Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Monday, February 16, 2009
Back Home Again In Indiana!!
John has arrived safely back home Saturday afternoon. Here he is in the Indianapolis Airport being greeted by family and friends. It was a good and profitable trip, and hopefully much good has been done in Africa. God has answered our prayers by bringing him back home safely.
Friday, February 13, 2009
Nothing really profound to report. We awoke at 4 AM and drove from Jinja to Entebbe. Entebbe misses the equator by a few hundred feet. Entebbe is beautiful but it is mostly luxury hotels and one of the Ugandan presidents’ homes. The town itself is about 3 blocks long. We arrived at 8am and got Keith to his flight immediately. He got through with no problem.
Then the really boring stuff started. My flight does not leave till 10:30 tonight. I got through boarding and customs about 7:30 and will only have another 2 and a half hours to wait. It was waiting all day in a town with nothing to see that was the hard part. I have seen a lot of Lake Victoria. I enjoyed the conversations with Francis and Rosemary. I have watched more native fisherman than I would care to mention. By the way, they seem to spend about 25% of the time bailing out their boats. Rosemary says there are a lot of them killed. They row deep into the lake and when it storms there is little they can do except lie down and bail. She says a lot of them drink and take drugs to deal with the fear.
Francis Okech went to the Doctor last night, which I did not find out till today. He has been having serious pain in his leg the entire time we have been here. The doctor says that it is a serious infection. He spent part of the day going through various pharmacies for his drugs. That is not as easy as it seems in the US. There are no chains and country of origin seems to affect the performance of the drugs. German drugs are good. Indian drugs leave something to be desired. There are a lot of Indians here. They own most of the grocery stores and much of the business. Idi Amin threw them all out in the early 70’s and killed the ones who would not leave. They owned most of the manufacturing businesses then. They all closed. The economy tanked and when Amin was overthrown, they invited all the Indians still around to come back and restored their property. The big businesses have not recovered.
Francis and Rosemary stayed till I got my boarding passes. I hated to put them through this long wait. It had to be agonizing for them. I tried to get them to just leave me here this morning, but they refused. At least having rearranged both our tickets for the same day, they did not have to make two trips on separate days. I can imagine that they are happy to begin piecing their lives back to normal. It was good to be with them. This was really my first opportunity to be with them myself without Keith or someone else, so we could speak. I had some questions that I was sure that Keith already had asked and knew and I hated to make them repeat.
I will endure the wait and the flights. If the Lord wills I will see my family tomorrow afternoon after flying all night and losing 8 hours of time.
Love, John
Then the really boring stuff started. My flight does not leave till 10:30 tonight. I got through boarding and customs about 7:30 and will only have another 2 and a half hours to wait. It was waiting all day in a town with nothing to see that was the hard part. I have seen a lot of Lake Victoria. I enjoyed the conversations with Francis and Rosemary. I have watched more native fisherman than I would care to mention. By the way, they seem to spend about 25% of the time bailing out their boats. Rosemary says there are a lot of them killed. They row deep into the lake and when it storms there is little they can do except lie down and bail. She says a lot of them drink and take drugs to deal with the fear.
Francis Okech went to the Doctor last night, which I did not find out till today. He has been having serious pain in his leg the entire time we have been here. The doctor says that it is a serious infection. He spent part of the day going through various pharmacies for his drugs. That is not as easy as it seems in the US. There are no chains and country of origin seems to affect the performance of the drugs. German drugs are good. Indian drugs leave something to be desired. There are a lot of Indians here. They own most of the grocery stores and much of the business. Idi Amin threw them all out in the early 70’s and killed the ones who would not leave. They owned most of the manufacturing businesses then. They all closed. The economy tanked and when Amin was overthrown, they invited all the Indians still around to come back and restored their property. The big businesses have not recovered.
Francis and Rosemary stayed till I got my boarding passes. I hated to put them through this long wait. It had to be agonizing for them. I tried to get them to just leave me here this morning, but they refused. At least having rearranged both our tickets for the same day, they did not have to make two trips on separate days. I can imagine that they are happy to begin piecing their lives back to normal. It was good to be with them. This was really my first opportunity to be with them myself without Keith or someone else, so we could speak. I had some questions that I was sure that Keith already had asked and knew and I hated to make them repeat.
I will endure the wait and the flights. If the Lord wills I will see my family tomorrow afternoon after flying all night and losing 8 hours of time.
Love, John
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Thursday, February 12, 2009
Let’s start by talking about the finish of our classes. Keith spoke for about an hour and a half today and I did also. Three of the students spoke. Although a couple of them were obviously nervous, they were well organized and did very well. These three men were from Jinja and should be a considerable help here. William who spoke is already filling in for brother Okech when he cannot be there. I believe that we accomplished something. It was hard we both had to completely reinvent our teaching methods in order to get across the divide. It worked. These men seemed to have gained confidence. I believe they will be a big help to this church growing in Tororo. There are currently some plans for a new congregation in Jinja in Massessee. If this materializes over the next year thee will be an even greater need for speakers. Francis can spread himself only so thin.
I mentioned Siliver’s sick baby yesterday. We found out more about this. The 2 and a half month child had at least some of his baby teeth removed. This was performed by some of the old women in Massessee where Siliver and his wife are from. Apparently they have some superstition about this. They would have cut the child’s gums and removed some of the teeth. They would have had no means of stopping the bleeding. The family was given antibiotics and other help at the doctors. Such levels of superstition are hard to fathom until you go to Massessee.
As I mentioned earlier I am hoping that some churches who have spare communion sets will help the churches here. They also need the cheap plastic individual communion cups. With the incidence of HIV and the incidence of TB in the churches this seems important. Several of the members are also diagnosed with TB. Cholera is not too much a problem in these areas except in the crowded conditions in the large city of Kampala. We have seen nothing there other than our brief visit to the congregation there.
Ofwono Fred sproke to us again about his concern for his 14 year old son Richard. His school starts on February 16th and Fred has nothing to send him to secondary school. There is no public school. He needs somewhere in the neighborhood of $350 to send him to school. If someone can help, I will give you Fred’s address. Richard is not a servant IN Rosemary’s house. He is just a house guest who is occasionally helpful. I might add that Fred receives absolutely nothing for preaching in Tororo. He has training as a computer technician and copier repairman, but there is no work in those areas in Tororo or anywhere else in the country. He receives nothing for preaching and has gathered a congregation of from 100 to 200 people. He could use some help. He has no computer though that is the area of his training. Consider him.
I spent a few more minutes finding trinkets to bring home. I spent some time trying to pack all this and appear ready for our trip tomorrow morning. I will have to wait in the airport from morning, when Keith Sharp’s flight leaves, till late at night, when my flight leaves.
There are so many more things I should have told you, but frankly now I am consumed with the idea of home and cannot clear my mind sufficiently to remind you of the events of the day. I am looking forward to seeing many of you on the Lord’s Day.
Love, John
I mentioned Siliver’s sick baby yesterday. We found out more about this. The 2 and a half month child had at least some of his baby teeth removed. This was performed by some of the old women in Massessee where Siliver and his wife are from. Apparently they have some superstition about this. They would have cut the child’s gums and removed some of the teeth. They would have had no means of stopping the bleeding. The family was given antibiotics and other help at the doctors. Such levels of superstition are hard to fathom until you go to Massessee.
As I mentioned earlier I am hoping that some churches who have spare communion sets will help the churches here. They also need the cheap plastic individual communion cups. With the incidence of HIV and the incidence of TB in the churches this seems important. Several of the members are also diagnosed with TB. Cholera is not too much a problem in these areas except in the crowded conditions in the large city of Kampala. We have seen nothing there other than our brief visit to the congregation there.
Ofwono Fred sproke to us again about his concern for his 14 year old son Richard. His school starts on February 16th and Fred has nothing to send him to secondary school. There is no public school. He needs somewhere in the neighborhood of $350 to send him to school. If someone can help, I will give you Fred’s address. Richard is not a servant IN Rosemary’s house. He is just a house guest who is occasionally helpful. I might add that Fred receives absolutely nothing for preaching in Tororo. He has training as a computer technician and copier repairman, but there is no work in those areas in Tororo or anywhere else in the country. He receives nothing for preaching and has gathered a congregation of from 100 to 200 people. He could use some help. He has no computer though that is the area of his training. Consider him.
I spent a few more minutes finding trinkets to bring home. I spent some time trying to pack all this and appear ready for our trip tomorrow morning. I will have to wait in the airport from morning, when Keith Sharp’s flight leaves, till late at night, when my flight leaves.
There are so many more things I should have told you, but frankly now I am consumed with the idea of home and cannot clear my mind sufficiently to remind you of the events of the day. I am looking forward to seeing many of you on the Lord’s Day.
Love, John
Thursday, February 12, 2009
Review of the trip
Nigeria
I felt that both legs of this trip were poorly planned. The situation in Nigeria was not well considered and I could have been used better to do more preaching. Some of this is because of the difficulty and remoteness of the areas.
In retrospect I suppose that it was good for me to begin in Ibadan, though of the cities of Nigeria they needed teaching the least of all. It did allow me to become familiar with the weather and many very good preachers in a friendly environment. I preached on topics they requested and that had absolutely nothing to do with the material I had come prepared to give. Yet, it was what they said they needed and wanted. These brethren and al these churches have a habit of a question and answer session after every lesson. These were profitable and interesting. I enjoyed the time, they said they appreciated my efforts but I suspect that several of the men there could have done the same teaching that I did. It was gratifying to be among them.
I believe that in Calabar we did our best effort. It could have been much better with more preplanning, but I believe in this environment of growing institutionalism among the churches that we opened a door of study and friendship there. It will need follow-up and currently I do not see anyone available to do it. If 6 months goes by without follow-up this door will close and the result of the teaching that we did will be lost. I did not spend enough time in Uyo to do more than social visiting with a very few brethren. In Benin we did a little teaching and helped to solidify the congregation there in the truth. Our influence was limited perhaps because of the fact that lines of division were already drawn in this area. I believe that we did limited good here.
Keith in his latter weeks seems to have been very successful. That is a story for him to tell. The little we did in Lagos, was a successful study and confrontation of ideas. This was a meeting thrown together in little time. I would think that future trips to the area should concentrate on Lagos for much of the fight will be there and perhaps search out other area of the country that have not been reached as yet.
Nigerian churches do not need American preachers to come there and preach on the first principles. At this stage this influence would almost be an insult. There are plenty of Christians here who can preach on these subjects as well as any American if not better. There are also capable men who can teach on institutionalism. They need some help in these areas. Americans can help draw a crowd and American funds can help with the expense of traveling around the country.
The Christians in this country are hospitable and friendly. They are sincere in difficult situation. The contrast between the difficulty of the country and the gentility of the Christians is hard to fathom.
Someone told me that the United Nations has referred to Nigeria as a “failed state.” I believe it. Traveling in this country is dangerous, unpleasant, unhealthy, hostile, and constantly tense. In my opinion, sooner or later some American preacher who travels to Nigeria will be hurt. It will be by disease, accident, robbers, or simply stressed ill health. Anyone who goes there should be aware of this.
Insist on more detailed planning. Teaching for two or three hours during the daytime and then sitting around watching TV is a waste of time and expense. There should be as much opportunity to teach morning and night as possible. There are not a lot of tourist sites in Nigeria and that is not why you came here in the first place. Settle the expenses involved in this trip at the outset. Handle your own money. A few Nigerian preachers can be trusted with your money as good money managers. Others are not so good. Be adaptable. Your preaching subjects and direction will change quickly. Good can be accomplished, but you want to plan as well as possible.
Uganda
This is completely different. The dangers here have to do with the health challenges. Your personal safety is reasonably secure.
These churches are in absolute infancy and their situation is very tenuous. Brother Okech is a major influence and more preachers need to be developed. That is just beginning and it will take considerable time. Organizing these churches and establishing them in independent and autonomous situations is just beginning. There are good signs.
The poverty here is profound. This is not a cash economy. It is expensive to live here in any fashion that an American would understand.
The tenuousness of the situation and the difference in the cultures makes planning difficult. You should speak plainly and with the difference in the cultures this is not always as easy as it sounds. One party may think he is speaking plainly and the other end of the conversation may not have the tools to understand what he is talking about. Cost control will be a challenge. In both countries you may need to send money ahead to make certain that the folks helping you have a working automobile. You will want that. If these costs cannot be controlled you will want to think before coming. These churches do not gather easily. It is hard to gather after dark. It is a walking or transport situation for many of them to gather. We have arranged a place for them to come and many of the men we are teaching are housed here and there and I have spoken to you about the challenge of keeping them fed. I would suggest that you come with Keith or someone who has been here ahead of you. That will make the planning much easier.
I must admit that I had reservations before coming here. It seemed that Francis received a large amount of support. I was tired when we finished in Lagos and irritated with myself that I had to come here and give up two more weeks and be away from home.
I am glad I came. I would not have understood what is happening here nearly as well as I understand now. Francis is supporting his sister who obviously works with him in this effort as a fellow helper and advisor. She is a good woman and a good Bible student. He is at charges for much of the expense of three very poor congregations. These churches have increased in size by double and in one case by tenfold. I mentioned at the first of this days blog, two emergencies that required small amounts of money. I believe Francis and Rosemary face this situation several times a week. Here is a sick, lethargic, two month old baby belonging to a church member who has absolutely no money and there are no state resources of help. What should they do? Harden their hearts and say, this is hard to explain to American churches so we have to save our money and cannot help you. Obviously not! What would you do?
I believe this situation is unique. I cannot think of another group of churches like this anywhere in the world at this time. Yes, he was receiving a lot of money. He was not living lavishly. He was not squandering the money. He was not saving it in a large pile. He and she were building three churches and helping poor people who can hardly understand the gospel. They made it understandable. Can you do that? They were doing it without a lot of help. There is still not much help and they have lost at least a third of their support abruptly.
Some asked me whether Francis deserves support. Yes.
Do I understand absolutely everything going on here? Probably not. Could Francis be a better manager? Probably so. Is Francis sometimes difficult to understand or does he occasionally express himself poorly? Oh yes. Our worlds are so very different. How could it be any other way? Do these people need to know more about the Bible? Should Francis be teaching them better? This is always so. It is certainly so where I preach.
So the answer is yes. He deserves and needs support. Something unique and wonderful is happening here. It is balanced on a knife edge. It could explode in growth faster than these people can keep up with. It could disappear in disaster and lack of support that will set the work back for many years. It is different from anything I have been acquainted with. I am not sure that the usual formulas for support and rules for money spent apply. I can only tell you that they use everything sent them to teach the gospel and to help needy Christians from their own pocket, and they do this in the most practical and profound way imaginable.
These people have created something out of nothing, with precious little outside advice and help. They seem to have sincere hearts and a genuine love of the truth. They are in the middle of a stressful and terrible situation. They are succeeding. With support and the development of more preachers the Lord’s work here could truly explode. At the same time without support and without a little thoughtful and careful direction it could implode and the opportunity could be lost.
God speed to all you brethren. Thank You. It has been an experience in a lifetime of experiences. I still do not know if I was the man for the job, but I tried to do my duty as I understood it best and I have carried away far more than I gave. I have tried to tell you the truth about what I saw and experienced. These are hard places. The people working here are gentle people who know how to work in hard places. They are better than me. May God give them strength and may brethren give them prayer and support.
Love John
I felt that both legs of this trip were poorly planned. The situation in Nigeria was not well considered and I could have been used better to do more preaching. Some of this is because of the difficulty and remoteness of the areas.
In retrospect I suppose that it was good for me to begin in Ibadan, though of the cities of Nigeria they needed teaching the least of all. It did allow me to become familiar with the weather and many very good preachers in a friendly environment. I preached on topics they requested and that had absolutely nothing to do with the material I had come prepared to give. Yet, it was what they said they needed and wanted. These brethren and al these churches have a habit of a question and answer session after every lesson. These were profitable and interesting. I enjoyed the time, they said they appreciated my efforts but I suspect that several of the men there could have done the same teaching that I did. It was gratifying to be among them.
I believe that in Calabar we did our best effort. It could have been much better with more preplanning, but I believe in this environment of growing institutionalism among the churches that we opened a door of study and friendship there. It will need follow-up and currently I do not see anyone available to do it. If 6 months goes by without follow-up this door will close and the result of the teaching that we did will be lost. I did not spend enough time in Uyo to do more than social visiting with a very few brethren. In Benin we did a little teaching and helped to solidify the congregation there in the truth. Our influence was limited perhaps because of the fact that lines of division were already drawn in this area. I believe that we did limited good here.
Keith in his latter weeks seems to have been very successful. That is a story for him to tell. The little we did in Lagos, was a successful study and confrontation of ideas. This was a meeting thrown together in little time. I would think that future trips to the area should concentrate on Lagos for much of the fight will be there and perhaps search out other area of the country that have not been reached as yet.
Nigerian churches do not need American preachers to come there and preach on the first principles. At this stage this influence would almost be an insult. There are plenty of Christians here who can preach on these subjects as well as any American if not better. There are also capable men who can teach on institutionalism. They need some help in these areas. Americans can help draw a crowd and American funds can help with the expense of traveling around the country.
