Ndere Troupe

Last Sunday night Travis and I met up with some good freinds of ours at the Ndere Center. Recently we heard about the place and that they have a trained troupe of dancers who perform each Sunday at the center. Of course I was dying to go watch the dancers and it worked out perfectly for us to meet up with our friends. Amber and Terril work up in Northern Uganda and come down for breathers every 6-8 weeks. It is alway so much fun to hang out with them when they are down here. Ambers parents were also there for a visit along with some family friends.

Ndere had a great facility with beautiful paintings done by local artists and other cultural art displayed. It was such a neat place. So strange that we had not heard a thing about it before now. Even when talking to friends hardly anyone knows about it.

The group performs traditional dances from all over Uganda. It is also cool how most of the dancers are from underprivileged families so dancing with the troupe provides them with opportunities that they would not have otherwise. The variety of drums and other instruments were also AWESOME!!! It was just an all around great experience.

You can see how CRAZY active these dances are, one dance the guys jumped almost the entier time.

One reason that I was so excited to go to see this group dancing is because I am planning on doing a Ugandan theme Praise concert for the close up of my dance classes that I teach here. I got all kinds of ideas of steps and got some great African Children's Choir music. Also making adorable wrap around skirts for the girls out of a very traditional Ugandan print.

Rafting the Nile take 2

Kelsey, Travis and Clay at Adrift riverbase looking over the Nile.

Last week Travis and I enjoyed a visit from Clay Hearn, one of Travis's good buddies from high school. Clay has been in Kapoeta Sudan since January helping build a school and also volunteering at a local clinic. Check out what he has been up to at http://clayhearn.wordpress.com . We were really hoping that we would be able to meet up with him at some point while we were both here so it was so wonderful when it worked out for him to come down to Entebbe for a few days.

While Clay was here we decided to go to Jinja and let him take a trip down the Nile. Travis and I had done this back in June, heres the story http://traviskelsey.blogspot.com/2008/07/rafting-nile.html . After the first trip I told Travis that it was a once in a life time opportunity and that is exactly how many times I wanted to do it "ONCE". Well, I guess that it had been too long since I had made that statment because I did it again. I have to say I am glad that I went ahead and did because I had a great time. I was so in shock at the intensity of it the first time I went, this time I knew what to expect and so I really enjoyed it. Clay also had a blast and said he would have done it agian the next day had we had the time to.

One of my favorite parts of this trip was our awesome German raft mate who was 69 years old (you can see his picture on the top left corner). He was awesome!!! Our other raft mates consisted of an American medical student, Eeyore (litterally I have never met anyone so melencolly), a Brit and a South African. Our guide was Ugandan and was actually the same guy that Travis went with back in 2003. He used to be a fisherman on the Nile then when Adrift started rafting the Nile they trained him and he has been guiding ever since

Enjoy the pictures and remember to see them bigger just click on them.

Piggy Puppy

So here are some pictures of the puppy one of our Dogs randomly had two weeks ago. At birth he was already HUGE then add on that he is the only one no brothers or sisters to compete for mommas milk, well it seems his name was inevitable. PIG, piggy, Babe, Wilbur, pretty much anything having to do with the fact that the little guys is ginormous.

In fact, he is so large that it seems his hind legs are not strong enough to lift his body off the ground in the least bit. He drags them behind or does a little army crawl. I have to say it is cute but it does worry us a bit. We think developmentally he might be a little behind.

I was trying to get a picture with his eyes opened, they just opened yesterday. He closed his eyes for a little nap right as I took the shot.

Surprise

Heart pounding, I start to sweat, could it be? It surly isn't. But wait, yes, yes it is. It's CRAFT MAC AND CHEESE!!!!!!! For what? How much? This has got to be marked wrong. 4,000 Ugandan Shillings, but that's only 2 bucks. There are only two I better grab then fast. Hey, do you guess have any more of these. OHHHHH here come five more.

It all started with the Mac...

Next I meet up with my long lost hubby who's been flying all day. "I've got a surprise for you", he says. hmmmmmm!!!! Java house coffee which is the best coffee in the world. Only found in Nairobi. I wouldn't say that I am addicted to it but I sure do LOVE IT. Especially when Travis makes me an amazing frothed coffee, his specialty. Could this day be any better? The answer is yes. "oh, that's for you too, but there's another surprise in there" he says. What do I pull out but a big bag of my fav, peanut M&M's. YUMMMY!!!!

Moving on to the the next day.

Oh look!!! It's craft again in a tiny little hole in the wall shop in Kampala. Not just craft though, oh, ohh, ohhh. CONCORD GRAPE JELLY!!!! CONCORD GRAPE JELLY!!!! GRAPE JELLY. I think i need to stop for a moment and let you know that I am not obsessed with food :):):) Back to the jelly. Over the course of our shopping experience we came to find out that there is a certain American gentleman who has found the desire in his great big heart to ship a very large crate of good old American food to Kampala, Uganda. It is like the biggest care package you could ever dream up. We are talking, Bisquick, muffin mixes, hot chocolate, mac and cheese, syrup, jelly, Campbell soups, instant noodles, little boxed cereals and oh so much more. The greatest part is that they are CHEAP(comparatively that is) and he is planing on doing it monthly.

I think that is quite enough on the food surprises. We did encounter one other surprise I want to share with you.

