Trip to Soroti, Uganda, 7 January, 2012

A couple of weeks ago we traveled to Soroti, which is north and east of Kampala. The drive there was pretty easy except for the stretch between Mbale and Soroti. It took nearly 3 hours to drive 100 km on a road that was full of potholes and ruts. Once in Soroti we met up with our friend Pastor Richard Otim. We enjoyed a traditional Teso (the tribe that lives in and around Soroti) dinner with Pastor Richard’s lovely family under a beautiful starlit sky- chicken, rice, beef in peanut sauce and my personal favorite atap, which is a dough-like mixture of millet and cassava. Sunday we enjoyed worshipping at Rockview Baptist Church. That afternoon we drove out to Lake Kyoga. Along the way we stopped a village church in a place called Lale. The people in this village are from the Kumam tribe. They welcomed us with much celebration and shouting. We shared a time of prayer and fellowship in their mud-walled and thatch-roofed church. Then they invited us to the pastor’s compound for supper- more chicken, rice, and atap! The compound was made up of several mud huts and it was clean, neat, and very well-organized. We left Lale and continued on the Lake Kyoga reaching it just before sunset. It was very beautiful. Pastor Richard had been given a fishing pole a few years back, but he never could figure out how to use it. So we rigged it up and squeezed in a quick lesson before darkness fell. Then it was back to our hotel. Monday we went to the Soroti market, the East Africa pilot school, and toured the rest of the town. It was a really great time. I can’t get over how much Soroti and especially the villages surrounding it remind me of being in South Sudan. The people are similar, and I even found out that the Kumam language is very similar to the two main languages of South Sudan, Dinka and Nuer. That certainly has some interesting implications for ministry and missions in South Sudan!

A Bunny Story

We decided to get our youngest daughter Milenia an early Christmas present- two bunnies, a male and female. (And yes, I know why that is not such a good idea.) When we got them home, Milenia was thrilled as were our other two kids. On our compound, we have a fenced area for the dog that we've never used. We thought it would make a good home for our bunnies. We took out Mrs. Bunny to see how she would do in the dog pen. After a minute or so our black lab Roxy crashed through the door of the dog pen. Mrs. Bunny screeched in terror and bolted toward the fence. Somehow she managed to squeeze through the wire, and we managed to get the dog away from Mrs. Bunny.
A short while later we noticed that Mrs. Bunny's left leg was not doing so well. That's an understatement- it was completely broken. We felt terrible and called the vet. They sent someone to have a look and determined that Mrs. Bunny needed to go to their clinic for further consultation. A while later, they called, and we concluded that our best option was to put Mrs. Bunny down. Our kids were sad, but it was the only thing to do under the circumstances.

So then we were left with only Mr. Bunny. He's doing quite well. We've managed to keep him away from the dog. He's been hopping around our house and enjoying himself immensely. However, we started to get a little tired of bunny droppings all over our floors. We decided a cage was in order. Suzy went to see our favorite craftsman, made a deposit, and the work began. Just today we went to pick up the cage. It turns out that our cage is more like a bunny house. It was quite obvious that it wasn't going to fit in our SUV. So we did what all good Africans do- we hired a boda boda to carry it to our house for us. In case you've never been to Uganda, a boda boda is a motorcycle that is used to transport people and things all over town. Last week I saw one carrying a full size refrigerator. Our bunny house is a little smaller than that, so we figured it could work. As they moved the bunny house over to the boda boda, people started to gather around to watch. A few guys jumped in to help load the bunny house on the bike . It was quite tricky for them to get it secured and balanced just right, but after about 20 minutes they had it all ready to go. It was quite a sight as I looked in my rearview mirror and watched a boda boda driver weave through traffic with our bunny house. As I chuckled to myself, I couldn't help but think about what a crazy, unique, and special place Uganda is!

Happy New Year!

