and frequent trips to the outhouse part. I also had a bad fever. Just about that time four of my American friends and their host families decided to pay us an after-church visit (there’s a nice view of a waterfall from my family’s land they wanted to see). In the African tradition, they set up lawn chairs around my mattress, and about 15 people sat around to chat and watch me throw up. Even some of our chickens and dogs were interested, though more for the vomiting part (yummy) than the chatting. I was what I guess could be called “sick in style,” though sick in a very different way then I have ever been sick in the US. Here, it would be rude to leave a sick person alone.
My family took excellent care of me. Truly, I love the culture here and how well they care for one another. I’m coming to love community and communalism. It’s the love of Christ and the church in action. No one is ever left out. So being sick here (now twice) has given me a special appreciation for the African culture and family. My mom even pulled a mattress into my room and slept over, waking each time I began to be sick again. I vomited for around 12 hours, and had the fever for 48 or so. I didn’t become fully well again until Wednesday. And being well is always such a blessing after being sick. On Wednesday and Thursday my family took me out walking as much as possible (sometimes 6-8 miles at a time) to see their property and visit friends in the area. It was incredible! I loved every minute of our long walks, talking, enjoying the land, meeting random villagers. I took a ton of pictures, some of which I will post on facebook in the next few days for all to see.
Ok, this has really possibly been my longest post yet. I could say so much more, but will save you the time of reading it, and me of writing it. I better begin to do some homework…we are back to classes this week after a nice break, and have lots to do! I’m at the half-way point of my experience here. This is week 8 of around 16. Time is going by so fast and I am learning so much. I miss many of you from home. Thanks for praying and thinking of me!
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Crazy Week, Birds, and the Bush
Hello! I hope this finds you all doing well. This will be my last entry for a little while because I am leaving tomorrow to live with a family in Captura, a rural area of Uganda, for one week. These are called “rural homestays.” Each student in the Uganda is given the opportunity to spend a week in the bush experiencing the village lifestyle. I live in a village around the university, but it is not a rural village. Captura is a 7-8 hour drive away from the city into the hills. I’ve heard it’s beautiful, so I’ll probably take lots of pictures while I’m there. Most students will be placed alone in a family. This kind of makes me nervous. I live alone in a host family near the university, but I see my friends every day when I go to school. This will be one week by myself in a very new cultural setting. I am sure it will be challenging, but I also expect to learn a lot. And I think that is the important thing in just about any cross cultural setting—always go with the expectation of learning and growing. It’s impossible to leave unchanged.
We’ve been asked to take very little with us to Captura, because the families do not have many possessions. I am allowed a backpack…so I suppose it will be entertaining tonight when I try to pack a week worth of clothes, toiletries, mosquito/bug repellants as well as my rain boots, portable mosquito net, rain coat, Bible, and journal into my backpack. We’ll see how that works. It might take some magic. The rain gear is because at the end of the week, we are all going to be picked up and spend the weekend debriefing at Seepy Falls, a hiking resort. So I’ll have the opportunity to do some pretty cool hiking, but that means extra clothes (pants of some kind) and rain gear. We will not be allowed to wear trousers of any kind in the village. The modesty rules will be stricter: skirts have to go to the ankles, shoulders must be covered at all times, no visible tattoos, no dangly earrings, no makeup, sit with legs together (not crosses or apart) at all times…that’s a hard rule for me to follow. Being accustomed to sweat pants, I have the habit of sitting like a boy, legs wide apart gangster style, which is startling and rude here. Not to mention sometimes in long skirts you just need a bit of a breeze and it helps not to have to be squeezing your legs together the entire time. Haha.
Ok. That’s all beginning tomorrow. But here’s some news of the week. This week has been crazy stressful. This happens at least 2-3 weeks every semester it seems. All of the sudden everything is due at the same time and it’s crept up on the procrastinating student who suddenly has ten assignments and two days…ok, it hasn’t been that extreme, but close. I had a paper due on Tuesday, a paper and two presentations due today, and I have an exam tomorrow! It will be my first exam here in Uganda, so I have no idea what to expect. But with all of the other assignments, I haven’t had time to study until today…so that’s rough. But as the French say “c’est la vie.” That’s life. And the week is nearly finished, and we won’t be attending classes next week, so the rural homestays will be a chance to relax a bit. Sort of like a spring break, except instead of tanning on a beach I’ll be sleeping in a grass hut and squatting over holes to…
Sometimes I’m amazed at how well I’ve adjusted to the lifestyle here. I just don’t really have time or energy to freak out about things most Americans would freak out about—it’s desensitizing in a way. For instance, bugs and outhouses are just a part of my everyday here, along with the lack of toilet paper—and I don’t even flinch anymore when I pee on my foot/leg, which happens about every day. But lots of the things are the same here as well. African people are people too, just like us. There are cultural differences, sure, but people are people everywhere. We still eat three meals a day, live in houses, sleep in beds, go to college, put off assignments, hang out in the dorms on campus…they’ve encouraged us not to romanticize Africa in our blogging and messages home. I hope I haven’t done that. I hope reading my blog that you get some sense of the differences, some of the similarities, and that you are able to share in the lessons with me. God’s Kingdom is incredibly diverse. All people are created in his image and have unique things to contribute to the Kingdom.
So this is random. But I keep forgetting to mention it and it’s something sort of funny. Sitting in class the first couple of weeks, I thought I was going insane. I kept hearing this beeping noise. Beep, beep, beep. Were other people hearing it too? Where did it come from? I asked around and discovered that people did indeed hear it, and like me, were utterly distracted by it in class. It’s hard to focus in class here anyway, because the classrooms are practically open air and thus don’t shut out any sights, sounds, or noised from outside, but the beeping was especially aggravating. So we asked someone who’s lived here for a long time. The source of the mysterious beeping/ticking noise (this is a reference to a youtube video some of my friends might know of and enjoy)? A bird! Yes, that’s right. And while we don’t know its official name, and I’ve never been able to actually see it, we call it “The Catch Phrase Bird” because if you’ve ever played the game of Catch Phrase, that’s exactly what the bird sounds like. And there’s one camped out somewhere near my house right now as well…thank God for earplugs! If only I could find some way to block it out in class. And just once I want to see the bird.
We’ve been asked to take very little with us to Captura, because the families do not have many possessions. I am allowed a backpack…so I suppose it will be entertaining tonight when I try to pack a week worth of clothes, toiletries, mosquito/bug repellants as well as my rain boots, portable mosquito net, rain coat, Bible, and journal into my backpack. We’ll see how that works. It might take some magic. The rain gear is because at the end of the week, we are all going to be picked up and spend the weekend debriefing at Seepy Falls, a hiking resort. So I’ll have the opportunity to do some pretty cool hiking, but that means extra clothes (pants of some kind) and rain gear. We will not be allowed to wear trousers of any kind in the village. The modesty rules will be stricter: skirts have to go to the ankles, shoulders must be covered at all times, no visible tattoos, no dangly earrings, no makeup, sit with legs together (not crosses or apart) at all times…that’s a hard rule for me to follow. Being accustomed to sweat pants, I have the habit of sitting like a boy, legs wide apart gangster style, which is startling and rude here. Not to mention sometimes in long skirts you just need a bit of a breeze and it helps not to have to be squeezing your legs together the entire time. Haha.
Ok. That’s all beginning tomorrow. But here’s some news of the week. This week has been crazy stressful. This happens at least 2-3 weeks every semester it seems. All of the sudden everything is due at the same time and it’s crept up on the procrastinating student who suddenly has ten assignments and two days…ok, it hasn’t been that extreme, but close. I had a paper due on Tuesday, a paper and two presentations due today, and I have an exam tomorrow! It will be my first exam here in Uganda, so I have no idea what to expect. But with all of the other assignments, I haven’t had time to study until today…so that’s rough. But as the French say “c’est la vie.” That’s life. And the week is nearly finished, and we won’t be attending classes next week, so the rural homestays will be a chance to relax a bit. Sort of like a spring break, except instead of tanning on a beach I’ll be sleeping in a grass hut and squatting over holes to…
Sometimes I’m amazed at how well I’ve adjusted to the lifestyle here. I just don’t really have time or energy to freak out about things most Americans would freak out about—it’s desensitizing in a way. For instance, bugs and outhouses are just a part of my everyday here, along with the lack of toilet paper—and I don’t even flinch anymore when I pee on my foot/leg, which happens about every day. But lots of the things are the same here as well. African people are people too, just like us. There are cultural differences, sure, but people are people everywhere. We still eat three meals a day, live in houses, sleep in beds, go to college, put off assignments, hang out in the dorms on campus…they’ve encouraged us not to romanticize Africa in our blogging and messages home. I hope I haven’t done that. I hope reading my blog that you get some sense of the differences, some of the similarities, and that you are able to share in the lessons with me. God’s Kingdom is incredibly diverse. All people are created in his image and have unique things to contribute to the Kingdom.
So this is random. But I keep forgetting to mention it and it’s something sort of funny. Sitting in class the first couple of weeks, I thought I was going insane. I kept hearing this beeping noise. Beep, beep, beep. Were other people hearing it too? Where did it come from? I asked around and discovered that people did indeed hear it, and like me, were utterly distracted by it in class. It’s hard to focus in class here anyway, because the classrooms are practically open air and thus don’t shut out any sights, sounds, or noised from outside, but the beeping was especially aggravating. So we asked someone who’s lived here for a long time. The source of the mysterious beeping/ticking noise (this is a reference to a youtube video some of my friends might know of and enjoy)? A bird! Yes, that’s right. And while we don’t know its official name, and I’ve never been able to actually see it, we call it “The Catch Phrase Bird” because if you’ve ever played the game of Catch Phrase, that’s exactly what the bird sounds like. And there’s one camped out somewhere near my house right now as well…thank God for earplugs! If only I could find some way to block it out in class. And just once I want to see the bird.
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Week 5
Hello amazing friends and family. I hope you all are doing well. I realized today it's been a while since I've sent out one of my mass emails, so here goes. I have, however posted on my blog in the past week, so you can check that out as well.
This is week 5 of my stay in Uganda. Every Friday, I tick another week off of my calendar and can't believe I've been here for so long already and how fast the time has gone!! In these five weeks, I've taken two weekend trips (Jinja and Rackai), done a lot of course work, including four presentations and a paper, made American and Ugandan friends, learned a little of the Luganda language, written a lot of sociology fieldwork journals for my degree at Milligan, become a part of a family, walked who knows how many miles, acquired love handles from waayy too much rice and bread, cooked nobake cookies for my family, had my eye-glasses stolen and miraculously returned, taken terrifying rides in matatus (Ugandan taxis), learned to love matoke (staple food made of mashed green bananas), handwashed my clothes three times, attended two Anglican church services each lasting 2.5 hours and in Luganda, learned to pee in a bucket without peeing on the floor, not learned to pee in the outhouse without peeing on my foot, made friends with our cow Kwagala (which means loved one or love)...besides a lot of other really fun and challenging stuff. Every morning I wake up and still can't believe I am in Africa and loving it here. I really have no complaints. Life here is different, but good.
