So after a loooong journey, running through Heathrow airport for a 15 minute layover in my karamojong skirt and all my beads, getting funny looks from observers upon arrival in JFK with one of my three suitcases. After figuring out the machine that makes you spend $5 to borrow a cart for 10 minutes (do people steal those things or something?!) and waiting for the suitcases that weren’t coming, I gave up and walked through the doors toward the cold NY outside. There standing down the hall were my mom, dad and Cesar! I ran towards their HUGE smiles and gave them the biggest hugs I could muster. They enjoyed the Karamojong attire and, I was glad, were not too embarrassed to walk through the airport with me and my plaid/striped skirt and colorful tribal-looking beads. Each of them were also wearing some of Karamoja that had been sent for Christmas - Dad and Cesar each had beaded bangles and Mom had a necklace made of bone. Very appropriate :-) After figuring out the baggage that ended up arriving at my house before I woke up the next morning (makes transport a lot easier - losing baggage isn’t so bad!) we walked into the frigid NY air. Fortunately Cesar was there to warm my hands during the car ride... we stopped at a grocery store to pick up some things on the way to my aunt and uncle’s house on Long Island. I went inside to see what was there... the size of that place was incredible. First thing I walk into is the produce section... in front of me are piles and piles of fruits. Outside it appears to be dead winter and yet the oranges and apples are piled high, pineapples and watermelons are numerous... you can get anything you want. I never used to find this so funny, but what a strange concept! The fruits even coincided with their stereotypical colors... oranges were orange, apples were red, bananas were yellow, lemons were yellow small and smooth. (All oranges in Uganda are green unless they’re rotten... apples are nonexistent but the few I saw in the Indian supermarkets were green... bananas are a huge variety of shapes, sizes and colors... and lemons were green huge and ridiculously lumpy - if you get the yellow ones they are quite over-ripe... oops :-P) So that was the start of the surprises... there have been many more in the meantime. My first meal was at my aunt’s house... homemade chicken soup. I could easily identify EVERY piece of meat that was in it and there was hardly any starch :-D Everything was chewable and it tasted amazing. I was quite happy :-)
Since my arrival I have been enjoying a new outlook on life. I’m still in the excitement phase of all the ‘new’ (again) things around here, but I know that I see the world differently after having spent so much time in a completely different culture, seeing the immense needs of others in this world. I’m learning more and more to appreciate what I have and to seek God, asking how He wants me to serve Him and help others see His love and what He has for them. I appreciate any prayers on guidance for the future... I feel Him calling me and that’s awesome... just have to work out the details :-)
I want to thank all of you once again for the support you’ve been to me. Whether it has been financial or in prayer, I could not have done it without you. God gave me the strength to get through the tough times while I was out there and He will continue to be with me now that I’m home and determining what to do with this new outlook on life and the plans He’s laying before me. Please continue to pray - especially about vet school. I’m still waiting to hear the final decision... April 15th at the latest. It’s definitely on my mind a lot so please be praying for peace and for me to trust God in the plans He has for me. I know that they are best but of course if they don’t go the way we expect that can be hard to really get! But I’m trying my best, and praying that our plans line up in this respect!
THANKS AGAIN! I love you guys... it’s great to be back with friends and family :-) I’ll be doing some touring with pictures and stories now that I’m back. Did a family slideshow a couple days ago but I’ll have one for churches and for schools and other things so 1. please pray that those go well and that they can really tell the story of what God is doing as well as inspire people to support ministries reaching people like those of Karamoja and 2. if you (your church, etc...) would like to hear about the ministry and what it was like out there feel free to talk to me... I’d love to share with as many as I can!
About Me
- Heidi
- I just graduated from undergrad with an Animal Science degree from Cornell University in May 2010. I decided to commit a year before vet school to do veterinary missions work in Africa through Christian Veterinary Mission. I am working with Dr. Val Shean for about 8 months with the Karamojong tribe of NE Uganda. I am currently applying to vet schools and praying to start next Fall!
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Monday, March 7, 2011
Small recap and the final weeks...
Every time I take my Leatherman out of my bag, I try to think back to the last thing I did with it. That way I can know whether I need bleach, soap, or just water. Not that my determination really makes a difference because it’s not like I ever have bleach with me, but still… the thought is intriguing anyway. And who wouldn’t want some leftover rat guts on their cheese sandwich?!
The Life of a Leatherman Knife (not including other instruments, which have ALL been used):
1. Cut an orange
2. Gut a rat
3. Cut cheese for a nice cheese and grasshopper sandwich
4. Cut tire treads to fit firestone sandals
5. Strip wires to make a converter to charge devices
6. Slaughter a cow
7. Cut garden hose to make substitute fuel line
8. Cut ropes to save drowning cows
9. Spread Nutella on piece of bread
10. Cut nails
11. Assist with eating of sugar cane (and thereby close-removal of fingertip)
12. Cow necropsy
13. Remove Africa-calluses from feet (sorry… that’s tmi I think :-P)
14. Be at-the-ready to protect against creepy guy in hotel room next door
15. Many many more uses but for now, I think this shows enough contrast :-P
As for an update of the current situation…
I am getting ready to leave Kampala for a journey to KENYA today!!! Val and I are going to meet up with Jennifer in Mbale and then take an overnight bus across the border and to Nairobi, where we will find NIELLYYYYY!!!! Then we’ll hop on the train all together tomorrow night and travel overnight to Mombasa. We have some fun plans for the train ride already, so it should be a good time. I’m SO excited for Val and Jennifer to meet Nielly because I talk about her ALL the time, so it will be good :-) We’ll spend a few days in Mombasa hanging on the beach and maybe doing some snorkeling and such. My transition out of bush life is nearly coming to a completion. After Mombasa, I’ll be heading back to Entebbe for my flight home! I’m going to miss it here a LOT, but I’m also really really excited to come home, see people and report on all the crazy things that have gone on here. Also… I have become quite the mess technologically in the past few weeks. My American phone was stolen at some point recently which is very unfortunate because I have to get all my contacts back and I lost pictures and things like that… so I’ll be requesting some of your numbers once I get home :-P Also, my computer underwent a slow death by dust invasion. First the screen wouldn’t work and then after using a projector for a while to see my emails, the bottom row of my keyboard decided to stop working. So I’ve been using Val’s when I get the chance (THANK YOU VAL!) but it has complicated communication a bit! So I’m working on getting a new one of those for when I get home (and by that I mean Daddy and Cesar are working on it :-P)… but it’s not very helpful to be without because I would like to be putting slideshows together and things but I can’t do that without my computer, so sorry if they’re not as organized as they would be when I get home! The past few days I’ve been living it up at a resort where Val is attending a conference. I was not able to get in, but instead I’ve been spending my days swimming in the Olympic size pool that’s here, so I’m happy :-)
I’ve also had plenty of time to be reading and praying and things, so I’m all caught up on God’s plan (HA :-P). But I have had some good time just getting ready for the transition back to the states and praying about the future. Some interesting and scary new thoughts, so we’ll see how it all plays out. I’m really excited about serving God wherever He takes me! But I’ve got some years to figure that all out, given vet school is next on the agenda. Continued prayers for admission would be appreciated… I would LOVE to get in this year… but I know that God’s plan is best – I’m just praying that includes vet school this year!
Thank you all for the thoughts and prayers… I can’t wait to see you again!! I’ll be back in just over a WEEK! Not sure how blogging will go from here… I will try to post again before I go, but if not, you should get a real update even with pictures when I get back to the states with REAL internet and a functioning computer!
The Life of a Leatherman Knife (not including other instruments, which have ALL been used):
1. Cut an orange
2. Gut a rat
3. Cut cheese for a nice cheese and grasshopper sandwich
4. Cut tire treads to fit firestone sandals
5. Strip wires to make a converter to charge devices
6. Slaughter a cow
7. Cut garden hose to make substitute fuel line
8. Cut ropes to save drowning cows
9. Spread Nutella on piece of bread
10. Cut nails
11. Assist with eating of sugar cane (and thereby close-removal of fingertip)
12. Cow necropsy
13. Remove Africa-calluses from feet (sorry… that’s tmi I think :-P)
14. Be at-the-ready to protect against creepy guy in hotel room next door
15. Many many more uses but for now, I think this shows enough contrast :-P
As for an update of the current situation…
I am getting ready to leave Kampala for a journey to KENYA today!!! Val and I are going to meet up with Jennifer in Mbale and then take an overnight bus across the border and to Nairobi, where we will find NIELLYYYYY!!!! Then we’ll hop on the train all together tomorrow night and travel overnight to Mombasa. We have some fun plans for the train ride already, so it should be a good time. I’m SO excited for Val and Jennifer to meet Nielly because I talk about her ALL the time, so it will be good :-) We’ll spend a few days in Mombasa hanging on the beach and maybe doing some snorkeling and such. My transition out of bush life is nearly coming to a completion. After Mombasa, I’ll be heading back to Entebbe for my flight home! I’m going to miss it here a LOT, but I’m also really really excited to come home, see people and report on all the crazy things that have gone on here. Also… I have become quite the mess technologically in the past few weeks. My American phone was stolen at some point recently which is very unfortunate because I have to get all my contacts back and I lost pictures and things like that… so I’ll be requesting some of your numbers once I get home :-P Also, my computer underwent a slow death by dust invasion. First the screen wouldn’t work and then after using a projector for a while to see my emails, the bottom row of my keyboard decided to stop working. So I’ve been using Val’s when I get the chance (THANK YOU VAL!) but it has complicated communication a bit! So I’m working on getting a new one of those for when I get home (and by that I mean Daddy and Cesar are working on it :-P)… but it’s not very helpful to be without because I would like to be putting slideshows together and things but I can’t do that without my computer, so sorry if they’re not as organized as they would be when I get home! The past few days I’ve been living it up at a resort where Val is attending a conference. I was not able to get in, but instead I’ve been spending my days swimming in the Olympic size pool that’s here, so I’m happy :-)
I’ve also had plenty of time to be reading and praying and things, so I’m all caught up on God’s plan (HA :-P). But I have had some good time just getting ready for the transition back to the states and praying about the future. Some interesting and scary new thoughts, so we’ll see how it all plays out. I’m really excited about serving God wherever He takes me! But I’ve got some years to figure that all out, given vet school is next on the agenda. Continued prayers for admission would be appreciated… I would LOVE to get in this year… but I know that God’s plan is best – I’m just praying that includes vet school this year!
Thank you all for the thoughts and prayers… I can’t wait to see you again!! I’ll be back in just over a WEEK! Not sure how blogging will go from here… I will try to post again before I go, but if not, you should get a real update even with pictures when I get back to the states with REAL internet and a functioning computer!
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Wow... One month left!
Oh my goodness, I just realized this is my last week in Karamoja. That is insane! So here’s the plan… as I’m sure you can assume by now, that doesn’t mean it’s what will actually happen… it’s just what is kind of laid out to make the mzungu in me feel better. Need some sort of schedule! I’ve gotten used to them not actually meaning anything, but I still want it for some reason. So it looks like next week we’ll be in Soroti. Some guys have been building a shelter at our house there to keep the turkeys in while they’re in transit before making their way to the peace villages. They need to stay for a couple weeks and be treated to make sure they’re healthy before moving on. While we’re down there, Val and I are going to go around to the different markets and pick up what turkeys we can find… possibly 20 by 20 or so until we get to 800!!! Could take a while… but there are a few places we should be able to get a couple hundred at once and we know God will provide! So that project is moving along… the communities are SO excited about it. In our last meeting with them, one of the men said that “even the insects can’t wait!” (some saying around here I guess :-P) He also was talking about how he had never tasted the meat or eggs of a turkey and so he said – ‘bring them quickly!!!’.
After a week or so in Soroti, we will head down to Kampala for a conference for lady missionaries. Actually, it is yet to be determined whether or not I will be going to that because of registration issues. Please pray about it… I think it would be a great opportunity to debrief and hear from other missionary ladies before I leave… I would love to be able to attend! But we’ll see what God has in mind :-) If not, I may stay in Soroti for a while or hang with Val in Kampala and attend whatever I can sneak in to :-P
Then… the next part is SO exciting. Val and Jennifer and I are going to KENYA!!! There, we’re going to see one of the most amazing people ever who is going to suffocate me with her hugs, but I will forgive her because it’s going to be SO much fun. We head to Nairobi on the 8th, where we will meet up with Nielly! and then take a train to Mombasa. We will spend a few days in Mombasa which is right on the Indian Ocean and we will get to go SWIMMING! Jennifer’s training for a triathlon at the end of March so we’re going to work on her swimming skills :-P I also hear the water’s warm… which is nice :-) I’m basically going straight from there to the airport, which is a bit unfortunate because it may be essentially three days of straight traveling, but it’ll be worth it! I’m very excited to get home to the family and all, so that will be nice :-) I feel a little bad that I’m actually going to be in semi-real civilization before I come home. It would have been funny to go straight from Karamoja to NY but maybe it’s good to have a little transition to decrease the culture shock. Though it still is… a liiiiitle bit different. And I still haven’t worn anything but a skirt in seven months. So I’m looking forward to that… and to food that I don’t need to wonder what it is and forks and people and not speaking with an African accent and a hot shower… and many many other things!
So I didn’t really update you on recent activities. Many of you may have seen on Facebook some of our adventures. Last week we had a rat roast! Jennifer had hunted one gigantic pack-rat down in her house and killed it with a mop. So when Val and I discovered this and as one of her cats began to play with it (it was MUCH bigger than the small cat) we quickly intervened and told her to put it in her fridge for the next day. She hesitantly agreed to the idea and we organized to roast it up with a couple of our Teso friends. I unfortunately have to admit to actually really enjoying the rat! I couldn’t believe it. But seriously… they did a very good job of roasting it – they skinned it first which is different from the Karamojong style and is the reason it was even edible… but it was actually good! I think maybe it was a bit like a mixture of chicken and pork taste. Very tender and we even used McCormick’s Grillmates that we had gotten from a vet doctor in America while Val was there. There are plenty of fun pictures, so I think you’ll enjoy those!
I have also become a surgeon as of late. After we roasted the rat, Jennifer brought her cat over to be neutered. I got to be the surgeon with Val as my assistant watching and guiding and Jennifer as the scrub nurse. She’s normally a human nurse, but lately she’s become a vet one too! And even an anesthesiologist! Jennifer came up to Karamoja with us after we were done with meetings and obligations in Soroti. I have continued to be a surgeon here. We neutered one of our dogs, Obed, yesterday. Dog neuters are a bit more complicated (though still not at all for a real vet! :-P) and there is stitching involved and things. I did one a while ago and this one was a lot smoother even! I have gotten down some of the knots and how to suture in different ways, so that’s improvement! And even before attending vet school! We were supposed to do a spay yesterday also. It was for a local vet, but vet school here is a bachelor’s degree and they don’t exactly even learn surgeries. So we were going to do it for him but when we went to pick up the dog, we found out she has seven adorable little puppies… a variety of interesting colors (from about 3 different fathers :-P). Unfortunately this meant we couldn’t do the surgery yet, but we did take the pups and mother back to the office to clean them up and deworm them. We bathed them all, gave them some milk and cookies, and then brought them back home in the afternoon. I carried the seven puppies in a basin on my head, which was fun. I’ve taken to carrying things on my head recently (like a mattress last night and this morning)… I find it a very nice method and may take it up in the US too… though I will possibly get even funnier looks there.
Can’t wait to see you guys again! God is working around here and I am so excited to share it all with you once I get home. Thanks for the thoughts and prayers!
After a week or so in Soroti, we will head down to Kampala for a conference for lady missionaries. Actually, it is yet to be determined whether or not I will be going to that because of registration issues. Please pray about it… I think it would be a great opportunity to debrief and hear from other missionary ladies before I leave… I would love to be able to attend! But we’ll see what God has in mind :-) If not, I may stay in Soroti for a while or hang with Val in Kampala and attend whatever I can sneak in to :-P
Then… the next part is SO exciting. Val and Jennifer and I are going to KENYA!!! There, we’re going to see one of the most amazing people ever who is going to suffocate me with her hugs, but I will forgive her because it’s going to be SO much fun. We head to Nairobi on the 8th, where we will meet up with Nielly! and then take a train to Mombasa. We will spend a few days in Mombasa which is right on the Indian Ocean and we will get to go SWIMMING! Jennifer’s training for a triathlon at the end of March so we’re going to work on her swimming skills :-P I also hear the water’s warm… which is nice :-) I’m basically going straight from there to the airport, which is a bit unfortunate because it may be essentially three days of straight traveling, but it’ll be worth it! I’m very excited to get home to the family and all, so that will be nice :-) I feel a little bad that I’m actually going to be in semi-real civilization before I come home. It would have been funny to go straight from Karamoja to NY but maybe it’s good to have a little transition to decrease the culture shock. Though it still is… a liiiiitle bit different. And I still haven’t worn anything but a skirt in seven months. So I’m looking forward to that… and to food that I don’t need to wonder what it is and forks and people and not speaking with an African accent and a hot shower… and many many other things!
So I didn’t really update you on recent activities. Many of you may have seen on Facebook some of our adventures. Last week we had a rat roast! Jennifer had hunted one gigantic pack-rat down in her house and killed it with a mop. So when Val and I discovered this and as one of her cats began to play with it (it was MUCH bigger than the small cat) we quickly intervened and told her to put it in her fridge for the next day. She hesitantly agreed to the idea and we organized to roast it up with a couple of our Teso friends. I unfortunately have to admit to actually really enjoying the rat! I couldn’t believe it. But seriously… they did a very good job of roasting it – they skinned it first which is different from the Karamojong style and is the reason it was even edible… but it was actually good! I think maybe it was a bit like a mixture of chicken and pork taste. Very tender and we even used McCormick’s Grillmates that we had gotten from a vet doctor in America while Val was there. There are plenty of fun pictures, so I think you’ll enjoy those!
I have also become a surgeon as of late. After we roasted the rat, Jennifer brought her cat over to be neutered. I got to be the surgeon with Val as my assistant watching and guiding and Jennifer as the scrub nurse. She’s normally a human nurse, but lately she’s become a vet one too! And even an anesthesiologist! Jennifer came up to Karamoja with us after we were done with meetings and obligations in Soroti. I have continued to be a surgeon here. We neutered one of our dogs, Obed, yesterday. Dog neuters are a bit more complicated (though still not at all for a real vet! :-P) and there is stitching involved and things. I did one a while ago and this one was a lot smoother even! I have gotten down some of the knots and how to suture in different ways, so that’s improvement! And even before attending vet school! We were supposed to do a spay yesterday also. It was for a local vet, but vet school here is a bachelor’s degree and they don’t exactly even learn surgeries. So we were going to do it for him but when we went to pick up the dog, we found out she has seven adorable little puppies… a variety of interesting colors (from about 3 different fathers :-P). Unfortunately this meant we couldn’t do the surgery yet, but we did take the pups and mother back to the office to clean them up and deworm them. We bathed them all, gave them some milk and cookies, and then brought them back home in the afternoon. I carried the seven puppies in a basin on my head, which was fun. I’ve taken to carrying things on my head recently (like a mattress last night and this morning)… I find it a very nice method and may take it up in the US too… though I will possibly get even funnier looks there.
