Merry Christmas From the Paechs!

(Photo above - left to right: Abbey, Joshua, Brian, Sarah, Simon, Aggie, Sharon)

Merry Christmas from the new Paech family clan in Uganda! Finally a blog update! There's so much to tell you about! God has done it!: I (Simon) arrived in Kampala on October the 14th and Aggie and I were re-united. It was SO good to be back together again after more than seven months apart. During the following weeks, we were extremely busy planning for two major, back-to-back events: a “Kwanjula” on November the 9th (my formal introduction to Aggie's relatives), and our wedding on the 11th. It was as tiring and stressful as you hear from everyone who is organizing a wedding, but we continually saw God at work, and both events went beautifully! Aggie and I then headed off for our honeymoon to Kabale, a beautiful location in far SW Uganda, arriving back in Kampala at the end of November.

Before our wedding, and with amazingly minimal effort (God again), we found a place to rent within our budget that exceeded what we had imagined! A four bedroom house in a good area, complete with furniture and appliances, AND a backup power system and solar hot water heater! It has some issues that need to be worked on, but we are very happy with it and it is now starting to feel like home.

All the (now Paech!) kids are home for Christmas holidays (Dec-Feb), so we are getting to spend a lot of time with each other and are starting to settle in together as a family. Mealtimes have been excellent with everyone sitting around the table talking and laughing. Everyone has been working really hard around the house - Aggie has raised an amazing family – they all work together as a team (a big change for me after being single for so many years), one that is great to join. Brian built a multi-level house for our (seven I think) chickens and I can hear the roosters crowing as we speak. Sharon has taken over Aggie's cleaning job at IMFC for the holidays, and Abbey, Joshua have been heading out early almost every day to play soccer. Sarah (and everyone else) has been enjoying watching movies I brought from the U.S.

Aggie took a break from IMFC ministry work for the kwanjula and wedding, and for us to get settled in together. However we are really looking forward to getting to work with the IMFC team and doing what God has put in our hearts!

God is faithful – 100% of our first three months of financial support (Oct-Dec) was raised before we left! Our longer-term support (January 2008 onwards) is currently a lot slimmer at only 25%. But we are confident that God will provide for us and we look forward to telling you how He does this (more amazing stories)!

When we have better internet access we hope to update this blog with details & photos of all the events of the past few months but for the moment you can go to http://www.ugandajourney.org/ and click on "Wedding Photos".

Again, merry Christmas from all of us!

The Paechs.

Uganda Journey

Ok, I'm not even going to talk about how long it's been since my last post! But things have really been moving along! I am returning to Uganda on the 13th of October, so 6 weeks from today I'll be there!! Aggie and my wedding will be on November the 11th! Wow! We're both really excited! I can't wait until she runs into my arms again at the airport - it was amazing enough last time - this time we're about to be married!

So things have been incredibly busy here, as you can imagine. A team of people here in Huntsville is forming who will be supporting Aggie & I in many different ways from back here in the U.S. This involves various sub support teams: a finance team, logistics team, accountability team, prayer team, and communications team. The leaders of these sub-teams will be from the church I'm part of, and the members can be anyone else who would like to be part of this adventure.

At this point, the team is not very large and there is a LOT to do, but we are trusting God! This is such a big thing and we are so small (as a team, and as humans) that only He can do it! Right now we're very focussed on finances (the money for Aggie & I and our family to live in Uganda and do the work God is putting in our hearts) and logistics (all the details like shipping stuff, insurances, etc). God has lead us to send me and trust Him to provide. I know He will - this is His thing!! We get to see how He does it and brings it all together, and He'll get the credit for it!

We are going to be raising funds through the support of individuals and also other creative ways, including selling beautiful necklaces, hand-made by Ugandan ladies from recycled magazine pages (advertisement there, *grin*).

