> AM/PM

Every morning over breakfast we swapped stories from overnight. You know, things like how the dogs started barking at 2am and barked non-stop until 6am, at which time Candice’s jump rope could be heard on the concrete driveway outside our windows letting us know that it was almost time to get up. Once I woke up feeling refreshed after a good night’s sleep and realized that I had simply incorporated the dog-barking into my dreams as just another foreign language.

There are no photos of the same dog below. In Africa, all the dogs just seem to be the same size, the same shape, and have one of two distinct ear shapes.


Dogs in Zambia


Dogs in Uganda

Every evening we looked forward to the visit from the African Gray parrot. He came to the same limb in the same tree just outside of our guest house compound every single evening. He would sing and whistle, and Rebecca would whistle back, and he would answer her. We left for 5 days and upon our return, he appeared to have missed us! Having only seen these birds in captivity, I was thrilled to see this one thriving in the wild!


We were only allowed out of our walled compound if we had a local with us, so we were very pleased when John Paul came over on Wednesday afternoon to take us for a walk. There’s a big church at the top of the hill and a big school not far from our house. There’s also a hospital very close. I laughed at the sight of a free-range chicken strutting through the entrance of the hospital! There are banana trees everywhere and little gardens next to the houses. The children called to us, “Mzungus! Mzungus!”, which originally meant “European” but seems to have become the word to refer to all white people. (I later learned that “Mzungu” has a slang meaning, “money bags” – a definition I find offensive, but I suppose I can understand why they think that.)


Hospital Entrance w/Chicken

> Life in Kampala by Jon Blanc

Note from LeeAnn: I don't know Jon Blanc. This was passed to me from Candice. It's such a candid account of life among the people I worked with that I want to share it. Warning: It's a bit long!

Newsletter from Jon Blanc: http://kabiza.com/
African Insights – July 2008

Life has been rather unique for the last month since I wrote to you regarding the robbery that took place at my home. I have replaced my stolen camera with the same model and it is here now thanks to some dear people who came to Uganda to do some volunteer work. My cell phone came and has broken down several times and is only half working.

I am writing from a computer that was loaned to me. By tomorrow I should be able to work on my websites again…need to do so…but I had to download the total site and it takes forever here…there is no such thing as high speed, but then one is glad to have internet access at all.

I have since moved to a new place that I like a lot. It is inside of a compound where five other people or families are living. It has a kitchen, a living room and bedroom with toilet and shower. It is comfortable and freshly painted and I can park my car inside of the compound.

Below you will find an account of life in Kampala, in particular life in a slum. In this case I would call it an upscale slum -- much better than some of the slums I have been in.

In the story I have taken a little courtyard of that slum and recounted a day there for you to get a feel as to what most Ugandans experience on a daily basis. Hajj, who you will meet in the story, is one of the few Ugandans without a cell phone, at least in Kampala. I met the family while looking for a place to live. Some of the names have been changed, however everyone in the story exists in real life. -- Jon

Life in Kampala, Uganda
The Neighborhood

It is 5:30 in the morning. A mother rises early in the morning and lights a candle because the power is out again. From the nearby Mosque there is the call to prayer. People begin to stir around Momma Axum's place. A Somali woman arrives outside of her home with her daughter Jasmine bowing down toward Mecca, while Junior, a student at a university, looks out his small window thinking of how he will spend the day.

The little courtyard in the slum comes alive. Mom, the resident elder woman, starts her charcoal stove and heats water which she puts into a flask so her husband Hajj can have his Chai (tea) later. Now she is making porridge from millet, something to fill the stomach on a damp morning in Kampala.

From his makeshift bed little Axum arises, removes his worn out and faded blanket; Morning has come and he is hungry as always. Last night he went to bed with an empty stomach because there was just enough for one meal during the day. On his bed is a ball that has been given to him…he hugs it. He is one of the only boys in the neighborhood who has a ball. The other kids kick plastic bottles.

His mother dresses him inside their small house that is just a few seconds from her parents place. Momma Axum prays under her breath as she dresses her son…to have enough for just this day in their lives. Her radio is tuned to listen to morning devotions in Luganda from a local preacher.

More people are coming out of their one-room homes. Mukole comes out with her 9-month old baby named Joy. The little girl has a tuft of thick hair on her head, big eyes looking out into the world. Mukole has Joy tied to her back with a blanket, bending over as she prepares breakfast for her husband who runs a small second-hand clothing stall at Owino market. Her little radio is playing gospel music performed by Ugandan singers. She sings along.