It's just past midnight here in Kampala. I hear lots of music, fireworks, and cheering crowds as people celebrate the start of 2012. 2011 has been an interesting year to say the least. You can read all about it in our December newsletter by clicking here- http://myemail.constantcontact.com/Looking-Back-On-2011.html?soid=1109016511512&aid=kj4bx3sbfOo

One of my resolutions is to post more frequently on the blog. It's been almost two years since I last posted. I guess I'm off to a pretty good start! Hope everyone has a happy and safe New Years!

March 7 Update

We are so thankful for God's provision over the last few challenging weeks. We have pretty much gotten settled into our house. We have living room furniture, beds and mattresses, and a few tables. This week our dining room table and chairs should be finished along with the kids' school desks. It will be nice this week to finally start to get back to a normal routine; the last few weeks have been quite draining! We also did finally get our internet set up, and the company who installed just cut their monthly rate from over $100 per month (which is pretty much what everyone charges) to $40 per month. That monthly savings will really help us out going forward.

We also ended up with enough funding to purchase a 4-wheel drive vehicle. It is a Toyota Surf, which is the equivalent of the old 4-Runners in the U.S. It's a 1994 model, but the motor, interior, and exterior are all in great condition. A few days after I got the car, I was pulling into our gate, and my day guard told me that there was fluid coming out from under the vehicle. Sure enough, all of the power steering fluid was pouring out from the bottom. I called Buyundo, a Ugandan friend who has been an incredible help to us, and he referred me to a mechanic to come to look at the car. The mechanic showed up a little while later with a couple of other guys, and they quickly diagnosed the problem, which was simply a broken hose. But he also started showing me a number of other things that needed to be replaced, which was basically the entire structure underneath the car including the control arm, shocks, etc. (By the way I did have a mechanic check the car before I bought it, but he mainly focused on the motor and brakes.) I agreed that the stuff under there looked pretty bad, and I authorized him to do the work. So for the next two days, these three guys essentially took apart the car right in my driveway and then put it back together again, leaving only to sleep and to travel downtown to get the necessary parts. Perhaps the funniest part of this whole sequence of events was when the mechanic told me he needed money to get a second round of parts. I told him I was out of money, and that I would need to go to the ATM. My plan was to take a boda boda to the bank about a mile or so a way and then return with the cash. By the way, boda bodas are one of the most popular forms of transportation here. They are motorcycles or scooters and you pay the driver to take you places just like you would a taxi. They are everywhere and can make driving in a car quite difficult as they dart in and out of traffic. One of these days I'm going to post some photos of boda boda scenes. I've seen them carrying anything from a mom holding her infant to chicken coops to panes of glass (scary!) to a family of 5 (usually with the smallest child up front on the handlebars). But anyway, the mechanic tells me that I don't have to take a boda boda- he has one and can drop me off at the ATM. I agreed, grateful to save a few thousand shillings. So one of the guys gets on the bike and starts it up, then the mechanic gets on behind him and motions for me to sit on the very back. So we have 3 grown men on this little bike, but we weren't done yet. The mechanic also needed to take the old parts to the Toyota place to make sure he would return with the right ones. So his other helper hands him a large plastic bag containing the control arm, shocks, and some other things I don't know the name of, and then piles on two more greasy triangle things that hold the wheels on the car, each weighing 20 pounds or so. It was quite a ride, I'll tell you as that bike sputtered up the hill to the ATM. The biggest lesson I learned along the way was to not let my bare ankles touch the exhaust pipe on the sides of the bike. (Or maybe the bigger lesson I should learn is to not ride a boda boda wearing flip flops!)

So finally the mechanic finished the car, and the whole thing cost me about $600, mostly for parts. The labor charge for two days of work from 3 mechanics- $75! I'm going to have him come back next week to do a few other things to the car, and once he's done it should be good as new!

And I almost forgot to mention that we received our visas last week! Visas here aren't too difficult to obtain, but we have learned from past experience never to take the granting of a visa for granted. Praise the Lord that the whole process went smoothly and that our visas were issued for two years instead of one (although we have to pay twice as much as we thought, but we know God will provide for that as well).

