Title

We have been staying busy over here and if I'm going to have a chance to post about much of what we have accomplished I suppose I better get started.  We have expanded our land over the past 2 years and have started a farming ministry.  Because of these facts we felt it would be beneficial to build a small house for our farm supervisor on the tail end of our property.

Not only will it serve as a home, but also it will help with security.  As soon as we purchased our new land we put up a fence around the perimeter to identify our boarders.  We used two different types of fence posts.  First is the more traditional steel fencepost and the second is a live one.  Basically there is a type of tree here that you can cut off a branch and then just stick it in the ground and it will germinate.

The Foreman for the project

Anyway, back to the security.  Within a week or two, the steel fence posts had been cut in the middle of the night to be sold as scrap metal.  This is one aspect of Uganda that I am still getting used to.  Everything has value.  No matter if it is a steel fence post, used plastic bottle, or plastic sack.  Whenever I think about this I think about all the crap people leave in their yards back in the states.  One raid of bigwheels, garden hoses, and planters would pay for a 3 month holiday from work.  I talk about this flippantly, but it has drastic implications about both cultures.  Don't want to start preaching so I will get back to the house we built.

It has 3 rooms that are all 10' x 12' - for those who don't know ' = foot :)

                                                      - for those who don't know :) = Smiley face

These guys loved to pose

Basically it will end up having 2 bedrooms and a sitting room.  This is a pretty decent set up here because it allows the parents to sleep in a separate room from the kids, which is kind of a luxury.  We also built a small overhang that will work as a cooking area.  This will allow his wife to avoid the rain while she is cooking over her charcoal stove.

As an organization we don't do anything extravagant...on purpose.  Chris and I had been brainstorming how to make a latrine at minimal cost.  Basically this means a hole in the ground with some sort of sturdy cover to allow you to squat over the hole and not fall in.  This is a pretty traditional and common way to design toilets.

Hauling the dirt out one bucket at a time

This isn't even at full depth

Side story:  We had been communicating with some local staff and the builders about how deep we would dig it.  We were thinking that 10' or 12' (remember the lesson learned earlier in the post) would be pretty deep.  They informed us that they were thinking more like 30'.  What!!!!  I thought this was a situation of miscommunication because there is no way they can hand dig 3 stories into the ground.  Come to find out it wasn't.  They actually ended up digging it 38'  deep.  Absolutely nuts.  No miscommunication here.

Back to the original point I was making.  When building or doing whatever we go for minimal expense and maximal function.  The builders and I talked for long periods of time trying to hammer out the design we wanted.  I couldn't really understand the plan they had in mind and finally was just like "ok do whatever you all do here because you would know better than I on how to do it."  I felt like this was a fair annalysis due to it being my rookie venture in latrine building.  Well turns out they decided to build a two stall toilet with a bathing stall.  Not exactly what I had in mind, but I guess Andrew (our farm supervisor) and his family will never have to wait for an open toilet/hole.

Well this is getting long, like it always does, and I must say farewell till next time.

Good night and good luck.

 

Slow to Annoy

1 Corinthians 13:4-7
⁴ Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. ⁵ It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. ⁶ Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. ⁷ It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. 

James 1:19-20 
¹⁹ My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, ²⁰ because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires. 
  
We have been studying 1 Corinthians in our weekly Bible study.  I was convicted by 13:4-7.  Whenever I hear these verses I instantly think of a white dress, bouquets of flowers, and bad dancing.  I've heard this verse a dozen times at weddings and I always think, "yeah of course I should be slow to anger with my wife."  Well, not that I have a wife, but in fantasy land I know for certain I would be slow to anger with her.  


During and after our Bible study it hit me that I am to love everyone in this manner.  The Lord was also telling me that slow to anger may also translate as slow to annoy.  Of course I am never truly "ANGRY," but if I start looking at how often I am, what I define as, annoyed then we have a problem.


I may not have been the best at this type of love in the States, but I for sure am lacking here.  


There are so many things I see in the culture here that I admire and cherish.  

I won't lie and tell you that there are not a handful of things that push my annoyance boundaries.

Traffic cops in Uganda are hard to love.  When you pass a checkpoint they often see that you are western and pull you over.  Lots of times they have no reason to do so.  Once you are stopped they try and come up with a reason to write you a ticket (or threaten to do so in hopes of a bribe).  There is a huge range of random traffic laws that are generally not enforced, but technically can be.  That is what frustrates me so much.  As you drive up you can witness 10 traffic laws being blatantly broken and then when you reach they decide now is the time to pull somebody over.  These are probably not cases of full blown anger, but they are for sure cases of severe annoyance.

