Thursday, May 31, 2012

Here I am Africa! The first several days

When I first arrived in Mbarara at the Martin's house, poor baby Naomi was sick. My first night I stayed awake as LONG as I could. Then the next day we went to the children's hospital in Mbarara to just get Naomi checked on (hospitals are kinda different here and all the Doctors that the Martins generally go to are in America right now). Naomi is all better now. Ruhanga Nimarungi (God is good).
Later that day we had a play date at the Martin's with all the Mazungu (white people). I love what they are doing here. It wasn't just their team, but all the teams around. If  I ever am a missionary, I want to do the same thing.
Taylor and I had trouble staying up through the afternoon, but I think we both made it to night before we slept. Jet lag is interesting.
The next day we went to the town church on our way to a village. There I saw Livingston and Alexander. Alexander sneakily tricked me into thinking he was Richard, although I knew better. Silly Alexander. Alexander was one of my dearest friends. Then we saw Richard another friend. Then we went to a village. They fed us and we listened to sermons and wonderful singing! I liked the matoke (it kinda tastes like potato...kinda), but I struggled with the meat. We saw lots of cute kids and gave them stickers and pipe cleaner people. It was a lot of fun. Here are some pictures of us with the kiddos and at a scenic place.
Lots of children

Look at that smile.

Us stopping and viewing the beauty of Africa

Road to Africa: Travel

Hey friends and family and stumble readers!
I've been here in Uganda for over a week now and. . . I LOVE IT! I've had many adventures already. I will try to get y'all all caught up.
So my trip started on the 21st of May. I woke up SUPER early and showered and drove to the airport from our team reunion (every year the team I grew up with in Uganda, meet in Arkansas for a couple days). When we got there, I had some trouble with luggage and such, but we got it taken care of. The first airplane I boarded was in Arkansas was... tiny to say the least. There was condensation coming out of the air vents and I thought the plane was going to poison me. However, I'm still alive and well. My first stop was Chicago. I ran across that airport lugging my backpack and the camera bag. I made my connecting flight in perfect time! When I got on the plane a sweet elderly couple asked if they could use my seat and I could just sit one seat up. I was totally fine with that. I would hate to separate a cute older couple. I sat down and my new Canadian friend sat with me. I thought I'd sleep, but I was glad to have company. He was touring part of America on a civil war tour. Next, I landed in Washington and met up with my new team. Then we flew together to Brussels and walked around in the airport for a while. Then we went through the security check and searched for our gate. We flew on a fairly empty flight to Kigali, Rwanda. I slept for a couple hours! It was wonderful.Then we had a short flight to entebe.
After we reached Entebe, we spent the night there. We woke up to a beautiful view of Lake Victoria. Here's a picture: 



After that we traveled around  Kampala and shopped. Then, we drove to Mbarara. And there is all of the traveling!
Well, I know that wasn't much of an update, but I'll try to catch y'all up more today.

Sunday, May 20, 2012

The road to Africa: Arkansas!


Howdy!
This is the last update until I’m in UGANDA!!!! Tomorrow is the day I leave town (America) and head on my international journey. I am SO excited! I would like to ask all of you to pray for my time traveling and my time in Uganda. I will fly out of here on the 21st (tomorrow!!!) and fly out of Uganda on the 26th of June. 

On a somewhat separate note, I have gotten to spend the last few days in Arkansas with my friends (or as I like to call them “family”) that I grew up in Uganda with. It’s been such a blessing to spend time with them. I adore them all. They bring me such joy and I can see the good works being done in and through them. 

I hope all of you have a great week.

Monday, May 14, 2012

The road to Africa: California

So, now that I'm all packed up and such, I've been traveling America. I am in California right now doing crazy fun things like biking across the Golden Gate Bridge; touring Alcatraz; tomorrow I will go to Yosemite. Then, later I'll be heading to Arkansas to see the team I grew up with in Africa. We try to get together as much as possible and just catch up. What's really neat is I fly out of Arkansas, saying goodbye to my team, and then fly to Uganda to say hello to the new team! It may even be that I stay in some of our team's old houses. I am SO pumped. 
ONE WEEK!!!!

Friday, May 11, 2012

Packed!

So, I think it was a small miracle, but I finally have my bags all packed. I don't leave the country for several more days, but life is just going to be kinda busy up to the day I leave.

This is kinda how packing went for me: 

But now it's all over and I can just enjoy myself. I cannot wait to go. 10 days left (in an hour it will be 9 days left!!!!). 

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Packing

Wow, it's been a LONG time since I've posted ANYTHING on here. Well, that's about to change. I am going to Africa this summer and will hopefully be able to post about my adventures while I' m there on here. 
Right now, here's just a short post (I should be packing). Packing is gross. I dislike it. I really want to just be going and forget all of this packing stuff. I can only have two bags, and they have to weigh less than 50 pounds. So if anyone wants to come pack for me, I'd be ok with that :D 
Well, sorry for the short post, I just have to go and stop procrastinating. I hope you enjoy the upcoming posts.
I'll come back later and tell more about why and how and where and all that stuff about Africa. 


This time for Africa!