The Christians in this country are hospitable and friendly. They are sincere in difficult situation. The contrast between the difficulty of the country and the gentility of the Christians is hard to fathom.
Someone told me that the United Nations has referred to Nigeria as a “failed state.” I believe it. Traveling in this country is dangerous, unpleasant, unhealthy, hostile, and constantly tense. In my opinion, sooner or later some American preacher who travels to Nigeria will be hurt. It will be by disease, accident, robbers, or simply stressed ill health. Anyone who goes there should be aware of this.
Insist on more detailed planning. Teaching for two or three hours during the daytime and then sitting around watching TV is a waste of time and expense. There should be as much opportunity to teach morning and night as possible. There are not a lot of tourist sites in Nigeria and that is not why you came here in the first place. Settle the expenses involved in this trip at the outset. Handle your own money. A few Nigerian preachers can be trusted with your money as good money managers. Others are not so good. Be adaptable. Your preaching subjects and direction will change quickly. Good can be accomplished, but you want to plan as well as possible.
Uganda
This is completely different. The dangers here have to do with the health challenges. Your personal safety is reasonably secure.
These churches are in absolute infancy and their situation is very tenuous. Brother Okech is a major influence and more preachers need to be developed. That is just beginning and it will take considerable time. Organizing these churches and establishing them in independent and autonomous situations is just beginning. There are good signs.
The poverty here is profound. This is not a cash economy. It is expensive to live here in any fashion that an American would understand.
The tenuousness of the situation and the difference in the cultures makes planning difficult. You should speak plainly and with the difference in the cultures this is not always as easy as it sounds. One party may think he is speaking plainly and the other end of the conversation may not have the tools to understand what he is talking about. Cost control will be a challenge. In both countries you may need to send money ahead to make certain that the folks helping you have a working automobile. You will want that. If these costs cannot be controlled you will want to think before coming. These churches do not gather easily. It is hard to gather after dark. It is a walking or transport situation for many of them to gather. We have arranged a place for them to come and many of the men we are teaching are housed here and there and I have spoken to you about the challenge of keeping them fed. I would suggest that you come with Keith or someone who has been here ahead of you. That will make the planning much easier.
I must admit that I had reservations before coming here. It seemed that Francis received a large amount of support. I was tired when we finished in Lagos and irritated with myself that I had to come here and give up two more weeks and be away from home.
I am glad I came. I would not have understood what is happening here nearly as well as I understand now. Francis is supporting his sister who obviously works with him in this effort as a fellow helper and advisor. She is a good woman and a good Bible student. He is at charges for much of the expense of three very poor congregations. These churches have increased in size by double and in one case by tenfold. I mentioned at the first of this days blog, two emergencies that required small amounts of money. I believe Francis and Rosemary face this situation several times a week. Here is a sick, lethargic, two month old baby belonging to a church member who has absolutely no money and there are no state resources of help. What should they do? Harden their hearts and say, this is hard to explain to American churches so we have to save our money and cannot help you. Obviously not! What would you do?
I believe this situation is unique. I cannot think of another group of churches like this anywhere in the world at this time. Yes, he was receiving a lot of money. He was not living lavishly. He was not squandering the money. He was not saving it in a large pile. He and she were building three churches and helping poor people who can hardly understand the gospel. They made it understandable. Can you do that? They were doing it without a lot of help. There is still not much help and they have lost at least a third of their support abruptly.
Some asked me whether Francis deserves support. Yes.
Do I understand absolutely everything going on here? Probably not. Could Francis be a better manager? Probably so. Is Francis sometimes difficult to understand or does he occasionally express himself poorly? Oh yes. Our worlds are so very different. How could it be any other way? Do these people need to know more about the Bible? Should Francis be teaching them better? This is always so. It is certainly so where I preach.
So the answer is yes. He deserves and needs support. Something unique and wonderful is happening here. It is balanced on a knife edge. It could explode in growth faster than these people can keep up with. It could disappear in disaster and lack of support that will set the work back for many years. It is different from anything I have been acquainted with. I am not sure that the usual formulas for support and rules for money spent apply. I can only tell you that they use everything sent them to teach the gospel and to help needy Christians from their own pocket, and they do this in the most practical and profound way imaginable.
These people have created something out of nothing, with precious little outside advice and help. They seem to have sincere hearts and a genuine love of the truth. They are in the middle of a stressful and terrible situation. They are succeeding. With support and the development of more preachers the Lord’s work here could truly explode. At the same time without support and without a little thoughtful and careful direction it could implode and the opportunity could be lost.
God speed to all you brethren. Thank You. It has been an experience in a lifetime of experiences. I still do not know if I was the man for the job, but I tried to do my duty as I understood it best and I have carried away far more than I gave. I have tried to tell you the truth about what I saw and experienced. These are hard places. The people working here are gentle people who know how to work in hard places. They are better than me. May God give them strength and may brethren give them prayer and support.
Love John
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
This is casava drying on the side of the road.The class was decimated again. Some more the men had to go back to Tororo. They had family sickness and difficulty and needed to return. These were some of our best men, but they had been away for a long time.
One of our men was not here this morning. He was one of the men named Peter. He is a taxi driver here in town. That means he has a bicycle. I had mentioned that I was concerned that providing meals for the men would somehow predispose them to the truth. Peter however had been neglecting his business. He owed a 10,000 shilling debt. This is about $5. Apparently the man he owed was about to take his bike/livelihood for the debt. He said he had to work hard today to try to make up the lost money. I believe he was sacrificing for the classes. Rosemary helped with his expenses and he was able to join us.
I also mentioned Siliver the other day. He is attending our classes and works here as a servant. I had assumed that he lives in one of the tiny apartments out back. This is not so. He lives at the church building and apparently helps with maintaining that. I mentioned that the dirt floor of the building has to be treated to hold down some biting insects so the children can lie and sit on papyrus mats on the floor. Siliver is also married and his child was sick. The child is 2 months old. They were concerned about malaria. There is no medical care here without money. There were free clinics until several years ago the government privatized all of them. There are no social service organizations. There is no help for poor people who are sick. There is a state hospital across the street, but there are no beds and no medicine, even aspirin. Siliver needed 20,000 shillings to go to a doctor. That is $10. Keith provided this because he was faster than I was. The child was dehydrated. Rosemary says many children here die of this. He was lethargic when he was here. They provided some medication. I hope he will be better.
I had to make 4 trips to town to get off the blog today. The internet is not a terribly dependable thing here. That is about 6 miles of walking. My wife says I should keep it up, it would be good for me. Humph!
Keith did well with a study of the role of the Holy Spirit. I think that it was much needed and much appreciated. Two of my men delivered good lessons. I hope that they will begin to be used in their congregations. They are not preachers, but they are ready to make a short talk or deliver an invitation and would soon develop. These are mature men who seem to express themselves well in their native tongue.
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
The Lord's church in Uganda
The church in Tororo, Uganda.
The building where the Tororo congregation meets.
This is our class that meets each day in Jinja.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
I have learned a few things about the servants around here. I thought I would inform you so you did not think that these folk were living high and mighty. First servants here are so cheap it is a little silly not to have them since it is an act of charity to give them a place to live. Mary, who helps with the cooking and cleaning and does not seem to speak a word of English beyond hello was hired just for the period of time we are here to help deal with us. Mary, I have been told, is the perfect vision of Uganda womanhood as can be born out by the young men in the classes who seem to avail themselves of various opportunities to speak to her and smile at her. (She is a little fleshy by American standards of this sort of thing.)
Richard is about 14 and is Fred Ofwono’s son. Fred lives in Tororo. Fred does not have enough money to send this young man to secondary school. That would cost about $350 dollars. Consequently there is nothing for Richard to do. He apparently scored well in school and would like to go ahead. He has about 3 years to do so, but that area is as cash poor as here. He opens the gate when someone honks. He puts out the chairs and goes to the store for small chores as bidden. He seems to sneak quite a bit of time watching TV. I have no idea how much or whether he is paid. Siliver lives in the former servants apartments out back. The only thing I have seen him doing is to use a broom made of sticks to brush the yard each morning. It is spotless. I have no idea whether he is paid or is allowed to live in one of the apartments in exchange for this yard work. There are two or three other young men who live in these apartments. They are reasonably well dressed. I am told that they rent and that they work in banks here in town. I am also told that they are Christians.
Our classes went well again. Keith has finished the cases of conversion and is currently studying to teach about the work of the Holy Spirit tomorrow. My men are to start preaching tomorrow. They are having a little more trouble with this topical sort of sermon. It does not suit story telling as easily as last week’s textual sermons did. They seem to be working well. Having Bibles and some sort of reference materials is a must.
I have now done my part to help the Ugandan economy so that I will have some trinkets to throw in the door in front of the women in my life and the grandchildren. I left the street with all the trinket shops with smiling merchants waving at me and calling me by my first name and hoping I would come back next year. I do not think that it is a good sign that they were so happy.
We learned a little bit more about the naming system here. These men have their family name first and their individual name last. Thus, he is Ochieng David. Francis would really be Okech Francis, but I think perhaps he has westernized the name a bit. Many of the women do not seem to have a personal name especially in Massesse, At least no one seems to know them. They are simply called Mama_____________, and one of the children’s names is then inserted. Rosemary was saying that one of the women she helped in Massesse she simply has named Rejoice since whenever she sees her she says “rejoice in the Lord.”
We did find out good news this morning. We called the airline ourselves to see if we could change our tickets. It was done after we went to bed last night from Indianapolis. Apparently we will be able to board a late night flight headed home on Friday night. If we can make connections we should be home Saturday afternoon. I am informed that this is Valentine’s day. I am doubly glad I have trinkets. One can be confident of a welcome with some sort of gift. I will gain 8 hours and Keith says that I will collapse when I finally relax at home. I must admit that the one thing that I have noticed while here is that there is always a considerable exercise of discipline and therefore some stress at all times. The Jet lag may be a factor too.
I did not want brother Okech to have to make a double trip to the airport at Entebbe This is about an hour and a half ride from Kampala where he lives. This way I can go with Keith who is leaving Friday morning and just stay at the airport until my flight that evening. Entebbe is virtually on the equator as a point of information.
I will try to write more of a review of the trip in the next few days.
Needless to say I am looking forward to seeing you. I could not get on line to send the blog the past few days. I will try again tomorrow
Love,
John
Richard is about 14 and is Fred Ofwono’s son. Fred lives in Tororo. Fred does not have enough money to send this young man to secondary school. That would cost about $350 dollars. Consequently there is nothing for Richard to do. He apparently scored well in school and would like to go ahead. He has about 3 years to do so, but that area is as cash poor as here. He opens the gate when someone honks. He puts out the chairs and goes to the store for small chores as bidden. He seems to sneak quite a bit of time watching TV. I have no idea how much or whether he is paid. Siliver lives in the former servants apartments out back. The only thing I have seen him doing is to use a broom made of sticks to brush the yard each morning. It is spotless. I have no idea whether he is paid or is allowed to live in one of the apartments in exchange for this yard work. There are two or three other young men who live in these apartments. They are reasonably well dressed. I am told that they rent and that they work in banks here in town. I am also told that they are Christians.
Our classes went well again. Keith has finished the cases of conversion and is currently studying to teach about the work of the Holy Spirit tomorrow. My men are to start preaching tomorrow. They are having a little more trouble with this topical sort of sermon. It does not suit story telling as easily as last week’s textual sermons did. They seem to be working well. Having Bibles and some sort of reference materials is a must.
I have now done my part to help the Ugandan economy so that I will have some trinkets to throw in the door in front of the women in my life and the grandchildren. I left the street with all the trinket shops with smiling merchants waving at me and calling me by my first name and hoping I would come back next year. I do not think that it is a good sign that they were so happy.
We learned a little bit more about the naming system here. These men have their family name first and their individual name last. Thus, he is Ochieng David. Francis would really be Okech Francis, but I think perhaps he has westernized the name a bit. Many of the women do not seem to have a personal name especially in Massesse, At least no one seems to know them. They are simply called Mama_____________, and one of the children’s names is then inserted. Rosemary was saying that one of the women she helped in Massesse she simply has named Rejoice since whenever she sees her she says “rejoice in the Lord.”
We did find out good news this morning. We called the airline ourselves to see if we could change our tickets. It was done after we went to bed last night from Indianapolis. Apparently we will be able to board a late night flight headed home on Friday night. If we can make connections we should be home Saturday afternoon. I am informed that this is Valentine’s day. I am doubly glad I have trinkets. One can be confident of a welcome with some sort of gift. I will gain 8 hours and Keith says that I will collapse when I finally relax at home. I must admit that the one thing that I have noticed while here is that there is always a considerable exercise of discipline and therefore some stress at all times. The Jet lag may be a factor too.
I did not want brother Okech to have to make a double trip to the airport at Entebbe This is about an hour and a half ride from Kampala where he lives. This way I can go with Keith who is leaving Friday morning and just stay at the airport until my flight that evening. Entebbe is virtually on the equator as a point of information.
I will try to write more of a review of the trip in the next few days.
Needless to say I am looking forward to seeing you. I could not get on line to send the blog the past few days. I will try again tomorrow
Love,
John
Monday, February 9, 2009
The source of the Nile River. There is a large Spring here, and at one time there were rapids where Lake Victoria empties into the Nile.
This mountain is Tororo Rock. The city is at the base of the mountain, and the church is on the backside.Our classes resumed today. We had about 11 present. The men seem to be getting in gear with what we are doing. They are taking notes better and seem more in tune with the regime. Keith seems to have found a comfortable level and is simply telling the cases of conversion in Acts and the men are more alert and able to follow. We will continue classes through Thursday. The men are to deliver a sermon on a topical topic for me this week. Last week I was showing them examples of sermons drawn straight from the text. They understood that concept well. This may be a little harder for there is a smaller element of storytelling and requires more natural logic to follow the thought. So far it is going well.
We went to town today to try to send out our blog, but our internet café was closed. They should be back up tomorrow. I spent some time bargaining with the local merchants for various trinkets. I am not sure I can get all this junk in my luggage. One woman and I had to call a truce and may start again tomorrow.
We went back out to Massesse tonight to visit a couple of women that Rosemary wanted us to see. I took a lot of photos. I will get them on eventually. She set one woman up in the hotel business. It was a three room mud hut smaller than most backyard storage buildings in America. They were cooking a variety of food though. There was a room to eat (the restaurant) and a sleeping room. You will not believe this till I show you pictures. And you may not believe after you have seen them. We went to a mud home that she built for the older woman Mamma Zamba that I mentioned earlier. It was on a hillside and had cost her $75. The hillside is good because it is away from the village and because the rains drain off. We saw another house that she had built for a woman who had 8 children in a shelter with simple clear plastic walls. It held water inside and when it rained the children had to sleep standing. Francis said he will get me the picture. Her new home is a mud hut with a metal roof. It is dry and clean. Of course there is no electricity or light. It cost Rosemary $250.
We saw two women naked from the waist in a fight as we left and third woman was beating them with a stick. I did not take pictures. We could also see a line of women across the valley returning to the community from the city. They had been begging in the city and rummaging through the trash.
William Ochieng was able to be in class today. He preached at Jinja yesterday. He reminded Keith that he had met him during Keith’s previous visit here. He said that at that time his two year old daughter was sick with malaria. She died shortly after Keith left. We also learned that two of the men in our class have aids. I think Keith knows which ones, but I did not want to enquire.
It is the start of the week so that the city has a new crop of Europeans showing up on the streets.
I mentioned that my CPAP machine died last week. The end result is that I do not sleep as well as before. I was tired today and needed to take a short sleep. The men take a long lunch. So thankfully there was time to do just that before they returned. I am in good health and doing well. I am trying to not think of home so much as it grows closer. I keep asking the Lord to help me concentrate on the teaching for the next three days so that I can fulfill the reason for my being here.
I ought to take some time to give some reflection on the work in these two great countries. I am afraid that if I wait till I return home, I will be too busy catching up with my left behind life. I do not want to write before this week is over. Perhaps I will have some time on the plane flight home.
I am currently waiting to call home till late in the day Monday there to hear whether they were able to rearrange my plane ticket to come home beginning on Friday and arriving on Saturday. I am trying very hard not to get my hopes up. If it possible I will see you Sunday Morning, if the Lord wills.
Love,
John
We went to town today to try to send out our blog, but our internet café was closed. They should be back up tomorrow. I spent some time bargaining with the local merchants for various trinkets. I am not sure I can get all this junk in my luggage. One woman and I had to call a truce and may start again tomorrow.
We went back out to Massesse tonight to visit a couple of women that Rosemary wanted us to see. I took a lot of photos. I will get them on eventually. She set one woman up in the hotel business. It was a three room mud hut smaller than most backyard storage buildings in America. They were cooking a variety of food though. There was a room to eat (the restaurant) and a sleeping room. You will not believe this till I show you pictures. And you may not believe after you have seen them. We went to a mud home that she built for the older woman Mamma Zamba that I mentioned earlier. It was on a hillside and had cost her $75. The hillside is good because it is away from the village and because the rains drain off. We saw another house that she had built for a woman who had 8 children in a shelter with simple clear plastic walls. It held water inside and when it rained the children had to sleep standing. Francis said he will get me the picture. Her new home is a mud hut with a metal roof. It is dry and clean. Of course there is no electricity or light. It cost Rosemary $250.
