Goodbyes

May 4, 2012

     So if you're reading this, I made it safely back into the states!  After 2 consecutive 8 hour flights I'm finally relaxing in the Detroit airport drinking my Starbucks that I've been craving for a better part of two and a half months and it is worth every single craving I had while in Uganda!  For as miserable as the two 8 hour flights were, they actually went by really fast.  I had no time to rest in between because our flight from Uganda left an hour late and I only had a one hour layover so I had to book it when I landed!  In Detroit they overbooked the flight, so they kept trying to give out vouchers for people to take a later flight but there was no way after 3 months and 20 hours of flying that I was gonna wait 8 more hours!  Landing in charleston was such a good feeling, to finally be home and not have to get on an airplane again for a very long time was amazing!  I was anxious to see family and friends for so long that when I finally saw them it was sooooo exciting!  My first night back was a little overwhelming for me and I had a slight breakdown just being back in the American culture and away from Uganda.  I think I was finally realizing that I'm not sure how long it'll be until I go back and see all my friends.  Mom and I went to dinner that night and just hung out, it was definitely a great way for me to begin readjusting to the not so simple life.  

     Today is Tuesday, so be been home for 3 whole days and I finally feel like I'm starting to readjust to the time zone change.  Unfortunately, my body is taking a little longer to adjust to the food change :/... Feeling sick after everything I eat and not being able to pass anything is not fun! Haha sorry too much information I know.  Other than that adjusting has just been a process and will continue to be and I realize and am as prepared as I could be for it.  I will always miss my friends there and they will always be my Uganda family, but I know I'll see them again.  The fast pace of America is something I'm not thrilled to readjust to, but I know with time it will inevitably happen.  Luckily, I got a long term subbing position at the same middle school I worked at last year and I'll be teaching 8th grade math, which I'm pretty excited about.  I'll have my own classes, so I'll get to set everything up how I want to until the regular teacher comes back from maternity leave.  

     That is a wrap up of my trip and my blog.  I hope y'all have enjoyed following my adventure and I'm so grateful for all of your encouraging words and prayers.  I can't express how helpful they were to me and continue to be.  Y'all helped sustain me while I was there and I love you all so much for that.  Thank you for following and for everything! 

July 28, 2012

July 28, 2012      Ok, so this will probably be my second to last blog because I'll be writing about my goodbyes later this week.  Again, I'm sorry it's been a little while since I've blogged.  Everything here is coming to an end, and it's kind of hard to fully understand that right now.  I feel like I don't completely remember home, but I also feel like I just got here.  The children from school went on their holiday break on Thursday, so we got to be a part of their closing meeting with all the children, the few guardians that showed up, and the school staff.  Following the meeting, we had a very good meeting with the staff and Basco- the administrator of the school.  Amanda and I gave some more insight into different ways the teachers could continue to develop their school and teaching methods.  The teachers were so gracious and are just wonderful women that we were so blessed to have the opportunity to work with.      I wanna take this opportunity to sing Basco and Nancy's praises again because they invited us over to dinner last week for an absolutely AMAZING meal!  Now in case I haven't mentioned this before, the food here is somewhat lacking in versatility.  There aren't nearly the amount of options in food as there are at home, so anytime we get a chance for something new we get so excited!  Nancy cooked all day and everything was homemade- EVERYTHING!  Prepare yourselves because I'm sure you'll be drooling after I tell you what we had.  She made- homemade hamburger buns, homemade tortilla chips, salsa, guacamole, passion fruit juice, sloppy joes, pineapple and banana salad, and a strawberry cake to finish it all off!  The hamburger buns were absolutely AMAZING! Needless to say, we stuffed our faces until we couldn't eat anymore.  The rest of our time here is pretty open, we will probably just be spending time with friends and trying not to think about saying bye :/- I'm not prepared for that yet.  Tuesday is Sarah's 22nd birthday, so I think we're gonna have a sleepover at our friend Christine's again on Monday.  As far as I know, we plan on heading to Kampala on Thursday and staying the night so we don't have to drive up Friday and be in a car for 4 hours then get on a plane for a day.  This is all I have for now, but definitely continue to pray for the ministry and sick people here-there are several sick people here rig now (typhoid and malaria are everywhere!).  Also start praying for our flights because I'm not looking forward to them! Love you all!

