Our First Quiet Day (NOT!!)

We were all but finished with shoes. There were no messages to deliver. There were no photos to take. It was shaping up to be an easier day!

Well, think again!

We started with French toast, coffee, and fruit. I haven’t mentioned the coffee, so I’ll take this opportunity. We get our coffee in individual French press brewing pots. I noticed from the start that the coffee still tasted like Nescafe Instant. So I checked, and there no grounds in the pot. It is serving simply as a carafe for instant coffee! The fruit was fine and so was my French toast – mildly sweet, firm but not crisp, soft bread inside. Lisa passed her plate with one half piece of French toast remaining. She didn’t say a word about it. When I took a big forkful, it tasted as if it had been rolled in salt!

We started down by 9:10, but the elevator wasn’t working so we had to take the stairs. We are on the second floor, which means we were up four flights of stairs, but I handled it fine with the cane.

Joseph had big news. On Thursday, Dan had come upstairs to our room because he wanted to ask me about his anniversary gift. I told him I would talk to him and his wife together about this, but not to him alone. He left, not very happily.

He left our room and got on the elevator. A few minutes later, he called Joseph to tell him that the elevator was stuck! Joseph had to go to the front desk and they had to call for help to get the door open and get him out!!

Our program for the day called for a time of talking about budgeting and the Children’s Project. Wayne had asked us to talk with his young boy because the boy had said he wanted to quit school. So when we got in the van, we found Charles waiting there for us. I told him we would talk when we got to the church.

While there was a bit more traffic, it still wasn’t as bad as pre-Christmas. We were at the church in no time. Lisa and I walked into the office with Charles. I took down chairs and we began to talk.

“So Charles, do you want to quit school?” I asked as gently as I could.

“No,” he whispered. His eyes darted downward.

“You don’t?”

“No.”

“Did you tell the people here that you wanted to quit school?

“No.”

“They sent me a letter saying you had said you wanted to quit school. So what’s going on?”

He looked at his hands for a minute. “I want to change schools, not quit.”

Now young Charles has incredible English. He is obviously a very bright boy. He has never caused any trouble to anyone and he has been in the program, so I didn’t understand this at all. Our team is normally very good about getting things right!

“So you have told Vincent or Joseph that you want to change schools?”

Again, he stared at his hands for a while. “No,” he whispered.

“Your English is very good. The school must be teaching you well.”

“Yes.”

“Then why do you want to change?”

He launched into an animated story about missing school because he was sick. When he tried to go back to school, they told him he had to have a letter from his parents or guardians telling the school why he had been away. They sent him home. His grand parents (his parents are dead) didn’t come home that night, so there was no one to sign for him. He went back to school the next day and he was beaten for not having the letter. And they sent him home. Eventually, he got back in. When he fell sick again later, he was beaten when he came back. And there was a teacher who was also beating him. So he wanted to change schools.

“Okay,” I said. “I’m glad we talked to you! I’ll talk with Vincent and Joseph, then we’ll decide what to do.”

They had set up a table for us in the church, so I went inside and took a seat. I explained what the boy had told me as all our team sat very quietly listening to me. When I had finished, I asked, “Is this what you have heard.”

Vincent waited a minute, then said, “No… We went to school to check on this boy as the term started. He wasn’t there. We went to his grandparents’ home and found no one there. We found his uncle, who told us the boy was in big trouble at school because he had taken a job and was working instead of going to school. He went back when the uncle insisted, then started to work again. The school through him out.”

“Let’s talk to this boy,” I said.

We called him in and he took a seat. “Have you been working instead of going to school?”

His eyes went everywhere and he fumbled with his hands. Finally, he looked at me. “Yes.”

“And have you been thrown from school because of this?”

He was even slower to meet my eye. “Yes.”

“So were you telling us the truth about being sick and being beaten?”

“I was beaten, but I was never sick.” Tears were welling up in the corners of his eyes and he was beginning to shake just a bit.

“You were beaten because you were working instead of coming to school?”

“Yes.”

“And you lied to us?”

“Yes.”

We talked a bit about whether he could go back to the same school. Vincent knew the head master there, and he assured us that Charles’ return would not be a good idea because this man would be watching him. So they will find him a different school.

We sent Charles on his way. He never did cry, but I don’t think he will lie again soon!

We then talked for about three hours. We talked mostly about budgeting. I had challenged them to keep track of their spending for thirty days. The next thing I asked them to do was categorize their spending, then to start thinking about how they might conserve. We’ll talk more about this later. We also talked about the Project and the church. They are doing such a good job. They have set up an accounting system that is better than many in America!

We finished around 2:00. We were to be at a church to distribute our last shoes at 3:00 and we were to meet Jon’s sister, Jody, at 5:00. We stopped at a service station and bought somosas for Lisa and me. Joseph chose a huge cream filled creation for his lunch (we are teaching him bad habits). From there, we drove on to the church at Gyoza. It was in a part of town that we have rarely visited, approximately northeast of downtown. The area was very much slum, but not as run down and desolate as some. We drove on a dirt track through a maze of small brick homes. Children began to appear and to run in front of us. We turned around a corner and found a wood plank structure painted bright blue. There were two inch gaps between the boards in many places.

The sound hit us when we opened the van doors. We walked in to a room filled with 400 kids. We had 75 pairs of shoes remaining and the pastor knew this, but it was as it had been before: if we bring more kids, maybe more shoes will appear! There were no more shoes, so we decided to buy bread for all the other kids. Joseph and Vincent went out to buy it while the choirs sang. The pastor told me that the church was more than 90% youth and younger. They were simply everywhere in the long, narrow, barnlike church. And they were very very loud!

The kids sang and danced. They were delightful!