I am absolutely in love with my family here. Mama Joyce, Ida, and I are becoming fast friends, sisters, family. It's really cool. And a guy named Dennis recently moved in with us, and he's cool as well. Sometimes communicating is tough because they all have to work in their second language, but we are getting by and beginning to know each other. I enjoy going to school and seeing all of my friends, but I look forward every night to returning home. I always get home just in time for tea and bread (quickly becoming two of my favorite things ever). We eat buttered white bread and take hot tea with lots of sugar. It can't be healthy, but it sure is good! It's been interesting being a commuter student for the first time ever. I commute on foot between university and home everyday. I enjoy the walking, even in the mud, because then I get to wear my awesome rain boots and go tromping through puddles and several inches of squishy mud. It's the rainy season here now until March I think, so it rains here everyday, sometimes all day, but the rain is beautiful in its own right, and we're still getting plenty of sunshine.
School is going really well. I am finally getting used to the amount of assignments we have due each week. Here, there aren't so many exams, but there are tons of papers, journals, and presentations. I have at least one, sometimes 2 presentations each week. It's a different education system. Now that I've got the hang of it, it isn't so stressful. I think my favoirte class is African Literature. It's been a long time since I've taken a lit class, so I am just enjoying the opportunity to read and discuss novels in class, and to write more creatively. Sometimes I feel like being a sociology major in college has killed my creative side and made me into more of a critical analysist--not that analyzing things isn't good, but I miss more creative writing and thinking. So here's my chance--and what better place to take African lit than in Africa with an African professor? And the prof is really great--he's an older eccentric guy absolutely in love with his students and teaching. I am excited for the oppportunity to get to know him. His name is Dr. Patrick Mukakanye. His last name is hard to pronounce, but I think I'm getting it down (Mook-a-con-yay).
This past weekend we travellled to a beautiful region of south western Uganda called Rakai. We were near a village called Kibaale (Chee-ball-ay). The area is right on the equator near the Uganda-Tanzania border. We took a hike up this hill/mountain thing, and it was gorgeous--from one side we could see Tanzania and from the other Uganda. We all got really sunburned in the process (forgetting we were on the equator and the malaria meds make us sun sensitive) but it was well worth it. Besides hiking, we visited a Canadian mission that was a school and medical clinic as well as a farm. It was neat to see how God is working in the region. Because I am a part of the group of students in the Intercultural Missions and Ministry Emphasis (IMME), I get to stay with my host family off campus and travel around to see different missions in Uganda. It's pretty cool. God is definitely working in my heart and confirming my calling and desire to go into long term missions after school is finished. I am learning a lot here.
I got a package from my Grandma Mira and Grandpa Joe yesterday, and it pretty much made my week. Lots of valentines goodies, and a teddy bear, as well as gifts for Mama Joyce (which she loved!). It was good to binge on some American candy and have a letter from home. Thanks also for all of the prayers and support everyone is giving me. I love hearing from you, talking to you, and the knowledge that I am thought of and prayed for is very encouraging and comforting. I am reminded that I am never alone, but am forever a part of the body of Christ, something so much bigger than me and my world!
Well, I think I'll hop off here. I was invited to tea this afternoon in the dorms with some Ugandan friends, and then I have orientation for our rural homestays. In a couple of weeks we'll be heading out to the bush to live with families in rural villages for one week. I am looking forward to the adventure and the week off of classes. I'll give all the details when I return! But for today, I just have to go to a really long, boring meeting about how not to killed in the bush...
Alright. Love you all.
--Danielle
This is week 5 of my stay in Uganda. Every Friday, I tick another week off of my calendar and can't believe I've been here for so long already and how fast the time has gone!! In these five weeks, I've taken two weekend trips (Jinja and Rackai), done a lot of course work, including four presentations and a paper, made American and Ugandan friends, learned a little of the Luganda language, written a lot of sociology fieldwork journals for my degree at Milligan, become a part of a family, walked who knows how many miles, acquired love handles from waayy too much rice and bread, cooked nobake cookies for my family, had my eye-glasses stolen and miraculously returned, taken terrifying rides in matatus (Ugandan taxis), learned to love matoke (staple food made of mashed green bananas), handwashed my clothes three times, attended two Anglican church services each lasting 2.5 hours and in Luganda, learned to pee in a bucket without peeing on the floor, not learned to pee in the outhouse without peeing on my foot, made friends with our cow Kwagala (which means loved one or love)...besides a lot of other really fun and challenging stuff. Every morning I wake up and still can't believe I am in Africa and loving it here. I really have no complaints. Life here is different, but good.
I am absolutely in love with my family here. Mama Joyce, Ida, and I are becoming fast friends, sisters, family. It's really cool. And a guy named Dennis recently moved in with us, and he's cool as well. Sometimes communicating is tough because they all have to work in their second language, but we are getting by and beginning to know each other. I enjoy going to school and seeing all of my friends, but I look forward every night to returning home. I always get home just in time for tea and bread (quickly becoming two of my favorite things ever). We eat buttered white bread and take hot tea with lots of sugar. It can't be healthy, but it sure is good! It's been interesting being a commuter student for the first time ever. I commute on foot between university and home everyday. I enjoy the walking, even in the mud, because then I get to wear my awesome rain boots and go tromping through puddles and several inches of squishy mud. It's the rainy season here now until March I think, so it rains here everyday, sometimes all day, but the rain is beautiful in its own right, and we're still getting plenty of sunshine.
School is going really well. I am finally getting used to the amount of assignments we have due each week. Here, there aren't so many exams, but there are tons of papers, journals, and presentations. I have at least one, sometimes 2 presentations each week. It's a different education system. Now that I've got the hang of it, it isn't so stressful. I think my favoirte class is African Literature. It's been a long time since I've taken a lit class, so I am just enjoying the opportunity to read and discuss novels in class, and to write more creatively. Sometimes I feel like being a sociology major in college has killed my creative side and made me into more of a critical analysist--not that analyzing things isn't good, but I miss more creative writing and thinking. So here's my chance--and what better place to take African lit than in Africa with an African professor? And the prof is really great--he's an older eccentric guy absolutely in love with his students and teaching. I am excited for the oppportunity to get to know him. His name is Dr. Patrick Mukakanye. His last name is hard to pronounce, but I think I'm getting it down (Mook-a-con-yay).
This past weekend we travellled to a beautiful region of south western Uganda called Rakai. We were near a village called Kibaale (Chee-ball-ay). The area is right on the equator near the Uganda-Tanzania border. We took a hike up this hill/mountain thing, and it was gorgeous--from one side we could see Tanzania and from the other Uganda. We all got really sunburned in the process (forgetting we were on the equator and the malaria meds make us sun sensitive) but it was well worth it. Besides hiking, we visited a Canadian mission that was a school and medical clinic as well as a farm. It was neat to see how God is working in the region. Because I am a part of the group of students in the Intercultural Missions and Ministry Emphasis (IMME), I get to stay with my host family off campus and travel around to see different missions in Uganda. It's pretty cool. God is definitely working in my heart and confirming my calling and desire to go into long term missions after school is finished. I am learning a lot here.
I got a package from my Grandma Mira and Grandpa Joe yesterday, and it pretty much made my week. Lots of valentines goodies, and a teddy bear, as well as gifts for Mama Joyce (which she loved!). It was good to binge on some American candy and have a letter from home. Thanks also for all of the prayers and support everyone is giving me. I love hearing from you, talking to you, and the knowledge that I am thought of and prayed for is very encouraging and comforting. I am reminded that I am never alone, but am forever a part of the body of Christ, something so much bigger than me and my world!
Well, I think I'll hop off here. I was invited to tea this afternoon in the dorms with some Ugandan friends, and then I have orientation for our rural homestays. In a couple of weeks we'll be heading out to the bush to live with families in rural villages for one week. I am looking forward to the adventure and the week off of classes. I'll give all the details when I return! But for today, I just have to go to a really long, boring meeting about how not to killed in the bush...
Alright. Love you all.
--Danielle
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Names, Laundry, and Matoke
So this will hopefully be a brief note including a few things I keep really wanting to say and then forgetting to. I have a few minutes, so I'll say them now.
Names in African are incredibly important. They are a part of who you are. You have a special relationship to your name whether it was given to you at birth or you were named later. Names are a part of your character. Mama Joyce chose a name for me recently: Mirembe. It means "peace." What a powerful name. It could mean so many things for me: I love peace, I am peace, I seek peace, and I am peacemaker...I could probably go on for a while. So I am proud of my name, because it reflects Mama Joyce's opinion of me, and because it challenges me to think peace in my everyday life. As Christians I think we are called to peace. What does that mean? Peaceful living with people around us, with nations around us, with nature..."Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called Children of God" (Matthew 5:9).
Ok. So laundry. I was doing it the other day and when I am washing clothes by hand I kind of feel like I am in hell. It is SO MUCH work. And it hurts your back, and my knees, and your knuckles and palms get rubbed raw...and that stain still won't come out. And if you are a Mizungu, then you didn't learn to wash clothes by hand from the time of birth, so you suck at it to boot. So here's a comical picture of my African life for you: I was washing clothes, or trying to wash them, the other day. And I had been washing for some two hours, and it was only like ten pairs of underwear, a couple of skirts, and some shirts--in total, like 20 items of clothing. So I have been laboring, and I am kind of mad at the world, and I am soaking wet, and squatting African style (this is a unique style I am convinced) by my basin, and the guy who takes care of our cow and one of his friends show up. And his friend, who I've never met before thinks this is hysterical. I have this soaking wet towel, which weighs like 20 pounds, and I don't even know where to start scrubbing and washing, and I am wearing more water than the basin holds--so he starts teasing me. And I am so not in the mood. He's like "you don't wash!?" and the cow guy (who is named Francis and I really like) says "no, they have machines." And this brings another fit of laughter from his friend and a comment like "oh I forgot. Americans are rich and they machines, but in Africa, we use our hands and they are strong..." And so I try to laugh along, and then luckily they feel sorry enough for me to help me do the towel. I was talking to a good friend via the internet. And if he reads this, I hope he doesn't mind me quoting him. He's been reading a book recently that encourages each of us every day to do something we hate. Basically, to practice the discipline of doing not-so-fun things with the cheerful and faithful heart. And that really spoke to me. What a discipline to have. To be cheerful in all circumstances, and to intentionally do something every day to challenge your cheerfulness. So last night I did laundry. And I kept that in mind. And it went so much better.
So food. Can I please just say that I love the food here? And that is such a blessing in so many ways. Americans live to eat, but Africans pretty much just eat to live, so there isn't much variety. They have a staple food called Matoke made up of smashed green banannas or something--and at first, it seems tasteless--and they eat it almost every meal. But as far as food is concerned, I realize how important it is to accept the food of the culture you are in and to accept their hospitality. So I just eat whatever comes my way. So I have a lot of Matoke. And at first it was hard. And then I had a revelation this week: I REALLY like matoke. Yum, yum. I am pretty sure I Would miss it if we didn't have it with pretty much every lunch and dinner. It's a great mixer food, going well with rice and veggies and the different sauces and soups here...so I guess if you eat anything (or maybe almost anything) enough consecutive times, eventually you come to like it.
Ok...so that's all for now. And I'm sure I'll post this and then remember something else I wanted to say. But I'll just say it later. Love you all and hope God is blessing you like He is me.