July 12, 2012

July 12, 2012            The past week has been full of my usual daily routine with school, AWANAS, and church with the exception of Monday.  Usually Monday's are our day of rest, but last Wednesday two new visitors, Todd and Roni, got here and so we ended up going hiking at Sipi Falls on Monday with them because Roni is only here until next Tuesday.  Last time I was here cara and I went to Sipi Falls so I knew what to expect and was excited!  I love hiking and the falls are on the top of Mount Elgon in a beautiful, cool, plush area.  As we got closer to the base of the mountain it started to look more and more overcast.  Last time we didn't get a drop of rain, but this time we were in for a very different, pleasant surprise!  As we got up to the first fall (not very far up) it started to trickle raindrops.  Well, we left that fall and continued up the mountain only to encounter the pouring rain as soon as we started up.  We were already pretty far up the mountain from where we parked, so the farther up we were hiking the colder it became.  Now believe me when I tell you at the top of that mountain the rain drops were huge and FREEZING!  At one point I'm pretty sure it was hailing.  Now I'm definitely not complaining because it made the hike so much more fun and exciting because we were trying to hike fast without slipping on the steep path in the mud.  It was hilarious watching everyone, including myself, trying to get down that mountain in the pouring rain using our walking sticks they gave us.  Long before we even got to the bottom we were literally soaked to the bone and freeeeeezing.  It was a great adventure and everyone enjoyed themselves.  I enjoyed myself a little more once I was home and showered in my sweatpants and sweatshirt under my covers, but it was worth it!      Wow, the three week point has come and I'm not sure how it got here so fast.    The days come and go so fast sometimes its hard to stop and catch my breath and remember to take advantage of every single opportunity i have here.  As i was laying in bed last night i couldnt get to sleep because i kept thinking about how im gonna say bye to everyone here.  Its amazing to me how many close relationships ive formed in the time ive been here.  I consider myself a friendly person, but at the same time at home its sometimes hard for me to get outside of my comfort zone and make friends.  Thats one of the most encouraging, genuine things about all the friends ive made here, they have no hesitations about making friends with someone theyve just met.  The biggest difference for me is that i dont feel like i have to mold to fit someone elses personality in order to be friends with them (not that i feel like i have to do this at home all the time but our culture is so much more physically and, for lack of better word, "popularity" aware and judgmental than the culture here and it's so refreshing).  Everyone here is so genuine and I can relax and just be myself.  Now if youve been reading my blog you know about Eva.  The main reason i couldnt get to sleep last night is because i kept thinking of what i would tell her when i leave.  With adults its somewhat easier because they understand the coming and going of missionaries, but with young children it's a whole different playing field.  The fact of the matter is I'm not sure when I'll be back.  How do I tell a 6-7 year old that?  How do I form this relationship with a child and become a trusting adult to her and then just leave her?  Sitting here writing about it is making me cry and i still have 3 weeks!  How in the world am i supposed to figure out how to do this?!  I'm sorry if I'm starting to sound dramatic, it just helps me to write things out in order to process them, and maybe somebody has some advice for me? That would be wonderful!  I'm not sure why it's taken me this long to realize but this is the catch 22 of mission trips, especially longer ones.  You're given the amazing opportunity to come and love a new culture and new, amazing people and then you have to leave.  I think I'm realizing this more this trip because of the consistency of being with the children everyday at the school and spending the evenings and weekends with the same staff people.  This has been my reality and life for the past 2 months and will be for the next 3 weeks.  Maybe that doesn't seem like a big amount of time but with the relationships I've made it's a HUGE amount of time.all of the relationships I've made here have also taught me so much and i haven't figured out how to thank them all for that yet either.  The lord is definitely using these relationships to help me grow and encourage me.  I was talking to Sarah the other day and realizing how far I have come personally since I've been here.  It amazes me how fast the lord has restored me (not that I'm completely restored but just how far I've come in so many different aspects of my life).  Ok, I think I've gone on long enough, so now for prayer requests and some praises!  Please continue to pray for some guidance for me and the other visitors when it comes to saying bye, even though it's a little ways away.  I know it's gonna be hard for all of us.  Also, I still need prayers for patience here please!  Also pray for becca and derek and their wedding planning, less than 3 months!Please pray for the ministry as well, they have some necessary projects coming up and definitely need help with the funding, so pray that the lord provides for them.  Please also continue to pray for Bryan and his family (our mzungu neighbors).  They've been battling different illnesses among the 7 of them and just pray that they can have a rest from all of that, but along with that comes a praise because Bryan is feeling better!  Mindy says he is still weak but healing, which is so good considering how awful he was feeling.  Lastly, my praise is that I'm feeling better also!  If you know me you know I'm a baby when it comes to being sick, so this is some stress off of me for sure.  Thank you always for your love and support and I hope you enjoyed getting caught up! Love you all!