Here is a Ugandan line.  Obviously, this is a generalization, but seriously lines are hard to love.  At the supermarket whoever pushes to the front and puts their money in the face of the retailer is first in line.  There are so many personal space boundaries broken in these situations, but you gotta do what you gotta do.  The banks are the worst.  Actually, the banks do a decent job at keeping people in order, but when you come from a small town in the Midwest you are not used to waiting behind 10+ people to get service at the bank.  To make things worse many people at the bank are wealthy (lots of the poor villagers don't have easy access to banking due to transport costs) which means that the other customers are depositing/withdrawing several million shillings (1 million shillings = $400). 

Side note (man puns are a ridiculous blessing God bestowed on us), here is a list of note sizes in Uganda in shillings:
1,000=$0.40
2,000=$0.80
5,000=$2.04
10,000=$4.08
20,000=$8.16
50,000=$20.40
The fact that basically the $20 bill is the biggest and that credit cards and checks are almost never used means that if you are involved in an sizable transaction that you have to carry and count a suitcase of money.  Very time consuming, but it does make you feel like a "high roller." 


Sorry for the really long side note hope you were able to make the connection in paragraphs.  This is painful because it can often be in very small notes and each note has to be checked under a black light to make sure it isn't counterfeit.  Ok, well I need to change subjects cause I am getting annoyed just thinking about bank lines.  Point being lines are hard to love.

This is an image of a T-shirt that I found online.  Really tempted to buy it.  I struggle to love the cultural difference in time and pace.  Things here are very laid back.  I know so many people that come here and absolutely adore this aspect of the culture.  Yep, if you are here for 2 weeks and on vacation or a short term missions trip it can be a break from American fast pace.  If you are here trying to supervise 35 staff and a range of programs, the difference "can at times be not so appealing."  This is probably the biggest area that the Lord convicted me.  I need to find the beauty in every experience and the opportunity to share Christ and his love in every moment.  There has to be a balance between work ethic and relationship focus.  


And I need to strive to love the way the Lord does "slow to anger"
Numbers 14:18
Exodus 34:6 
Psalms 86:15
Psalms 103:8
Psalms 145:8


The Lord is doing great works in my heart.  I pray that He shines brighter in me each day.

Oink was my first word

I never feel as though I'm in the right mindset to blog.  I'm always too tired.  I always don't feel like my writing will be good enough.  I never know what to say or how to say it.  This leads to long stretches with no updates.  I apologize for this.  Even tonight I don't feel like I am going to put together anything great.  Either way here goes...

The housing for both my pigs and goats

I've been meaning to give an update on my animals for a long time and figure now is a good time to do so. 

Floyd

Gypsy

Inez and Shakes

If you have been following my blog you know that I started with goats.  I had a rough start because of wild dogs, but am on the rebound.  Right now I have 1 big male named Floyd, 3 females named Gypsy, Inez, and Maizie.  I also have two young males, Shakes and Mowgli, that I plan on selling once they are full grown.  All of my goats are just local goats except Maizie who is a milking goat.  The local goats don't produce enough milk to make it viable, but Maize is a cross between local and milking (obviously she probably has an official breed, but I'm not certain what it is).  She can produce around 1.5-2 liters of milk a day.  If she was pure she would produce 3 or more.  Many people in Uganda raise goats for meat and almost all of them just raise the local breed.  The exotic milking breeds cost at least 4 times as much so they are much more rare.

Maizie

More recently I have purchased a few pigs.  I grew up raising pigs and showing them at the county fair.  We never did it on a large scale, but from birth I think I have liked pigs.  Pigs cost 2 to 3 times more than goats so I just started with 1 boar and 2 gilts.  About 2 weeks ago I had my first litter.  It was a bit disappointing with only 4, but I'm still please to have a few piglets.  My male is named Mr. Darcy and the females are Flowers and The Baroness.  I'm guessing for future litters I'm not gonna put the effort into naming them all, but this litter was 4 females and they will be called The Supremes.

Mr. Darcy

The Baroness

Flowers and The Supremes

Flowers

The Supremes

I am also trying to figure out chickens.  I have never raised any chickens so I have a bit to learn.  I built a chicken coop behind my house and I'm hoping to have 10-15 layers. 