Can’t wait to see you guys again! God is working around here and I am so excited to share it all with you once I get home. Thanks for the thoughts and prayers!
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
I'm real Karamojong now!
So my time in Kangole has been great. I am becoming more and more Karamojong every day as I gain accoutrements, learn more of the language, eat more new things, accidentally try the ‘wrong’ local beverages, “marry” more people (or at least have people plan for me to marry them), and attempt to eliminate my rat friends from my hut.
I entered my house to what looked like a hurricane. The wind is strong around here and it can come through the four inch opening where the grass roof “meets” the concrete walls, but this seemed excessive. It was dark and with no electricity, I used my “torch” to look around the room. What gave it away was the soy beans that had been strewn across the floor… coming from a sac with ragged edges around a good size hole… obviously chewed open by a rat. Awesome. I continue the search to find various things missing. I have NO idea why, but for some reason rats seem to like bars of soap for a nice snack. Two bars of soap were missing… their wrappers left nicely on the ground. Rat poop was EVERYWHERE… luckily I had had the forethought of leaving my mosquito net down over my bed meaning that it was covered in poop but my bed was not :-) I spent the next 30 minutes or so cleaning up and sweeping the whole place (with my African broom… those ladies have strong backs to stand like that so long!). I then head over to Val’s hut, which contains almost all the food, unlock the door and slowly peer in as it opens. The sight is even worse. Pretty much everything in the hut was on the floor and hair was all over from a Dik-dik skin that the rats had happily discovered hanging within their reach. I cleaned up in the dark for a while, luckily with the help of our friend Joyce who does some work for us and showed up at just the right time, then sat down to have tea. After pouring the water, brewing the tea and taking a sip, something made me turn on my flashlight . I look in the cup and see hair covering the top layer of liquid. EW. Fun night. To say the least… I got a new cup and decided to boil the water in a saucepan that hadn’t been under the dikdik skin, got a piece of chocolate that I’d been preserving from Fred’s visit a while ago and took a deep breath. The relaxing may have been ruined slightly when one of my new friends went darting by on the ledge on the top of the wall, knocking various objects back on the floor. But at least there was no more hair in my tea.
The rest of the time in Kangole involved intermittent rat adventures… including using an overdose of an intense painkiller to get rid of my friends. Only found one dead rat (as I stepped on a hairy carcass in the dark one morning)… I’m hoping a few escaped and died outside… but I know that one is still running around… Tutu unfortunately failed at catching it – we went hunting together one night and found the rat lair… but it was still a bit too quick for us. Hopefully it decided the place was no longer safe and has evacuated by the time we get back.
Much of the rest of the time there was a youth conference going on at the Church of Uganda right outside our gate. I joined in with a few friends and had a great time. My translation was intermittent, but even when it’s not there, the music is great! More and more cultural differences come out every time I’m at a function like this. It’s amazing the attention span of these people. I realize it doesn’t help that I have no idea what they’re saying half the time and that definitely makes it harder but seriously! If we have a conference at home… there may be three sessions – morning, afternoon and evening (and that’s a ‘busy’ conference)… but here, they don’t even have that. They just have CONTINUOUS sessions from 6am until about 9pm. There are “breaks” for meals of course – but not like a relaxing break… they eat and then go back inside. There’s dancing and singing going on while people are getting food because they went in shifts – so they’d always have something going on. There’s no – go back to your room and relax-time like there would be in the states. Craziness. I had to escape many times :-P But I did enjoy it very much! It was about living “a life with a purpose”. MANY people went up and were saved during the conference. It’s also amazing how they do that. They’ll make the alter call… sometimes people go up right away but other times they don’t. If they don’t, they keep calling and eventually someone will make the move. Which is a bit similar, but the difference is that everyone starts cheering for them! At home I feel like everyone wants to make it a private thing – they hardly want people to know and they definitely don’t want to be pointed out like that. But as the cheering starts more and more people will come. And they’re not doing it for the attention – they don’t even acknowledge it – just go up and kneel amongst the others – but they don’t NOT go up because of it, which I think would happen in the states. We tend to do the ‘eyes closed’ alter call where you just raise your hand and no one is supposed to be able to see. I understand it completely cause that’s more my personality – I don’t want a big deal of it – I want to just tell God and let people see a change in me. But they start clapping louder and louder at each individual person! It’s cool. They are bold and unashamed (I think that’s biblical :-P)! So anyway… great time!
Other adventures included my Karamojong accoutrements! My friend Jacinta helped me become a real Karamojong while I was there. Some of the village girls made me a super-cool skirt (see picture hopefully!). It’s very… … … Karamojong! Striped and Plaid all at the same time. Red, green and blue all at the same time. With PLENTY of pleats. And then on top of it you’ve got to wear insane amounts of beads. So I have lots of waist beads and I still have some neck ones to finish making. It was fun :-) And shoes made of tires! Still need to work on my Ngakaramojong fluency… but I’m trying! Keep moving around to Soroti and places with other languages which is unfortunate for language learning!
Otherwise… I discovered/confirmed a new allergy to simsim… or sesame as we call it in the states. Before I came here I knew I didn’t like it, but now I know why! James, our little boy, brought me some simsim balls one morning (they’re just globbed together with sugary stuff… I’m sure they’re very tasty if you like sesame!). Of course, I couldn’t refuse them, especially cause I can’t explain anything to him since he doesn’t know English, so I generously offered to share them with him (he had brought 6). We had breakfast together and I ate two of them. Felt bad leaving the other, but I could only do so much cause my tongue already felt real funny (don’t worry… no anaphylaxis). So we each had two and left two and then we headed to church (me looking “smart” in my new k’jong outfit!). As I sat there my stomach decided to ball up into a giant rock and I sat sweating trying not to leave cause NO ONE leaves (unless they have a screaming baby). I could only make it so long, though. I awkwardly left my translator sitting there with no one to translate to and went to my hut to at least move around a bit. After using the narsty latrine and opting for some pepto bismol (not that there was really anything that helped… just had to do something!) I headed back and awkwardly squeezed into my seat. My translator was up in the choir singing so I avoided any questions that may have occurred – it’s hard to explain things because everything is always misunderstood even if they speak English. I would have had to tell him I had “some malaria” which basically just means you’re sick – it’s either “some flu” or “some malaria”. Flu = sneezey kind of deal and malaria = stomach or fever or headache or a variety of things. But he just welcomed me back when he came back and the service continued. Of course it was ridiculously long anyway – we were there until after 2:00! Service starts at “9:00” – not that that’s true… but it did start around 10 or 10:30, and that’s still four hours! So that was fun. Since I was dying and couldn’t pay attention so much to the sermon (even though it was a dude from Teso and he actually preached in English!) I decided to practice my Karamojong by reading simultaneously my K’jong Bible and my English one. As soon as my translator noticed, he started helping me! (yes… it seems as if I was encouraging not listening to the sermon :-P) He made me read it out load and then the girls next to me started hearing and were laughing and LOVING it. My translator was very impressed with my pronunciation… it’s funny because since so many of them can’t read I think it’s that much crazier that a mzungu can read their language. I just sound it out with the pronunciations I know for each letter and there ya go! So he thought it was great. He told me next time he’s going to have me do one of the readings in the beginning of the service – they’ll read a chapter from both the Old Testament and the NT – cause so many of them can’t read and don’t have Bibles. So I was quite relieved that I’m not going to be around this weekend… it’s true that I may not be that much slower than the ones who do read just because of their ability level. But there would be a LOT of laughter and I’d be in front of a LOT of people not even knowing what I was saying. I feel like that can’t go well. He quizzed me and I read an entire chapter “successfully”. I understood some things? Lol. I may not get much from it, but it’s fun. Anyway… I made it through service… luckily the reading distracted me a bit from the extreme pain in my stomach. After church I went back to my hut and of course it’s not like I could just hide and rest cause there were a bunch of little kids who thought it was way too cool that I was Karamojong and had to hang out and ask me things and play around and pester me (:-P I do love them, but man they’re crazy!). So after a while I recovered… managed to avoid lunch so that helped :-)
Then… that night. Here’s a good story (hopefully I won’t get in too much trouble!). So James came into the hut when I was sitting around with a bag of liquid. It’s not uncommon to package drinks in “peels” – little “white” (clear) bags – so he asked me for a cup so he could let me try. He told me a name for it – which I promptly forgot even after repeating it with him about a thousand times to try to get it right. I quickly poured out a second knowing I was really going to want help drinking whatever this was. It was somehow white… but a bit yellow-ish. I tried to ask him if it was made of milk based on the color… thinking about the previous experience with bongo… he said yes, but after smelling it I was pretty certain that’s not what it was – I was a bit unsure of what the smell was – not terrible – but not necessarily identifiable. I think the milk answer was a translation issue. After taking a sip – still not sure what that taste was – at least it was all liquid this time. A bit of a ‘bite’ after swallowing… I smile, pretending I’m enjoying – it really wasn’t as terrible as many things I’ve had but I really didn’t want to go through the whole cup. I offer it to him and he takes a sip and I motion to have him pour more into the other cup. Unfortunately he left me with about 3/5 of it. I try to ask him again what it’s made of and he motions to the simsim balls left from earlier. OHHHHH great. Two issues with that: One: I had just recovered from my last dose and that explained why my tongue was starting to feel strange again. And two: So… given that I can’t communicate with him there’s not much I could do, but I was pretty sure that I knew what they used simsim for (other than the balls). It is a very common way to make the local brew they drink around here. I had already had a good amount of it (I mean… a good portion of what he gave me – not that it was a lot) and to establish more facts I asked if his mother makes it. She did. Well, that almost confirms it – MANY of the ladies are alcoholics (and men as well, that is) and they often make their living by selling the stuff. So I’m not supposed to drink it… as Christians we don’t like to because of all the issues there are with alcoholism here. I drank slowly while he finished his quite quickly (it’s very possibly his main source of nutrition at home – the kids usually eat the dregs, which do have a lot of nutrients, but in America we generally consider alcohol a bad thing to give a child). I was hoping he’d decide to go home so I could dump the rest out but he just sat there. Joyce came in a little later and started talking to me (in rapid Karamojong/Kiswahili… still don’t understand why people don’t get that I don’t know what they’re saying! And they seem to think it’ll help to switch to Kiswahili which I know even less than K’jong!) Anyway… in all the confusion of her arriving and her daughter coming in and things I managed to pretend to take a last sip and put the cup in the dirty dish basin. I was wondering what would happen if Joyce smelled it cause she’s very involved in the church and would be SHOCKED that I was drinking it. (Though I was quite surprised myself :-P I didn’t exactly want it!) I was actually still a little unsure if that was really what it was… James definitely knew I wasn’t “supposed” to drink it – they all know the Christians don’t drink it… so I wasn’t sure. But she didn’t notice and that was probably good. On his way out, I tried to ask James the name again and he started giggling and looking around at Joyce and people nearby and not saying anything. That’s what really confirmed it. I gave him a look and decided not to press the issue or make a deal of it or he may be too excited that he got me to break the “law”. After that, he took 2000 shillings out of his pocket and asked me if he could come with me to Soroti the next day (I was wondering if he was trying to influence my answer with his choice of beverage). I tried to tell him that his mother would miss him… I couldn’t exactly just kidnap him! Besides, transport is 12,000, so good try :-P Nah, I coulda paid but he couldn’t really explain why he wanted to go or tell me about his parents or anything so what could I do. I left the poor kid in Kangole. I think he just wanted an adventure though, which doesn’t really work because I’ll be going to Kampala and all over after that. Anyway, my stomach decided to do the same thing that night (confirming my allergy diagnosis) only this time I couldn’t get out of dinner and I sat there sweating with the pastor’s family – trying unsuccessfully to escape after eating.
The good thing is that eating with their family has been AMAZING :-) The first day, I was sitting in the circle of 15 chairs. Every one of them filled… one by the mother, Esther, one by me and the rest by a bunch of orphan children the couple has taken in. It’s crazy because the husband is the pastor and they don’t get paid anything so it’s not like they have money. But they’ve decided to somehow help these children… they’re SO sweet… they all help each other and sacrifice for each other and it’s adorable. They all sing together a few worship songs before dinner, and although sometimes not everyone can go to school each year because the fees aren’t there, and they eat posho and beans most every day… God continues to provide. They love each other and support each other through their very tough circumstances. I really enjoyed being with them. Also… that first day they were chatting and my friend Jacinta turns to me and asks me if she’s fat. There is no question here that I find harder to answer. I have no idea what to say. I gave up and told her what I thought. I said “I have NO idea how to answer that question! In America if I said yes that would be the biggest insult ever, but here… if I say no I think it’s the same deal?!” So that sparked an entire conversation – they were very intrigued – which was SO good. “why don’t you like fat people???” lol. Some fun things to explain… but in the end they understood that I’m not supposed to eat so much!!!!! They let me serve myself and take the portions I wanted!!!!! It was awesome. I did get questioned once in a while – “don’t you want more?!” And I would say “Well, I’m quite satisfied, but it was so good I may have to take a little more” and since I was taking very small portions ( :-) ) I still wouldn’t be dying of full-ness at the end! And they would know I loved them :-) So that worked out well. Unfortunately that conversation doesn’t really work out some places. Especially the villages.
Anyway… I’m going to stop here because this is SO long! Sorry!!! Thank you, God bless you, love you, miss you all!
One and a half months!!!! CRAZY. I’m getting really excited :-D
I entered my house to what looked like a hurricane. The wind is strong around here and it can come through the four inch opening where the grass roof “meets” the concrete walls, but this seemed excessive. It was dark and with no electricity, I used my “torch” to look around the room. What gave it away was the soy beans that had been strewn across the floor… coming from a sac with ragged edges around a good size hole… obviously chewed open by a rat. Awesome. I continue the search to find various things missing. I have NO idea why, but for some reason rats seem to like bars of soap for a nice snack. Two bars of soap were missing… their wrappers left nicely on the ground. Rat poop was EVERYWHERE… luckily I had had the forethought of leaving my mosquito net down over my bed meaning that it was covered in poop but my bed was not :-) I spent the next 30 minutes or so cleaning up and sweeping the whole place (with my African broom… those ladies have strong backs to stand like that so long!). I then head over to Val’s hut, which contains almost all the food, unlock the door and slowly peer in as it opens. The sight is even worse. Pretty much everything in the hut was on the floor and hair was all over from a Dik-dik skin that the rats had happily discovered hanging within their reach. I cleaned up in the dark for a while, luckily with the help of our friend Joyce who does some work for us and showed up at just the right time, then sat down to have tea. After pouring the water, brewing the tea and taking a sip, something made me turn on my flashlight . I look in the cup and see hair covering the top layer of liquid. EW. Fun night. To say the least… I got a new cup and decided to boil the water in a saucepan that hadn’t been under the dikdik skin, got a piece of chocolate that I’d been preserving from Fred’s visit a while ago and took a deep breath. The relaxing may have been ruined slightly when one of my new friends went darting by on the ledge on the top of the wall, knocking various objects back on the floor. But at least there was no more hair in my tea.
The rest of the time in Kangole involved intermittent rat adventures… including using an overdose of an intense painkiller to get rid of my friends. Only found one dead rat (as I stepped on a hairy carcass in the dark one morning)… I’m hoping a few escaped and died outside… but I know that one is still running around… Tutu unfortunately failed at catching it – we went hunting together one night and found the rat lair… but it was still a bit too quick for us. Hopefully it decided the place was no longer safe and has evacuated by the time we get back.
Much of the rest of the time there was a youth conference going on at the Church of Uganda right outside our gate. I joined in with a few friends and had a great time. My translation was intermittent, but even when it’s not there, the music is great! More and more cultural differences come out every time I’m at a function like this. It’s amazing the attention span of these people. I realize it doesn’t help that I have no idea what they’re saying half the time and that definitely makes it harder but seriously! If we have a conference at home… there may be three sessions – morning, afternoon and evening (and that’s a ‘busy’ conference)… but here, they don’t even have that. They just have CONTINUOUS sessions from 6am until about 9pm. There are “breaks” for meals of course – but not like a relaxing break… they eat and then go back inside. There’s dancing and singing going on while people are getting food because they went in shifts – so they’d always have something going on. There’s no – go back to your room and relax-time like there would be in the states. Craziness. I had to escape many times :-P But I did enjoy it very much! It was about living “a life with a purpose”. MANY people went up and were saved during the conference. It’s also amazing how they do that. They’ll make the alter call… sometimes people go up right away but other times they don’t. If they don’t, they keep calling and eventually someone will make the move. Which is a bit similar, but the difference is that everyone starts cheering for them! At home I feel like everyone wants to make it a private thing – they hardly want people to know and they definitely don’t want to be pointed out like that. But as the cheering starts more and more people will come. And they’re not doing it for the attention – they don’t even acknowledge it – just go up and kneel amongst the others – but they don’t NOT go up because of it, which I think would happen in the states. We tend to do the ‘eyes closed’ alter call where you just raise your hand and no one is supposed to be able to see. I understand it completely cause that’s more my personality – I don’t want a big deal of it – I want to just tell God and let people see a change in me. But they start clapping louder and louder at each individual person! It’s cool. They are bold and unashamed (I think that’s biblical :-P)! So anyway… great time!
Other adventures included my Karamojong accoutrements! My friend Jacinta helped me become a real Karamojong while I was there. Some of the village girls made me a super-cool skirt (see picture hopefully!). It’s very… … … Karamojong! Striped and Plaid all at the same time. Red, green and blue all at the same time. With PLENTY of pleats. And then on top of it you’ve got to wear insane amounts of beads. So I have lots of waist beads and I still have some neck ones to finish making. It was fun :-) And shoes made of tires! Still need to work on my Ngakaramojong fluency… but I’m trying! Keep moving around to Soroti and places with other languages which is unfortunate for language learning!
