319...

That is the number of speed bumps we went over yesterday as we traveled back from Moyo to Kampala (Thanks to Genevieve and Caitlin for counting). Words will not do justice to what we have gone through! The Nile river, baboons by the side of the road, camping in the middle of a village, praise and worship at the light of a single lightbulb with hundreds of villagers dancing their praises to God, hours upon hours of rough driving. We have been so blessed! Nothing has gone even remotely wrong; not a single sickness, not a single accident! We are so grateful! 

Thanks for your prayers. We leave Uganda at midnight tonight and should be getting into Chicago around 2 pm tomorrow. Then we should be back at Grace around 7 pm. Come out and see us...we are all eager to see you!

Guelaba (bye)

Casomesa (Small Teacher i.e., Carlos)

Beautiful People

Here I am in Kampala with Edgar by my side...yes, we are doing some last minute shopping for our camping trip tomorrow. That's right we will be camping at the site where we will be helping with the church. Two nights of camping in Uganda...it doesn't get better than that!
The people here are amazing! They are always greeting you with a smile and ready to just drop everything for you...BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE, beautiful country! This trip has been incredible. We have been challenged, we have grown as a team and as individuals.
We will be crossing the Nile river tomorrow...twice!
This is a rather random post...we are ALL homesick but love being here.
Thanks for your prayers!
Carlos

The Week Ahead

Well, the VBS was a blast!! We had close to 250 kids. We had a great plan which fell apart within the first few minutes but the team adapted, improvised and overcame! Praise the Lord!

We will likely not be posting anything in the next few days as we are leaving for the pastor's conference tomorrow, in fact, this may be the last post for the trip (we won't have internet access for the remainder of the trip). Also, we had a bit of a change of plans, we will be traveling to Moyo instead of Gulu from Tuesday to Thursday. The place is farther north than Gulu... we have been assured there is nothing to worry about as far as security is concerned, so we are going with a great desire to serve and trusting God. 

We will be helping build a church in Moyo and interacting with local villagers...more manual labor and more people time! Please pray for us! God has been very good to us and trust He will continue to guide and protect us.

Thanks!

Carlos 

And then we ate Posso...

 The picture you see to the right is a picture of the group in Entebee before we took our infamous right in a box truck. I really wish we would have taken an after picture. 

What a challenging couple of days! Mentally, Emotionally, and Physically. So far, this trip is beyond what I could have ever imagined.

God has been working here in Uganda, humbling most of us. I can't speak for everyone, but I know that working out in the field was difficult for most of us. It takes a lot of energy to cut back the "bush". I kept thinking-'ok, just a few more hours, just a few more minutes.' But, after I sat last night and processed-I realized these people do this EVERY day. They live like this, work like this, eat like this, everyday. I know it sounds silly, but, for a while I just looked around like-they'll just go home tomorrow. But, that is terrible thinking. This is their home. All their possessions are there. Ughh. This poverty...it sucks. Why, why is it that I have so much and they are sitting in dirt. Needless to say, the Holy Spirit is present and working. 

Today, we'll be working with about 300 doing a VBS. It should be A LOT of chaos. But, fun. A LOT of fun. Pray for us. 

Sorry this post is so short. But, the internet was being slow. 

Today for lunch, we'll be eating posso. It is a Ugandan meal. It's made from corn and has beens and veggies in it. 

Maybe there will be another post tonight recapping VBS- look for it. 

Keep praying. AND THANKS. 

Love from the team. 

 

"I don't know how you do it!"

This was a quote my me this morning while the missionary wife, Danielle, and I were making breakfast for about 30 people. And that's a normal count minus the 13 of us Americans! Let me tell you a little bit about her. She is an incredible godly woman. As I was talking with her this morning, my mind immedietely went to Proverbs 31. She runs her home with amazing wisdom, love, energy, patience and with a quiet strong spirit. In addition to her four kids, she has (I think) about 8 natives living in the house as well. These are kids my age and younger who for one reason or another don't have homes or possibly families. Some are not yet believers but they are being exposed to God's love and Truth of Scripture through Sunday morning church, Bible studies in this home and the many other believers around this home. Each of the kids and teens have responsibilities that they must complete each day. The girls keep the home and the boys work outside keeping the property and doing building projects for the mission. 

Our team worked outside a newly built home (will later house team members of SOS Ministries). We worked clearing the brush, weeds, and branches the covered the entire yard. That so far has been the hardest part of the trip (I think all would agree). The sun is torturous during the day and the work is rough. These men here really work hard. When it's work time they are the hardest workers I've ever seen, but in the evenings, when it's relaxing time, they are good at that too! 