I have a young man named Dominic who lives in the boys quarters behind my house (boys quarters are common here.  basically they are small buildings with a couple bedrooms, a kitchen, and a bathroom.  people often allow either ground keepers, security guards, or house workers to stay in them as a benefit of their job).  Anyway, I don't need a whole lot of assistance at my house, but it is nice to have somebody at the house during the day when I am at work.  Dominic cuts the grass, takes out the garbage, washes my truck, and feeds the dogs.  I honestly don't have a whole lot of work for him so I figured this chicken venture could be a good educational opportunity for him and myself.  I am planning on making the initial investment and let Dom learn how to take care of chickens and in exchange he will be able to sell the eggs they produce.

Young layers produce much better than old ones so I decided to just buy 2 hens and rooster and let them hatch 10-15 that will become my longer term layers.  First two hens were a failure.  They laid around 20 eggs, but wouldn't sit on them to hatch em.  These first two were what they call Mzungu (white person) chickens.  I changed them out for a couple local hens.  Hoping these two want to be moms.  I also learned that chickens will eat their own eggs.  Had no idea.  On my to-do list this week is clip their beaks so they stop, people tell me it will.

Last on my animal list are my dogs.  I can't say I have ever really been a dog person, but since being in Uganda it has grown on me.  I think my issue in the states was that they had no purpose.  In Uganda dogs are the best security you can have.  They don't fall asleep on duty, they always know when somebody is near the house, and they only demand food and love as payment.  A large majority of Ugandan's are scared of dogs.  The reason for this is that almost 100% of dog owners own them as guard dogs.  There are no yippy dogs that ride in purses here.

Max

I started with a hand-me-down dog named Max.  I say that and it sounds like he might not be that great of a dog.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  He comes from a long line of pure bred Ugandan street muts.  Max can be a bit obnoxious at times, but he is big, his bark is loud, and he can easily intimidate anybody he doesn't know.  He is great!  I then found him a companion named Evelyn.  I raised her from a pup and she did well enough, but she chewed the electrical wires on my truck 4 times which diminished my affection for her.  Lucky for me I found a new job for her.

Recently we have purchased 4 more acres of land in the village where our sponsorship program is located.  Because of the increase in land we needed to add a security guard to patrol the new big area.  We don't have electricity out there and this makes the guards job difficult.  I realized how beneficial it would be for him to have a dog to patrol with him.  Evelyn, the job is yours!

Because she was going out to the land I needed a replacement.  I found a family in town that breeds German Shepards and was able to purchase a pup.  I have decided to name the little guy Shadow and am excited about his addition to my household.

Shadow

Ok, so this is way longer than I imagined it would be and I apologized if i dragged on.  Maybe it is my subconscious trying to make up for my lack of updates.














Thanks for checking in.

Maize for my dad

 Well my dad mentioned that he wanted to see how our maize was doing.  I don't currently have time to type much up about it, but figured I'd post the pictures regardless.  These were taken probably on the 15th of June or so.  I don't remember exactly.  You probably can see that we had to replant some of our field because of very poor germination, but we learned our lesson. 

Kids are back in school

Term 2 of the Ugandan school year started recently.  I suppose I will take this time to explain a bit about the Ugandan school system.  Be sure to take everything I say with a grain of salt cause I am still learning the intricacies of it (Blasted British influences).

They don't have spring mattresses here, instead it is just a big piece of foam

I'm a list guy.  I think because it helps me organize, but also it lets me avoid one of my badest suits...English and grammar.  No transitions needed in a list.  No real sentence structure or punctuation is required.  Gotta love lists.

1.  You are able to start school around age 3 in nursery, but many children don't due to cost and wait till age six and just go straight into Primary 1
2.  There are 3 levels of nursery: baby class, middle class, and top class
3.  You then move onto primary which there are 7 classes.  P1 up to P7
4.  P7 is a very important year cause you take your first permanent record exams and the results determine which secondary school accepts you
5.  These exams are called PLE (primary leaving examination).  This past holiday we for the first time implemented holiday tutoring.  We paid some school teachers to come out to our land and work with the kids that were approaching the important exam years.  It allows them some extra study time and more attention from the teachers due to the reduction in kids present.
6.  Because of their importance many kids in P6 and P7 go to school longer hours and even attend on Saturdays.
7.  Then you go on to secondary.  Secondary is the equivalent of high school
8.  There is technically S1 through S6, but many don't continue on after S4.  From what I have gathered S5 and S6 are preparatory years for University.  So, if you plan to pursue vocational or can't afford University then you often stop after S4
9.  At the end of S4 you take another set of exams that allows you to pick a future track of study.  These exams are called your "O" level exams and basically there are different subject combinations that you can choose to focus on based on your scores which theoretically will prepare you for a University education in that field
10.  High school, secondary, college are all terms that describe these S1-S6 schools.  University is the only term that refers to what we know as college.  Pretty sure that is the Brits again.
11.  There are 3 terms of school, which are all about 3 months long with about 1 month in between each
12.  School year starts at the end of January or the beginning of February and ends beginning of December
13.  Ugandans seem to define real success as finishing through University despite the fact that the majority of work available is vocational.  Also, they seem to believe that boarding school is always better.  Most decent secondary schools are boarding and most families will send their kids to boarding even in primary if they can afford it.  This means that kids as young as 6 are shipped off for 9 months out of the year.  I don't like primary boarding and see it to be nearly the same as orphanages.  I don't want to say luckily, but I am kinda glad most families can't afford to send their kids to primary boarding.  *This is my take on it
14.  If you have read this far into these details I am impressed and want to thank you for your interest in all that I do.  Also, you obviously care about me more than those who skipped over and I therefore think you are much sweeter.  I will add one more fact at the end as to hide this from the lazy readers who don't deserve my gratitude.
15.  School fees and school supplied significantly increase as you continue on in your education.  I making rough guesses here without looking at any of our numbers so these could be off.  Nursery around $25-$50 a term (day school).  Primary $35-80 per term (day school).  Secondary $250-$500 per term (boarding).  University $500-800 per term.