We're calling all of this "Uganda Journey". Not just my journey in Uganda, but the journey of anyone and everyone who God leads to join us - whether on a support team, supporting us financially, or in any other way. You will be part of the journey. If you'd like to know more about this, click on this web page link: http://www.ugandajourney.org/ From this website you can also find out more about International Missionaries for Christ (the organization Agge & I will be working with in Uganda), as well as "Life's Journey" - the church I'm part of. At the top it also has a count-down of days, hours, and minutes until I fly out of the United States.

I have at least 2 more amazing stories to post - they've been sitting in the archives (of my mind, that is)! THE Amazing Story is continuing - having seen, and continuing to see God bring all of this together. All the other amazing stories are chapters in THE story.

Love in Him,

Simon &:-)}

Amazing Story #3

Well once again it's been too long since I last updated this blog! It hasn't been from a lack of things happening, that's for sure. The picture here is of a typical "boda-boda" (short for "border to border") - a small motorbike used a lot in Kampala for transport, especially as a taxi service. Imagine me & Aggie on this! That's what Amazing Story #3 is about.

In the living expenses budget for our family (to be) in Uganda, I estimated that Aggie & I would spend around US$1000/yr using local transport to get around. Every day we'll be going from place to place in Kampala - between our house & the IMFC ministry centre, house churches, discipling groups, as well as to go shopping etc. Most of these trips involve multiple routes, and although the individual routes are pretty cheap to travel, it all adds up over time. If you are going to have a car in Kampala, you really need a meadium-heavy duty 4WD vehicle because the roads are pretty bad. And when you have one of those, you're hit with US$4-5/gallon (AUS$1.50/litre - probably what you Australians pay now anyway) for fuel. A boda like this one (Indian made "Bajaj" brand, 100cc engine) costs about US$1400, and would get excellent fuel mileage. If we bought one ourselves, the money we'd spend on transport in just the first year would almost equal the motorbike cost.

When I came home from my 3 month trip to Uganda, I brought back lots of Ugandan hand-made bead necklaces - purchased from ladies in one of the house churches there - with the idea that we could sell them here in the U.S. and raise money to set aside for a boda. But God had other plans! Every year in Huntsville, a well-known suburb has a neighbourhood-wide garage sale, and people come to it from all over the place (even from other states!). Some wonderful ladies from my church decided to have a garage sale to raise money for a boda for me & Aggie! Two families from the church who live in that neighbourhood let us use their houses, and people from the church donated all sorts of (quality!) things to sell. Through the work of one wonderful lady, the Huntsville Coca-Cola factory donated 300 bottles of drink, and a local "Publix" supermarket gave us HEAPS of high-quality bakery goods (cakes, muffins...*mouth starts watering at the thought*)!

At the time of all this, it was early spring here, so the weather was oscillating between cold & warm, rainy and dry, so we weren't sure what the weather would hold for the Saturday of the garage sale. As the day drew neigh, things weren't looking good - a cold front was forecast to move through that very morning, with rain & thunderstorms, and the heaviest rain in the middle of the sale! God was sitting by wringing His hands saying "Oh no....this is a disaster" - not! Everything works out according to His plan, even if things don't LOOK good. The morning of the garage sale came and it was overcast and looked a lot like rain. A few light showers went through, but the people came - and bought! Bought garage sale stuff, drinks, and ALL the bakery stuff. At about 11am, close to when most garage sales have usually seen their greatest flow of people, the heavens opened and it poured & thundered & lightninged (learnt that term during my Master's degree work) and we packed things up. The money was counted at both houses, and put together it came to ONE THOUSAND AND EIGHTEEN DOLLARS!!!! wOw! I knew that was a lot of money, but I (an inexperienced garage sale person) was also told that this is amazing and pretty atypical for a garage sale. And put together with money my church has given towards support for Aggie & I, the total came to right around $1400! So this amount is set aside for Aggie & I to buy a boda when I get to Uganda! Amazing story #3!!