We saw two women naked from the waist in a fight as we left and third woman was beating them with a stick. I did not take pictures. We could also see a line of women across the valley returning to the community from the city. They had been begging in the city and rummaging through the trash.
William Ochieng was able to be in class today. He preached at Jinja yesterday. He reminded Keith that he had met him during Keith’s previous visit here. He said that at that time his two year old daughter was sick with malaria. She died shortly after Keith left. We also learned that two of the men in our class have aids. I think Keith knows which ones, but I did not want to enquire.
It is the start of the week so that the city has a new crop of Europeans showing up on the streets.
I mentioned that my CPAP machine died last week. The end result is that I do not sleep as well as before. I was tired today and needed to take a short sleep. The men take a long lunch. So thankfully there was time to do just that before they returned. I am in good health and doing well. I am trying to not think of home so much as it grows closer. I keep asking the Lord to help me concentrate on the teaching for the next three days so that I can fulfill the reason for my being here.
I ought to take some time to give some reflection on the work in these two great countries. I am afraid that if I wait till I return home, I will be too busy catching up with my left behind life. I do not want to write before this week is over. Perhaps I will have some time on the plane flight home.
I am currently waiting to call home till late in the day Monday there to hear whether they were able to rearrange my plane ticket to come home beginning on Friday and arriving on Saturday. I am trying very hard not to get my hopes up. If it possible I will see you Sunday Morning, if the Lord wills.
Love,
John
Sunday, February 8, 2009
We went to Tororo today. We started in the dark and that is scary. These knuckleheads drive on the wrong side of the road (something they got from the British). By the way when you are crossing the road be sure to check both ways for traffic. You should first check the direction they would be coming from in America if they had sensibly adopted that system. Then you should check the other way that they will really be coming from. I have been saved by chance several times. They often drive in the middle of the road which I think they invented and did not get from anyone. It is dark as pitch. There are no road markings, and I am getting old, when there is an oncoming car I cannot see the road at all. If the other guy hogs the road we are going in the ditch.
The road was better than Nigeria which is not a recommendation. 80% of the road is good. There is no speed limit. There are hundreds of people walking and riding bicycles along both sides of the road. The 20% of the road that is bad is really bad: Endless potholes and some wash boarding. This portion takes as long to navigate as the good portion that is much longer. This was the good road that we detoured to avoid the bad road. It was better and safer than Nigeria by several magnitudes.
There are a couple of twists. There are no speed limits buuuuuuttttttttt. At odd points that make sense to someone there are speed bumps in the road. There are two types of speed bumps. There are some that are about 6 inches high and there are about 5 of these in quick succession. I suppose that they intend these to resemble rumble strips. I did mention that they are 6 inches high. These were actually installed by Ugandan dentists as filling checkers. If you have a tendency to travel with your mouth open you will regret it. Think of the thrill of hitting one of these in the dark while an oncoming car has blinded you. Naturally, you are driving about 70 miles per hour. Where there is one series of these there will be others thrown in with no sign or warning. They are just there. Filling checkers.
The other type of speed bump is about 2 feet high and sloped. I refer to these as the Evel Knievel speed bump. Hit this at 70 and you will definitely be air born. Again they occur in what appears random fashion without sign, road paint, or warning. Just a big black bump in the road.
Brother Okech drives a Toyota Hiace which is not imported to the US with good reason for the second seat was intended as a punishment for midgets. However, the car is used as a Taxi all over Africa and must resemble a tank with extensive body work. Brother Okech’s vehicle apparently was a bargain model that was sold without shock absorbers. Keith Sharp was sitting in the third seat back, the most comfortable. However as we came to these unique combinations of road slower downer any passenger in the third seat had a definite tendency to take flight. There were several “whooopiies” from the rear (at least that is what I think he said). I am sure he now has a free pass at every amusement park in America by reason of his experience. He is also 2 inches shorter and a licensed member of the rodeo cowboys association for bull riding.
Another unique feature of the road is that it is used for food production. These people eat Cassava as their primary carbohydrate. This is a root that can be ground to flour. It is primary staple and cash crop. The stuff has to be dried before being bagged. Apparently every resident in the country uses the pavement at the side of the road to dry his cassava. So at any given moment while dodging potholes, bicycles, taxis, road crossers, and Buses there are also farmers and their families either placing cassava to dry on the road or collecting in large bags for storage. Don’t take your eyes off the road.
The entire collage makes one tend to travel with muscles tensed, teeth clenched, gripping some firm point in the auto, sweating profusely, blinking road dust out of the eyes, and craning one’s neck when someone points out some roadside oddity which is whipping by at break neck speed. This does not even begin to figure in the pucker factor. Woe to the man who dozes off: it is either the dash or the ceiling at some point for him. Brother Okech was in a rush to get there this morning. I know that he still has springs on some of his wheels because of the lurching of the vehicle.
We left at 6AM and arrived in Tororo at 9AM. It is a small town, but orderly and typically African. We went to a local hotel where brother Okech said we would “rest” (that apparently is his code word for “eat”) before church services. Keith had an omelet. Sister Rosemary had Ham and a greasy taco called Chapati, and brother Okech, who can eat like the devil has offered him a last meal, cleaned up. I had one salty pancake and a Coke.
The congregation meets at the clubhouse of a golf club on the side of the mountain that Tororo is named after. Now don’t get excited. This golf club really bears a strong resemblance to a cow pasture. I don’t think there are really any greens unless that word is just figurative. The rest of the grass bears a strong resemblance to long (hasn’t been cut in a week or two) crabgrass. The clubhouse was built in the 40s for the colonial British. It was probably nice then. I think it is just a storage warehouse now. But it serves for the church and the setting is picturesque. Brother Okech pays the equivalent of $30 per week for the brethren to meet there.
There were about 80 there, including Fred Ofwono and three of the men from our class. Apparently there were other brethren who had gone to a different location through some misinformation. Both of us preached and worshipped. It was good to do so. We did this about 8 hours ahead of you folk in the eastern half of the US. The Lord was with all of us. Most of these brethren walk in. There were no other cars beside ours. Some would use a pickup. These are loaded as full as people can stand in the back and hold on to one another. In fact in Africa, everything that you should not do in a vehicle is done regularly here. Some probably arrange for local bicycle taxis. These are long walks of several miles to get to the meeting place. The singing was lovely though not as forceful as in Nigeria. I recorded a little bit and if I can enhance it will eventually put it on this blog. It was in their language.
We headed home after talking with Fred and his family. There is no meat in that area. Fred’s wife is a vet. She walks everywhere. There is a hoof and mouth quarantine on the area so meat is a tough commodity to come by. Fred came back with us and I think is already beginning to lust over the deceased pig that I mentioned in a previous blog.
I took lots of pictures on the way back. We took that trip slower so that I could take pictures. The landscape is entirely small subsistence farms for the entire distance. Brother Okech was lamenting (He and Rosemary came from the area around Tororo) that what had once been dense forest throughout that whole region had been entirely deforested and was now these subsistence farms. If it recently was densely forested the change in the landscape must have been profound. Most of the people live in small family or communal compounds. These are largely round huts made of mud or occasionally brick with thatch roofs. There are outbuildings for cooking and often new buildings are begun as young people come of age. They are usually clean and orderly and rather strangely speak of family and clan. A subsistence farm here can involve as little as half an acre of land. Not much from which to make your entire living. There are no jobs.
I might mention that Ugandans generally build with locally made brick, where the Nigerians generally built with locally made concrete block. I think that the distinction is in the soil types available in the two countries. Nigeria is mostly sandy and they can use the natural dirt with cement for block. The soil here has a red clay content/ This would make bad concrete blocks, but works fine for bricks. Many homes have small brick kilns and fire their own bricks. The soil is largely volcanic and very fertile.
I had an interesting conversation with Rosemary and sister Ofwono. They said that women in Uganda are abused. They are often beaten. They are subjected to situations with multiple marriages without any real escape or recourse. They are threatened with abandonment if they have too many children and this is often done. There is nothing really in place to protect women in their society from these things. I suspect that there are laws against such, but apparently enforcing them is either difficult or impossible. Travel between these countries for Africans is very easy, so the men can disappear. The woman said that the men would just leave their wife or wives and find a barren woman to live with. There is little or no advice to give. The gospel needs to be taught, that may be the only hope.
We have returned home having stopped in a hotel along the way for a 4pm meal. Ugandans eat meals late. This was lunch. Rosemary has had rice and beans at the house for us late at night for the last two days. The beans were welcome and tasty. I was missing vegetables. I once again am here to testify that Africans have never met a fried food that they did not like.
I have confirmed again the hope for plus size women in Africa. Brother Okech is a widower and pretty easy on the eyes it seems. He also has his own home and is apparently interesting enough to have convinced several hundred people to join him in serving the Lord. Brother Sharp was exercising the God given responsibility for gospel preachers to match make suggesting various women in Nigeria (see 2 Timothy 5:7; see also Titus 4:3). Some of these women were advertised as healthy women. I mentioned that if he would come to the US I knew some wealthy, well educated, skinny women. I was once again informed that Ugandans do not want skinny women. They have a tendency to associate skinniness with ill-health and AIDs. They want someone who can be a good mother and worker. You women should either immigrate or import these ideals to America.
Our classes resume tomorrow. I miss you
John
The road was better than Nigeria which is not a recommendation. 80% of the road is good. There is no speed limit. There are hundreds of people walking and riding bicycles along both sides of the road. The 20% of the road that is bad is really bad: Endless potholes and some wash boarding. This portion takes as long to navigate as the good portion that is much longer. This was the good road that we detoured to avoid the bad road. It was better and safer than Nigeria by several magnitudes.
There are a couple of twists. There are no speed limits buuuuuuttttttttt. At odd points that make sense to someone there are speed bumps in the road. There are two types of speed bumps. There are some that are about 6 inches high and there are about 5 of these in quick succession. I suppose that they intend these to resemble rumble strips. I did mention that they are 6 inches high. These were actually installed by Ugandan dentists as filling checkers. If you have a tendency to travel with your mouth open you will regret it. Think of the thrill of hitting one of these in the dark while an oncoming car has blinded you. Naturally, you are driving about 70 miles per hour. Where there is one series of these there will be others thrown in with no sign or warning. They are just there. Filling checkers.
The other type of speed bump is about 2 feet high and sloped. I refer to these as the Evel Knievel speed bump. Hit this at 70 and you will definitely be air born. Again they occur in what appears random fashion without sign, road paint, or warning. Just a big black bump in the road.
Brother Okech drives a Toyota Hiace which is not imported to the US with good reason for the second seat was intended as a punishment for midgets. However, the car is used as a Taxi all over Africa and must resemble a tank with extensive body work. Brother Okech’s vehicle apparently was a bargain model that was sold without shock absorbers. Keith Sharp was sitting in the third seat back, the most comfortable. However as we came to these unique combinations of road slower downer any passenger in the third seat had a definite tendency to take flight. There were several “whooopiies” from the rear (at least that is what I think he said). I am sure he now has a free pass at every amusement park in America by reason of his experience. He is also 2 inches shorter and a licensed member of the rodeo cowboys association for bull riding.
Another unique feature of the road is that it is used for food production. These people eat Cassava as their primary carbohydrate. This is a root that can be ground to flour. It is primary staple and cash crop. The stuff has to be dried before being bagged. Apparently every resident in the country uses the pavement at the side of the road to dry his cassava. So at any given moment while dodging potholes, bicycles, taxis, road crossers, and Buses there are also farmers and their families either placing cassava to dry on the road or collecting in large bags for storage. Don’t take your eyes off the road.
The entire collage makes one tend to travel with muscles tensed, teeth clenched, gripping some firm point in the auto, sweating profusely, blinking road dust out of the eyes, and craning one’s neck when someone points out some roadside oddity which is whipping by at break neck speed. This does not even begin to figure in the pucker factor. Woe to the man who dozes off: it is either the dash or the ceiling at some point for him. Brother Okech was in a rush to get there this morning. I know that he still has springs on some of his wheels because of the lurching of the vehicle.
We left at 6AM and arrived in Tororo at 9AM. It is a small town, but orderly and typically African. We went to a local hotel where brother Okech said we would “rest” (that apparently is his code word for “eat”) before church services. Keith had an omelet. Sister Rosemary had Ham and a greasy taco called Chapati, and brother Okech, who can eat like the devil has offered him a last meal, cleaned up. I had one salty pancake and a Coke.
The congregation meets at the clubhouse of a golf club on the side of the mountain that Tororo is named after. Now don’t get excited. This golf club really bears a strong resemblance to a cow pasture. I don’t think there are really any greens unless that word is just figurative. The rest of the grass bears a strong resemblance to long (hasn’t been cut in a week or two) crabgrass. The clubhouse was built in the 40s for the colonial British. It was probably nice then. I think it is just a storage warehouse now. But it serves for the church and the setting is picturesque. Brother Okech pays the equivalent of $30 per week for the brethren to meet there.
There were about 80 there, including Fred Ofwono and three of the men from our class. Apparently there were other brethren who had gone to a different location through some misinformation. Both of us preached and worshipped. It was good to do so. We did this about 8 hours ahead of you folk in the eastern half of the US. The Lord was with all of us. Most of these brethren walk in. There were no other cars beside ours. Some would use a pickup. These are loaded as full as people can stand in the back and hold on to one another. In fact in Africa, everything that you should not do in a vehicle is done regularly here. Some probably arrange for local bicycle taxis. These are long walks of several miles to get to the meeting place. The singing was lovely though not as forceful as in Nigeria. I recorded a little bit and if I can enhance it will eventually put it on this blog. It was in their language.
We headed home after talking with Fred and his family. There is no meat in that area. Fred’s wife is a vet. She walks everywhere. There is a hoof and mouth quarantine on the area so meat is a tough commodity to come by. Fred came back with us and I think is already beginning to lust over the deceased pig that I mentioned in a previous blog.
I took lots of pictures on the way back. We took that trip slower so that I could take pictures. The landscape is entirely small subsistence farms for the entire distance. Brother Okech was lamenting (He and Rosemary came from the area around Tororo) that what had once been dense forest throughout that whole region had been entirely deforested and was now these subsistence farms. If it recently was densely forested the change in the landscape must have been profound. Most of the people live in small family or communal compounds. These are largely round huts made of mud or occasionally brick with thatch roofs. There are outbuildings for cooking and often new buildings are begun as young people come of age. They are usually clean and orderly and rather strangely speak of family and clan. A subsistence farm here can involve as little as half an acre of land. Not much from which to make your entire living. There are no jobs.
I might mention that Ugandans generally build with locally made brick, where the Nigerians generally built with locally made concrete block. I think that the distinction is in the soil types available in the two countries. Nigeria is mostly sandy and they can use the natural dirt with cement for block. The soil here has a red clay content/ This would make bad concrete blocks, but works fine for bricks. Many homes have small brick kilns and fire their own bricks. The soil is largely volcanic and very fertile.
I had an interesting conversation with Rosemary and sister Ofwono. They said that women in Uganda are abused. They are often beaten. They are subjected to situations with multiple marriages without any real escape or recourse. They are threatened with abandonment if they have too many children and this is often done. There is nothing really in place to protect women in their society from these things. I suspect that there are laws against such, but apparently enforcing them is either difficult or impossible. Travel between these countries for Africans is very easy, so the men can disappear. The woman said that the men would just leave their wife or wives and find a barren woman to live with. There is little or no advice to give. The gospel needs to be taught, that may be the only hope.
We have returned home having stopped in a hotel along the way for a 4pm meal. Ugandans eat meals late. This was lunch. Rosemary has had rice and beans at the house for us late at night for the last two days. The beans were welcome and tasty. I was missing vegetables. I once again am here to testify that Africans have never met a fried food that they did not like.
I have confirmed again the hope for plus size women in Africa. Brother Okech is a widower and pretty easy on the eyes it seems. He also has his own home and is apparently interesting enough to have convinced several hundred people to join him in serving the Lord. Brother Sharp was exercising the God given responsibility for gospel preachers to match make suggesting various women in Nigeria (see 2 Timothy 5:7; see also Titus 4:3). Some of these women were advertised as healthy women. I mentioned that if he would come to the US I knew some wealthy, well educated, skinny women. I was once again informed that Ugandans do not want skinny women. They have a tendency to associate skinniness with ill-health and AIDs. They want someone who can be a good mother and worker. You women should either immigrate or import these ideals to America.
Our classes resume tomorrow. I miss you
John
Saturday, February 7, 2009
Pictures from Uganda
This is the church in Kampala. The women were not there because they were taking the kids to school. This is rented from a hotel and the church meets in their parking lot behind the hotel.
This is the Jinja church. Most of the people have AIDs. They are getting medicine through Rosemary's help and assistance. Most of the come from Massesse. Lake Victoria is in the background. They walked 2 miles or rode in brother Okech's van to get there.
Rosemary Athieno
Francis Okech
This is Rosemary's house where we are staying.