A few other things of note- all Aid Sudan trips for March and April have been canceled. We haven't had many people sign up and given the rising tensions in Sudan in advance of the April elections, we felt led to cancel these trips. For those of you in Houston, please don't forget about the Hands On Sudan prayer event at Houston's First Baptist this Thursday. It would be great to have some of you attend; I know my parents are going so let them know if you want to ride along. If any of you who do not live in Houston would like to be praying for Sudan this Thursday (or any other time), please let me know and I will get you a list of topics to pray about. It would be neat if people in other locations could get groups together to intercede for Sudan during this very critical time in the nation's history.

We are so thankful to those of you who have donated money over the last couple of months to help out with our start-up expenses. It's been amazing to see how God has given us just enough to get the things we need, and we are so grateful to all of you who have contributed. Have a great week!

February Update

Hello everyone! I've just been enjoying all the Facebook pictures of the amazing snow event in the South. Looks like quite a lot of fun, although I have to say I'm happy to be sitting on my porch 20 miles north of the equator where it's a comfortable 78 degrees. Not a big fan of the cold!

Things here are going well. We have found a house, and we have been busy getting the things we will need to live in it. This isn't quite as easy as it might sound. While there are a few large stores that sell many different things including furniture, they are pretty expensive and sometimes the quality is not the best. So for the last couple of weeks, we have been trying to locate a carpenter who can build our beds, tables, and chairs. We have talked to several, but the prices they have quoted have been quite high. Today we finally met with a guy who seems to do high quality work at a reasonable price, so we will most likely have him get started on our furniture on Monday. It will take him a couple of weeks to make everything, so we'll likely spend a week or so sleeping on mattresses on the floor until he is finished. We also met with our landlady today to pick out a paint color for the house. She informed us that the house will not be ready on Monday as planned, so we will have to stay here at the Hendersons for a few extra days. They get back to Uganda Wednesday night, so I'm hoping they won't mind if we all pile in here until Friday or Saturday!

Praises:
1. For good health for all of us. We've had a few minor stomache bugs, but no malaria yet!
2. That God has provided a house for us!
3. Elise had a fun-filled 10th birthday a couple of weeks back. She had 3 girls over for a sleepover, and they all had a great time!
4. For the Henderson's return this week.
5. For the strengthening US dollar at a time when we are purchasing many things for our house. This has been a real blessing and gives a lot more buying power!
6. My trip to Juba, Sudan has been postponed. As I had mentioned in a previous email, I was hesitant to make this trip given the insecurity in Juba and concerns over leaving Suzy and the kids alone in a new and still pretty unfamiliar place. So I'm thankful that the trip will be put off until after Kerry gets back.
7. Vince Ward from Cush4Christ, a partner organization that we work with in southern Sudan, stayed with us here in Kampala for four days this past week. It was great to visit and get to know him better, and he offered some great insights for moving forward with our radio programming.
8. We hired a girl to help in our house. Her name is Prossy, and she has just finished high school. She doesn't have a lot of experience, but she is eager to learn and is picking things up quickly. Prossy is hoping to go to college in the next few years, so we are excited to be able to give her some work experience and the opportunity to save some money for her future education. We'll also be providing a room for her to stay in as well as 3 meals a day. One thing that was quite funny was that Prossy did not know how to turn on the stove. We were surprised but after we thought about it, we realized that almost no one here can actually afford a stove. They usually do their cooking over a simple kerosene cooker. Stoves cost over a million shillings ($500) which is 4 or 5 months salary for the average worker. I paid Prossy for the first time yesterday, and she was so happy that she started to cry! It was moving to see someone be so overjoyed to receive what is to me a small amount of money. But I guess when you grow up in poverty and in a place where it is nearly impossible to find regular work (the unemployment rate is probably well over 50%), you are extremely happy and thankful to receive any amount of money.

