The Village

I’ve been enjoying the company of our new volunteers. Alex, Rebecca and Kate are all full of life and super excited about being here. It is really good to be with people who are so anxious to dive in.

Last weekend we went to our first church service in the village. We went with our good friend George to his village about an hour-and-a-half away. The church building is literally on George’s property. Despite being an hour late to the service (thanks to Uganda’s lovely public transportation system) the congregation waited for us to arrive before starting. They welcomed us with open arms. The building we worshiped in had a footprint of about 10’x20’. The framework for the walls and roof were small tree trunks slowly being taken over by termites. The walls were constructed using dried cow dung, and the roof was corrugated aluminum sheets. There were all of about 30 people in the building including the 5 of us. The rhythm of hands clapping and feet stomping was worship in and of itself. They sang from such a sincere place to the Lord’s provision in their lives. For some of them, even making it church that day was a victory and testament to the Lord moving. I never cease to be amazed as to how thankful these people are to even the smallest things in their lives. You will see in the picture the worship team leading us. Most of which are George’s children.

We’ve been spending valuable time with some of the Suubi women and some of our friends who own shops on Main St. I am becoming more and more comfortable in my interaction with Ugandans and the natural dynamics that occur in time spent with them. Long periods of silence are no longer uncomfortable for me. It is getting easier to understand some of their heavy accents. It is even easier for me to read some of their non-verbal communication and body language. Baby step #2 is to conquer the local language. This one may take a while.

Unexpected Perspectives

One travels to a place like Africa with so many pre-conceived notions. Some are certain to be in the neighborhood of accurate, others nowhere close. There is one in particular which has caught me off-guard; specifically, how despair and poverty affect me in so many differing ways.

I fully expected to see and experience Uganda from a constant place of heartache and longing to help the people I pass by and interact with on a daily basis. To a certain extent, this has indeed been my experience.

These photos are of two kids I have come across here in Uganda. One is the daughter of one of the Suubi women, the other a friend of ours who hangs out at the house just about every day. These pictures are no different than the vast majority of what we in America see flooding our media outlets on a regular basis. This picture is what compels us to give of our money, maybe our prayers and sometimes even our time. Rightfully so. What I did not expect is to see some of these same children on the street and find myself being frustrated by their involuntary reaction to my presence, namely outstretched arms asking for a handout. For some of them, the sight of a “mazungu,” or white person triggers this response, almost like Pavlov’s dog. How, why am I so overcome with two completely differing emotions under very similar circumstances? I think part of it is the immediate change in their demeanor. They really don’t seem to care one way or another about who I am or why I’m here. They’re really not even interested in shooting me a quick smile or even saying hello. Why would they? Just as I have been programmed by my culture and society to respond a certain way to the poor, so too have they to respond a certain way to a mazungu. Realizing this has definitely changed the vast majority of my internal responses to these children I see everyday.

One other thing I have started noticing is my internal response to some of the men here. I came expecting a hard heart towards just about every man I came across. Not only are we not “programmed” in the U.S. to care for some of these broken men, but my experience of these men through those who have been before me has established quite a stigma. Most of what I have seen and heard about the presence of the male in Ugandan culture has left a strong distaste in my mouth. I have come across and entered into friendships with several men who have, once again, broken the mold for my heart’s response to their situation. I have recently had several conversations with a man who has seven children, six of whom he is trying to send to school. Keep in mind the biggest, largest, craziest dream a Ugandan parent experiences is that their children can go to and make it through High School or maybe even University. Other than that, they just want to be able to afford food and a safe place to stay. Up until the last couple of years, he has been able to afford to send his children to school because he made good money working in a larger Ugandan company. He was laid off due to downsizing and, like many Americans as of late, his life changed. He has since been holding down a steady job, making decent money, but not enough to actually send six kids to school. My time with him has led me to believe he is a good, honest man who simply wants his children to have the hope of a better life. This man’s face and story are not told in the U.S. His picture is not highlighted in any magazine. This saddens my heart. Even in my conversations with him, he is reluctant to voice this great need in his life because he does not want to be just like all the other Ugandans who see the color of my skin and inevitably want only one thing. I am hopeful that I am somehow able to help this man. I am hopeful his story isn’t pushed aside any longer.

