Kingdom +1

We've got a friend in town named Paul who works with NEFHCOD, a small local NGO that was just started up in October of 08. Great guy and hard working. NEFHCOD, being brand new, has no funding and is mainly comprised of community volunteers. However, there are some full(er) time employees doing various work. Paul's one of them and mans the office in town, serving as the administrator for the office and taking in help requests. We've been able to partner ourselves (KCC) up with NEFHCOD in a few ways - for one, all of our community loans applicants are now required to take some business classes which are handled by NEFHCOD. Another is that once a borehole repair is completed, NEFHCOD swoops in with some follow up training and sensitization materials to educate the community about health and maintenance and all other issues that are applicable to their newly repaired water source. Paul is kind of the go-to guy for all of these activities and more.

The thing is that he doesn't get paid. Like I said, they're a brand new NGO, and a local one at that, and so far finding funding has been incredibly difficult. They're organized and have a great work-plan, but expecting people like Paul to hang around and do the work being done with no compensation seems like a tall order. At least from my Canadian perspective.

Paul just left our house, saying that it has been tough but that he enjoys the work and will just keep pushing forward until the end of the year, and hopefully some money will come of it. He's confided in me earlier that he doesn't care for the money at all but instead just wants to serve the people and make a difference in his country. Man... what a fantastic attitude to have. I don't want to overly expose Paul here, but his attitude is nothing short of dumbfounding when you realize that he makes zero money and gives everything he has, though he has barely enough to eat and his house is little more than a tiny storage room. People like him put everything into perspective for me and make me realize how much more there is to give everyone here. I just pray for the strength to be able to do it, day by day, without collapsing. Unfortunately I've proven to be weaker than I thought and some days it feels like there's nothing more to give.

So it's conversations like the one I just had that give me a boost and slam everything back into perspective. The key words he spoke tonight were more than just his descriptions of living a life I want to model, giving everything while having nothing. More encouraging than that, and I hope this doesn't sound like I'm giving myself a pat on the back, but he just gave me hope by defining an action I've always hoped to be able to have a part in in someone's life. Paul's a new christian.

We'd sat in his office a long time ago. Over the weeks we had become friends, and one day after finding out that he was a catholic I jokingly told him that he should switch sides - become a christian. We chatted about it a bit and what it meant, but it really was just casual conversation. Even that small thing I said combined with everything else he had heard, pastors in the town telling him to get Jesus... yeah, he took the step, did his homework, decided it was right, and found a pastor to seal the deal. Now he's asked to be baptized. No idea if he meant by me or not just yet, and I'm not exactly thrilled to go wading into a river teeming with you-don't-want-to-know and the rare hippopotamous, but I'd do it in a heartbeat.

When you feel a bit down, I don't think I could imagine a better pick-me-up than what he told me tonight.

Anyway, life continues here in Ug. We'd appreciate your continued prayer support while we're here as school is about to ramp up again, people are continuing to be incredibly needy, water sources continue to break, and we continue to do the things we do.
-S

Community Services

The community services department is where I get to work (I being me, and me being Sean.) Some pretty cool stuff happens here daily, so I think I'll try and do a small blurb on each area every now and then to keep you all in the know.

One part of the work we do is to help out needy families in the area (you might recall the wheelchair for Annet). Some of these assisted families are child-led homes because of AIDS. Some are dealing with physical issues such as age or disability. Some are just needy and need a helping hand to come along and give them not only a gift or physical item, but also some love and encouragement. That's where the staff in the office here shine.

From Community Services

From Community Services

From Community Services

People are so thankful for whatever we can do.

Jamie and kids

Here's some of Jamie's favourite pictures (either taken of her or by her) with Ugandan kids.

From Jamie & Kids

At a graduation ceremony, Jamie hangs out with Immaculate

From Jamie & Kids

Jamie doing a home visit with some of the students

From Jamie & Kids

Jamie milling about

From Jamie & Kids

Baby Amos. The proper way to say his name, by the way, is "AH-moss"

From Jamie & Kids

More Amos. Perfect size to fit in one of our bags when we eventually come home (we like him :) )

From Jamie & Kids

A photo of Derek, who we both think looks and acts like one of Jamie's cousins...

From Jamie & Kids

The eyebrow baby

From Jamie & Kids

A typical site in Uganda. Question: What is the cheapest diaper? Answer: .....

From Jamie & Kids

Auntie Lamie and her best friend :)

Hey Map Geeks

I'm a map geek. So while there's tons we could update on, here's something dumb just for entertainment's sake. Courtesy of my being a geek, and owning a GPS (geek +1)

Check this link to grab a Google Earth file showing some of the boreholes I've been working on in the area. If you don't want to bother with Google Earth, you can check us out in any nice atlas.

