Life's one big safari

This past weekend was hands down the best one here. Last Friday was women's day, so we all had the day off work and a 3-day weekend...we were going on an adventure. Everyone at home is on spring break heading to PCB or somewhere...I felt pretty awesome being in Uganda going on a safari instead. At around 10:00 we rolled out of town with 10 of us packed into an awesome van that you could sit on the top of, such a perfect safari vehicle. We didn't leave that early but it felt like it since thursday night we had been celebrating our trivia win for many many hours at the one night club here in town. Everyone was running on VERY little hours of sleep, but I guess excitement made up for it!

After several hours of typical Uganda driving...potholes and dirt roads (except a tourist stretch of road with actual lines down the middle?!??!)...we arrived at Murchinson. It's a national park right on the Nile and tons of wild animals are just walking around and chilling, and there is also an amazing waterfall, so I guess it's a pretty cool place.

Never a dull moment driving through Africa......

The first animal we saw.....a million African deer things. It was almost like being in Indiana.

Our first activity was a boat cruise down the Nile to see the water animals. The idea was to go downstream a while until the boat dropped us off, and we were supposed to hike up to the top of the waterfall. Obviously nothing goes as planned here....we did see tons of cool animals all down the Nile, but then all the sudden a big storm started rolling in.

 The middle of the Nile is not a great place to be stuck on a little boat during lightning and rain! The waves got too big for the boat to continue, so we were pulled over on the shore as the rain pelted inside and the boat rocked back and forth. We were all enjoying this way too much and the whole thing was hilarious. We were pretty slaphappy. Good thing we had all prepared for this journey by applying tons of sunscreen and stacking up on water bottles....weren't too prepared for the storm! The great thing about Africans is that they were really unphased by this whole thing. In America we would have all had to sign waivers and they would have turned around at the first sign of lightning, there would DEFINITELY not have been a hike to the top of the waterfall. But we just continued on as soon as we could, and then the motor on the boat started breaking so at times we were just floating, and then it would start up again on and off. EVENTUALLY we arrived to where we were supposed to start our hike. We were all totally soaked and it was about to get dark, but we definitely made the most of our hike. The waterfall was so crazy and the water was so powerful, like I felt like if I stuck my pinky finger in just part of it it would break off.

We made it to the top!!

After our adventure and getting sort of lost in the millions of curvy dirt roads throughout the park, we arrived at this super nice lodge to eat dinner, and it felt so good to change into dry clothes (shout out to Brittany for helping me out with that...forgot to bring literally any extra clothes). The lodge was so nice and outdoorsy and beautiful. We sat around the fire and waited for our food, and we were right by the water and the restaurant part of the lodge was made out of all these beautiful thatched roofs. I had like 4 cups of hot chocolate and ate lamb for dinner. TASTY. As if that wasn't enough I also very unclassily stole some leftover bread from a dirty table...we didn't pay enough to get bread dishes with our meal! Gotta do what you gotta do...

We left the lodge to go to our campsite, but only slept there for a few hours before getting up before the crack of dawn to catch the ferry back across the Nile to go on a game drive. All the cool animals come out earliest in the morning. The sunset was beautiful, and we rode all through the park sitting on top of the roof. It was a dream.

Lesson learned: don't let anyone in your van get out of the car when elephants are literally RIGHT there, because the start to charge!

So it was a pretty awesome and weekend. We got home midday on saturday and our driver dropped us off in town at the grocery store. I was super pumped that there was some cool yogurt there. I stacked up and was so distracted by visions of African animals and strawberry yogurt, and I left my wallet at the register. Didn't realize it until I had gotten home ten minutes later, I jumped on my bike and returned to the store...of course it was already gone. So RIP my driver's license, debit card, and large sum of cash.....that's a bit of a bummer but oh well, life goes on!

Later that night Hailey and Brittany treated the girls to a trip to the fair in town, and the all loved it and were so sweet and excited to get to go. We divided up and my team wanted to be called "team Jesus." So I was "Mama Jesus".....

We saw some animals (kinda sad to see them in such small cages after seeing animals roaming the Nile earlier that day!), the girls ate ice cream, went on some rides, and got their face painted. The face painting line was more like a crowd of 40 children around one face painter, so Tessa and I just asked him for some of his paint and did our girls on our own!

