.Zoe.

This past weekend I had the privilege of visiting New Hope, a home for fatherless and motherless children in Kasana. I left Friday afternoon with a UCU student named Medie (Medie is from Kasana and attended primary and secondary school at New Hope). After sitting in a few different crowded and sweaty taxis, wandering through the crowded streets of Kampala, and getting pulled over by the police, we arrived in Kasana five hours later (about 2-3 hours longer than it would take if we had our own private hire). I was so glad to have had Medie with me, both for company and direction.
Medie’s father, a devout Muslim, has worked for New Hope for many years. Although it is a Christian organization, he enrolled Medie in their primary school, where Medie chose to give his life to Christ. Because of this, his family became very upset and stopped financially supporting him. Medie has maintained his faith and enrolled at UCU, where he has had to work extremely hard to pay his way through- he barely gets by (this is frustrating because he has some well-off relatives who could help him out, but refuse to because he has turned his back against Islam).
Medie and I got to New Hope late Friday night and I met up with a wonderful woman name Nancy, who has worked at New Hope for fourteen years. Nancy generously housed me and fed me during the weekend. Nancy lives on one of New Hope’s sites, which consists about 200 acres of land…. So her house is pretty much in the middle of a huge gorgeous field. It was so refreshing to be away from campus, on my own, and out in the country for a couple of days!
Saturday morning, Nancy and I got up early (after eating a delicious breakfast of chocolate chip oatmeal and an entire press of coffee!!!!!!!) and went to clean one of the classrooms. I had the opportunity to talk with a lot of the staff on sight as well as get an extensive tour of New Hope; I was beyond impressed.
New Hope is the home to around 140 orphans, 120 staff, and it serves a total of about 500 children in the community. It runs a primary school, secondary school, clinic, farm, an institute (for staff and people going into ministry), church, a baby house, offices, and seven family units. Each family unit consists of around 15-20 orphans and their adopted parents. All of the orphans are extremely well supported—they each have counselors, staff assigned to them as mentors, and opportunities to go to school, do vocational training, and start their own businesses (one night we bought hamburgers and chips..also known as fries… from one of the older girls). It was so encouraging to see an organization that is run entirely for the children… everyone on staff is so genuine and passionate about serving the fatherless in Uganda. They are all working hard to make New Hope self-sustaining, eventually they plan to have no foreigners on staff.
Along with hearing many moving stories about the children and staff, one of the most transforming moments of the weekend was on Saturday night when the children held their monthly worship service. For weeks now, many of the kids have been learning to play guitar, so about 5 guitarists, their teacher, and countless vocalists led worship. Not only was it amazing to worship with Ugandans, but also halfway through the service the power went out. This is nothing new for Africa, but considering we were out in the middle of nowhere, it was PITCH BLACK. Yet we continued to sing and worship for another 30 minutes, and as we were doing so, a huge rainstorm came! Worshipping the same God with 100s of orphaned children amidst pouring rain. I couldn’t have asked for a better Saturday night.
Another highlight of the weekend was having the opportunity to play with the orphaned babies at the baby house. This weekend there were only four babies there, but apparently they have had up to 12. Nancy and I took a beautiful baby girl, Zoe, with us to church on Sunday and I got to hold her for over two hours because she fell asleep on my lap. It was literally painful to leave her after church. Zoe is one of the most calm and joyous babies I have ever met; yet the circumstances she comes from are anything but happy. Zoe was born about a year ago in a pit latrine. Her mother was only 17 when she had her and claims that she did not know she was going to give birth, hence the reason Zoe fell into the latrine. During the beginning of her life, Zoe did not have the will to eat or sleep. It was as if she did not have the will to live. But after living at the baby house for 6 or so months (during which time she contracted a horrible case of malaria), Zoe began to thrive. While holding Zoe, I could not help but to think of all of the millions of orphans in Uganda, particularly all of those that are abandoned in pit latrines. I am so glad that there are wonderful places such as New Hope to love and care for kids such as Zoe.
This Friday we all leave for Soroti for ten days for our rural home stays! I’m not totally sure what to expect yet, and how living with a family there will compare to living with a family in Mukono, but I will let you know as soon as I return!!!
Love and miss you all like crazy! And sorry if I haven’t gotten your letters or packages yet, they can take up to two months to get here…. TIA (this is Africa)!!!!!!!!!!!!!... also, if you happen to send me a package, it will get here muchhh faster in a padded envelope, rather than a box.
Alive in His grace, Kelly
P.s. I joined the Buganda tribal dance group last week!!! Except I looked NOTHING like the Ugandan girls who were doing it….hopefully I can bust a few moves when I get back. :-D

Being Present: Life as a Mzungu in Africa.