This evening the 13 of us broke up into 3 groups, each with a native translator and covered our village and the surrounding villages, going to homes and inviting their children to the VBS afternoon our team will be hosting Saturday afternoon. This has been a favorite part of the trip for all of us. It was so neat to take about 3 hours and just walk through the road (trail) that led to each house. What we saw as we stopped to talk with the families was incredible. I think most of us are still processing though this as well. They live in one room huts but at every house we went to, the women and children were always outside. They were usually sitting in the dirt of their yard and busy with drying some type of food they grew or making dinner over the fire, weaving, or drying leaves for their roof. At most homes, the children were always involved with helping in some way. The toddlers would be sitting in the dirt beside their moms usually completely naked. We couldn't believe we were seeing the things that we hear about or read about from others. 

I think we are all pretty exhausted and will be going to bed early tonight. 

We are so thankful for how God has really unified our team and given us his grace having truly servant hearts shown through each person's actions. We're also amazed by the team here and their dedication to this ministry, the way the Lord uses each one and their amazing openness and kindness to us. 

Thanks for praying: that we would continue with attitudes focused on glorifying our Lord and Creator and continue to encourage one another and be a blessing to the team here - that they would be encouraged and uplifted by our presence here.

Love to all from the team!

 

"I'm going to eat so much cake, I'm going to get diabetes!"

First, let me start off by telling you...the internet connection here in the bush-not fast. Shocking, really, but praise God that we have this turtle or we wouldn't be able to communicate with you. Second, I'm running on eh, 6 hours of sleep for the last 3 days. Plus, it's 1 am at school, so I'm not liable for any terrible puns. :)

At 4 am this morning, I woke up to a crying baby. You ask, why would you tell me this? Because it was not a baby. That's right. It was a bird. I will not attempt to spell the name of this bird because I will butcher it. (pahaha) But, the literal translation of the name of this bird means, "crying baby". It was the craziest way to wake up. And for the next-uh-5 or 6 hours this bird told me his life story. Have no fear, we took pictures, and I'm pretty sure someone was chasing it around taking a video of it. 

After we were all awake, we gathered in the dinning commons to eat a lovely meal, prepared by Tibatha. It consisted of eggs, bacon, toast, and the most succulent pineapple I've ever tasted. After nearly licking the entire bowl clean, I tasted passion fruit juice. O-H-O-H-O PEOPLE. It was F-A-N-T-A-S-T-I-C! 

The best part of the day happened next. Anthony, a seminary student and a very tall man (2 meters tall-that's six feet and 8 inches for us americans), told us that we would be driving in a truck to Kampala to shop for a while. Ya, this was a box truck. It had flaps that folded over the "box" part. I took a picture-but you'll have to wait to see it. Fourteen of us piled into this box truck, with over 22 suitcases might i add, and headed to Kampala-the capital of Uganda. In Kampala, we exchanged american dollars for shillings and headed to the market. 

After the market, we hit up a place for lunch. Are you ready for this? We went to a New York pizza place that was owned by an Israeli-who, from what I was told, makes the best Mexican food in Uganda. Mmk. Enough said there. 

Once again, we piled into our box truck, flaps open so that we could see Kampala in all of it's splendor. We saw a cazy black cloud in the distance and Anthony said, "I hope we are going around that." Guess what we headed straight into-that's right. A full fledge monsoon. Ok-so I am totally exaggerating, BUT IT WAS RAINING SO HARD. We all were laughing. It was so funny. The rain stopped and we pulled onto a back road and had a safari ride. There were so many pot holes. We hit everyone of them. There was a lot of screaming and laughing. Many butts were bruised on our way into Kubamitwe, the village that we are currently staying in. 

We met our missionary's wife, as Shannon is in the USA getting over malaria-no worries, he comes on Saturday. 

Our missionaries have four precious children. We all love them. Emma is the oldest, she is cool. Elisa. Ethan. And Evan. Evan is 4. He is adorable. After dinner tonight he said, "I'm going to eat so much cake, I'm going to get diabetes." I love little kids. They say such dumb and wonderful things. 

Well, I just hit a huge wall. So, tomorrow we head to a construction project. Pray that God keeps the rain away. 

Talk to you soon. 

Thanks again for your prayers. 

Hopefully, I won't be this exhausted tomorrow!  

We have safely arrived!

The humidity, the geckos on the wall, the driving on the right hand side of the road, the sweet smell of unfamiliar foliage...yes, we have arrived in Uganda!
After a slightly delayed but otherwise uneventful fligh we arrived in London...we sat and sipped coffee, looking at each other like zombies.
Then we flew to Entebbee airport...everything went perfectly well!

We are so thankful for:

• Safe travel
• Meeting the people who were picking us up in Uganda

Praying for:

• Our trip to the village tomorrow (2.5 hour drive)
• So nobody gets sick!

Thanks for your prayers and support!