Jesus is the Reason for the Season!

"Joy to the World the Lord has come!"

"O Holy Night...this is the time of our dear Savior's birth"

"Mary did you know that your baby boy would one day rule the earth"

As far as I can recall I have happily joined in singing these (and plenty more) lyrics in abundance every Christmas season. I always look forward to that day after thanksgiving when it becomes somehow acceptable to blast the Christmas music as you sip peppermint hot cocoa or bake cookies for hours on end. And I do find that I value the lyrics of Christmas worship songs more and more each year as they carry such truth and importance. This year was no different especially being so far from home.

For people here in Uganda Christmas can look different among families just like in the states but primarily it is marked by the time of year when the cows , goats, and chickens are butchered, the students and town dwellers are hustling home to their villages, and new church dresses are being purchased for Christmas day service. Christmas day typically consists of  a church worship service reflecting on the true reason for this season, an abundance of special once-a-year foods, and families together. Among the majority of families presents are not a component of Christmas.

I do not want to mislead you to think I don't appreciate the traditions of gift-giving. I was overjoyed to receive a Christmas season package from my family at home and unwrap a few gifts on Christmas day with them via Skype. I do want to share how easy it is to fail to reflect on the amazing miracle that Christmas represents. What do our material things have on the gift of salvation that was given years ago in the form of a baby wrapped in some old rags and laying in a feeding box? The first Christmas had gift-giving (the wise men gave fancy gifts!), and beautiful worship from angels above, but through it all Jesus was the main focus. Let us never get too busy that we fail to remember that Jesus is the reason for the season (as I have done too many Christmases).

This Christmas was truly a gift. With the lack of the endless Christmas advertisements, crazy store sales and extravagant decorations here in Mbarara, I was truly feeling "peace on earth" this Christmas season. With the lack of hype and climactic build up that I commonly experienced back home, Christmas morning felt just like the start of another sunny day with the roosters crowing. Upon waking up I had to remind myself that it was in fact Christmas day. With a wide open day ahead of me I was able to rest, read, and rejoice in the birth of Jesus. I topped of my evening video chatting with loved ones back home and attending a nice dinner with friends, making this Christmas day a very special day indeed.

I hope that this Christmas season was a sweet one for you all of you with family, friends, delicious food and meaningful reflection. I am so thankful for such continuous support and love from back home. As this new year approaches let us continue to glorify the Lord everyday and in all we do!

If you enjoy photos I would love to share with you some snapshots from my Christmas Break outing with new friends:

Mt. Elgon towering over the town of Mbale

The view from our little cabin dormitory!

The next series of photos capture part of the extensive coffee making process that is the livelihood of so many families in the Sipi area. We met a local man who allowed us to try out our skills making a cup of coffee starting from picking the colorful beans of the coffee tree!

Anika and I climbed up a small little butte to capture some sunrise shots over the valley. Imagine waking up to this every morning!

The first of a three series waterfall through the valley.

A glance at the daily life in this area. A woman carrying water atop her head, cows grazing and some boys dancing around with sticks and practicing the traditional dance they use during circumcision ceremonies.

Hanging out in the cave behind waterfall number two!

Anika and I abseiled the last and largest waterfall. 100 meters down (It is way further than it sounds) and it was exhilarating!

If you look closely I am a small little dot just to the left of the waterfall below the green brush line!

Our creator is so good!

Blessings,

Meggie

Home Sweet Home

When I leave Mbarara for only a few days and am almost immediately craving to be back in my flat surrounded by familiar faces, it carries a comforting feeling that this place has become my home. After a long day at the clinic or running errands in town, I find myself feeling a sense of peace (and sometimes relief) as i step through the gate and onto my compound, greeting and blowing a kiss to our compound neighbor girl. A call from a close work friend just to share that I have been missed or the surprise drop-in from another friend to chat and laugh about anything and everything brings me such joy. My early morning neighborhood runs have become less lonely and more competitive as I am now regularly challenged in a foot race by the commuting school children (backpack and all).

Through the gate and I am home!