Again God has done exceedingly abundantly more than we could ask or imagine. And I've felt so loved by the people who have come around me (and Aggie) supporting us and being excited for us and enthusiastic about all of this. Honestly, I don't think Aggie & I can do this (or could have come to this point even) on our own, so thankyou to all of you who have been and are there for us. We love you and cherish you!

Our projected (and hopeful (and prayerful!)) date for me to return to Uganda is October. This has started to look more likely in the last few weeks. We're currently focussing on logistics (lots to sort through!), and the financial means. It looks highly possible that I may be able to work 1-2 days a week in my current field of work from Uganda (via the internet)! If this works out, it will go a long way to providing what we'll need financially there. If I do arrive back there in October, Aggie & I will likely be married in December, so anyone who has even vaguely considered coming to our wedding, start thinking more seriously about it! December is one of the cheapest times to fly to Uganda (at least from the U.S. anyway), which may just be great timing for anyone who might come.

By the way, Aggie now has electricity in her house, complete with a small colour TV! This is awesome for her! She also has the glass in the windows, so the place is almost complete. God is good - He provided this for her (and not through me!).

Well until Amazing Story #4 (which took place in the last couple of weeks), siiba bulungi (good-day!).

Simon &:-)}

Amazing Story #2

I'm going to have to update this blog more often if I'm going to keep up with all the Amazing Stories! I can't believe it's been almost a month since my last post. This amazing story is about a couple from another church in Alabama who went on a short-term mission trip with IMFC earlier last year, just like the one I went on with my church in July. Actually, only the husband went on the trip, but this story is about both him and his wife. He met Aggie in Uganda as the team from his church worked with the team there, and his heart went out to her and her kids. He decided to sponsor all 5 of them so that they could go to school! I think that they had been in and out of school over the years as Aggie could afford to send them.

When I was there over Christmas, Aggie was telling me that she was a bit worried that when she told this couple that we were engaged, they might stop supporting her. I said that I doubted that (having a glimpse of their heart through what they was doing for Aggie and her family), although I thought they would probably stop when we got married. Aggie emailed them and told them the news, trusting it all with God. They emailed back and said that they wanted to keep supporting Aggie in this way even WHEN we get married, and that they would only stop when we asked them to! Wow, how's that for trust and generosity! That blew me away, and we both saw this as part of God's provision for us as a family when I returned to Uganda.

You'll probably remember in my post of Feb 16 that Aggie and her kids and I travelled up to Kotido in the Karamojong region of NE Uganda. The reason we went was to take the kids to a boarding school up there, which is what Aggie (and most Ugandan parents) has really wanted for her kids. She did this in faith, believing that God was giving her the go-ahead, and that He was going to provide for her to keep them there.

Back in the US, I called the couple who were supporting Aggie's kids - to meet them, and also to update them on Aggie's situation. They had sponsored the kids for schooling in Kampala, which was about half the cost of their school fees at boarding school. I talked to the husband and he was awesome - he was so excited about me and Aggie being engaged and when I told him about the schooling changes, he thought about it, and then said that they wanted DOUBLE the support they were sending Aggie and pay for all their boarding school fees! Holy Shnikeys!! And he said again that they would do this even when we get married and would only stop if we asked them to. Amazing story #2! God's provision for me and Aggie! Katonda mulungi nnyo (God is very good)!

Aggie's youngest son, Joshua, topped his class at school in Kampala in the term before they went to boarding school. He wants to study to be a medical doctor. Brian wants to be an engineer. Sarah's favorite subject is English. Later, Aggie told me that when we were up in Kotido, she heard Brian, the oldest, saying to his brothers and sisters something like "We've been given this opportunity, let's not mess this up!". These are amazing kids and it's so good to see them have this opportunity to get an education and pursue their passions, and to think that this will enable them to be lifted out of a future of poverty. Katonda mulungi!