Names in African are incredibly important. They are a part of who you are. You have a special relationship to your name whether it was given to you at birth or you were named later. Names are a part of your character. Mama Joyce chose a name for me recently: Mirembe. It means "peace." What a powerful name. It could mean so many things for me: I love peace, I am peace, I seek peace, and I am peacemaker...I could probably go on for a while. So I am proud of my name, because it reflects Mama Joyce's opinion of me, and because it challenges me to think peace in my everyday life. As Christians I think we are called to peace. What does that mean? Peaceful living with people around us, with nations around us, with nature..."Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called Children of God" (Matthew 5:9).
Ok. So laundry. I was doing it the other day and when I am washing clothes by hand I kind of feel like I am in hell. It is SO MUCH work. And it hurts your back, and my knees, and your knuckles and palms get rubbed raw...and that stain still won't come out. And if you are a Mizungu, then you didn't learn to wash clothes by hand from the time of birth, so you suck at it to boot. So here's a comical picture of my African life for you: I was washing clothes, or trying to wash them, the other day. And I had been washing for some two hours, and it was only like ten pairs of underwear, a couple of skirts, and some shirts--in total, like 20 items of clothing. So I have been laboring, and I am kind of mad at the world, and I am soaking wet, and squatting African style (this is a unique style I am convinced) by my basin, and the guy who takes care of our cow and one of his friends show up. And his friend, who I've never met before thinks this is hysterical. I have this soaking wet towel, which weighs like 20 pounds, and I don't even know where to start scrubbing and washing, and I am wearing more water than the basin holds--so he starts teasing me. And I am so not in the mood. He's like "you don't wash!?" and the cow guy (who is named Francis and I really like) says "no, they have machines." And this brings another fit of laughter from his friend and a comment like "oh I forgot. Americans are rich and they machines, but in Africa, we use our hands and they are strong..." And so I try to laugh along, and then luckily they feel sorry enough for me to help me do the towel. I was talking to a good friend via the internet. And if he reads this, I hope he doesn't mind me quoting him. He's been reading a book recently that encourages each of us every day to do something we hate. Basically, to practice the discipline of doing not-so-fun things with the cheerful and faithful heart. And that really spoke to me. What a discipline to have. To be cheerful in all circumstances, and to intentionally do something every day to challenge your cheerfulness. So last night I did laundry. And I kept that in mind. And it went so much better.
So food. Can I please just say that I love the food here? And that is such a blessing in so many ways. Americans live to eat, but Africans pretty much just eat to live, so there isn't much variety. They have a staple food called Matoke made up of smashed green banannas or something--and at first, it seems tasteless--and they eat it almost every meal. But as far as food is concerned, I realize how important it is to accept the food of the culture you are in and to accept their hospitality. So I just eat whatever comes my way. So I have a lot of Matoke. And at first it was hard. And then I had a revelation this week: I REALLY like matoke. Yum, yum. I am pretty sure I Would miss it if we didn't have it with pretty much every lunch and dinner. It's a great mixer food, going well with rice and veggies and the different sauces and soups here...so I guess if you eat anything (or maybe almost anything) enough consecutive times, eventually you come to like it.
Ok...so that's all for now. And I'm sure I'll post this and then remember something else I wanted to say. But I'll just say it later. Love you all and hope God is blessing you like He is me.
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Week 4--Wow--Almost a Month!
Hello everyone! It’s been great to hear from you in email, on facebook, in blog comments, and by phone. And thank you for all of the prayers and thoughts and the coming packages. I am so far a away from home, but one of the coolest parts of this experience is to realize that no matter how far I travel, I am not disconnected from my friends and family at home, that God’s family is global, and prayer reaches to the ends of earth.
In Uganda, when a Christian asks you for your testimony, they don’t want to hear the story of how you came to Christ. There is a time and place for that, of course, and there is powerful witness in those stories, but in Uganda when someone asks for a testimony, they want to hear how God is acting HERE and NOW in your life. They want the story of this past week, yesterday, today. Africans believe in the power of presence. It is easy for them to sit in silence with one another, because a friendship does not have to be built on conversation. So to them, God is ever-present, regardless of his seeming silence—God is present and active in everyday life. I am learning how to see God in this way, how to see Him in small moments of my day to day life as well as the mountain-top moments of spiritual clarity, which are rarer. It takes discernment and practice to search for God constantly, but what a great discipline to develop—the act of sharing in God’s presence even in what seems to be the monotonous routines of my average days. And isn’t this true friendship? When you have a friend that doesn’t only come to share your good times, but is present in all your times, a friend who doesn’t necessarily come with advice or a helping hand (although those are nice), but who often comes just to sit and commune with you in silence?
So that’s a bit of insight on the spiritual journey I am pursuing in Uganda right now. I am trying not to form such a dichotomy between my spiritual and physical life. Classes are going very well right now. I am beginning to adjust to the work load and figure out the Ugandan system of doing things. It doesn’t aggravate me so much to go on scavenger hunts through various libraries to find books or to travel to printing offices for each assignment I need printed. I am hopefully coming to learn the African concept of time and simply going with the flow. Things become less aggravating when you aren’t running on such a tight schedule. When time is flexible, we have more time to meet obstacles and obstacles aren’t so daunting when you accept the fact that they are simply a part of life and when they come it isn’t a sin to stop and take the time to experience them fully. Interruptions aren’t much of an issue here—society is relationally based, so saying hi to my friend who I pass on the road is far more important than being on time to class. People trump schedules always. It’s been challenging for me to slow down. Sometimes the time here drives me nuts and I have what I like to call “mini culture rages” on the inside, but these instances are becoming fewer I think. Case and point:
On this past Friday I thought I was going to have a free day (which means no class!). But when I informed Mama Joyce of my free day, she thought that was excellent because we had been invited to a “party.” Now I have learned already to be skeptical of how Ugandan’s use the word party. It generally isn’t the same thing as the US version. And of course, it wasn’t in this case either. The party was an Anglican church service for all of the priests and clergy in the area, as well as special guests, presided over by the Anglican Bishop of the area (sound like a rocking party yet?). The church service began 45 minutes late and lasted 2.5 hours and was in Luganda to boot. I followed the liturgy of the service to some extent, but 2.5 hours in a foreign language is a long time to sit still. After the church service, there was supposed to be entertainment and food, so we all trooped over to the Bishop’s back yard. The entertainment was a highschoolish band of about 15 young people that seemed to play the same song over and over again, or a variety of songs that were nearly the same, and some songs sang by the wives of the clergy and Bishop (who had organized the party). So we all sat in chairs outside listening to this entertainment, and waited for food for over two hours (though the food could have been served immediately). So I had somewhere to be on campus at 4:00pm, and I didn’t even get food until almost 3:30, and the party had started at 10:20, when Mama Joyce and arrived for the church service, which didn’t start until 11:15 (though scheduled for 10). Sound frustrating to all of you Americans out there? It was for me. But here is the Ugandan way of seeing it: how awesome it is to get to worship with other believers for 2.5 hours—what better kind of party could Christians attend? And the entertainment was great because who doesn’t like music? And besides, we were all sitting together outside for more than two hours, which was lots of time to share in conversation and community with our friends. I was really interested in the food, and my stomach isn’t used to waiting, but patience here is a virtue, and food wasn’t the main point of the party.
This week is shaping up to be a good one, and I am looking forward to this weekend, when we are travelling to an area called Rackai (likely spelled wrong). It’s a rural area where the students interested in missions and ministry are going to meet some missionaries and see what kinds of things they are doing. It should be a fun trip, and hopefully I won’t cap it off with a case of food poisoning like I did our Jinja trip. This means persons interested in phoning me this week should probably wait until 8-9 on Sunday night (my time, which is like 12-2 your time) to call me, because the rest of the weekend will be spent on the bus/in Rackai, and I won’t have too much time to talk.
Some prayer requests: firstly, that I find my glasses. They’ve been lost in the chaos of a huge family party we had this past weekend (check out the pics on facebook), and they are either in a really strange place at home or not at home at all. So just pray that I find them or that they are returned to me. Also, just my fellow students, that we are all adjusting well to Uganda and learning and not getting homesick…etc.
Well, time to jump off here and go to lunch. Love you all and am looking forward to hearing from you!
--Danielle
In Uganda, when a Christian asks you for your testimony, they don’t want to hear the story of how you came to Christ. There is a time and place for that, of course, and there is powerful witness in those stories, but in Uganda when someone asks for a testimony, they want to hear how God is acting HERE and NOW in your life. They want the story of this past week, yesterday, today. Africans believe in the power of presence. It is easy for them to sit in silence with one another, because a friendship does not have to be built on conversation. So to them, God is ever-present, regardless of his seeming silence—God is present and active in everyday life. I am learning how to see God in this way, how to see Him in small moments of my day to day life as well as the mountain-top moments of spiritual clarity, which are rarer. It takes discernment and practice to search for God constantly, but what a great discipline to develop—the act of sharing in God’s presence even in what seems to be the monotonous routines of my average days. And isn’t this true friendship? When you have a friend that doesn’t only come to share your good times, but is present in all your times, a friend who doesn’t necessarily come with advice or a helping hand (although those are nice), but who often comes just to sit and commune with you in silence?
So that’s a bit of insight on the spiritual journey I am pursuing in Uganda right now. I am trying not to form such a dichotomy between my spiritual and physical life. Classes are going very well right now. I am beginning to adjust to the work load and figure out the Ugandan system of doing things. It doesn’t aggravate me so much to go on scavenger hunts through various libraries to find books or to travel to printing offices for each assignment I need printed. I am hopefully coming to learn the African concept of time and simply going with the flow. Things become less aggravating when you aren’t running on such a tight schedule. When time is flexible, we have more time to meet obstacles and obstacles aren’t so daunting when you accept the fact that they are simply a part of life and when they come it isn’t a sin to stop and take the time to experience them fully. Interruptions aren’t much of an issue here—society is relationally based, so saying hi to my friend who I pass on the road is far more important than being on time to class. People trump schedules always. It’s been challenging for me to slow down. Sometimes the time here drives me nuts and I have what I like to call “mini culture rages” on the inside, but these instances are becoming fewer I think. Case and point:
On this past Friday I thought I was going to have a free day (which means no class!). But when I informed Mama Joyce of my free day, she thought that was excellent because we had been invited to a “party.” Now I have learned already to be skeptical of how Ugandan’s use the word party. It generally isn’t the same thing as the US version. And of course, it wasn’t in this case either. The party was an Anglican church service for all of the priests and clergy in the area, as well as special guests, presided over by the Anglican Bishop of the area (sound like a rocking party yet?). The church service began 45 minutes late and lasted 2.5 hours and was in Luganda to boot. I followed the liturgy of the service to some extent, but 2.5 hours in a foreign language is a long time to sit still. After the church service, there was supposed to be entertainment and food, so we all trooped over to the Bishop’s back yard. The entertainment was a highschoolish band of about 15 young people that seemed to play the same song over and over again, or a variety of songs that were nearly the same, and some songs sang by the wives of the clergy and Bishop (who had organized the party). So we all sat in chairs outside listening to this entertainment, and waited for food for over two hours (though the food could have been served immediately). So I had somewhere to be on campus at 4:00pm, and I didn’t even get food until almost 3:30, and the party had started at 10:20, when Mama Joyce and arrived for the church service, which didn’t start until 11:15 (though scheduled for 10). Sound frustrating to all of you Americans out there? It was for me. But here is the Ugandan way of seeing it: how awesome it is to get to worship with other believers for 2.5 hours—what better kind of party could Christians attend? And the entertainment was great because who doesn’t like music? And besides, we were all sitting together outside for more than two hours, which was lots of time to share in conversation and community with our friends. I was really interested in the food, and my stomach isn’t used to waiting, but patience here is a virtue, and food wasn’t the main point of the party.