Otherwise… I discovered/confirmed a new allergy to simsim… or sesame as we call it in the states. Before I came here I knew I didn’t like it, but now I know why! James, our little boy, brought me some simsim balls one morning (they’re just globbed together with sugary stuff… I’m sure they’re very tasty if you like sesame!). Of course, I couldn’t refuse them, especially cause I can’t explain anything to him since he doesn’t know English, so I generously offered to share them with him (he had brought 6). We had breakfast together and I ate two of them. Felt bad leaving the other, but I could only do so much cause my tongue already felt real funny (don’t worry… no anaphylaxis). So we each had two and left two and then we headed to church (me looking “smart” in my new k’jong outfit!). As I sat there my stomach decided to ball up into a giant rock and I sat sweating trying not to leave cause NO ONE leaves (unless they have a screaming baby). I could only make it so long, though. I awkwardly left my translator sitting there with no one to translate to and went to my hut to at least move around a bit. After using the narsty latrine and opting for some pepto bismol (not that there was really anything that helped… just had to do something!) I headed back and awkwardly squeezed into my seat. My translator was up in the choir singing so I avoided any questions that may have occurred – it’s hard to explain things because everything is always misunderstood even if they speak English. I would have had to tell him I had “some malaria” which basically just means you’re sick – it’s either “some flu” or “some malaria”. Flu = sneezey kind of deal and malaria = stomach or fever or headache or a variety of things. But he just welcomed me back when he came back and the service continued. Of course it was ridiculously long anyway – we were there until after 2:00! Service starts at “9:00” – not that that’s true… but it did start around 10 or 10:30, and that’s still four hours! So that was fun. Since I was dying and couldn’t pay attention so much to the sermon (even though it was a dude from Teso and he actually preached in English!) I decided to practice my Karamojong by reading simultaneously my K’jong Bible and my English one. As soon as my translator noticed, he started helping me! (yes… it seems as if I was encouraging not listening to the sermon :-P) He made me read it out load and then the girls next to me started hearing and were laughing and LOVING it. My translator was very impressed with my pronunciation… it’s funny because since so many of them can’t read I think it’s that much crazier that a mzungu can read their language. I just sound it out with the pronunciations I know for each letter and there ya go! So he thought it was great. He told me next time he’s going to have me do one of the readings in the beginning of the service – they’ll read a chapter from both the Old Testament and the NT – cause so many of them can’t read and don’t have Bibles. So I was quite relieved that I’m not going to be around this weekend… it’s true that I may not be that much slower than the ones who do read just because of their ability level. But there would be a LOT of laughter and I’d be in front of a LOT of people not even knowing what I was saying. I feel like that can’t go well. He quizzed me and I read an entire chapter “successfully”. I understood some things? Lol. I may not get much from it, but it’s fun. Anyway… I made it through service… luckily the reading distracted me a bit from the extreme pain in my stomach. After church I went back to my hut and of course it’s not like I could just hide and rest cause there were a bunch of little kids who thought it was way too cool that I was Karamojong and had to hang out and ask me things and play around and pester me (:-P I do love them, but man they’re crazy!). So after a while I recovered… managed to avoid lunch so that helped :-)
Then… that night. Here’s a good story (hopefully I won’t get in too much trouble!). So James came into the hut when I was sitting around with a bag of liquid. It’s not uncommon to package drinks in “peels” – little “white” (clear) bags – so he asked me for a cup so he could let me try. He told me a name for it – which I promptly forgot even after repeating it with him about a thousand times to try to get it right. I quickly poured out a second knowing I was really going to want help drinking whatever this was. It was somehow white… but a bit yellow-ish. I tried to ask him if it was made of milk based on the color… thinking about the previous experience with bongo… he said yes, but after smelling it I was pretty certain that’s not what it was – I was a bit unsure of what the smell was – not terrible – but not necessarily identifiable. I think the milk answer was a translation issue. After taking a sip – still not sure what that taste was – at least it was all liquid this time. A bit of a ‘bite’ after swallowing… I smile, pretending I’m enjoying – it really wasn’t as terrible as many things I’ve had but I really didn’t want to go through the whole cup. I offer it to him and he takes a sip and I motion to have him pour more into the other cup. Unfortunately he left me with about 3/5 of it. I try to ask him again what it’s made of and he motions to the simsim balls left from earlier. OHHHHH great. Two issues with that: One: I had just recovered from my last dose and that explained why my tongue was starting to feel strange again. And two: So… given that I can’t communicate with him there’s not much I could do, but I was pretty sure that I knew what they used simsim for (other than the balls). It is a very common way to make the local brew they drink around here. I had already had a good amount of it (I mean… a good portion of what he gave me – not that it was a lot) and to establish more facts I asked if his mother makes it. She did. Well, that almost confirms it – MANY of the ladies are alcoholics (and men as well, that is) and they often make their living by selling the stuff. So I’m not supposed to drink it… as Christians we don’t like to because of all the issues there are with alcoholism here. I drank slowly while he finished his quite quickly (it’s very possibly his main source of nutrition at home – the kids usually eat the dregs, which do have a lot of nutrients, but in America we generally consider alcohol a bad thing to give a child). I was hoping he’d decide to go home so I could dump the rest out but he just sat there. Joyce came in a little later and started talking to me (in rapid Karamojong/Kiswahili… still don’t understand why people don’t get that I don’t know what they’re saying! And they seem to think it’ll help to switch to Kiswahili which I know even less than K’jong!) Anyway… in all the confusion of her arriving and her daughter coming in and things I managed to pretend to take a last sip and put the cup in the dirty dish basin. I was wondering what would happen if Joyce smelled it cause she’s very involved in the church and would be SHOCKED that I was drinking it. (Though I was quite surprised myself :-P I didn’t exactly want it!) I was actually still a little unsure if that was really what it was… James definitely knew I wasn’t “supposed” to drink it – they all know the Christians don’t drink it… so I wasn’t sure. But she didn’t notice and that was probably good. On his way out, I tried to ask James the name again and he started giggling and looking around at Joyce and people nearby and not saying anything. That’s what really confirmed it. I gave him a look and decided not to press the issue or make a deal of it or he may be too excited that he got me to break the “law”. After that, he took 2000 shillings out of his pocket and asked me if he could come with me to Soroti the next day (I was wondering if he was trying to influence my answer with his choice of beverage). I tried to tell him that his mother would miss him… I couldn’t exactly just kidnap him! Besides, transport is 12,000, so good try :-P Nah, I coulda paid but he couldn’t really explain why he wanted to go or tell me about his parents or anything so what could I do. I left the poor kid in Kangole. I think he just wanted an adventure though, which doesn’t really work because I’ll be going to Kampala and all over after that. Anyway, my stomach decided to do the same thing that night (confirming my allergy diagnosis) only this time I couldn’t get out of dinner and I sat there sweating with the pastor’s family – trying unsuccessfully to escape after eating.
The good thing is that eating with their family has been AMAZING :-) The first day, I was sitting in the circle of 15 chairs. Every one of them filled… one by the mother, Esther, one by me and the rest by a bunch of orphan children the couple has taken in. It’s crazy because the husband is the pastor and they don’t get paid anything so it’s not like they have money. But they’ve decided to somehow help these children… they’re SO sweet… they all help each other and sacrifice for each other and it’s adorable. They all sing together a few worship songs before dinner, and although sometimes not everyone can go to school each year because the fees aren’t there, and they eat posho and beans most every day… God continues to provide. They love each other and support each other through their very tough circumstances. I really enjoyed being with them. Also… that first day they were chatting and my friend Jacinta turns to me and asks me if she’s fat. There is no question here that I find harder to answer. I have no idea what to say. I gave up and told her what I thought. I said “I have NO idea how to answer that question! In America if I said yes that would be the biggest insult ever, but here… if I say no I think it’s the same deal?!” So that sparked an entire conversation – they were very intrigued – which was SO good. “why don’t you like fat people???” lol. Some fun things to explain… but in the end they understood that I’m not supposed to eat so much!!!!! They let me serve myself and take the portions I wanted!!!!! It was awesome. I did get questioned once in a while – “don’t you want more?!” And I would say “Well, I’m quite satisfied, but it was so good I may have to take a little more” and since I was taking very small portions ( :-) ) I still wouldn’t be dying of full-ness at the end! And they would know I loved them :-) So that worked out well. Unfortunately that conversation doesn’t really work out some places. Especially the villages.
Anyway… I’m going to stop here because this is SO long! Sorry!!! Thank you, God bless you, love you, miss you all!
One and a half months!!!! CRAZY. I’m getting really excited :-D
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
A Village Reunion...
I spent this past weekend in the village with Dr. Moses and his family. He has two adorable little girls named Mercy (5) and Joy (2) and his wife Christine who is very pregnant with their third child. We were in Christine’s village about an hour away from Soroti for something like a family reunion. They speak Kumam in those parts so I was learning language number five or so of this trip (plus a few words from some other languages). We had a great time, but as usual I have some stories to bring out of the time. I was the only Mzungu there of maybe about 60 people… I’m getting used to these ratios these days with Dr. Val out of the country. And it will only be exaggerated more as of tomorrow when I go up to Kangole where a total of… ummm… ZERO other mzungus stay :-P Luckily, Dr. Moses has even been to the USA, so it’s not too hard to communicate – at least he’s around to help me when needed (until tomorrow :-P)! I have discovered more and more how much I LOVE learning other languages, though. It makes everyone SO happy when you can even say a word in their language – just the effort is a huge deal to them. So if you make an attempt (even if feeble :-P) to know the language then they love you even more than they did to begin with! So my Kumam vocabulary may be small – hardly in the double digits probably, but it’s amazing how often you can use the same word if that’s the only one you know :-P
So… on to the food stories I think. As usual, we got a late start when we intended to get to the village in the afternoon. We ended up getting there after dark – maybe around 8:00. After greeting the family members we moved into the house to have dinner and get some tea or the like. I went outside to bathe due to the fact that Joy had “susued” – don’t know how to spell that word – all over my lap. To explain briefly… around here, we don’t exactly use diapers for our babies. They just kinda go when they gotta go… on your lap or not. So I was a bit damp and smelly (Omi, that skirt doesn’t quite smell like you anymore :-P) and decided to bathe before dinner so I could change first. Afterwards… I was not aware that meal #1 was an appetizer to meal #2, but of course I was not allowed to end there and had quite the excess of food. After dinner was the real adventure, though. Now you know how bad that glass of milk was for me… I do have to say that was actually worse than this, but that’s only because that time I had to drink the whole thing… this time I was “just tasting”. In other words, I was expected to drink the whole thing and they were probably disappointed that I didn’t, but it was a bit more conducive to giving in and I just had to do so considering throwing up would probably have been more insulting. So this little refresher is called “Bongo”, which they translate as “sour milk”. Pretty self-explanatory… basically what they do is take a bunch of milk –fresh from the cow most the time – and they put it in a jerrican to let it sit for a whiiiile and then shake it. Once it is the right amount of chunkiness, they pour it into a glass, add some sugar and serve! Pretty simple… feel free to try it at home. As I took my first (and almost last) sip, the texture was by far the worst part. There’s the watery aspect that runs over your tongue initially. Then there’s the grainy part that comes next… and then the chunks that you almost have to chew or just swallow like a pill. I think I went for the latter. It was quite an experience. I think I will eat pretty much anything I find in the US, and I think I’ll even like it at this point. It’s funny… I even like fish now. If you know me, that’s just CRAZY, but I’m usually happy when I see that’s what is for dinner because… what are my other possibilities?!! Definitely safer than MANY options. So my horizons are broadening every day :-P
The next morning was another one of my favorites here. A GIGANTIC plate of liver and posho! When liver is served for dinner it’s one thing… I can almost handle it, though it’s still not exactly my first choice. But… breakfast?!! Oh my goodness. That was literally more liver than I’ve ever eaten “at a go”… and then she added another scoop (except maybe the still-horrifying experience of leberkaese in Germany – crunchiness included… still don’t know why there were little hard parts). All I have to say is… what happened to roasted ground-nuts or a boiled egg?!!
That day (Saturday) was the day of the reunion. Dr. Moses’ family is from a village not so far away (though pretty far when everyone’s coming on foot or by bicycle) and there were many relatives joining us at the house. It’s pretty cool because the tradition here is that the in-laws aren’t allowed to interact with each other. I’ve been told it’s sort of a respect thing but that still doesn’t make any sense to me based on the rest of this culture. Dr. Moses is ‘not allowed’ by the culture to greet his in-laws – not even a handshake let alone a hug; and Christine should be the same with her in-laws. But, this is cool, because this is the only family I’ve seen do this… since they come from a Christian home, the parents have decided that they don’t think that’s right. Christine’s mother was speaking to the group and brought Dr. Moses up and shook his hand to make the point. You can tell it’s still a bit hard for the fathers – they still hesitate automatically, but they have decided it’s okay and even they greet each other.
The reunion was an interesting concept… I wasn’t sure what to expect initially – I didn’t even know who was coming or what was going on. All the communication is usually in Kumam and they often don’t realize that by the end I’ve gotten nothing out of the conversation :-P (hmmmm sounds like some certain Spanish-speaking friends of mine… :-P) So I just go with it as time goes on and usually I figure things out by the end (more like ‘at the end’)! There was a huge “tent” set up… with two tarp(olin)s attached to trees and covering an area. So on Saturday we spent the morning blowing up lots of balloons, setting up chairs and decorating the place (with briiight clashing colors of course). People started arriving around 12 or 1:00. There was a small choir from the local church who was there – all dressed in blue looking uniform and with two really cool locally made drums and an udungu which looks a bit like a small harp but I think sounds a bit like a banjo… lol, I dunno :-P Anyway, lots of family then arrived as well as some pastors and even some government leaders or candidates there to campaign (at a family reunion! Isn’t that crazy?!!) (I think some were family and some weren’t). So essentially the entire day was spent with each person introducing themselves and their family. One of the men would stand up front and call to the people from his clan. They would introduce themselves and their wife/husband and children, sometimes speak for a few minutes (sometimes more than a few minutes) and then sit down. Some people, I’m pretty sure, ended up introducing themselves multiple times… I don’t know what they were saying because it was all Kumam but that lasted a total of literally about four or five hours. Every once in a while the choir would sing a song. They sang for a bit in the beginning and danced and things and that was awesome. Then in between clans they would sometimes sing a song. We ate “lunch” at about 6:00 and then people mostly sat around and chatted. They had a generator there (Christine’s family stays in Entebbe and works from there… they’re doing pretty well financially compared to most the people in the village, so this celebration was quite elaborate comparatively) so there was a small TV playing a Nigerian comedy in front of the whole group of people. The kids were all sitting on the floor before it watching intently. (TV is SUCH an exciting thing for them… and even the adults)
They had slaughtered a cow in the morning for the gathering, so we ate boiled meat, fried meat, lots of internal organs and things, and some fish along with our Kworn (same as Atapa if I’ve mentioned that… it’s a sticky sticky starch made of millet and cassava flour), posho and rice. Of course, all eaten with your fingers (well… hands.). I went easy on myself because I wasn’t being watched so intently by anyone besides Dr. Moses and he’s more understanding of the American diet than anyone here, so I actually managed to avoid the innards… until dinner. Since lunch was at 6:00, that means dinner was at about 10:00. I knew it would happen and I thought about escaping to go to sleep, but I knew that I was just kidding myself because they would only wake me up to go eat dinner (I’m not even kidding). So I stayed up until I was served my dinner. Earlier in the day I had gone over to check out the cow slaughtering deal and encountered the rinsing of the omasum. Oh so appetizing. I thought about how I may have to eat some of that… by the end of the rinsing, it was close to just as green/brown as when it started – it’s hard to get between all the folds of the omasum – the cow’s third stomach compartment that can be identified by folds that make it look like a book. So I was not surprised at dinner to find some reticulum on my plate. I’m not sure what’s better… reticulum or omasum… but I don’t think it makes so much of a difference. The reticulum is identified by the honeycomb raised pattern on the inside. Every meal I take around here has become less of an ordeal, though, even if the cuisine is just as questionable. I tried my reticulum… hid some under my leftover rice… then drank my third bottle of soda I was “encouraged” to take (with no actual choice). Almost routine now!
Breakfast on Sunday was quite a relief. They actually made popcorn in the morning, which I’ve never seen them do, and it was SO good!!! Breakfast consisted of a boiled egg and some bread along with dry tea so that was completely do-able. I played with the babies for a while and then some of us went off to church. Christine stayed around because Joy hadn’t exactly slept the night before… meaning the four (five if the baby in Christine’s belly counts) of us who were sharing two twin-sized mattresses pushed together on the floor didn’t exactly sleep much, either. (Except Mercy seems to be used to her sister screaming by now). So she stayed back to rest while I walked with a few local family members, Mercy, Joy and Judith – a girl who helps take care of the kids. The church was “just near” by African standards, so maybe a 20 minute walk… with Joy very attached to me, I carried her while memorizing the twisting path through the village. I led the way on the walk home to see if I’d make it and our “guide” was very impressed that I didn’t get lost!
Church was really nice. It took place in a building with mud walls and a grass-thatched roof – the walls were painted with some pictures of Jesus and some unidentifiable figures (by the mzungu eye at least). I “got to” sit up front so they could all watch me (try not to doze off) the entire time :-P (I was “praying”, right Niells/Mr. D?! :-P) because it was such a big exciting thing to have a mzungu there. After introducing myself, I sat down and Joy slept on my lap while one of the sons of the family preached. He spoke in English which was really nice :-) with a translator into Kumam. After the preaching we had some singing and the Pastor called people up for if they needed prayer. It was neat because I’ve actually been surprised that I haven’t seen more of that kind of thing - people really praying with the Spirit and praying for healing and things like that. In Honduras we saw a LOT of that… it was a more “spiritual” culture in general – partially shown in all the witchcraft and things like that. So since that’s so prevalent here, I expected to see it more even in the churches. I have seen a bit… definitely more than in America, but not nearly as much as we experienced in Honduras. So it was nice to see people really praying in the Spirit and trusting God to heal even. After the service, I “talked” to a few people… by that I mean, used my three Kumam phrases and made everyone laugh, and then we headed back to the home. Once we reached, Moses and I went into the town to bring back the chairs that were rented from the Catholic mission there. I met the priest and had an entertaining chat about Connecticut and NYC because he had been there. I also discovered he’d been to Germany! That was neat… I attempted to speak German with him but was sad to find out he didn’t know any :-P We had a good time, though. After returning, we headed back to Soroti over the nonexistent roads, crammed in the back seat with four adults and three children – not unusual!
It really was a great time. Christine’s parents are amazing… her mom especially was SO funny. She started dragging me by my hand one time and brought me over to the cooking area. There was a gigantic pot there where a lady was “mingling” posho and she shoved me towards her to take over the job… she wanted me to learn to mingle. I grabbed the gigantic mingling spoon and made my feeble effort to do it as the 20 or so people surrounding were hysterical laughing (along with me :-P). After about 30 seconds or probably less, I ran away yelling about how I didn’t want to burn it and ruin the whole pot of posho and made the lady take over again. So it was extremely entertaining… she also told me I was going to come back to the village… that I would marry someone from the family - when I asked her who she said she would show me the next day, so we’ll see what happens. She planned out my whole life! Lol
So I made many new friends as usual! I really enjoy being in the villages… in the middle of the bush, no electricity or running water, etc… so I’m also looking forward to going up to Kangole :-)
Next point… point of prayer I guess. I had told you all I would find out about vet school this month. It turns out that I heard from Cornell and I won’t find out the final decision until possibly April at the latest. I was put on the alternate list… so basically God wants to keep testing my trust in Him! Haha. I know that He will work everything out… no matter which way that goes. I’m definitely still praying that a spot opens up but I do see that He’s working… sometimes He wants to make it so we just have to follow Him step by step. It’s funny because I had sort of two vague alternative plans… to go to school or to work for a year. And either one was okay… of course I would prefer school, but I’d be fine with working for a year as well. But I had never thought that there could be an in between. I had figured once I go the decision I could start planning my summer – looking into where to work if that was the case, etc, etc… But sometimes God likes to take that control away I think :-P There is now no option… I can’t plan anything! And I think that’s where He wants me for now… just doing what I’m doing and not worrying about the rest. Trusting that He will open doors and close them as they come. So please keep the final decision in prayer and pray that I can continue to just blindly follow God, knowing He’s got the future figured out and His plan is best!!