Life in Kampala is unique…tossing together Muslims and Christians, all getting along, sharing the daily pains of living and the humor that flies freely and often the food that one might have.

It is 6:30 now. Little Axum is drinking his thick millet porridge quite eagerly and asking for some chai (tea with milk and sugar). People are moving with small cans and basins to the shower area getting ready for the day…the pit latrine door swings open and closes. Slowly daylight moves in and people are putting their first load of wash on the lines that crisscross the red clay courtyard.

Rain is coming. The winds are increasing and the dust is moving visibly in the air. The first drops of rain are coming down and soon it’s pouring buckets of rain. Everyone runs under their makeshift porch (if they have one)…moving the charcoal stoves closer to the walls of the house…coming out with tubs to collect the rain water since it is free. (Here you must pay 200 shillings for water from the tap.) The rains have formed small creeks that run through well-formed ruts towards the shower area. The red clay mixed with the water creates an ugly stream that takes with it some matoke peelings (plantain bananas), empty water bottles, match boxes…all swept away. Axum throws in a stick to see if it is also swept away. Soon the rain stops and the sun slowly dries up the courtyard. The chatter of women can be heard against the background of Luganda Music coming over the radio…it is the local Queen of Singers, Juliana, singing a song about "Mukwano" meaning friendship…at the same time on another radio you can hear President Museveni once again proclaiming his campaign slogan of 2006 "Prosperity". Someone laughs, mumbling something about reality of life in Uganda.

This is the real Uganda, a state of being that is common to most of the 30 million that call this country their home…Kampala is 2 ½ million in size, 60% of its people live in slums. Living on less than 3 dollars a day, meaning that most families eat only one meal a day, and mostly it is without meat. Unemployment can run as high as 70%. Jobs are tough to get and if do not know someone at the place where you are applying, forget it.

Momma Axum works in shoe shop in town owned by an Indian woman and receives 50,000 shillings a month (about $30 a month). A chicken here is 10,000 shillings ($6); a kilo of beef runs 4500 shillings ($3). The diet consists of beans boiled and spiced with Royco (contains lots of MSG made by Unilever and a staple of the East African kitchen). One also uses onions, which are quite potent here, garlic, lots of Munyo (salt), tomatoes and cilantro. Beans are served with posho, cooked maize flour that is a staple all over Africa, though called different names such as 'ugali' in Kenya and 'nshima' in Zambia. The priced of posho and beans, along with everything else, has increased dramatically during the last few months making life even tougher for the average family here…and families here are quite large. The average Ugandan woman has more than six children. The first four children can attend Uganda Primary Education for free, but such a school has a ratio of one teacher to 100 pupils or more. Pupils have to pay to sit up close where they can hear, bring their own brooms to clean the classrooms, bring their own toilet paper and everything else we might take for granted in the West. Plus they have to pay for school supplies, which is something many families can’t afford.

Shilati, age 7, lives with her grandparents here in the courtyard. Shilati lost both of her parents to AIDS. She attends a school just a hundred meters away. Even though Shilati is Muslim, she attends Saint Andrew's (Christian) Primary School. St. Andrew’s is a private school located right in the slum. School fees are 80,000 shillings a term ($50 three times a year). Other expenses include things such as shoes, books, uniform, and at times lunches that can run 60 cents each. From the courtyard you can hear her class reciting numbers and letters. The younger children are singing. After school Shilati shops for vegetables and charcoal for the day, she cooks and she washes her one uniform so it dries for the next day. She rarely plays.

It is now noon in the courtyard. Word has reached Mom that one of her sons has been arrested by the police who swept through the slum looking for idle men sitting around not working. He is at the Kabelagala police station and Hajj, his father, is gathering some funds from friends and neighbors to bail out his son. Hajj is more fortunate than others; he owns the buildings in the courtyard and gets monthly rent from six tenants who live there. A Boda-Boda (motorcycle taxi) arrives and Hajj goes off to the police station while Jackie awakens next door.

Jackie arrived home late…or early, however you choose it. It was 4 am when she unlocked the door to her dwelling. She usually sleeps most of the day, going out at night. Upon awakening, her first action is lighting a Ganja Stick to smoke. (Marijuana – cheap: 200 to 500 shillings a stick, or 10-30 cents each.) It is smoked often to make one forget the problems of the day and the hunger. As she puffs on her weed, Mom knocks on the metal door and enters, greeting her politely with “Wazuse Otya Nno?” (How was your night?). Jackie replies “gendi” (ok).