Ok, this is a pretty long post, but one more thing! It looks like God has opened up the immigration door for me to go back to Uganda! IMFC has talked to their lawyers over there and have said that getting a work permit for me through them in Uganda is not going to be an issue. Excellent! That's one big hurdle down! Now I'm focussing my efforts on the financial side of things, trusting God to guide and provide and bring everything together in His time.

Tujaka laba gana! (we shall meet again! - not sure if I spelt it right though, *grin*)

P.S. The picture with this blog entry is outside the gates to the new school that Aggie's kids are now at in Kotido.

Amazing Story #1

Not that there hasn't already been a string of these and that the whole thing isn't one in itself, but THIS is an amazing story! When I landed back in the U.S. on March the 3rd, I caught a shuttle van service from Atlanta to Birmingham (about a 2hr trip) before being picked up by a friend in Birmingham and driven to Huntsville. A guy called Jess was driving the shuttle van, and his wife, Denise, was keeping him company. They asked me where I'd been etc, and I told them. They were REALLY excited about it all, and we talked for the whole trip. At one point Denise asked me "What kind of dresses do they wear for weddings in Uganda?" and I told them that for a lot of weddings there, they wear the same sort of wedding dresses as we're used to. She said that she had a beautiful wedding dress that they had bought a year or so ago for their son's fiancee, but the engagement was called off and they'd been wondering what to do with it since. They said to find out what Aggie's size would be, and if it was a match, they may be able to help us out in some way. In addition to that, they asked how they can go about supporting us financially! WoW!!! My feet had barely touched the ground in the U.S. and God was already showing me that He was at work! If nothing else came of it, I thought, I'd made 2 new friends.

Back in Huntsville, over the course of a few weeks, I gathered some information, called a bridal dress alterations place, and emailed back & forth with Denise. It "turned out" that the size that was estimated Aggie would wear was the same size as the dress!! Wow! I emailed Aggie some photos and she loved it! It also just so happened that it was very much like a dress we saw in Uganda that she really liked, only way nicer! So what was left to find out was how much Denise & Jess were prepared to part with it for. I wasn't sure what they'd meant by "we may be able to help you out in some way" - it ocurred to me that they might even give it to us, but I didn't want to assume or expect. They came up to Huntsville this past Saturday so we could catch up and spend some time together, and they asked if they could bring the dress to show me (even though I'd seen it in the photos - being a guy, that was enough for me). The 1st thing they did when they got here was to get it out. It was phenomenal! Not overdone, yet ornate & amazingly beautiful. I could picture Aggie in it - she would look incredible. "So..." I said, after exclaiming how beautiful it was, "I have to ask...how much are you guys willing to part with it for?". They said "Well we've prayed about it and we'd like to GIVE it to you and Aggie". Maaaaaaaaaaaaaan! How amazing!! I called Aggie and she was over the moon and got to thank Denise & Jess in person over the phone. Jess & Denise left the dress with me - it's now hanging up in a massive bag in my room (it looks like I'm marrying a giant!).

Aggie and I both agree that this is 100% a God-thing. One thing we had planned was for me to try and find a dress for her here, since they're even more expensive in Uganda. My feet had literally barely touched the ground back in the USA, and there it was! Wow! Thankyou Denise & Jess, and thankyou Lord! The photo for this blog post is of Jess, Denise, and the dress. I have more photos but we'll save the full glory for the wedding day!

Stay tuned for Amazing Story #2!

Back in the U.S. of A!

Well I've been back in the U.S. for almost 2 weeks now, back at work, back into normal life things. My biggest culture shock can be summed up in one word: COMFORT! Sitting outside the house on a beautiful spring day I felt like I'd died and gone to heaven. Compared to Kampala, the air is so clean, everything is so orderly and flows and works, and I can drink water from the tap!! Driving around in my own car is a luxury. The power doesn't go out for hours every couple of days, and I don't have to soak fruit & veggies in water with bleach before eating them. I can eat salads at restaurants (not recommended in Uganda). Fast internet connections! Uganda toughened me up - even my feet. I'm going to go soft again! "The Projects" - the government housing here in Huntsville are luxurious compared to the places so many people in Uganda live: running water, plumbing, electricity, heating, air-conditioning - roofs that don't leak, insect screens on the windows... And it's nice to not see poverty like in Uganda - but I know it's still there.