Finally, Joseph returned. He told the pastor to select ten kids and send them over to the van which was parked about half a block from the church. Then, when this ten had their shoes, to send 10 more until the shoes were gone. Then he should send 10 for bread until all were served.

The first ten arrived and Grace began fitting them. As soon as he saw the ten kids stop at the van, the man placed in charge of the door released ten more. When they were about half way to the van, he let the next ten go. All the kids were yelling, and this attracted kids from all over the neighborhood. They all started running toward the van. And mothers from the community started running. And more kids from the church.

The pastor was sitting quietly in church listening to kids singing. I went to the window. “Get out here now,” I shouted above the singing. “Joseph needs you.”

I followed the pastor out to the van. It was ugly. There were kids pushing and screaming, mothers yelling at the top of their voices. And there were Vincent and Grace with about 20 pairs of shoes left and easily 250 screaming kids. And everyone was trying to get up front for the last few pairs! Joseph told me to get in the van. Grace followed a minute later and Vincent started the van. The kids and mothers were screaming at us, but Vincent slowly backed the van down the narrow drive. Lisa and Joseph weren’t able to get to us when the van started so they had to follow the van down the drive until Vincent had room to stop. Both jumped in quickly! The riot was of the pastor’s making, but we had little choice other than to leave the remaining shoes and all the bread with him. Joseph said it was his problem!

This was a terrible way to end our distribution. There are so so many children here and they need help. We can only do what we can do, but it would have been nice to end with a group of happy kids instead of a screaming mob!

Jody lived on another road that we have rarely used. It was near the Katsubi Tombs which I visited last year and not too far from Narimbe Guesthouse where we have stayed several times before. We drove through a crowded market and stopped at a taxi stand. I called Jody to confirm that we were in the right place. She said she would walk to us. Joseph and I got out to find her. After a few minutes, I heard her call me. She hurried up and hugged me. We walked back to the van and introduced her to everyone, and we all met her friend, Aaron. They climbed into the van and we drove up a very steep hill to a concrete wall with a gate in it. Vincent blew and Ronnie, their yard person and guard, opened the gate for us. We walked around to the back of the brand new brick house and went inside. The floors were brand new tile. The walls were brightly painted and covered with pieces of paper with Bible verses on them. We met Patrick, a two year old that Jody rescued after his mother abandoned him. We sat in the living room and talked for a while. Jody is in Uganda with an orphanage. She and Aaron work there during the days. They work with the kids as they need working with. Their house had been only a few doors down from the orphanage until recently when they relocated the orphanage to a large house about 25 minutes away.

After a while, we toured the two bedroom flat then went back to the van. We wanted to see the house!

I napped as we drove through the countryside to the orphanage. The sun was beginning to set as we arrived. There were only about 15 of the 85 kids that normally occupied the place. The others were all gone to their families for Christmas. The kids gathered around the van as soon as we cleared the gate.

They came in all sizes from about 6 to late teens. A large boy drove a bicycle around the small front yard. We learned it was a Christmas gift to the whole group. We went inside to look around. We climbed a flight of very Ugandan stairs – no two were the same height or depth! And the stairway was dark! But I made it!!

The girl’s dorm was at the top of the stairs. An older teen girl was lying on one of the beds. She seemed to be sick. We watched the kids play from above. We also watched as the sun started to fall toward the horizon. It was a beautifully serine setting, a perfect place for these children.

We started back downstairs and I experienced fear for the first time since I’d been in Uganda. I had no idea where the steps were. Joseph walked at my side and Lisa in front of me. There was no hand rail, so I had to use the cane to feel for each step. It took a while, but we all made it down successfully.

Jody had told us she felt badly when we picked her up. She said she was recovering from e coli, but she had thought she was over it. She started feeling worse when we were upstairs and she had to go outside quickly. As we were walking into the front yard to join her, my phone rang. It was my mother. I talked with her for a moment, then she called my father to the phone. He was enjoying the sound of the kids playing. The large boy was riding the bicycle. He was standing on the bar and weaving wildly to the delight of the smaller ones. My father listened for a minute then asked if he could talk to one of the kids. Jody called a young girl to the phone. She was an early teenager and her English was excellent. She is HIV positive. She laughed with my father for a few minutes, then handed the phone back to me.

Suddenly, Patrick screamed. The boy on the bicycle had hit him. He was only scared, no hurt at all, but this seemed to be a good time to leave. I told my father we needed to go, and we all returned to the van.

Jody still wasn’t feeling well, so we took her and Aaron home. We agreed to meet later for dinner once she was feeling better. I also promised to try to do some shopping for her. She was having severe processed food withdrawal!

We left her and Aaron about half way up the hill to their house. We turned the van around and entered the Uganda I had not seen in a while! It was weekend night in a night market. There were people everywhere. And there were taxis trying to navigate through the people. Everyone was moving, shopping at the stalls all lit by single, unshaded bulbs. There were cooking smells, food smells, unidentifiable smells. There were the colors of all the fresh fruits and vegetables and all the people dressed in their street shopping best. We passed bars that were already becoming crowded and cars rushing to get into the bars. It was an absolute riot of color and sound!

On the way back, Vincent told me he and Joseph were late for a meeting at church. We hurried back to the hotel and Lisa and I went in alone. At the desk, the manager came by to apologize for the trouble we’ve had with the Internet. He also wanted to invite us to a food sampling in honor of the grand opening of the Thai restaurant. He said we could come on Monday or Tuesday next week and sample foods from the kitchen!

We went to the room for water, then back down for Thai food. We had soup again, and it was definitely mislabeled, though quite good. Lisa ordered chicken fried rice and I ordered a ginger chicken dish. Both were reasonably good.

We finally got to the room for good a little before 10:00. The day was neither short nor easy. With a similar day lined up for Saturday, we wondered what we had in store for us!