BLOG NO 9 - 17TH OCTOBER 2014

BLOG NO 9 – 17TH OCTOBER 2014

And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast. To Him be the power for ever and ever. Amen.

1Peter 5 : 10-11

First of all thank you for your prayers -

The problems at the school have been resolved and and it does feel as if a cloud has lifted to allow life to return to normal.

Kato Patrick is now back at work having recovered from typhoid, the eyes are twinkling again!

A few days ago we saw the young couple who lost the baby. They are very philosophical and so strong. They thank you for your prayers.

All 504 of our students had returned safely by the third week of term – for some it takes a while to remember the day and then to travel, and for some they are waiting until the school fees can be found.

Our Activate and English lessons have resumed, as has cricket!

The security improvements at The Bridge have been completed and the computers installed. They will be such a blessing to the local primary school children who come to The Bridge as there are no such opportunities in the local schools. The computer teacher, Brenda, has started her first lessons. We sat in on the first one when the students went nowhere near the computers – it was entitled 'This is a computer and this is what it can do'. They were awestruck!

We now have another new nurse/midwife at The Rock, Lillian. She is delightful and the two nurses are working well together.

Did you spot the deliberate mistake in the last blog photos – the goat on a termite mound – was a sheep!

Bad timing of the week – Stan went into Kampala, into the bank, shopping malls and a café, on the 13^th September. When he got home we heard on BBC World Service that the US embassy had told it's citizens not to go anywhere near malls or cafés that day as they had received intelligence that a bomb was to be planted (it was four years to the day since a café in Kampala was bombed).

The police did in fact arrest someone with explosives so this time not a false alarm. However the good old UK embassy said nothing and the malls were full of us stiff upper lip British who would not be put off shopping!

We spent a brief but very enjoyable couple of days going to Murchison Falls Game Reserve, calling in at Ziwa rhino sanctuary on the way. Both places were awesome in the real sense of the word. Stan trekked with a guide through the bush after a herd of rhino. I stayed in the car and the rhino obliged by turning abruptly and walking right in front of the car, causing Stan and the guide to jump back in sharpish!

In Murchison we drove through the reserve in our own car which involved a great deal of off-road driving in the torrential rain by Stan, who secretly loved it! We were fortunate to see herds of buffalo and various types of antelope – hundreds, as far as the eye could see. We also saw elephants, giraffe, warthogs, everything in fact we wanted to see except leopards and lions. But as the guide explained, cats don't like water! We plan on going back when Will is here and will hope to see some big cats then.

To get to the game reserve involved crossing the Nile on a car ferry, and later that day we even managed to fit in a brief boat trip up river to the falls.

We realised that two items on our 'bucket list' had been crossed off in one day – a safari in Africa and a boat ride up the Nile!

Recently we had a group of volunteers from Kampala International School, 25 students and 4 teachers. They used the guest house as a base/chill out area/shower area! They were great fun and very enthusiastic. They spent the mornings planting grass and making 'Tippy' bottles for hand washing outside the latrines, and the afternoons in running workshops for Senior 1 in such diverse subjects as drama, creative writing, making a WTA newsletter, making 'house' boards, art projects and making a 'lip-dub video' (no we didn't know what it meant either) of the song 'Happy'.

In the evenings they prepared a myriad of games and sports tournaments which the whole school were able to take part in.

On Friday all the projects were presented to the school followed by lunch provided and prepared by the KISU students. We needed a few days to lie down in a darkened room with a gin and tonic, but apart from that it really was great fun!

Will arrived last Friday and we have already got him in the timetable to teach Biology, he's already successfully completed his first three Activate lessons and played a couple of football matches. So great to have him here and be able to show him around.

You will remember in the last blog we said we had a cobra at the bottom of the garden. We still haven't got a photo of it (and I confess I am quite pleased), but we did find this very large skin that it had shed, which means there is an even larger cobra slithering about now! On a positive note – there are no mice around!

And on the subject of wildlife – you will have seen in the previous blog the pictures of our two ferocious guard dogs Tusker and Juno. They belong to Jerry and Elspeth who one day will be taking them back to the UK, and we have loved having them. In reality they are lovely and very soft, except (with Tusker) where chickens are concerned.

Unfortunately one day the gate was left open and he followed Stan (unbeknown to Stan) through the school into the village where he found a slow chicken. And unfortunately the worst happened.

Stan then had to trace the owner and offer blood money, but the lovely old lady told him that of course she didn't want money as we were her neighbours! She then offered the chicken to him to take home for the dog!

Tusker was in disgrace, but a few days later redeemed himself when he rescued Sue from a rat the size of Lichtenstein that was in the house – the end was swift!

Sad news recently – our Biology and PE teacher Nesimye Juliet died suddenly after suffering a heart attack, she was only 24. Stan took Charles and some of her colleagues to the funeral in her village which was three hours drive north and was attended by over 600 people. Such a reminder of how fragile life is here.

We changed our Activate lessons that week to be able to talk about how the students felt and about the promise for us all that was such a comfort to them. They knew Juliet was a very strong Christian so we were able to talk about where she had gone.

And – under the heading of 'things you never thought you would do' – Sue was given the task of answering all the questions raised following the last health talk from The Rock. As both members of staff are new (the other two have recently left) it seemed unfair to ask them to do it, so Sue drew the short straw!

Of the 150 questions 50% were about sex and 50% about disease, in particular HIV/Aids. Most were myths, and dangerous ones at that – examples – you can't catch Aids if you drink merinda soda before sex, you can't catch Aids if you are circumcised, you can't get pregnant the first time you have sex. The questions were answered over two assemblies.

The students were quiet and attentive, and many of them said afterwards how grateful they were to have some proper answers to their questions from someone they trusted, which was a wonderful compliment. As we are still learning – God only asks you to do things He knows you can handle!

Best email of the week – from our medical suppliers after we reminded them for the refund they had promised us in August, “the process is a bit long because the paper work has to move from one desk to another” - fair enough then!

As this was written in haste the photos aren't labelled, so you will see – in no particular order – returning to school, revision, the KISU visit – workshops, sport, games, grass planting and lunch preparation. Rhino trekking at Ziwa, various wild animals at Murchison Falls Game Reserve, the Nile (note British engine powering the ferry!), the falls. The bungalow at the side of the Nile is where the Queen stayed! Will getting stuck in to football – and the hammock – and Nile Special! And – beautiful African sunsets. 

And finally please pray for one of our students who nearly died during the night recently from lack of blood. It seems she had a botched abortion in one of the villages. Thank the Lord that she was discovered by another girl in the dorm and taken to hospital and is now recovering. The procedure happened when she was away from the school supposedly to collect school fees from her parents.

With love

Sue and Stan x