As much as I love it here I get more and more excited every day to come home and see you guys! Love you LOTS.
And NIELLY hurry up and get to Africaaaa already!!!!!! I can’t wait to see you on the other side of the WORLD :-D
Heidi
So… on to the food stories I think. As usual, we got a late start when we intended to get to the village in the afternoon. We ended up getting there after dark – maybe around 8:00. After greeting the family members we moved into the house to have dinner and get some tea or the like. I went outside to bathe due to the fact that Joy had “susued” – don’t know how to spell that word – all over my lap. To explain briefly… around here, we don’t exactly use diapers for our babies. They just kinda go when they gotta go… on your lap or not. So I was a bit damp and smelly (Omi, that skirt doesn’t quite smell like you anymore :-P) and decided to bathe before dinner so I could change first. Afterwards… I was not aware that meal #1 was an appetizer to meal #2, but of course I was not allowed to end there and had quite the excess of food. After dinner was the real adventure, though. Now you know how bad that glass of milk was for me… I do have to say that was actually worse than this, but that’s only because that time I had to drink the whole thing… this time I was “just tasting”. In other words, I was expected to drink the whole thing and they were probably disappointed that I didn’t, but it was a bit more conducive to giving in and I just had to do so considering throwing up would probably have been more insulting. So this little refresher is called “Bongo”, which they translate as “sour milk”. Pretty self-explanatory… basically what they do is take a bunch of milk –fresh from the cow most the time – and they put it in a jerrican to let it sit for a whiiiile and then shake it. Once it is the right amount of chunkiness, they pour it into a glass, add some sugar and serve! Pretty simple… feel free to try it at home. As I took my first (and almost last) sip, the texture was by far the worst part. There’s the watery aspect that runs over your tongue initially. Then there’s the grainy part that comes next… and then the chunks that you almost have to chew or just swallow like a pill. I think I went for the latter. It was quite an experience. I think I will eat pretty much anything I find in the US, and I think I’ll even like it at this point. It’s funny… I even like fish now. If you know me, that’s just CRAZY, but I’m usually happy when I see that’s what is for dinner because… what are my other possibilities?!! Definitely safer than MANY options. So my horizons are broadening every day :-P
The next morning was another one of my favorites here. A GIGANTIC plate of liver and posho! When liver is served for dinner it’s one thing… I can almost handle it, though it’s still not exactly my first choice. But… breakfast?!! Oh my goodness. That was literally more liver than I’ve ever eaten “at a go”… and then she added another scoop (except maybe the still-horrifying experience of leberkaese in Germany – crunchiness included… still don’t know why there were little hard parts). All I have to say is… what happened to roasted ground-nuts or a boiled egg?!!
That day (Saturday) was the day of the reunion. Dr. Moses’ family is from a village not so far away (though pretty far when everyone’s coming on foot or by bicycle) and there were many relatives joining us at the house. It’s pretty cool because the tradition here is that the in-laws aren’t allowed to interact with each other. I’ve been told it’s sort of a respect thing but that still doesn’t make any sense to me based on the rest of this culture. Dr. Moses is ‘not allowed’ by the culture to greet his in-laws – not even a handshake let alone a hug; and Christine should be the same with her in-laws. But, this is cool, because this is the only family I’ve seen do this… since they come from a Christian home, the parents have decided that they don’t think that’s right. Christine’s mother was speaking to the group and brought Dr. Moses up and shook his hand to make the point. You can tell it’s still a bit hard for the fathers – they still hesitate automatically, but they have decided it’s okay and even they greet each other.
The reunion was an interesting concept… I wasn’t sure what to expect initially – I didn’t even know who was coming or what was going on. All the communication is usually in Kumam and they often don’t realize that by the end I’ve gotten nothing out of the conversation :-P (hmmmm sounds like some certain Spanish-speaking friends of mine… :-P) So I just go with it as time goes on and usually I figure things out by the end (more like ‘at the end’)! There was a huge “tent” set up… with two tarp(olin)s attached to trees and covering an area. So on Saturday we spent the morning blowing up lots of balloons, setting up chairs and decorating the place (with briiight clashing colors of course). People started arriving around 12 or 1:00. There was a small choir from the local church who was there – all dressed in blue looking uniform and with two really cool locally made drums and an udungu which looks a bit like a small harp but I think sounds a bit like a banjo… lol, I dunno :-P Anyway, lots of family then arrived as well as some pastors and even some government leaders or candidates there to campaign (at a family reunion! Isn’t that crazy?!!) (I think some were family and some weren’t). So essentially the entire day was spent with each person introducing themselves and their family. One of the men would stand up front and call to the people from his clan. They would introduce themselves and their wife/husband and children, sometimes speak for a few minutes (sometimes more than a few minutes) and then sit down. Some people, I’m pretty sure, ended up introducing themselves multiple times… I don’t know what they were saying because it was all Kumam but that lasted a total of literally about four or five hours. Every once in a while the choir would sing a song. They sang for a bit in the beginning and danced and things and that was awesome. Then in between clans they would sometimes sing a song. We ate “lunch” at about 6:00 and then people mostly sat around and chatted. They had a generator there (Christine’s family stays in Entebbe and works from there… they’re doing pretty well financially compared to most the people in the village, so this celebration was quite elaborate comparatively) so there was a small TV playing a Nigerian comedy in front of the whole group of people. The kids were all sitting on the floor before it watching intently. (TV is SUCH an exciting thing for them… and even the adults)
They had slaughtered a cow in the morning for the gathering, so we ate boiled meat, fried meat, lots of internal organs and things, and some fish along with our Kworn (same as Atapa if I’ve mentioned that… it’s a sticky sticky starch made of millet and cassava flour), posho and rice. Of course, all eaten with your fingers (well… hands.). I went easy on myself because I wasn’t being watched so intently by anyone besides Dr. Moses and he’s more understanding of the American diet than anyone here, so I actually managed to avoid the innards… until dinner. Since lunch was at 6:00, that means dinner was at about 10:00. I knew it would happen and I thought about escaping to go to sleep, but I knew that I was just kidding myself because they would only wake me up to go eat dinner (I’m not even kidding). So I stayed up until I was served my dinner. Earlier in the day I had gone over to check out the cow slaughtering deal and encountered the rinsing of the omasum. Oh so appetizing. I thought about how I may have to eat some of that… by the end of the rinsing, it was close to just as green/brown as when it started – it’s hard to get between all the folds of the omasum – the cow’s third stomach compartment that can be identified by folds that make it look like a book. So I was not surprised at dinner to find some reticulum on my plate. I’m not sure what’s better… reticulum or omasum… but I don’t think it makes so much of a difference. The reticulum is identified by the honeycomb raised pattern on the inside. Every meal I take around here has become less of an ordeal, though, even if the cuisine is just as questionable. I tried my reticulum… hid some under my leftover rice… then drank my third bottle of soda I was “encouraged” to take (with no actual choice). Almost routine now!
Breakfast on Sunday was quite a relief. They actually made popcorn in the morning, which I’ve never seen them do, and it was SO good!!! Breakfast consisted of a boiled egg and some bread along with dry tea so that was completely do-able. I played with the babies for a while and then some of us went off to church. Christine stayed around because Joy hadn’t exactly slept the night before… meaning the four (five if the baby in Christine’s belly counts) of us who were sharing two twin-sized mattresses pushed together on the floor didn’t exactly sleep much, either. (Except Mercy seems to be used to her sister screaming by now). So she stayed back to rest while I walked with a few local family members, Mercy, Joy and Judith – a girl who helps take care of the kids. The church was “just near” by African standards, so maybe a 20 minute walk… with Joy very attached to me, I carried her while memorizing the twisting path through the village. I led the way on the walk home to see if I’d make it and our “guide” was very impressed that I didn’t get lost!
Church was really nice. It took place in a building with mud walls and a grass-thatched roof – the walls were painted with some pictures of Jesus and some unidentifiable figures (by the mzungu eye at least). I “got to” sit up front so they could all watch me (try not to doze off) the entire time :-P (I was “praying”, right Niells/Mr. D?! :-P) because it was such a big exciting thing to have a mzungu there. After introducing myself, I sat down and Joy slept on my lap while one of the sons of the family preached. He spoke in English which was really nice :-) with a translator into Kumam. After the preaching we had some singing and the Pastor called people up for if they needed prayer. It was neat because I’ve actually been surprised that I haven’t seen more of that kind of thing - people really praying with the Spirit and praying for healing and things like that. In Honduras we saw a LOT of that… it was a more “spiritual” culture in general – partially shown in all the witchcraft and things like that. So since that’s so prevalent here, I expected to see it more even in the churches. I have seen a bit… definitely more than in America, but not nearly as much as we experienced in Honduras. So it was nice to see people really praying in the Spirit and trusting God to heal even. After the service, I “talked” to a few people… by that I mean, used my three Kumam phrases and made everyone laugh, and then we headed back to the home. Once we reached, Moses and I went into the town to bring back the chairs that were rented from the Catholic mission there. I met the priest and had an entertaining chat about Connecticut and NYC because he had been there. I also discovered he’d been to Germany! That was neat… I attempted to speak German with him but was sad to find out he didn’t know any :-P We had a good time, though. After returning, we headed back to Soroti over the nonexistent roads, crammed in the back seat with four adults and three children – not unusual!
It really was a great time. Christine’s parents are amazing… her mom especially was SO funny. She started dragging me by my hand one time and brought me over to the cooking area. There was a gigantic pot there where a lady was “mingling” posho and she shoved me towards her to take over the job… she wanted me to learn to mingle. I grabbed the gigantic mingling spoon and made my feeble effort to do it as the 20 or so people surrounding were hysterical laughing (along with me :-P). After about 30 seconds or probably less, I ran away yelling about how I didn’t want to burn it and ruin the whole pot of posho and made the lady take over again. So it was extremely entertaining… she also told me I was going to come back to the village… that I would marry someone from the family - when I asked her who she said she would show me the next day, so we’ll see what happens. She planned out my whole life! Lol
So I made many new friends as usual! I really enjoy being in the villages… in the middle of the bush, no electricity or running water, etc… so I’m also looking forward to going up to Kangole :-)
Next point… point of prayer I guess. I had told you all I would find out about vet school this month. It turns out that I heard from Cornell and I won’t find out the final decision until possibly April at the latest. I was put on the alternate list… so basically God wants to keep testing my trust in Him! Haha. I know that He will work everything out… no matter which way that goes. I’m definitely still praying that a spot opens up but I do see that He’s working… sometimes He wants to make it so we just have to follow Him step by step. It’s funny because I had sort of two vague alternative plans… to go to school or to work for a year. And either one was okay… of course I would prefer school, but I’d be fine with working for a year as well. But I had never thought that there could be an in between. I had figured once I go the decision I could start planning my summer – looking into where to work if that was the case, etc, etc… But sometimes God likes to take that control away I think :-P There is now no option… I can’t plan anything! And I think that’s where He wants me for now… just doing what I’m doing and not worrying about the rest. Trusting that He will open doors and close them as they come. So please keep the final decision in prayer and pray that I can continue to just blindly follow God, knowing He’s got the future figured out and His plan is best!!
As much as I love it here I get more and more excited every day to come home and see you guys! Love you LOTS.
And NIELLY hurry up and get to Africaaaa already!!!!!! I can’t wait to see you on the other side of the WORLD :-D
Heidi
Sunday, January 2, 2011
Christmas in Kapchorwa
So I just got back to Soroti after spending a week, including Christmas, in the mountains by Sipi Falls. It’s good to see a mirror again now that I’m back… though a little scary after a week without :-P It’s interesting the things you miss. The people of Kapchorwa are part of the Sabiny tribe, so an entirely new culture, new language and everything. I stayed with a family in the middle of the village. There are a good amount of tourists in Sipi because of the beautiful waterfalls and mountains and more comfortable climate than Karamoja, but being the only Mzungu in the real village, I still got many looks and comments as I learned to be a true African! I still have some work to do on my balancing skills, though I did get a good bit of practice. I can at least make a half-decent Ngwatiet to provide as a buffer between my scalp and bunch of matoke or jerrican of water. Need to start working out my neck muscles, though… didn’t get to work up to the full size Jerrican like the village kids do! I practiced washing clothes… without a washer and drier! :-P The people thought it was HILARIOUS seeing a Mzungu (Mzungionet in Kupsabiny) washing clothes… not that I knew what they were saying, but when they burst into laughter I got the hint… that’s a pretty universal language. The Sabiny have some other interesting traditions… I got to witness a traditional ceremony held every two years… they have multiple ceremonies at the end of the year to initiate boys into manhood. I’m not sure you really want the details, but I’ll give you the quick version. Basically it’s a public circumcision ceremony… they stand in front of a HUGE crowd and have to keep their faces completely stoic as they’re cut… and they really want you to take pictures while you’re there – it’s a huge day for these boys – very exciting (despite the extreme pain) so they want to show off. So now I have a file on my computer under Kapchorwa called “R-Rated” so I don’t show it to the wrong crowd :-P Then after they become men… this is the funniest part in my opinion… they wear skirts for about three weeks because it’s more comfortable. And it’s not like they wear a wrap or something or even a plain colored not-so-girly skirt. I think they pick their little sister’s favorite skirt… with all the lace and bright pink or yellow they can find. It’s SO funny to see them walking down the streets like that – now that they’ve become men. So I saw two of those ceremonies… I think that may be enough for my lifetime :-P
Everyone always likes to know about food, so let’s see… Main dish in Kapchorwa is Matoke. I learned how to peel and cook them! Now I just need to find them for the family in the states. So the most common meal was matoke and beans. For Christmas, I (in Dr. Val’s honor) was given a chicken… and because it would have been a bit much for me to eat, we slaughtered it and cooked it up for Christmas feast-ing. We also had a treat of rice and chapatis for Christmas. Even sodas! The family is a typical village family… meaning they don’t have much… they live off of what they grow and the little money that comes in – I’m assuming mainly from the older sons and they probably sell some of the matoke and bananas they grow. So of course I was fed an insane amount every day because no matter how much they have, their priorities are ALWAYS taking care of the visitors. Family members came in and out all the time… between the mother’s 8 siblings and allllll their children, there is a lot of family around. For most people, I didn’t have any horrifying eating experiences (apart from food quantities)… but if you know me well enough, there was one REAL rough day. So Ali (one of the older sons in the family) and I were going to go visit the late Uncle’s place to see his wife and anyone who was around in Kapchorwa town. We strategically decided to go unannounced so they wouldn’t need to prepare a huge meal and get ready for visitors… it’s not rude to just drop by around here – it was very welcomed. That way they would just make some tea and we could chat a little while and then head home. So we ate lunch at home and then headed out around 3:30. We arrived and greeted the Aunt who was very excited to see us… and she led us inside the house. She left us in the living room and we looked at a photo album that was on the table. We could hear her in the kitchen… figuring she was getting the tea together. About 15 minutes later she comes out with two plates heaped with matoke and beans and cabbage. Of course I was already stuffed from first lunch about an hour ago, but I had practiced enough to keep all the food down anyway. But the bigger issue came next. She went back into the kitchen and came out with two tall glasses of MILK. Dad… as you understand… this was quite an issue. I looked at the milky white in my glass… actually it had a bit of a yellow tinge because it was straight from the cow… luckily boiled… but completely whole. Praying that I would survive this venture, I tackled the meal first… waiting for Ali to make the first move on his glass of milk… maybe with some tiny unfounded hope that I wouldn’t have to face it… maybe he wouldn’t drink it either… or he’d only drink a little and I could get away with just a sip. After all the food was gone (well, as much as would possibly fit in my stomach… and after getting yelled at (by Heidi definition) for not eating more… story of my life here!)… Ali picked up his glass of milk and took a big gulp. Watching was bad enough but I knew my turn was next. Jealous of the Ugandan talent of drinking half the glass in one sip, I faced to tackle the opposition. I try to look at the wall in front of me and hold my breath so as not to smell it as the milk approaches my lips. I take three sips… as big as I could manage… as I hid my tongue at the bottom of my mouth so as not to taste it. I put the glass down… feeling, at first, triumphant in managing my three sips… and then quite disappointed as I see that the level of the glass does not appear to have moved more than a centimeter. Next time I go for four sips. I mistakenly look into the glass and see the oily film forming on the side of the glass from the crazy amount of fat meant to nourish a growing baby calf and not a completely weaned human mammal that needs no more growing. Anyway… after painstakingly downing the rest of the glass and trying not to breathe too hard to prevent tasting the milk on my breath, I thanked God for helping me get it down (and trusted that I would be able to keep it down). I thought it was over at that point. I was about to explode and there was nothing to distract me because they were speaking in Kupsabiny the whole time and I had no idea what was going on. But the Aunt left again and I heard soda bottles clinking away from the other room. Oh my goodness. After finishing a Fanta and chatting a little more it was time to leave. I told Ali I would run home (about 14 km) but he wouldn’t let me :-P considering it would be dark by the time I got back and that’s bad news. So we hopped on the motorcycle, me sitting sideways in my skirt of course (Alex… I can ride yours like that, right?!!), and headed back with me doing driveby diagnoses of the cows to entertain myself as we passed. I saw some lumpy skin disease, lots of worms, some sun sensitivity from lantana poisoning, a couple birth conformational defects… some other things and a good amount of impressively healthy cows (especially as compared to Karamoja!).