Alright on to the interesting stuff.  There are many things than need to occur to get all 581 of our kids back in school.  First, we have to pay school fees at over 35 schools.  This is becoming easier because we are pushing for the schools to allow us to do bank transfers so we no longer have to run the actual cash to the school.

These are the trunks (or as they are called here suitcases) that the boarding students load all there stuff in and take to school to use as footlockers

Then we have to buy all the supplies.  For the nursery and primary kids it is mostly crayons, notebooks, pencils, pens, and toilet paper.  Yep toilet paper.  Part of the list of supplies required is bringing your own portion of the TP for the school.  Secondary and university kids are much more difficult.  It grows to a much longer list because they are boarding and also need daily living items like; soap, razors, basins, towels, sheets, mattresses, torches (flashlight), brooms, mops etc...

Here is Sam (our bus driver holding the mops), Siraji (a mentor on staff in the tan shirt), and Oliver (head of sponsorship in red) buying several hundred mops and hard bristled brushes in central market.

Our current system operates like this.  Oliver, the mentors and myself go and buy about 4 pickup loads of supplies and bring them to my house.  They are then stored in my living room until the day before the secondary kids go back to school.  We then hire a flatbed truck to come and load all the stuff up to take it to the Amazima land where it will be sorted, bagged, and distributed (side note:  we are hoping to build a bigger storage building at the land to accommodate this as well as some of future farming plans).

My living room leading up to 1st term

My living room leading up to 2nd term

Loading the big truck at my house to take the supplies out to the Amazima land for distribution

Oliver hard at work.  I love this woman and would be lost without her.

Once supplies are distributed then I thank the Lord for the opportunity that Amazima supporters are giving these kids and pass out from exhaustion.  Again, thank you all for taking interest in how God is working all the way on the other side of the world.   Most of all thank you for your prayers. 

I love my parents!

My parents came to visit a bit back and it was really nice to show them what life is like for me over here.  They came for about 10 days and we stayed busy the whole time.  I wasn't able to take off the whole time they were here, but they were more than willing to accompany me while I did my work and were so patient.

It was a whirlwind of a tour.  It was my goal to show them as much of Uganda and my life/work here as possible.  We were also able to go on Safari the last couple days of their time here which was a first for us all.

Here is a list of some of the things I was able to show them
-Masese Women's Group
-Masese Co. Primary lunch program
-Jinja Central Market
-Sponsorship Saturday Program
-Lumber yards, welder's shop, craft shops, and posho mills
-My house
-Amazima Office
-Several of my favorite places to eat (including Ethiopian in Kampala)
-Katie's house and family
-My church
-Amazima Playground and Farming project
-Rhino Sanctuary
-Murchison National Park

They brought me tons of goodies as well.  You know your parents love ya when they come with 4 suitcases of stuff for you and pack all their clothes in their carry-on bags.  They brought tons of food as well as some random things like guard dog warning signs and animal ear tags.

God blessed me with incredible parents and I am so thankful for how supportive they have been, not only with my move to Africa, but in everything I have done.  I love you mom and dad and thank you for helping shape me into who I am today  It was their faith and love for our Savior that stirred my heart in the same direction.  I can't be more grateful! 

 I didn't get many pictures of the random day to day stuff that we did, but here are a few of our trip up to Murchison.

 Can't wait for them to come again (my parents not the hippos)