August 6, 2008

Hair Loss.

Upon the advice of Gloria, I decided to braid my hair. EIGHT hours of pain later, I had long extensions. It was fun! Sitting still, watching the same Baganda music video and weird Mexican soaps over and over… really. Seriously though, it was actually fun. My brother Roland said “Now you look like a real hippie!”

And here is the finished product:


We’re drinking some traditional millet alcohol at a wedding in Burundi. I wouldn’t pick it out of a line-up for a relaxing drink, (those chunks of sour tasting, flour-like texture can be a real turn off) but this was also fun!

Ugandan culture dictates true honesty with true friends… So by the time we got home from Burundi, three weeks after braiding, I’d heard several renditions from several good friends of “Your braids are looking bad.” “Oh my gosh, your head looks so dirty.” “You even have dandruff coming now.” “It’s time to let the braids go.” I spent two hours unbraiding in the car, and ended up with a wad of hair extensions and some cool frizzy hair.

After showering the next day I found this small animal in the shower:

SICK! That’s all my own hair by the way!

So, word of warning. If you braid in Ug… be prepared for hours of fun times sitting in a chair getting your head yanked on, true honest evaluation of the quality of your braids, and then extreme hair loss upon removal.

July 27, 2008

Masaka.

There are so many things that I love about my sister Gloria. Her laugh, the truth that she has brought into my life and relationships with her insight, the way she tells stories, the fact that she fails to comb her hair, how she remembers details about people and asks after them. One of them is that she is a woman of prayer. We’re very different; as our brothers tell us almost daily, but I think we both feel burdened to serve others through prayer, and specifically our friends who are poor through prayer. She is the kind of person that will say “I think we should just walk around and pray for these people,” when we’re at an IDP camp in Northern Ug and then we’ll do it. Or I’ll say “I’m really thinking so much about this friend from home” and she’ll respond with “let’s pray for them.” If I want to stop the car so we can pray for some prisoners we passed on our way, Gloria will always joyfully interrupt her plans to do those things. 

On our roadtrip to the West I think we both saw Jesus very clearly through prayer. I saw Him during times of rest in Nshenyi at Graceful Savannah. That deserves an entire blog post; it was a powerful few days of redefinition for me.

On our way home from Nshenyi, Gloria and I stopped in Masaka for the night. Gloria, in her former life as a glamorous Ugandan tv journalist, had made a documentary about child-headed households in Uganda. She and her crew traveled to Masaka and with an NGO called Kitovu Mobile had filmed four households where both parents had died of HIV/aids and the kids were taking care of themselves. In 2005, in Nepal, Gloria told me about those kids, and a bit of their stories. Four years later she still had them on her heart, so we went to Kitovu Mobile, searching for those families. We had decided beforehand to stay the night with one of these families. We hated the idea of just going and bringing some money and going home to our hotel, we wanted to participate in life with these kids, even if it was only for 24 hours.

So, we drove up to this small house, back in a typical Ugandan village ‘road.’ (Road= dusty, pothole path through matoke plantations.) They were there, waiting to greet us… Five boys aged 16, 14, 12, 10, and probably 6 or so. They had no furniture in their main room, they borrowed some stools from a neighbor for us to sit on. We sat and talked. They were shy and didn’t say much. After the ice was broken we took their ‘cook’- the 12 year old- and got some groceries; rice, tomatoes, curry powder. He made rice pilau and as it cooked I played cards with the kids. No mercy, I won. :) 

I’m struggling to write this post, because I want to fully express who these boys are. They are sons of Jesus, they are not ‘orphans’, they have been set in families. They are kids- they fight and skip school to go to the cinema, they laugh and make jokes. I would never pity these guys. But their lives are difficult- they have very little- often even going without meals during holidays and weekends. What little they may get, even their clothes or lamp kerosene, is sometimes stolen from them by their neighbors, since they didn’t have a good lock for their door.  

As we sat around after our simple meal (which tasted really good, by the way) the youngest boy was sitting just to my left. He has the kind of face that is endearing, he still seems like a baby except for his eyes which are so sad. He’s very quiet and reserved, but super intelligent, I think his English was better than all the others. I wanted to just hold him in my lap and love him. I thought about Nick- who is 8 and I’ve babysat for several years- and imagined him without his mom and dad, taking care of himself. We sang around the bongo drum I had brought. The guys wanted to sing “Lord, Lord of Mercy, Jesus, Jesus of Mercy” that they learned at their school. After we sang, we went to bed. “Goodnight Auntie” they said. The boys gave us the ‘master bedroom’ and Gloria and I shared our smallest bed yet- a twin mattress and dirty blanket- the best they had. I was laying awake in the dark, thinking the same thoughts I find myself thinking so frequently… I know Jesus that you are a Lord of Mercy, but I can’t always see it.

