.....today Amanda asked me why my blog was looking so old, poorly, and outdated......in response i replied that the past several months had kept me on my toes with the demands of work and school and the social life that i did not have...(more plainly and honestly i said.."i'm lazy.") anywho i was feeling guilty and sleep wasn't ready to come to me yet so i sat down to newly decorate or just attempt to interestingly refurbish my page of pictures and posts. Pictures? well i did shoot a wedding on friday but unfortunately i got the underhand of the deal and found a pile of blurry and dark photos under my name, so pictures?.....no, not now but with discipline and sun they will come.....also tonite here in this missouri house i was sorting through my facebook (aka bane of my existence) inbox and came across a brief interlude about Africa that i had sent to a dear friend and upon asking Manda if i had sent it to them i realized i hadn't shared around my....sigh....'African Sentiments'...so i was excited to know that i had something to fill up space here! but really i feel like You can't put an exclamation point before such a writing as is coming.....i think i'm sounding silly with this formal language....(i want to be like me big sister Bec, i don't think i can ever stop trying, but i think that sounds more like a personal journal entry now.....) but really most honestly and dearly from my heart i hope and have faith that my writings upon returning from Uganda Africa will touch your heart as it broke mine.....
Several weeks into my trip we took a break from the usual trip to the orphanage, hospital, school, and juvenile detention center and we made a special trip to a place we only knew as JaJa's. JaJa's was an orphanage that was begun by a single elderly woman (named JaJa) with a heart for the Lord and for orphaned children. JaJa lived in a two bedrooom house with a small dirt kitchen, no doors or windows and dangerously cracked roof and walls. She began to take in orphaned children and before 4 months was up she had 28 children sleeping within the crumbling walls of her home. JaJa became a mother and provider to these children. 5 months after taking these children into her care JaJa passed away. A two bedroom house became home to 28 Ugandan and Kenyan children who took care and provided for each other. When our team came to the home children swarmed our van as we drove up, such joy and happiness in their eyes was overwhelming even in their situation. We stayed there for several hours, getting aquainted with the children, doing our best to tidy up the houses, carrying water in old water cans from the well, and cutting the grass outside the house. One of the girls of 10 or 11 and I washed the dishes. I was overcome when we began washing the dishes in fridgid water, a bar of soap about the size of a penny and a strip of sack that we pulled up off the street. Up to my elbows in soapy water with a beautiful african girl singing beside me I called out to God to break my heart and bring me back to this place. As we waved goodbye to the children that day, they knew we had no intentions of coming back yet gratefulness and love still filled their eyes and they chased the van down the dusty road. In their minds they were running after their only hope. There were no plans to go back to that place but my heart was pulled there. Later that week I talked to Mama on the phone and told her about my experiance at JaJa's. Mama went to the church and mentioned the need that I had seen. Well you know the rest from there. But about a week later $1200 was dropped into my bank account. Money that was ready to be used for the glory of God. As a brief overview as to where the money went, about a week after the first visit to JaJa's William and one of the African team mates and I visited the orphanage again, in one hour we went over the general needs of the house and made up a list, as we left I looked the oldest orphan in the eyes and said to her "we will come back". The rest of the week I pulled some money from the account and traveled from market to market collecting the essentials to get this home of children through six more months. We got blankets, rice, beans, oil, knives, plates and cups, water jugs, potatoes, etc. We scheduled to go and visit them that weekend and cook lunch for them that day. On Saturday we loaded up the vans and bumped down the dusty road to a broken down, dilapidated home that was built strongly on their love for eachother. That afternoon I saw childrens smiles, I felt a small head lay against my heart, I smelled boiling potatoes and fresh cut fruit, and I heard prayers of joy and thanks sent up to heaven. We cooked a lunch that afternoon (complete with bottles of coke for all!) for 28 children, when the meal was ready to serve the entire village was there to eat. It was the story of 5,000 feed by 2 fish and 5 loaves, retold African style! There was food to spare when the meal was over. That afternoon was one of the most humbling and beautiful experiances I had in Africa. These Africans do not show their joy or appreciation, they cannont laugh or smile or even cry, they can't even look at you, they are so so overcome with no way to show their emotion, yet it spoke the loudest to my heart. To feed that family and help them through the next 6 months cost $150. So the money that was left over was used to build walls in a little school where they were using bamboo to seperate the classes, it sent the oldest girl of JaJas orphanage to 4 years of University and all the essentials she needed, and it built a new house for a family in the village of Kyambago. This family of a widowed mother and 5 children, lived in a two room house that the walls shook when touched, two beds, the pigs and chickens slept with them, there was no light to see by and no room to move around, we built them a new house in three days at double the size. This money was used in a mighty mighty way! How incredible it was to see these gifts from this church go and spread themselves over Uganda. Thank you.