July 5, 2012

July 5, 2012      Goodness how the time has gone by! I'm so sorry, especially to you grandpa, that it's taken so long for me to blog!  I've been so into my routine that I haven't thought of a specific event to share, but then after thinking about it I realized I haven't shared updates from school yet!  Amanda and I have been teaching at the primary school run by the ministry every morning from 9-12.  During this time we pull out small groups of children that are struggling and need extra help.  Unfortunately, it's not in their curriculum to teach phonics, so unless the kids are smart enough to just pick it up along the way, they end up really struggling in class.  They are taught to copy stuff from the. Lard in class but not letter recognition or sounds at all.  Luckily for me, I've been able to get tons of help from mom AND my exposure in preschool and kindergarten classrooms subbing has definitely given me some direction in our teaching.  We've also been fortunate to get supplies from mom through a team that came in June, which has helped develop our teaching methods here as well.  We start each group by going through alphabet flash cards and do letter and sound recognition.  We then break off into smaller groups and I work mainly with phonics through some great iPad apps that I have while Amanda goes over colors, shapes, and counting with them.  Halfway through we switch so every child is exposed to both teachers and both types of curriculum.  The kids have jumped leaps and bounds since we've started working with them, which is really encouraging to me.  They have come to recognize letter and letter combination with sounds and everything!  The most encouraging part for me personally is little Nora.  I talked about Nora in an earlier blog, but just to remind you she is a 13 year old girl who was severely malnourished as a child so her brain didn't develop like other kids and she suffers from mental impairment as a result.  At first I wasn't as optimistic as I should have been with her progress, but the weeks have proven me so wrong!  She can recognize almost half of her alphabet now and can do sounds and everything!  I have an app on my iPad where the children have to spell out words by picking the letter after hearing only it's sound and she does amazing at this game! She is really progressing and not only am I excited but she gets so tickled when she gets it right, which is precious! in a couple weeks another team will be bringing more supplies for the school, which will help build up the school and it's resources that much more because it's still in the very early stages of development.        As for me, unfortunately i haven't been feeling so hot lately.  Sickness is coming and going for me and I'm not exactly sure what it is, which is the most frustrating part.  At first, I went to the clinic and they thought it was worms so I took deworming tablets and they didn't have the effect they should have had if I had a parasite, so that has been ruled out.  After talking it through with one of the new visitors from the states who is a nurse, we have come to the conclusion that it's a protein deficiency paired with a high starch intake.  At home I eat so much protein and not so many starches that now after a month and a half of exposure to very very low protein and very high starch intake (as a result of the availability of foods here) my body is low on nutrients and it's making me sick and somewhat weak.  Luckily, I can start here and try and focus on taking in as much protein as is available and cutting down on carb/starch foods.  Right now it's more of a frustration and annoyance for me than anything else because I don't have tons of energy and have to lay down almost every day after I eat lunch, but other than that things are going well.        Ok so now for prayer requests!  A new mzungu family moved into our compound a couple weeks ago (a couple with 5 children under the age of 9 and their brother in law who is from Uganda) and since they've been here their 2 youngest have developed a staph infection and now the dad is very very sick and they're not sure what it is.  Please pray that they can figure it out so that it can be effectively treated, that the kids stay healthy, and that the mother will stay strong for the family.  Also please keep praying for the development of the school and the children.  Please also keep me and the other mzungus here in your prayers for our health as well because there is always some sort of sickness going around here (lately its been typhoid), and we have been fortunate so far to have steered clear for the most part.  Luckily, we have been immunized against most of the sicknesses that are very prevalent here.  Also please continue to pray for all of our patience in every aspect of our lives here. Again again thank you for your support and encouragement it is doing awesome things here! Love and miss you all thank you for keeping up and being patient with me! :)