Find KCC on the earth at

0° 46.629'S
31° 20.918'E

Enjoy.

The Breakdown

Our Toyota Hilux “double cab” is a workhorse. It goes through everything we throw at it and keeps on giving. Unfortunately, this week it decided to take a little instead.

We’re just thankful that it broke down where it did – in a nice cushy parking lot close to a coffee shop. The alternative place could have been anywhere but probably would have been somewhere along 300kms of highway between Kampala and Kibaale, as we were just about to return home when the breakdown happened.

We’re also thankful we had the chance to chat it up with such a cool old mechanic while waiting for the repairs to be finished. He’s an old car nut and takes pride in his work. The double cab is happy with a new clutch now thanks to Hamid - if you ever break down in Kampala, go to TAP Garage. And sit in the Mitsubishi Minica, ‘cause it’s awesome :)

From Breakdown

An old 1962 Mitsubishi Minica. Hamid bought this from Japan for 800 bucks

From Breakdown

Power via this 359cc two stroke oil-injected air-cooled two cylinder with a whopping top speed of 80kmh

From Breakdown

Not meant for large Canadians

From Breakdown

Waiting for the repairs on the double cab to be finished

From Breakdown

Repairs complete and just getting it washed now. It lives to fight another day

Parliament

So on our way out of town our truck, a Toyota Hilux, had the clutch blow up. That was my thought anyway, but it turned out that parts of the flywheel let go and had their way with the release bearing that the clutch works together with, which ended up disintegrating the bearing and sending tiny bits all over the bellhousing. Carnage at low speed (thankfully) ground us to a halt in a mall parking lot in Kampala, and after getting the truck towed to a mechanic Jamie and I were left to find something to do.

We’d heard that the Parliament buildings offered free tours so we decided to check them out. The police at the front gate had not heard of anything but checked us for explosives anyway and let us pass to the main security checkpoint. The main security checkpoint had not heard of any tours but checked us instead for firearms and advised me to not wear a hat, and sent us over to reception. Reception had not heard of any tours available, but said we could try and find out more by talking to some police on the other side of the building and told us to walk around… so, free in Ugandan Parliament, we made the best of the situation and walked around aimlessly, giving ourselves a free unguided tour.

It was a bit strange to be walking around Parliament as a tourist with no purpose but no one seemed to mind (we sure didn’t have anything dangerous on us by this point.) We found the other police point and they told us that they had no idea about tours, but we should leave all of our bags with them and go walk upstairs through a door for some reason. We said, “ok”, and left our bags and walked through a door. The door opened and we were welcomed by a booming voice coming through speakers just over our heads saying “The Aye’s have it”, and we realized we had walked into an active session of Parliament, at that moment passing a new Bill into law and making amendments on the fly. Something to do with information technology and how it would affect Uganda. Very cool stuff actually.

When we’d had enough we just got up and left. Very similar to the Canadian system as it turns out, from what we could tell. The amount of transparency geared into the Parliamentary process was really good to see with an open gallery for the public (and misguided tourists like us) and recorded and televised sessions. No pictures of the inside so these will have to do.

From Parliament

Inside the gates of Parliament

From Parliament

The Ugandan flag

From Parliament

Jamie does not have any explosives on her

From Parliament

And Sean does not have any weapons on him

Crafts and Friends

Friends of Jamie's, Frank and Amber Devine (originally from Medicine Hat, now residing in Vancouver), have been serving here in Uganda since January and are now headed back home. We made sure to catch up with them before they left and had some great times together exploring some more of the city and swapping stories and experiences. It is such an encouragement to get together with like-minded people and talk about things that matter, and just as good to get together with people who are from the same area as you and just talk about nothing at all and have a good laugh. Frank and Amber were great for both those things and we feel completely recharged after hearing of so many similar happenings from their work in Mbale. God is doing great work through so many great people… it’s cool we get to be a part of it all.

Unfortunately, their last day in Mbale was a very trying time for the two of them – on the trip down to meet us they had most all of their important papers and travel documents lifted. So some of our time was spent scurrying around to the Canadian Consulate or having meetings with various important people trying to salvage what was possible of their last days in the country. They should have an update on their site of how things ended up working out, but we’re just glad we were able to help in any way we could during a tough one.

From Crafts and Friends

We hit the craft market and saw this freaky doll thing

From Crafts and Friends

Killing time at the market

From Crafts and Friends

The market

From Crafts and Friends

Taking a break at Cafe Pap

From Crafts and Friends