Mom sits on the bed beside Jackie and slowly begins to talk about how tough life is and that there is a problem with paying school fees for her son Shafiki who is in secondary school and how Jackie needs to pay rent so that Mom can pay the school fees. Jackie sighs; she had no customers last night, she herself needs to get money together to pay for her own son's school fees. Her stomach pains her once again as it did every day. She has avoided taking a blood test but somehow she knows that she probably has AIDS. She has been losing weight, her skin is breaking out… but what is she going to do? How is she going to live? Who will support her son? She doesn’t even know the father. In her mind, the only place where she could find comfort was the church nearby. Jackie might be a prostitute but every Sunday she attends church. She has two Bibles, one in Luganda and one in English, she read them every day, prays... but without an education, without skills besides her body, what was she going to do?

Yesuf skips toward his home. He was born in Somalia but fled to Kenya and with his mother Farida and his sisters Jasmine and Habiba. They came to Uganda claiming they had relatives here as they crossed the border at Busia, and they have been living with Hajj since then. Farida sells Kangas (wraps with Swahili writings on them and pictures) and second hand skirts just up on the road. The children are exceptional at school and it is Farida’s hope that they will go far in life… farther than she. Farida’s husband and father of the three children was shot as he was walking home from the small store that he owned in Mogadishu, Somalia.

Yesuf wants lunch. Awaiting him are some freshly cooked beans that Farida prepared before she went to work. Yesuf cares about enough volume to fill his belly…since there are nights when he goes to sleep hungry. Yesuf loves English Premier Football (soccer) and supports the team ‘Arsenal’ no matter what. He himself plays football with an old ball that has no air in it and is filled with holes…but a ball is better than no ball. He wants to be a doctor, go back to his mother country and help his people who have been caught up in an ongoing war.

It is three o' clock in the afternoon now and Junior returns from University. He hasn’t had any food all day, and as he walks into the small courtyard, the smell of food meets him and he is even hungrier than he was before. Jeanne, who with her sister lives next to Junior, greets him…and Mom asks him if he has eaten. He replies no and she silently prepares a huge plate of Matoke covered with g-nut sauce (ground peanut sauce). He eats eagerly, thinking of his father's home near Mount Elgon in the east of Uganda where there was never lack of food, always an abundance. But he had come to Kampala in order to learn. He has taken Mass Communications as a major, but he has made money by organizing robberies at night. He visits people and notes what they have, where it is, and where they keep the key. Sometimes he brings wax and makes a copy of the keys or key. Then he comes with his friends at three or four in the morning and take the things that are there. Anything of value will be taken. TV's, computers, DVD players, and watches are the best and they bring him some money to live on and pay his 50,000-shillings ($30) rent. He is the only one in the courtyard that doesn’t believe in God. He simply cares about having enough and doesn’t care how he gets it. He would even steal from his neighbors, his conscience having been burned of anything decent.

Jeanne and Danielle who lived next door to Junior were originally from Rwanda. They fled their mother country while they were young with their parents in order to avoid being killed by the Interhamwe Hutu Militia that killed over 800,000 in those fateful days from April to July of 1994. Life in Uganda is safer for them. They have even found jobs selling cell phone airtime for MTN, Celltel and UTL. Between the two of them they make about 100,000 shillings a month, enough to pay the rent and eat one meal a day. But they are safe.

It is now five in the evening here. The laundry is being taken down to be ironed. Hopefully the power stays on today. (Load shedding is common in Uganda and the low income areas suffer the most. Power goes out every day for a few hours, sometimes for as long as 12 hours. Many people steal power, often at the risk of their lives). Hajj returns from the police station without his son. His son will have to appear in front of the magistrate in a few days. His crime? He has no job. Hajj mumbles something about InshAllah, the will of God, and sits on the stool outside of his house talking to his neighbors and laughing. He is 48 years old, he has known good times and bad, he has lived through the times of president Milton Obote, Idi Amin, Milton Obote's second regime and now Yuweri Museveni who has been in power since 1986. He is still hoping that the Buganda Kingdom will secede from Uganda and become an independent state and reclaim the glory of the past…but it does not seem that way at all.