June 23, 2012

June 23, 2012      Ok, so I wanna start this blog got by talking about you all.  Y'all are the foundation of my drive to come here and my continuous support.  Without all of you this journey would be a lot tougher.  Your prayers, encouragement, and support keep me going here.  Just to know that all of you are interested and reading and praying for me pushes and motivates me!  And I know the Lord is motivating me through your prayers, so thank you all so much!      2 Corinthians 12:9 is a perfect summarization of Gods grace and love for me here.  It says "Gods grace is sufficient, for His power is made perfect in weakness.".  I came to Uganda with a hope of learning how to fully trust in the Lord and grow and move forward in my life leaving the bad stuff behind and striving for a new good future.  Even more, I came with a desire to be taught.  Taught by the people, taught by the Lord, and taught by the other missionaries.  Little did I know, the Lord had/has similar plans for me but has been going about it differently than I would have hoped- the hard way.  Sometimes we have to learn the hard way in order for there to be a lasting impression, right?  My time here slowed down a little bit yesterday and my friend Sarah and I were able to go into town to a small coffee shop and read.  While we were there we both put our iPods on and zoned into our own thing.  I think it was one of the first times that I actually sat and focused solely on what the Lord is doing in my life here and what I've been/ continue to learn.  Now, if you know me you know that I'm somewhat selfish in different areas of my life.  I have found that coming through here as well at times and hate it.  I've been consistently praying for the Lord to restore me and give me patience and direction and trust in every aspect of my ministry here and my relationships I've been forming here.  Now this is gonna sound very simple and most of you will probably be thinking duh, but I'm gonna share it anyways bc I'm not sure I've really learned this until now because I've been living it.  First let me start by referencing back to the bible verse I mentioned.  Sometimes the Lord has to completely break us down in order to fully restore and heal us.  Towards the beginning of my trip and even still now sometimes I feel completely helpless and weak when it comes to helping these people, being homesick, and really trying to discern the Lords will for me here. In the beginning I completely questioned my whole purpose here and went as far as to ask if this was even in His will for me or if I selfishly decided to go because I knew I needed it in my life.  I have been through some very frustrating, irritating, and heart breaking situations here that have made me angry, cry, and again question my purpose here.  But through all of it I constantly feel the Lords presence and love for me and all these people here.  It's been an amazing and simple lesson for me here to remember that the Lord here is the same as the Lord in America.  He loves these poor, hurting, broken, joyful, loving, amazing people just as much as He loves me.  How can He not? In my opinion, He should love them more because of their unfailing and unceasing love, trust, and faith in Him.  Now after all those scattered and random thoughts I'm gonna go back to the simple lesson I was gonna say I've learned.  No matter how broken, hurt, upset, or weak I am if I come to the Lord and surrender it to Him in full faith and trust that He is the Lord of all things and can strengthen me in and through it then he will be faithful to me and restore me.  My emotions are a roller coaster here, which is hard at times but I'm also so thankful for it because I have not become complacent or desensitized to my surroundings.  We are told to rejoice in our sufferings because when we are weak, then He makes us strong.  The Lord is restoring and preparing me for my future everyday here and I'm so thankful that we have such a loving and faithful Lord that He promises us those things.        If you're sitting there thinking about how random and maybe nonsensical that all was I apologize!  I taught on that stuff in AWANAS today and felt compelled to share, if not for you all then maybe for myself to read in the future when I get discouraged.  If nothing else, I pray that this could be an encouragement for you in tough times.  We don't always know it or think about it at the time, but when we're going through hard times the Lord always has a purpose for it, we just need to be patient and he will reveal it in His perfect timing.  I love you all and thank you for your love and support it's really doing amazing things over here :)      