I think I almost love it here. I don't know if it's just because it's been so fun to be here the past few days, and today back at work was so good too. All of the new colors are finally passed out to the women for cutting, and soon enough the new fashions will be a reality! But I thoroughly enjoy life here. The power has been out literally 90% of the past week, I have had no gas to cook for the past month, I lost my wallet, I can't remember what it feels like to be really clean or have air conditioning or have someone actually wait on you at a restaurant. A week ago I wanted to cry because I was so sick of the third world but now I don't feel like it bothers me at all.

And God's just beaming down a big huge smile. I have a list 3 miles long of all these things I am thankful for and since I've started to only focus on that instead of things I don't have because I am here, I am so much more content. But I don't ever want to love Him only because of what he has given me or not given me in life...I do believe he wants good things for us and he exceeds our wildest dreams. But then all over the place here there is so much despair. A lady sitting in the dirt with a broken leg and flies buzzing around her just waiting to die. A mother with 5 kids whose husband has left her with nothing. So many slums. So much need. And I wonder sometimes if I was in their position, if I would still want to be in love with God. I remember the feeling in my own life of being so hurt in the past and losing things I loved, and that's the only feeling some people here ever know. There's a lot I don't understand. But I know his heart is oozing for the lady with the flies just as much as it is for me and he is always, always good. And the girls in our rescue home and the Imani women have all come from the worst backgrounds and they still have so much joy in their life now. I don't know, I don't understand why things seem so unfair but I do know that he is so full of love, and I ask him all these questions trying to figure things out, and his only answer is this huge smile back at me. "You don't have to understand, you'll never understand, you just have to feel my love and let it overflow."

Now to completely change the topic, I'm a badass. I totally ate this entire handful of white ants that the ladies had at work today. The first one very cautiously, and then I liked it enough to take a whole handful! I highly recommend, they taste like crunchy french fries.

Gulu= finally home sweet home

So in high school, my friends and I kept track of "domesticity points" just to be funny. You show up to hang out with a plate of homemade cookies...you get a point. We're making dinner and you whip out something awesome and impressive...you get a LOT of points. But if you self-promoted your domesticity, you got zero. I think I used to have negative points back in the day, and even though this may be considered self-promotion, I just have to say after a month of living on my own in Uganda my domesticity has been totally off the charts. Ain't got no oven, no stovetop anymore (gas has been out...), no dishwasher, no washer and dryer...sometimes no water or power either...but I have been kinda doing laundry and cleaning and cooking and baking...woohoo!

Homemade Reese's balls? Okay they look like poop but they were awesome.

Anyway, it took a few weeks, but I feel pretty adjusted now :). Besides feeding myself and surviving, I've met awesome people, more or less learned my way around the city, and kinda got the hang of my job. The most exciting new addition to my life is this bike. Purchasing this may have seriously decreased my chances of coming home in July in one piece, but I love it. The streets in town are a giant free for all of cars, bodas, potholes, pedestrians with heavy loads on their heads and babies on their backs...so I can't decide if riding around is terrifying or totally exhilarating. Both? But anyway, hellooooo mas independencia and extra exercise!

When I'm catching up with people from home everyone asks how Uganda is, whether I like it or not, etc. And honestly every 10 minutes I have a different answer. Deep down the answer is I am really happy here and this is a long-term dream that I'm actually living every day. I like the adventure of being in a different culture, I love designing so my job is pretty sweet, I like my friends a lot lot, and I am so impressed by the Imani women and the girls at the rescue home. I think I said this in my last blog too, but it's just so amazing to know of all of the pain and hurt they have come from and then to see them totally transformed. There is so much LIFE here and they are all so full of joy. Every Wednesday afternoon we go on outreach with the women, and it's pretty great. One of our woman had the best advice and most encouraging words ever to a group of women in the village we were in yesterday. A couple weeks ago the women all went to pray for a boy they knew who had been really sick after an encounter with a witch doctor. The women were SO fervent and passionate as they were praying for him, and whaddaya know....45 minutes later a boy who could barely stand when we first entered his hut, is walking around outside and smiling!

