May 2013 Update 5

Jambo! So camp is finished. Now I have a bunch of business to do.
First thing Monday morning I met up with my friend Raphael and we went
out to a village called Nyenga. For those who followed my trip in
January, this is where the land is that I looked at. I have had many
questions about this at home. So I am going out to do some follow up.
I want to walk around on the land. Get a feel for how big it is, how
much work we would need to put into it, etc I have a ton of questions
too. So I went out ready. I had my water, my walking shoes and my
backup battery. When we got out there with Steven, the land broker, he
looked at me like I was crazy when I said I wanted to go out and walk
the property and find the boundaries. “Are you sure you’re ready to
walk?”  “I am. Are you?”  He was in business pants and nice shoes. So
we set off. At first we we walking through potato fields with little
mini mogel mounds, then we headed into an area with tall grass and
then corn. I was doing great. The area really is beautiful. I had
received a map of the property, so I kept showing it to the broker and
asking, so where are we now??? His reply didn’t very much. I’m not a
surveyor, I don’t really know. Super helpful guy! Next thing I know I
took a large step over a small creek and what I stepped on was soft. I
kept walking and then my feet sank. What is this?? Oh it’s a rice
field. Awesome! I now had mud up past my ankles and my friend looks at
me and says try to walk softer. Gotta love Ugandans. I kept going but
found that the rice fields kept going and going. I finally talked to
my friend and then Steven. If this land is even 50% like this, I don’t
want it. We’ll flood at camp regularly. This is the first time the
broker even considered asking me what I was looking for. Great
salesman. There are about 150 acres available and Steven really
couldn’t give me any answers I needed. I asked who could and he said
the land owner, but we had tried to get him this morning, but he had
to take his wife to the clinic in town. Ok, well I need to know this
info before I can even consider buying, so we set up to come out the
next day. Then an associate of steven’s who was with us said he knew
another property near by that was probably around 50 acres and it is
all dry land. Would I like to see it ? Well sure I guess. It is the
property that borders this one. We drove around a bit to look, but
couldn’t get out and walk around really because 1 they didn’t really
know the details of this property 2 they hadn’t told the land owners,
so we could get in trouble. You know trespassing 🙂 They asked if I’d
like to look at it tomorrow too. Well, if you can provide the title
for the land and be able to answer the questions I’ve been asking
today, then I guess it would be good. So they sent Bionci, a man-I
asked if he liked to sing, up to gather the landlord and the
paperwork. Of course I was asked to pay his transport as he had to go
almost to Kampala. Roughly $20, ok that isn’t a big deal.

So we headed back toward town and stopped along the way to visit my
boys that I sponsor. Both were home, so I had a quick chat with them
asking if they could hang out tomorrow afternoon and they were both
excited!! Mohammed is getting so tall, it’s crazy! Joel’s grandma
(jjajja) hugged me about 15 times in the 3 minutes I was with her and
when she wasn’t, she was holding and shaking my hand. So sweet!! And
she talks to me a mile a minute, but I don’t understand a word. Smile
and nod smile and nod. Ok back to town. Erin is waiting for me with
John Mark at the hotel. He apparently cut his foot before camp and it
was healing, but running around mostly barefoot at camp has it hurting
again. When I arrive to our room, there are 5 people packed into our
little room, Erin, John Mark, his brother and sister and little Erin.
I take a look at JM’s foot, yeah be has a little abscess. No big deal!
What do I have in my bag of medical goodies?!?! Thank you alpine
experience, within a few minutes, I had him laid out on the bed and I
was draining it. It was painful!! Poor JM was crying which they don’t
do for pain much. A couple years ago when we had a boy with a
displaced fracture at camp, he didn’t cry at all not even when one of
the Ugandans grabbed his foot and pulled his leg straight. When I got
it as clean as possible and drained as much as he could tolerate, I
put some Bactroban on, that I happened to have, and wrapped it up.
Didn’t expect to be do major wound drainage.  Yummy!!