The family I was staying with owns a few cows so I brought along medicines to treat them and the neighbors animals. Most were very healthy; we had one day when I treated a couple hundred animals I think. Anytime you treat one, fifteen more come and mob around to have their animals treated too so it adds up. It was fun… I mostly dewormed and sprayed for ticks, but there were a few sick ones, too. I trimmed some goat hooves and practiced pig restraint. I have discovered my new LEAST favorite animal. Some of you may know that I really don’t like loud noises… and pigs… are SO loud. As soon as you grab hold of them they start squealing - it’s more like screaming though. I guess the owners don’t have to do much with them normally because they don’t really know how to hold them, making the process painstakingly long. Their usual method was to hold the ears and the pig would pull back and break my eardrums as I tried to inject it. It usually worked out – they didn’t bring ropes most the time so there wasn’t really anything else you could do – those things are STRONG! So I would go away with my ears ringing, disliking pigs more every time I treated one. But it was cool to be able to help out the community. So in the end, I had a great time in Kapchorwa. I missed home and all the traditions I’m used to, but it was fun to see what it’s like in another country. See everyone all dressed up and the kids running around, so excited on Christmas Eve even though by American standards they won’t be getting anything good for Christmas. For them it was just a day to celebrate… with or without presents. It’s nice to see a place where the priorities are more in order :-) On Christmas, I went to church with one of the girls, Cherop, who brought me to a Catholic Church. It was interesting :-P The next day I went to the church Ali goes to, which is more what I’m used to. They had some people visiting from Kenya who were AMAZING (Nielly… I can’t wait till you get here!!!! :-P). The worship was awesome – I LOVE watching people dancing and excited and these guys were really good at getting everyone going (not that it takes much around here) :-P I just couldn’t stop smiling… it’s awesome how much the music can reach you even when you don’t know what they’re saying!
So now I’m back in Soroti… it’s been pretty relaxing around here except for the numerous marriage offers I’ve had to escape from. I’ve been careful about giving out my phone number, but not careful enough. I’m stepping up to the next level of refusal. Sometimes they beg SO much I just give in, but not anymore! 3AM phone calls are not normally appreciated… especially when they’re to ask me to come to their village with them. New Years was neat – the churches all get together and have a big “overnight”. There was a huge tent outside next to one of the churches to create added space. I went with Dr. Moses, his wife, nephew/my friend and some other kid who used to be Muslim until a couple days before Christmas (it’s cool… he’s really excited about God and his first Christmas! He even wanted to give his testimony and everything.)… we didn’t’ stay the WHOLE night – just from about 10 until 2. There was lots of singing and some preaching… a really cool way to start the year off! Dr. Moses said he thought it was so strange that when he was in the states the churches didn’t do anything for New Years. It’s very common here that they do overnights, which I think is really cool. I’ll be in this area for another week or so and then I head up to Kangole to live in my little hut. I’m excited about that… I’ll have to put my new cooking skills into action I think as pretty much the only thing to eat there is beans and posho. So that’ll be fun :-P
I hope you all had a WONDERFUL Christmas and a great New Year. Happy 2011!!!!! Keep praying for my vet school admission if you don’t mind… I find out sometime this month!!! AH!
Only 2.5 months until I come back… I miss you guys!
Everyone always likes to know about food, so let’s see… Main dish in Kapchorwa is Matoke. I learned how to peel and cook them! Now I just need to find them for the family in the states. So the most common meal was matoke and beans. For Christmas, I (in Dr. Val’s honor) was given a chicken… and because it would have been a bit much for me to eat, we slaughtered it and cooked it up for Christmas feast-ing. We also had a treat of rice and chapatis for Christmas. Even sodas! The family is a typical village family… meaning they don’t have much… they live off of what they grow and the little money that comes in – I’m assuming mainly from the older sons and they probably sell some of the matoke and bananas they grow. So of course I was fed an insane amount every day because no matter how much they have, their priorities are ALWAYS taking care of the visitors. Family members came in and out all the time… between the mother’s 8 siblings and allllll their children, there is a lot of family around. For most people, I didn’t have any horrifying eating experiences (apart from food quantities)… but if you know me well enough, there was one REAL rough day. So Ali (one of the older sons in the family) and I were going to go visit the late Uncle’s place to see his wife and anyone who was around in Kapchorwa town. We strategically decided to go unannounced so they wouldn’t need to prepare a huge meal and get ready for visitors… it’s not rude to just drop by around here – it was very welcomed. That way they would just make some tea and we could chat a little while and then head home. So we ate lunch at home and then headed out around 3:30. We arrived and greeted the Aunt who was very excited to see us… and she led us inside the house. She left us in the living room and we looked at a photo album that was on the table. We could hear her in the kitchen… figuring she was getting the tea together. About 15 minutes later she comes out with two plates heaped with matoke and beans and cabbage. Of course I was already stuffed from first lunch about an hour ago, but I had practiced enough to keep all the food down anyway. But the bigger issue came next. She went back into the kitchen and came out with two tall glasses of MILK. Dad… as you understand… this was quite an issue. I looked at the milky white in my glass… actually it had a bit of a yellow tinge because it was straight from the cow… luckily boiled… but completely whole. Praying that I would survive this venture, I tackled the meal first… waiting for Ali to make the first move on his glass of milk… maybe with some tiny unfounded hope that I wouldn’t have to face it… maybe he wouldn’t drink it either… or he’d only drink a little and I could get away with just a sip. After all the food was gone (well, as much as would possibly fit in my stomach… and after getting yelled at (by Heidi definition) for not eating more… story of my life here!)… Ali picked up his glass of milk and took a big gulp. Watching was bad enough but I knew my turn was next. Jealous of the Ugandan talent of drinking half the glass in one sip, I faced to tackle the opposition. I try to look at the wall in front of me and hold my breath so as not to smell it as the milk approaches my lips. I take three sips… as big as I could manage… as I hid my tongue at the bottom of my mouth so as not to taste it. I put the glass down… feeling, at first, triumphant in managing my three sips… and then quite disappointed as I see that the level of the glass does not appear to have moved more than a centimeter. Next time I go for four sips. I mistakenly look into the glass and see the oily film forming on the side of the glass from the crazy amount of fat meant to nourish a growing baby calf and not a completely weaned human mammal that needs no more growing. Anyway… after painstakingly downing the rest of the glass and trying not to breathe too hard to prevent tasting the milk on my breath, I thanked God for helping me get it down (and trusted that I would be able to keep it down). I thought it was over at that point. I was about to explode and there was nothing to distract me because they were speaking in Kupsabiny the whole time and I had no idea what was going on. But the Aunt left again and I heard soda bottles clinking away from the other room. Oh my goodness. After finishing a Fanta and chatting a little more it was time to leave. I told Ali I would run home (about 14 km) but he wouldn’t let me :-P considering it would be dark by the time I got back and that’s bad news. So we hopped on the motorcycle, me sitting sideways in my skirt of course (Alex… I can ride yours like that, right?!!), and headed back with me doing driveby diagnoses of the cows to entertain myself as we passed. I saw some lumpy skin disease, lots of worms, some sun sensitivity from lantana poisoning, a couple birth conformational defects… some other things and a good amount of impressively healthy cows (especially as compared to Karamoja!).
The family I was staying with owns a few cows so I brought along medicines to treat them and the neighbors animals. Most were very healthy; we had one day when I treated a couple hundred animals I think. Anytime you treat one, fifteen more come and mob around to have their animals treated too so it adds up. It was fun… I mostly dewormed and sprayed for ticks, but there were a few sick ones, too. I trimmed some goat hooves and practiced pig restraint. I have discovered my new LEAST favorite animal. Some of you may know that I really don’t like loud noises… and pigs… are SO loud. As soon as you grab hold of them they start squealing - it’s more like screaming though. I guess the owners don’t have to do much with them normally because they don’t really know how to hold them, making the process painstakingly long. Their usual method was to hold the ears and the pig would pull back and break my eardrums as I tried to inject it. It usually worked out – they didn’t bring ropes most the time so there wasn’t really anything else you could do – those things are STRONG! So I would go away with my ears ringing, disliking pigs more every time I treated one. But it was cool to be able to help out the community. So in the end, I had a great time in Kapchorwa. I missed home and all the traditions I’m used to, but it was fun to see what it’s like in another country. See everyone all dressed up and the kids running around, so excited on Christmas Eve even though by American standards they won’t be getting anything good for Christmas. For them it was just a day to celebrate… with or without presents. It’s nice to see a place where the priorities are more in order :-) On Christmas, I went to church with one of the girls, Cherop, who brought me to a Catholic Church. It was interesting :-P The next day I went to the church Ali goes to, which is more what I’m used to. They had some people visiting from Kenya who were AMAZING (Nielly… I can’t wait till you get here!!!! :-P). The worship was awesome – I LOVE watching people dancing and excited and these guys were really good at getting everyone going (not that it takes much around here) :-P I just couldn’t stop smiling… it’s awesome how much the music can reach you even when you don’t know what they’re saying!
So now I’m back in Soroti… it’s been pretty relaxing around here except for the numerous marriage offers I’ve had to escape from. I’ve been careful about giving out my phone number, but not careful enough. I’m stepping up to the next level of refusal. Sometimes they beg SO much I just give in, but not anymore! 3AM phone calls are not normally appreciated… especially when they’re to ask me to come to their village with them. New Years was neat – the churches all get together and have a big “overnight”. There was a huge tent outside next to one of the churches to create added space. I went with Dr. Moses, his wife, nephew/my friend and some other kid who used to be Muslim until a couple days before Christmas (it’s cool… he’s really excited about God and his first Christmas! He even wanted to give his testimony and everything.)… we didn’t’ stay the WHOLE night – just from about 10 until 2. There was lots of singing and some preaching… a really cool way to start the year off! Dr. Moses said he thought it was so strange that when he was in the states the churches didn’t do anything for New Years. It’s very common here that they do overnights, which I think is really cool. I’ll be in this area for another week or so and then I head up to Kangole to live in my little hut. I’m excited about that… I’ll have to put my new cooking skills into action I think as pretty much the only thing to eat there is beans and posho. So that’ll be fun :-P
I hope you all had a WONDERFUL Christmas and a great New Year. Happy 2011!!!!! Keep praying for my vet school admission if you don’t mind… I find out sometime this month!!! AH!
Only 2.5 months until I come back… I miss you guys!
Friday, December 17, 2010
Timothy Kids
These people are amazing! So I was just thinking… trying to figure out what’s been going on in the past few weeks. We’ve been holding retreats for the students that we sponsor in school through the Timothy Project. The students have American sponsors who pay for their school fees… many of them are orphans or kids found on the streets in Kampala begging for money. Last week we had the retreat for Primary students. There were about 80 girls and boys in total. This week is the Secondary Retreat with about 30 or 40 students. We lose too many as they get older. The secondary retreat has a total of about 10 girls because so many drop out after becoming pregnant or getting married. But I was thinking about the difference between education here and at home. Although school is technically required here, many people don’t get the opportunity to go because of the cost or because of home responsibilities. During the first retreat, it was announced that the church was going to donate textbooks to the children. The looks on their faces astonished me. It’s amazing to see children SO excited to own a book… even a textbook! These kids were a range of ages… maybe 8 to 16 or so… but every single one could not wait to get their book at the end of the retreat. Their passion and dedication to learn is amazing… something we don’t see in the states because we just don’t understand how much education is worth. But it’s amazing to see what it’s like here and see how grateful I need to be with where I’ve come from!
We had a couple sponsored boys graduate this year from Secondary School or from College. One has the equivalent of an Associate’s Degree in Crop Management… something that is very applicable around here. He should be able to get a job working with an NGO on agriculture and finally be able to make some money to support the rest of his family. Families tend to be very large here (nine kids or so is not uncommon… they think I’m insane when they hear I have one brother!) and when the parents die or can not make enough to support their children it usually falls on the older ones to help the younger ones. It’s great to see the community… see the sacrifices they make to help each other out, but often times it doesn’t work out as well as we would hope. They have a lot of trouble getting enough to survive let alone to pay school fees and support sick parents or young children. Many families have been torn apart like that because of AIDS which is quite prevalent or because fathers and young men are killed while raiding or protecting their cows.
It was really neat working with the kids a bit during the retreats. They have such amazing stories and to think about what they’ve gone through will amaze you. Through their circumstances, many of them have come to know God, as they’ve seen him protect them through the craziest things. Being in the Timothy Program has also been an amazing blessing for them and they see how God has provided even though life seems SO tough to our often sheltered eyes. They see it so much more than many of us in the States do – we tend to give ourselves all the credit and not appreciate the blessings God provides for us. I love hearing about the kids’ lives and seeing their appreciation as they speak, but I have found it very hard to have a good conversation with them myself. We come from such different backgrounds that it’s so hard to connect! The language barrier doesn’t help… the secondary students were all very good at English, but the accents are really tough for them. So it’s hard to sit down with someone and talk seriously – it’s much easier to just joke around and play. So we enjoy our time together, but I’m praying for God to help me really connect with some people – makes for a much deeper relationship and I would love to see God use me to reach out to people here.
Dr. Val is back in the states now… she is speaking at a mission’s conference in January and enjoying the holidays with the family before then. So for now I am hanging in Soroti with the CLIDE team. I’ve been taking on her role as vet to whatever extent I can, with some of Dr. Moses’ help. It’s been fun… treated a calf with East Coast Fever the other day. ECF is a tick-borne disease caused by a protozoa that invades the parotid lymph nodes (under the ear) and then spreads through the lymph vessels down the body. This one had progressed to the stage where they get lung edema as well. After treatment it has been getting better slowly… I check on it every day as I pass by. It’s now suckling on its mother again and breathing much better, though still depressed. Other animals have included a goat, two dogs and two chickens… maybe more to come!
Next Wednesday I’ll head to Kapchorwa to spend Christmas with a family in the mountains. They plan to teach me all the ways of the Africans… including more practice carrying water on my head (and up a hill), smearing cow dung in the houses, cutting firewood, cooking and making tea, and I’m sure many other things I could never learn in the states! I’m bringing my vet kit to treat some animals around there, too, so that should be fun. I’ll be eating lots of bananas and maybe drinking homemade coffee (Kapchorwa is, I think, the main coffee growing area in Uganda). They have lots of groundnuts, too (same as peanuts) so that may be forming a sauce on a lot of my food… my fav of course. I’m sure they will make sure I am “satisfied” (aka full) the entire time… or “over-satisfied” as I would consider it… meaning I may be getting even more “compliments” soon. It’s funny how different cultures can be. The insane amount of starches and fried things around here have been getting to me… the locals need the energy, but us mzungus aren’t quite used to it and they like to feed us the same amount that they eat – or more - so it makes us grow. That’s what they compliment you on – the bigger you are the more beautiful… you look “healthy”. It makes sense in this culture… so many people are dying of AIDS and when someone is skinny they are assumed to be sickly. But some of us are not sick but do not need to be so “beautiful” especially when translated into American culture. Here’s a typical day when I’m in the hands of the Ugandans… breakfast, break tea, lunch, afternoon tea, supper. The tea times are not just tea, though. Each time you have to have an “escort” to go with the tea. In other words, it’s an entire meal. I made a bad move somewhere in the beginning of my time here and looked at the nutrition facts of the “glucose biscuits” people eat all the time – it’s a pretty common escort. Each package has 500 calories - and that’s just a snack! But they love us and they want to take care of us so you can’t turn them down. I do appreciate the hospitality… and I think the compliments are funny… but that may change when I switch cultures again!
As a reminder… we’re still raising money to buy turkeys for the peace villages. They are desperate for a good source of protein because they have decided not to own cows or goats to reduce incidents of raiding and promote peace in Karamoja. We have about 260 turkeys paid for so far… thank you SO MUCH if you contributed! We are looking to get 500 by Christmas so please donate if you are able! $10 per turkey… just go to www.cvmusa.org/africavet and click on “animal revolving loans” under “related links” on the left, then scroll down to “Turkeys”. Thanks again!
We had a couple sponsored boys graduate this year from Secondary School or from College. One has the equivalent of an Associate’s Degree in Crop Management… something that is very applicable around here. He should be able to get a job working with an NGO on agriculture and finally be able to make some money to support the rest of his family. Families tend to be very large here (nine kids or so is not uncommon… they think I’m insane when they hear I have one brother!) and when the parents die or can not make enough to support their children it usually falls on the older ones to help the younger ones. It’s great to see the community… see the sacrifices they make to help each other out, but often times it doesn’t work out as well as we would hope. They have a lot of trouble getting enough to survive let alone to pay school fees and support sick parents or young children. Many families have been torn apart like that because of AIDS which is quite prevalent or because fathers and young men are killed while raiding or protecting their cows.
It was really neat working with the kids a bit during the retreats. They have such amazing stories and to think about what they’ve gone through will amaze you. Through their circumstances, many of them have come to know God, as they’ve seen him protect them through the craziest things. Being in the Timothy Program has also been an amazing blessing for them and they see how God has provided even though life seems SO tough to our often sheltered eyes. They see it so much more than many of us in the States do – we tend to give ourselves all the credit and not appreciate the blessings God provides for us. I love hearing about the kids’ lives and seeing their appreciation as they speak, but I have found it very hard to have a good conversation with them myself. We come from such different backgrounds that it’s so hard to connect! The language barrier doesn’t help… the secondary students were all very good at English, but the accents are really tough for them. So it’s hard to sit down with someone and talk seriously – it’s much easier to just joke around and play. So we enjoy our time together, but I’m praying for God to help me really connect with some people – makes for a much deeper relationship and I would love to see God use me to reach out to people here.
Dr. Val is back in the states now… she is speaking at a mission’s conference in January and enjoying the holidays with the family before then. So for now I am hanging in Soroti with the CLIDE team. I’ve been taking on her role as vet to whatever extent I can, with some of Dr. Moses’ help. It’s been fun… treated a calf with East Coast Fever the other day. ECF is a tick-borne disease caused by a protozoa that invades the parotid lymph nodes (under the ear) and then spreads through the lymph vessels down the body. This one had progressed to the stage where they get lung edema as well. After treatment it has been getting better slowly… I check on it every day as I pass by. It’s now suckling on its mother again and breathing much better, though still depressed. Other animals have included a goat, two dogs and two chickens… maybe more to come!
Next Wednesday I’ll head to Kapchorwa to spend Christmas with a family in the mountains. They plan to teach me all the ways of the Africans… including more practice carrying water on my head (and up a hill), smearing cow dung in the houses, cutting firewood, cooking and making tea, and I’m sure many other things I could never learn in the states! I’m bringing my vet kit to treat some animals around there, too, so that should be fun. I’ll be eating lots of bananas and maybe drinking homemade coffee (Kapchorwa is, I think, the main coffee growing area in Uganda). They have lots of groundnuts, too (same as peanuts) so that may be forming a sauce on a lot of my food… my fav of course. I’m sure they will make sure I am “satisfied” (aka full) the entire time… or “over-satisfied” as I would consider it… meaning I may be getting even more “compliments” soon. It’s funny how different cultures can be. The insane amount of starches and fried things around here have been getting to me… the locals need the energy, but us mzungus aren’t quite used to it and they like to feed us the same amount that they eat – or more - so it makes us grow. That’s what they compliment you on – the bigger you are the more beautiful… you look “healthy”. It makes sense in this culture… so many people are dying of AIDS and when someone is skinny they are assumed to be sickly. But some of us are not sick but do not need to be so “beautiful” especially when translated into American culture. Here’s a typical day when I’m in the hands of the Ugandans… breakfast, break tea, lunch, afternoon tea, supper. The tea times are not just tea, though. Each time you have to have an “escort” to go with the tea. In other words, it’s an entire meal. I made a bad move somewhere in the beginning of my time here and looked at the nutrition facts of the “glucose biscuits” people eat all the time – it’s a pretty common escort. Each package has 500 calories - and that’s just a snack! But they love us and they want to take care of us so you can’t turn them down. I do appreciate the hospitality… and I think the compliments are funny… but that may change when I switch cultures again!
