Sunday Sunday – April 1

Today started off with a trip to visit the LC1 (Local Council). Whenever you have someone new staying at your house, you are required to inform him so that he is aware of who is living in his town. Alex and I had tried to go visit him 2 times the day before, but he was never around.

The LC is a funny man. He likes to make jokes, and watches how you respond. We called first this time (to make sure that he WAS around) and even though we were told he was, he wasn’t. (TIA-This is Africa). We were told to sit and wait, so we did. He soon showed up, followed by 2 other people who wanted to speak to him, but we were helped first. It turned out that he wanted me to tell him (again) the names of everyone living at The Sanctuary, and their ages. Once we did that, we had to pay money just so that we could get a stamp saying that he now knew this information. What is comical and frustrating all at the same time, is that even as the line up to talk to him grew, he took his good old time, carefully writing out each boys names, as well as our names…it was a long process. Finally though we were finished and we walked away happy. The LC has a lot of power, and can essentially deny you what you need if he is so inclined, so we were happy.

This meeting with the LC happened just before church, which of course meant that I would be late for my first church service (not that this bothered me – although it would be been nice to be early atleast for the FIRST time!). We got back and went with most of the boys to church. Church is in Jinja, so we have to pay bodas to take everyone to church.

Church with the boys put a smile on my face. I don’t know what it is about worshipping and learning together, but I love it J

Leaving my church back home was hard. I love all of my youth kids, and friends at that church, and on my last Sunday there, I felt really sad to be leaving. Being at church in Uganda though was better then I thought it would/could be! The worship was great! And the speaking was so good too (and relevant – for myself AND the boys). I am so thankful to have a church like that to attend!

On Sunday afternoon I went with the younger boys, plus our neighbors daughter TiTi (Daniella, who I think I will be seeing a lot of) and a few of the older boys for a walk down to the Lake again. It was fun to walk and laugh and play with them. We came up by a place that has a slide and some swings so we spent some time there watching the little ones play. I had the chance to talk more to one of the older boys who filled me in more on his story. To told me more about his life growing up, and the time that he spent in prison because he was in Kampala begging on the streets. He told me about moving around with his mother, who “took too much alcohol” and was not able to provide for him, and how she died on her way back to their village. It was hard to hear his story, but I was so glad that he was willing to be open with me. ALSO, this was one of the boys who I had a very hard time talking to last year because he lacked in his English skills, BUT now I could understand him with no problems.

That night we had a fantastic meal of meat and posho. Although they don’t have a lot of variety, these boys really do know how to cook! The bad news is that the rice is over, so now we eat Posho, posho and posho until the posho is over. As much as I like posho…I am missing the rice.

My evenings are spent hanging out with the boys, whatever that looks like. Often times that is revising with them, or reading their books. Sometimes I go out on the porch with a couple of them and we practice their reading by reading a child’s bible together. I am also trying to work on my LUganda skills, so sometimes I am there beside them revising as well. Other times they want to look up something on the computer or find a better picture of a map that they are studying for a test. Steven was working on memorizing the first 20 elements of the periodic table, so together we can up with a rhyme to help him remember. These are the moments that I love. Getting the chance to invest into each boys life. It doesn’t always have to be some deep meaningful conversation, but just loving on them, and making sure that they know how important they are.