This week is shaping up to be a good one, and I am looking forward to this weekend, when we are travelling to an area called Rackai (likely spelled wrong). It’s a rural area where the students interested in missions and ministry are going to meet some missionaries and see what kinds of things they are doing. It should be a fun trip, and hopefully I won’t cap it off with a case of food poisoning like I did our Jinja trip. This means persons interested in phoning me this week should probably wait until 8-9 on Sunday night (my time, which is like 12-2 your time) to call me, because the rest of the weekend will be spent on the bus/in Rackai, and I won’t have too much time to talk.
Some prayer requests: firstly, that I find my glasses. They’ve been lost in the chaos of a huge family party we had this past weekend (check out the pics on facebook), and they are either in a really strange place at home or not at home at all. So just pray that I find them or that they are returned to me. Also, just my fellow students, that we are all adjusting well to Uganda and learning and not getting homesick…etc.
Well, time to jump off here and go to lunch. Love you all and am looking forward to hearing from you!
--Danielle
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Facebook Photos
And if anyone wants to view my photos of the trip so far, log onto facebook. If you have an account, friend me so you can see my photos.
If you don't have an account, the following public links should allow you to see my photos anyway:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2010049&l=51de7&id=162900835
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2009976&l=795ce&id=162900835
If you don't have an account, the following public links should allow you to see my photos anyway:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2010049&l=51de7&id=162900835
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2009976&l=795ce&id=162900835
Week Three: Food Poisoning--the Nile Virus? :)
Hey everyone! I hope you all are doing well. I am doing really well now. This weekend we took an amazing trip to a town called Jinja. It is right on Lake Victoria, which is the source of the Nile River. So we got to take several really cool tours around the town, and a boatride on the lake to the source of the Nile. It was so beautiful!
The sad thing was I got really sick with food poisoning on the way home on Sunday--so I spent 1.5 hours on the bus puking my guts out, and continued puking until 8-9 pm on Sunday night. Brooke, one of my leaders, called Mama Joyce to let her know I was really sick and that Americans prefer to be left alone when they are sick. That lasted about an hour and a half, and then Mama Joyce just couldn't resist. The African culture is very different. Here, when someone is sick, it is very rude and offensive to ignore them. Instead, you should do everything you can do to help them and wait on them. They have no qualms about seeing sick people or being seen when they are sick--they expect people to help them when they are ill and they do the same thing for others. It is the difference between the individualistic culture and the communal culture. I explained to Mama Joyce how we hate being seen sick because it is embarrassing--we don't like being seen at our worst. And we don't like to feel like a burden on other people, so we hate to see people take so much time to help us. She said that is not the way in Africa. And she said she tried to stay away, but she is a mother and it's not natural for her to leave a sick child alone. I appreciated the help. I don't really know how to be sick here. Everything is so different. Our toilets are 50 feet or so outside of the house. I tried a couple of times to run to the outhouse from my bedroom, carrying the basin I was puking in, but that didn't work so much. So eventually I just sat outside for a while. Then Mama Joyce came and explained to me that if I was "diareteting" they had a bucket inside I could use. So while that felt very strange and embarrassing to me, she assured me "that's how we do it" so I spent the rest of the evening sitting on one bucket and puking into another. I'm sure it was a sad picture, but I didn't care so much at the time.
Praise God I am feeling much better today. Yesterday I was still a bit queasy and skipped lunch, but I have eaten today and felt much better overall. One day of food poisoning was mild compared to some of the sicknesses I could catch here, so I suppose I'll count my blessings.
This week is going to be a bit crazy at school. I feel like American universities tend to push all of the projects and papers to the end of the semester, but in Uganda they just do them throughout. So I am a bit stressed. This week I have two long ournal entries due, and a huge paper/project due (all of this on Thursday/Friday) and I had a rough start being sick this weekend and traveliing--not much time for homework! So please pray that I am able to finish all of the assignments on time and without too much stress.
Otherwise, the weeks are flying by so far and I am really enjpying it here still. I am building better relationships with my fellow American students and beginning to find Ugandan friends as well. I am definitely becoming more a part of my host family and thinking what a blessing it is to have the opportunity to have a family here. How cool to be a genuine member of an African family! I look forward to going home from campus every night and hanging out with Mama Joyce and various other host relatives.
Well, I have to head home now actually. I have a mass amount of laundry that isn't going to do itself. I have clean underwear...but no skirts, really. So unless I want to go to class in my underwear tomorrow...looks like I get to spend some quality time with the washing basin this afternoon.
The sad thing was I got really sick with food poisoning on the way home on Sunday--so I spent 1.5 hours on the bus puking my guts out, and continued puking until 8-9 pm on Sunday night. Brooke, one of my leaders, called Mama Joyce to let her know I was really sick and that Americans prefer to be left alone when they are sick. That lasted about an hour and a half, and then Mama Joyce just couldn't resist. The African culture is very different. Here, when someone is sick, it is very rude and offensive to ignore them. Instead, you should do everything you can do to help them and wait on them. They have no qualms about seeing sick people or being seen when they are sick--they expect people to help them when they are ill and they do the same thing for others. It is the difference between the individualistic culture and the communal culture. I explained to Mama Joyce how we hate being seen sick because it is embarrassing--we don't like being seen at our worst. And we don't like to feel like a burden on other people, so we hate to see people take so much time to help us. She said that is not the way in Africa. And she said she tried to stay away, but she is a mother and it's not natural for her to leave a sick child alone. I appreciated the help. I don't really know how to be sick here. Everything is so different. Our toilets are 50 feet or so outside of the house. I tried a couple of times to run to the outhouse from my bedroom, carrying the basin I was puking in, but that didn't work so much. So eventually I just sat outside for a while. Then Mama Joyce came and explained to me that if I was "diareteting" they had a bucket inside I could use. So while that felt very strange and embarrassing to me, she assured me "that's how we do it" so I spent the rest of the evening sitting on one bucket and puking into another. I'm sure it was a sad picture, but I didn't care so much at the time.
Praise God I am feeling much better today. Yesterday I was still a bit queasy and skipped lunch, but I have eaten today and felt much better overall. One day of food poisoning was mild compared to some of the sicknesses I could catch here, so I suppose I'll count my blessings.
This week is going to be a bit crazy at school. I feel like American universities tend to push all of the projects and papers to the end of the semester, but in Uganda they just do them throughout. So I am a bit stressed. This week I have two long ournal entries due, and a huge paper/project due (all of this on Thursday/Friday) and I had a rough start being sick this weekend and traveliing--not much time for homework! So please pray that I am able to finish all of the assignments on time and without too much stress.
Otherwise, the weeks are flying by so far and I am really enjpying it here still. I am building better relationships with my fellow American students and beginning to find Ugandan friends as well. I am definitely becoming more a part of my host family and thinking what a blessing it is to have the opportunity to have a family here. How cool to be a genuine member of an African family! I look forward to going home from campus every night and hanging out with Mama Joyce and various other host relatives.
Well, I have to head home now actually. I have a mass amount of laundry that isn't going to do itself. I have clean underwear...but no skirts, really. So unless I want to go to class in my underwear tomorrow...looks like I get to spend some quality time with the washing basin this afternoon.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
week 2 news
Hello my amazing friends and families. I am doing extremely well (so far) during this second week of school at Uganda Christian University. Homework is getting slightly crazy, though, so it's been hard to find time to write.
So some more info about my family. Mama Joyce is 68 years old (as of today I think, actually), and incredibly wise. She works as the secretary to the bishop of the church we attend. I love having the opportunity to spend so much time with her. I feel so blessed to have such a special home stay situation. She has six children, only one of them is a boy. They are all grown, and all but one are married. Martin is her only son, and he has several children, including Emmanuel (Ema, for short), and adorable 2 year old who is kind of scared of me but really likes the hotwheels cars I brought to give to children, and he now knows the expression "ready, set, go," because I taught him how to race hotwheels. Mama Joyce also has a new granddaughter, Jewel, who is the daughter of Josephine, one of Mama's five daughters. The other children I have met so far are Agatha, Sharon, and Angel, three beautiful girls belonging to Martin. This weekend was amazing because I got to meet a lot of my Ugandan family--everyone kept dropping by and we had a large family dinner on Sunday night--we had these things called Chipotis, which are like fried bread (yummm) and then we had them with some sort of a meat sauce...they were really good.
School is going well so far. I have my first presentation/paper in one of my classes on Thursday this week. It's for Reading the NT in Africa, a really good but challenging class, and I am presenting about interpreting scripture in African sermons and art. Pretty cool stuff. I have lots of reading homework and presentations and papers, but not as many exams as I would have at university in the states, so that's nice I guess. The hardest thing so far is finding time to do all of my homework because we are busy on campus all day, and then I go home to Mama Joyce and want to spend time with her. But she lets me do homework at the table while we are all waiting for dinner (usually served between 9-11pm, "whenever it's ready"). So I get homework time during the evenings, I'm just torn between hanging out and reading. At any rate, tonight and tomorrow will have to be homework nights because I have to get this presentation ready! And then I have a presentation and paper due next week, on Thursday, for my class called African Traditional Religions, Christianity and Islam in Uganda. It's a good class, one of two that I have an African professor for. My other African professor is my African Literature teacher. He's a really eccentric, kind of funny older man. He didn't even come to class the first day, and they called him and he was like "I didn't know I had to teach today...and I'm in Kampala, so I'm not coming back". So that was a funny start to the semester. I'm not sure how much I'll learn about African lit, but he'll be a fun guy to get to know. He really likes having American students. The biggest problem with the African teachers is communication--we don't understand their accents, and they don't understand ours...so in my notes sometimes I write the wrong words, and we all look at each others notes, trying to figure out who heard the prof correctly. Good times. I'm sure I'll eventually understand. If I could sit through French lectures this summer (in French) I should be able to understand African English!
Lat night I had dinner with Brooke, one of my profs and the director of the missions emphasis program, and her husband, a Ugandan man I met for the first time. Brooke is pregnant with their first child, so that's exciting. We had some good ol American sandwiches. I don’t really like sandwiches, but it was actually nice not to have to eat a lot—because in Uganda the portions are huge and it’s rude to only have one portion…so I have been eating mass amounts of food. It was nice to just have half a sandwich and stop eating. And I'll take American food and dinner at 7:30 when I have the opportunity (my dinners are normally between 9-10pm)! It was fun to hang out with Brooke, her husband, and some of the other missions students (we were all invited). The rest of the week is basically filled with classes. Then this weekend we are traveling to a town called Jinja to visit some missionaries who work in a prison ministry there. We'll get to listen to them and ask questions and then we'll get to hang out in the city. We'll be attending a Baptist church on Sunday, and Chuck, one of our students, is preaching.