Friday, February 6, 2009
We had a good day. We lost the men from Tororo as we expected. That hurt but they needed to return to their gardens and families. I hope we get to see them again this Sunday when we go there. Tororo is about 3 hours east of here on the border with Kenya. There is supposed to be a good group of Christians there. We did pick up a new man, Ochieng George William. I met him at Massesse yesterday. I think he has been employed and unable to come before today. He is fluent in English and seems capable. He is going to speak at Jinja in place of brother Okech this Sunday. We had about 11 in class. Two men delivered their lesson, they seemed orderly and capable. I have been impressed with these men who spoke. They have interested their audience, stuck to their topic and exceeded every possible expectation I had.
Rosemary and Francis took us to the source of the Nile River. It is about ½ mile from Rosemary’s house. I took a lot of picture. John Speck discovered this spot in 1862 after several men had been hunting for many years for the source of the Nile. These of course are white men, the folk here had known it was here for some time. They just did not know where the water went when it left. There is a hydroelectric project on the river so that its level is higher than it would have been naturally and there is no rapid as there was before the dam. However, the power here is very reliable when compared to Nigeria. It was a pleasant day. I think Keith managed to get his ticket moved up. This will make it possible for him to worship on the Lord’s day and hopefully ease the transport burden on brother Okech. We have a day off tomorrow I have no idea what we are going to do. They were threatening to take me to the equator so that I could take a picture at a monument there. It is a three hour trip and I see no reason to put Brother Okech and his car through the expense of the trip. I told Keith that if I wanted I would just Photoshop my picture in over the picture he took on his last trip and no one would be the wiser.
You don’t see that everyday anymore. We were sitting in the living room talking and hearing a banging and hammering on the back porch for about an hour. Finally, curiosity got the better of us. Rosemary had apparently invested in a couple of pigs. She was having someone tend them. One of the pigs broke its leg. We had heard this earlier in the day. She was trying to get someone to buy the injured pig. She finally decided apparently to turn him into food. Sure enough on the back porch there was a fellow swinging a machete chopping up Porky. We hope to enjoy more of him in the near future. Things may be looking up.
My CPAP machine died about 4AM last night. Luckily I am in a separate portion of the house so they will not have to endure my snoring. I should be a little less rested, but I should be fine in the little time that we have left. I was sad, but it could be something serious. I think both of us are looking for home. Keith is a gung-ho kind of guy but I think that he too is beginning to feel restive for his home. We have resolved to teach classes through Thursday and prepare for our trip home.
I miss you all
John
Rosemary and Francis took us to the source of the Nile River. It is about ½ mile from Rosemary’s house. I took a lot of picture. John Speck discovered this spot in 1862 after several men had been hunting for many years for the source of the Nile. These of course are white men, the folk here had known it was here for some time. They just did not know where the water went when it left. There is a hydroelectric project on the river so that its level is higher than it would have been naturally and there is no rapid as there was before the dam. However, the power here is very reliable when compared to Nigeria. It was a pleasant day. I think Keith managed to get his ticket moved up. This will make it possible for him to worship on the Lord’s day and hopefully ease the transport burden on brother Okech. We have a day off tomorrow I have no idea what we are going to do. They were threatening to take me to the equator so that I could take a picture at a monument there. It is a three hour trip and I see no reason to put Brother Okech and his car through the expense of the trip. I told Keith that if I wanted I would just Photoshop my picture in over the picture he took on his last trip and no one would be the wiser.
You don’t see that everyday anymore. We were sitting in the living room talking and hearing a banging and hammering on the back porch for about an hour. Finally, curiosity got the better of us. Rosemary had apparently invested in a couple of pigs. She was having someone tend them. One of the pigs broke its leg. We had heard this earlier in the day. She was trying to get someone to buy the injured pig. She finally decided apparently to turn him into food. Sure enough on the back porch there was a fellow swinging a machete chopping up Porky. We hope to enjoy more of him in the near future. Things may be looking up.
My CPAP machine died about 4AM last night. Luckily I am in a separate portion of the house so they will not have to endure my snoring. I should be a little less rested, but I should be fine in the little time that we have left. I was sad, but it could be something serious. I think both of us are looking for home. Keith is a gung-ho kind of guy but I think that he too is beginning to feel restive for his home. We have resolved to teach classes through Thursday and prepare for our trip home.
I miss you all
John
Friday, February 6, 2009
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Rosemary prepared beans and rice for us late last night. It was good. This was just about the first vegetables that I have had in some time. It was welcome. It rained hard overnight so we will move our class to the large porch on the house to avoid the mud in the yard. We are fully expecting a bumper crop of mosquitoes from all this rain. I learned news that it is only the female mosquito that carries malaria. I will start checking sex now before I swat them.
I thought you might like to have the email addresses for these two people
Roseaburu@yahoo.co.uk Rosemary Athieno
FrancisOkech@yahoo.com Francis Okech
I noticed a local newspaper here that reported the poorest areas in this country. This area around Jinja is the poorest area in the country. Their definition means that income in this area is less that $1 a day. That is about $30 a month. They make less than this. There is such a stunning contrast. The area is beautiful and clean. There are very fine hotels here and many fine homes and a number of western buildings for various aid organizations and religious groups. The overall appearance of the town with its western tourists is a strange opulence for a small African city. But, it is a wealth amidst incredible poverty. Perhaps a difference here between this country and others is that the trees here and the soil abound with fruit so that the people do not starve. In other areas of Africa where there is poverty there is nothing to eat. Perhaps these people are a bit better off than that. I imagine that it is little comfort. They have no cash.
In case it has escaped you I am trying to update my spellings of names and places as I learn the precise spelling. Phonetics will only go so far. Maybe you should just read the blog backwards if you want to get the names correct.
Our classes today were very good. The men are really relishing the sermon preparation type approach that I am using. It has really been hard for both Keith and myself to find a way to teach these classes hindered as we are by the need for translation, the lack of Bibles; The lack of night lighting for the students to study, and the fact that several of them do not speak English at all. The ones who do speak English struggle to read. Three of them delivered a short speech. Two of them were very good and really had their audience with them; the third covered the topic well. Keith was a bit discouraged tonight. He has really been steadily trying to adapt to this situation but with his topic studying through the book of Acts, it is hard given the situation I described above. It is so tempting to go into detail in Acts 1 through 3 but the men were not really able to keep up. At least it appeared that way to him. His material has been excellent. He adapted it today and just presented it in the style of sermon outlines. This did better. Since it is obvious that he will not be able to complete Acts in the time we have here. He is switching to discussions of the cases of conversion. He is going to Acts 8 tomorrow and I am confident that this will resound better with these new Christians. He can just tell the story. They will follow and profit.
We also have received some bad news. The rains have come early to Uganda. I have mentioned that normally this month is dry here. However for the last three days we have had rains. Last night’s rain was heavy and apparently broad across the country. This means that many of the men need to be planting their gardens. These are more than just a vegetable garden. This is both what they will live on and what they can sell or trade for the year so this is important for them. Remember these people do not have a lot of cash. They live off this produce. The men are afraid that it may dry up later and they will be hurting. One man has a wife who has just recently had a child and she cannot dig. I am afraid that we are going to lose some of our men tomorrow, especially the men from Tororo. These were some of our most promising prospects.
We did have an unusual conversation with Rosemary about this. When we were told that some might have to leave, Keith simply and sensibly said, “if they have to go they have to go.” Rosemary responded that he could not say that. She said that was an insult in Uganda. It would sound to them like you did not care or that they did not matter. She said that we should beg them to stay for just a few more days. Of course, we will both know that they have to leave, but they will feel that we will miss them and regret their going. This is not too unusual. I remember being in the South as a youngster and everyone at church would invite you to go home with them. They did not really mean it. It was just what you said to be polite. Polite people realized it and politely declined, but one side felt hospitable and the other side felt wanted.
Toward the end of class we received terrible news. A congregation in Florida that has been a longtime supporter of brother Okech felt obliged by what they said was their changing receipts in contributions to cut off brother Okech’s support. He has lost $1000.00 of support. That is quite a hole and was very abrupt on the part of these brethren, but I am sure that they were driven to this by necessity; otherwise it would have been a considerable unkindness not to let him down a little more gently. He has carried on manfully throughout the rest of the day. He has not shown sign of concern and done his duty well in teaching, but it is certainly on my mind and Keith’s, though both of us can do little or nothing to directly help. I do not ask for help for him, but you should be aware.
Immediately following class we went to the slum in Massesse for services. I took many pictures. There were many people seated in the open on plain wooden benches that the women brought from their homes carrying them on their heads. We were mobbed by children. They came running in swarms from all directions. When I got out of the car they grabbed my hand and arms in large numbers and held on. They felt the hair on my arms. I suspect that this fat hairy white man was something new. I spoke briefly for frankly I did not want to lose control. Keith spoke very well, ending with Revelation 21. God will wipe away all tears. The former things are passed away. Keith had trouble reading it. The image from my eyes and the assault on my ears from the reading of that passage was too much. Most of the young men from the class were there. They had contracted motorcycles as taxis and who knows what to get them there. There were perhaps 100 men women and children there. Francis and Rosemary rent the space in the village so that they can meet there for Bible class. Most of them have AIDs. Most of them are dying. They live in filth and squalor.
I said the other day that these people were resettled Masai. That is not correct (misinformation). These people are Karamajong from the northeastern corner of Uganda on the border of Sudan and Kenya. They wandered naked behind cattle in a migratory pattern. I was told that they ate blood drawn from their cows mixed with cow urine and excrement in a stew. They eat this for a breakfast porridge. They go dumpster diving here and specialize in chicken innards, heads, and feet. Keith took a picture yesterday of two vultures competing with them in one of the same dumpsters. They have been resettled without any training. They are mostly clothed now. The women have nothing to do except as prostitutes and the men are thieves. Rosemary has gotten most of them who come to the meetings tested along with their children for HIV. Most of them are infected. Rosemary said that one couple went together and found they were both infected. The wife blamed the husband for killing her and the husband blamed Rosemary for getting them tested. They have not spoken to her since. (shoot the messenger!)
In fact while brother Okech was speaking to this group he pointed to a large tree. He was speaking about the rich man and Lazarus and he said that in that spot a man had lain dying begging for water. No water was given him. He was found dead the next morning. It made a appropriate illustration about the beggar Lazarus.
Rosemary helps these people. One old woman she noticed was sick and she gave her the equivalent of $1 to seek help or food. I have a picture of the oldest woman there whose picture I had already seen and had met at services on Sunday. She was living in a shack that had fallen down and was full of mud. Rosemary built a house with a tin roof for her. It was just a pole building, but it was dry and much better than what she had. I don’t think that she spent more than $50. Another woman Rosemary loaned $10.00. To someone who makes less than $1 per day that is a fortune. She bought fish and dried them over a fire and sold them. I mentioned her in a previous blog. She was away making charcoal. Still another woman Rosemary loaned $5. This allowed her to buy about 5 to 10 pounds of raw peanuts. She fried them in palm oil and would then put them on a large platter on her head and sell them around town. This in turn would give her enough money to buy more peanuts and have a few dollars for herself as well. Someone from the states asked Rosemary what she could possibly accomplish with a $5 loan. It is very hard to understand the level of poverty and how much one dollar means when you are this poor.
There were a couple of interesting things about these folk from Karamajong. One man got dressed up with a shirt, tie, Jacket, socks and shoes but no pants. He looked very smart. He said that he did not want to be mistaken for a woman. I don’t think that was going to happen. They also have a superstition that if they are wearing clothes when they plant a garden that the plants will not grow. Consequently they dig naked. It would not be good time to visit when it is garden planting time.
These folk need communion sets. If you have an old one, consider sending it. They need Bibles. I am currently checking on Bibles in their language, Japadhoula. It has really been hard teaching these men when they cannot read the Bible. This needs to happen.
These folk have the habit of applauding when a lesson is finished. This is a national custom. They do not misbehave, but it is their custom. I do not see anything unscriptural or wrong with it. Does anyone have book, chapter, and verse so that I can tell them they are sinning? They have the habit of a threefold handshake. They shake normally then grab your thumb and shake and then shake again. Go with it. It is natural for them and might be considered offensive if you cut it short. I might add that Ebos in Nigeria and some of the other brethren do this same three fold handshake but they will at the end of it as your hands are separating snap your middle finger with theirs. This was a little shocking at first and I thought that the fellow who did it was just showing off. However, there were several who did it and I decided that this too is a natural thing. Go with it. I may not be dexterous enough to manage it myself.
Here at the end of the day, I have talked with Rosemary and Francis and, of course they are concerned about their financial situation. They were using this money which they considered dependable to provide a meeting house for the church in Jinja as well as renting meeting places in Tororo, Kampala, and Massesse where they meet. It is a worry.
I wish I could help more. I have learned through the years that I cannot solve everyone’s problems. Some things are in God’s hands. I can only tell you about it.
After the day’s roller coaster ride; after the stress and emotions of four weeks in Africa; after this final confrontation with poverty; frankly, I am left numb. How does God keep track of all of this? He says that not a sparrow will fall that he does not know it. There are many sparrows falling here. I want to retreat. I want to go to the safety and comfort of my home, but now I know. What are we to do? I will do again today what I did yesterday. I will teach men to long for the land where God will wipe away all tears; where there will be neither poverty, pain, crying, nor death; where the former things are passed away.
I long to see you. I think about all of you through the nights. I go through all your names and call your faces to my memory. I still keep track of events over there checking my watch for the time delay. I say to myself. They are taking the Lord ’s Supper now. They are having Bible Class now. Now, they are just waking up. We are ahead of events over there by 8 hours. Keith is moving his return flight to Friday so that he does not have to travel over Sunday. It cost him a modest amount. I tried to do the same to avoid an extra trip for Francis and to avoid a trip to Nairobi (Their airport is a tad disorganized-I am worried I will miss a connection). They wanted too much money for the change. Perhaps I will pay the ransom or they will reduce it. I long to see you
John
I thought you might like to have the email addresses for these two people
Roseaburu@yahoo.co.uk Rosemary Athieno
FrancisOkech@yahoo.com Francis Okech
I noticed a local newspaper here that reported the poorest areas in this country. This area around Jinja is the poorest area in the country. Their definition means that income in this area is less that $1 a day. That is about $30 a month. They make less than this. There is such a stunning contrast. The area is beautiful and clean. There are very fine hotels here and many fine homes and a number of western buildings for various aid organizations and religious groups. The overall appearance of the town with its western tourists is a strange opulence for a small African city. But, it is a wealth amidst incredible poverty. Perhaps a difference here between this country and others is that the trees here and the soil abound with fruit so that the people do not starve. In other areas of Africa where there is poverty there is nothing to eat. Perhaps these people are a bit better off than that. I imagine that it is little comfort. They have no cash.
In case it has escaped you I am trying to update my spellings of names and places as I learn the precise spelling. Phonetics will only go so far. Maybe you should just read the blog backwards if you want to get the names correct.
Our classes today were very good. The men are really relishing the sermon preparation type approach that I am using. It has really been hard for both Keith and myself to find a way to teach these classes hindered as we are by the need for translation, the lack of Bibles; The lack of night lighting for the students to study, and the fact that several of them do not speak English at all. The ones who do speak English struggle to read. Three of them delivered a short speech. Two of them were very good and really had their audience with them; the third covered the topic well. Keith was a bit discouraged tonight. He has really been steadily trying to adapt to this situation but with his topic studying through the book of Acts, it is hard given the situation I described above. It is so tempting to go into detail in Acts 1 through 3 but the men were not really able to keep up. At least it appeared that way to him. His material has been excellent. He adapted it today and just presented it in the style of sermon outlines. This did better. Since it is obvious that he will not be able to complete Acts in the time we have here. He is switching to discussions of the cases of conversion. He is going to Acts 8 tomorrow and I am confident that this will resound better with these new Christians. He can just tell the story. They will follow and profit.
We also have received some bad news. The rains have come early to Uganda. I have mentioned that normally this month is dry here. However for the last three days we have had rains. Last night’s rain was heavy and apparently broad across the country. This means that many of the men need to be planting their gardens. These are more than just a vegetable garden. This is both what they will live on and what they can sell or trade for the year so this is important for them. Remember these people do not have a lot of cash. They live off this produce. The men are afraid that it may dry up later and they will be hurting. One man has a wife who has just recently had a child and she cannot dig. I am afraid that we are going to lose some of our men tomorrow, especially the men from Tororo. These were some of our most promising prospects.
We did have an unusual conversation with Rosemary about this. When we were told that some might have to leave, Keith simply and sensibly said, “if they have to go they have to go.” Rosemary responded that he could not say that. She said that was an insult in Uganda. It would sound to them like you did not care or that they did not matter. She said that we should beg them to stay for just a few more days. Of course, we will both know that they have to leave, but they will feel that we will miss them and regret their going. This is not too unusual. I remember being in the South as a youngster and everyone at church would invite you to go home with them. They did not really mean it. It was just what you said to be polite. Polite people realized it and politely declined, but one side felt hospitable and the other side felt wanted.