As time is flying by and I am becoming more and more comfortable with my surroundings, I am beginning to realize how much I will miss this place when I leave. Lately I have been working on being Present in every situation and soaking in the beauty of Uganda. One of the main themes of the semester has been learning to be present—to be a learner at all times. As an outsider in Uganda, it is my job to listen, observe, ask questions, be silent, and take everything in. often times, westerners will come into places, such as Uganda, and try and impose their culture and ideals on the people. God has been teaching me that the best way to love on people is just to be present with them. To be okay just being. sitting, listening, eating, walking-- whatever it may be. By learning to just be present, I am also learning to practice humility. I am no better than Ugandans because I am from America, take warm showers, drive a car, own more than three shirts, eat a variety of foods every day, have clean water to drink, and have white skin. My traditions, sense of humor, taste in music, etc. are not better than any Ugandan’s. I know this is a simple statement, even an obvious idea, but becoming a learner has been much more difficult than I had anticipated. I have felt very humbled by the fact that although our world consists of a diversity of cultures and people, we are all human beings—people who desire to love, be loved and experience the richness of life.

Here are some beautiful things about Uganda that I never hope to forget:

-       - the large variety of birds

-       -people saying “sorry” every time I trip, drop something, etc.

-       - the slow pace of life: people sitting all day on their verandas

-       - music being played in public at all times

-       - adorable naked babies

-       -brightly painted buildings

-       - lush, green, trees, big rain drops, huge sunsets and sunrises, big puffy white clouds, bright blue skies, bright orange and pink skies, thousands of bright stars

-       - having to repeat myself at least 3 times in every conversation

-       -my lumpy pillows

-       - little shops everywhere full of random things

-       - bright red mud

and the list continues…..missing you all in Uganda! I would love to hear how your lives at home are going as well! At times it is hard being so separated from all of you and life at home. So keep me posted!!!!!!

Unreal.