On the downside though, #1: I miss Aggie heaps! She is an amazing woman. We are back to 3 x 1/2hr phone calls a week, but it's so much better now that we know eachother well. She is doing well & sends her greetings. I'm missing the joyous Ugandan atmosphere (I'm listening to some Ugandan music online as I write this - http://www.ugandaonline.net/mp3 - from the list, choose "Nkuweeki - Iryn" - my favorite!). I miss the friends I've made there, the boda-boda motorbike taxi rides - even being packed in a taxi van with heaps of Ugandans I think! I'm back to Muzungu food too, which is good in some ways (breakfast cereals are way cheaper here), but I miss the Ugandan food - and Aggie's cooking!

Ok, down to business! It looks like it will be longer until I return to Uganda than planned. Aggie and I won't be getting married in early June. Before I left, I went to the Ugandan Immigration Service and it appears that staying in the country for an extended period of time is more difficult than I'd though. Marrying a Ugandan doesn't grant you that, strangely enough. The bottom line is that it looks like I'll need to go back to Uganda under a missionary organization, and get a work permit/visa through them. The organization that I went to Uganda with on my church mission trip back in July, and the one I worked with this time, is looking into this - which would be ideal, since it's the one Aggie works with, and the one her & I want to continue to work with. My best guess at the moment is that it will be about 6 months or so until I go back. That has actually relieved a lot of pressure on us - it will give Aggie & I time to raise financial support back here in the USA, and we will only begin to plan our wedding after I return, instead of trying to plan it now, along with everything else that we would have needed to get organized. So I'm thankful for this!

I've already seen God begin to provide for Aggie & I - I have some amazing stories - some of you know them! Maybe I'll share them in future blog entries - that would give me something to talk about actually, *grin*.

Alrighty then, until next time! I'll leave you with today's feature blog photo: me in Uganda after the typical "woman-braids-man-with-long-hairs'-hair" photo.

The Karamojong

Hi everyone - the trip to the Karamojong region in north-east Uganda went really well and was an amazing experience for me. The bus trip was AMAZINGLY grueling - I consider myself pretty tough when it comes to travel, but man....it was amazingly long, amazingly rough, and amazingly crowded. I didn't realize the Karamojong area was so remote - for the last 2 legs of the trip we travelled on dirt roads for a couple of hundred kilometres - it was awesome. It reminded me a lot of central Australia - very dry with stunted trees & bushes. I didn't know there were going to be mountains (well, HILLS for you Americans, mountains for us Australians), but there were, and some really cool rock formations and stuff. I saw my first chicken transition from life to death & to the plate (prepared by Aggie's sons), saw the arc of the Milky Way galaxy all the way down to both horizons for only the 2nd time in my life, bathed in an outhouse with a small plastic tub of water & candle (with a cool breeze & to the sound of insects - very relaxing), was served a plate solely of meat, liver & kidney for breakfast (to my horror - but had to eat it all so I wouldn't offend - that cliched thing you hear about happening to other people! I thanked God for the bowl of peanuts on the table!), met the Karamojong people (beautiful) & Aggie's oldest son, Brian, and her father, was given 2 chickens as gifts and smiled and thanked Aggie's relatives but thought "how the heck am I going to get these back alive on a 12hr bus trip!?" (we did! Barry & Freda are now happily pecking around Aggie's Mum's place in Kampala). Aggie's relatives were great & I really enjoyed it. Aggie's kids are now in good schools up there as well, which is excellent. The photo here is of a group of Karamojong girls we came across who were excited to have their photo taken. Amazing photo!