We got cleaned up from surgery and headed to a Ugandan restaurant for
lunch with all our friends including Raphael and Dennis our driver for
the day.  We went to Park Villa, this is the place I first met Joel,
my sponsor.  Walking through that door brought back all those
memories.  So amazing!!!  All 9 of us piled in around 2 small round
tables and enjoyed lunch.  It was pure entertainment watching little
Erin eat.  She was so focused and it may have been one of only a
couple times in her life that she has ever used a fork.  She was
stabbing as many fries as it would hold and then dipping them in
ketchup and attempting to stick them all in her mouth.  I got a couple
cute pix.  Then Raphael saw some notes I had taken from a language
lesson at camp and decided to continue my tutoring.  We are learning
our numbers today.  Some of them are very difficult to say, but others
and really fun.

From lunch we dropped everyone back off at their respective homes and
Erin, Raphael and I went out to Masese to see the HELP International
School.  This is the main group that was at camp.  As we drove up we
got some typical mzungu calls and waves, but then there was a whole
group who recognized us…the kids from camp were there still from
lunch.  THe school runs their feeding program even during the breaks,
which is pretty rare, because their kids probably won’t eat otherwise.
 It was fun to see these faces again even though we just left each
other yesterday.  I got to see both Mirembe and Grace again and the
staff were there also.  Richard the director gave us a tour of the
school and then we walked down the road a bit to the rescue home they
have started.  Their long term goal includes an orphanage, but this is
just a start.  They have 7 kids living with a woman, 3 of the girls
were at camp.  One of the classrooms they had rigged up as a movie
theater and were showing a movie to the kids.  All are welcome here.
They are truly partnering with the community, so the movie, feeding
program, library are all open to the community not just the kids in
their school.  Pretty sweet!!  They need more support, so if anyone is
interested in supporting them, please let me know. We bought some
beads from the ladies there to help support them more ourselves.  It
was sad to say goodbye again, but I think the kids seeing us in their
home was a big deal and they know that we are invested beyond just
camp.

We headed out of Masese and were headed to Raoul’s house for dinner.
His mom and older sister with her 2 kids are in town from the Congo
and we’ve been invited to hang out with the family. The drive out of
Masese was rather disturbing though.  We came out a different way than
we came in and we drove through the local dump.  Now, I’ve heard of
people groups living in these areas in different countries and I’ve
seen pictures, but I’ve never seen it with my own eyes.  We saw young
kids picking through the waste.  We saw an older ladies with bags of
what I’m not sure, that she has scavenged through the waste to find.
Just a few feet away were these large storks, ugly scavenger birds
doing the same thing.  As we passed and my heart was breaking, these
kids looked up and smiled and waved.  What do you do with that???  I
will wrestle with that and discover what seeing that does in the
future.

We arrived at Raoul’s and were greeted with hugs and kisses.  Raoul’s
2 nieces were so cute!  They made me miss home!  One is only 4 months
old.  I’m excited to get home and hopefully meet a new little VP…it
is waiting for my return (I fussed at Amanda’s belly and told the baby
it had 2 weeks to relax a bit before entering our world.) We played
with the 2 yr old and danced.  She is one sassy little thing. We
visited with Raoul’s sisters and played cards.  His mom doesn’t speak
english, but she hung out in the living room while all the chaos was
going on around her.  You can tell she was just enjoying having all
her kids together again.  Raoul finally arrived and we enjoyed an
awesome BBQ chicken dinner with potatoes, rice and fresh squeezed
mango juice. Yum!!  It was great for me to finally get to know this
family.  Erin has spoken so highly of them and loves them so much.  I
have spent time with Raoul, but my interactions with his sisters were
always brief photo shoots for Erin.  I don’t think they really got who
I was until this trip seeing me with Erin.  Now I know when I return,
we will hang out and be friends.  Such a sweet family!

This was a long day and I have an even longer one tomorrow, so we
headed back to the hotel and crashed!!

Please be praying for the land process.  I want to be wise and
discerning and attentive to what God has to say about it all.  Please
pray for my time with my boys tomorrow as well that it would be
sweet!!  Erin will be hanging out with friends in town, so please pray
for her friend time too.  Thanks!!  Love you all!!

Sula bulunge!!  Good night!