Reality...At Least So Far

To be honest, blogging is a very difficult thing for me at the moment. I sit and stare at the keyboard and haven’t the foggiest idea of anything important I have to say. It’s frustrating. That being said, here’s my best effort…

As Rachel and I try to learn how to balance running an efficient business with pouring ourselves into the people we have come here to help, we are finding it is a more challenging balancing act than we would care to admit. Rachel came home earlier this week and shared with me an experience she had. She had been walking home from visiting some of the Suubi women and noticed a young girl walking very slowly with her hands over her face crying. Upon getting a little closer to the girl, Rachel noticed she was bleeding from the mouth. The young girl’s mother had beaten her because she was not working hard enough at home. Rachel took her to a clinic, got her some medicine, treated her to a banana, Coke, and doughnuts and wasn’t sure what to do from there. The girl insisted she was ready to go back home and she understood how to properly apply her medicine. Although Rachel’s response to this experience was, “How can I send this young girl back to a mother who beats her,” my response was, “imagine the good you did in this little girl’s heart even if it was just for a couple hours.” This is an experience in which one feels they are really helping, even if it’s for a brief moment. Yesterday, I spent the majority of the day gluing tiny stickers on small beads and walking all over town just to find a particular zipper I was looking for. These are experiences in which one questions whether they are really helping at all. Although it’s not always glamorous, the reality we are experiencing is most of what we do is not, as Dave Hansow would say, sexy. Most of what we do is not seen or heard about in inspiring documentary films or talked about on cool hip websites. That’s probably the way it should be. What I can say is what we do is necessary, is important, is making a difference. It’s the efficient piecing together of the small mundane things with the big inspiring things that really allow us to truly help. Realizing this has helped me a great deal.

I have really been enjoying my time with some of our friends around the compound. Betty takes care of the house for us. She lives behind our house on the compound with her son Kimby and her cousin Sharon who is in grade school. George is our night guard. We see him from about 6 pm on during the week. They have all become such a delight for me to be around. We are all starting to become more integrated into each other’s daily routines in terms of conversation and relational dynamics. This has been such a joy for me to experience.

Days One & Two

It is the morning after our first night in the house…our first night in our new home. It has been an interesting start to this journey. Our 26-hour trip to Entebbe International Airport in Uganda ended with Rachel and I waiting in line at the lost luggage counter. Joe, Melissa and Heather picked us up at the Central Inn yesterday around noon. We proceeded to Kampala from there.

Kampala is like nothing I have ever seen or experienced before…nothing. Complete chaos. People everywhere. Filth consumes everything. The smells are indescribable. We began the day at Café Pap where we enjoyed some fresh Mango juice, straight from the fruit. We proceeded to Owino Market to find paper for beads. Owino reminds me of the slums you see in Slumdog Millionaire. The smell of raw meat covered in flies, sewage, old fruit and vegetables, human bodies that probably haven’t seen a shower or bath in months, among numerous other unknown scents was enough to keep me in the balance between losing it completely and barely keeping it all in. We were carted around the city in an old, beat up mini-van of sorts. Then came rush hour traffic…We would literally sit in traffic (not moving) for 10-15 minutes at a time only to move forward all of 30 ft before the waiting continued. The traffic was bumper to bumper and in all directions. What I mean by this is cars, piki’s (motorcycles), bicycles, buses, etc. were stuck facing all directions, no rhyme or reason, facing 360 different directions like a puzzle, inches separating one vehicle from the next. Mass chaos. The 2-hour drive back to Jinja was nice for the most part. Speed limits are non-existent. Go at your own pace. Pass whenever you feel like it and hope oncoming traffic leaves enough room for you to squeak by. There seemed to be a consistent presence of flashing headlights; no idea as to why. I am still working on solving this mystery.

My sleep pattern is still working itself out. Getting to sleep is not typically the problem…staying asleep is. Over and out. RS