As a reminder… we’re still raising money to buy turkeys for the peace villages. They are desperate for a good source of protein because they have decided not to own cows or goats to reduce incidents of raiding and promote peace in Karamoja. We have about 260 turkeys paid for so far… thank you SO MUCH if you contributed! We are looking to get 500 by Christmas so please donate if you are able! $10 per turkey… just go to www.cvmusa.org/africavet and click on “animal revolving loans” under “related links” on the left, then scroll down to “Turkeys”. Thanks again!
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
Peace Meeting at Moruangamion
So last week we got back from our little vacation up in Kidepo Valley National Park, at the Northernmost part of Karamoja, bordering Sudan. We had a great time there and were able to relax and see many amazing animals. On the drive in we even encountered a pair of lions breeding in the road! Then when we pulled up as they wandered off the road, the male was lying about 15 ft. away from my window! That was quite the start to our time there. We proceeded to see many giraffes and elephants throughout the weekend. I’m still waiting on the hippos, but I was quite satisfied by the zebras, water buffalo, water buck, hartebeests (goofy looking creatures!), warthogs, ostriches, and other animals that we saw! We also had a lot of time to spend relaxing and praying and things. We would sit on a rock or under a tree and read and pray during the day and go for game drives in the late afternoons. (We went for the trees after the first day when I got nice and crispy from sitting in the sun for six hours :-P) The view is absolutely amazing from Kidepo, though. There are mountains all around and the sunsets are awesome. It was the perfect place to relax for the week.
Val was also brave enough during our time there to let me drive a couple times. Now this is a very interesting experience considering just a few facts.
1. “wrong” side of the road
2. “wrong” side of the car
3. driving a diesel
4. driving a Land Rover pickup
5. driving with horns blocking your view
6. shifting (standard) with your left hand
7. blinkers on the opposite side of the steering wheel
8. encountering gorges in the middle of the road about every six inches
9. driving through the bush with unseen “footing”
10. turning the key backwards to start the vehicle
Luckily the pedals are in the same places!!
So we had many adventures during our time there… feel free to ask more when I’m home! :-P
Following a week of new staff orientation and transition time in Moroto/Kangole, this past weekend we held a peace meeting in one of the Pion villages. This village has been one of the biggest sources of raids in the area. Deaths have occurred and animals stolen between the Pion and Bokora subtribes, many of which have been traced back to this one village. We planned to meet with the villagers on Saturday. Saturday morning we left early to gather up our “troops”. This included some pastors and a reverend from the Bokora side, our little friend James from Kangole and our Muslim friend, Mohammad, who has been a huge help in the peace process – leading the peace choir in Nabwal and being our official animal slaughter-er at gatherings. We made the drive through Nabwal, picking many members from there (I squeezed in the back of the truck with about 15 other people – dodging thorn bushes by being pushed into some guy’s lap every time they came near) and continued on through to the ‘enemy’ side – the Pion subtribe. Our Nabwal members included both Pion and Bokora people… they have come together in peace to mend relationships and stop the killing and stealing. Many people from Nabwal left early that morning to make the 20-30 km walk to the place where we were meeting, as we would not have enough room for everyone in the Land Rover.
We arrived at Moruangamio (good luck with that one! ;-P) and saw a group of men sitting under the trees there. They were having an akiriket… a traditional meeting with the elders and the young warriors. There is usually a reason to have these meetings – they didn’t say exactly what prompted it but sometimes it can be to plan a raid or for cleansing after a raid or if someone has killed a person. The young warriors were blessed by the elders and the meeting was coming to an end when we arrived. Some of our men went in to talk to the elders at that point – women are not allowed near the meeting, so we waited in the vehicle. There was some confusion about when we were having our meeting, so they were expecting us on Sunday instead. Since everyone was already gathered they told us we could meet once they were done, but additional people would be coming the next day to meet with us and we decided to wait so that we could have a bigger crowd. In a normal situation this would have been a problem – we hadn’t packed anything to stay overnight – no toothbrush, no clothes, no shampoo… it was a stretch for some of us :-P But we knew what we had to do and as the time went on we saw how God was working in this situation. Because of the ekiriket, all the important elders and opinion leaders were in the area. We had brought elders from Nabwal… some of whom had family on the Pion side and others who didn’t. But because we couldn’t exactly return home and come back the next day, everyone was going to have to find a place to stay for the night. Karamojong culture is very welcoming… people think of them as fierce warriors, but they have such soft hearts as well. The Pion elders stood up after a small discussion where the decision was made that we would meet the next day and they went over to our Nabwal guys and introduced themselves. They then proceeded to pair up and host their “enemies” for the night! It was amazing… we were able to give them some money for food and they all were able to have a good night of getting to know each other. Val and I and some other staff members went to the one guest house that was about a half hour away. The rest of the day, the word was spread throughout the villages that there would be a meeting the next day and by that time more than 500 people showed up! Sunday morning, Val and I grabbed a branch from a “toothbrush tree” so we could feel a little more human – wearing the same clothes as the day before and feeling the dusty sweaty grime covering my hair and body. The toothbrush tree was quite the experience… I tried it once before, but last time it wasn’t dry season. During dry season, the “toothpaste” qualities are even more concentrated and they don’t exactly taste like mint. It was difficult to endure the extreme bitterness that got my teeth clean, but worth it in the end (I think). Basically you chew on the branch for a while to make it “bristley” and then brush your teeth with it. So that morning we had a couple mandazis and African tea and then proceeded on back to Moruangamio.
The meeting ended up going so well! We started with a short prayer service complete with much singing and dancing and me being dragged into the middle of the circle by some tall guy so I could jump with him in front of everyone. As we sat in the shade of some trees, the scent of freshly slaughtered bull coming up the hill, some political leaders, tribal elders and pastors held a discussion about the current situation. There was no accusation going on, it was fully understood that there were still raids and there was no need to go into the specifics. Instead, they talked about the need for peace and how to recognize conflict before it goes too far and what to do to prevent it. Pretty soon after the start, one of the Pion elders suggested the idea of forming a joint krawl for the cows. At night, after grazing for the day, the animals are all taken to a protected location to try to prevent raids. By bringing together Pion and Bokora animals, there would be a greatly reduced reason to raid - The animals would be identified easily and they would just end up back on the other side. It was really neat that they came up with this because Dr. Val and CLIDE have had this idea for a long time and were waiting for the people to be ready for it. It was amazing that they came up with it on their own! So they discussed organizing that… we will be able to provide some veterinary care for the animals as they settle in and we are going to help with identification by doing ear-tags and branding and ID cards to better keep track of the animals and even discourage raiding. Peace choirs from Nabwal as well as two Pion villages formed intermissions in between speeches by singing about how much they love each other and how amazing peace is, etc. Another reason it was so cool to wait until Sunday – because the Nabwal choir had been practicing all night, some of the young Pion girls joined in and sang with them! As the meeting closed after about six hours or so, it was time to eat the two roasted bulls! Everyone gathered into groups and it was distributed without any conflict. Our little boy, James, and I guarded the sodas and water (which were for the “big” people – political leaders and such) as everyone ate. Somehow none of the CLIDE staff even tasted any meat but we enjoyed watching everyone bonding. Poor James, though… we had already unintentionally kidnapped him for the night and then we didn’t feed him allll day. And he probably expected to be living the good life hanging with the mzungus all weekend! Luckily he did get a soda, but that was it until about 7pm. After fighting the mob and taking some pictures of the cool tribal singing and dancing, we headed out, crowded in back with all my clossse friends of the day before.
It was maybe 5:00 or so – we were going to get back late enough even before the challenges arose. After about an hour, we were in the middle of the bush to Nabwal when smoke starts filling the vehicle. Land Rover batteries are located under the passenger seat and we have two of them there. Because of the roads and constant bumping the wires had been rubbing together and chose that time to touch each other and create a fire. Val yelled to evacuate the vehicle and sacrificed her fingers as she opened the cover and managed to get the wires apart. Luckily, diesel engines don’t explode like others, so it wasn’t quite as risky. It took a while but after disconnecting one of the batteries and moving some wires around, we got the vehicle going again and proceeded on our way. Only one more mishap on the way home – and this one we were used to! After dropping people off at Nabwal we were driving the road back to the Bokora side and got a flat tire. It was now pitch black, but luckily we had a good amount of passengers still and between our driver, Lowok, and some other people, it didn’t take so long to change the tire. At that point it was about 8:00 maybe and I was feeling very bad for little James. I discovered a pretty decrepit granola bar in my bag and gave it to him. I’ve hardly seen his face light up so much… I think he was hungry! We made it back to Kangole at around 10:30… thinking we must be done for the day. Because it was so late, we couldn’t send James back home and he stayed with a staff member for the night.
Then as we were driving home, a small group of people on the side of the road flagged us down. They had a really sick kid and had to get him to the hospital. We couldn’t exactly refuse that request so we quickly dropped some things at the hut and grabbed a granola bar and proceeded to the nearest hospital about a half hour away. The kid was really sick… they had said he had malaria but that’s pretty much how they’ll describe anything here :-P As we were driving the boy (about 2 years old) starts coughing and half-breathing. You could hear the pneumonia from about a mile away. We got him to the hospital as fast as we could with the roads in the condition they were in and rushed him inside. There were no doctors around and just a few nurses. They eventually… after about a half hour and poking every limb (literally) about 3 times… got a catheter in. They gave him valium to stop the seizures he was having from lack of oxygen and gave some fluids but weren’t allowed to give any antibiotics to treat the pneumonia because the doctor wouldn’t come – he was tired. It was quite frustrating to watch knowing you and the doctor that’s with you could help the boy when the hospital can do nothing. We left after a little while… his seizures had stopped from the valium, but he wasn’t at all breathing well. He’ll probably have some mental retardation at least from waiting until the morning for treatment. We haven’t had any updates but we’re praying he made it through and the doctors were able to help in the morning! While we were there another baby who was basically a skeleton came in. The grandmother was the one taking care of him and she wasn’t feeding him at all. There’s even a program at the hospital to nourish starving children but she wouldn’t bring him there. So pray for that boy too – that maybe he can find a home with someone who is able to take care of him. So… it was another adventurous and long day! We got home around 12:30 and had become un-tired by all the adrenaline. We stayed up and had some tea and meat that some elders had given us to take home then went to bed.
Another thing to let you all know… we’re doing a program with the Nabwal and Nakayot (peace village) people… they want to start incorporating some animals into their villages again now that they’re becoming stable enough. Most of the children are protein-deficient and could really use some meat so it’s a very good step for them. We’re going to do a “Turkey Blessings for Karamoja” project. We’re trying to supply the village with as many turkeys as we can and hoping to raise money for 500 turkeys by Christmas! There are about 12,000 people in Nabwal at this point and 3,000 in Nakayot so the more the merrier! They will cost $10 per turkey and if you would like to donate a turkey or two (or more!) then you can do so on the CVM site. Go to www.cvmusa.org/africavet and then on the left side under “related links” there is a place that says “Revolving Animal Loans”. Click on the option that says “turkeys” and the amount you would like to give and you will end up feeding some very needy peace villagers. Thank you for your help ahead of time!! (The option for turkeys should be up soon but if it’s not when you try feel free to pick “chickens” and we’ll assume it means turkeys until we get the site updated)
Val was also brave enough during our time there to let me drive a couple times. Now this is a very interesting experience considering just a few facts.
1. “wrong” side of the road
2. “wrong” side of the car
3. driving a diesel
4. driving a Land Rover pickup
5. driving with horns blocking your view
6. shifting (standard) with your left hand
7. blinkers on the opposite side of the steering wheel
8. encountering gorges in the middle of the road about every six inches
9. driving through the bush with unseen “footing”
10. turning the key backwards to start the vehicle
Luckily the pedals are in the same places!!
So we had many adventures during our time there… feel free to ask more when I’m home! :-P
Following a week of new staff orientation and transition time in Moroto/Kangole, this past weekend we held a peace meeting in one of the Pion villages. This village has been one of the biggest sources of raids in the area. Deaths have occurred and animals stolen between the Pion and Bokora subtribes, many of which have been traced back to this one village. We planned to meet with the villagers on Saturday. Saturday morning we left early to gather up our “troops”. This included some pastors and a reverend from the Bokora side, our little friend James from Kangole and our Muslim friend, Mohammad, who has been a huge help in the peace process – leading the peace choir in Nabwal and being our official animal slaughter-er at gatherings. We made the drive through Nabwal, picking many members from there (I squeezed in the back of the truck with about 15 other people – dodging thorn bushes by being pushed into some guy’s lap every time they came near) and continued on through to the ‘enemy’ side – the Pion subtribe. Our Nabwal members included both Pion and Bokora people… they have come together in peace to mend relationships and stop the killing and stealing. Many people from Nabwal left early that morning to make the 20-30 km walk to the place where we were meeting, as we would not have enough room for everyone in the Land Rover.
We arrived at Moruangamio (good luck with that one! ;-P) and saw a group of men sitting under the trees there. They were having an akiriket… a traditional meeting with the elders and the young warriors. There is usually a reason to have these meetings – they didn’t say exactly what prompted it but sometimes it can be to plan a raid or for cleansing after a raid or if someone has killed a person. The young warriors were blessed by the elders and the meeting was coming to an end when we arrived. Some of our men went in to talk to the elders at that point – women are not allowed near the meeting, so we waited in the vehicle. There was some confusion about when we were having our meeting, so they were expecting us on Sunday instead. Since everyone was already gathered they told us we could meet once they were done, but additional people would be coming the next day to meet with us and we decided to wait so that we could have a bigger crowd. In a normal situation this would have been a problem – we hadn’t packed anything to stay overnight – no toothbrush, no clothes, no shampoo… it was a stretch for some of us :-P But we knew what we had to do and as the time went on we saw how God was working in this situation. Because of the ekiriket, all the important elders and opinion leaders were in the area. We had brought elders from Nabwal… some of whom had family on the Pion side and others who didn’t. But because we couldn’t exactly return home and come back the next day, everyone was going to have to find a place to stay for the night. Karamojong culture is very welcoming… people think of them as fierce warriors, but they have such soft hearts as well. The Pion elders stood up after a small discussion where the decision was made that we would meet the next day and they went over to our Nabwal guys and introduced themselves. They then proceeded to pair up and host their “enemies” for the night! It was amazing… we were able to give them some money for food and they all were able to have a good night of getting to know each other. Val and I and some other staff members went to the one guest house that was about a half hour away. The rest of the day, the word was spread throughout the villages that there would be a meeting the next day and by that time more than 500 people showed up! Sunday morning, Val and I grabbed a branch from a “toothbrush tree” so we could feel a little more human – wearing the same clothes as the day before and feeling the dusty sweaty grime covering my hair and body. The toothbrush tree was quite the experience… I tried it once before, but last time it wasn’t dry season. During dry season, the “toothpaste” qualities are even more concentrated and they don’t exactly taste like mint. It was difficult to endure the extreme bitterness that got my teeth clean, but worth it in the end (I think). Basically you chew on the branch for a while to make it “bristley” and then brush your teeth with it. So that morning we had a couple mandazis and African tea and then proceeded on back to Moruangamio.
The meeting ended up going so well! We started with a short prayer service complete with much singing and dancing and me being dragged into the middle of the circle by some tall guy so I could jump with him in front of everyone. As we sat in the shade of some trees, the scent of freshly slaughtered bull coming up the hill, some political leaders, tribal elders and pastors held a discussion about the current situation. There was no accusation going on, it was fully understood that there were still raids and there was no need to go into the specifics. Instead, they talked about the need for peace and how to recognize conflict before it goes too far and what to do to prevent it. Pretty soon after the start, one of the Pion elders suggested the idea of forming a joint krawl for the cows. At night, after grazing for the day, the animals are all taken to a protected location to try to prevent raids. By bringing together Pion and Bokora animals, there would be a greatly reduced reason to raid - The animals would be identified easily and they would just end up back on the other side. It was really neat that they came up with this because Dr. Val and CLIDE have had this idea for a long time and were waiting for the people to be ready for it. It was amazing that they came up with it on their own! So they discussed organizing that… we will be able to provide some veterinary care for the animals as they settle in and we are going to help with identification by doing ear-tags and branding and ID cards to better keep track of the animals and even discourage raiding. Peace choirs from Nabwal as well as two Pion villages formed intermissions in between speeches by singing about how much they love each other and how amazing peace is, etc. Another reason it was so cool to wait until Sunday – because the Nabwal choir had been practicing all night, some of the young Pion girls joined in and sang with them! As the meeting closed after about six hours or so, it was time to eat the two roasted bulls! Everyone gathered into groups and it was distributed without any conflict. Our little boy, James, and I guarded the sodas and water (which were for the “big” people – political leaders and such) as everyone ate. Somehow none of the CLIDE staff even tasted any meat but we enjoyed watching everyone bonding. Poor James, though… we had already unintentionally kidnapped him for the night and then we didn’t feed him allll day. And he probably expected to be living the good life hanging with the mzungus all weekend! Luckily he did get a soda, but that was it until about 7pm. After fighting the mob and taking some pictures of the cool tribal singing and dancing, we headed out, crowded in back with all my clossse friends of the day before.
It was maybe 5:00 or so – we were going to get back late enough even before the challenges arose. After about an hour, we were in the middle of the bush to Nabwal when smoke starts filling the vehicle. Land Rover batteries are located under the passenger seat and we have two of them there. Because of the roads and constant bumping the wires had been rubbing together and chose that time to touch each other and create a fire. Val yelled to evacuate the vehicle and sacrificed her fingers as she opened the cover and managed to get the wires apart. Luckily, diesel engines don’t explode like others, so it wasn’t quite as risky. It took a while but after disconnecting one of the batteries and moving some wires around, we got the vehicle going again and proceeded on our way. Only one more mishap on the way home – and this one we were used to! After dropping people off at Nabwal we were driving the road back to the Bokora side and got a flat tire. It was now pitch black, but luckily we had a good amount of passengers still and between our driver, Lowok, and some other people, it didn’t take so long to change the tire. At that point it was about 8:00 maybe and I was feeling very bad for little James. I discovered a pretty decrepit granola bar in my bag and gave it to him. I’ve hardly seen his face light up so much… I think he was hungry! We made it back to Kangole at around 10:30… thinking we must be done for the day. Because it was so late, we couldn’t send James back home and he stayed with a staff member for the night.