June 12, 2012

June 12, 2012      Hello everybody!  I'm so sorry it's been a little while since I've updated, we've been pretty busy with traveling, safari, and the team leaving over the past couple days.  I hope everyone is doing well as we are here.  The team concluded their crusade on Wednesday evening and we left for safari very early thursday morning.  I don't want to complain over and over about the actual bus and trip there and back, so I'll leave it at this- we were promised a new van with air conditioning and the van the driver brought was very old with NO air conditioning.  We traveled 8 hours there (first 3 hours on unpaved, pot hole covered road) and 6 hours to Kampala after the safari (first 2.5 hours on unpaved BUMPY road).  In case some of you were unaware, I get super car sick, so I was a little uncomfortable.  For about 40 min of the drive to kampala on the napped road there were swarms of tse tse flies, so we had to drive with windows up in the scorching heat with no air conditioning! All we can do is laugh about it now, but it sucked!        As far as the safari goes we definitely had an adventure!  We got there thursday afternoon and quickly had lunch and went out on our first game drive.  It was the perfect weather and we were out until dark, so it was just beautiful.  We were greeted at the park by elephants and around sunset of our night game drive we came n contact with a herd of about 50 giraffes that were about 50 feet away from us.  We were able to get out and walk towards them, which was amazing.  Giraffes are my favorite animal and it as such a "wow moment" to be up close and personal with that many giraffes in their natural habitat.  The next day we went out very early at 6 am for a morning game drive that ended up turning into a half day game drive haha.  Game drives in general normally go about 4 hours give or take a few, but we ended up being gone for 6.5 hours on ours.  About 4 hours into our drive our van got stuck in the sand in the middle of the tall grass region.  All I could do was laugh the whole time because the guys were literally using sticks they found around us to try and dig the sand out from under the car, and then all 9 of us would try pushing it out to no avail.  It really was pretty funny and definitely an adventure.  The guide didn't have service on his phone so we waited 45 minutes until another truck came driving down the path-I'm sure you can imagine our excitement!  Again, small world because the people that saved us were from Colorado and have been living in Kampala.  So after that we made our trek back to the entrance of the park.  Before we got stuck we actually got to see a 3 legged lion that lived in the park.  It was so neat because I rode on top of the van the whole time and we literally got 10 feet away from it and it just sat there and stared at us for a little bit.   The rest of the safari was good and we got to stay the night in Kampala which was a lot of fun because I haven't had an opportunity to spend a lot of time there.        Yesterday (Monday) was our much needed off day, which allowed us to catch up on sleep and get ready to get back into a routine.  I'm so happy to start the routine back up today and have a sense of normalcy back, but I really enjoyed our time with the team!  Today at school I found out Eva wasn't feeling well again, so she walked back to the clinic with Amanda and me and we found out she has a very high temperature and has to get treated for malaria.  Poor girl screamed and cried when they went to put the needle in for an IV, but luckily I managed to sit there and hold and comfort her again.  I took a little pb&j picnic in to eat with her and we watched Rio on a laptop while she had her treatment in the clinic.  I love that child so much it scares me to think about leaving her :/.  Please continue to pray for that precious girl.   I miss and love all of you and really really appreciate your prayers.  Sleep has been troubling again a little bit so please pray for peaceful nights as well! Thank you all!      