Toward the end of class we received terrible news. A congregation in Florida that has been a longtime supporter of brother Okech felt obliged by what they said was their changing receipts in contributions to cut off brother Okech’s support. He has lost $1000.00 of support. That is quite a hole and was very abrupt on the part of these brethren, but I am sure that they were driven to this by necessity; otherwise it would have been a considerable unkindness not to let him down a little more gently. He has carried on manfully throughout the rest of the day. He has not shown sign of concern and done his duty well in teaching, but it is certainly on my mind and Keith’s, though both of us can do little or nothing to directly help. I do not ask for help for him, but you should be aware.
Immediately following class we went to the slum in Massesse for services. I took many pictures. There were many people seated in the open on plain wooden benches that the women brought from their homes carrying them on their heads. We were mobbed by children. They came running in swarms from all directions. When I got out of the car they grabbed my hand and arms in large numbers and held on. They felt the hair on my arms. I suspect that this fat hairy white man was something new. I spoke briefly for frankly I did not want to lose control. Keith spoke very well, ending with Revelation 21. God will wipe away all tears. The former things are passed away. Keith had trouble reading it. The image from my eyes and the assault on my ears from the reading of that passage was too much. Most of the young men from the class were there. They had contracted motorcycles as taxis and who knows what to get them there. There were perhaps 100 men women and children there. Francis and Rosemary rent the space in the village so that they can meet there for Bible class. Most of them have AIDs. Most of them are dying. They live in filth and squalor.
I said the other day that these people were resettled Masai. That is not correct (misinformation). These people are Karamajong from the northeastern corner of Uganda on the border of Sudan and Kenya. They wandered naked behind cattle in a migratory pattern. I was told that they ate blood drawn from their cows mixed with cow urine and excrement in a stew. They eat this for a breakfast porridge. They go dumpster diving here and specialize in chicken innards, heads, and feet. Keith took a picture yesterday of two vultures competing with them in one of the same dumpsters. They have been resettled without any training. They are mostly clothed now. The women have nothing to do except as prostitutes and the men are thieves. Rosemary has gotten most of them who come to the meetings tested along with their children for HIV. Most of them are infected. Rosemary said that one couple went together and found they were both infected. The wife blamed the husband for killing her and the husband blamed Rosemary for getting them tested. They have not spoken to her since. (shoot the messenger!)
In fact while brother Okech was speaking to this group he pointed to a large tree. He was speaking about the rich man and Lazarus and he said that in that spot a man had lain dying begging for water. No water was given him. He was found dead the next morning. It made a appropriate illustration about the beggar Lazarus.
Rosemary helps these people. One old woman she noticed was sick and she gave her the equivalent of $1 to seek help or food. I have a picture of the oldest woman there whose picture I had already seen and had met at services on Sunday. She was living in a shack that had fallen down and was full of mud. Rosemary built a house with a tin roof for her. It was just a pole building, but it was dry and much better than what she had. I don’t think that she spent more than $50. Another woman Rosemary loaned $10.00. To someone who makes less than $1 per day that is a fortune. She bought fish and dried them over a fire and sold them. I mentioned her in a previous blog. She was away making charcoal. Still another woman Rosemary loaned $5. This allowed her to buy about 5 to 10 pounds of raw peanuts. She fried them in palm oil and would then put them on a large platter on her head and sell them around town. This in turn would give her enough money to buy more peanuts and have a few dollars for herself as well. Someone from the states asked Rosemary what she could possibly accomplish with a $5 loan. It is very hard to understand the level of poverty and how much one dollar means when you are this poor.
There were a couple of interesting things about these folk from Karamajong. One man got dressed up with a shirt, tie, Jacket, socks and shoes but no pants. He looked very smart. He said that he did not want to be mistaken for a woman. I don’t think that was going to happen. They also have a superstition that if they are wearing clothes when they plant a garden that the plants will not grow. Consequently they dig naked. It would not be good time to visit when it is garden planting time.
These folk need communion sets. If you have an old one, consider sending it. They need Bibles. I am currently checking on Bibles in their language, Japadhoula. It has really been hard teaching these men when they cannot read the Bible. This needs to happen.
These folk have the habit of applauding when a lesson is finished. This is a national custom. They do not misbehave, but it is their custom. I do not see anything unscriptural or wrong with it. Does anyone have book, chapter, and verse so that I can tell them they are sinning? They have the habit of a threefold handshake. They shake normally then grab your thumb and shake and then shake again. Go with it. It is natural for them and might be considered offensive if you cut it short. I might add that Ebos in Nigeria and some of the other brethren do this same three fold handshake but they will at the end of it as your hands are separating snap your middle finger with theirs. This was a little shocking at first and I thought that the fellow who did it was just showing off. However, there were several who did it and I decided that this too is a natural thing. Go with it. I may not be dexterous enough to manage it myself.
Here at the end of the day, I have talked with Rosemary and Francis and, of course they are concerned about their financial situation. They were using this money which they considered dependable to provide a meeting house for the church in Jinja as well as renting meeting places in Tororo, Kampala, and Massesse where they meet. It is a worry.
I wish I could help more. I have learned through the years that I cannot solve everyone’s problems. Some things are in God’s hands. I can only tell you about it.
After the day’s roller coaster ride; after the stress and emotions of four weeks in Africa; after this final confrontation with poverty; frankly, I am left numb. How does God keep track of all of this? He says that not a sparrow will fall that he does not know it. There are many sparrows falling here. I want to retreat. I want to go to the safety and comfort of my home, but now I know. What are we to do? I will do again today what I did yesterday. I will teach men to long for the land where God will wipe away all tears; where there will be neither poverty, pain, crying, nor death; where the former things are passed away.
I long to see you. I think about all of you through the nights. I go through all your names and call your faces to my memory. I still keep track of events over there checking my watch for the time delay. I say to myself. They are taking the Lord ’s Supper now. They are having Bible Class now. Now, they are just waking up. We are ahead of events over there by 8 hours. Keith is moving his return flight to Friday so that he does not have to travel over Sunday. It cost him a modest amount. I tried to do the same to avoid an extra trip for Francis and to avoid a trip to Nairobi (Their airport is a tad disorganized-I am worried I will miss a connection). They wanted too much money for the change. Perhaps I will pay the ransom or they will reduce it. I long to see you
John
Wednesday February 4, 2009
Well we are struggling but we are still learning more. Our classes went well and in their sermon preparations a few showed ability and others showed a sense of working together and for a first effort it was much better than my own first effort so many years ago. Keith has made his study through Acts almost through the second chapter. He prepared an excellent workbook for the class, but it is simply beyond the class. They will have to work on it later. The difficulty with English. The fact that they have no good light in the places they are staying so that they cannot study after dark and the complexity of the questions is beyond their ability. Keith had adapted. Keith usually teaches with a question and answer style. This works wonderfully in Nigeria where the audiences love to speak out answers. These people simply do not. It was not working. Keith gave up on the process and adapted to more a straight lecture. They are following and the feedback we are getting from the men is good.
We have learned more about the church at Tororo (note the correct spelling). Fredrick (Fred) Ofwono is preaching up there and Francis goes there about every 3rd or 4th week. This congregation numbers about 400. We were both astounded. From Keith’s last trip this group consisted of a handful of perhaps 20 meeting in a bad brush arbor on a farm. Fred was working in the north of Uganda at the time of that visit and returned shortly after. He says that the Christians are scattered throughout several villages around the city. There are Bible studies throughout the week in each village. Once a week they all come together in a service in the city. Most of them have to walk. If the Lord wills we will go there on Sunday and perhaps be able to tell you more. We do know that Rosemary and her former husband worked a bit in this area while they were still Pentecostals. Fred was with them at that time. His contacts have apparently been able to reach and influence many of these people.
We learned a little about the contribution at these churches. The contribution here at Jinja amounts to approximately 3 dollars in coins. The bulk of this money pays a round man to water and brush the floor of the meeting house as a prevention against biting insects that would otherwise afflict the church. The same round figures are true at Kampala. Many of the people simply have no cash. Their contribution is in produce, Yams, Casava, chickens, eggs, etc. I suspect that the money from these contributions is mingled by Francis. We will talk with him about this practice as well as making decisions for the churches rather than letting them become accustomed to making their own decisions. I believe these things need correction, but they seem small faults at this stage, that are easily corrected and even perhaps understandable given the situation.
One of our talking points with Francis and Rosemary is about transparency. Someone in this position, expecting support from the US must be absolutely obvious in making everything known to people so far away and in a different culture that can barely understand. If there is a fault that Francis has it is in this area. He needs to talk more about the work. He needs to explain what is happening. In large measure the two of these people have worked together getting this off the ground. I believe that Rosemary has good instincts. In fact she would be a wonderful (I can’t emphasize that enough) Bible class teacher in the states. I would love to listen to her. Her speech is very slow and soft and carefully chosen. Her words show an amazing wisdom and comprehension of situation. She also shows a very profound knowledge of a subjective role as a woman in her relationship with Francis and us. I am impressed and I am a hard man to impress. If you write on questions concerning the work it would be truly wise to copy the message to both of these individuals. Your conversation will probably be with Francis, but Rosemary is a profound adviser.
I misrepresented something in a previous blog. I said that we were providing one meal a day for these men. That was not true. I did not know it was not true, but I want to correct it now. Apparently our funds are providing three meals a day for about 13 men. They are given rice and tea for breakfast. I mentioned the corn mush and beans they have for lunch. They also are fed cow entrails (tripe) and greens (maybe spinach) for supper. Each of these meals costs about 1 dollar. I was still concerned about buying men to listen to me preach. Rosemary said that this was not the case. These men had wanted to come. She said that this was the time for sowing in Uganda and for these men to leave their gardens to come here for this was very serious business indeed. She is concerned that she may not have enough money to finish the two weeks. Transparency in how the funds we have provided will be a subject for calm discussion tomorrow.
I have been thinking considerably about the differences between the beginning of this work in Uganda and what little I know about the beginning of the work in Nigeria. In Nigeria there were American brethren on the ground constantly for several years to guide the Christians, teaching them how to organize the churches and advise them in their affairs. Many of those converted were well education. They spoke English well. Some were from a middle class background or quickly were enabled to grow into it.
Here in Uganda none of those things exist. There are no American brethren on the ground to give daily and weekly advice. The man and woman figuring so greatly in this work had about 6 months study with brethren in South Africa and has been turned loose on this nation to do his best with capable advice from his sister. Those being converted are from the very poor, not at all middle class and not likely to rise above their station in life. They do not really speak English, although a few can read it and barely understand. The only preachers who have ever been on this ground has been Keith Sharp and a brother from Holland. I have heard there may have been one other private individual. Everything else is happening by Email. The prospect for confusion between here and the US is obvious. The prospects for misunderstanding are paramount. More men need to come here. There will need to be a greater transparency on the part of those here which we are working on. There will need to be planning for where to stay, where to teach, provision of transportation and expenses for local brethren who help. It will need to be arranged. This country could very well take off with explosive growth, but there is little capable direction. I said about Nigeria that young men should carefully consider before going there. It is dangerous to be there. Their youth is at a disadvantage with experienced men on the ground there. Young men could come here. It would be a considerable help. Your knowledge compared to what is here would be almost encyclopedic. MORE MEN NEED TO COME HERE!
I am hoping to go to Massesse tomorrow with Francis and Rosemary. She showed me some pictures this morning. One was of a sister who lives there who was starving. Rosemary loaned her the equivalent of $10 to start a business. She bought fish; fried them; and sold them. The business has been very successful and she is able to support herself. I asked whether I could meet her this week. She has gone to the country to make charcoal. They hire men to cut hardwood and pile it and then set it afire. They cover the burning logs with dirt until the fire is virtually smothered. The end result is raw charcoal. We would refine it and form it into briquettes. For these people this serves as their primary means of cooking fires. I will try to take pictures so that I can tell the story better.
We are trying to rearrange our airline tickets for less burden on Francis in transporting us to Entebbe which may bring us home about a day earlier. I do not know whether we will be successful. We may end our classes and come home early if we run out of funds. We allotted a set amount between us which seemed adequate. Oftentimes, those on the ground here think that US money is a limitless resource and so do not budget wisely. That lesson has to be learned. I am sure that it will be. This is part of the transparency that we will be talking about.
Overall I am encouraged tonight. The classes are going a little better than we have anticipated. We have identified a few men who may be able to conduct services and make short talks. This is very needful. Most of the men we have been encouraged about so far have come from the area around Torroro. If that church is doing anything close to what we have been told they need the help and right now.
I get too attached to things. I “lost” my flashlight that a friend gave me years ago and which I have kept for years. It is helpful when one is stumbling around strange places to avoid tripping and falling headlong. I think I mistakenly left it in the bathroom having used the flashlight to find it in the dark. It was shiny and useful. I stewed and stewed searching my room like the woman looking for her lost coin. I get too attached to things. I feel like Jonah after the Lord rebuked him as he bemoaned that gourd vine that dried up. He was so resentful over a vine but oblivious to the life and death situation in the city before him.
Tomorrow is another day. It is also a day closer to being back with you
Love, John
We have learned more about the church at Tororo (note the correct spelling). Fredrick (Fred) Ofwono is preaching up there and Francis goes there about every 3rd or 4th week. This congregation numbers about 400. We were both astounded. From Keith’s last trip this group consisted of a handful of perhaps 20 meeting in a bad brush arbor on a farm. Fred was working in the north of Uganda at the time of that visit and returned shortly after. He says that the Christians are scattered throughout several villages around the city. There are Bible studies throughout the week in each village. Once a week they all come together in a service in the city. Most of them have to walk. If the Lord wills we will go there on Sunday and perhaps be able to tell you more. We do know that Rosemary and her former husband worked a bit in this area while they were still Pentecostals. Fred was with them at that time. His contacts have apparently been able to reach and influence many of these people.
We learned a little about the contribution at these churches. The contribution here at Jinja amounts to approximately 3 dollars in coins. The bulk of this money pays a round man to water and brush the floor of the meeting house as a prevention against biting insects that would otherwise afflict the church. The same round figures are true at Kampala. Many of the people simply have no cash. Their contribution is in produce, Yams, Casava, chickens, eggs, etc. I suspect that the money from these contributions is mingled by Francis. We will talk with him about this practice as well as making decisions for the churches rather than letting them become accustomed to making their own decisions. I believe these things need correction, but they seem small faults at this stage, that are easily corrected and even perhaps understandable given the situation.
One of our talking points with Francis and Rosemary is about transparency. Someone in this position, expecting support from the US must be absolutely obvious in making everything known to people so far away and in a different culture that can barely understand. If there is a fault that Francis has it is in this area. He needs to talk more about the work. He needs to explain what is happening. In large measure the two of these people have worked together getting this off the ground. I believe that Rosemary has good instincts. In fact she would be a wonderful (I can’t emphasize that enough) Bible class teacher in the states. I would love to listen to her. Her speech is very slow and soft and carefully chosen. Her words show an amazing wisdom and comprehension of situation. She also shows a very profound knowledge of a subjective role as a woman in her relationship with Francis and us. I am impressed and I am a hard man to impress. If you write on questions concerning the work it would be truly wise to copy the message to both of these individuals. Your conversation will probably be with Francis, but Rosemary is a profound adviser.
I misrepresented something in a previous blog. I said that we were providing one meal a day for these men. That was not true. I did not know it was not true, but I want to correct it now. Apparently our funds are providing three meals a day for about 13 men. They are given rice and tea for breakfast. I mentioned the corn mush and beans they have for lunch. They also are fed cow entrails (tripe) and greens (maybe spinach) for supper. Each of these meals costs about 1 dollar. I was still concerned about buying men to listen to me preach. Rosemary said that this was not the case. These men had wanted to come. She said that this was the time for sowing in Uganda and for these men to leave their gardens to come here for this was very serious business indeed. She is concerned that she may not have enough money to finish the two weeks. Transparency in how the funds we have provided will be a subject for calm discussion tomorrow.
I have been thinking considerably about the differences between the beginning of this work in Uganda and what little I know about the beginning of the work in Nigeria. In Nigeria there were American brethren on the ground constantly for several years to guide the Christians, teaching them how to organize the churches and advise them in their affairs. Many of those converted were well education. They spoke English well. Some were from a middle class background or quickly were enabled to grow into it.
Here in Uganda none of those things exist. There are no American brethren on the ground to give daily and weekly advice. The man and woman figuring so greatly in this work had about 6 months study with brethren in South Africa and has been turned loose on this nation to do his best with capable advice from his sister. Those being converted are from the very poor, not at all middle class and not likely to rise above their station in life. They do not really speak English, although a few can read it and barely understand. The only preachers who have ever been on this ground has been Keith Sharp and a brother from Holland. I have heard there may have been one other private individual. Everything else is happening by Email. The prospect for confusion between here and the US is obvious. The prospects for misunderstanding are paramount. More men need to come here. There will need to be a greater transparency on the part of those here which we are working on. There will need to be planning for where to stay, where to teach, provision of transportation and expenses for local brethren who help. It will need to be arranged. This country could very well take off with explosive growth, but there is little capable direction. I said about Nigeria that young men should carefully consider before going there. It is dangerous to be there. Their youth is at a disadvantage with experienced men on the ground there. Young men could come here. It would be a considerable help. Your knowledge compared to what is here would be almost encyclopedic. MORE MEN NEED TO COME HERE!
