Steve, Ben, Laura, Allison, Jeannette, Michelle, Amanda, Hugh
Well I didn’t have too much time to sit around feeling homesick or sorry for myself. I wasn’t planning on going this week with Deane to Kubamitwe village but the TMC team from LA arrived Tuesday (same day as James left) and packed up and headed out to the village for 3 nights!!!
I met with the girls from the team to discuss what meals they had in mind and then we did a list of all the food/supplies they would need to get.
We left just after lunchtime with 4 of the SOS Ugandan team members, with luggage for 27 people and the three tents!!! It was reasonably slow trip as we were packed up to the max!!!We arrived and got the stuff unloaded while Edward and Emmanuel put the tents up. Zach and Sam got on the “Roadstar King” village bicycle and headed off to greet and meet their village friends, good one guys!!!
Deane and I returned to Wobelenzi to get cement for the fence work and took Alex to the Dr again, he tested positive for malaria again (2nd time in 2 months), so back on the treatment medication. Deane decided it was too risky to NOT take the pills for maleria at the village and thankfully has started taking them again.
The TMC team stopped in Wobelenzie for chapati and eggs (13 squashed into the vehicle which made a couple of them sick and it was hilarious in Wobelenzi watching all the locals watch and count as each person piled out of the vehicle) they arrived at Kubamitwe at 6.30 just on dark and unloaded and organized themselves into their particular tents.
Had a neat time of fellowship, worship and singing around the camp fire before heading to bed.
Preparing, cooking and serving for 27 people over a open fire and two coal burners took some time BUT it was great to see the mission team in action – they were such a great example of serving others. They prepared and served food to everyone in the camp before they sat down themselves, and then they willingly headed for the dish basins and started the cleanup!!! Amazing example to everyone around them.
We had a sharing time in Romans led by Shannon and Q’s & A’s before heading on a walk around the new boundary fenceline, stopping and chatting with some of the locals. Some of us stayed back and prepared for lunch – the preparation took longer than the cooking and eating but it was great how everyone pitched in and did their bit. Guys cooking, doing dishes and willing to go with Zach and Sam to fetch water – which with 27 people was a huge job, I lost count of how many times a day the 2 x 20L gerry cans were filled!
The team worked and cleared a path to the pineapple plantation and removed some stumps along the roadside on the SOS property, arriving back very hungry, tired and some very dirty. Time to start the shower process for 27 – some missed out – we had been boiling water on the open fire for 5 hours.
Deane and his local workers achieved some work today also – they finished digging the post holes to the bottom boundary and then concreted a few more strainers and all the posts to the corner, the fence is looking great.
Dinner, sharing, worship and singing around the campfire again, which was an encouraging time. Deane was asked to give “our road to Uganda story” which after watching the lightening and hearing the cracking thunder around us all night, was ended very suddenly as the heavens opened and it poured. The tents survived but some did have holes that let just a “little” water in!!!!
Friday was breakfast and Romans study again and then lunch. After that we collected the large boxes received from a local organisation (huge boxes filled with Christmas Shoe boxes filled with goodies for girls and boys of all ages, like the ones done in NZ) the two vehicles headed in different directions with boxes loaded on top, people hanging off the side of the vehicles(standing on the running boards tho) and stopping at every house in the village for a radius of about 1okm from the SOS Property. It was awesome watching the kids and time was spent talking and laughing and watching as the boxes were opened and all the presents picked up and looked at. Even just helping the children blowing up balloons and watching them run around after them as they let them go was fun. The villagers were just so excited. I took the guys to the water bore to get water in the vehicle and this local man stopped me on the side of the road. Two of his children weren’t home when the boxes were handed out so he had them standing there asking for their box PLEASE!!! Simon and Alex had a neighbour tell them that 3 of his 5 children had missed out and there was fighting and tears in his house all night, so we had to go back to their house quickly and deliver more boxes to the children that had missed out!!!!
We had dinner and an evening around the openfire with LC3 telling us about his life and days in the war and the Idi Amin, Abode and Musevini days in Uganda.
Saturday we got up had breakfast (with the wasps, that we have never had before but the girls had jam and cinnamon/sugar to go on toast and the sweetness brought wasps from everywhere). We cleaned up breakfast and then packed up all the tents and luggage on to the vehicles headed for chapatti and eggs in Wobelenzi (27 people PACKED and I mean PACKED) into two vehicles. Shannon organized a local taxi for the SOS team to head back to Mukono in.
Great encouraging time and loads of fun, great team of 5 girls and 3 guys – neat bunch of Christians just wanting to serve and help whenever and wherever they could. Great company and a neat time to get to know them (they are here for 6 weeks, back and forward, in and out of Mukono as their schedule allows)
We are hosting the 3 guys, along with Alex and Simon at our house. We returned for hot showers, 3 days of washing for 13 odd people and NO POWER for just under 3 days!! So the showers after the first day weren’t hot and you can imagine how bad the laundry smelled!!Finally power came on and it took two days of continuously running the washing machine, dryer and hot water cylinders to catch up and get everything back to normal. The Hurleys had 25 people in their house - no dishwasher or washing machine either so it was a huge task just getting dishes done after each meal and the washing I think is STILL being done, 3 days later!!! In the middle of it all The Masters Faculty team of 8 arrived from LA, the TMC teams travel arrangements changed so all 32 are currently “bunking down” anywhere and everywhere at the Hurleys.
Thursday 29th May - Deane has escaped back to the village with Alex and Simon, for 3 days, hard digging/concreting work on the fenceline. Zach Sam Bri and I are catching up on some much needed sleep (had so many late nights over the last 3 weeks, but the company has been awesome and its great to have something to fill in the long dark nights!!!) schoolwork (although Bri has not done any as yet) and to get the emails/blog updated too.
Feeling much better, not so homesick a week later!!!! Just have to remain focused and move on with much anticipation to the next lot of visitors!!!