Then as we were driving home, a small group of people on the side of the road flagged us down. They had a really sick kid and had to get him to the hospital. We couldn’t exactly refuse that request so we quickly dropped some things at the hut and grabbed a granola bar and proceeded to the nearest hospital about a half hour away. The kid was really sick… they had said he had malaria but that’s pretty much how they’ll describe anything here :-P As we were driving the boy (about 2 years old) starts coughing and half-breathing. You could hear the pneumonia from about a mile away. We got him to the hospital as fast as we could with the roads in the condition they were in and rushed him inside. There were no doctors around and just a few nurses. They eventually… after about a half hour and poking every limb (literally) about 3 times… got a catheter in. They gave him valium to stop the seizures he was having from lack of oxygen and gave some fluids but weren’t allowed to give any antibiotics to treat the pneumonia because the doctor wouldn’t come – he was tired. It was quite frustrating to watch knowing you and the doctor that’s with you could help the boy when the hospital can do nothing. We left after a little while… his seizures had stopped from the valium, but he wasn’t at all breathing well. He’ll probably have some mental retardation at least from waiting until the morning for treatment. We haven’t had any updates but we’re praying he made it through and the doctors were able to help in the morning! While we were there another baby who was basically a skeleton came in. The grandmother was the one taking care of him and she wasn’t feeding him at all. There’s even a program at the hospital to nourish starving children but she wouldn’t bring him there. So pray for that boy too – that maybe he can find a home with someone who is able to take care of him. So… it was another adventurous and long day! We got home around 12:30 and had become un-tired by all the adrenaline. We stayed up and had some tea and meat that some elders had given us to take home then went to bed.
Another thing to let you all know… we’re doing a program with the Nabwal and Nakayot (peace village) people… they want to start incorporating some animals into their villages again now that they’re becoming stable enough. Most of the children are protein-deficient and could really use some meat so it’s a very good step for them. We’re going to do a “Turkey Blessings for Karamoja” project. We’re trying to supply the village with as many turkeys as we can and hoping to raise money for 500 turkeys by Christmas! There are about 12,000 people in Nabwal at this point and 3,000 in Nakayot so the more the merrier! They will cost $10 per turkey and if you would like to donate a turkey or two (or more!) then you can do so on the CVM site. Go to www.cvmusa.org/africavet and then on the left side under “related links” there is a place that says “Revolving Animal Loans”. Click on the option that says “turkeys” and the amount you would like to give and you will end up feeding some very needy peace villagers. Thank you for your help ahead of time!! (The option for turkeys should be up soon but if it’s not when you try feel free to pick “chickens” and we’ll assume it means turkeys until we get the site updated)
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
From Civilization to… Kidepo
So after Soroti we headed down to Kampala for the weekend to fix up the vehicle (for good!) and get it serviced. We were planning on leaving Friday night, but as you could probably have guessed by now, that didn’t work out. Val and I went into town on Thursday to pick some dinner [up] that part of that phrase is not used around here… you just pick things; you don’t pick them up. (I LOVE this language… it’s SO funny!) When we were trying to leave, the vehicle wouldn’t start and then it began POURING. Anyway… the issues ended up delaying us until Saturday morning, when we drove down to Kampala (without turning the vehicle off so as not to risk getting stuck along the way). We ended up having to wait around in Kampala until Tuesday because it took a while to do the servicing and everything.
But it’s crazy… Kampala is pretty much real civilization! We even got ICE CREAM! Actually it was gelato… I had stracciatella and hazelnut and it was SO good. A real Italian man owned the place… looked and sounded straight from the mafia :-P So that was quite the treat… and we may have gone there multiple times over our three days in the city. We also went to a MALL! Okay, so it wasn’t quite Crossgates (or any other one at home), but it wasn’t so bad. There was a theater and we saw a movie! A real movie too and I think they even play(ed) it in the states… Eat, Pray, Love. The theater was pretty Clifton Park-esque… not the most up-to date, but the seats were actually pretty comfortable and it wasn’t so bad! The only real difference was the fact that the movie turned off about five times during it and it did look a bit like the 1980s or something – not terrible but a little grainy. Came back on every time though! There was also a PIZZA place in the parking garage of the mall. It was called “I Love New York Kitchen” – made by some Mzungu… The pizza was pretty good but I don’t think they knew they were supposed to add some sort of seasoning… I’ve never had to put salt on a pizza before, but it definitely helped. So Kampala was fun :-) Since our vehicle was out of service the whole time, we traveled on Boda-bodas. The ones in Kampala are motorcycles, so you sit sideways behind the driver (if you’re a girl), holding your bags tightly on your lap and trying not to go flying or hit your knees on the cars they are weaving between. A couple of times Val and I squeezed onto the back of one together, which was interesting as I had a gigantic heavy backpack on and only about half of me was actually on the motorcycle… it was fine until going uphill or speeding up… then Val would grab me and make sure I didn’t disappear off the other side. Normally we took two, though, and tried to get them to stay together so we wouldn’t lose each other. We got some very good drivers and even managed to get to all our destinations! Eventually, by Tuesday night, the vehicle was ready and after negotiating down a ridiculously high price to a mostly ridiculously high price (well for here… for home it would have been cheap :-P) we left Kampala to go to Mbale.
Mbale is about five hours from Kampala and is still pretty close to civilization in atmosphere! We were meeting with the rest of the CLIDE team there for a spiritual retreat. Wednesday and Thursday we spent bonding with the others and hearing from a Bishop/Pastor/Reverend. The theme of the time was from the book of Jonah… I’ve never studied it so deeply so it was very interesting. We all really enjoyed the Bishop… God was definitely speaking through him! So we were all very encouraged/challenged by the retreat and I was really able to get to know the other CLIDE members better, which was good :-) We were staying in a place that was like a real hotel while we were there! It was so nice… infinitely nicer than the place we stay in Kampala (with no running water or even walls between the “bathroom” and the actual room… only the best for us :-P It costs a total of $8 per night for both me and Val in a room) But the place in Mbale had a FLUSHING toilet and a pseudo-shower (one of those removable heads that had no mount to hang it on). It even had a refrigerator! We had to leave early… it was supposed to go through Friday, but we had another visitor (a photographer/journalist) coming into Soroti on Friday morning, so we left early that morning to pick her at the ‘airport’. She works with an organization called MAF (Mission Aviation Fellowship). They selected an organization that uses their services from each country to use as promotion for both them and for the selected organization. They chose CLIDE and so the journalist (LuAnne) came to visit and we brought her to the peace villages.
Now the peace villages are quite different from real civilization :-P We started at Nakayot (because the road is more reliable) and we stayed in a couple mud huts they built for us. It was a really good time… we did some dancing (jumping) with the villagers in the pitch black night and we checked out the water situation because they are having some issues. They only have one borehole in the area (for 1000 homes) and it has been broken for a while. They are supposed to be getting around five more, but the organization that promised them (about a year ago) hasn’t gotten around to it. So for now the people walk about three or four kilometers to get water from a pool that collects a ways down the mountain from a spring. I went with another CLIDE person to go check it out, and we saw how dirty the water was. There is funny colored algae growing at the bottom of the pool and lots of sediment… it is not safe at all and is one of the reason almost all the kids have really bad worms (to go along with their malnutrition). Despite the walk, the people were so nice… they went and filled our jerricans so we could bathe and cook some tea in the morning. Saturday night we went to the other peace village, Nabwal. They are also having water problems and they have to walk about six miles to get to a working borehole. Life is so tough out there! We stayed in tents near a tree there and on Sunday we went to a makeshift church they have formed there. The pastor (who comes when he can make it down the road on his bicycle… he’s gotten ambushed in the past and almost killed) is absolutely amazing. The people LOVE him and God uses him SO much. He is planning on moving to live in Nabwal (a HUGE sacrifice) with his family, he just needs to get a house built first. So hopefully it’s not so long – it’s really hard for him to get there now. So we had a great time there… they pray in a building that was just completed recently for a school. Nakayot is a year younger than Nabwal and doesn’t have a health clinic or a school yet… it’s 25km away from the main road – in the previous no-man’s land between warring subtribes… so none of the children are able to go to school yet. Nabwal is a bit further along… their school just moved from a UNICEF tent to a real building and they have three volunteer ‘teachers’ from the area for primary years 1-3. The school has no chairs and they have a total of about 6 books – a math primary 2, English primary 3, things like that – references for the teachers to teach from. It’s amazing the effort those men are putting in to help the children learn with SO little, though.
After ‘prayers’ (they never refer to it as church… you ‘go to prayers’… ‘where do you pray from?’... etc) we had a meeting with the Peace Council. I learned how to cook rice and some other things for more than 60 people during the meeting. Had some close encounters with the fire and with messing up the rice by “mingling” it instead of “rotating” it. But all worked out and after the meeting there was a gigantic feast with two goats, some rice and “Irish”, posho and cabbage. The meeting went really really well, too. We haven’t been able to get to Nabwal so much because of the roads (it will be a bit easier now since it’s the dry season), so the people decided they needed to take things into their own hands (which is our goal, so that’s perfect!). They had come up with an ‘action plan’ and presented it to Val regarding how to deal with one village that has been a big contributor to the raiding in the area. I’ll let you know what happens after a couple weeks when they go through with the plan, but basically they’re going to go confront the elders and have some peace talks. They invited us to come along and bring some bulls (somehow… we’re not sure how we’re going to get them yet… so be praying for some provision!). We’re excited to see what happens… it could kind of go either way, but something is going to change because of it. A couple years back someone from this same village killed the main peace builder organizing Nabwal. It was a huge deal and after a pretty long story… an elder ended up giving his own son (who was responsible) to the mercy of the police and allowing the peace to come back. So it will be interesting to see what will happen this time.
After Nabwal, we came back up to Moroto, treated some animals the next morning in Kangole for photos and then LuAnne flew [out] and a couple more visitors (pastors from Oregon) came in to lead a Pastor Training Conference for leaders in Karamoja. Val and I are heading out today to go to Kotido and then Kidepo up in the more northern part of Karamoja, right near Sudan. There is a wildlife park up there so I can’t wait to find some giraffes and other cool things!! :-D It is an eight hour drive on the worst roads in Karamoja, so there probably won’t be anyone else there. Not exactly the best tourist destination. I’ll let you know more about that when we get back! :-P
But it’s crazy… Kampala is pretty much real civilization! We even got ICE CREAM! Actually it was gelato… I had stracciatella and hazelnut and it was SO good. A real Italian man owned the place… looked and sounded straight from the mafia :-P So that was quite the treat… and we may have gone there multiple times over our three days in the city. We also went to a MALL! Okay, so it wasn’t quite Crossgates (or any other one at home), but it wasn’t so bad. There was a theater and we saw a movie! A real movie too and I think they even play(ed) it in the states… Eat, Pray, Love. The theater was pretty Clifton Park-esque… not the most up-to date, but the seats were actually pretty comfortable and it wasn’t so bad! The only real difference was the fact that the movie turned off about five times during it and it did look a bit like the 1980s or something – not terrible but a little grainy. Came back on every time though! There was also a PIZZA place in the parking garage of the mall. It was called “I Love New York Kitchen” – made by some Mzungu… The pizza was pretty good but I don’t think they knew they were supposed to add some sort of seasoning… I’ve never had to put salt on a pizza before, but it definitely helped. So Kampala was fun :-) Since our vehicle was out of service the whole time, we traveled on Boda-bodas. The ones in Kampala are motorcycles, so you sit sideways behind the driver (if you’re a girl), holding your bags tightly on your lap and trying not to go flying or hit your knees on the cars they are weaving between. A couple of times Val and I squeezed onto the back of one together, which was interesting as I had a gigantic heavy backpack on and only about half of me was actually on the motorcycle… it was fine until going uphill or speeding up… then Val would grab me and make sure I didn’t disappear off the other side. Normally we took two, though, and tried to get them to stay together so we wouldn’t lose each other. We got some very good drivers and even managed to get to all our destinations! Eventually, by Tuesday night, the vehicle was ready and after negotiating down a ridiculously high price to a mostly ridiculously high price (well for here… for home it would have been cheap :-P) we left Kampala to go to Mbale.
Mbale is about five hours from Kampala and is still pretty close to civilization in atmosphere! We were meeting with the rest of the CLIDE team there for a spiritual retreat. Wednesday and Thursday we spent bonding with the others and hearing from a Bishop/Pastor/Reverend. The theme of the time was from the book of Jonah… I’ve never studied it so deeply so it was very interesting. We all really enjoyed the Bishop… God was definitely speaking through him! So we were all very encouraged/challenged by the retreat and I was really able to get to know the other CLIDE members better, which was good :-) We were staying in a place that was like a real hotel while we were there! It was so nice… infinitely nicer than the place we stay in Kampala (with no running water or even walls between the “bathroom” and the actual room… only the best for us :-P It costs a total of $8 per night for both me and Val in a room) But the place in Mbale had a FLUSHING toilet and a pseudo-shower (one of those removable heads that had no mount to hang it on). It even had a refrigerator! We had to leave early… it was supposed to go through Friday, but we had another visitor (a photographer/journalist) coming into Soroti on Friday morning, so we left early that morning to pick her at the ‘airport’. She works with an organization called MAF (Mission Aviation Fellowship). They selected an organization that uses their services from each country to use as promotion for both them and for the selected organization. They chose CLIDE and so the journalist (LuAnne) came to visit and we brought her to the peace villages.
Now the peace villages are quite different from real civilization :-P We started at Nakayot (because the road is more reliable) and we stayed in a couple mud huts they built for us. It was a really good time… we did some dancing (jumping) with the villagers in the pitch black night and we checked out the water situation because they are having some issues. They only have one borehole in the area (for 1000 homes) and it has been broken for a while. They are supposed to be getting around five more, but the organization that promised them (about a year ago) hasn’t gotten around to it. So for now the people walk about three or four kilometers to get water from a pool that collects a ways down the mountain from a spring. I went with another CLIDE person to go check it out, and we saw how dirty the water was. There is funny colored algae growing at the bottom of the pool and lots of sediment… it is not safe at all and is one of the reason almost all the kids have really bad worms (to go along with their malnutrition). Despite the walk, the people were so nice… they went and filled our jerricans so we could bathe and cook some tea in the morning. Saturday night we went to the other peace village, Nabwal. They are also having water problems and they have to walk about six miles to get to a working borehole. Life is so tough out there! We stayed in tents near a tree there and on Sunday we went to a makeshift church they have formed there. The pastor (who comes when he can make it down the road on his bicycle… he’s gotten ambushed in the past and almost killed) is absolutely amazing. The people LOVE him and God uses him SO much. He is planning on moving to live in Nabwal (a HUGE sacrifice) with his family, he just needs to get a house built first. So hopefully it’s not so long – it’s really hard for him to get there now. So we had a great time there… they pray in a building that was just completed recently for a school. Nakayot is a year younger than Nabwal and doesn’t have a health clinic or a school yet… it’s 25km away from the main road – in the previous no-man’s land between warring subtribes… so none of the children are able to go to school yet. Nabwal is a bit further along… their school just moved from a UNICEF tent to a real building and they have three volunteer ‘teachers’ from the area for primary years 1-3. The school has no chairs and they have a total of about 6 books – a math primary 2, English primary 3, things like that – references for the teachers to teach from. It’s amazing the effort those men are putting in to help the children learn with SO little, though.
After ‘prayers’ (they never refer to it as church… you ‘go to prayers’… ‘where do you pray from?’... etc) we had a meeting with the Peace Council. I learned how to cook rice and some other things for more than 60 people during the meeting. Had some close encounters with the fire and with messing up the rice by “mingling” it instead of “rotating” it. But all worked out and after the meeting there was a gigantic feast with two goats, some rice and “Irish”, posho and cabbage. The meeting went really really well, too. We haven’t been able to get to Nabwal so much because of the roads (it will be a bit easier now since it’s the dry season), so the people decided they needed to take things into their own hands (which is our goal, so that’s perfect!). They had come up with an ‘action plan’ and presented it to Val regarding how to deal with one village that has been a big contributor to the raiding in the area. I’ll let you know what happens after a couple weeks when they go through with the plan, but basically they’re going to go confront the elders and have some peace talks. They invited us to come along and bring some bulls (somehow… we’re not sure how we’re going to get them yet… so be praying for some provision!). We’re excited to see what happens… it could kind of go either way, but something is going to change because of it. A couple years back someone from this same village killed the main peace builder organizing Nabwal. It was a huge deal and after a pretty long story… an elder ended up giving his own son (who was responsible) to the mercy of the police and allowing the peace to come back. So it will be interesting to see what will happen this time.
After Nabwal, we came back up to Moroto, treated some animals the next morning in Kangole for photos and then LuAnne flew [out] and a couple more visitors (pastors from Oregon) came in to lead a Pastor Training Conference for leaders in Karamoja. Val and I are heading out today to go to Kotido and then Kidepo up in the more northern part of Karamoja, right near Sudan. There is a wildlife park up there so I can’t wait to find some giraffes and other cool things!! :-D It is an eight hour drive on the worst roads in Karamoja, so there probably won’t be anyone else there. Not exactly the best tourist destination. I’ll let you know more about that when we get back! :-P
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Greetings from Soroti!
Well, now that we have no visitors things have been a bit different. We are free to camp in the bush without feeling bad about not taking proper care of visitors (I don’t count anymore :-P), so we spent another night there. We went in the early afternoon and started at the dam. From there we walked to the village and to the army barracks. We discovered that a good amount of people are moving around back there during the day… either gathering firewood or grass for roof-thatching or making charcoal. There are some “paths” that go from near the dam to the village that Punzel must be using to move around. It seems like she’s staying in that area but there’s still no sight of her. The land looks so vast when you’re wandering through the bush… grass up to your shoulders, thorny trees as far as you can see and mountains in the background. Seems like she should be right there on one hand but it seems like she could be anywhere on the other. So we search and search, calling out into the sorghum fields and across the plains. This time we brought her son, Tutu. When we first got there and Val called out for Punzel, his ears perked up and he looked around as alert as I’ve ever seen him. He even stood up from the spot he had found in the shade of a tree… which was quite an accomplishment considering the effort it took us to get him going in the heat of the day. We literally chucked him into the pond to get him all wet where he proceeded to just lay and drink water in that position until we almost dragged him out. Once we got going, though, he was alright and he followed along in the “paths” we created through the grass. After searching around there we proceeded to the Army barracks and wandered for a while to leave Tutu’s smell for Punzel to recognize. We saw a bunch of footprints in the area, but probably the same ones as from last week. As we followed them, they led us in circles and under trees and into piles of rocks or sticks and we concluded that Punzel was getting some hunting in. They had recently burned the grass, which should have released lots of little game (mice, lizards, etc), providing Punzel with, hopefully, some good meals. Tutu would stick his nose right into the center of the footprints and take in the scent of his mother. Unfortunately, he’s not exactly a tracking dog and that’s pretty much where he left it. We’re gonna need someone with some more experience (I hear Val’s sister, Holly, may have a candidate?! Can’t wait to meet you soon! :-P) to help us out in the search…
That night we stayed in our mosquito coffins again. Luckily Limlim decided to keep the rain away :-) and we only got a few drips before we went to bed. We spent some time in the vehicle… on our computers and listening to music. I played a song for Val - Nielly, that’s why I asked about the name of our song… Worth it All by Rita Springer. It was very fitting for the occasion as frustration set in at our lack of success. We don’t always understand why things happen, but God does have a plan and I think He knows a bit more than me anyway :-P Funny background fact for the rest of you… Danielle and I always listened to this song while studying for orgo tests at about 3am the night before. There’s NO way you’re going to know it all and you don’t want to care, but we figured if God wanted us in med/vet school then He was going to take care of it. We didn’t need to overstress about it – just put forth the effort we had and it would be worth it! “I don’t understand your ways… but I will give you my heart, give you all of my praise” So that’s what Val and I did. We know that God knows best – that He will take care of Punzel and He can bring her to us if that’s His plan. But we just need to trust Him and thank Him for what He’s doing and know that… It’ll be worth it! (I would copy the lyrics for you but I have no internet, so feel free to google/youtube it with your super fast connection that I’m jealous of :-P) Anyway… the next morning we couldn’t stick around too long but we did one last loop and then dropped the Army men off because they wanted to help. We dropped them at the dam and they walked back to the barracks from there. Can you picture six armed guys in camo walking in formation through the bush calling “Punzel, Punzel…”?! I think it’d be a funny picture.