Also some other prayer requests: we have a student who is pretty sick right now. His name is Geoff and he has a virus of some sort--it's not malaria (praise God), but it's pretty bad, and he has had a really high fever. He seems to be improving, but still needs prayer. And Kaia, one of the other girls, also isn’t feeling well. So pray for Kaia and Geoff, and just for God's protection for all of us. Also keep a guy named Chuck in your prayers—he’s one of our students who has volunteered to preach this Sunday while we are travelling and visiting a Baptist church in a town called Jinja.
This week I have met a couple of Ugandan friends (one girl, one guy) on campus. The girl especially is really nice. Her name is Judith. She studies some kind of social work, so we’re interested in similar things. I am looking forward to getting to know her more. I just hope the relationships are genuine. They caution us to be careful in our relationships. Many people here have the misconception that American’s are rich, and also that white women are sexually loose/promiscuous. This is our fault. Pretty much all they see of American is Hollywood. So just imagine if all you knew of the US was James Bond and American Pie. They don’t get very many examples of what most Americans are actually like. So I have to be careful making friends that they aren’t just trying to get close to me to take advantage of me. It sucks to have to be suspicious, but since I don’t really know how to navigate this culture yet, suspicion is pretty healthy. The guy friend wanted to talk on the phone and wants me to visit his hostel, but I told him I would prefer to meet in person, in public, to talk. So I took a couple of girl friends to the café on campus and we had an awesome conversation and he seems genuinely nice. But I don’t really intend to let my guard down just yet. I have in my reserves an imaginary husband or boyfriend if need be not to mention a fairly intimidating father and brother who would fly all the way to Uganda to chase off the boys…Caleb especially wouldn’t mind beating a few people up for me. I’m generally glad he’s on my side He might be my little brother, but he’s never shy to take up for me. The American guys here take up for us too. They’re always willing to come along when we go out so we’re not alone.
On Sunday I helped teach Sunday school at the church I go to. It was great. I don’t any of the kids’ names yet, but I’ll continue to work with them throughout the semester. They are ages 7-9 and lots of fun. We sang songs and then one of the other teachers told them the story of Moses and related it really well to them. Then we did a memory verse that went along with the lesson. Eventually I will have the opportunity to be the storyteller, so that’s pretty cool.
Hmmm. This has been a fairly long email. I'm sure there's more stories to tell, but I should probably do some homework or something...I'll write again when I can--later this week or the weekend. For mom and dad, my camera seems fine...I think I got it clean, but I haven't really taken pics with it yet since this weekend. Sorry to wake you up on Sunday morning. I think being so upset about something so small was probably a sign of the culture shock I am going through. But I am feeling great right now, loving this experience, trying to live it up, meeting new people..learning culture...it's good.
and PS anyone who wants can check out some photos that I posted on the internet at http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=30302363&l=501e8&id=162900835
So some more info about my family. Mama Joyce is 68 years old (as of today I think, actually), and incredibly wise. She works as the secretary to the bishop of the church we attend. I love having the opportunity to spend so much time with her. I feel so blessed to have such a special home stay situation. She has six children, only one of them is a boy. They are all grown, and all but one are married. Martin is her only son, and he has several children, including Emmanuel (Ema, for short), and adorable 2 year old who is kind of scared of me but really likes the hotwheels cars I brought to give to children, and he now knows the expression "ready, set, go," because I taught him how to race hotwheels. Mama Joyce also has a new granddaughter, Jewel, who is the daughter of Josephine, one of Mama's five daughters. The other children I have met so far are Agatha, Sharon, and Angel, three beautiful girls belonging to Martin. This weekend was amazing because I got to meet a lot of my Ugandan family--everyone kept dropping by and we had a large family dinner on Sunday night--we had these things called Chipotis, which are like fried bread (yummm) and then we had them with some sort of a meat sauce...they were really good.
School is going well so far. I have my first presentation/paper in one of my classes on Thursday this week. It's for Reading the NT in Africa, a really good but challenging class, and I am presenting about interpreting scripture in African sermons and art. Pretty cool stuff. I have lots of reading homework and presentations and papers, but not as many exams as I would have at university in the states, so that's nice I guess. The hardest thing so far is finding time to do all of my homework because we are busy on campus all day, and then I go home to Mama Joyce and want to spend time with her. But she lets me do homework at the table while we are all waiting for dinner (usually served between 9-11pm, "whenever it's ready"). So I get homework time during the evenings, I'm just torn between hanging out and reading. At any rate, tonight and tomorrow will have to be homework nights because I have to get this presentation ready! And then I have a presentation and paper due next week, on Thursday, for my class called African Traditional Religions, Christianity and Islam in Uganda. It's a good class, one of two that I have an African professor for. My other African professor is my African Literature teacher. He's a really eccentric, kind of funny older man. He didn't even come to class the first day, and they called him and he was like "I didn't know I had to teach today...and I'm in Kampala, so I'm not coming back". So that was a funny start to the semester. I'm not sure how much I'll learn about African lit, but he'll be a fun guy to get to know. He really likes having American students. The biggest problem with the African teachers is communication--we don't understand their accents, and they don't understand ours...so in my notes sometimes I write the wrong words, and we all look at each others notes, trying to figure out who heard the prof correctly. Good times. I'm sure I'll eventually understand. If I could sit through French lectures this summer (in French) I should be able to understand African English!
Lat night I had dinner with Brooke, one of my profs and the director of the missions emphasis program, and her husband, a Ugandan man I met for the first time. Brooke is pregnant with their first child, so that's exciting. We had some good ol American sandwiches. I don’t really like sandwiches, but it was actually nice not to have to eat a lot—because in Uganda the portions are huge and it’s rude to only have one portion…so I have been eating mass amounts of food. It was nice to just have half a sandwich and stop eating. And I'll take American food and dinner at 7:30 when I have the opportunity (my dinners are normally between 9-10pm)! It was fun to hang out with Brooke, her husband, and some of the other missions students (we were all invited). The rest of the week is basically filled with classes. Then this weekend we are traveling to a town called Jinja to visit some missionaries who work in a prison ministry there. We'll get to listen to them and ask questions and then we'll get to hang out in the city. We'll be attending a Baptist church on Sunday, and Chuck, one of our students, is preaching.
Also some other prayer requests: we have a student who is pretty sick right now. His name is Geoff and he has a virus of some sort--it's not malaria (praise God), but it's pretty bad, and he has had a really high fever. He seems to be improving, but still needs prayer. And Kaia, one of the other girls, also isn’t feeling well. So pray for Kaia and Geoff, and just for God's protection for all of us. Also keep a guy named Chuck in your prayers—he’s one of our students who has volunteered to preach this Sunday while we are travelling and visiting a Baptist church in a town called Jinja.
This week I have met a couple of Ugandan friends (one girl, one guy) on campus. The girl especially is really nice. Her name is Judith. She studies some kind of social work, so we’re interested in similar things. I am looking forward to getting to know her more. I just hope the relationships are genuine. They caution us to be careful in our relationships. Many people here have the misconception that American’s are rich, and also that white women are sexually loose/promiscuous. This is our fault. Pretty much all they see of American is Hollywood. So just imagine if all you knew of the US was James Bond and American Pie. They don’t get very many examples of what most Americans are actually like. So I have to be careful making friends that they aren’t just trying to get close to me to take advantage of me. It sucks to have to be suspicious, but since I don’t really know how to navigate this culture yet, suspicion is pretty healthy. The guy friend wanted to talk on the phone and wants me to visit his hostel, but I told him I would prefer to meet in person, in public, to talk. So I took a couple of girl friends to the café on campus and we had an awesome conversation and he seems genuinely nice. But I don’t really intend to let my guard down just yet. I have in my reserves an imaginary husband or boyfriend if need be not to mention a fairly intimidating father and brother who would fly all the way to Uganda to chase off the boys…Caleb especially wouldn’t mind beating a few people up for me. I’m generally glad he’s on my side He might be my little brother, but he’s never shy to take up for me. The American guys here take up for us too. They’re always willing to come along when we go out so we’re not alone.
On Sunday I helped teach Sunday school at the church I go to. It was great. I don’t any of the kids’ names yet, but I’ll continue to work with them throughout the semester. They are ages 7-9 and lots of fun. We sang songs and then one of the other teachers told them the story of Moses and related it really well to them. Then we did a memory verse that went along with the lesson. Eventually I will have the opportunity to be the storyteller, so that’s pretty cool.
Hmmm. This has been a fairly long email. I'm sure there's more stories to tell, but I should probably do some homework or something...I'll write again when I can--later this week or the weekend. For mom and dad, my camera seems fine...I think I got it clean, but I haven't really taken pics with it yet since this weekend. Sorry to wake you up on Sunday morning. I think being so upset about something so small was probably a sign of the culture shock I am going through. But I am feeling great right now, loving this experience, trying to live it up, meeting new people..learning culture...it's good.
and PS anyone who wants can check out some photos that I posted on the internet at http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=30302363&l=501e8&id=162900835
Friday, January 16, 2009
Wild Dogs and Laundry Flies
Hey! It's good to hear news of home. I am jealous you got to cuddle with the dogs, mom. I brought all kinds of pictures of the dogs here, and the rest of the family, and then when Mama Joyce looked at the pictures I realized she pretty much hates dogs, which was a turn off for her to the pictures. She was like "I don't understand you people and your dogs." I have seen a few dogs here, but mostly wild, and it's best to avoid them. So I miss having pets...but I guess the cow could count as a pet? even though she isn't exactly petable...people don't really domesticate animals here. Even when they have farm animals, they let them run pretty wild, so I walk by lots of chickens and goats on my way to school. They just wander around, and people don't really mind them, and surprisingly, people don't seem to steal them from each other. There's even a family who keeps some ducks, even though there definitely aren't any ponds or lakes near here...just puddles.
School is going well. I am not too swamped with homework yet, but I will have quite a bit in coming weeks, starting next week and this weekend. It's a lot of reading and papers. I made a make shift calendar in my notebook to try to keep track of everything. And from what my friends who have been here before say...I should be able to get away with some skimming and strategic skipping of some reading, so we'll see. And writing papers will be hard because I am used to shutting myself away from the world and having lots of privacy and time to work...and air conditioning, oh air conditioning...but I won't have those luxuries here. I am going to need to learn some serious time management! And I'm going to figure out how to make my brain work even though it's like eighty degrees outside and I am sitting here sweating in these heavy skirts...I keep having the urge to strip, but that would be quite the scandal here. Heck, women in shorts is kind of a scandal...which is hard for me. I put shorts on the other night, in the privacy of my locked room at night, and it was the greatest feeling ever...after one week of solid skirts, I was really way to excited about the shorts. The moment was truly monumental--I guess that's part of this experience, learning how to appreciate the small things in life, like shorts and showers, toilets, toilet paper, and air conditioning.
