Lake Victoria

It is Sunday afternoon and Travis and I just got back from enjoying a picnic on lake Victoria. We went into Kampala yesterday and decided to swing by Quality Cuts, which is where we get our meat. Local meat isn't so great and although we can purchase minced meat and chicken legs at the local shopping markets their electricity is as unpredictable as ours and so there is no telling how many times it has been thawed out and refrozen. Anyway we went to Quality Cuts to pick up some lunch meat(Travis insist it should be called sandwich meat) and some REAL cheddar cheese both delicacy's and special treats for us (isn't life funny). So we drove out to a place that we had discovered one time while out and about trying new roads and seeing where they lead. The location is actually really close to a fishing village so we were accompanied by a constant flow of young and old fishermen coming out with their makeshift fishing poles, some fishing boats pulling in their nets Bible style, and a butt naked bather (once again I want to say isn't life funny). The lake was gorgeous and we could see several islands from where we were. From almost any point in Entebbe you can see the lake because Entebbe is on a Peninsula but this place provides a particularly beautiful view of lake Vic. There was a countless array of birds including some King Fishers who are pretty cool little black and white birds who dive in the water to grab their meal, and also to see the fishermen working so diligently and patiently to bring in a living through fishing. After eating we started a new book about a young girls life in Somalia, Travis and I have enjoyed reading a few books together since we have been here about different people in African nations. All in all it was just so great to be out in the Ugandan sun (should have put some sunscreen on) and just see how beautiful a country and a people God has put here remembering what a privilege and a joy it is to be here.

Grace

I feel like I am unable to put the words into the right order to be able to share this story with you and I know that my little post on it will not even come close to expressing it to its fullest, but I feel it is better to have what I can write written than nothing at all. This is the story of a little girl named Grace,

A few weeks ago a family at a fellowship that Travis and I go to sometimes shared a prayer request with everyone, they told of a little baby girl who had been found in a pit latrine. She was only a few hours old and yet had been thrown into the toilet to die. Those who found her just heard a slight whimper because the little baby had been wrapped in a flour bag before being thrown into the pit. The rescuers were able to lower someone very small into the pit in order to bring the baby out and by the Grace of God they got her in time.

After being pulled from the bit the authorities tried placing her in an orphanage but none would take her the reason being, as ironic as it sounds, she was too healthy. She miraculously hadn't suffered any harm in her first few hours and was free of AIDS and any other life threatening illness so she was rescued but without a home.

Through the next few weeks, Graces story of hardships continued she was then placed in a home with a woman from a local church but it was difficult for the woman because she worked full time and therefor had to place her in the care of a house girl most of the time and on top of that her husband was not a believer and had a not so flattering history. To say the least it seemed like Grace's life had improved very little in terms of safety.

The really good news is soon to come but first a few more facts, In Uganda like many other countries it is bewildering because there are seamlessly countless orphans with very few having opportunities to be taken in by people and yet it is very difficult for anyone not from their country to adopt them or have custody of them. Well by another act of God's grace the police authority gave custody of the baby to the couple who had lifted her up for prayer a few weeks earlier.

Grace is in the care of a family who now have four precious little girls. Two biological and now two from Uganda.

I got to see Grace for the first time on Sunday and it was all I could do to keep myself from crying because she is such a beautiful little girl and to think of how someone out of desperation and fear (or whatever reason it was) could throw her into a pit and leave her to die is just unfathomable.

Grace's story is a reminder to me that like her we were are born in a pit and yet God hears our cry and not only rescues us out of the bit but adopts us into his family as one of his own. Loving us and caring for us our whole life through.

There is still a long road ahead for Grace just because the authorities have given her into the custody of a loving and caring family the process of adoption is long and unpredictable. Please pray that God will bless the process and open doors and windows where they need to be open.

Our house

Our house is really looking like a home now especially since the recent addition of curtains in the Kitchen and some wall hangings in the living room and bedroom that help to fill up the blank white walls. Almost all the walls in the house are white and therefor extremely plain. It has been a fun challenge trying to find ways to cheaply fill up the walls. Surprisingly wall hangings, baskets, pictures, frames and other African crafts are way more expensive than I expected then to be. Since we are probably just going to be here for a year it would be silly to spend too much on decorating the house. From my experience in other countries you can buy things at markets for pretty cheap if you know how to bargain. Sometimes you even walk into a market and the people practically chase you and save you the effort of trying to bargain by selling it to you for an unbelievable price. Here they are not like that, some people don't even want to bargain at all and you know that they are charging you way too much. You try to offer a price and they bluntly say no and then you try the walk away strategy which normally works in other countries and they turn around and walk away to. Not to much fun. But none the less I have been able to get some things to help to make our house look more like a home.

Here are some pictures...

Comical

I think that it is pretty comical that we get internet at the house and then neither of us have written in almost a month. We will have to see if we can change that.