I saw, smelled, touched, and experianced more than I felt that my heart could handle. But never had I felt more alive than in this place. There is once experiance that impacted and fractured my heart in a tremendous way. It hurts me to relive this moment, this experiance, but by the grace of God, I am a testimony. So let me begin with a passage from the Word of God."When he came down from the mountianside, large crowds followed him. A man with leprosy came and knelt before him and said, "Lord, if you are willing you can make me clean." Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. "I am willing. Be clean." Immediately the man was cured of his eprosy. Then Jesus said to him, "See that you don't tell anyone, but go show yourself to the priest and offer the gift Moses commanded, as a testimony to them"-Matthew 8:1-4August 5, 2009"How can I even begin to explain what happened today?This morning we went to the Katalemwa hospital. When I passed by the physical therapy room at the hostpital, I briefly glimpsed a body lying on the floor, quaking. Hands and feet ridgidly extended into the air. Just the glimpse told me that I didn't want to witness what was lying there. I stood akwardly in the courtyard with my back to the door. The group moved along to a classroom where we welcomed kids in casts or with deformities. I couldn't handle my own conceince or the probing of God. Slipping out quietly I slowly waked back to the physiotherapy room, knowing that what I was going to see could be sickening. Stopping outside the doorway seeing the now still body lying on a thin mat, almost made me turn back. I stepped inside. His name was William. When I came close to him I waved a greeting. He began to quiver again, his hands and feet extended into the air. As i bent down onto the mat and placed my hand on one of his mangled limbs, his mouth opened into a smile. I almost ran. But I stayed to see. His mouth was blackened from the lips inward. His gums were glowing red, in the place where teeth should have been, green ozing sores made his smile. The smell was unbelivable. Flies crawled freely in his mouth, ears, and eyes and all over his body. As I began to talk to him and tell him my name and the adventures of Alaska, he began a mix of cry and laugh. His eyes were just calling for help and attention. The smile never left his face. I tried to brush the flies away. i talked with him and pattted his hand, but my heart was completely numb and shocked. After several minuts another patient was brought into the room. He cried and screamed. His head was swollen grotesquely. His arms and legs were unusually long and seemed like twisted sticks. He was missing an eye and an infected hole bore into his stomach. Ants and flies crawled freely over his body as well. The smell, the sight, the realization was torturous. He looked at me and tears clouded his eyes. I could only take his hand and look at the floor. Leaving the room that day and waving Goodbye to William. I knew something had changed." That day, I didn't witness a miraculous healing. I didn't see a lame man walk, or an open wound close. I saw something simplistic, yet something that couldn't be grasped by an everyday American. I saw an open heart. He was the same man in Matthew 8 that cried out saying "Lord, I am willing, cleanse me!" And the Lord did, he humbled this mans heart, and opened his soul to be loved. His healing was far greater than that of any physical healing. I was humbled. He was glorified.August 29, 2009"Flying. Amsterdam to Washington. My trip to Uganda, Africa is over, the trip home has began. God, I want to be lead by you, living and loving through you. Surrendering. Delighting. Being filled by your joy. I'm not in Africa anymore, but my heart is still there. I can't even cry. I can't expect. I can't even write within these pages the depth or pungency of my experiance. There and back again. It wasn't a story. It was a reality. How do I even process? When joy cannot be expressed through a smile or tears, you know it is genuine. When a water bottle is cut in half to get the last drops of water, when crumbs are licked off of the ground. When a burning pile of garbage might hold hope to be your next meal. Where a great achievement is in finishing school. When home and school are the only places you have been. When you walk miles a day with a jerican of slimy red water to drink, pressing down on your head. When flies eat at open wounds. Where clothes are not a necessity and coke is a great gift. Where Americans are you hope for the future. Where your music is your escape. Where there is no surprise of circumstances. Where only your eyes can speak for you.That is Uganda.That is reality."
-EmilyElizabeth