Prayer requests:
1. We have a lot to do this week to get settled into our house. Please pray for things to go smoothly with the carpenter and also that we will be able to find the appliances we need at fair prices. Also, pray that the things we need (like a refrigerator, stove, mattresses, etc.) will be delivered to our house on time. And pray that our house will be ready by next weekend!
2. We still need to buy a car. Pray that God will provide one for us that Suzy feels comfortable driving and that fits our budget- we are still praying for a few thousand more dollars so that we can buy a quality 4-wheel drive vehicle.
3. Pray for the Hendersons as they fly back Tuesday and Wednesday.
4. Pray that God will help us to find trustworthy security guards for our house that can begin working the day we move in. We have one person we want to hire and will be interviewing at least one other guy this week. It is critical that we have security 24/7 so this is a top priority for us this week, and we need lots of wisdom to choose the right people.
5. Aid Sudan has three trips scheduled for March and April, but not very many people have signed up. As a result these trips may have to be canceled. Pray that God will give us wisdom on whether to move forward with these trips or not, and for God to raise up people to come if He wants us to move forward with these trips.
6. Sudan has elections in April. This will be a big challenge, particularly for the people of the south, most of whom are illiterate and don't have a very good grasp of the democratic process. The potential for violence is quite high during this time, and most organizations are pulling their personnel out of Sudan during the elections. (I suspect this has something to do with why we don't have many people signed up for our March and April trips.) Please pray that the people of southern Sudan will understand the importance of voting in this election, and pray that things will be peaceful during this time.

Thanks for your prayers and support and have a blessed week!

Radios delivered to Wanyjok, Sudan

One of my favorite things about Africa is that things almost never go how you would expect them to go. This was certainly the case with my trip to Wanyjok, Sudan to deliver 3,000 radios to Cush 4 Christ. I had expected that my biggest challenge would be with customs officials in Uganda and possibly in Sudan. For weeks many people have been praying specifically for things to go smoothly with customs, and the Lord answered those prayers. I had absolutely no problems with any local officials. In Uganda the customs officials signed off on all the documents without any hesitation, in Sudan I never even ran into an official of any type, and on the way back to Uganda, I was easily able to obtain a 60-day visa, something that sometimes is not so easy to do. I had expected to have problems with officials and thankfully had none; what I did not expect was to have a major international airport run out of jet fuel, or for the tail stop of our plane to break causing the plane to tip backwards during loading. Two doors to the storage department underneath the plane were damaged and had to be repaired before the long trip north to Sudan. These two problems delayed our departure by about 4 hours, but by 11 AM my son Brody and I were on our way to Wanyjok with 1500 pounds of radios.

Once in the village of Wanyjok, we unloaded the radios at the studios for 99.9 FM Weer Bei radio. “Weer Bei” means “redemption” in the local language, and it is the creation of Vince Ward with Cush 4 Christ ministries. Cush 4 Christ has 3 families and two singles living among the Dinka Rek who call this area home, and the radio ministry supports their effort to evangelize and plant churches here. Weer Bei is using Aid Sudan’s first completed radio tower to broadcast their signal, and the radios that I delivered will be distributed to 3,000 families who cannot afford a radio of their own and allow approximately 40,000 people to here the Gospel in their own language.

I want to thank all of you who have been praying for this trip. Never did I imagine a few weeks back that we could actually be able to get these radios up to Wanyjok before Christmas. But God is so good, and He provided us with some incredible people to help along the way. The folks at Galcom International in Toronto, who manufactured the radios, were amazing to work with. Diligent Delivery Systems in Houston handled the air freight for the shipment from Toronto to Uganda, and not only got the radios here by the date we needed them, but also saved us several hundred dollars in the process. Then there are the amazing folks at MAF (Missionary Aviation Fellowship) Uganda who helped us get through the customs process here and as usual provided safe and reliable transportation up to Sudan and back. Our pilot Simon was a tremendous blessing- flexible, easy to work with, and excited to engage the Sudanese as we spent time with them last night and this morning. And perhaps the greatest heroes of all are the folks at Cush 4 Christ who are giving their lives so that a group of people that most people in the world have never heard of can hear the incredible message of Jesus Christ. Please pray that these radios will be a great support to their work in and around Wanyjok and that tens of thousands will be reconciled to God through their ministry.