The next morning we woke up and started to clean and do some wash. Gloria washed all their clothes and dishes, while I swept out the place and cleaned the wasps nests off the wall. They didn’t have a broom, so we bought one to use, and took all the bedding out of the room to be aired out. It only took us about three hours to do all of this- handwashing all their clothes and cleaning their entire home. I told Gloria what I had been thinking the night before, and in that moment I was so thankful for my sister’s eyes.

She said “I can see so clearly God’s provision for those boys.” Through Gloria’s documentary, the heart of a Ugandan in Kampala was touched and he came and built this family a house. Kitovu Mobile pays their school fees and makes sure that they get one good meal at lunch time from school. A few neighbors make sure that they go to school (because seriously, what 14 year old boy without parents wants to get up and go to school?), and I think sometimes bring over some food and a bit of money. When she met them four years ago, they had only the torn clothes on their backs. Now they have at least a few changes of clothes and some flip-flop type of shoes.

And so I remembered that He is not a God far off… He is a God close at hand. I’m thankful for continual reminders like Masaka; I’m Thomas- I need to see the scars, I need to know that these, my brothers, are not alone, that He will not forsake them.

July 22, 2008

Liz Auntie and Weddings in Ug.

That’s right…. I’m going to be an Aunt! WOOHOO! Which makes my parents GRANDPARENTS. Mind-blowing. 

~

In other, less exciting news, Gloria and I are resting in Kampala for a few days. We’ve been doing things like internet and coffee-drinking, and attending wedding meetings.

What’s a wedding meeting? Well, when people have weddings in Ug, they have two kinds- traditional and church. The bride’s family pays for the traditional, which is held at the bride’s home and combines the two traditions of “Introduction” and “Give-Away.” There’s lots of food, clothes, and speeches at this one. After that the bride/groom are technically married. Gloria’s brother Roy and sister-in-law Anita had their traditional wedding two years ago. At the end of August they’re having their “church wedding.” The church wedding will combine 800 of their closest friends for an all night extravaganza that makes normal American weddings look small. It has all the usual- decorations, cake, food- catered, good drinks, and lots of speeches and dancing. (Speeches are a very common phenomenon in Ug, inescapable.)

To prepare for a wedding, two months before the wedding the bride and groom and their families host weekly or bi-weekly ‘wedding meetings’ where 30-40 people at a time come to drink beer and give advice/counsel/input/more speeches about how and where and who should do the wedding. There is a chairman and various sub-committees and lots of laughter and talking. The groom’s family pays for the church wedding in Ug, but the way they do it is through these wedding meetings. At the meetings the people invited make pledges and donate money towards the overall budget of the wedding, so often the family ends up not having to pay anything out of pocket at all. Not bad! (Roy said not to be surprised if my name ends up on the invitations though, in the hopes that Mom and Dad Ivkovich will help pay for the wedding in true American tradition, haha.)

Last Sunday night was a wedding meeting…  I’ve noticed a trend here, it’s called “greeting.” You never enter a room without greeting every single person, and at these meetings we have to greet by standing up and saying something about ourselves. The unfortunate thing about being white at these meetings is that it’s really obvious when I start blushing from having to stand up and introduce myself. Fortunately though I can impress all my Aunties, Uncles and cousins by saying something like “Agandi, I’m called Kobusingye and I’m a daughter of this family.” My ten words of Runyankore really come in handy there. Phew!

I love this place and this family, all blushing and speeches aside.

July 19, 2008

Photos!

Home Sweet Kampala

- beginning days in Uganda

Sisters on the Road! 

- roadtripping out west for a few weeks

I adjusted these so I think you can see them even if you don’t have Facebook… and if you don’t have Facebook, I have to ask why not? If it’s a statement against the nature of the internet and the fact that it sort of makes us feel connected while actually destroying true social capital and meaningful relationships between people, I sympathize. If you get easily addicted to things and have seen the effect of Facebook on your friends’ social lives, I understand. At the same time though, you have at least one friend who lives in another country (me), and it’d be nice for us to easily stay in touch over Facebook. [Lisa, this means you!]

Sidenote: As I’m sitting in this hotel in Kampala, using their free internet and drinking a cup of real coffee (first in three weeks, can you believe it?!) “Omaha” by Counting Crows came on! It’s a confirmation of my call to Omaha! :) 

 

Peace friends.

July 17, 2008

Rally Driver.