Click here for more Karamojong trip photos!

So 2 weeks today I leave to go back to the US, planning to be back here in late May for our wedding in the 1st week of June! Aggie & I have a lot to organize! So blog posts may be few & far between in the next few weeks, but this is not the end of the blog (although I'll have to think of a new title when I'm back in the US - "Simon Paech's a Series of Fortunate Events" maybe?). I'll use it to keep you all posted of future developments.

Thankyou all for your thoughts & prayers!

Simon.

P.S. I'm feeling better than I was 2 blog entries ago - thankyou Lord!

A Wife of Noble Character

"A wife of noble character who can find? She is worth far more than rubies." (Proverbs 31:10)

Ok, in this blog I haven't revealed *all* of the goings on here in Uganda! As a lot of you know, I came here for 2 reasons - to see where God would guide Agnes & I in our relationship, and to see where he would guide me as far as the possibility of working with the Kampala Christian Church Network (KCCN) and International Missionaries For Christ (IMFC) - 2 things that He put in my heart to pursue when I was here for 2 weeks last year working alongside these teams with a group from my church. After about the 1st week of being back here I already knew I wanted to marry Aggie. She is an amazing woman - beautiful inside and out, and truly a woman of noble character! After spending a lot of time together over the last 2 months, the desire to marry her didn't change, but I felt I needed to wait for God to make some other things clear (or clearer). One of these was the place he might have here for me with the KCCN and IMFC. He did speak to me about this - to start out small and be faithful to use the gifts he has given me - the strongest ones being serving and mercy - "Those who can be trusted with little will be trusted with much". So that was the direction that I needed.

The other thing I felt I needed to see was his provision for us - for me & Aggie and her (to be *our*) children. I didn't feel that I could ask her to marry me and plan to come back to Kampala until I knew that this provision was in place. We would both really like to work full time in teaching & training and evangelism with the KCCN and IMFC here in Kampala, but we need to have some way of supporting ourselves. So at that point I felt that the ball was in God's court. Over a period of a couple of weeks, God hit the ball back into my court - I felt that he was leading me to do the reverse - to move ahead with plans to marry Aggie, and trust him to provide. Yikes! But the truth of it is that all of this has been his thing - so he is going to provide!

So this past Friday evening I took Aggie to a nice outdoor Thai restaurant - and I asked her to be my wife. She said yes! I already knew she would - she has been patiently waiting for me to ask this question, *grin*. We are planning to be married in the first week of June. I go back to the U.S. on the 2nd of March, will get everything ready to return to Uganda to live in late May, and we will trust God to bring together the provision.

Wow - what an adventure! I have to be honest - I've stuggled with fear and anxiety along the way, but God keeps reassuring me and guiding me and encouraging me step by step. So I know we'll continue to see him do that!

I know a lot of you will be really excited to hear this news! Aggie and I will be away until the end of this weekend - we're leaving Wednesday to take her kids to school up in north east Uganda - which will be an adventure in itself! So I'll catch up with you all (with lots of photos I reckon!) when we get back.

Simon &:-)}

(P.S. The photo at the top of this blog entry is after I asked Aggie to marry me, *grin*)

The Kotolis have moved in!

Hi everyone. It's been a few days since I've written because I'm still not feeling well. I think the whole cold/sinus thing is starting to go away, but I think the thing I had for about 5 weeks before coming to Uganda (feeling out of it in my head when I start to do things physically or mentally) may be back. I'm hoping it's just a side-effect of the cold thing. Trusting (and re-trusting, and re-trusting) God - He knows exactly what it is & what's going on. It's a shame because I haven't been able to do much with the volunteer team that's here at the moment. God is in control.

