May 29, 2011

• 500 calorie feast

  So today, we went to a FEAST at a members house from church.  It was crazy!  Thinking back, I think there were 12 dishes to collect a heap of food from.  It was like an all you can eat Ugandan buffet.  I still cannot believe how much food they offered us.  And as we left, they gave us 6 pounds of Avocado!  The real cool thing was that we hung out there for like four hours and they started to offer us more food!  You all know that made us happy.  All said and done, I am certain that we still did not consume even 500 calories!

  So Saturday was quite the eventful day for me.  At 7:45 in the morning, I left the house to get on my first taxi of the day.  I was meeting up with a few other people from WWCS-Uganda and we were heading out to a small town about two thirds of the way to Kenya.  That is about a 5 hour ride from Kampala, one way.  All said and done, I rode four taxi's and four motorcycles in my eleven hour journey to and from this town.  Holy uncomfortable, Batman!  However, the visit was very fruitful.  This town, called Pallisa, in the community of Agule, they do not have a school or a clinic.  The nearest school is about 4.5 miles from them.  The nearest clinic is about 10 miles away.  As you can imagine we are quite excited about this opportunity because there is a great need.

  I mentioned this school before.  Liz and I had met with the proposer, James, a few weeks ago.  He is a very committed man to help a community that was destroyed by the civil war years ago.  He has since proposed the concept to the community and they have decided to support their efforts as much as they can.  Unfortunately, that does not mean they have money, but manpower.  They are now in the process of brick making.  We estimate that there will be about 20,000 bricks needed for the project.  I will soon start conceptual drawings for the site plan to assist them in their construction efforts.  Because at this time, this project does not have US support.  I am a little depressed by this, because it means that the process will be very slow.  I would really like to see this school get built before our departure.  The estimated cost for a full school campus is about $10,000.  It seems like a lot of money, but think about a school in the US.  Those average in the $50 Million range.

  While meeting with the folks in Agule, they told me about their building priority.  I was surprised when they first mentioned that they would like to focus on the clinic first.  One would think that when you meet with Worldwide Christian Schools, you would want to build a school first.  But no, these gentlemen had a very legitimate reason for wanting to start on the clinic first.  Since the initiation of the school construction process, which started about 3 months ago, there have been three mothers that have died during childbirth.  It is purely due to the distance of their village to the nearest hospital/clinic.  It is a sad situation.  As you can imagine, I completely agree with their decision and will assist in any way possible.

  I cannot tell you how hopeful I am for this school.  Right now, there are about 200 children who have little to no future other than farming rice and fishing.  Please pray for a miracle for this community.

  Wow, that was a long serious story. 

  On a side note, we have been noticing lately that there are a large quantity of people around here that are drinking from little small bottles.  In looking into it, they are consuming something called Ugandan Waragi.  It is a Gin made from bananas.  Apparently we live near a bunch of drunks!  So Lizzy and I wanted to see what the big deal was.  Being the sound Christians that we are, we sent Azeda to go buy it.  It cost about $0.50 for a half of a pint.  She got back, and we asked her how did they know she was of age to purchase this drink.  She said that they do not care.  So I asked her if Isaac could go and purchase the alcohol and she said, "of course, all they want is the money!"  Yep, Isaac will do our bidding when we have the need for alcohol in the future!  (fyi... the legal drinking age here is 18)

  Again, as you are consuming your glorious pizza, and CHEESE burgers, and cheesy anything, think about us!

  Ta Ta For Now

  • 12:19 pm
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