Today is our trip into Kampala, which is the closest large city to the school. Mukono is the closest town, but it's kind of like the Frankfort to Kampala's Lousiville. We are going to get to eat at a restaurant (another thing that nearly never happens here) and I am torn between trying some crazy Ugandan food and using one of my few chances to eat a hamburger and fries. I might do a bit of shopping, but Mama Joyce says it's a bit early, so I think I'll take her advice. The other exciting thing is that I'll finally get to exchange money. So dad, the answer to your question, is I am doing great with money, because so far I pretty much haven't had any because this is our first chance to exchange. Once I exchange money, I have to pay for my books, which will put an 85,000 shilling dent (about 40-50$) in my funds, but I guess that's not bad compared to the 500$ cost of books at Milligan. When I have money, I will be able to have more minutes on my cellphone, and to eat in the canteen on campus, which has food slightly more exciting than beans and rice. And there's a lady named Lydia who makes smoothies as a business, and she's very close to the canteen, which is nice, and she's also very adamant that you buy a smoothie, which is hard when you don't have money.
This weekend will be exciting for me. Tomorrow I am going to learn to handwash my clothes, which is good timing, because most of them are dirty. But it's going to be quite the chore. You have to hand wash, hang dry, and then iron anything. The ironing part is good for looks, because Ugandans hate sloppiness of appearance, but it's also because there are these flies that will lay eggs on damp clothes, and then burrow into your skin if you wear the clothes, so ironing will kill them. So I will also be learning to iron. Being presentable is so important here and it's something I am generally not, so it's a challenge for me every morning to get up, take a basin bath, put on skirts, wash my shoes, put on jewelry....the one blessing is that makeup really isn't necessary because the climate here definitely isn't condusive to makeup. So I have that down pretty well--no makeup, Check!
Also this weekend I get to help teach Sunday school for the first time. They ask that we do some kind of service while we are here, so Mama Joyce got permission from the teachers at her church to let me help. So that's exciting. They even said they would like for me to teach the class (give the lesson) at least once, which might be kind of challenging because the kids will probably speak English at varying levels. But we'll just face that hurdle when it comes. And in one of my classes, I have to do a project, using the Bible from an African perspective, so there you go--teaching a Sunday School lesson to African children.
Well, it's time to get off of the internet and begin to read, and get ready for Kampala. And also I have to pee...and the closest hole is like a ten minute walk away on campus...
School is going well. I am not too swamped with homework yet, but I will have quite a bit in coming weeks, starting next week and this weekend. It's a lot of reading and papers. I made a make shift calendar in my notebook to try to keep track of everything. And from what my friends who have been here before say...I should be able to get away with some skimming and strategic skipping of some reading, so we'll see. And writing papers will be hard because I am used to shutting myself away from the world and having lots of privacy and time to work...and air conditioning, oh air conditioning...but I won't have those luxuries here. I am going to need to learn some serious time management! And I'm going to figure out how to make my brain work even though it's like eighty degrees outside and I am sitting here sweating in these heavy skirts...I keep having the urge to strip, but that would be quite the scandal here. Heck, women in shorts is kind of a scandal...which is hard for me. I put shorts on the other night, in the privacy of my locked room at night, and it was the greatest feeling ever...after one week of solid skirts, I was really way to excited about the shorts. The moment was truly monumental--I guess that's part of this experience, learning how to appreciate the small things in life, like shorts and showers, toilets, toilet paper, and air conditioning.
Today is our trip into Kampala, which is the closest large city to the school. Mukono is the closest town, but it's kind of like the Frankfort to Kampala's Lousiville. We are going to get to eat at a restaurant (another thing that nearly never happens here) and I am torn between trying some crazy Ugandan food and using one of my few chances to eat a hamburger and fries. I might do a bit of shopping, but Mama Joyce says it's a bit early, so I think I'll take her advice. The other exciting thing is that I'll finally get to exchange money. So dad, the answer to your question, is I am doing great with money, because so far I pretty much haven't had any because this is our first chance to exchange. Once I exchange money, I have to pay for my books, which will put an 85,000 shilling dent (about 40-50$) in my funds, but I guess that's not bad compared to the 500$ cost of books at Milligan. When I have money, I will be able to have more minutes on my cellphone, and to eat in the canteen on campus, which has food slightly more exciting than beans and rice. And there's a lady named Lydia who makes smoothies as a business, and she's very close to the canteen, which is nice, and she's also very adamant that you buy a smoothie, which is hard when you don't have money.
This weekend will be exciting for me. Tomorrow I am going to learn to handwash my clothes, which is good timing, because most of them are dirty. But it's going to be quite the chore. You have to hand wash, hang dry, and then iron anything. The ironing part is good for looks, because Ugandans hate sloppiness of appearance, but it's also because there are these flies that will lay eggs on damp clothes, and then burrow into your skin if you wear the clothes, so ironing will kill them. So I will also be learning to iron. Being presentable is so important here and it's something I am generally not, so it's a challenge for me every morning to get up, take a basin bath, put on skirts, wash my shoes, put on jewelry....the one blessing is that makeup really isn't necessary because the climate here definitely isn't condusive to makeup. So I have that down pretty well--no makeup, Check!
Also this weekend I get to help teach Sunday school for the first time. They ask that we do some kind of service while we are here, so Mama Joyce got permission from the teachers at her church to let me help. So that's exciting. They even said they would like for me to teach the class (give the lesson) at least once, which might be kind of challenging because the kids will probably speak English at varying levels. But we'll just face that hurdle when it comes. And in one of my classes, I have to do a project, using the Bible from an African perspective, so there you go--teaching a Sunday School lesson to African children.
Well, it's time to get off of the internet and begin to read, and get ready for Kampala. And also I have to pee...and the closest hole is like a ten minute walk away on campus...
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Hey everyone! I hope you're all well in the US right now. Your emails have brought much encouragement and joy and nearly some tears...it's hard not to read the emails, hear your voices, and miss you! I am doing really well right now. I think with culture shock I will have good days and bad days...yesterday I was a bit sad, but talking to mom and dad, even if only for three minutes each was really nice.
I got to see the city of Mukono yesterday. It's the closest town to the University, so we just walked there and played a sort of scavenger hunt game. I bought a bottled coke and some laundry detergent (it's nearly time for my first round of handwashing clothes to take place) and a scrub brush--in Uganda, the red dirt/dust/mud gets everywhere, and the people and washing with your hands or a washcloth just isn't enough. There's no such thing as a high pressure shower, either. I take my baths out of a basin of water...it's a round basin maybe 6 inches high and a foot and a half across. A bath only involves a couple of inches of cold water poured into the basin. Then I wash my hair first, using a cup to pour water on my head and rinse the shampoo and conditioner out--which never seem to completely come out. Next I soap down my body and use my hands to scoop up water and pour it on myself--bathing with one's hands is quite a skill to have, because it takes talent to squat down, get a hand-full of water, stand up, and get the water dumped onto your back (over your shoulder) before all of the water has drained out. I haven't tackled shaving my legs yet...but it's coming in the next couple of days. My family has a bath-room, which is a room with a cement floor, clothes line, and a drain where you wash clothes or take a bath. After getting water over all the floor, you use this water-broom thing to sweep the water into the drain. The first night, while trying to dry off with my towel, I discovered what happens when you don't get all the water to the drain--you fall flat on your back on the cement floor...and then if you're me, you lie flat on your back, naked, on the floor and wonder what in the heck you are doing in Africa.
So that's bathing. Other interesting things include the food. We eat something called Matoke often. It's basically a yellow mash of a bitter banana they have here--the texture is really odd...but it passes as food when covered with some kind of a sauce. We have rice all of the time, and the dining hall on campus always has rice and beans. My family at home has better food than the campus. We mostly have rice or noodles, sometimes with Matoke and Potatoes, and then sometimes cabbage, and always some sort of sauce, the past couple of nights it's been a fish sauce of some sort. We also had some dried fish. That's lunch/dinner. My lunches are on campus, my dinners at home. I have breakfast at home as well, usually bread and butter, and tea, and the past couple of days we've had some form of egg (fried and boiled). We also drink tea in the afternoon between 7pm and dinner. Dinner here is not until between 9-10:30 pm, or in African language "whenever it is finished". I like most of the food, and am adjusting well to it. That's one thing I was worried about, but so far so good. American life centers around food--it's easy to spend the day looking forward to the next meal--here food can be important around holidays and special occassions, but it certaintly isn't a preoccupation of most people...you simply eat what you have when you have it, when it's ready. With all the walking I am doing, I would think I would lose weight, except the story here is that most girls gain weight--the portions here are huge, that's for sure. I feel forced to eat way beyond when I am full. It's rude not to have at least two portions of everything. So I am eating a lot of food at dinner especially, and then sleeping on it, but I am walking sooo much! My legs are very sore from walking so many miles on uneven, hilly roads, but it's a good muscle-building sort of sore and my knees seem to be doing well so far.
Dad, thank you for the humor of your email. It brightened my day. We do share a lot of good laughs. I remember being lost around Milligan and crying...may I never complain about being lost in the US again! Being lost in a car is nothing to being lost on foot in a foreign country, where everyone who sees you says "hey mzungu!" (white person!) and then, when you pass them for the 3rd time, says "welcome back mzungu" lol And I might have called you if I would have had a cell phone...though I doubt my village is on very many maps. It's very close to the town of Mukono, up on a hill that surrounds the city, behind the university somewhere. It's called upper Nabuuti, which is close to the correct spelling I think.
Mom, thanks for the encouragement. It was so good to hear your voice yesterday. I really liked the calendar quote. That's pretty cool. You're right about my quest for strategy, which is hard in a new culture. It drives me nuts sometimes here...I still haven't figured out the politest way to greet people, or how to make small talk--there are always lots of tiny strategies and ways of doing things in cultures, and I am doing my best here to find them. And yes, landmarks here are important. They told us it would be hard to ask directions from a Ugandan because they'll tell you to take a left at the big mango tree, a right at the grey outhouse, and another right at mayors house. And I dont know what a mango tree looks like, all outhouses seems to be gray cement, and who is the mayor anyway? :)
Alright. My posts get longer each time. As the semester picks up, with crazy amounts of homework to come, I won't have so much time to write. I love you all and thank you for the prayers!
I got to see the city of Mukono yesterday. It's the closest town to the University, so we just walked there and played a sort of scavenger hunt game. I bought a bottled coke and some laundry detergent (it's nearly time for my first round of handwashing clothes to take place) and a scrub brush--in Uganda, the red dirt/dust/mud gets everywhere, and the people and washing with your hands or a washcloth just isn't enough. There's no such thing as a high pressure shower, either. I take my baths out of a basin of water...it's a round basin maybe 6 inches high and a foot and a half across. A bath only involves a couple of inches of cold water poured into the basin. Then I wash my hair first, using a cup to pour water on my head and rinse the shampoo and conditioner out--which never seem to completely come out. Next I soap down my body and use my hands to scoop up water and pour it on myself--bathing with one's hands is quite a skill to have, because it takes talent to squat down, get a hand-full of water, stand up, and get the water dumped onto your back (over your shoulder) before all of the water has drained out. I haven't tackled shaving my legs yet...but it's coming in the next couple of days. My family has a bath-room, which is a room with a cement floor, clothes line, and a drain where you wash clothes or take a bath. After getting water over all the floor, you use this water-broom thing to sweep the water into the drain. The first night, while trying to dry off with my towel, I discovered what happens when you don't get all the water to the drain--you fall flat on your back on the cement floor...and then if you're me, you lie flat on your back, naked, on the floor and wonder what in the heck you are doing in Africa.
