If I'm sitting on the bench, I might as well eat some ice cream...

On Saturday we took two of the boys teams to play a friendly match near Kampala. We loaded about 40 kids and four of us adults into two, 14 seater vans. It was hilarious watching the kids pile in on top of each other and they had no problem sitting on top of one another and they spent the whole ride there and back chanting cool things in Luganda (well I assume what they were saying was cool, I couldn't really understand any of it). We won both games, the first was a 1-0 victory and the second 2-0, so that was exciting for the boys. Some highlights from the games: during the younger boys' match, in the middle of the first half one of the kids who was sitting on the bench decided that if he wasn't in the game, he might as well enjoy a cool snack. So he got up, walked over to a vendor selling ice cream, purchased it, then walked back to the sidelines to enjoy his treat while his teammates played. TIA. Another interesting phenomenon occurred when a pack of cows decided to meander across the field, totally oblivious to the action going on around them. There aren't injury timeouts here, there are cow crossing timeouts.

For Americans who think that church is boring, they need to experience an African service. I attended my first one on Sunday and it was awesome! It lasted about three hours, which was a bit long, but it's because they spent the first two hours singing worship songs and dancing all over the place. It was so cool to see this kind of unabashed worship, because many churches in the U.S. can come across as being so straight-laced. Seeing these Africans worship has totally changed my perception of what it means to "praise God."

Not only was the worship part of the service cool, but the message was also great. The pastor talked about how even with few resources, everyone could make a difference in a child's life. His main theme was, "If you care for one child, you could end up saving thousands." The examples he gave was those of the Pharoah's daughter saving Moses and Mordecai caring for Esther, and orphan. By saving those individual children, the Pharoah's daughter and Mordecai ended up saving an entire population of people by default. The other cool phrase was, "If you want to change the tide of a nation, start with it's children." This is so true, because it is by investing in the next generation of children that we are going to see positive changes made. It was a really encouraging message that helped me to reevaluate some of my goals here. My focus is going to be to simply try to create positive and meaningful relationships, one child at a time, because even if I don't get to see the fruits of my labor, those efforts may end up prospering in a more meaningful way than I could ever have imagined.

Also last week, I walked to Lake Victoria to check it out. It took about two hours to finally get within sight of the lake, and when I asked a local how I could get down to sit by the water, he was so confused. He wanted to know why I wanted to get to the water and when I told him that I just wanted to sit and relax and read a book by the lake, he was baffled. Apparently people do not sit and relax by lakes in Uganda, good to know. Instead of walking the two hours back to Ndejje, I took my first ride on a boda boda, which was awesome!! Boda bodas are basically scooters and it was so fun riding back, up and down the hills with the wind in my face!

We made an addition to our house in the form of a hammock on our front porch, provided by Adam. Our neighbor, Kakinda, looooooves the hammock and he can be found chilling out, listening to music in it morning, noon, and night. The other night he was laying in it for a while, singing along to his radio which was hilarious because he doesn't exactly have the best voice in the world. And the hammock is right outside my bedroom window, so it's a good thing I can fall asleep under almost any condition, I would feel bad if I had to tell him to stop singing. He and I would probably make for a phenomenal karaoke duet, seeing as how I have been told that my voice is slightly sub par.

Well, that is most of the excitement as of late. We have been working on sign painting and other projects in preparation for the kids' return to school on Sept. 6. Next week the other interns and myself are heading to Jinja for a few days to raft the source of the Nile! Sooooo stoked for that adventure! The next time you hear from me will probably be after that excursion, so I am sure there will be many great stories to tell. Until next time...