June 6, 2012

June 6, 2012    Ok, I'm gonna try and catch y'all up.  Sorry it's been a little while, since the teams been here we haven't really been able to get the Internet up bc there are too many people trying to use it!  It's definitely been an eventful couple of days with the team here, which has been good but exhausting.  Sarah and I got to take Monday morning off, which was so nice because we went to the pool in town with our friend Kristin.  In the evenings we've been doing what's called an open air crusade.  Basically it consists of live music with dancing and the preacher here from Florida with the team preaches a short message.  It's definitely been a new and fun experience.      Tomorrow morning Sarah, Katherine, Bosco, a family with the team, and I will be heading up north for safari.  We'll be there from Thursday until Saturday.  Katherine said we could go out for 2 or even 3 land safaris (if we have time) and 1 water safari.  Saturday afternoon we'll leave and head to Entebbe to drop off the team at the airport.  Saturday night the rest of us will stay the night in Kampala and head back to Kamonkoli on Sunday.      Now to the real stuff.  Last time I was here in 2009 I became very fond of a little girl (unsponsored at the time) named Eva.  When I came back this time I was so excited to see her again and find that she's sponsored now.  She's 8 years old and goes to the primary school that i teach at, which is exciting for me because I get to see her everyday!  Monday evening she came to the crusade with a black eye and a swollen jaw.  Katherine asked her about what happened and she told her that she had been beaten by her grandmother who takes care of her.  Now, I've also been told Eva is a very stubborn child and may have fought with her title sister, BUT there is still no excuse for that type of beating... At least not in America.  Pastor Charles took a look at her and told us to take her to the dentist to get looked at.  Sunday morning when she came into church it was 5 times more swollen than the day before, so Bosco and I took her straight into town to the dentist.  The dentist took a look at it and decided the tooth had been knocked loose and was infected, which explained the severe swelling.  He said he would have to pull the tooth in order for the infection and swelling to go away.  Now, I absolutely hate the dentist, so when I heard that I got scared but decided I wanted to play the "motherly" role in the situation and give her a sense of safety and security.  I stood right next to her holding her hand and stroking her arm calmly telling her it's ok.  The dentist proceeded to pull out this huge needle to numb her gums with.  Now, in America we get numbed with a topical numbing cream before the needle, but not in Africa.  So this little 8-year old girl is sitting in this chair screaming as the dentist puts the needle in her gums and I'm rubbing her arm and trying to soothe her while Bosco has his hands on her shoulders trying to comfort her.  I have never in my life seen a child in that much pain.  It was heart wrenching for me to watch and listen to, but I knew if I lost it it would make it even worse for her.  The dentist had to inject her twice with the needle and she screamed and cried the whole time.  While he was waiting for the numbing to take effect she just sat there crying and I was holding her the best I could n that chair trying to comfort her.  Finally, she calmed down but only until he pulled out this huge tool to pull the tooth with.  She started crying again and was gripping my hand and as soon as he got hold of that tooth and pulled she screamed a scream that sounded like someone was being severely tortured.  I lost it, just started crying.  Luckily, my face was behind her and she didn't see me and I gathered myself before she saw me.  After the tooth was pulled she just cried.  Now to preface what I'm about to say I need to tell you that Eva isn't a very affectionate child.  A lot of the children here love to be held and babied, but not really Eva.  I assume that it's a result of a lack of love in her home life, which has probably hardened her, which breaks my heart because she really is a sweet girl.  So anyways, after her tooth is pulled we go get in the car and I pulled her up in my lap and just held her (probably more for my comfort than hers) and she slowly stopped crying and laid her head on my chest.  We just sat there quietly the whole way back to the village.  I decided to take the responsibility of giving her her medicine for the next 4 days because I didn't wanna try and rely on her grandmother to be responsible for it.  So everyday for the past 3 days I've had the opportunity to bond more with her and she is almost completely recovered! The swelling is gone and her beautiful smile is back!  If you wanna see Eva I have a picture of her on my Facebook.  I wish I could adopt her, I would do it in a heartbeat if I could. I know I love that child.    So that's just one of the many many stories of children in this village and another eye opener of the differences in cultures.      A side note for everyone, there is a brand new clinic right in the village on the compound where we live that was fully funded by a doctor from Huntington, west virginia! How cool is that?!  Anyways that's all for now, safari tomorrow! Miss and love you all :)