Thursday, January 31, 2008
Ahhh and now...
Two full weeks and one day in. Life is about to pick up quick. Monday we met with the primary school and discovered that Kami, me, is soon to be a not-so-renowned math and english teacher. Today, Chris met with the secondary school and will soon be teaching East African History, European History and English. He just ran out of the internet cafe to get back to the village for futbol practice that he is coaching. Our days of waking up slowly, yoga, studying, and playing with the kids all day are quickly disappearing. The holiday is over this coming Monday. Ugh. No pressure huh! Ha ha. Chris is very excited as my feelings are a little more like anxiety. But soon it will be great and you know I will be bursting at the seams.
Sam returned from Kanungu yesterday and we were so happy to see him! He left on Friday to go visit the girl's home, visit his wife, Dorcas, and see to the work being done there. Studying of Lugandan is coming along...let us just say it is coming along. We'll leave it at that. :)
We are getting closer and closer to each of the boys as the days go by. Every one of them are a giant little booger full of joy and life. They are willing to pour their love out to us with no reserves.
Today we jointly decided to bring in another boy by the name of Mowingo. He is such a bright kid that has been nothing but helpful since the first day we met him. Mowingo just lost both of his parents in the past year and has been going without food and being beaten by the girls he lives with. It didn't take very much thought to invite him to come to the home.
Chris and I are loving it here. Today we had pizza for the first time since leaving. I know I know, it has only been a couple weeks, but after eating potatoes, cabbage, beans, pinnapple, potatoes, potatoes, and rice for every meal everyday, our American diets need a bit of a spice up, if you will. Anyhoo, it was amazing. So glad you got to hear about it! :)
Thank you all for your constant prayers and support. We feel at home and very loved knowing your prayers are with us.
Love to you
Sam returned from Kanungu yesterday and we were so happy to see him! He left on Friday to go visit the girl's home, visit his wife, Dorcas, and see to the work being done there. Studying of Lugandan is coming along...let us just say it is coming along. We'll leave it at that. :)
We are getting closer and closer to each of the boys as the days go by. Every one of them are a giant little booger full of joy and life. They are willing to pour their love out to us with no reserves.
Today we jointly decided to bring in another boy by the name of Mowingo. He is such a bright kid that has been nothing but helpful since the first day we met him. Mowingo just lost both of his parents in the past year and has been going without food and being beaten by the girls he lives with. It didn't take very much thought to invite him to come to the home.
Chris and I are loving it here. Today we had pizza for the first time since leaving. I know I know, it has only been a couple weeks, but after eating potatoes, cabbage, beans, pinnapple, potatoes, potatoes, and rice for every meal everyday, our American diets need a bit of a spice up, if you will. Anyhoo, it was amazing. So glad you got to hear about it! :)
Thank you all for your constant prayers and support. We feel at home and very loved knowing your prayers are with us.
Love to you
Friday, January 25, 2008
If you would like to help...
If you have any clothes or shoes (new or used) you would like to donate, the kids would love them. Most of them have only 1 or 2 changes of clothing, so they wear the same things everyday. They don't mind because they have never known different, but anything you might send would be greatly appreciated. They play football all day, but only one boy as shoes to run in, the rest just tough out and never complain, but after any good games, its very common for them to come back with cuts, bruises, or bent toe nails.
The oldest boy is 18 and the youngest is 6. None of them are very big so anything in that range (large being the biggest) would be great. Shoe sizes anywhere from size 4 for the smallest to 11 for the oldest would be great. They are not picky though.
Send any donations to:
Dorcas Children's Home
PO Box 7161
Kampala, Uganda
Africa
The oldest boy is 18 and the youngest is 6. None of them are very big so anything in that range (large being the biggest) would be great. Shoe sizes anywhere from size 4 for the smallest to 11 for the oldest would be great. They are not picky though.
Send any donations to:
Dorcas Children's Home
PO Box 7161
Kampala, Uganda
Africa
Monday, January 21, 2008
Settling In
So much has happened in the past 5 days so I'm going to try and keep this succint. We love it here. The weather is always beautiful. It is either beautiful and sunny, or beautiful and raining. But if it does rain it lasts for only a few minutes, then drys back up and everything just looks better. The scenery is often too much to take in. Green, palm tree covered hills as far as you can see, red clay ground, and clouds that stack up like mountains in the sky. We've really never seen anything like it. Leaving Portland, the thing we thought we would miss most in the scenery were the giant mountian peaks, but here the clouds stack up so high, it looks like you are surrounded by mountains. School does not start until the 7th of Feb so over the last few days our time has been spent settling in, getting to know the kids and learning the culture. Its very different. All of the smaller children do not know much English and so both Kami and I are studying like crazy everyday to learn Lugandan. Its a really challenging language (esp in pronounciation) but its fun trying to learn and the kids love to help (and laugh at us when we get it wrong.)