Hajj has one wife and it has always been that way. He loves Mom. He worries about his eight children -- three have died, two of malaria and one of AIDS. Hajj makes a living by renting out some of his property. He also tries to act as a real estate agent finding rentals for a small fee, all enough to afford a three-room house with a flush toilet inside and food each day. But today he worries about his son. He closes his eyes to pray, slowly rocking backward and forward. He is soon interrupted by his grandson Axum who stands in front of him with an outstretched hand asking "Pako Sente," (give me money). Grandfather Hajj reaches into his pockets and fishes out two 100 shilling coins. Axum races off to a little shop where he buys some Mandazis (donuts) and goes off to play with some friends down by the well.

People drink from the well, not realizing that the pit latrines surrounding it drain into it and pollute it. In many slums where 60% of the people have no access to any latrines, many use black plastic bags and throw them onto the roofs (which are referred to as flying toilets). Water costs money, 20 cents for twenty liters, meaning that most people do not use soap and water or wash the produce they cook. That’s one of the reasons most food here is boiled until it is mush. Childhood diseases take the lives of many needlessly.

Momma Axum returns home from her job at the shoe shop. She has had no food since the porridge and tea in the morning. She has been on a matatu (a minibus carrying 14 passengers, the mainstay of transportation in Kampala) for over an hour and she is tired. Her son Axum greets her. Her mother welcomes her back and offers her some matoke and beans. She changes her clothes, puts a scarf on her head and sits down on a stool in front of her mother's house. She is 28 years old. The father of her son left her and she does not know where he is. But there is no running away for Momma Axum -- she knows that her son needs her. She is feeling the fever tonight (malaria), pains in her joints, her temperature is up and her stomach feels funny. But there is no money for medicine or for going for a test, so she simply suffers. She eats her food quietly, exchanging pleasantries with others in the courtyard. Axum climbs into her lap as she finishes eating. She rubs her hands over his arms and legs and feels the bumps that are there, little pimple-like things. The doctor told her that it is syphilis (supposedly gotten from his father) and that it would take 28,00 shillings to treat it with 10 injections. He was born like that, the doctor told her, and she worried as she applied calamine lotion on his itchy body.

Evening has come. Darkness arrives around 7 pm every night in Uganda. The power had come back in the afternoon, but promptly at 7pm it went off again, most likely not to come back until 10pm.

It is dark and candles are lit inside and outside of the small homes. The Somali girls prepare the evening meal. Shilati washes her school clothes and does the dishes for grandmother. Axum wants a chapatti and Junior and Shafiki are listening to Capital One Radio Station as the night sets.

Mukole’s husband returns from Owino Market at 9pm. Mukole, with little Joy on her back, has been preparing dinner for him. He is angry tonight. They are both Christians, but the frustrations of life invade their peace. He shouts at her and tells her to go back to the village where she came from and leave the baby here; he has been seeing another woman since Mukole became pregnant. (According to a Ugandan Bishop of the Church of Uganda, 86% of Ugandan married men have extra curricular activities regarding women). Mukole goes to bed crying, praying out to her Lord to bring a miracle into her life. Her husband meanwhile is watching a movie in English with a Ugandan video jock translating it into Luganda.

The courtyard slowly empties, people move indoors, the power has come back on and it is past 10 pm. Jackie gets up for the second time this day. She asks Momma Axum to make her some hot water. She lays out her clothes for the evening, all things to make her look appealing to men. When the water is ready, she bathes and comes back in applying make-up and cheap imitation perfume to her body. She puts on a mini-skirt, all the while praying for a customer that night. At 11pm she walks towards the local bars. She has no money for a Boda-Boda taxi. She knows she is a “mosquito girl”, biting with her AIDS infection, but what choice does she have? Who will help her? She is simply a prostitute.

Meanwhile Junior is plotting inside his small house; Shafiki, with unsavory friends, has joined him. They are going to steal Jackie's things that were given to her by a British boyfriend. There is the TV, a gas cooker, a DVD player and maybe she left some money and her watch behind.

The courtyard is empty, just one light is on. Junior goes to work. The copied key works, the doors open and Jackie's place is emptied of her belonging.

Momma Axum blows out her candle after reading her bible, Mukole cries herself to sleep, Jeanne and her sister think of their mom and dad who are now back in Rwanda, and Hajj prays for a good day to come…while Jackie sits and waits for a customer with money.

