This week's blog is going to be in the form of a letter to my lovely sister Immy, who has read every single one of my blogs and sent me very excited emails in response to them :) Immy - I love you!! This one is extra specially for you...
It's Monday as I write and we're in Mukono for the last time. It's so weird getting used to doing things for the last time, seeing people for the last time and all of that... Today I'm really excited about coming home :D Sometimes feeling sad outweighs it but today it's all happiness and excitement :) I need to finish my packing tonight and sort out all the mess in the house. It looks like a rubbish dump at the moment - sort of like my room at home! We need to clean out the cupboard tonight and dust the table and sort out the craft boxes under the sofa so that they're nice and clean for the next team that comes. When we arrived it was pretty dirty, and it wasn't very nice for us to start cleaning and disinfecting things as soon as we arrived... If another team comes it won't be till October but hopefully it'll stay quite clean.
I'll do the usual blog thing now and tell you about my week :) Ims, you would've loved doing the mural at Lilo! We got all the handprints finished on Wednesday and it looks really colourful. It catches your eye whether you walk into the school from the front or the fields at the back. The kids had fun doing it and we played some games with them too; Nicky and Ell took some stuff so they could draw pictures of themselves then talked to them about how special and unique they are. That's one of the most important things we've been teaching them. Cos some of them are disabled, sometimes they're laughed at and treated not very well. It's just not fair, and that's why the school is so good for them - it teaches them in a way that works well for them :) We didn't have V.W.G in the afternoon cos there was some other meeting going on, so we're having it tomorrow instead. A few days we talked to Ugandan-Dad about all the plans for the group so we just need to remind the women tomorrow. It's very cool to think that they're trained now and know more than they did 5 months ago. It's a big achievement for them!
One lady called Rose always turns up on time and she's lovely, doesn't speak English but you can tell that she's over the moon to see us. She came round yesterday afternoon - Mama Rachael and some other ladies who live nearby cooked LOOOOADS of food for people from a few local churches and some teachers from the schools we've worked at so we could spend the afternoon with them and say goodbye. It was lovely but also quite sad :( They made some really kind speeches and said they want us to come back soon, only go home for a short time then come back and see the fruits of the work we've been doing! We had to give a few speeches, which obviously resulted in us crying then they prayed for us. We've made some good friends here :)Some of the older kids from Gilgal School came along - a boy called Kenneth, who's AWESOME and helped do translating for Saturday Boys Group and Sarah and Florence, who came to Girls Group and are 2 of my closest friends here. I'll miss those three a lot :( It was good to have time to say goodbye though. We prayed with them and Sarah gave me a watch to remember her by... I didn't want to take it cos it obviously meant a lot to her, but she was being really kind so I couldn't say no. I miss them already :( Church in the morning was a bit sad too, the last bit of all-singing-all-dancing African worship that I'll have for a while. It's so free in church here, you can do whatever! I know it's the same at home, but I always feel a little bit more nervous! We gave the church their presents (communion cups and a bread basket) and did David and Goliath in Sunday School. I'm looking forward to returning to Transformers at church :) I've missed the space you all have to play games! At church in Uganda we don't really have much space at all, but sometimes we sit under the mango tree (remember that song Nick sang from Zambia about the mango tree and how he made us laugh with it?!?!)
Hmmm what else did we do this week... We had Kids Club on Saturday, which was very cool cos we did a treasure hunt all around the compound. I made proper treasure maps of the compound and made them brown with a teabag then burned the edges and wrote out some challenges for the kids and did the same with them. They looked wicked! :D We hid the challenges round the compound then gave the kids a clue about the area they were hidden in, then they had to come back to the front and do the challenge before we gave them the next clue to find the next challenge. The best challenge was to run round and catch a chicken!! And we had another one where they had to stick their hands in some gunk and guess what was hidden in it :) The big prize at the end (hidden in the shower) was a crate of soda and some biscuits for them. They had so much fun! It took ages to get ready but it was definitely worth it... We said our goodbyes, the only one I haven't cried in so far, and then did Boys and Girls Groups at Gilgal. We played a type of rounders, except we didn't have a rounders bat so we used a washing bowl...!! But it worked surprisingly well! Girls vs. Boys, guess who won ;) Girls all the way! We talked to the girls about being strong women of God again and it was really good. A bit like the email I sent to you earlier, about how strong and brave they can be and how they can make good choices for themselves because they're free and loved by God. It was good - some of the deaf girls from Lilo came and one of them tied Becky's scarf round my head so I looked like a Muslim! Some of the kids asked me if I'd become a Muslim lol... It was a little bit worrying cos none of the older girls from Gilgal were allowed to come :S Pastor Murenzi was there and cos of that I think he made them stay in their dorm room. Mama Rachael went to talk to them to get them to come but they weren't allowed. It was a real shame...
I'm running out of time, not sure how much more I can write.. I'm trying to make sure I talk about what we've been up to this week so that everyone else who also reads this blog is updated! Maybe I'll just talk about food instead.... I CANNOT WAIT for tomato soup, crusty white bread fresh from the bakery and cheddar cheese :O I might explode if I think about it too much! Yummy yummy yummy :) Ooo I also can't wait for lasagne and salad. Esp that bacon, pear, tomato and avocado salad that Mum does! Mmmmm. Only six days!!!!! :D :D :D
Anyway! Is there anything else I can talk about? Gilgal on Thursday, we talked to the kids about prayer and why it's important and how we can pray. They all have this idea that you HAVE to raise your hands up in the air when you don't! It was great to hear what they thought about it though. When we said goodbye in the praise and worship session I tried to say something then started crying halfway through and had to stop :S So embarrassing! Leaving gives us an excuse to say really important things to them though, like talking about how wrong prosperity gospel is (that's when people say you're a bad Christian if you're not rich because God doesn't think you're good enough to give you money) and telling the kids how awesome they are. It's good to be able to tell them all of that :)
I have to go now, gotta go get lunch then head home. Busy evening and afternoon ahead! I'm quite dehydrated, I really should drink more water (don't tell Mum!) Love you millions Imo, not long till we get a hug! :D *does excited dance*
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And to everyone else - thank you for keeping in touch with me and reading my blog the whole time I've been here. It means a lot :) This is my last blog that'll be written in Uganda so the next time you hear from me I'll be at home! Please pray that our last few days are full of God's peace and that he protects us on the journey home. Please pray that our family gets used to us not being there and that we'll have fun today, tomorrow and Weds morning and that our last bit of time together will be full of God's grace and that we'll be able to show them how much we love them. Please also pray that our families at home are prepared for our return, that the culture shock doesn't knock us to the ground and that our debrief time in Kampala goes well from Weds - Saturday. Sorry I know there's a lot of prayer requests there! Please also hold the projects and schools we've been working at in your prayers; they need practical and spiritual provision so that they can keep on running. We'll be praying that God pours his love and life into the kids we've met and the women and families we've spent time with :)
Lots of love to you all - very excited to see you so soon xXx
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