I am hoping to go to Massesse tomorrow with Francis and Rosemary. She showed me some pictures this morning. One was of a sister who lives there who was starving. Rosemary loaned her the equivalent of $10 to start a business. She bought fish; fried them; and sold them. The business has been very successful and she is able to support herself. I asked whether I could meet her this week. She has gone to the country to make charcoal. They hire men to cut hardwood and pile it and then set it afire. They cover the burning logs with dirt until the fire is virtually smothered. The end result is raw charcoal. We would refine it and form it into briquettes. For these people this serves as their primary means of cooking fires. I will try to take pictures so that I can tell the story better.
We are trying to rearrange our airline tickets for less burden on Francis in transporting us to Entebbe which may bring us home about a day earlier. I do not know whether we will be successful. We may end our classes and come home early if we run out of funds. We allotted a set amount between us which seemed adequate. Oftentimes, those on the ground here think that US money is a limitless resource and so do not budget wisely. That lesson has to be learned. I am sure that it will be. This is part of the transparency that we will be talking about.
Overall I am encouraged tonight. The classes are going a little better than we have anticipated. We have identified a few men who may be able to conduct services and make short talks. This is very needful. Most of the men we have been encouraged about so far have come from the area around Torroro. If that church is doing anything close to what we have been told they need the help and right now.
I get too attached to things. I “lost” my flashlight that a friend gave me years ago and which I have kept for years. It is helpful when one is stumbling around strange places to avoid tripping and falling headlong. I think I mistakenly left it in the bathroom having used the flashlight to find it in the dark. It was shiny and useful. I stewed and stewed searching my room like the woman looking for her lost coin. I get too attached to things. I feel like Jonah after the Lord rebuked him as he bemoaned that gourd vine that dried up. He was so resentful over a vine but oblivious to the life and death situation in the city before him.
Tomorrow is another day. It is also a day closer to being back with you
Love, John
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
It was another good day here. They say that it is unusual that they have been having thunderstorms at this time of the year. It is usually hotter and dry. Francis does say that they are more concerned during these rainy periods about cholera. That has a tendency to get your attention. And make you careful about eating from public stalls.
I was very tired today and did not sleep well last night. I was up late writing the blog. The teaching at the classes lasted from about 10:30am till 4PM. Keith managed to get through the first chapter of Acts. I managed to get the men an outline on Hebrews 10. I am trying to get them to work up an outline on the parable of the Sower. This teaching is very hard. Less than half of these men speak English. The lessons are translated into Luo which is the overall language with Japadolo (Jap) being a specific dialect within this. A few of the men are functionally illiterate. Some have Bibles in Luo. Keith and I have decided that in any future classes, we must be firm and insist that we will only teach men who speak and read English. We will have to train them and depend on their being able to teach the others in their native languages. We are going to work with this situation as it is for it would hurt the feelings of the men currently involved. They do seem to be taking some satisfaction in being trained. They are not well educated and this will be difficult. We have identified one man who is already doing some preaching. We will see what becomes of the others.
We did find a local fast (relative) food joint that has a bible book store, an internet café, and a gift shop. It is run by Harding University. They apparently operate a school and who knows what else here. We saw more white people of the streets here than I have seen at any time in Africa. This is obviously a tourist spot for Europeans and others. The restaurant actually had a cheeseburger advertised. The cheese was questionable. The tomato ketchup may well be colored water, but it was the first beef (I assume it was beef) I have had since I have been in Africa. It was also my first meal in 24 hours.
We have discussed the organization of these three churches. It appears to Keith and myself that they need to be split so that Brother Francis can stop working himself to death trying to cover all of them. We suggested that he separate the church in Jinja and create two churches. One in Jinja that will meet here at Rosemary’s house. And another that will meet in Massesse. This is the slum that I have mentioned before. Perhaps one of these young men can start preaching there with occasional visits from Francis. We also suggested that the church in Kampala be split in two. One group of several men who live in the same are and a congregation that would meet at Francis house. This would relieve Francis of the burden of housing these two churches and transporting many of the members. It is possible, but will need implementation from these folks. They say that they have been considering the very thing.
Let me add a word about this large group of people from Massesse. Most of these people have AIDs. These are the poorest of the poor and the lowest of the low. They simply love Rosemary. She has worked among them for some time. She said she noticed that they had continual diseases that would not heal. She insisted that the women and as many of the men that would go be tested. They all, including the children have AIDs. In the pictures that you see of the Jinja church you should understand that most of these people have AIDs, including the children. They do not maintain hygiene. They share razor blades. They share bedding and there is probably no help for it. Keith says that the sight of where they live will break my heart. Rosemary says she thought about the wisdom of shaking hands with them, but decided that she could not hold her hands behind her back when they offered their hands. She says that Christ has forgiven us much greater sins than this and she could not forget them. They treat her with great respect. I mentioned that some of these people actually kneel when they greeted me. What can I say to this? Peter said “stand up I myself also am a man.” This is probably a major reason that these two cannot stretch their funds. They give large amounts away to help these people. She has been tested several times and is clear herself.
By the way Rosemary has assumed her maiden name. She is Rosemary Athieno.
Someone emailed me earlier and asked me about watches. The folks in Nigeria wear watches, but here in Uganda, African time is observed. This means that they work by the sun and where the shadow is. If the day is cloudy, telling the time is difficult. This is the reason that when they say we will have services at 10 or class at 9:30 that the whole process is very approximate. Experience says that this may be the time that everyone starts beginning to think about coming. They will actually arrive about an hour later and not precisely. As near I can tell this is epidemic in Uganda. It can be a tad frustrating. I am told that if they have a watch they probably can’t read it.
Daniel Abiru, Rosemary’s former husband has been especially diabolical in frustrating the efforts here. The last time Keith was here he drew away a group of young men promising them pay from a Wesleyan Methodist Group. This group accused Francis and Rosemary before the courts saying that they had entertained a stranger and were keeping secrets. They also accused them of not paying some of them for translating. One of the suspicious elements of the church was the fact that they did not have instruments of music. This made it seem that Francis and Rosemary were somehow plotting Revolution. They had to go before the magistrates with several of their members and plead their case. The courts had forbidden them to meet. They were successful in getting the ban lifted. By the way, Rosemary’s former husband has AIDs. He is currently writing preachers he knows in the US accusing them. I don’t think anyone is listening.
I was happy to be able to communicate the blog today. I hope we can be back on schedule. I need to study for class tomorrow.
I am still counting the days when I come Home. Gloria told me that Jonathan, my grandchild was dreaming about me. That hurt. I miss all of them
Love
John
I was very tired today and did not sleep well last night. I was up late writing the blog. The teaching at the classes lasted from about 10:30am till 4PM. Keith managed to get through the first chapter of Acts. I managed to get the men an outline on Hebrews 10. I am trying to get them to work up an outline on the parable of the Sower. This teaching is very hard. Less than half of these men speak English. The lessons are translated into Luo which is the overall language with Japadolo (Jap) being a specific dialect within this. A few of the men are functionally illiterate. Some have Bibles in Luo. Keith and I have decided that in any future classes, we must be firm and insist that we will only teach men who speak and read English. We will have to train them and depend on their being able to teach the others in their native languages. We are going to work with this situation as it is for it would hurt the feelings of the men currently involved. They do seem to be taking some satisfaction in being trained. They are not well educated and this will be difficult. We have identified one man who is already doing some preaching. We will see what becomes of the others.
We did find a local fast (relative) food joint that has a bible book store, an internet café, and a gift shop. It is run by Harding University. They apparently operate a school and who knows what else here. We saw more white people of the streets here than I have seen at any time in Africa. This is obviously a tourist spot for Europeans and others. The restaurant actually had a cheeseburger advertised. The cheese was questionable. The tomato ketchup may well be colored water, but it was the first beef (I assume it was beef) I have had since I have been in Africa. It was also my first meal in 24 hours.
We have discussed the organization of these three churches. It appears to Keith and myself that they need to be split so that Brother Francis can stop working himself to death trying to cover all of them. We suggested that he separate the church in Jinja and create two churches. One in Jinja that will meet here at Rosemary’s house. And another that will meet in Massesse. This is the slum that I have mentioned before. Perhaps one of these young men can start preaching there with occasional visits from Francis. We also suggested that the church in Kampala be split in two. One group of several men who live in the same are and a congregation that would meet at Francis house. This would relieve Francis of the burden of housing these two churches and transporting many of the members. It is possible, but will need implementation from these folks. They say that they have been considering the very thing.
Let me add a word about this large group of people from Massesse. Most of these people have AIDs. These are the poorest of the poor and the lowest of the low. They simply love Rosemary. She has worked among them for some time. She said she noticed that they had continual diseases that would not heal. She insisted that the women and as many of the men that would go be tested. They all, including the children have AIDs. In the pictures that you see of the Jinja church you should understand that most of these people have AIDs, including the children. They do not maintain hygiene. They share razor blades. They share bedding and there is probably no help for it. Keith says that the sight of where they live will break my heart. Rosemary says she thought about the wisdom of shaking hands with them, but decided that she could not hold her hands behind her back when they offered their hands. She says that Christ has forgiven us much greater sins than this and she could not forget them. They treat her with great respect. I mentioned that some of these people actually kneel when they greeted me. What can I say to this? Peter said “stand up I myself also am a man.” This is probably a major reason that these two cannot stretch their funds. They give large amounts away to help these people. She has been tested several times and is clear herself.
By the way Rosemary has assumed her maiden name. She is Rosemary Athieno.
Someone emailed me earlier and asked me about watches. The folks in Nigeria wear watches, but here in Uganda, African time is observed. This means that they work by the sun and where the shadow is. If the day is cloudy, telling the time is difficult. This is the reason that when they say we will have services at 10 or class at 9:30 that the whole process is very approximate. Experience says that this may be the time that everyone starts beginning to think about coming. They will actually arrive about an hour later and not precisely. As near I can tell this is epidemic in Uganda. It can be a tad frustrating. I am told that if they have a watch they probably can’t read it.
Daniel Abiru, Rosemary’s former husband has been especially diabolical in frustrating the efforts here. The last time Keith was here he drew away a group of young men promising them pay from a Wesleyan Methodist Group. This group accused Francis and Rosemary before the courts saying that they had entertained a stranger and were keeping secrets. They also accused them of not paying some of them for translating. One of the suspicious elements of the church was the fact that they did not have instruments of music. This made it seem that Francis and Rosemary were somehow plotting Revolution. They had to go before the magistrates with several of their members and plead their case. The courts had forbidden them to meet. They were successful in getting the ban lifted. By the way, Rosemary’s former husband has AIDs. He is currently writing preachers he knows in the US accusing them. I don’t think anyone is listening.
I was happy to be able to communicate the blog today. I hope we can be back on schedule. I need to study for class tomorrow.
I am still counting the days when I come Home. Gloria told me that Jonathan, my grandchild was dreaming about me. That hurt. I miss all of them
Love
John
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Monday, February 2, 2009
I have a story to tell about the two principals here. But first I will tell you about today.
We came at a very inconvenient time for Francis and Rosemary. Their process of arranging for their children’s expenses while trying to care for us is stressing them considerably. They have to buy all the things that their children need including uniforms. They have to arrange transport for the children. Because of their children’s ages they go to schools in vastly different locations. Then, children being children, and transportation being what it is they have to provide the things that their children lost or forgot at long distance. The frustration level is high.
Let me tell you about our classes today. We had about 17 men show up. Most of these are very new Christians, so just getting them around the Bible can be hard. Some of them show a light of intelligence in their eyes, but their education level is very low. I suspect that a couple of them are illiterate. Brother Sharp is teaching them in a review of the book of Acts. He produced a very nice workbook for them that he gave them. It is slow going as the entire proceeding has to be translated. This makes for slow teaching. One of the men in the class has already been teaching a bit at Terorro where we are going next Sunday. He has come down here for the classes with his son and is living here with us.
I decided after long study and scrapping much of what I had prepared to teach a class in Homiletics. (I don’t use that word) We had no chalk board so we went to town while the men were eating lunch and found a white board and some note pads and pencils. They had nothing to write with and many had not brought their Bibles. This work needs to broaden out and these are the men available. It is slow going. Most of them do not have enough training to know what an outline is, so we are working on it. I told them that I expected them to come out of the two weeks with at least two sermons and they were going to have to preach to me. It will be translated into English for me. Brother Francis Okech desperately needs help. He needs some starting preachers who can just cover for him. Perhaps some of the churches need to split since their members are coming from great distance. If they can meet in smaller groups closer to home there would be less transportation costs. Brother Okech could concentrate on teaching and some of these men could cover for the times when he cannot be there.
Let me tell you a bit about these men. I spoke with one of them and asked where he had stayed prior to the class. He said that he was sleeping in the place that the church meets. This means that he was sleeping on a dirt floor in a pole barn with no sides during what was an enormous rainstorm last night. One of the difficulties of having this class is feeding these men. Keith and I agreed to pay for feeding them. Rosemary has arranged to purchase food for their lunch each day for the equivalent of 1 dollar per man. The meal is maise meal (maybe that is corn bread, but I do not know how it is cooked), and beans. I was concerned before I came about this arrangement. I did not want to make it appear that I was paying men to listen to me preach the gospel. I do not believe that this simple 1 dollar per person meal meets that criteria, but is simply an act of charity.
Let me remind you about Francis Okech and Rosemary Abiru.
This work was begun about 4 years ago when Daniel Abiru was visiting in Florida. Brother Abiru was a Pentecostal and highly placed in the denomination. He chanced to visit a congregation in Florida and then various brethren there spent 3 or 4 months converting and teaching him. He came back to Uganda a Christian and taught his wife. He eventually taught His brother-in-law Francis Okech. The Abirus have 4 children. At that time they had another. Brother Abiru was backing his car and accidentally killed his youngest son. As best can be told he lost his faith and perhaps his mind. He left his wife and family and is currently in Kenya. His brother-in-law who had a good position with a national bank gave up his job. He went to South Africa for some 6 months and studied with various brethren there. He came back and is currently the only faithful preacher in this nation. He has four children. His wife died about 3 or so years ago in child birth. She gave birth to twins, but died, perhaps due to the poor health care in the country.
Rosemary Abiru works as hard as any Christian I know. She teaches on Thursdays each week in the toughest slum in this area. Many of the women at the Jinja church are from this slm. She spends much of the money she has helping these people to the detriment of her own family. There are many little children begging on the streets and she tries to make contact with their mothers through them.
Rosemary’s story needs to be told and I will tell it as best I can. She mentioned one sister in the slum. I met her on Sunday. Her brother has the pictures and I hope I can get them from him. This woman with her 8 children lived in what looked like a plywood backyard shed in America. It appeared to be about 6 feet by 10 feet. When it rained, The children were obliged to sleep standing because of the water on the dirt floor. Rosemary took all the money she had in her possession and built a better home for the family. It is just a pole barn with a tin roof and sided, but it is better than what they had. It is larger and it is dry. These stories can be repeated over and over. I will try to give you as many as I can get in detail. I will try to get her to tell me more of them and will try to go with her on Thursday. The government here was irritated with the Masai tribe which was migratory tending cattle. They forced them to settle, but gave them no training for how to live. Consequently, the women became prostitutes and the men are gamblers and thieves. The HIV rate among these women is skyrocketing and unbelievable. I have no doubt that many of the women in the congregation are infected. This is the slum. This is where Rosemary works.
Let’s talk about money. It is the hardest and most confusing situation about this work. Brother Okech, while he reports faithfully on his financial situation, does not tell the story of his work well or accurately describe the situation. Some in America who support him wonder what is happening. Here is the story. These two live in separate homes in separate cities. Rosemary’s Home is rented and is an old government house which has been purchased by a government employee who lives and has another home in Entebbe. It looks like a great house and probably was at one time. Rosemary maintains the lawn and grounds immaculately. However once you step inside you will be aware that though the house is large and spacious and an American might do great things with it, Rosemary’s life is Spartan. The kitchen cabinets are 40 years old and there is little food in them. There is no stove or cooking instrument in the house at this time. Rosemary cooks over an open fire in the yard. While she cares for the hosue and keeps it immaculate and clean there is really nothing new in it. It is a shell that they live in. There are servants’ quarters in back of the house and there are those who live there. They tend the grounds and though I have not inquired, I suspect that this is an act of charity on her part allowing them to live there.
Rosemary’s only income is from Francis. He has agreed that he will split his income evenly with her. I believe that his is a kindness to his sister who is alone and without support. It is a kindness to a sister who helps him enormously in his work and as an advisor. Rosemary has good sense and they seem to work well together. The amount of money that they each live on is $900 per month.
Yes, I know if you have received his financial report that figure does not jibe with the report. I did not understand this either till I got here. Francis receives according to his last report somewhere near $40,000 per year. This is a very large sum in Africa. Yet, here is what he does with it. He is himself paying the rent on all three meeting places in this country. He rents the property in Jinja and meets the church’s expenses. Remember this group of 100 is incredibly poor. He pays the rent on the meeting area in Kampala and provides for its expenses. He has recently rented a meeting place in Teroro which I have not as yet seen. He also is generous to a fault in acts of charity to his brethren and his sister. He is supporting two households with a total of 8 children and two homes and driving at least 120 miles on each Sunday and often more. It looks like a big figure, but I do not know of any preaching brother overseas who is bearing this sort of burden. I plead with you to see that his situation may be unique.