The "Big White Arch" is the gateway to my sweet home.

While my weeks tend to follow a sort of familiar rhythm, there seems to always be room for more "firsts" here in Mbarara:

First time holding a tiny infant affected by HIV while encouraging the mom along in the babies physiotherapy. I was truly touched working alongside this mother who loved her daughter so well despite the developmental difficulties.

This is the Mbarara hospital's pediatric therapy room where I spend all my Wednesdays.

First time seeing many extravagant animals in their natural habitat (not behind bars or in cages) during our game drive through Queen Elizabeth National Park. Also, first time feeling shocked at seeing a woman's thighs as we ran into tourists in short shorts along the safari (of course, I wouldn't have given even a second thought to such a sight in the states).

What do you do with a free Saturday in Southwest Uganda?... How about joining a few friends for an impromptu trek through Queen Elizabeth Safari Park! While everyone at home in the US was dawning their best costume for a night of tricks and treats I was on a game drive along the wild rugged roads of the vase Wildlife park with the Rwenzori Mountain range towering in the backdrop.


First time attending a Ugandan wedding to witness one of my colleagues marriage and join in the festivities that followed. After the Runyankore church service the afternoon was full of singing, eating, dancing and taking photos. A loud sound system and plates mounded with food are both a must at such events and always tend to leave my ears ringing and stomach extremely full afterwards!

Even the youngest of our work friends dressed smart for the occasion!

First time taking public transportation as I traveled with a teammate to Kampala for the weekend. During our trek to Kampala and back home we stopped many times over to pick up passengers just waiting on the side of the road. At times we didn't even have to stop but rather the bus slowly rolled in as passengers jumped aboard the still moving vehicle. In both directions we faced at least two hour delays due to heavy traffic stand stills and then due to misplaced documents on our bus driver's part. I thought it was such a sweet surprise, however, when the ticket man asked that Lydia, my friend and riding buddy, to pray over our travels before we departed the station.

Empty bus during our halfway mark while everyone took their snack or bathroom break.

Vendor's like to stick the foods (like meat sticks) through your window if its cracked enough during our roll through stops.

First time planning a birthday party for two little ones approaching the one year mark. As Emily, my roommate, rightly put it, "You don't really need much entertainment for a one year birthday party"... just the babies themselves could have entertained for hours.

mommy-daughter moments with both birthday girls!

Our sweet little Sophie turns one year this December!

Miss Abrielle turned one year this November!

Thank you all for your continued support and prayers. A prayer request I have for this month is concerning a new physiotherapist they are interviewing to come work at the clinic. At the moment there are two OTs and then myself as a PT student so this addition would be so positive for OURs if it works out. It tends to be hard to keep employees committed for an extended period of time in private clinics such as OURS so prayers would be appreciated. Also, the Mbarara Hospital where I work on Wednesdays for the CP Clinic is short handed after suddenly losing a physio (he transferred elsewhere) and soon to be losing all the practicing students for Holiday, so we are praying for provision in this area as well. May you all have a joy-filled Thanksgiving holiday surrounded by friends and family. I am thankful for all of you!

Blessings, 

Meggie

Happy October to you all! The Months seems to be flying by as life has become more comfortable and familiar here in Uganda. I could still not tell you what a "normal week" looks like because as i have come to understand there is no such week. The rains and relationships are the best determinates of what a day looks like here. On any given day at OURs clinic, once the rain has begun to fall patients will usually cease to come. This phenomenon is due to the challenge of riding a motorcycle in the rain (very few people actual own cars unless they are well off) and due to planting patterns of the farmers (it is best to plant in the fields directly after the rains). Also, unlike the trend in the US, conversations with individuals trump timeliness and operating on a tight schedule. When I arrive to work 30 minutes late because I ran into a friend on my 45 minute walk to Ruharo (the district I work in) not one person will question me. And if I go so far as to apologize for my tardiness they will say "you are not late, you make perfect time!" Only within our expat community do we really make a conscious effort to arrive in a promptly manner.