But at the same time it's not easy to move here. Many things have changed since the day I was fired from Walmart in high school :P Now I actually have a work ethic and never in my life have I had such an intense desire to do a job of mine well. Unfortunately trying to make things happen is really hard in Gulu, I feel like such a failure sometimes because nothing goes as planned! I try to print pictures of jewelry and what should be an easy one-time trip turns into showing up at the store multiple times a day because they keep losing, forgetting, or messing up the order. I have so much respect for the Ugandan woman who is training me, and she is awesome, but lots of important things I need help with go on her "maybe I'll think about it later" list. And then just life too. I forget what it's like to be waited on at a restaurant, to rely on ANYTHING, or what customer service is. And I really want/need to be more patient. I find myself demanding discounts and getting pissed and scolding the mechanic who fixed my bike twice and it STILL doesn't work. Then I remember, oh yeah I live in Uganda. All these things are frustrating but in the long scheme of things they aren't that important, so I guesssssss I could use this opportunity for personal growth and learn to deal with it....

So every day is like :)...:(.... :/.... :D

And another thing, since Gulu is a refugee city, there are tons of aid groups here, which means lots of white people, and the local population definitely notices. You cannot walk for more than 10 feet without a group of Acholi children running up and saying "mzungu!!!" (white person) and wanting to shake your hand or laugh at you or just say hi. Or creepy men...."Mzungu, how are you? Mzungu, you look beautiful today. Hi! Hi!" But I've gotta say that the creepy men here are way more classy and nice about it than the ones in Chile were! Gotta get used to standing out, and people going through LOTS of effort to get money from you... a while ago I hopped off a boda outside of Brittany and Hailey's house, and a pregnant woman fell down next to me and cried out in pain. I went over to her to see what was wrong, and she kept saying she just needed money for her baby. I said "umm...I'll pray for you instead?" And then I started to get really worried because through a series of questions I asked her she told me she was 9 months pregnant and her water had broken. We were freaking out and for a while we thought we were going to have to help deliver a baby right in Brittany and Hailey's house! It was a little fishy to me because she did NOT look 9 months pregnant...maybe 5...and it didn't seem like her water had broken. Plus she kept asking for money. But I mean, she seemed obviously in a lot of pain. We eventually got ahold of a driver to take her to the hospital, relieved that the baby didn't come out when she was with us!! BUT the next day someone saw her walking around on the road, still pregnant and totally fine. Hmm...good actress. It is heartbreaking and kind of just depressing though to be around so many people who have so many needs, and know when to help and how much to help. And I hate that now an automatic response of mine is to be guarded and assume someone is trying to play me, instead of just to have compassion.

One of the awesome things about being here is a whole new world of adventures we can have. Looks like Easter will be spent on the beaches of Kenya, we're heading to see waterfalls and African animals next next weekend, rafting the Nile= def a possibility, and a couple weekends ago we had the best camping adventure ever. Pictures are worth a thousand words?

I guess it's pretty cool to be sleeping on top of a little mountain thing in the middle of Africa, joined by a ton of village children, and watching the sunrise and sunset across Uganda :)

But what I love the most so far and what has been the most meaningful is how kind I am learning God is. It sounds dumb and I swear I think I learn this only to relearn again and again. Because getting on the plane to come here was so hard, I blamed Him because for the first time ever I felt like following His plan, and dreams HE had given me, had become so painful. I was having to sacrifice things I did not want to give up at all to do what I felt like I SHOULD do. And I don't feel that way about being here anymore...so God and I were chill, but at the same time my idea of His character had changed and I didn't even realize it. He doesn't abuse His control over my life, I'm not some piece in his chess game. I started to get so scared that from this point on every time I wanted to do something, He would be like "hahahaha, yeah right, Laura. No grad school for you, get back overseas asap. Marry someone who you don't like at first. Go here. Go there, because remember Laura, my plans are better!!!" It sounds ridiculous, I know. But there is so much freedom that He gives us, and I don't know, I still don't understand why following Him is sometimes hard, but I know He cares so much about our desires and He wants to co-plan with us. When I finally listened, He said back to me, "Tell me about what you want, what you don't want. Talk to me about what makes you feel alive, what makes you excited, I care!" He wants our opinions! And sometimes there will be sacrifices to make, I know that. But He is so smart and He knows sometimes when we want to hold onto something that we think is so meaningful, it will actually lose its meaning if we don't move onto what is better. I'm rambling....but bottom line is, He isn't out to crush dreams. He's out to fulfill. Our hearts are safe.