I am not sure that he has always used good judgment in the arrangements concerning these churches and his personal life, but then I am not on the spot. I am not completely alone in this country without peer or advisor or comforter. He and they need help on many levels.
The simple fact is that alone and without any real help he has created one congregation with 100 attending. He has created another congregation with 50 attending and a third with a small number I do not know as yet. Who can default this effort. Should he have done more? Should he have made better arrangement? Perhaps, but you were not there helping. Should he have spent money more wisely? Is that not true of all of us. His automobile has no shocks and is the main transportation for at least the Jinja church and his entire extended family. I do not believe we should fault him. I need to figure out some sensible suggestions for how to help him.
Your support and encouragement of these two Christians is needed and welcome. They have done this alone, without a great entourage of support. They do not know how to paint a pretty picture for Americans so that they will understand this entirely different culture. There are few brethren who come here to report and tell the story and understand the situation. They are sometimes confused to distraction and occasionally penniless. Rosemary came to me in the darkness tonight crying. I had given her money to exchange into shillings for me which was my contribution to our support while here. Half of it I wanted to hold and the other was given to her care. She said that her children needed it desperately for school. She had dipped into this money having nowhere else to turn. I will not starve. I had brought more than I should need. I had planned to leave any excess with her/them. She needed it early. I suspect that these emergencies arise often. Should she manage her money better? Should she give less to the poor? Those things are really easy to say from America. They are harder to say here.
This household is hungry. We have noticed that any food that we purchase and leave in the refrigerator will disappear. We had some juices and cokes and cookies for emergency rations. These are all gone. The refrigerator is empty. We asked that they buy a case of bottled water tonight so we could keep water. We were running out at several times during the day yesterday. I had one meal yesterday at a restaurant. I brought a portion home and showed it to Rosemary late tonight. A fire was started in the backyard and this small portion of food was warmed and eaten. I came to Africa with much more body fat than Keith. He needs to eat more regularly or he is troubled. We will need to walk out for breakfast this morning. I think he kept a few biscuits (cookies) in his room which may suffice. Yesterday I found him some bananas in a cupboard. I suspect that they are gone by today. I don’t know where the food goes. It could be the children (they are gone to school now); it could be the servants or it could be some of those who are staying who knows where for the classes. It does not matter. I think they are hungry, who can begrudge them? Food was plentiful in Nigeria, but new to me and with the heat and stress I was not hungry. This is a different situation. There is little or no food in the home.
We have pled with Rosemary and Francis to finish whatever arrangements that they need to make for their children today and to ignore caring for us. We have also apologized for coming at this time. I told Francis that he will have to learn to say “no” I can’t do that. We should have at least postponed these classes for Monday and Tuesday so they could take care of these necessities. They are concerned as well as we that if we do not proceed with today’s classes that the young men will grow discouraged and begin to scatter. By tomorrow, I trust that they will have settled their children and the stress for them will have eased somewhat.
Keith and I are talking about some things that we think they need. We have talked with them about the need to be realistic about their support situation tonight. Brother Okech was concerned that he was informed that he would be losing some support from one congregation. We talked with them about the economic problems in America and that many congregations will be losing contribution and may have to cut back. We have talked to them about the dangers of constantly making emergency appeals to Americans for money. It does not go down well and one is occasionally reminded about the boy who cried “wolf.” We have told them that they simply must tell the story of what is happening here better. If Americans knew what they were doing and doing alone, I am confident that they would be moved to both prayer and more practical help. I do not believe that either one of them wants to appear to boast and considers such reports in this vein. We encouraged them to realize that by not keeping Americans who can only understand this from a distance in the dark about what is happening and then sending emergency appeals for help they were confusing people and that this would eventually be a discouragement to those who support them. I don’t think Francis was happy for some of this conversation was critical. It took a lot of talk, but I think we made some headway.
These are good people. They are being pulled from pillar to post trying to do an impossible job. They are doing it alone without any shoulder to cry on. They are stressed to the absolute limit for funds. I can assure you that these people are far removed from luxuriating your funds on themselves.
I will say more later, but it is late tonight. I need to close. I am hoping that I can get this backlog out tomorrow. My wife said people were complaining that I had not added to the blog. Here we face again the internet challenge. Francis has already had his email broken into by a scammer from an internet café that requested funds in his name. This was embarrassing to him. It also shut down his email for 2 weeks without his knowing. He was confused and others thought he was ignoring their messages. There may be a way tomorrow. Telephone calls from here to the US are strangely inexpensive on their cell phones, but I think that is relative as well. They purchase recharge cards here too, but they do not buy in large amounts so most of our conversation are not leisurely and relaxed. We have asked them to buy in larger quantities of time for us, but we will see what happens. Also our phone disappears to Kampala each evening with Francis as he leaves to care for his two young twins, Benjamin and Mary.
There is no hot water in this house. This makes for cold baths. This was tolerable in Nigeria. Most of their water is heated in large tanks raised above their homes, so that the water temperature is about 60 or 65. They pump water up into the tank at various times. The raised plastic tanks give them pressure water on demand without the need to turn on a pump. We have them in the US too. It is just that the city pays for them and they hold 10,000 gallons and they are not in everyone’s backyard. Here at Rosemary’s there is no visible tank. It may be somewhere in the attic of the house, but the result is that the water temperature is about 55 which is ground temperature. The weather here has been cool so that this combined with the water temperature makes for an uncomfortable shower. There is no way to heat water in this household without asking them to start a fire. That would take an hour and a half. Consequently, we are doing what my mother used to call a “bird bath.” Someone in my family also referred to it as a “three point landing.” It serves the purpose, but it is not very satisfying and it is still cold. This too shall pass. It is not intolerable, just another of those acts of discipline necessary for working here. After all, that is what everyone else in the house is doing. It is just not what we are accustomed to. Let me assure you that hot water on demand is a great luxury. I have not appreciated it enough.
It was good to hear my wife fuss at me again about sending this blog, I am looking forward to the day when she can do it in person. Strangely, there is something comforting about an old married couple going through that lifetime’s ritual of fussing at one another. I miss you all.
John
We came at a very inconvenient time for Francis and Rosemary. Their process of arranging for their children’s expenses while trying to care for us is stressing them considerably. They have to buy all the things that their children need including uniforms. They have to arrange transport for the children. Because of their children’s ages they go to schools in vastly different locations. Then, children being children, and transportation being what it is they have to provide the things that their children lost or forgot at long distance. The frustration level is high.
Let me tell you about our classes today. We had about 17 men show up. Most of these are very new Christians, so just getting them around the Bible can be hard. Some of them show a light of intelligence in their eyes, but their education level is very low. I suspect that a couple of them are illiterate. Brother Sharp is teaching them in a review of the book of Acts. He produced a very nice workbook for them that he gave them. It is slow going as the entire proceeding has to be translated. This makes for slow teaching. One of the men in the class has already been teaching a bit at Terorro where we are going next Sunday. He has come down here for the classes with his son and is living here with us.
I decided after long study and scrapping much of what I had prepared to teach a class in Homiletics. (I don’t use that word) We had no chalk board so we went to town while the men were eating lunch and found a white board and some note pads and pencils. They had nothing to write with and many had not brought their Bibles. This work needs to broaden out and these are the men available. It is slow going. Most of them do not have enough training to know what an outline is, so we are working on it. I told them that I expected them to come out of the two weeks with at least two sermons and they were going to have to preach to me. It will be translated into English for me. Brother Francis Okech desperately needs help. He needs some starting preachers who can just cover for him. Perhaps some of the churches need to split since their members are coming from great distance. If they can meet in smaller groups closer to home there would be less transportation costs. Brother Okech could concentrate on teaching and some of these men could cover for the times when he cannot be there.
Let me tell you a bit about these men. I spoke with one of them and asked where he had stayed prior to the class. He said that he was sleeping in the place that the church meets. This means that he was sleeping on a dirt floor in a pole barn with no sides during what was an enormous rainstorm last night. One of the difficulties of having this class is feeding these men. Keith and I agreed to pay for feeding them. Rosemary has arranged to purchase food for their lunch each day for the equivalent of 1 dollar per man. The meal is maise meal (maybe that is corn bread, but I do not know how it is cooked), and beans. I was concerned before I came about this arrangement. I did not want to make it appear that I was paying men to listen to me preach the gospel. I do not believe that this simple 1 dollar per person meal meets that criteria, but is simply an act of charity.
Let me remind you about Francis Okech and Rosemary Abiru.
This work was begun about 4 years ago when Daniel Abiru was visiting in Florida. Brother Abiru was a Pentecostal and highly placed in the denomination. He chanced to visit a congregation in Florida and then various brethren there spent 3 or 4 months converting and teaching him. He came back to Uganda a Christian and taught his wife. He eventually taught His brother-in-law Francis Okech. The Abirus have 4 children. At that time they had another. Brother Abiru was backing his car and accidentally killed his youngest son. As best can be told he lost his faith and perhaps his mind. He left his wife and family and is currently in Kenya. His brother-in-law who had a good position with a national bank gave up his job. He went to South Africa for some 6 months and studied with various brethren there. He came back and is currently the only faithful preacher in this nation. He has four children. His wife died about 3 or so years ago in child birth. She gave birth to twins, but died, perhaps due to the poor health care in the country.
Rosemary Abiru works as hard as any Christian I know. She teaches on Thursdays each week in the toughest slum in this area. Many of the women at the Jinja church are from this slm. She spends much of the money she has helping these people to the detriment of her own family. There are many little children begging on the streets and she tries to make contact with their mothers through them.
Rosemary’s story needs to be told and I will tell it as best I can. She mentioned one sister in the slum. I met her on Sunday. Her brother has the pictures and I hope I can get them from him. This woman with her 8 children lived in what looked like a plywood backyard shed in America. It appeared to be about 6 feet by 10 feet. When it rained, The children were obliged to sleep standing because of the water on the dirt floor. Rosemary took all the money she had in her possession and built a better home for the family. It is just a pole barn with a tin roof and sided, but it is better than what they had. It is larger and it is dry. These stories can be repeated over and over. I will try to give you as many as I can get in detail. I will try to get her to tell me more of them and will try to go with her on Thursday. The government here was irritated with the Masai tribe which was migratory tending cattle. They forced them to settle, but gave them no training for how to live. Consequently, the women became prostitutes and the men are gamblers and thieves. The HIV rate among these women is skyrocketing and unbelievable. I have no doubt that many of the women in the congregation are infected. This is the slum. This is where Rosemary works.
Let’s talk about money. It is the hardest and most confusing situation about this work. Brother Okech, while he reports faithfully on his financial situation, does not tell the story of his work well or accurately describe the situation. Some in America who support him wonder what is happening. Here is the story. These two live in separate homes in separate cities. Rosemary’s Home is rented and is an old government house which has been purchased by a government employee who lives and has another home in Entebbe. It looks like a great house and probably was at one time. Rosemary maintains the lawn and grounds immaculately. However once you step inside you will be aware that though the house is large and spacious and an American might do great things with it, Rosemary’s life is Spartan. The kitchen cabinets are 40 years old and there is little food in them. There is no stove or cooking instrument in the house at this time. Rosemary cooks over an open fire in the yard. While she cares for the hosue and keeps it immaculate and clean there is really nothing new in it. It is a shell that they live in. There are servants’ quarters in back of the house and there are those who live there. They tend the grounds and though I have not inquired, I suspect that this is an act of charity on her part allowing them to live there.
Rosemary’s only income is from Francis. He has agreed that he will split his income evenly with her. I believe that his is a kindness to his sister who is alone and without support. It is a kindness to a sister who helps him enormously in his work and as an advisor. Rosemary has good sense and they seem to work well together. The amount of money that they each live on is $900 per month.
Yes, I know if you have received his financial report that figure does not jibe with the report. I did not understand this either till I got here. Francis receives according to his last report somewhere near $40,000 per year. This is a very large sum in Africa. Yet, here is what he does with it. He is himself paying the rent on all three meeting places in this country. He rents the property in Jinja and meets the church’s expenses. Remember this group of 100 is incredibly poor. He pays the rent on the meeting area in Kampala and provides for its expenses. He has recently rented a meeting place in Teroro which I have not as yet seen. He also is generous to a fault in acts of charity to his brethren and his sister. He is supporting two households with a total of 8 children and two homes and driving at least 120 miles on each Sunday and often more. It looks like a big figure, but I do not know of any preaching brother overseas who is bearing this sort of burden. I plead with you to see that his situation may be unique.
I am not sure that he has always used good judgment in the arrangements concerning these churches and his personal life, but then I am not on the spot. I am not completely alone in this country without peer or advisor or comforter. He and they need help on many levels.
The simple fact is that alone and without any real help he has created one congregation with 100 attending. He has created another congregation with 50 attending and a third with a small number I do not know as yet. Who can default this effort. Should he have done more? Should he have made better arrangement? Perhaps, but you were not there helping. Should he have spent money more wisely? Is that not true of all of us. His automobile has no shocks and is the main transportation for at least the Jinja church and his entire extended family. I do not believe we should fault him. I need to figure out some sensible suggestions for how to help him.
Your support and encouragement of these two Christians is needed and welcome. They have done this alone, without a great entourage of support. They do not know how to paint a pretty picture for Americans so that they will understand this entirely different culture. There are few brethren who come here to report and tell the story and understand the situation. They are sometimes confused to distraction and occasionally penniless. Rosemary came to me in the darkness tonight crying. I had given her money to exchange into shillings for me which was my contribution to our support while here. Half of it I wanted to hold and the other was given to her care. She said that her children needed it desperately for school. She had dipped into this money having nowhere else to turn. I will not starve. I had brought more than I should need. I had planned to leave any excess with her/them. She needed it early. I suspect that these emergencies arise often. Should she manage her money better? Should she give less to the poor? Those things are really easy to say from America. They are harder to say here.
This household is hungry. We have noticed that any food that we purchase and leave in the refrigerator will disappear. We had some juices and cokes and cookies for emergency rations. These are all gone. The refrigerator is empty. We asked that they buy a case of bottled water tonight so we could keep water. We were running out at several times during the day yesterday. I had one meal yesterday at a restaurant. I brought a portion home and showed it to Rosemary late tonight. A fire was started in the backyard and this small portion of food was warmed and eaten. I came to Africa with much more body fat than Keith. He needs to eat more regularly or he is troubled. We will need to walk out for breakfast this morning. I think he kept a few biscuits (cookies) in his room which may suffice. Yesterday I found him some bananas in a cupboard. I suspect that they are gone by today. I don’t know where the food goes. It could be the children (they are gone to school now); it could be the servants or it could be some of those who are staying who knows where for the classes. It does not matter. I think they are hungry, who can begrudge them? Food was plentiful in Nigeria, but new to me and with the heat and stress I was not hungry. This is a different situation. There is little or no food in the home.
We have pled with Rosemary and Francis to finish whatever arrangements that they need to make for their children today and to ignore caring for us. We have also apologized for coming at this time. I told Francis that he will have to learn to say “no” I can’t do that. We should have at least postponed these classes for Monday and Tuesday so they could take care of these necessities. They are concerned as well as we that if we do not proceed with today’s classes that the young men will grow discouraged and begin to scatter. By tomorrow, I trust that they will have settled their children and the stress for them will have eased somewhat.
Keith and I are talking about some things that we think they need. We have talked with them about the need to be realistic about their support situation tonight. Brother Okech was concerned that he was informed that he would be losing some support from one congregation. We talked with them about the economic problems in America and that many congregations will be losing contribution and may have to cut back. We have talked to them about the dangers of constantly making emergency appeals to Americans for money. It does not go down well and one is occasionally reminded about the boy who cried “wolf.” We have told them that they simply must tell the story of what is happening here better. If Americans knew what they were doing and doing alone, I am confident that they would be moved to both prayer and more practical help. I do not believe that either one of them wants to appear to boast and considers such reports in this vein. We encouraged them to realize that by not keeping Americans who can only understand this from a distance in the dark about what is happening and then sending emergency appeals for help they were confusing people and that this would eventually be a discouragement to those who support them. I don’t think Francis was happy for some of this conversation was critical. It took a lot of talk, but I think we made some headway.
These are good people. They are being pulled from pillar to post trying to do an impossible job. They are doing it alone without any shoulder to cry on. They are stressed to the absolute limit for funds. I can assure you that these people are far removed from luxuriating your funds on themselves.
I will say more later, but it is late tonight. I need to close. I am hoping that I can get this backlog out tomorrow. My wife said people were complaining that I had not added to the blog. Here we face again the internet challenge. Francis has already had his email broken into by a scammer from an internet café that requested funds in his name. This was embarrassing to him. It also shut down his email for 2 weeks without his knowing. He was confused and others thought he was ignoring their messages. There may be a way tomorrow. Telephone calls from here to the US are strangely inexpensive on their cell phones, but I think that is relative as well. They purchase recharge cards here too, but they do not buy in large amounts so most of our conversation are not leisurely and relaxed. We have asked them to buy in larger quantities of time for us, but we will see what happens. Also our phone disappears to Kampala each evening with Francis as he leaves to care for his two young twins, Benjamin and Mary.