So that's bathing. Other interesting things include the food. We eat something called Matoke often. It's basically a yellow mash of a bitter banana they have here--the texture is really odd...but it passes as food when covered with some kind of a sauce. We have rice all of the time, and the dining hall on campus always has rice and beans. My family at home has better food than the campus. We mostly have rice or noodles, sometimes with Matoke and Potatoes, and then sometimes cabbage, and always some sort of sauce, the past couple of nights it's been a fish sauce of some sort. We also had some dried fish. That's lunch/dinner. My lunches are on campus, my dinners at home. I have breakfast at home as well, usually bread and butter, and tea, and the past couple of days we've had some form of egg (fried and boiled). We also drink tea in the afternoon between 7pm and dinner. Dinner here is not until between 9-10:30 pm, or in African language "whenever it is finished". I like most of the food, and am adjusting well to it. That's one thing I was worried about, but so far so good. American life centers around food--it's easy to spend the day looking forward to the next meal--here food can be important around holidays and special occassions, but it certaintly isn't a preoccupation of most people...you simply eat what you have when you have it, when it's ready. With all the walking I am doing, I would think I would lose weight, except the story here is that most girls gain weight--the portions here are huge, that's for sure. I feel forced to eat way beyond when I am full. It's rude not to have at least two portions of everything. So I am eating a lot of food at dinner especially, and then sleeping on it, but I am walking sooo much! My legs are very sore from walking so many miles on uneven, hilly roads, but it's a good muscle-building sort of sore and my knees seem to be doing well so far.
Dad, thank you for the humor of your email. It brightened my day. We do share a lot of good laughs. I remember being lost around Milligan and crying...may I never complain about being lost in the US again! Being lost in a car is nothing to being lost on foot in a foreign country, where everyone who sees you says "hey mzungu!" (white person!) and then, when you pass them for the 3rd time, says "welcome back mzungu" lol And I might have called you if I would have had a cell phone...though I doubt my village is on very many maps. It's very close to the town of Mukono, up on a hill that surrounds the city, behind the university somewhere. It's called upper Nabuuti, which is close to the correct spelling I think.
Mom, thanks for the encouragement. It was so good to hear your voice yesterday. I really liked the calendar quote. That's pretty cool. You're right about my quest for strategy, which is hard in a new culture. It drives me nuts sometimes here...I still haven't figured out the politest way to greet people, or how to make small talk--there are always lots of tiny strategies and ways of doing things in cultures, and I am doing my best here to find them. And yes, landmarks here are important. They told us it would be hard to ask directions from a Ugandan because they'll tell you to take a left at the big mango tree, a right at the grey outhouse, and another right at mayors house. And I dont know what a mango tree looks like, all outhouses seems to be gray cement, and who is the mayor anyway? :)
Alright. My posts get longer each time. As the semester picks up, with crazy amounts of homework to come, I won't have so much time to write. I love you all and thank you for the prayers!
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
God Bless the Cow, classes, marriage, toilets, and flashlights
On the way home yesterday I had to walk alone for the first time and I got really lost. My home is maybe 1-2 miles away (or more? it's hard to judge distance here) and about a 30 minute walk. I made it all the way to the village where I live (which is a village on lots of dirt roads that wind up and down this hill called Upper Nabuuti), and to the path/road I live on, and then couldn't recognize my home because everything is so different from the US and it all looks the same to me. So I went up and down the road, asked directions, then tried another road and went up and down it, then I began to cry because it was so scary--it's not really dangerous here, it's just scary not to know where you are and we can receive calls on our cellphones right now but don't have minutes to make calls (I should by friday, though), so I didn't know what to do. I finally went back to the original road I had tried first, and I walked down it again, very slowly, and then I saw our cow--Mama Joyce has a cow, and she came close to the road so I recognized the cow and then home. God bless that cow!! It was a trying experience, but I found out today that almost every student who had to walk home got really lost last night, so I wasn't the only one. One other girl was by herself too, and it was scary for her as well. Mama Joyce was a bit worried. She walked me to school again this morning so I wouldn't be lost. I don't think I will ever be lost again after last night, though, because now I pretty much know the entire village surrounding our house.
All of that being said, I have been tired and maybe a bit depressed today. I think it is taking a lot of energy to adjust to so many changes and that is probably why I am feeling a bit down. The first several weeks will probably be an emotional roller coaster for me. But I am still happy to be here and enjoying most of the people. Mama Joyce is incredible and I am having the opportunity to develop a very special relationship with her. We are learning a lot from each other. Pray for me also with school work--I have way more than expected. After my first couple of days it is shocking to know all of my assignments--and because I don't live on campus, I will have less time to do them. Really, I just need to relax and take in the experience. Making all As isn't really the point of being here. So I am going to do my best on everything I can, but I don't want my four months here to be nothing but studying, because there is so much more than college credit to this experience. The classes I am now taking (after some schedule shifts, which is common here) are Missions, Faith and Action, Reading the New Testament in Uganda, African Traditional Religions/Islam/Christianity in Uganda, and African Literature. So far my lit class and religion class have not met, but will be meeting tomorrow. Most classes here only meet twice a week, once for two hours and once for one hour, and the meetings are at different times. Memorizing my schedule is going to take work!!
On a humorous side, I got asked to marry someone for the first time today. A guy asked me and another white girl after chapel to "come back to Uganda, stay, and be married"--it was kind of funny. Just like Americans have all kinds of preconceptions about Africans, they also have preconceptions about us, mainly that we are extremely wealthy (which we might be by their standards, but their class system is different than ours)--many of the men will try to marry american white women so they can have money and move to the US. And they aren't afraid to propose. So it's kind of funny. I guess I need to make up an imaginary husband! :) I'm certainly not here to find one.
I am getting used to the toilets now also. I actually prefer the hole in the ground to the toilet here, because if there is a toilet here, there is no toilet seat, so you have to half-squat over the really dirty toilet...or you can just use the hole in the ground, and it takes a lot less effort to squat all the way down. And I am getting to be a fairly good aim and it doesn't bother my knees as much as I though it would. I might come back with extremely huge squatting muscles...because every time I have to pee, I have to walk forever to find a toilet (on campus, anyway) and then I have to do squats. haha.
Last night at home the power was out and I was in the dark from around 7:30pm on. Mama Joyce, Ida, and I had dinner in the dark--the only light we had was candles and a couple of flashlights. They think the crank light I brought is very neat because there are no batteries with it. It's probably something I'll leave with them at the end of the semester.
All of that being said, I have been tired and maybe a bit depressed today. I think it is taking a lot of energy to adjust to so many changes and that is probably why I am feeling a bit down. The first several weeks will probably be an emotional roller coaster for me. But I am still happy to be here and enjoying most of the people. Mama Joyce is incredible and I am having the opportunity to develop a very special relationship with her. We are learning a lot from each other. Pray for me also with school work--I have way more than expected. After my first couple of days it is shocking to know all of my assignments--and because I don't live on campus, I will have less time to do them. Really, I just need to relax and take in the experience. Making all As isn't really the point of being here. So I am going to do my best on everything I can, but I don't want my four months here to be nothing but studying, because there is so much more than college credit to this experience. The classes I am now taking (after some schedule shifts, which is common here) are Missions, Faith and Action, Reading the New Testament in Uganda, African Traditional Religions/Islam/Christianity in Uganda, and African Literature. So far my lit class and religion class have not met, but will be meeting tomorrow. Most classes here only meet twice a week, once for two hours and once for one hour, and the meetings are at different times. Memorizing my schedule is going to take work!!
On a humorous side, I got asked to marry someone for the first time today. A guy asked me and another white girl after chapel to "come back to Uganda, stay, and be married"--it was kind of funny. Just like Americans have all kinds of preconceptions about Africans, they also have preconceptions about us, mainly that we are extremely wealthy (which we might be by their standards, but their class system is different than ours)--many of the men will try to marry american white women so they can have money and move to the US. And they aren't afraid to propose. So it's kind of funny. I guess I need to make up an imaginary husband! :) I'm certainly not here to find one.
I am getting used to the toilets now also. I actually prefer the hole in the ground to the toilet here, because if there is a toilet here, there is no toilet seat, so you have to half-squat over the really dirty toilet...or you can just use the hole in the ground, and it takes a lot less effort to squat all the way down. And I am getting to be a fairly good aim and it doesn't bother my knees as much as I though it would. I might come back with extremely huge squatting muscles...because every time I have to pee, I have to walk forever to find a toilet (on campus, anyway) and then I have to do squats. haha.
Last night at home the power was out and I was in the dark from around 7:30pm on. Mama Joyce, Ida, and I had dinner in the dark--the only light we had was candles and a couple of flashlights. They think the crank light I brought is very neat because there are no batteries with it. It's probably something I'll leave with them at the end of the semester.
Sunday, January 11, 2009
My first three days in Uganda
Hey guys! I am finally getting the opportunity to get on the internet. It's Monday morning at 9:05 AM. I am on campus in the quarters for the missions emphasis students. We have a special small house on campus with two very small rooms since we don't have a dorm room because we live with families off of campus. One room has tables in it for studying and the other has couches for hanging out. Each room has lockers in it, and we each have a locker of our own with a padlock that we can leave computers and other valuables in. So that's good.
We arrived on campus at 1 AM on Friday morning. The ME (missions emphasis) students stayed in a guest house and then we had meetings all day on Friday. Immediately after meetings on Friday, they took us to the homes where we are staying and left us. It all happened very fast and was a bit disorienting, but there I was, meeting Mama Joyce, my host mom and several of her relatives, all teenage girls, who I think are her neices. Mama Joyce is a wonderful, older woman--my guess is she is in her 50s or 60s, but it's hard to tell and would be rude to ask I think. I am still trying to adjust to all of the rules of house. Mama Joyce is single, so either she was never married or her husband died, but again, it would be rude to ask. She does have several children. I have met two of her grown sons, but have not met the others yet--she has a daughter living in England, studying for her masters in education.
The house where I am at is very simple. There is a kitchen, a living room, a room with a table in it, two bedrooms (mine and Mama Joyce's), and a washroom (with the buckets that we take baths out of). The bathroom is not attached to the house. It is a small stone building with two stalls, each with a brick sized and shaped hole in the ground that you squat over to go. I am trying to get the hang out it--the frustrating thing is that we are not allowed to go outside at night, so I have to use a bucket in my room, which I empty and wash the next morning. My room has two bunkbeds in it, so it could sleep up to 4 people. I thought I would have my own room, but Mama Joyce said that there are two people (more relatives?) that sleep in there usually, only they are not here for some reason right now. That's ok, though. The company will be nice I guess. I've had lots of good conversations with Mama Joyce so far. She's teaching me a lot about the Ugandan way of life and culture. So far I haven't messed up anything too badly, but we'll see. My house is around 25-30 minutes of a walk away from university. I hope I can remember how to get home today...Mama Joyce walked me to school, but I need to walk home. There are a couple of other girls who I think I can walk with. Oh, one more thing--I have a single homestay, which means I am the only student staying, no American roommate. I am glad it worked out this way though. I think this is something I want to experience alone. Having a roommate would make it harder to build relationships in the family I think--this way, most of the time it is just me and Mama Joyce and sometimes her oldest niece, Ida, who is in her mid 20s I think. Outside of the house we also have a cow, which is kind of fun. It makes lots of noise, though, so the earplugs are definitely coming in handy. The village I am living in is called upper Nabootie (spelled wrong, I'm sure) so if I get lost today on my way home, Mama Joyce told me how to tell someone where I live so they can help me. The Ugandan people are very helpful and hospitable so that shouldn't be hard.