Right now our life includes: Waking up at 6-6:30. Gronola bar, then we run about 4 miles through several villages. Everyone stops and points, little kids shout Mizungu! over and over. Come back, walk to the water hole, pump water, bring it back, wash body using a basin. Eat a pinneapple for breakfast. Study for awhile, see how the kids are doing. Help around the the home till lunch. Eat lunch around 1 (the food is amazing: beans, rice, bannas, potatos (called Irish), cabbage, chipati (basically like tortillas only way better tasting) and jak fruit (really sticky, really sweet.) Study vocab, help around the home. Play with the kids. Teach them songs, help study english.) At dusk every night I play futbol on a clay pitch beside the home until dark. Its my favorite time of day. When the sun sets with these clouds, the sky has a hundred layers each with a different color. If it has not rained the ground is very dry, almost like rock and none of kids have shoes. But they play anyway. At this time, Kami, if she is not playing, sits with the smaller kids laughing and playing. They crawl all over her fascited with her skin and her hair. The call her Beronzi (not spelled right) which means beautiful in Lugandan. Eat dinner around 7:30 or 8. Only time in the day Kami and I are alone, so we talk about the day and laugh and the cultural differences or stories from the kids. At 9 every night we all join together in a big room, sing songs, play drums and pray. No matter how old each of the kids are (even 6 years old) they all have perfect rythym and every night different kids play the drums. The singing is beautiful. See goodnight, kids go to sleep. Wash face, write in journal or study more words. Sleep by 10-10:30. Night is filled with more noises than I have ever heard before. Wild dogs fight outside our windown, cows walk by, birds, bats, hundreds of different sounding insects, heat bugs, periodic rain that sounds like thunder on the tin roof (it rains harder here than anywher I have ever been before), and several other sounds I have not identified yet. Haven't slept all the way through an entire night yet. Get plenty of rest though.
We're happy, getting darker, getting smarter, exhausted in the best way every night and totally content here. Tons of adjustments that make life interesting. We love you all.
Right now our life includes: Waking up at 6-6:30. Gronola bar, then we run about 4 miles through several villages. Everyone stops and points, little kids shout Mizungu! over and over. Come back, walk to the water hole, pump water, bring it back, wash body using a basin. Eat a pinneapple for breakfast. Study for awhile, see how the kids are doing. Help around the the home till lunch. Eat lunch around 1 (the food is amazing: beans, rice, bannas, potatos (called Irish), cabbage, chipati (basically like tortillas only way better tasting) and jak fruit (really sticky, really sweet.) Study vocab, help around the home. Play with the kids. Teach them songs, help study english.) At dusk every night I play futbol on a clay pitch beside the home until dark. Its my favorite time of day. When the sun sets with these clouds, the sky has a hundred layers each with a different color. If it has not rained the ground is very dry, almost like rock and none of kids have shoes. But they play anyway. At this time, Kami, if she is not playing, sits with the smaller kids laughing and playing. They crawl all over her fascited with her skin and her hair. The call her Beronzi (not spelled right) which means beautiful in Lugandan. Eat dinner around 7:30 or 8. Only time in the day Kami and I are alone, so we talk about the day and laugh and the cultural differences or stories from the kids. At 9 every night we all join together in a big room, sing songs, play drums and pray. No matter how old each of the kids are (even 6 years old) they all have perfect rythym and every night different kids play the drums. The singing is beautiful. See goodnight, kids go to sleep. Wash face, write in journal or study more words. Sleep by 10-10:30. Night is filled with more noises than I have ever heard before. Wild dogs fight outside our windown, cows walk by, birds, bats, hundreds of different sounding insects, heat bugs, periodic rain that sounds like thunder on the tin roof (it rains harder here than anywher I have ever been before), and several other sounds I have not identified yet. Haven't slept all the way through an entire night yet. Get plenty of rest though.
We're happy, getting darker, getting smarter, exhausted in the best way every night and totally content here. Tons of adjustments that make life interesting. We love you all.