And He's so clever too. So the other day, I mean like over 2 weeks ago, the Zion Project staff had this little prophecy workshop, led by an awesome couple from the US who were visiting here and serving for a few days. I swear, Zion Project attracts great people. Anyway, if you don't know, prophecy is just hearing from God words of encouragement or basically anything that reveals anything God wants to say to someone. We all took turns sitting in the middle and everyone else would just listen and share whatever God was giving them for that person. It's my turn, and right before I sat down all the sudden I was reminded of a picture God had shown me in Brazil, probably the clearest thing I have ever seen from Him. At that time I was wanting so much more with God that I wasn't seeing in my life yet, I was shooting for the moon....basically I wanted to experience everything that was possible in a relationship with Him and I was frustrated because I wasn't yet. He showed me a meal, like a 5 course kinda thing on a huge fancy table, with like 3 forks and nice plates, it was like a Thanksgiving dream. And He said to me, "I made this whole meal for you, that's right, you stay hungry and I will give you SO Many good things. But right now, you are going to eat the appetizer. The rest is coming later." And that was really encouraging to me, honestly I think about it a lot and can't wait for entree or dessert time. So anyway, no one has any idea of that, but Brittany had this picture of me sitting down to eat an entree he had prepared, what she described was exactly what I had seen a year and a half ago. So cool! And everything everyone else said was so right on also. So maybe the appetizer phase is done, and bigger and better things are coming. 

In conclusion, there are really hard moments, hard days...I still catch myself wishing I was a being a normal college student. And I miss lots of things and lots of people. But still, I gotta say I'm pretty pumped about what there is to come here. I have good feelings :) Except right now I feel really sick and should have been asleep a couple hours ago but I was really slow at writing this....oopsies.

Across the world!

It's been almost 2 weeks since I got on a plane to head to Uganda! After 2 long flights, and 2 nights chillin in guesthouses outside the airport, I met up with a mission trip team from a church in Virginia and we made the journey to Gulu across the Nile and over bumpy roads lined with baboons.

First of all I have to say THANK YOU so much to everyone back at home, all of the support you've given me financially and just with prayer has totally blown me away and I am so thankful for you, you are the best cheerleading team ever :)

For anyone who doesn't know, I am working with Zion Project, an NGO focused on healing and empowering women and girls that have been sexually exploited or affected by the war. There are two parts to Zion Project...a rescue home for younger girls, and a jewelry program, Imani (http://www.imanilove.com/), that employs women mostly from the Congo. I'm here to design jewelry for Imani, but I also get to spend time at the rescue home with the girls!

I've been slowly learning things and getting used to everything here. Last week was a little bit of a different week for Zion Project because the team was here, and they were awesome. It was amazing seeing them loving and playing with the girls and hanging out with the women. They were just down for anything, really fun to be around, and they loved the people here so well. This week I'll have a lot more training and I'll get much more familiar with what my role will look like here. For most of today I sat with Christine, one of the Ugandan staff members, who manages the jewelry line. We played around designing some new fashions with the extra beads the women had, and she explained a lot of things to me, and it was so much fun. I love any chance to get creative and design, and the fact that I get to do this for 6 months is seriously a dream.

I live in a guesthouse that is connected to our office, so the Imani women come here to make the beads and fashion the necklaces. I live with Janet, a Ugandan woman who helps out with Zion Project, and the three most adorable little kids ever. I have a king-sized bed which is the greatest thing ever for me and also for them, because they like to come in at night and roll around on it and squeal. It is so adorable. Another plus to living here is that I literally roll out of bed walk out the door and there I am at work. The women start out every morning with worship and devotions, which is full of lots of dancing and drumming. I don't know any of the words because they sing in Swahili, but all you gotta do is follow their moves. The women don't speak English, except one, so sometimes it's hard to find ways to connect with them. Emily, a volunteer who left yesterday, lived in the guesthouse with me and left me her Swahili dictionary, which I am SO thankful for, because I want to learn. Today I learned that Hakuna Matata actually literally means "no worries" in Swahili. I also practiced this one: "Kuna nyingi mdudus." There are many bugs. Which I think is a little off because the women just kind of looked and laughed at me.