In general, I spend two full days a week at OURs (the clinic for children with disabilities), a day at the hospital's weekly pediatric  clinic for neurological disorders, and an afternoon at the eye hospital playing with the little ones going through chemotherapy or waiting on surgery for the removal of one or both eyes. I continue to learn language for a few hours each week with my sweet friend Sarah and her baby Sophie in an effort to communicate with the parents and children who come from surrounding villages with no English speaking abilities. I try to take a day off once a week for cleaning (we have a house helper once a week but washing clothes by hand and fighting all the dust takes extra time) , shopping, and preparing food for the week (no packaged anything here so cooking organic from scratch is a necessity not just the in thing to do).

Baby Sophie on her mom's back, taking off after language lessons.

I joined the OURs medical team for an outreach last week and together the team saw and referred a couple hundred children with disabilities or visual impairments. The outreaches are scheduled once or twice a month and take place in surrounding districts that have partnered with OURs all over SW Uganda (usually a few hours out from Mbarara). The purpose is to first educate the hundreds of villagers young and old on disabilities and how they can, as a community, best help and promote a good quality life for these individuals. And then, secondly, each child was to be seen by the medical team in some capacity.

In the eight hours we spent in this village I was exposed to so many different cases for the first time. I saw a child suffering from Spina Bifida walking almost flawlessly after undergoing surgery and maintaining a strict adherence to therapy exercises, and I also witnessed a young girl so malnourished that she cried when touched. I watched as a young boy with Athetoid CP demonstrated his ability to walk comfortably and write with his left hand independently (he was intelligent and able to attend school due to his fathers determination and support), and I also saw a boy of about the same age who had Muscular Distrophy (with no current cure the life expectancy is about 20 years, probably less here) and the mother had to be told she should have no more kids (if she had another boy, he would also have this disability). All she could do for her son was promote exercise to delay the contractures from reaching his heart. Microcephally was a new case for me and rather common here in rural areas where nutrients is lacking for babies of poor and large families. These children have smaller than average heads and therefore their brains were unable to completely develop, delaying all their milestones of development. There were also a couple cases of hydrocephalus which I have never seen first hand until I came here. So many of these same disabilities do exists at home but because of the US's wide array of medical resources these children are attended to immediately after birth. The knowledge of the staff at medical clinics in the villages is so basic that many disabilities are never recognized until the parents acknowledge an issue with their child and seeks further attention. Our medical convoy bought a few of the worst cases home with us that evening while many others were referred. Please do join me in praying for these children and their families; that the families would know how to care for and unconditionally love on their children with special needs and that the children would find joy despite the hardships and stigmas they encounter every day.

My friends at OURs sending us off with kisses and goodbyes as we take off in our jeep for outreach.

We picked up this little guy in front and his family on the way to outreach because they could not afford transport. He really loved playing with Ricarda and myself (the two "Omuzungus" or white people).

Ambrose, the OT at OURs educating the masses as children come forward to be seen.

A sweet little one who found her way to the front to play with me and the little ones in their therapy.

Hundreds of school children would periodically leave school during breaks to watch the therapy and special needs education.

Ambrose sharing this young girls diagnosis with her young mom. 

Ricarda playing with one of our new friends.

This healthy little one sneaked through the crowds to come play beside the children in therapy.

These two got closer and closer as they were feeling us out. They rarely see white people in the villages.

This is the church where the mobilizations happen for this village. We were working on the field directly in front of this building as well as in that building behind the church,

The school children lined the jeeps as we were preparing to take off. I taught them how to "pound it" and they taught me some local dance moves.

The sun setting on our journey back to Ruharo.

