Oh Sweet Ugandan Internet

Our internet right now is terrrrrible. So this post was supposed to be posted (lots of ‘posts’ in that statement) last week. If you thought we were dead because you haven’t heard from us in so long, no need to worry. We’re alive!

Last weekend we took a trip to Kampala. We had a bunch of errands to run so we wasted no time getting started early Friday morning. The trip started off with a bang when, at our first stop of the day, in a gated and guarded parking lot, my purse was stolen. Thankfully I had my wallet in my pocket, so no money or important documents were taken. But my cell phone, ipod, memory stick, book, water bottle, sunglasses, hairbrush, etc. were gone. It was discouraging. Lesson learned: never leave anything in your car even for a millisecond. As much as it was my own fault for leaving it slightly visible from under the passenger seat, it was a bummer. Especially because the guards “didn’t see anything.” Hmm.

But there wasn’t much time to dwell on it, because the rest of our day consisted of running around downtown Kampala visiting fabric shops, and stopping on the side of the road to look at furniture. Downtown Kampala is insane. The smell is…aromatic…and there are about 50 bazillion people milling around at any given moment. It was quite an experience! And of course, the curtain fabric that we ended up liking the most was out of stock and there’s no such thing as a special order.

That night we stayed at the Entebbe guesthouse, and the next morning picked up Lizabee Wickett at the airport. Lizabee was one of my high school teachers and is now coming to work at the Timothy Centre for two years. So that morning, while Lizabee and I sat and had coffee together (yay jetlag), Paul and Arleen went back into Kampala and bought the largest and heaviest roll of fabric I’ve ever seen. Then a man carried it through the city on his head and put it in the vehicle. Arleen and Paul could barely keep up. This man was crazy. Crazy I say! The next task will be to find upholstery fabric for the couches that matches the curtains. Which is not as easy as it sounds.

The beginning of this week was busy with a new kind of work. I put aside the sewing machine and markers for a bit (don’t worry, I have returned to my teaching aids and am now making pocket charts)…and we spent two days painting! The one-bedroom duplex guesthouses at the Timothy Centre now have their first coat of primer. It’s obvious that Paul is used to manual labor and I’m not. My back was killing me and I had the start of blisters on my hands. But it was rewarding to stand back and see that at the end of the day the walls looked better than they did at the beginning! One step closer to being able to move in.

And now for the highlight of the week: Irish dancing at the Kitovu Hospital. Yes, there are three things funny about that. 1 – Irish dancing. 2 – in Uganda. 3 – at the hospital. Our Irish friends that we met at the lake invited us to come. They had about 15 or 20 people there. You haven’t lived until you’ve seen a Ugandan trying to do Irish dancing. It was good exercise and a good laugh, that’s for sure! Lessons continue next week, so we may just be pros by the time we come home. (Yes, Paul participated as well!)

Other exciting things worth mentioning:

- I went to step class at the Danish café last week.
- Paul made tortillas. They were delicious.
- On Wednesday Paul went to Kampala to “quickly pick up an order.” One thing led to another which led to another until 5 hours of waiting in an office went by and he finally got the order loaded into the truck. He got home at midnight. Are we surprised?
- Yesterday I bought a loaf of bread. The package said, “Enriched with extra sugar and fat.” Mmmmmm.
- This morning I went for a run on the dirt road in front of our house. Everyone stared at me. The fact that I am in very bad shape made it even worse. Thankfully some big dark grey clouds rolled in and I called it quits just as it started to pour!
- A group of people from the Timothy Centre and surrounding community get together for Bible study every week under a tree. Recently, many new people have been going with their families and have given their lives to the Lord.
- Paul saw a big cement mixer on the side of the road that hadn’t been used in a long time, so he went and knocked on the door of the closest house to find out about it. The lady that answered the door said, “See that man sitting under the mango tree way over there? You must talk to him.” The mango tree was across a huge field. Paul decided it wasn’t worth the trek, and I thought it was a funny story of something that would only happen in Uganda!