It is simply another day in Uganda.

Written by jonblanc@kabiza.com

> Day 16 - Traffic and Morning Radio

Today is my 6th day in Uganda. I’m starting to get a feel for daily life here, although we are quite sheltered from the reality of it, living here in our beautiful guest house with regular meals and running water. Half of our team went on home visits today during lunch and I’ll go on home visits tomorrow. I’m really looking forward to seeing where our kids live.

Traffic:

I doubt I can describe the driving conditions in a way that will make you feel the commute the way we feel the commute back and forth to the school every day. If I wasn’t so curious, I’d just close my eyes and turn my IPod up really loud until it's over.

Few people can afford cars. The modes of transportation are:
- Walking
- Riding a bicycle
- Catching a ride on a boda-boda (a motorcycle taxi)
- Taking a matatu (mini-van taxi)



About 2 million people live in the city of Kampala. And about 2 million MORE people come into the city every day to work. It’s fairly common to see 3 people on a motorcycle and of course, they aren’t wearing helmets. It’s the norm to pack so many people into a matatu that no one can breathe, and then add 3 more people. Bicycles are not just for riding – they are a primary means of hauling stuff. Charcoal, 150 pounds of bananas, lumber, firewood...if you can carry it, you can put it on a bicycle. Even FedEx uses bicycles instead of trucks! There are locked, metal bins that sport the FedEx logo secured onto the back of bicycles, and THAT is how your package arrives before 10AM!

Many of the roads are full of pot holes. There are no traffic lights. There are so few traffic signs that I really only remember seeing a couple of them. The general driving philosophy is to just go and try not to hit anyone, but they fail at that miserably. One day I saw a boda-boda with 3 people on it collide with a matatu full of people. One of the guys on the boda-boda jumped up from the pavement, ran over to the matatu, grabbed the driver by the throat and starting pounding him in the head! Boda-bodas weave in and out of the matatus, which is difficult since there’s never more than 2 feet between the matatus. Lanes are invented on impulse in an effort to get more vehicles moving forward. Bicyclists with no peripheral vision because of their wide loads hug the sides of the roads. Pedestrians cross the streets in the midst of this chaotic cluster of vehicles. And if that isn’t enough, drivers must beware of the chickens and goats casually grazing along the side of the road!

3 men, 2 weed eaters, some sort of pole and gas cans!

There are no regulations on vehicles, so the exhaust fumes were thick. And with all of this movement, that limitless red dust coated our nostrils and covered our clothes. Street peddlers pushed their newspapers and fruit and useless-to-us wares in our windows. And because we are white, we were always given second looks by at least some of the 4 million people we passed each day. Some folks, especially the children, waved at us and grinned broadly when we waved back.

"Mzungu, buy this mystery meat that's been on a stick for hours with flies crawling on it!"

The only thing that could make the traffic in Kampala more difficult to endure is being forced to listen to the local radio shows while traversing this crowded city.

The topic one morning was a letter from a Ugandan woman complaining that her boyfriend was always talking about European (white) women and how beautiful they are. The DJ’s had a blunt discussion about how to refer to white women. They finally decided that we would prefer being called Mzungus over anything else. After much discussion about this Ugandan woman’s jealousy, the DJ concluded that the woman should just ignore the boyfriend’s comments and that the boyfriend would eventually realize that “all women are irritating and annoying”.

The next morning there was a letter from a Ugandan man. He has a girlfriend whom he loves. But he met another woman that he’s interested in. He told the new woman that he has a girlfriend but that he still wants to spend time with her, this new woman. The question from the man was “how can I get this new woman to have sex with me without giving up my girlfriend?” The two DJ’s proceeded to offer up suggestions.

I should add that one of the DJ’s was a woman.

During my entire 7 week trip, there was only one day when I was irritable and grouchy. It was just one of those days when I was tired and everything seemed to be going wrong... Yeah...That was the morning I climbed onto our little bus and the DJ’s were having a lengthy discussion about eating dogs. I was about to completely lose my self-control when Miriam came to my rescue and got the driver to understand that we wanted the radio turned OFF. I don't want to sound judgmental here... I mean, people in Africa are hungry and my stance against consuming canines is a very Western view. But I so dearly love dogs and I just couldn't sit and listen to the conversation without possibly throwing up my breakfast all over our bus.