Things have settled down quite a bit since my last post. It turned out to be a pretty quiet week around here. Our water was restored on Thursday evening. My big project for last week was to work with Daniel Lual, a Sudanese man from the Aweil area, to record 8 Bible stories in his native language which is Dinka Rek. Aid Sudan's first completed radio tower is in Aweil. It was finished earlier this year and supports the ministry of an organization called Cush 4 Christ. Cush 4 Christ will begin broadcasting very soon and these stories will be an integral part of their ministry through the use of the tower. Daniel is supported by Aid Sudan and attends Kampala International University here in Kampala.

We began recording last Monday evening and got off to a rocky start (Check out our "recording studio" in the attached pictures). It was the first time for either of us to record these stories. Daniel was struggling with the best way to learn the story and then to retell it in his language, and I was struggling to learn how to operate the recording software and equipment. After a couple of hours we finally had one two-minute story to show for our efforts- "The Creation of the Spirit World". Thursday evening Daniel came by again. This time things went much more smoothly, and we were able to record the second story ("The Creation of the Earth") in about half the time. We also began working on the third story, "The First Sin and Judgment". Daniel returned on Sunday, and we set out to finish the remaining 6 recordings, the last two of which are very long. After about 8 hours, we were finally done. I was very impressed with Daniel. He was extremely diligent about learning the stories and making sure that he was telling them with 100% accuracy. He would listen to the recording and if one small thing was not exactly right, he would ask to record it again. This is crucial because for many people these stories will be the only way for them to learn the Word of God. To my knowledge, there is no complete translation of the Bible in Dinka Rek, and even if there were, 99% of the people wouldn't be able to read it because they are illiterate. Daniel was also in the middle of his finals at school last week, and he is leaving today to return to Aweil where his wife is about to have a baby. His commitment to this project even in the midst of everything else going on in his life was amazing to me. I praise God for Daniel and for the heart he has for his people to know the Bible.

Here are some things you can pray for over the next couple of weeks:

1. Remember Daniel as he travels back to Aweil, a four-day trip by bus on some rough and sometimes dangerous roads. Pray for safe travel and for a wonderful time with his friends and family.
2. Pray for me as I learn how to edit the tracks we recorded and then convert them into MP3 files. Pray that God would use these stories to impact the Aweil area in a powerful way.
3. 3,000 hand-held solar-powered radios will be shipped to me from Aid Sudan in the next couple of weeks. I will be chartering a plane and delivering these radios to Aweil, hopefully before the end of the year. The radios will be distributed by Cush 4 Christ and allow approximately 40,000 people to hear the stories we just recorded. Please pray that the logistics involved with getting these radios to Uganda and then to Sudan go smoothly. Also pray for Cush 4 Christ as they distribute the radios and minister to the people. Pray that these radios will be an incredible tool for them to share the Good News with the people around Aweil and that many will come to know Christ as a result.
4. We have begun looking for a house. Please pray that God would lead us to the right one. We are still praying for a compound with at least 2 houses, one of which will be used as a guest house for Aid Sudan short-term mission teams.
5. My (Bob's) grandmother passed away this past Saturday in New Jersey. Please remember my family, especially my dad and my aunt and uncle as they deal with this loss and make the necessary arrangements. My dad was able to travel to New Jersey on Friday (just before the Houston snow storm hit) and say good-bye to her a few hours before she passed, so we praise the Lord for that opportunity.

As always, we appreciate your prayers and support so much. You are the reason that we are able to do what we are doing, and we are so blessed to have you as our partners in this ministry. Many blessings to all of you!