A day in Southern Uganda

We don't leave for Arua until tomorrow, but we spent yesterday here at the Africa Inland Missions house just 7 miles outside of Kampala. Jessica and I both had to return to the airport because our bags had not made it onto our flight into Entebbe with all of the craziness of flights changing. So Laurence, an older man who picked us up the previous night at the airport, had his son drive us there yesterday. As we started talking with him, it seemed like he was unsure at first of us, as I imagine that he has had different experiences with white Americans before. But as we began talking, he became more and more comfortable with us and we ended up having some really good discussion.

We went by a place called "Fresh Cuts" with a lot of people outside, and I asked him why they were all there, thinking that it was a hair cut place. He told me it was a place where you buy meat. Kinda funny how different cultures bring different meanings to words. He showed us where the President of Uganda lived, as it was right along our way to the airport. Even though we could only see it in the distance, his house was pretty big, yet it was not as big as some other business man's that we see on a distant hill. It was huge and extravagant, and compared to all of the poverty surrounding it, made absolutely no sense. Yet do we fool ourselves into thinking it is OK for us to live in homes larger than we need simply because we live further away from this sort of poverty?

What was really interesting was his description of the people near Arua, who he said he "had no love for." He described them as being blacker than him and that their language was incomprehensible. It is evident that there is a lot of tribal rivalry and even hatred. When I made an allusion to what happened in Rwanda, he said that it was not the same thing. Yet it is interesting that racism isn't really about skin color, it is about who we are as humanity. When there is very little diversity in skin color, people will find other things to distinguish themselves and then eventually hate about other people, whether it be the size of noses, shades of color, or whatever other distinctions can be found. The difference between Hutu and Tutsi people in Rwanda was apparently very small and insignificant, but tons of people were slaughtered over it. There is just something within us that causes us to choose teams and hate others.

I felt sick for the first time last night. I woke up periodically throughout the night with a headache and feeling nauseous, so I drank a lot of water and tried to stay asleep. I feel better now, but I also know that sickness is something to expect while here. I tend to romanticize suffering for the sake of the gospel, but honestly when I actually feel like crap, I just want to be done with it all and not feel pain. It makes me want to not press forward in service that would cause more pain. That is a problem. So I'm sure the Lord will work on me with that.

I also found out that the LRA was not really in Arua, but rather in areas to the East of Arua. But we learned a lot more about the church in Arua, and it sounds interesting and exciting. There is a lot of work to be done, and it seems they are excited about our coming. Can't wait to get there.