Beans and rice, and the sweet sweet orphans during home stay week

This weekend we were assigned to a home stay on a compound that houses a young woman's discipleship program (January through July), and a boarding school/orphanage for children through primary 7. Our host was the house mom that lives in the simple dormitories with the young women alongside one of the past students who has now joined the program as a teacher and fundraiser (they are working to become self sustainable by selling crafts). Despite our insistence to be treated as locals, rather than visitors, and to do life alongside our hosts, we were given specialties at meal time that are less common to this compound. We did however take part in preparing and cooking all the meals as well as walking to the local market to pick up fresh produce.The majority of meals here are composed of a combination of beans, rice, matoke (a green, starchy banana), and/or g-nut sauce (the local nut here) and then porridge is served for breakfast (with bananas if affordable). That is how they do it here; very simple and a staple to the average family. Food is a means of survival and here we eat to sustain ourselves. More time is spent cooking the meals than eating them. We enjoyed matoke and cabbage and the ground nut sauce in addition to rice and beans in different combinations throughout the week and as we aided in preparing the meals we found it could take up to three hours for the entire prep and cooking process. Breakfast is when you wake up, lunch around 1 and then we don't take dinner until about 8 at the earliest due to the long prep time. Of course these times are always flexible as that is how we work here; always ready to adjust our schedules. Beans and rice can be pretty tasty if you prepare it as the locals do with a sort of camp fire aroma added to the flavor, however, day after day it can become more bland.  The kitchen is very commonly separate form the house because if all the smoke that fills the shed. We prep inside by the sink and always cook in the shack-like kitchen area over wood or charcoal. It is amazing that locals can stand the smoke and heat that fills the room as they stand over the fire for hours and that they can grab and transport the hot pans with bare hands as if they we carrying an empty mixing bowl. I am continually Impressed.

The sweet orphans and borders with which we shared a compound over the weekend just stole my heart. Most of them matched in their maroon little outfits (the littlest ones sporting a more tattered uniform as they tend to be more messy and rowdy during play). I joined them for several games of duck-duck-goose as well as the local version of Down-by-the-banks. Squatting for such a long duration during these games finally took its toll on my knees but lucky for me the kiddos like to choose their new white friend as the "goose" more often than not. Throughout the weekend no matter where we were on the compound, the littlest ones always managed to find Emily and I with our host friends. And even if there were no games to be played at that time the children just liked a little extra attention and love which we were so happy to give. 

Boarding school is extremely common here for children especially once they reach their secondary education but this school began boarding at primary 1 grade which is for children around 5 or 6 years of age. This system helps families in the village or even in town who do not have time or resources to get their children to and from school everyday (including Saturdays here). And then the orphaned children are able to be educated through primary school as well. These thirty or forty orphans all come from very poor families and most likely lost one or both of their parents from AIDS. It may be possible that they do have a living parent but this parent is most likely too poor to afford any food or shelter for their child or children. While I would just have loved to scoop all of these orphaned children up and bring them home, I was happy to see that this institution did take good care of their little ones and even gave them an opportunity at some education. It was exciting to hear that local village churches were the main supporters for these orphans, taking initiative to care for their orphans as we are called to do. 

See were I spent my weekend:

Here are our lovely host sisters who taught us to cook, clean and live life the Ugandan way.

Here is the "bell" that they have created below the rows of classrooms. An older child will hit this bell with whatever utensil he has available at break and meal times.

Some children returning with staff to the main building that holds all the bunks that sleeps the kids and staff.

Here are two of the sweet little ones who would sneak into the common room and distract me from our sewing projects.

This is a view of the green grass plot where the boys like to play soccer on the compound.

Above is my view from inside the kitchen area as I was watching the water boil over the wood fire. The kitchen helpers are scooping out rice and beans into the orange buckets for the orphans and boarders.

Here the staff is serving out the lunch and beans just outside the school buildings.

I have now been here for more than five weeks but continue to learn something new every single day. Please continue to pray for this learners and servants heart as I begin spending more time at the OURs rehab clinic assisting in physical therapy. I will also be visiting the hospital to see where I can be supporting their therapy staff with pediatrics once a week as well as I will be spending 2-4 days a month at the eye center that treats children with cancer of the eye in efforts to reach out to the hundred of children going through chemotherapy every month. Thank you all for your continued support and contact me via imessage or facebook or email if you have any questions or want to catch up!

I can receive letters and small packages here at our PO BOX, though they may take 3-6 weeks to get here! Here is our mail box address: 

PO Box 547

Mbarara, Uganda

East Africa