Family & Friends!
The past few weeks of my time in Uganda have been absolutely unreal. Unreal in the sense that I have experienced some unreal cultural incidences (such as learning how to shop in a crowded market in Kampala where everyone is grabs your arm because you are white; such as riding in an open-sided, hour long, bus ride along the Nile with Ugandan, American, Australian, and Kenyan white water rafting guides and singing and laughing with them all the way; such as delivering milk with my home stay brother Joel; and such as attending an all day Scripture Party and being the only white person there; such as helping my roommate take out her red and brown weave; and such as watching my friend getting body-painted and perform in a tribal dance)….
Unreal in the sense that I am learning an incredible amount (about Ugandan politics and the corruption that follows; about the HSMF and the LRA and the impact that they are still having on the people of northern Uganda; about African traditional religions and the role they play in Ugandan every-day life; about Ugandan taboos, saying, myths, and proverbs; about poverty and the selfishness of the West; about living simply; and about the fact that I now feel more comfortable in poor towns like Mukono than at fancy resorts in Jinja)…
Unreal in the sense that I have been stretched emotionally, physically, and spiritually (as I have become more settled, homesickness has finally sunk in, but I am learning to live in the present and enjoy every moment of every day that I have here; being in Uganda is absolutely exhausting—I pass out every night around 10:30 because I am so drained from a day of walking, learning, difficult conversations, new concepts, cultural misunderstandings, and a full stomach of rice and beans; I was physically stretched last weekend went I went white water rafting on class five rapids and Bungee jumping 145 ft. over the Nile—the most petrifying, exhilarating, and exciting 30 hours of my life; spiritually stretching in the sense that God is revealing himself to me in new ways every day… I am just praying that he will continue to give me guidance as to what he wants me to do with all that I am learning, seeing, and experiencing; spiritually stretching in the sense that I am surrounded by a very faithful community of people—Africans incorporate their beliefs… whether they are traditional religions, Christianity, or Islam… into every part of their lives)….
Unreal in the sense that I still cannot believe that I am here, and that I am still here. Does that make sense? I have been talking to my roommates lately about how it feels like I am in a perpetual dream. Uganda is so different from anything that I know; I still cannot get used to the fact that this is my home, and I am not leaving for another two months.
For anyone who has ever studied abroad, you can sympathize with me when I say that writing a blog about my experience is ridiculously difficult. Attempting to put everything to words is very overwhelming, and I hope you can all forgive me when I say that there is sooo much more that I could be telling you.
Thanks again for all of your prayers and thoughts. I’m definitely feeling them over here :-D
By the way, if anyone gets a random urge to send me a package or a letter, here are some items that I am dearly missing:
- granola bars/ energy bars
- chocolate of any sort
- Mexican hot sauce (weird, I know… but the food is REAL bland)
- Plain t-shirts or tank tops (mine are already 6 times bigger than their normal size because of hand-washing.. even plain Hanes v-necks are lovely)
- Lollipops
- Candy corn!!!
- YOU (good one, right?)
Here’s my address in case you get the urge to write or send something (btw, don’t send anything later than the first week in November… it may not get here before I leave… or at all……):
Kelly Ranck, Uganda Studies Program
Uganda Christian University
PO Box 4
Mukono, Uganda
Thinking of you all daily!!!!!

Meet the Nagolos

Olyotia!!!!!
Meet my host family:
First there is Mama Jane (also known as Jaja, meaning grandmother), a large 70-year old African Mama who has birthed 12 children and raised many others. Mama Jane speaks little English, loves gospel music, loves when I speak Luganda to her, and is an excellent Ugandan cook (LOADS of matoke!!!). Now meet Tata Paul (also known as Jaja, grandfather), a tiny 90-year-old African man who has been married to Mama for fifty plus years. Tata speaks some English, can eat more matoke than anyone I know, is extremely relaxed, is extremely strong (you would never guess his age!!! he works all day outside) and enjoys teaching me words in Luganda. One time, while Tata was teaching me how to milk their cows, I pet one of the cows on the head at it proceeded to ram me in the side against a fence. Tata said, "It try to kill you!". No more milking cows for Kelly. Then there is Dennis, a 21-year old grandchild of Mama and Tata who lives with them for the time being. Dennis speaks great English, loves sappy love music (slow R&B, spice girls, Michael Bolton, Mariah Carey, etc.), loves to laugh and loves to teach me new things such as pool, dancing, and Draft- Dennis hopes to soon move to America, although I’m not sure there is any particular reason why besides the fact that is America… Dennis, like the rest of the family, is extremely kind and always makes sure that I am comfortable. He also lets me beat him in checkers. Then there is Joe, an 18year old grandchild of Mama and Tata who lives with them because he has lost both of his parents. Joe was my first friend in the house (our first bonding experience was listening to ‘gangster’s paradise’ together). He has kind of been my buddy from the get-go (kind of nice having a lil’ bro around again..) and has taken me on walks to town, around the house, etc. Joe, like the other grandchildren, is not in school because his grandparents cannot pay school fees, but he is a diligent student and wakes up every morning at 2am to do schoolwork in order to keep up (even if he has no school the next day). Joe also makes sure that I wake up on time every morning and that I drink my tea before leaving on my 40 minute walk to school. Andrew is the youngest grandchild staying in the house; he is 13 years old. Because he is the youngest, Andrew works the hardest to wait on his grandparents, older siblings, aunts, me, etc. (they are also a traditional African family, so all of the kids kneel when the enter the presence of an adult, especially their Jajas). Although Andrew doesn’t speak a lot of English, we still have a lot of fun together. Yesterday we made up a secret handshake, he took me to deliver milk to a neighbor (from one of their two cows.. and he’s going to teach me how to milk a cow!!), and he even got me a Samosa (fried treat with peas in it) because I had never tried one before. Along with those that I already mentioned, there is also Elizabeth (soon to be daughter-in law) and tons of other kids and adults who come and go throughout the house during the day. There is also the dog, Tildo, who follows me on my walk EVERY DAY to school and lays next to me in all of my classes (I have no clue how to make him stay home. he even walks me to my dorm...).
Apparently the Nagolo house is infamous in the village because Mama is on the head of the village counsel. Because of this, meetings and counseling sessions are constantly being held at our house (including at 6 in the morning). Mama even does marriage counseling!!—what a woman! 
The house itself is very small and very rustic: tin roofs, outdoor kitchen, one light, no plumbing (ie outdoor toilets and cement rooms to bucket bathe in), papers hanging from the ceiling, foam couches, and all of the boys in one room (I am staying in a tiny room in the garage on a foam bed with no pillow and a bucket in case I need to use the toilet in the middle of the night—I cannot go outside because of the wild dogs. There is a hole in my roof so during their HUGE rainstorms, water pours down my walls.. it happened at 4am last night! ( I am also currently covered in bug bites, including my face, but it is worth it!).
Even though I’ve only stayed with them three nights, I am already in love with the family!!! Just sitting with Mama while she cooks (btw we eat dinner at 1030pm or later...), chatting with the boys, or learning Luganda words brings me complete contentment. They have made me feel so comfortable, and treated me way nicer than I deserve to be treated. The Nagolo house is so full of love; they have already shown me what it means to find joy in living simply—all we need is friends, family, and God—American culture makes it too easy to forget this.
These are just descriptions of the family, so there will be more stories to come later. Many of them. Don’t worry, I’m writing them down!
Miss you all!!!