Oh, two more interesting facts from that trip. So Val and I have this thing… we need some more research done. During the time we were out, Val got about 28 ticks on her and no mosquito bites. I, on the other hand, found ZERO ticks on myself and got about a thousand mosquito bites. This has been consistent over the whole time I’ve been here. I have a total of one thousand bites on each of my feet (yes, I totally counted :-P) and Val hardly has any. I’ve never once in my life found a tick on me (I will now that I wrote this, but I’m risking it) and Val finds them literally all the time. It’s quite strange. I think someone should do some research on this. And fact two… while we were sitting near the dam letting Tutu get some rest in the shade I decided to play with this little weed that was growing nearby. I broke it off and some white stuff came out (like a dandelion). So of course the (logical?) thing to do would be to smell the white stuff. Okay, so no idea what made me do that, but it’s a good thing I did because otherwise I would have missed out. The second I lifted it to my nose I was transported back to my childhood. I felt like I was sitting at the kitchen table, just getting over a cold, with a bowl of chicken noodle soup sitting in front of me. The weed smelled JUST like Campbell’s chicken noodle soup. I’m not even kidding. (Though I may be about my childhood, cause I don’t really remember getting Campbell’s so often… I think Progresso is much better. But it didn’t smell like Progresso. It smelled like Campbell’s) I looked confusedly down at the weed, broke off another piece and handed it to Val. I could see the facial expression as soon as she lifted it to her nose. Guess what she thought it smelled like?! CAMPBELL’S! I think it’s there secret ingredient. Though since we had that thought, we decided to take a taste. So that was not the smartest idea, because it totally didn’t taste like chicken noodle soup – it was SO bitter and it actually made Val’s tongue hurt for the next couple days. But anyway… it was ridiculous how much they smelled the same. SO random.
Last weekend there was an Ordination at church. CLIDE works with the Church of Uganda pretty often and that’s where Val and I go while in Kangole. So four men were being ordained that day – it was a HUGE celebration. One man was becoming a deacon and the others were lay readers. I don’t entirely know what those mean but they’re pastors or church leaders of some sort. Basically they were completely committing their lives to ministry, which is a big deal because from then on they will pretty much get no income and be very poor. The ceremony was about 6 hours… mostly of speeches and singing/dancing. Val and I brought our little 10ish year old friend, James. He’s the one who we have do random things around the house because he just wants to help out. He also feeds some of our random pets while we’re gone. We give him some food or something little once in a while, but it’s cool how he really just wants to help out – with nothing in return. He speaks very little English, so communication is limited with him, but he was around in the morning before Church started… standing there barefoot in his little ripped up tan shorts and t-shirt – just like always. So we decided to bring him along to the ceremony. He sat next to us in the district officials section. They always make us sit up front with the “important people” so it was cool for James to be able to join us. He is pretty unexpressive, but it was fun to be able to take him past all the other kids and bring him up front. I was thinking how if it was in the US… the kid would have thought you were punishing him for something. He sat there for five hours listening to people talk. I was on verge of falling asleep (then again, I also had no idea what they were saying :-P) but James just sat there listening. During some of the Bible reading, I handed him the Karamojong Bible I had acquired and Val led him through word by word as they spoke. James doesn’t go to school – I’m not sure if he has at all, but it’s very likely that he hasn’t – his family probably can’t afford school fees. It was so neat to see though… when they had finished the reading, James continued to look at the Bible and try to read the same passage. You could see his little brain hard at work trying to decipher the words he just heard.
After the ceremony there was a feast. Which, of course, brings up some interesting foods. They had everything and it was a gigantic buffet table kind of thing (which was good because I could choose a bit what I wanted to avoid). But then Val told me of something I just had to try. I knew this was bad news, but I couldn’t actually avoid it – then what stories would I tell you all?! So it’s called Emuna. It’s a traditional “food” of the Karamojong… they used to make it for their long nomadic journeys because it would stay for a year. (I say the reason it “stayed” was because it was already rotten, but you can be the judge of that). So… Emuna is made by first taking a slab of meat and removing all the fat and tendons from it (not so bad!), then hanging up the strips in the shade outside for three days so it can dry with flies all over it. Then they boil the meat to remove the rest of the fat (or it would go bad), then dry it and pound it into meat powder with a mortar and pestle. After drying it again, you end up with a nice fluffy mound of meat to which you add gee. If you don’t know what that is, it’s fermented butter. Niiiice and oily and… well… fermented tasting. Then you pound cucumber seeds, sesame seeds and/or ground nuts (aka peanuts) into powder and add it. When in season, termites are also pounded and added in for a delicious additional flavor (thank God, they were not in season). Then you add sugar to taste and stir it together for… ummm… a… taste SENSATION. Awesome. And there is your high energy travel food, ready to go on a long raid or nomadic journey!
A couple days later, the emuna may have been put to use when we heard gunshots in the center of town. What a surprise! Raiders had come to steal the hundreds of cows that they gather together in one unprotected area in the middle of town. In the safety of our foot-thick cement walled hut, we listened to the raid go on down a couple of blocks. You can almost see the whole story play out… first there are some real fast one-after-another gunshots from the army’s machine guns. Then a few single shots shot by warriors who have to conserve their bullets. They are not so accessible these days because there is a disarmament project where the Army takes away all the Karamojong’s guns (and then sometimes sells them back to make some money :-P). So they have to get them from Sudan and it is harder than it used to be. So you can tell who’s who pretty easily during the raid. The gunshots would stop for a while and then a few more and then they slowed down as the raiders ran into the bush and hid from the Army amongst the tall grasses. Then we heard an APC (armored personnel carrier) drive by, pursuing after the raiders and the animals they had managed to capture. I’m not sure how many they got in the end but luckily the army did find them before they took all the cows of Kangole. I don’t think anyone got killed, either, so that’s good. But it made for an interesting night, listening to what would be fireworks in the states under a nice protective grass-thatched roof. We did stay inside, though we don’t have any appealing animals in our compound, so there’s not much of a temptation to come in.
So now… a week or so later… we are down in Soroti. Val had some meetings here and then on the way, the vehicle decided to fall apart, so we stuck around a bit longer than expected! The stabilizer bar for the left rear tire just kinda fell off (the bracket broke). So that was when we were about 2 hours from Soroti. We couldn’t really stop there, so we tied it up with rope and prayed that it would hold the tire on! It was a bit of an interesting drive… going about 10mph and we couldn’t turn right or it would pull on the rope and break it. And then after a little, the bar moved forward more and was stuck so we really couldn’t turn right even if we wanted to. And the bearings were all worn out from this little issue, so basically our rear tire was barely held on. About 1.5 hours later we got to the next town (amazingly still with four tires!) where someone was going to rescue us. We parked the vehicle with the police and carried all our stuff to a restaurant where we waited for our ride. Eventually we made it to Soroti, where we’ve been since last Thursday or something. The vehicle finally got fixed… well… “fixed” and was brought back yesterday. It was a miracle they found the replacement part here in Soroti, but it still needs some work, so we’re going to go to Kampala this weekend and get it serviced. Hopefully we’ll make it without a problem! So Soroti has been relaxing… I’ve been running in my running skirt, bringing my Ipod so I can pretend I can’t hear all the hollering as I run by the guys. There are also lots of cute little kids who yell – which is… better… but still not entirely appreciated cause you can’t go ANYWHERE without feeling like a one-person parade! The word “bye” turns into a two syllable word around here. “by-yee, by-yee… mzungu by-yee” I hear over and over. Or “mzungu how are you? How are you?”. So I say “I am fine, how are you?!” and they get SO excited to use their four English words that they know. “Fine!” “goo-d by-yee!” The ladies are sweet because they get really excited/embarrassed if you talk to them. It can be fun… but tiring to do so much interacting when you just wanted to run. Or walk to church about 50 feet away – it can take like 20 minutes to get there!
Anyway… my hope is that maybe with Kampala internet connection I’ll be able to put up some pictures?! Not sure if that’s true, but I will try my best! I hope things are going well back in the states. I miss you guys. Thanks for the prayers and everything!
That night we stayed in our mosquito coffins again. Luckily Limlim decided to keep the rain away :-) and we only got a few drips before we went to bed. We spent some time in the vehicle… on our computers and listening to music. I played a song for Val - Nielly, that’s why I asked about the name of our song… Worth it All by Rita Springer. It was very fitting for the occasion as frustration set in at our lack of success. We don’t always understand why things happen, but God does have a plan and I think He knows a bit more than me anyway :-P Funny background fact for the rest of you… Danielle and I always listened to this song while studying for orgo tests at about 3am the night before. There’s NO way you’re going to know it all and you don’t want to care, but we figured if God wanted us in med/vet school then He was going to take care of it. We didn’t need to overstress about it – just put forth the effort we had and it would be worth it! “I don’t understand your ways… but I will give you my heart, give you all of my praise” So that’s what Val and I did. We know that God knows best – that He will take care of Punzel and He can bring her to us if that’s His plan. But we just need to trust Him and thank Him for what He’s doing and know that… It’ll be worth it! (I would copy the lyrics for you but I have no internet, so feel free to google/youtube it with your super fast connection that I’m jealous of :-P) Anyway… the next morning we couldn’t stick around too long but we did one last loop and then dropped the Army men off because they wanted to help. We dropped them at the dam and they walked back to the barracks from there. Can you picture six armed guys in camo walking in formation through the bush calling “Punzel, Punzel…”?! I think it’d be a funny picture.
Oh, two more interesting facts from that trip. So Val and I have this thing… we need some more research done. During the time we were out, Val got about 28 ticks on her and no mosquito bites. I, on the other hand, found ZERO ticks on myself and got about a thousand mosquito bites. This has been consistent over the whole time I’ve been here. I have a total of one thousand bites on each of my feet (yes, I totally counted :-P) and Val hardly has any. I’ve never once in my life found a tick on me (I will now that I wrote this, but I’m risking it) and Val finds them literally all the time. It’s quite strange. I think someone should do some research on this. And fact two… while we were sitting near the dam letting Tutu get some rest in the shade I decided to play with this little weed that was growing nearby. I broke it off and some white stuff came out (like a dandelion). So of course the (logical?) thing to do would be to smell the white stuff. Okay, so no idea what made me do that, but it’s a good thing I did because otherwise I would have missed out. The second I lifted it to my nose I was transported back to my childhood. I felt like I was sitting at the kitchen table, just getting over a cold, with a bowl of chicken noodle soup sitting in front of me. The weed smelled JUST like Campbell’s chicken noodle soup. I’m not even kidding. (Though I may be about my childhood, cause I don’t really remember getting Campbell’s so often… I think Progresso is much better. But it didn’t smell like Progresso. It smelled like Campbell’s) I looked confusedly down at the weed, broke off another piece and handed it to Val. I could see the facial expression as soon as she lifted it to her nose. Guess what she thought it smelled like?! CAMPBELL’S! I think it’s there secret ingredient. Though since we had that thought, we decided to take a taste. So that was not the smartest idea, because it totally didn’t taste like chicken noodle soup – it was SO bitter and it actually made Val’s tongue hurt for the next couple days. But anyway… it was ridiculous how much they smelled the same. SO random.
Last weekend there was an Ordination at church. CLIDE works with the Church of Uganda pretty often and that’s where Val and I go while in Kangole. So four men were being ordained that day – it was a HUGE celebration. One man was becoming a deacon and the others were lay readers. I don’t entirely know what those mean but they’re pastors or church leaders of some sort. Basically they were completely committing their lives to ministry, which is a big deal because from then on they will pretty much get no income and be very poor. The ceremony was about 6 hours… mostly of speeches and singing/dancing. Val and I brought our little 10ish year old friend, James. He’s the one who we have do random things around the house because he just wants to help out. He also feeds some of our random pets while we’re gone. We give him some food or something little once in a while, but it’s cool how he really just wants to help out – with nothing in return. He speaks very little English, so communication is limited with him, but he was around in the morning before Church started… standing there barefoot in his little ripped up tan shorts and t-shirt – just like always. So we decided to bring him along to the ceremony. He sat next to us in the district officials section. They always make us sit up front with the “important people” so it was cool for James to be able to join us. He is pretty unexpressive, but it was fun to be able to take him past all the other kids and bring him up front. I was thinking how if it was in the US… the kid would have thought you were punishing him for something. He sat there for five hours listening to people talk. I was on verge of falling asleep (then again, I also had no idea what they were saying :-P) but James just sat there listening. During some of the Bible reading, I handed him the Karamojong Bible I had acquired and Val led him through word by word as they spoke. James doesn’t go to school – I’m not sure if he has at all, but it’s very likely that he hasn’t – his family probably can’t afford school fees. It was so neat to see though… when they had finished the reading, James continued to look at the Bible and try to read the same passage. You could see his little brain hard at work trying to decipher the words he just heard.
After the ceremony there was a feast. Which, of course, brings up some interesting foods. They had everything and it was a gigantic buffet table kind of thing (which was good because I could choose a bit what I wanted to avoid). But then Val told me of something I just had to try. I knew this was bad news, but I couldn’t actually avoid it – then what stories would I tell you all?! So it’s called Emuna. It’s a traditional “food” of the Karamojong… they used to make it for their long nomadic journeys because it would stay for a year. (I say the reason it “stayed” was because it was already rotten, but you can be the judge of that). So… Emuna is made by first taking a slab of meat and removing all the fat and tendons from it (not so bad!), then hanging up the strips in the shade outside for three days so it can dry with flies all over it. Then they boil the meat to remove the rest of the fat (or it would go bad), then dry it and pound it into meat powder with a mortar and pestle. After drying it again, you end up with a nice fluffy mound of meat to which you add gee. If you don’t know what that is, it’s fermented butter. Niiiice and oily and… well… fermented tasting. Then you pound cucumber seeds, sesame seeds and/or ground nuts (aka peanuts) into powder and add it. When in season, termites are also pounded and added in for a delicious additional flavor (thank God, they were not in season). Then you add sugar to taste and stir it together for… ummm… a… taste SENSATION. Awesome. And there is your high energy travel food, ready to go on a long raid or nomadic journey!
A couple days later, the emuna may have been put to use when we heard gunshots in the center of town. What a surprise! Raiders had come to steal the hundreds of cows that they gather together in one unprotected area in the middle of town. In the safety of our foot-thick cement walled hut, we listened to the raid go on down a couple of blocks. You can almost see the whole story play out… first there are some real fast one-after-another gunshots from the army’s machine guns. Then a few single shots shot by warriors who have to conserve their bullets. They are not so accessible these days because there is a disarmament project where the Army takes away all the Karamojong’s guns (and then sometimes sells them back to make some money :-P). So they have to get them from Sudan and it is harder than it used to be. So you can tell who’s who pretty easily during the raid. The gunshots would stop for a while and then a few more and then they slowed down as the raiders ran into the bush and hid from the Army amongst the tall grasses. Then we heard an APC (armored personnel carrier) drive by, pursuing after the raiders and the animals they had managed to capture. I’m not sure how many they got in the end but luckily the army did find them before they took all the cows of Kangole. I don’t think anyone got killed, either, so that’s good. But it made for an interesting night, listening to what would be fireworks in the states under a nice protective grass-thatched roof. We did stay inside, though we don’t have any appealing animals in our compound, so there’s not much of a temptation to come in.
So now… a week or so later… we are down in Soroti. Val had some meetings here and then on the way, the vehicle decided to fall apart, so we stuck around a bit longer than expected! The stabilizer bar for the left rear tire just kinda fell off (the bracket broke). So that was when we were about 2 hours from Soroti. We couldn’t really stop there, so we tied it up with rope and prayed that it would hold the tire on! It was a bit of an interesting drive… going about 10mph and we couldn’t turn right or it would pull on the rope and break it. And then after a little, the bar moved forward more and was stuck so we really couldn’t turn right even if we wanted to. And the bearings were all worn out from this little issue, so basically our rear tire was barely held on. About 1.5 hours later we got to the next town (amazingly still with four tires!) where someone was going to rescue us. We parked the vehicle with the police and carried all our stuff to a restaurant where we waited for our ride. Eventually we made it to Soroti, where we’ve been since last Thursday or something. The vehicle finally got fixed… well… “fixed” and was brought back yesterday. It was a miracle they found the replacement part here in Soroti, but it still needs some work, so we’re going to go to Kampala this weekend and get it serviced. Hopefully we’ll make it without a problem! So Soroti has been relaxing… I’ve been running in my running skirt, bringing my Ipod so I can pretend I can’t hear all the hollering as I run by the guys. There are also lots of cute little kids who yell – which is… better… but still not entirely appreciated cause you can’t go ANYWHERE without feeling like a one-person parade! The word “bye” turns into a two syllable word around here. “by-yee, by-yee… mzungu by-yee” I hear over and over. Or “mzungu how are you? How are you?”. So I say “I am fine, how are you?!” and they get SO excited to use their four English words that they know. “Fine!” “goo-d by-yee!” The ladies are sweet because they get really excited/embarrassed if you talk to them. It can be fun… but tiring to do so much interacting when you just wanted to run. Or walk to church about 50 feet away – it can take like 20 minutes to get there!
Anyway… my hope is that maybe with Kampala internet connection I’ll be able to put up some pictures?! Not sure if that’s true, but I will try my best! I hope things are going well back in the states. I miss you guys. Thanks for the prayers and everything!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)