Yesterday we went to church. The service lasted 2.5 hours--crazy! and it was in another language, Luganda so I didn't understand too much. But that's ok. I'll get the hang of things. Mama Joyce arranged for me to begin helping out with one of the childrens' Sunday school classes next week. I'll be working with the 7-9 year olds so that should be fun. All of the children are fascinated by me and giggle shyly and way and point and yell "mizungu" (white person!) when I walk by. It's very cute. I need to make friends with some of them and ask them to help me learn Luganda.
Today are my first classes, but I don't have class until 2. I didn't find that out until arriving on campus, so I have a long time to hang out and find my way around. Once I have classes, I let you know how they go. I am a bit nervous, but not much. The grading system here is nuts--an 80% and above is an A, though I've heard you have to work hard for that 80. So I'll stull work hard, but shouldn't have too much trouble keeping my 4.0. The home stay is the most stressful thing right now. Just pray I continue to adjust and don't get too homesick. I miss you all lots and just trying not to think about home too much or everything that's different. My ways are the foreign ways here, so I am just learning what's normal in Uganda.
We arrived on campus at 1 AM on Friday morning. The ME (missions emphasis) students stayed in a guest house and then we had meetings all day on Friday. Immediately after meetings on Friday, they took us to the homes where we are staying and left us. It all happened very fast and was a bit disorienting, but there I was, meeting Mama Joyce, my host mom and several of her relatives, all teenage girls, who I think are her neices. Mama Joyce is a wonderful, older woman--my guess is she is in her 50s or 60s, but it's hard to tell and would be rude to ask I think. I am still trying to adjust to all of the rules of house. Mama Joyce is single, so either she was never married or her husband died, but again, it would be rude to ask. She does have several children. I have met two of her grown sons, but have not met the others yet--she has a daughter living in England, studying for her masters in education.
The house where I am at is very simple. There is a kitchen, a living room, a room with a table in it, two bedrooms (mine and Mama Joyce's), and a washroom (with the buckets that we take baths out of). The bathroom is not attached to the house. It is a small stone building with two stalls, each with a brick sized and shaped hole in the ground that you squat over to go. I am trying to get the hang out it--the frustrating thing is that we are not allowed to go outside at night, so I have to use a bucket in my room, which I empty and wash the next morning. My room has two bunkbeds in it, so it could sleep up to 4 people. I thought I would have my own room, but Mama Joyce said that there are two people (more relatives?) that sleep in there usually, only they are not here for some reason right now. That's ok, though. The company will be nice I guess. I've had lots of good conversations with Mama Joyce so far. She's teaching me a lot about the Ugandan way of life and culture. So far I haven't messed up anything too badly, but we'll see. My house is around 25-30 minutes of a walk away from university. I hope I can remember how to get home today...Mama Joyce walked me to school, but I need to walk home. There are a couple of other girls who I think I can walk with. Oh, one more thing--I have a single homestay, which means I am the only student staying, no American roommate. I am glad it worked out this way though. I think this is something I want to experience alone. Having a roommate would make it harder to build relationships in the family I think--this way, most of the time it is just me and Mama Joyce and sometimes her oldest niece, Ida, who is in her mid 20s I think. Outside of the house we also have a cow, which is kind of fun. It makes lots of noise, though, so the earplugs are definitely coming in handy. The village I am living in is called upper Nabootie (spelled wrong, I'm sure) so if I get lost today on my way home, Mama Joyce told me how to tell someone where I live so they can help me. The Ugandan people are very helpful and hospitable so that shouldn't be hard.
Yesterday we went to church. The service lasted 2.5 hours--crazy! and it was in another language, Luganda so I didn't understand too much. But that's ok. I'll get the hang of things. Mama Joyce arranged for me to begin helping out with one of the childrens' Sunday school classes next week. I'll be working with the 7-9 year olds so that should be fun. All of the children are fascinated by me and giggle shyly and way and point and yell "mizungu" (white person!) when I walk by. It's very cute. I need to make friends with some of them and ask them to help me learn Luganda.
Today are my first classes, but I don't have class until 2. I didn't find that out until arriving on campus, so I have a long time to hang out and find my way around. Once I have classes, I let you know how they go. I am a bit nervous, but not much. The grading system here is nuts--an 80% and above is an A, though I've heard you have to work hard for that 80. So I'll stull work hard, but shouldn't have too much trouble keeping my 4.0. The home stay is the most stressful thing right now. Just pray I continue to adjust and don't get too homesick. I miss you all lots and just trying not to think about home too much or everything that's different. My ways are the foreign ways here, so I am just learning what's normal in Uganda.
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
Tomorrow is the Big Day!
My time in Kentucky has come to an end. Early tomorrow morning I will be heading to the airport to take off on this crazy adventure. Everything still seems kind of surreal, like it's not really happening, like it can't be me that's going to be spending a semester in Uganda beginning tomorrow. I'm sure it will set in about the time on Friday night when we set foot in the Entebbe airport. "Oh wow. I'm really here. What was I thinking last summer when I applied?" Sometimes it's good to be a bit impulsive and not give yourself time to talk yourself out of things.
I am a bit sad tonight. I have said goodbye to one of my best friends, to my brother, and to his puppy so far. The hardest goodbyes will be my parents tomorrow morning, but I might be half asleep for those...so I'll probably be more upset about that later on when I'm fully awake. It's been a good break with my family, but this has been hanging over our heads for most of my 3 and a half week Christmas break. This will be the biggest goodbye we've said so far, my longest time in one stretch away from home. It will be good for me, though, because I really want to do full time missions someday and that will entail being abroad for years at a time. So here goes. I'm taking my leap of faith tomorrow, jumping head first into a completely new environment--I have never met anyone I will be travelling with, I have never been to Africa, and I have never been away from home for more than 8-9 weeks.
Today has been a crazy day of running around trying to tie off all of the lose ends. I got up, did some cleaning and laundry, played/yelled at my dogs for a while...then went out to chiropractor and bank...came home for like twenty minutes to check on the dogs, went back out to lunch with my dad, went to the pharmacy to get some meds for the trip, went to walmart to get some photos, came home and started to finish up my packing...went out with my mom to get ice cream and coke...and now my dad is fixing me my favorite dinner: chicken wings with mashed potatoes and peas on the side.
And tonight I will at last finish up my Poisonwood Bible assignment, hopefully clean my room, and maybe go to bed at a semi-decent hour. It'll be rise and shine at around 4am tomorrow morning!
Over the past several weeks I have gone through a roller coaster of emotions, from initial excitment to anxiety about all of the "what ifs" to sadness about leaving my family to boredome for lack of friends in my hometown...and finally, God seems to have given me a peace about everything and a calm acceptance of the journey I am about to go on. I'm in that sort of numb phase, not so anxious, but not overly excited...just ready to get everything started. So here we go!
I am a bit sad tonight. I have said goodbye to one of my best friends, to my brother, and to his puppy so far. The hardest goodbyes will be my parents tomorrow morning, but I might be half asleep for those...so I'll probably be more upset about that later on when I'm fully awake. It's been a good break with my family, but this has been hanging over our heads for most of my 3 and a half week Christmas break. This will be the biggest goodbye we've said so far, my longest time in one stretch away from home. It will be good for me, though, because I really want to do full time missions someday and that will entail being abroad for years at a time. So here goes. I'm taking my leap of faith tomorrow, jumping head first into a completely new environment--I have never met anyone I will be travelling with, I have never been to Africa, and I have never been away from home for more than 8-9 weeks.
Today has been a crazy day of running around trying to tie off all of the lose ends. I got up, did some cleaning and laundry, played/yelled at my dogs for a while...then went out to chiropractor and bank...came home for like twenty minutes to check on the dogs, went back out to lunch with my dad, went to the pharmacy to get some meds for the trip, went to walmart to get some photos, came home and started to finish up my packing...went out with my mom to get ice cream and coke...and now my dad is fixing me my favorite dinner: chicken wings with mashed potatoes and peas on the side.
And tonight I will at last finish up my Poisonwood Bible assignment, hopefully clean my room, and maybe go to bed at a semi-decent hour. It'll be rise and shine at around 4am tomorrow morning!
Over the past several weeks I have gone through a roller coaster of emotions, from initial excitment to anxiety about all of the "what ifs" to sadness about leaving my family to boredome for lack of friends in my hometown...and finally, God seems to have given me a peace about everything and a calm acceptance of the journey I am about to go on. I'm in that sort of numb phase, not so anxious, but not overly excited...just ready to get everything started. So here we go!
Thursday, January 1, 2009
One Week to Go
Happy New Years! Only one week until I leave for Uganda! It still doesn't seem real. I am not sure it will hit me until I get on the plane...and then there's no turning back! After several weeks of shopping, and a couple of shopping sprees this past week, I think I finally have everything I need for the trip. I am still waiting on a couple of books from amazon, crossing my fingers that they will arrive in the next week. We'll see. But I have bug spray, suncreen, shirts and skirts, sandals and other summery yet comfy shoes, a huge duffel/suitcase thing, all sorts of medicine, my shots...the list goes on. To make sure I didn't forget anything, I made a packing list which was the entire front side of a piece of notebook paper...but I have at last crossed off pretty much everything, and it all seems to fit in the suitcase, which is a good thing.
Mostly now, it's a waiting game. Each day brings me one more day closer to departure. I am trying to hang out with my family and friends before I leave, getting in my goodbyes. I am trying to see movies in the theater because there are so many good ones right now. I am drinking as much coke as possible because I love it and am not sure how many opportunities I will have to drink it while I am there. I am going to the gym, doing my best to get my knees as strong as possible before I go since I have had problems in the past. Lastly, I'm doing some reading to get mentally and spiritually prepared.
My dad told me he has two children who like to take risks. If you know the family, you'll know what he means. I am the child who takes calculated risks...but it still scares me. This is definitely the biggest leap away from home and my comfort zone that I have ever taken...but risks are generally profitable. I am pretty sure this is going to be the experience of a lifetime.
Mostly now, it's a waiting game. Each day brings me one more day closer to departure. I am trying to hang out with my family and friends before I leave, getting in my goodbyes. I am trying to see movies in the theater because there are so many good ones right now. I am drinking as much coke as possible because I love it and am not sure how many opportunities I will have to drink it while I am there. I am going to the gym, doing my best to get my knees as strong as possible before I go since I have had problems in the past. Lastly, I'm doing some reading to get mentally and spiritually prepared.
My dad told me he has two children who like to take risks. If you know the family, you'll know what he means. I am the child who takes calculated risks...but it still scares me. This is definitely the biggest leap away from home and my comfort zone that I have ever taken...but risks are generally profitable. I am pretty sure this is going to be the experience of a lifetime.
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