Comfortable with the Uncomfortable.

Friends and family, this is Kelly speaking to you from Mukono, Uganda, East Africa. Although it is obvious, because I am able to write this blog, I want you to know that I am alive and well (and so far parasite and disease- free)! Overall, Africa has been treating me well and I am still beyond excited to be here!

 As of today, it has been two weeks since our plane Washington DC for Amsterdam, and then from Amsterdam to Entebbe. Initially, I was overwhelmed to meet so many new faces in the airport, but I was relieved to find that we all quickly bonded during the course of the 20+ hour trip. Upon arriving in Entebbe, sleep deprived and disoriented, we were picked up in buses, given bananas and biscuits (the Ugandan cracker/cookie which I have come to love and will probably live off of for the next few months) and taken on an hour drive to Uganda Christian University- my new home. During the bus ride, I so badly wanted to be able to pay attention to my first viewing of Africa, but staying awake proved to be too painful.

Since arriving on campus, I have been placed in a tiny dorm room with two other awesome girls (such an answered prayer). Our dorm consists of bunk beds with mosquito nets, cold showers, squatty potties, and no mirrors…. Yet I am so excited to be on this hall and to be living on a Ugandan campus! When we first arrived on campus, no UCU students had moved in, but as of today, there are 7,000 Ugandan students on campus! It has already been such an experience being a part of their orientation week and I cannot wait for what else is to come.

 After arriving in Mukono, at UCU, we hung out for four days and did a lot of getting settled (including adjusting to waking up at 6am to the sound of morning worship and loud birds that sound like monkeys, adjusting to new foods such as matoke and g-nuts, and adjusting to being constantly sweaty and dusty).  Just after four days, I found myself falling in love with the gorgeous tropical scenery, the people, the food, and the culture. I was surprised at how quickly I grew comfortable being uncomfortable, which I have found is basically the theme of my semester in Uganda. Just after spending four days in Africa, the cultural differences between home and Africa were so evident, yet I have found myself so at peace with the differences.