Gloria and I just returned from a two week road trip in the Western part of Uganda. If you know me, you know I love road trips… I love riding in the car and driving; except when I fall asleep at the wheel and crash my sweet Maggie car. :( We faced a view challenges - 1) Gloria hates driving long distances and 2) Gloria’s driving permit was expired, and I obviously didn’t have one. We were not phased, we borrowed a car in spite of those challenges and off we went.

The first day I decided that yes! I could! Live up to the challenge! I took the wheel… and by wheel, I mean, of course the ‘wrong’ side of the car and the road. Plus, it’s a stick shift. So I began driving in the right hand side of the car, on the left side of the road, shifting with my left hand. Throw in about 2 million HUGE potholes, people and bicycles, small motorbikes, taxis, buses blowing past you at 120 kph, large curves, and a smattering of rain here and there. It was great, I love Uganda! Everything when it comes to traffic is a bit, um, fluid. Those lines on the road, the use of your indicator lights, speed limits, you know- just don’t hit anyone or anything and you’re good to go.

But, at the beginning all that freedom can be daunting… especially when you’re wet behind the ears. Still I took the wheel, determined to prove my worth as a world traveler and liberated woman. Ten minutes later I hear “stop, stop, STOP!” from Gloria. I quickly pull over and see two police officers running towards our car.

“How did you fail to stop?!” they ask. (Whoops…. those guys holding out their hands weren’t asking for a ride, they were telling me to pull over.) 

“It’s ok, it’s ok.” Gloria says. “Those ‘Zungus, you know, they don’t know what that hand motion means.” 

One of the two officers looks at me intensely and says “Permit please.” (Oh crap.)

So, I calmly look in his eyes… and get out my Michigan driver’s license. He takes it, a bit surprised.

Gloria keeps talking; “Oh, so you’re Muyankore?” (her tribe) ”Yes.” and they go on for a bit about where they’re from, she tells them we’re one our way to her village. I practice my two words of Ruyankore “Agandi!” “Nimirungi.” he replies. (Those language lessons really came in handy.)

After five minutes of conversation and license examination one of the officers looks at me “This one,” he says, “She’s a rally driver. She could have left us in the dust if she hadn’t stopped.” We all laugh, some of us more nervously than others.

They hand me my Michigan driver’s license, wish us a safe trip… and off we go.

Five minutes later we’re laughing hysterically… and that’s why you should never leave home without your drivers’ license, even if you’re going to a country where it isn’t valid.

July 1, 2008

Bits.

(I wrote this on Saturday- Day 2 of my time in Uganda, by the way, but never posted it.)

I’m in Uganda!

During the two flights and day-long layover in London I had a bit of time to reflect on the wedding of the year- Laura & Justin 08. Some of the best parts were:

 

These shoes Which, while gorgeous and matching our dresses so well, also caused me a severe (and bloody) blister on my heel. Still it makes a good picture, eh?

My favorite single moment was riding in the car with Best Man Kris, his ice cream cone, and the two newlyweds to the reception. We laughed. A lot. And they’re in love. 

 

 

 

 

 

Impromptu photo shoot at the church, while unbeknownst to us Laura’s poor computer was stolen, and other members of the wedding party were frantically downloading music for the ceremony. Haha! 

What a lovely babysitter and date… and this one wasn’t too bad either:

Joey and I were just rejoicing to finally have a good picture of our friendship. There was lots of dancing to be had, from line dancing, to square dancing, to just all around breaking it down… which was when this was taken: 