"Surprise, surprise, puppy surprise. How many puppies are there inside. There could be three or four or five". ( I realize that very few people will remember that commercial, but i always wanted that little dog with the puppies that came out of her Velcro stummy(Em that's for you)). We got home last night from a day in Kampala, two dogs greet us as usual but where is Angel? As we climb out of the car we hear a little whimpering, but its dark so we head on in. The night guard got there at the same time so he starts to look around to find what is making the funny noise. Moments later he knocks on our door. With a huge smile on his face he says "we have a puppy". "What?" Travis says. "WHAT?" Kelsey says. A puppy? Sure enough we take a flashlight out and what do we find? A PUPPY. Lets take a step back here, first of all we had no idea that Angle was pregnant. Second, we got poor little Macho fixed for this very reason. Oh, well. A puppy we have none the less. Just one.... Quite odd I have to say but its cute.

So those are our surprises of the weekend. Hope you enjoyed them as much as we did :)

Clouds

This morning we woke up to a beautiful overcast day. Yes an overcast day here is a beautiful one and it is so because it provides a much needed break from the HEAT.Later in the morning while driving to the AIM Air office at the Entebbe Airport I noticed a dark brown cloud over lake Victoria. Before pointing it out to Travis I thought to my self, that's odd it looks like the lake is on fire. Travis then informed me that it was a cloud of lake flies. U huh, a cloud of flies. As an Entebbe dweller I have had my fair share of lake flies and I have seen patches of them for sure with a few thousand clumped together but never have I experienced bellowing clouds of lake flies. Of course, as would be expected, next to be seen were the clouds of birds. I assume they were getting ready for a feast (of lake flies that is). Each of these different clouds reminded me of a Bible study that I had just done the day before.

It is Beth Moore's study of John "Beloved Disciple". Yesterday I was studying Revelation chapter 1 verse 7 which says "Behold, He is coming with clouds, and every eye will see Him even they who pierced Him and all the tribes of the earth will mourn because of Him. Even So Amen.

She listed multiple references of the Lord and clouds including...
Exodus 16:10 - God appearing to Isreal in a cloud
Exodus 24:15-16 - God meeting with Moses and coming in a cloud
Leviticus 16:2 - God coming in a cloud onto the Mercy seat in the Tabernacle
1 Kings 8:10 - Cloud filling the house of the Lord
Luke 9:34 - Cloud comes and covers Christ, Elijah and Moses during the transfiguration.

In each of these examples God is in the cloud, His voice is heard from within the cloud, His glory is hidden within the cloud, and so on.

All of this got Travis and I thinking, in our lives right now Travis and I feel like we are in a cloud or that God's will is hidden within a cloud. Either way we are not sure whats next, where to go, what to do, what should we pursue? It's all so foggy, like flying through a dense cloud where you can't see anything but pure white. PURE, WHITE, hmmmmm. It might be rocky from the turbulence, but as long as you rely on your instruments you will make it through the cloud and see clearly what is ahead. Wow!!! Why would we want to be anywhere other than in GOD'S PURE, WHITE, Holiness and perfection. It will all be so clear when He chooses to bring us out and disclose Himself through His will to us but until then what a joy to realize that in the cloud we ARE close to God. It's alright to be here, to not see, to not know, to have some bumps and turbulence.

Pictures

Here are the pictures of our house which some how didn't end up on the blog about the house.
Remember click on the pic to see big

Rambling

This week.

Travis in Nairobi :( Coming back Wednesday, no Thursday, no Saturday, ok Sunday, well who knows he will be back when he gets back I guess.

First night he is gone night guard has emergency, that's ok the day guard will stay. Next morning bad news day guard has to go too. Thank goodness for friends.

Girl time!!!!! I would be dying here if God was not soooo very thoughtful. Just last week He brought two AWESOME American gals into my life. We are talking slumber parties, chocolate, coffee, movies, talk talk talk talk, laugh laugh laugh laugh and talk some more.

The office... Big CAA(Civil Aviation Authority) man trying to walk all over me. NOPE he is not going to win. I've been down to this guys office time after time trying to get him to change an incorrect fee. FINALLY he decided "ok your right, I'll change it on the next bill" I say "no you wont, you will change it on this bill" he responds "its just $20", I say "yeah $20, and we are a non-profit, mission organization, that means NO ONE GETS PAID". My personal fav, he says " oh but you will be paid in the kingdom of heaven"(with a smirk on his face) that just makes me laugh. In the end I convinced him that it would be unwise of me to watch that $20, which could be going towards furthering the kingdom, be senselessly lost. He laughed and finally gave in. You have to bargain for everything here, even your own $$. (by the way this conversation was all conducted in laughter and teasing although it was quite serious. He really didn't want to give me that money). Ahh, all done. Not quite, two offices, 1 hour and a few metal dicetors later I turn in the invoice(finally corrected) and recieve a $100,000 bill. WHAT!!!!! Yeah, they tried to charge me three zeos over. Fun, fun,fun. Life is certainly not boring at the Entebbe International Airport.

My great adventure. I drove to a shopping market near Kampala today. It was the first time that i have driven there and if you have read or heard anything about driving in Africa it is, well, SCARY. You know typical, two lanes, motorcycles, people, bikes, people, cars, BIG trucks, more people and everyone trying to pass each other. I am proud to say that I kept up with the traffic, passed a few, honked a bit and in general had a pretty pleasant drive. THEN, on the way back i came up on a slow car who is followed by a taxi(Public trans in the form of vans with too many people and drivers with no sense). Finally there is an opening in the oncoming traffic, its my chance, I get over and keep getting over and the taxi/van is still in front of me, I realize he is passing the slow guy too. AHHHHHH, step on the gas, now we are three cars across on a two lane road with on coming traffic. There was no turning back now. Moments later it was all over, both cars were behind me and who new what laid ahead. I took on the unknown with a new confidence. I Kelsey Joy Harris had not only gotten to Quality Shopping Hill on my own but I had passed the three car Ugandan chicken test. I'm a new woman. Don't worry mom, just because I passed the test doesn't mean that I must always drive the Uganda way.

Thats it for now folks :) My rambling session is over.