I've been meaning to tell you that Agnes and her family have moved out of their rented place & into the house that was being worked on - they've actually been in it for a couple of weeks now. In this photo you can see that the front wall has been plastered, and the porch area cemented. The inside also has been plastered, and floor cemented, so this is excellent. It feel so much bigger in there - and it's a much cooler place. What's left now is some iron sheeting to form a gutter of sorts on the right side (where at the moment rain from the place next door pours onto the outside wall and soaks through to the plaster inside), glass (& hopefully insect screens) for the windows, plastering the side walls, having the wiring etc for electricity installed, putting a door and window in the store-room, and painting the inside and out. That's quite a lot still, but this place has been built on faith & God's provision from the beginning when Aggie expressed to God that she needed a new place, and believed He said to go ahead. So in faith she had her old mud place knocked down & took on the extra cost of renting another place. And now, about 3 months later, she is in it, and looks around at what God has done, and in faith knows it will one day be finished. I believe it too!

Holy Giant Snails!

The snails here are another thing I wanted to tell you about! The first time I saw one, I exclaimed to myself quietly "Holy CRAP!!" and started grinning and wanted to run off and tell someone! I'd been waiting to come across one again (hopefully not in a dark alley, *chuckle*) so I could get a photo, but the dry season has pretty much set in here, so I think they went into hiding somewhere in the bowels of the earth. But the past few days we've had some impressive rains, and so they've emerged again. This fella accosted me & begged me to scratch him behind the ears as I trooped up the steps here in the compound. How could I say no!? I hoped his slime (or he) wouldn't eat through my hand, or that I wouldn't hear later "WHAT - you picked one UP! You can catch [insert name of exotic African disease here] from those!! What were you thinking!!?".

There are some other critters here that I'll tell you about in future blog entries, including, but not limited to "The Pirates of Kampala City" - the Marabou Stork - a bird with the 2nd biggest wingspan in the world! Stay tuned!

For the 2nd half of this week I've been resting, I've caught an African cold or something (huhhhhhhh - the snail?) & haven't been feeling too crash hot. John Barnett said to keep an eye on it, as us Muzungu's aren't used to some of the "tropical colds" here. If it hasn't gone in a couple more days I might go and get some antibiotics - you can get them without a prescription here.

In other news, last night a volunteer team just like the one I came with in July arrived from Alabama. They'll be here for 2 weeks & I'm hoping to get better soon so I can go out and be involved in what they're doing. It's been interesting seeing things from a different perspective as the guys here planned for them to come. I wanted to go the airport last night to see the looks on their faces when they got off the plane, *grin*, but thought I'd better stay "home" and rest.
Kaale - tu jakulaba gana! ("Ok, we will meet again" (literally, "we will see eachother continuously)).

P.S. I've been watching the first season of "LOST" with Aggie and others since I've been here - cool! Didn't expect that! John & Rebekah have it on DVD.

Monkeys!

When I was here in July, I saw some baboons, but no monkeys. I was told that they were around though, and that there were even some up on Tank Hill. A couple of weeks ago I saw some for the first time! They're really cool! Just like you'd expect monkeys to be, curious and pretty intelligent. In this photo, I accidently used the flash, and the monkey was a bit shocked right after I took it, but didn't run away. Yesterday I saw one holding a tiny baby but didn't have my camera - d'oh! I'm not sure what kind they are - spider monkeys maybe? This guy was about 1 ft tall.