> Day 15 - Tuesday, and All is Well

Camp was a lot more fun today. Our sessions went more smoothly and the kids seemed to have a lot of fun. We have 5 teams of kids, 24 kids on each team. Each team has a different colored T-shirt: Red, Green, Yellow, Brown and Black. It was originally intended that each team would be made up of a mixture of kids from all of the age groups, but through a bit of a mix-up, the Black Team ended up with 24 of the youngest kids (mostly 6 years old) and they were proving to be a challenge, but an amusing challenge in most instances.

We had 5 activities and the kids rotated to the different stations. The activities were Crafts, Music, Dance, Games and Lessons. Each day we performed a skit to introduce the “Animal of the Day” and the theme for the day. And then the kids would start their rotations.

Cathy & I alternated between leading the lesson and being the time-keeper. I taught the lesson yesterday so I was the time-keeper today. That gave me the chance to walk around and observe the other groups.

One little girl, Resty (a nickname for Esther), was one of the youngest and a child who seemed to always be getting into trouble. We found out that she is retarded and I think she also has trouble hearing. She was always grinning, even when she was hitting another child or being reprimanded, both of which happened often. The Bugalobi literacy school isn’t equipped to give what we Americans would consider to be an appropriate education to a mentally disabled child. But Teacher Isaac discovered her in his neighborhood and decided that it was better for her to be among children in school than in the slum that is her home. Little Resty is loved, not only by the teachers, but by the other children, too. I saw many kids participate in her socialization/education by gently pulling her into line, or by helping her with a game, or by simply ignoring it if she was being disruptive. There certainly wasn’t any reward to these children for helping Resty – they just knew it was the right thing to do. I thought about what opportunities this child might have in life. Perhaps being loved is enough.


Resty with a loving hand on her shoulder

The kids all looked so cute in their camp T-shirts. But on closer inspection, some of the kids were missing shoes or their shoes didn’t fit. And their socks had holes in them. And several of the boys’ shorts had been worn for so long and washed so many times that the pockets had torn out of them leaving large holes in the sides. One little boy wanted to present himself as neatly as possible, so he always tucked in his t-shirt and straightened his shorts before speaking when called upon. All of the kids, even the girls, wear their hair cut very close to their heads. It’s much easier to maintain that way and it helps to prevent things like lice. Thankfully all of the girls wear dresses/skirts with their t-shirts so we can easily tell who is who. This became more of a challenge the following week when many of the girls wore pants!

During today’s music sessions, Jon & Rebecca challenged the kids to write their own songs. Rebecca recounts that endeavor quite humorously in her blog entry for this day. Our favorite song, and one we sang for the rest of the trip, was the song that the Green Team wrote. "I love my shirt because it is good. I love my shirt because it is good. It's GREE-EEN! It's GREE-EEN!"
http://thisrooftop.blogspot.com/2008/09/day-23-july-29-2008.html

> Day 14 - Lunch!

Today was our first day of camp at the Bugalobi Literacy School. It was as most ‘first days’ are: wrought with confusion and angst, plagued by miscommunications, replete with discoveries of things we didn’t anticipate and things we needed to adjust… It was an exhausting day. Even after we left the kids we had hours of preparation for the next day’s camp. But we got through it. And it was an interesting day!

I found the lunch process to be most fascinating. The ‘kitchen’ is outdoors under a roof. There’s a team of kids that has the responsibility for dishing up the food and managing the distribution of plates. The kids line up by grade in order from shortest to tallest and wait. They wait until it’s their turn to wash their hands with water poured from a jerry can. And then they wait until it’s their turn to retrieve their dish. No silverware is used. Food is scooped into bowls using another bowl. Food is eaten with one’s fingers. And after eating, each child is responsible for washing out his/her bowl and stacking it with all the rest in preparation for the next day’s meal.

The menu consists of
- rice
- beans or matoke (bananas, usually mashed and heated)

Once a week they get meat.

At first I was surprised by the large amount of food given to each child. Then I remembered that this might be their only meal of the day.

The adults sat in the balcony to eat our lunch while the kids sat downstairs in the sanctuary. I was stunned by how well behaved and how quiet they were! The children were unbelievably quiet! They ate, they cleaned their bowls and then they played outside until they were called back inside to resume activities. I thought of days gone by in the Western world when kids were allowed to play outside unsupervised by adults.