However, nail polish goes a long way in making connections!

In Chile I volunteered at a similar rescue home to the one that is here...the girls were removed from their families for one reason or another, all had sad stories, and were the same age. I only went once or twice a week for a few hours, and I did not like it. It was such a heavy atmosphere, the girls fought and were nasty to each other, and every day when I left I just felt gross. Zion Project compared to that rescue home is like night and day. There are 17 girls in the home and they are so full of life, personality and joy. They've all been through things I can't even imagine, but the atmosphere there is indescribable and I love being with them. There is so much laughing and it's so easy to start to fall in love with these girls, they are so much fun. I can obviously only attribute this to the fact that God's presence is so sought after here, and all of the staff who has been here has created that kind of environment.

It really is a different world here. Women wrap babies around their backs and people carry water on their heads back from the well. I get around on bodas (motorcycle things), wear dresses and skirts, and sleep under a mosquito net. My hair looks like crap every day and the power goes out all the time. It's all part of the adventure though! It's also been fun to meet so many other people here working with different human rights groups or other organizations. I didn't realize how many other foreigners would be in the city! Most people are in their early, mid-20s, recently out of college, so it's been fun to start to get to know other people with similar interests. Brittany and Hailey are the other two volunteers with Zion Project from America, and they have been great helping me get accustomed and answering all my questions!

I honestly really like it here and am really excited about these next 6 months. It's been my dream to come to Africa for YEARS. Like all these things I have wanted for so long have been happening to me this year, and I'm only 21 and already I feel like I need to make a new dream list. It's seriously great. I loved being in Chile too last semester, but towards the end I could feel my heart starting to check out of there and start getting excited for this instead. I couldn't wait. Everyone would tell me "Oh wow, how brave of you to do all of this you are doing for a year!" But I never thought of it like that, I was more scared of staying than I was of going places. I longed to be overseas and the thought of being in Indiana seemed so boring. I thought the excitement would keep building up until I got here, but being in the US was such a teaser and it changed everything.

Right before I left the last thing I wanted to do was leave again. I didn't realize how hard it would be to drop life and leave the country for a year right in the middle of college. Maybe it would be different if I had already graduated and everyone else was starting new stages of life too. I don't like missing holidays or weddings or graduations or 21st birthdays, but most of all it's the little things, like having people I loved be part of my daily life and I can't have that when I keep leaving. I feel like I am missing out on so much. The whole month I was home I just realized how much I missed my life. It was so good to be back after being gone for so long, I didn't want to do it again because I was exhausted. I was a mess the last few days leading up to when I left and I landed in Africa feeling really sad instead of excited.

Last week I was starting to really like it here but still feeling really homesick and not truly on board with being here. Then one night God showed me a picture...I was standing on the side of a road with a lot of heavy baggage I couldn't carry. He pulled up alongside me in a jeep kinda thing and was asking, "Do you want to get in?" And I kept saying "no, please go away," because I knew as soon as I did He would drive me so far away, and I was tired and lonely and the last thing I wanted to do was go far. But finally I just thought... what the heck, and I got in with Him. And it was such a relief to set down all the heavy things I was carrying, and to be in the passenger seat. He was driving and I could see out the rearview mirror everything I knew getting smaller and smaller in the distance and it was awful, but when I looked into His eyes instead and saw Him laughing with me and talking to me about all of the adventures we were going to have, I stopped looking behind me.

So I'm all in, and sometimes I don't feel it in my heart but I know it deep down that this is where I'm supposed to be. I feel like God has been pouring into me and has been setting me up, and now I'm at the point where I want to take what He has given me and give it out to others here. I want to be serving out of the overflow of my own relationship with God and I am going to learn what that specifically looks like in Uganda :)