There is no hot water in this house. This makes for cold baths. This was tolerable in Nigeria. Most of their water is heated in large tanks raised above their homes, so that the water temperature is about 60 or 65. They pump water up into the tank at various times. The raised plastic tanks give them pressure water on demand without the need to turn on a pump. We have them in the US too. It is just that the city pays for them and they hold 10,000 gallons and they are not in everyone’s backyard. Here at Rosemary’s there is no visible tank. It may be somewhere in the attic of the house, but the result is that the water temperature is about 55 which is ground temperature. The weather here has been cool so that this combined with the water temperature makes for an uncomfortable shower. There is no way to heat water in this household without asking them to start a fire. That would take an hour and a half. Consequently, we are doing what my mother used to call a “bird bath.” Someone in my family also referred to it as a “three point landing.” It serves the purpose, but it is not very satisfying and it is still cold. This too shall pass. It is not intolerable, just another of those acts of discipline necessary for working here. After all, that is what everyone else in the house is doing. It is just not what we are accustomed to. Let me assure you that hot water on demand is a great luxury. I have not appreciated it enough.
It was good to hear my wife fuss at me again about sending this blog, I am looking forward to the day when she can do it in person. Strangely, there is something comforting about an old married couple going through that lifetime’s ritual of fussing at one another. I miss you all.
John
Saturday and Sunday, January 31 and February 1, 2009
This was hard. We arose at 5 AM having been awakened at 4:30 AM by the guys in white robes. They made two or three parades through the neighborhoods with drums, and cymbals shouting something that sounded like the end is near. As we left the apartment I stepped over the sleeping form of one of the watchmen for the compound lying on a rug on the pavement inside the compound, Brother Ebong said that it was cooler there, though he had a cot inside the building. The other watchman, who was a Muslem, was concentrating on his morning prayers. I didn’t mention the Muslim call to prayer on the loudspeaker about 4:45AM. Outside the apartment complex some women had been walking up and down the street shouting that judgment was coming. She was not one of the white robed guys who were marching to their temple/church, apparently this was just her private mission to warn the folk on the street. What a morning.
Everyone else went to the airport early because of the cleaning day. Long lines; and Airlines who opened an hour and half late seemed to be the order of the day. We flew to Nairobi, and then another flight to Entebbe, Uganda. We arrived about Midnight. We were both very thirsty having not had enough liquid to drink. Finally clearing customs and locating our luggage we were very happy to see the face of Francis Okech and Rosemary Abiru waiting at the airport. Our flights had been changed and we had to depend on email to notify them that we were coming. We had not known whether Francis had seen the email.
We drove for about 3 hours from Entebbe, Uganda, through Kampala to Jinja, Uganda. Keith kept pointing out sites on the way. It was dark. I was in the back seat. I couldn’t see anything. I am confident they were glorious sites. Rosemary and Francis are brother and sister. We were both very tired and grew weary on the trip. Rosemary and Francis spoke in their native language. I think she was criticizing his driving, but that may have been a transfer from most of the women who have ever ridden with me.
We arrived at three AM We bought some bottles of water on the way for our thirst and bought some time for Francis phone so we could call home and let our families know we were safe. I was tired and collapsed.
On Sunday we worshipped with the congregation here in Jinja. They meet in an open pole barn they have rented. It is directly on the shore of Lake Victoria. Francis must have arisen early. He picked up most of the people. They are widely scattered here. Many are on the other side of the lake from Jinja. Their normal starting time is 10AM. We were two hours late. (Keith was fit to be tied, but suffering in silence.) They insisted that we eat breakfast before going. When we arrived there were about 100 there. They had been waiting for 2 hours. The group was mostly women and children. I assume there were about 10 to 15 men among them. Rosemary works primarily with the poor women of the city. I will tell you more about that later. Keith spoke. It was hard because there were two translators. There are two principal languages spoken in Uganda other than English. One of those languages is from the southeast Uganda, Jap or Japalog and the other from the south Central, Luganda. One translator Is hard to work with. Two takes some work. Some of the children grew hungry and I saw Rosemary hand some money to someone to go buy some food for them. The children sat on reed mats that were placed on the dirt floor. Others sat on plank benches.
We were able to worship. They had some Communion cups which were served on plates. The people were not dressed in nearly as ornate a fashion as Nigeria. I suspect there is considerable poverty among this group. Francis must have been tired and rattled, he forgot to take collection. It was good to be with them. Some of the women actually kneel when they shake your hand.
The climate here is very pleasant. Of course we are on the Equator but the altitude is higher than Nigeria and the air is cool. I suspect that the high temperatures are in the 80s This is a different situation completely than Nigeria. The communities that I have seen are orderly and clean. The streets are safe without the dangers of attack and robbery that are very real in Nigeria. There are few motorbikes here with a higher percentage of bicycles. This too may be a reflection of greater poverty. The country is beautiful with forest preserves and Lake Victoria. It has mountainous terrain and large sugar and tea plantations.
This country is fighting on their northeast border inside the neighboring country of Congo. That is far from here and other than seeing it reported on TV has little effect. We are living across the street from a large hospital, but I would not go there unless unconscious. The property looks terrible and I am told that medical care here is terrible. Uganda has one of, if not the highest rates of HIV in the world. They are apparently fighting it from the number of assistance sites and advertising. They apparently also have a problem with incestuous relationships. This is the first place I have seen signs talking about putting a stop to cross generational sexual relations.
We went to a supermarket (a convenience store in the US) and bought some biscuits (cookies with high fiber). Keith and I ate a few of these and some grape drink. This was lunch. We traveled again to Kampala for an afternoon service with the church there. This is a 2 hour trip. We went to Francis’ house to pick up his children and to see his home. It is a nice home. I will have pictures. Keith was much impressed. He had stayed here with Francis two years ago. Francis has an indoor toilet now and he especially wanted Keith to see it. Keith was justifiably impressed with the improvement. I would have been impressed too.
The church here was to meet at 4PM. We arrived at 6PM. I don’t know whether this is going to be a pattern or not, but the brethren had been patiently waiting for two hours. This group meets in a gravel parking lot behind a hotel in Kampala. The hotel provides chairs and umbrellas for shade. There were about 30 there. This was almost entirely men. I believe that there may have been two women present.
The women had all taken their children to school. I will now try to explain something that I little understand. If there is a public school system here it does not seem to be functional or favored. Most of these people pay for a private education. The choice is a daily transport to school and daily provision of food or a boarding school. The vast majority of the country who can afford this at all seems to send their children of age. (perhaps 3rd or 4th grade) to a private boarding school. In the US this is only something for the wealthy and is considered somehow a negligence on the part of wealthy parents. That is not so here. I am informed that it is cheaper to send children to a boarding school. Meals are provided and there is no transportation required. The boarding schools are better. Both Francis and Rosemary send their children to private boarding schools. When I learned about this in the US I was concerned since this seems to be an extravagance. This is not so here. Here it is ordinary and less expensive than other options. Both Francis and Rosemary are single parents. Rosemary has no means of transportation and Francis is seldom at home. His children would be neglected.
I told that long story to say that yesterday was the day that parents were taking their children, with luggage and mats for sleeping, to boarding school. This accounted for several things. One was the enormous traffics jams in Kampala as everyone was on the road headed to school. Another factor was the absence of women at the services of the church in Kampala. The wives were all transporting their children while the husbands were there working and ready to work the next day. A large number of men came as a group in a rented vehicle (saving cost) from another section of the city. Francis said they will probably form another congregation in that portion of the city. Kampala is a little over a million people and appears clean and orderly. The city appears much more friendly to western eyes that Lagos or Ibadan. Jinja is a tourist destination and most westerners would be very comfortable here.
I do not have funds as yet as there has not been an opportunity to convert money. The money here is the shilling. The exchange rate is something about 1900 shillings to the dollar.
We drove another two hours in the dark back home. We stopped and ate at a large hotel that had a buffet. Rosemary said that this was the first she had really eaten for three days. Most of the food was African based. They had a good soup. Chicken, rice (notice a theme) and some beans. I never saw beans in Nigeria. I don’t really know why. The beans were differently spiced than I was accustomed to, but a change of diet was welcome. It was good to watch Francis and Rosemary eat. The meals for the four of us was about 35 dollars. We arrived home in Jinja about 10 PM. Francis said that he was going back to Kampala to be with his children. I hated for him to have to make this late drive. He has hurt his back and was wincing all day. I understood that he needed to be with his children.
It is now Monday morning. There is no hot water in the house. Cold baths leave a bit to be desired. There is no stove in the house. Rosemary has been cooking on wood and charcoal fires in the yard. I will tell you more about the housing situation later today. There was no drinking water as we awoke this morning. While we were gone the children ate everything we bought yesterday: Juices, Cokes, Biscuits and water. It is hard to begrudge them. There is little else in the house. Keith is concerned for his breakfast saying that he is dizzy without food. I came better supplied with body fat then him. We will try to remedy all this before the end of the day. I am little concerned.
Our classes are to start at 11AM. Considering the status of our starts yesterday I am not confident. Keith conjectures that is may be the African way from depending on the sun to tell time for so many years. He also opines that their lack of promptness is one of the things that contributes to their poverty. I am glad that they eventually get there. There is more to tell. I will have to find a computer café some time to send this. Perhaps I can do it tomorrow. As I write this I had thought that Rosemary had walked to town to shop for Keith and myself, but one of the children has just told me that they need school supplies. It must have been my ego that put myself first. There is more to tell and I will be better able to tell it tomorrow when I know more.
I am happy that it is February. That is the month when I am to return home to you
John
Everyone else went to the airport early because of the cleaning day. Long lines; and Airlines who opened an hour and half late seemed to be the order of the day. We flew to Nairobi, and then another flight to Entebbe, Uganda. We arrived about Midnight. We were both very thirsty having not had enough liquid to drink. Finally clearing customs and locating our luggage we were very happy to see the face of Francis Okech and Rosemary Abiru waiting at the airport. Our flights had been changed and we had to depend on email to notify them that we were coming. We had not known whether Francis had seen the email.
We drove for about 3 hours from Entebbe, Uganda, through Kampala to Jinja, Uganda. Keith kept pointing out sites on the way. It was dark. I was in the back seat. I couldn’t see anything. I am confident they were glorious sites. Rosemary and Francis are brother and sister. We were both very tired and grew weary on the trip. Rosemary and Francis spoke in their native language. I think she was criticizing his driving, but that may have been a transfer from most of the women who have ever ridden with me.
We arrived at three AM We bought some bottles of water on the way for our thirst and bought some time for Francis phone so we could call home and let our families know we were safe. I was tired and collapsed.
On Sunday we worshipped with the congregation here in Jinja. They meet in an open pole barn they have rented. It is directly on the shore of Lake Victoria. Francis must have arisen early. He picked up most of the people. They are widely scattered here. Many are on the other side of the lake from Jinja. Their normal starting time is 10AM. We were two hours late. (Keith was fit to be tied, but suffering in silence.) They insisted that we eat breakfast before going. When we arrived there were about 100 there. They had been waiting for 2 hours. The group was mostly women and children. I assume there were about 10 to 15 men among them. Rosemary works primarily with the poor women of the city. I will tell you more about that later. Keith spoke. It was hard because there were two translators. There are two principal languages spoken in Uganda other than English. One of those languages is from the southeast Uganda, Jap or Japalog and the other from the south Central, Luganda. One translator Is hard to work with. Two takes some work. Some of the children grew hungry and I saw Rosemary hand some money to someone to go buy some food for them. The children sat on reed mats that were placed on the dirt floor. Others sat on plank benches.
We were able to worship. They had some Communion cups which were served on plates. The people were not dressed in nearly as ornate a fashion as Nigeria. I suspect there is considerable poverty among this group. Francis must have been tired and rattled, he forgot to take collection. It was good to be with them. Some of the women actually kneel when they shake your hand.
The climate here is very pleasant. Of course we are on the Equator but the altitude is higher than Nigeria and the air is cool. I suspect that the high temperatures are in the 80s This is a different situation completely than Nigeria. The communities that I have seen are orderly and clean. The streets are safe without the dangers of attack and robbery that are very real in Nigeria. There are few motorbikes here with a higher percentage of bicycles. This too may be a reflection of greater poverty. The country is beautiful with forest preserves and Lake Victoria. It has mountainous terrain and large sugar and tea plantations.
This country is fighting on their northeast border inside the neighboring country of Congo. That is far from here and other than seeing it reported on TV has little effect. We are living across the street from a large hospital, but I would not go there unless unconscious. The property looks terrible and I am told that medical care here is terrible. Uganda has one of, if not the highest rates of HIV in the world. They are apparently fighting it from the number of assistance sites and advertising. They apparently also have a problem with incestuous relationships. This is the first place I have seen signs talking about putting a stop to cross generational sexual relations.
We went to a supermarket (a convenience store in the US) and bought some biscuits (cookies with high fiber). Keith and I ate a few of these and some grape drink. This was lunch. We traveled again to Kampala for an afternoon service with the church there. This is a 2 hour trip. We went to Francis’ house to pick up his children and to see his home. It is a nice home. I will have pictures. Keith was much impressed. He had stayed here with Francis two years ago. Francis has an indoor toilet now and he especially wanted Keith to see it. Keith was justifiably impressed with the improvement. I would have been impressed too.
The church here was to meet at 4PM. We arrived at 6PM. I don’t know whether this is going to be a pattern or not, but the brethren had been patiently waiting for two hours. This group meets in a gravel parking lot behind a hotel in Kampala. The hotel provides chairs and umbrellas for shade. There were about 30 there. This was almost entirely men. I believe that there may have been two women present.
The women had all taken their children to school. I will now try to explain something that I little understand. If there is a public school system here it does not seem to be functional or favored. Most of these people pay for a private education. The choice is a daily transport to school and daily provision of food or a boarding school. The vast majority of the country who can afford this at all seems to send their children of age. (perhaps 3rd or 4th grade) to a private boarding school. In the US this is only something for the wealthy and is considered somehow a negligence on the part of wealthy parents. That is not so here. I am informed that it is cheaper to send children to a boarding school. Meals are provided and there is no transportation required. The boarding schools are better. Both Francis and Rosemary send their children to private boarding schools. When I learned about this in the US I was concerned since this seems to be an extravagance. This is not so here. Here it is ordinary and less expensive than other options. Both Francis and Rosemary are single parents. Rosemary has no means of transportation and Francis is seldom at home. His children would be neglected.
I told that long story to say that yesterday was the day that parents were taking their children, with luggage and mats for sleeping, to boarding school. This accounted for several things. One was the enormous traffics jams in Kampala as everyone was on the road headed to school. Another factor was the absence of women at the services of the church in Kampala. The wives were all transporting their children while the husbands were there working and ready to work the next day. A large number of men came as a group in a rented vehicle (saving cost) from another section of the city. Francis said they will probably form another congregation in that portion of the city. Kampala is a little over a million people and appears clean and orderly. The city appears much more friendly to western eyes that Lagos or Ibadan. Jinja is a tourist destination and most westerners would be very comfortable here.
I do not have funds as yet as there has not been an opportunity to convert money. The money here is the shilling. The exchange rate is something about 1900 shillings to the dollar.
We drove another two hours in the dark back home. We stopped and ate at a large hotel that had a buffet. Rosemary said that this was the first she had really eaten for three days. Most of the food was African based. They had a good soup. Chicken, rice (notice a theme) and some beans. I never saw beans in Nigeria. I don’t really know why. The beans were differently spiced than I was accustomed to, but a change of diet was welcome. It was good to watch Francis and Rosemary eat. The meals for the four of us was about 35 dollars. We arrived home in Jinja about 10 PM. Francis said that he was going back to Kampala to be with his children. I hated for him to have to make this late drive. He has hurt his back and was wincing all day. I understood that he needed to be with his children.
It is now Monday morning. There is no hot water in the house. Cold baths leave a bit to be desired. There is no stove in the house. Rosemary has been cooking on wood and charcoal fires in the yard. I will tell you more about the housing situation later today. There was no drinking water as we awoke this morning. While we were gone the children ate everything we bought yesterday: Juices, Cokes, Biscuits and water. It is hard to begrudge them. There is little else in the house. Keith is concerned for his breakfast saying that he is dizzy without food. I came better supplied with body fat then him. We will try to remedy all this before the end of the day. I am little concerned.
Our classes are to start at 11AM. Considering the status of our starts yesterday I am not confident. Keith conjectures that is may be the African way from depending on the sun to tell time for so many years. He also opines that their lack of promptness is one of the things that contributes to their poverty. I am glad that they eventually get there. There is more to tell. I will have to find a computer café some time to send this. Perhaps I can do it tomorrow. As I write this I had thought that Rosemary had walked to town to shop for Keith and myself, but one of the children has just told me that they need school supplies. It must have been my ego that put myself first. There is more to tell and I will be better able to tell it tomorrow when I know more.
I am happy that it is February. That is the month when I am to return home to you
John
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