Thursday, January 17, 2008
We're in Africa!
Kami and I made it into Kampala, Uganda Wednesday morning. (Tuesday evening for everyone in the states.) Its basically like walking around in a dream. We both keep looking at each other wondering if it is real.
The trip was pretty eventful. Kami had something bad to eat for lunch before we left and as we began taxiing out she starting throwing up. This continued periodically through out the night. Probably about 14 times in all. Lets just say all of the flight attendants knew us really well. (Sub thought: British people are really nice, and they use great words like cheers even when someone is sick.) Don't worry moms, she is fine and smiling. They gave her a first class sleeping seat and she slept the rest of the morning away. We found a place to sleep in the London airport and both slept for 5 hrs until we boarded our plane that evening. Since we slept all afternoon, I couldn't sleep the entire flight, but it paid off because at 5 AM I opened my window shade and saw the outline of the sunrise begining. There was no clouds and no obstructions as far as I could see and for the next hour I watched the sun rise over Africa. It was unreal! The sun really does look burnt red when it rises here. As it starting unrolling over the land, I saw the Nile river below us, and just like the light, it was so expanisive I couldn't see where it ended. We landed at 8:40 in the morning and drove through Entebbe, the outskirts of Kampals, then the city itself and finally through the last road toward the home.
When we got to the road leading to the home, we got out of the car to find all the of children and the kids from the surrounding village there to meet us with drums and other instruments. 3 or 4 kids, probably around 6-8 years old grabbed Kami and my hands and like a marching band, we walked up the hill to the home. Pretty dang cool welcome.
We're in an interet cafe and I don't have many minutes so I have to wrap this up, but we're both healthy and so excited to get to work. We've settled in, Kami and I have our own house that more workers will come to join as the summer comes around. Its freshly built and pretty comfortable.
Last night since the eveving was 3 in the afternoon in Portland, Kami and I both couldn't sleep so we sat up all night eating licorice we brought with us and reading a really good book back and forth.
We're definitely going to sleep tonight! The kids are great. The surrounding village is warm and welcoming and we're set to get to get to start teaching and helping in the clinic. When we found some more time, we will upload pics and maybe some video.
We love you guys. We're so thankful for the support from all of you. Peace.
The trip was pretty eventful. Kami had something bad to eat for lunch before we left and as we began taxiing out she starting throwing up. This continued periodically through out the night. Probably about 14 times in all. Lets just say all of the flight attendants knew us really well. (Sub thought: British people are really nice, and they use great words like cheers even when someone is sick.) Don't worry moms, she is fine and smiling. They gave her a first class sleeping seat and she slept the rest of the morning away. We found a place to sleep in the London airport and both slept for 5 hrs until we boarded our plane that evening. Since we slept all afternoon, I couldn't sleep the entire flight, but it paid off because at 5 AM I opened my window shade and saw the outline of the sunrise begining. There was no clouds and no obstructions as far as I could see and for the next hour I watched the sun rise over Africa. It was unreal! The sun really does look burnt red when it rises here. As it starting unrolling over the land, I saw the Nile river below us, and just like the light, it was so expanisive I couldn't see where it ended. We landed at 8:40 in the morning and drove through Entebbe, the outskirts of Kampals, then the city itself and finally through the last road toward the home.
When we got to the road leading to the home, we got out of the car to find all the of children and the kids from the surrounding village there to meet us with drums and other instruments. 3 or 4 kids, probably around 6-8 years old grabbed Kami and my hands and like a marching band, we walked up the hill to the home. Pretty dang cool welcome.
We're in an interet cafe and I don't have many minutes so I have to wrap this up, but we're both healthy and so excited to get to work. We've settled in, Kami and I have our own house that more workers will come to join as the summer comes around. Its freshly built and pretty comfortable.
Last night since the eveving was 3 in the afternoon in Portland, Kami and I both couldn't sleep so we sat up all night eating licorice we brought with us and reading a really good book back and forth.
We're definitely going to sleep tonight! The kids are great. The surrounding village is warm and welcoming and we're set to get to get to start teaching and helping in the clinic. When we found some more time, we will upload pics and maybe some video.
We love you guys. We're so thankful for the support from all of you. Peace.
Wednesday, January 9, 2008
The Orange Book Show
Our last fund-raiser for the home went well. It was so good to be in a room full of friends and faces we haven't seen in awhile. Thank-you to everyone who came. For those of you who couldn't be there, here is a little bit of what you missed.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