 On August 29, four days after flying into Entebbe, we left UCU at 5am to embark on a 15 hr trek to Rwanda. Before arriving, I had no idea what to expect of our ten day stay in Rwanda- little did I know that it would be one of the most memorable and emotionally challenging experiences of my life. Describing my time in Rwanda, every emotion that I felt, everything that I saw, every testimony and talk that I heard, is nearly impossible, but I will try to give you a brief overview (ask me later for more details, I would LOVE to share). Basically, for those of you who do not know, in April 1994, the people of Rwanda of Rwanda endured one of the most horrific genocides our world has ever witnessed. In an attempt to overthrow the more dominant Tutsi ethnic group, the Hutu people ordered that all Rwandans obtain an ID card labeling them as Tutsi, Hutu, or Twa. To make a long story short, the Hutu then proceeded to kill around one million Tutsis. Unfortunately, the death of the Tutsis was not quick and painless; the Hutu brutally these innocent people who were their friends, neighbors, co-workers, etc. While in Rwanda, we spent time visiting sites where the genocide occurred (including a church called Nyamata where around 8,000 people were massacred and their clothes and bones remain), heard testimonies from numerous victim orphans, visited a place called Hope orphan village, went to the genocide museum, heard from numerous speakers, learned about the role that reconciliation has played in the current transformation of Rwanda, and even looked into the eyes of hundreds of the Hutu perpetrators (ask me for this story later). I could probably write an entire book about all that I learned and experienced in Rwanda, but I spare you for now (but PLEASE ask me about it sometime!). As well as studying genocide, I had the opportunity to visit a rural church with five other people from the program. When arriving at the church, I was surprised to find around 300 Rwandans singing and dancing their hearts out- it was so beautiful that it literally brought me to tears. While at church, we were seated on the stage, asked to teach them two songs (after SIX of their choirs had just performed), asked to give a testimony, and asked to give a sermon. And on top of all of this, the pastor was the only other person at the church who spoke English. After church, we were invited to eat lunch in the pastor’s one room home with all 25 elders of the church. Even though we did nothing for them, everyone at the church was so thankful that we had come and gave us way more than we deserved.

 After spending six nights in Rwanda, we hopped back on the trusty ol’ bus (which got a horrible flat tire on the bus ride home) and went to Bushara Island, a tiny island on Lake Bushara in Uganda. Bushara is not only one of the most gorgeous places in the world, but it was exactly what I needed after an emotionally and physically draining week in Rwanda. While on Bushara, we stayed in fully-furnished private tents, did a lot of debriefing, swam in the lake for four hours, went on rope swings, showering under buckets filled with hot water, ate guacamole, and danced to an African drum circle. It was the perfect rest before heading back to UCU.

 So here I am now, back at UCU, resting after my first day of classes, and praying that there will be internet so that I can post this ridiculously long blog. If you have read all the way to this point, thank you, and if not, I completely understand. Just know that all that I have written scarcely even skims what I have already learned, experienced, seen, and how I have already grown. Hopefully I will be blogging more often, but it is hard to tell when the internet is constantly down and the only place to use computers is in a dinning hall full of friendly Ugandans. Know that I miss you all DEARLY and think of you often. Always, Your Muzungu (meaning white person… a name that I get screamed at me literally EVERYWHERE I go), Kelly

 In case you want to keep reading even moreeee, here are some FFs (fun facts) about Uganda:

-       - a toilet is a toilet, the bathroom is where you shower

-      -  a bota-bota is a crazy motorcycle taxi that you can take if you are willing to risk your life… they are Everywhere

-       - Ugandans shower twice a day and think that Americans are dirty

-       - Dinner is always at 7pm and lunch at 1pm

-       - Girl’s basketball is called netball

-       - If you ride a bike, it is a sign of poverty

-       - There are anthills twice my height

-       - Once you get sick once, your immune system is good to go!

And the Adventure Begins

I cannot believe the day has finally come! Tomorrow I take off on my adventure to study in Kampala, Uganda for four months! At the moment, I am everything but nervous, and I am praying that this feeling will remain.

Tomorrow I will be meeting my group in D.C. and flying with them to Amsterdam then Entebbe airport. In case you wanted to contact me, I think I will be MIA for the next two or so weeks as I will be traveling to Rwanda just days after I arrive. Thanks all again for your support and encouragement!! I cannot wait to share my experiences with you- the good, the bad, and the ugly. as for now, your future Ugandan, kelly