The Source

Today Aggie and I and our friends Benon and (his wife) Betteth travelled to Jinja, the next largest town in Uganda next to Kampala, and about 80 km (50 miles) the east. We were going to a wedding, to see Jinja, and to see the source of the Nile River. On the way, we almost went to see THE Source! We hired a special taxi with a driver for the day, and we had entered a forest area about 3/4 of the way to Jinja when we hit a big pot-hole in the road, and I thought "Maaaaaan, that's SO bad for the car!!". I heard a noise like a wheel out of balance, and was wondering if I'd heard it before, when a couple of minutes later one of the rear tyres blew out. We went straight into the oncoming traffic lane and then fish-tailed back towards our lane and I thought "MAN I hope we don't go into those trees!", and then in the other direction again and I thought "MAN I hope we don't go into that ditch!", and then we went sideways and started to go into a spin and I thought "We're GOING into those trees!!". Aggie yelled out "Yesu!" in Luganda, Betteth yelled out the word for Jesus is in her tribal language, and I yelled out "Jesus!", and we stopped, in the middle of the road, facing the opposite direction. This all began at full highway speed! It was a miracle that we stayed on the road, a miracle that it didn't happen about 2 seconds earlier when a truck went past in the opposite direction, and a miracle that there wasn't any oncoming traffic, or traffic behind us. On top of it all, Betteth is pregnant! We were pretty shaken up afterwards, as we changed the tyre and proceeded on to Jinja, thanking God for protecting us, and reflecting on life and how it is in His hands! (I reflected more on that as we
returned back to Kampala at the end of the day on the tiny "doughnut" spare tyre, still at
full speed!).

I guess that's the dramatic highlight of the day, but the source of the Nile was beautiful! The source is Lake Victoria, the 2nd biggest freshwater lake in the world, and where we went was where the river begins. Men were out fishing in long wooden boats, the water was a deep, clean green, and there was a beautiful cool breeze blowing. It's estimated to take water 3 months to complete the trip from that point to where the Nile empties into the Mediterranean sea! Wow!

Click here for more photos, accident and Nile River source!

Tank Hill

I've mentioned it, but I've been wanting to write more about Tank Hill for a while. I'm living on the side of it. It's one of the 10 hills of Kampala. It's called Tank Hill because there are 3 pretty big concrete water tanks up there that are part of the citys' water supply. There's a road that goes to the top that I like to slowly walk up early in the morning, and up there, there's usually a beautiful breeze to complement the view - complete with Australian eucalyptus trees! The photos here are panoramas from the top - the one with the wetland valley is my favorite view from up there.

It's interesting that in some ways I feel very out of my element here, but at the same time there are things that resonate deeply with my roots - like the eucalyptus, bottle brush, and other Australian trees, banana, sugar cane & pineapple plantations, obsessive tea drinking (I just had a cup myself), biscuits (the type I grew up with), Cadbury chocolates, Milo, British spelling including "Zed" instead of "Zee" for "Z"). Like Australia, Uganda was colonised by the British, and I find these familiar things nice, as well as comforting. I don't know how the Australian plants got here though...I think they're native to Australia, so maybe were introduced from there, unless they're native to Africa as well??

Click here for more Tank Hill photos.

The new year begins...

Hello & happy new year! December was a quiet month here, as far as the work with the Kampala Christian Church Network (KCCN) team goes. This turned out to be really good because Agnes & I were able to spend a lot of time together getting to know eachother. Over Christmas things shut down completely for 2 weeks (including easily accessable internet service) but now things are picking up again. Today I went with Agnes to a district of Kampala called "Salama", a city/village area to the south of Kampala. It took us about 30-45 minutes to get there, changing connecting taxi van services twice, and travelling over some back-jarringly rough roads. Here a group of about 10 men & women from the KCCN Salama house church meet every Monday for "T4T" - Training for Trainers. This is a 3-level training course designed to empower Christians to live a supernatural life (a life that walks daily with God) by equipping them to evangelize (share with other people the good news about the forgiveness and new life available to us through Jesus), and to make disciples (to train and teach others in turn). It is based on the scripture of 2 Timothy 2:2. In the photo here, Aggie is teaching. 95% of these groups are taught by the Ugandans, which is awesome. This is the plan of John Barnett (the team stragegy leader) and the team here - for the Muzungus (white people) to work themselves out of their jobs by equipping & empowering the Ugandans to build God's Church and look to God themselves, rather than depending on and looking to the Muzungus. An excellent plan I reckon! Tomorrow I start level 1 T4T myself.