I should note that our food was prepared separately since our digestive systems are not accustomed to the bacteria present in the water. We usually had rice and/or potatoes, sometimes a stew with meat, always fresh fruit and sometimes a slaw with cabbage and carrots. And we served ourselves. AND we had forks! However, several of the students were assigned to pouring the water from the jerry can for us to wash our hands and they were responsible for cleaning up after us. They were marvelously efficient and they went without notice while we chattered on with our Ugandan adult team mates. I should also note that we went through a lot of antibacterial wipes on this trip!

> Day 13 - A Day of Rest?

Today is Sunday. It had been decided for us that we would attend the English service at the Makerere Full Gospel Church, a big church even by Western standards. What a joy to arrive and find that all of the children in Choir 32 would be at the service with us! They lined up dutifully in order from shortest to tallest (a practice I marveled at many times during my time with the kids) and we waited for the earlier service to end. It was fun just to start meeting them.

The kids sat on the pew in front of me. I derived so much joy from watching them sing and clap and move to the music during the service! And when it came time to pray, these 26 little kids closed their eyes, bowed their heads and they prayed out loud along with everyone else in the congregation.

Sadly, I wasn’t able to understand much of the guest pastor’s sermon that day due to his heavy accent. But Rebecca got it completely and I’m sorry I missed most of it! http://thisrooftop.blogspot.com/2008/09/day-21-july-27-2008.html

I was sitting next to a Uganda girl around the age of 17 (a random seating – she wasn’t affiliated with the Choir or our group). During the service she passed a note to me. She wanted to know if we could be pen pals. I knew that what she really wanted was to befriend someone who might be able to help her out of her life situation. We had been told to never give our contact information to anyone. We talked and hugged after the service and I told her that I wasn’t allowed to give out my contact information. I wrote her name inside my bible and since that day, Judith Lydia Aleso has been on my prayer list. She and several million others whose names I didn’t catch while I was in Kampala…

Our afternoon was busy with preparations for our first day of camp. I wondered if all of this preparation was necessary. If I had it to do all over again, I would want simplification. I wanted so badly just to chill out and read or sleep or take a walk. But I also wanted to be ‘a team player’ and after all, I was a co-lead for this team so I had to show some leadership. Besides, we wanted to make a good impression on the Ugandans. This conflict within me was one of the growing pains I experienced over the summer. One of the many themes that kept popping up for me was Control. (At the most basic level, detailed preparations for an upcoming event are merely an attempt to control the outcome of the event.) I was given many opportunities to simply let go and relinquish the control to God. I didn’t take that opportunity on that glorious Sunday afternoon when I could have been doing any number of things besides laying out timelines, making 130 name tags, organizing T-shirts, etc.


Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God? Or am I trying to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ. Galatians 1:10

> The African Children's Choir

I must take a moment to explain a few things:

Music for Life is the non-profit parent organization for The African Children’s Choir. Each year, kids from very poor areas are invited to audition for the choir. Roughly 25 children are selected for a choir. These talented and fortunate children spend several months learning the music and the dance moves they will perform while on tour. They are immersed in English lessons. They get medical and dental check-ups, immunizations, three meals a day, a warm bed to sleep in… These are luxuries they never dreamed they could have.

They tour with the choir for about 15 months, usually in the U.S., Canada or Western Europe. While on tour, they have to continue their studies, so they are on a pretty tight schedule. They travel by bus, they stay with host families in whatever town they are visiting, their meals are provided by host families… the point being, they try to keep their touring costs low. There is a $500 booking fee to secure a performance date and that money goes towards tour costs. But all of the money donated to the choir during each of their performances goes directly to Africa to support the kids in this program.

When the kids complete their tour, they remain in the program until they are adults. So from about age 6 to somewhere around age 18, the child has guaranteed meals, a free education, medical care and life skills training. All of it is provided in a Christian setting and all of it is funded through donations and sponsors. It’s an unimaginable gift for the families of these children! I met many former choir members while in Uganda… their stories are yet to come!