I’m sorry Amber, but those moves can not be ignored. Shortly after this it started raining? Coincidence? I doubt it. 

~~~~~~

An 11 hour layover in London?! Hmmm… I loved traveling at my own speed and style. I was hoping to see the Big Ben, but since I never actually looked on a map to find it, I ended up wandering around on the Tube to find likely looking stops. I took a nap in the rose garden at St. Paul’s Cathedral and then drank a cup of Starbucks while sitting and reading. I found the Thames! It was like I invented it or something I was so excited, and in the distance- could it be? Big Ben?! No, actually it was the Tower of London, but that too made me excited. So a few sites, a nap, some coffee, EuroCup 2008!, (and Wimbledon- Leah) and a lot of wandering later, I boarded my flight for the beautiful Uganda.

I cried when I saw my Kaalo sister; it was like coming home. We had a long and wonderful day yesterday. I liked my first two meals of matoke, and think I will be ruined for bananas from anywhere else after today, as the fruit here is the best I’ve ever had. Sorry India.

Last night we went with a friend, Douglas, to a house church in a slum community here in Kampala.  That was the perfect way to end my first day, meeting my brothers and sisters. They welcomed Gloria and I so much… except for two children who cried at the sight of my white skin and wouldn’t greet me. Gloria’s niece is also a bit apprehensive of me, but I’m hoping she gets used. We had the chance to pray with and for a few people, it was a gift for me. I’m still praying for specific direction for my time here in Uganda, even if the direction is “Rest.” So far I’ve done a good job of the rest bit… slept until 11 am today and I think effectively killed the last of my jet lag. I loved waking up and thinking “I’m in Uganda!” What a gift!

Thanks for the gift of reading this long post…  Looking forward to sharing more bits of the journey with you. Peace…

June 25, 2008

It’s happening… I think!

I’m on my way!

See you on the other side. 

 

June 20, 2008

the Zilla?

I always think that the world stops when I’m traveling or wedding-ing.

This weekend since I’m the maid-of-honor in my best friend Laura’s wedding, and getting ready to (hopefully) travel to see my African sister on Wednesday, I am a bit distant from the reality of everyday life. But the past week and a half at my parents’ house has been sweet and full of reconnections, from old high school and college friends to home church community.

It has also felt like a lot more time than a week and a half, which I realized a few days ago when some small travel fears turned into full-blown nuclear meltdowns. Too! Much! Free! Time! So I’ve decided to keep myself busy from now until Wednesday with slathering aloe on the sun burns I am constantly accumulating (shhh, don’t tell JZ) and wedding appointments because hey! what bride doesn’t want her maid of honor to accompany her on ALL the errands the week before her wedding? Laura, the most laid-back bride ever, has lovingly dubbed me “maid-of-honor-zilla” which should be funny, but actually really isn’t all that hilarious. I just want perfection, ok?! I keep telling her, “it’s not the wedding, it’s just my personality.” But since she’s not into the Enneagram, it’s hard to convince her of the truth in that statement.

And now, since I was given a camera by my wonderful GR family… welcome to the NEW [illustrated] lifeofliz!

Packing is going REALLY well, as you can see.

 

Had a wonderful goodbye date with my pastor’s family… this is Mary, doesn’t she look like my sister, seriously? I totally held her when she was in the hospital, just after being born. That makes me feel really old. 

 

Starting the decorations at the reception hall… it’s a small reception, only their 450+ closest friends, no big deal. And Laura’s family is cooking all the food.

 

Justin, the groom, is ready!

 

So is the bride! Haha, don’t hate me Laura… it was actually a sad night spent watching The Notebook, NOT pre-wedding jitters… I was laughing for the whole two hour breakdown, sorry to say.

 

At a family spaghetti fest with the ‘Okie’ half of Laura’s family. This picture is featuring my good friend and fellow bridal attendant/liberal Amber… she is great! I’m so glad to have some time with her. The 30 person spaghetti fest is not to be confused with the rehearsal dinner, which only 70 of the closest family members will be attending.

June 17, 2008

The Original Teranna.

I have a few really significant posts in my heart that are being slowly written down. In the meantime, for you impatient readers, feast on this…

This is the “Aquinas Sampler” I happened to have in my purse during my five day trek to ‘Teranna’ in May 2006. I wrote down funny quotes all weekend on this and then stuck it in a pile of papers, which I found during the massive move in May 2008. I laughed so hard that tears were coming out of my eyes. So I thought I’d share it with you. :)

~~~

“Find me a man and I’ll make out with him!”  - Chester on love

“I put my interests on the wall. I like romance, I like… building things.” - Jason from Freetown (which I think was the restaurant we were eating at?)

“I don’t like it when people talk a lot / he totally sucks you in!” - Chester on listening

“I didn’t know if five days was too long to stay at Lisa’s place but then I thought ‘Who cares about Lisa? I’m staying til Wednesday!” - Liz as quoted by Andrew

 

And, of course, my preposterous number of Lisa quotes:

On Relationships:

“He’s very pale and skinny, I’m like ‘Here’s a donut.’”

“Maybe I should stop questioning you… but I can’t stop!” 

“I want to take my brain out of my head because you are so boring my head hurts.” 

On Faith:

“My toilet seat got stuck in the up position. ‘You should pray about that!’”

“Guitar- the Christian instrument.”

“Jesus, why don’t you treat me better?!”

Etc.:

“I ate some sort of weird testacle [sic], I can’t remember what animal it was.” - on international travel

“I slew 5 spiders!” - her feat of strength

“This is embarrassingly laborious.” - as she vacuumed cat hair off her rug

“Under my cheapness tutelage.” - on her mom

You can read Lisa’s tale of this visit here. We attempted a Toronto 2008 trip, but it didn’t quite happen… which is sad since we didn’t get to see Ches and Dave much during their, you know, wedding this Christmas. I’m holding out for 2009!

June 6, 2008

ABC’s by Nick.

Cc

“Church is mostly for Catholic people and First Communions.”

-The Facts of the ABC Book by Nick, age 8