You might be wondering about the kids who don’t make it into the choir... There is a literacy program associated with Music for Life, too. Children who are too poor to attend public school are often found in neighborhoods and can become eligible for sponsorship. For $35 a month, a sponsor gives a child the opportunity to get an education, the only real way to get out of the extreme poverty into which he/she was born. Children receive school uniforms, school supplies, a meal every day and an education. Over the next few days I hope to provide some sense of the enormity of this opportunity for these kids.

http://www.africanchildrenschoir.com/aboutus/aboutus.php

> Day 12 - Restoration

We spent a couple of hours having a semi-structured "get to know you" discussion this morning right after breakfast. The main question was "what were the circumstances that led you to Uganda and this group?" For me, that was easy: The INSANITY of my job made me realize that I had to do something else. The child we sponsor in Uganda inspired me to go there. The worthiness of the African Children's Choir organization (Music for Life) made me want to do more with them than just sponsor a child. And over the years, I've experienced an unshakable pull towards kids. And I, who announced at age 11 that I would never have children, keep looking up towards the heavens and saying "You've got to be Kidding Me!"

Something that struck me during our morning discussion was the fact that on our team, there are 4 people under the age of 26. I was impressed by their commitment to God, with the fact that they are living their lives following God's direction. In our society there are so many pressures to "be" and to "have", and yet these young adults are fighting those pressures and following their hearts that are so full of God's love. The young people on my Zambian team and these young adults on my Uganda team make me thankful for all of the young people in this world who ‘get it’ when it comes to God because I don’t wish upon anyone the long, circuitous journey that some of us take!

Before lunch we drove to the site where we will have camp during our second week. We were met there by the team from the UK. The UK team will take the older kids and we’ll take the younger ones, so we were there to get to know the UK team, have a picnic lunch, scope out the site, etc. I didn’t really care about any of that. I was just so happy to be outdoors in a beautiful setting where I didn’t really have to do anything. There was a broad expanse of grass and the vegetation was lush and monkeys swung in the full trees around us and Lake Victoria washed the edges of the park… and for the first time since I arrived in Africa, I could breathe.

“The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, he restores my soul.” Psalm 23

> Day 11, Part 2 - Getting Settled in Uganda

After arriving at the guest house in Kampala, we claimed rooms, hurriedly unpacked a few things and had lunch. After lunch we had an orientation. After the orientation, we piled into our matatu (private taxi) because Jessica wanted us to see the Bugalobi School where we would be holding our first camp.

The Bugalobi School is designed for kids who are too poor to go to the public schools. Some of the children are older when they are discovered in their neighborhoods; therefore they might be 10 years old when they start the First Grade. At this school, the children don't feel embarrassed about things like that because all of the children are in the same state.

We were told that the week of Camp was something that the kids looked forward to all year long, so we were anxious to please them. I thought it was great that we were going to the school so we could get a feel for the space, determine how we would conduct our sessions, etc. That was the American ‘planner’ in me. It turned out that the visit to the school was more of an emotional preparation than a logistical one.

The school is held inside a church. When we pulled up to the school, the first thing I noticed was the sign below. I wondered who 'management' was. Then I noticed the ‘parking lot’. I put that in quotes because not many people around here can afford a car, so there’s really no need for a parking lot. We used the rocky, dirt space as a playground.

As we were getting out of the matatu, I suddenly heard screaming. Not just one scream… hundreds of screams. And cheering. And then like an ant hill, kids came pouring out of the building, running towards us. All of that screaming and cheering was for US! It was so overwhelming and so humbling. I struggled to hold back the tears that these kids would be that excited to see us, a group of regular ol’ folk from North America. In moments we were bombarded with hugs by the running and jumping kids. I felt like a rock star (but without all the leather, makeup and addictions). Once inside, the children lined up in 4 rows (Grades 1-4) and sang for us. What a fantastic welcome from the kids and their teachers!

Back at the guest house, we sorted the hoards of stuff each of us had brought for the camps and as donations. It took hours to organize everything! Jon & Rebecca, our two musicians, wisely used the time to practice songs on their guitars and decide what they would use during camp. That provided a pleasing background for the rest of us as we took over the entire downstairs of our guest house.



We took a break for dinner and then I logged on to the computer to send an actual email home. The computer was very slow and we had to pay for the internet access, but it was so satisfying to be able to send more than a cryptic text message home and to receive more than a cryptic message from home!


I finally headed upstairs for a shower and my own bed. You may recall that I shared a bed with Jada in Zambia and that for the last 36+ hours, my only sleep had been on the dusty ground under the tree in front of the Manda’s house and on a plane. And boy was it rewarding to get out of the clothes I had been wearing for two days and to take a shower! (BTW, this was only my second shower in Africa, both of them gifts from teammates whose showers in their rooms actually worked.)