WEEK TWO - GULU, LERA, BUGEMBE, AND ZONE CONFERENCEs

Elder Ballstaedt talking to Rose who is an employee of the Seminary and Institute program for Uganda.  

These children were on their way to school.  All the school children wear uniforms.  We met them in the town of Bugembe.  The Branch President of the Bugembe branch took us to visit a lot of the leadership so we could invite them to District Conference

More children on their way to school

President Jackson at the baptism's in Gulu

The Baboons sit at the side of the roads waiting for someone to throw them a meal.  There are always tons of them on the road to Gulu just after you pass the bridge over the Nile.

They look cute but they are pretty mean.  Just hanging out here..

One of the members we visited in Bugembe.  We went with the branch President to invite all the leaders to come to District Conference.  This is one of the nicer homes.

President and Sister Jackson with the Gulu and Lira Zones.  Zone Conference about a 7 hour drive from Jinja.  I took this picture after all of us had been sitting in a hot room for 9 hours.  There isn't air conditioning, but the windows were open so we did get a bit of fresh Diesel smoke with our air.

There were 8 convert baptisms in Gulu last week.  The baptismal font is a white dumpster at this location.  Mpumedde has a blue baptismal font dumpster

Another thing we saw a lot of on the way to Gulu was truck accidents.  The roads are narrow and drop off on the edges.  When two trucks pass each other, one or two will catch the edge and roll.  We saw four trucks that had rolled within the 7 hour drive.

We visited some members in Bugembe.  They keep their homes very clean inside, but this red dirt is everywhere.  Including in our washing machine.  We are pretty red ourselves from the dust.

WE visited this Sister who just had a baby.  She is the RS president in the branch, her name is Edith.

I can't even tell you how much they worship Obama.  This child has a t-shirt on, but there are also stores and gas stations named Obama.

Elder Shipley with Edith outside her home

This is inside the window of a private school in Bugembe. No teacher was there yet.  If you think this is bad, you should see the public schools.

I took some pictures out the window of the car...

You can see these sights along the road wherever you travel

Everyone is going somewhere.  Not necessarily to work since jobs are non-existent

Notice the "Boda-Boda" or motorcycle.  That is the means of taxi service for most people.  You might two or three people on the back, and sometimes a mother with her babies going somewhere.  It costs about 25 cents to get a ride.  Most members will travel to church this way

They will buy their produce in the market each day because very rarely does anyone have electricity to store food.  In fact even with electricity, it goes out a lot.

The markets are amazing.  Notice that the people mostly wear western attire, and dress very modestly.

Working hard selling their wares

The women often carry things on their head

More

Just scenes out the car window....

The children always want to hold your hands and stare at you.  Our skin color is a puzzle to them and they call us ; "Mazoombas"  Sometimes the children are afraid of us that we might be a ghost.  This was in the villiage of Bugembe while we were visiting members homes.

There are places where they fill their "gerry cans" of water. These yellow containers are called Gerry Cans. They hold about 5 gallons but you will see people carting them to their homes, even little children. They probably weigh over 50 lbs. Most people have to cart their water long distances, they could never afford water taps at their homes.

We visited a new member in her home, one of the nicest we have ever seen.  This girl is a councilor in the YW.  Sister Shipley

We were walking around around the lunch time.  We saw several women like this woman cutting up cabbage and onion to cook over her little charchol stove for lunch for her family.  The chickens and goats run wild all over.  In this case it looks like a duck.  That is why everyone lives on dirt, because the animals eat everything green in the yards possible.

This is a brother and sister of the same family who are the Elder's quorum president and the YW president in the branch. They live with their father who is Muslim so he hasn't joined the church but has allowed them to join.

They transport everything on a bike or on their heads.

The children follow us everywhere we go.  The smaller children are always on their mothers backs, and the toddlers are usually naked running around.

You see a lot of cattle on the roads

Kitchen in Jinja Chapel

Garbage in back of Jinja Chapel.  There is no such thing as garbage pick up in Uganda.  You have to wait for the trash pile to get really big and then you burn it.

Front of building in Jinja Chapel

SCENES FROM UGANDA

I have no idea what these fish are, probably minnows.  They are harvested from Lake Victoria and dried.  Umm...yummy.
I forgot my camera the day we went to the market so I can post that next time.

Everytime we get out of our car the children run up to us.  Everyone calls us Mazoomba which means "not African".  Sometimes our skin color scares them but mostly they are just curious

Keyboard lessons.  I have been going with Sister Shipley shown here to help her teach her keyboard students.  These two young men are prospective Elders who hope to go on a mission.  They want to learn the Hymns before going.  I have been studying the course, but I don't know how I would ever replace her.  We have District Conference on Sunday which she is getting all the Elders ready to sing in the Choir.  This picture shows her teaching these brothers how to sing the Bass.

There are no traffic signs here, but a puzzling number of other signs which seem to defy explanation

More signs....

Rock at the entrance of a really nice restaurant where we had a fabulous meal for about $6.00.  There are some beautiful tourist places scattered around

These termite hills are everywhere.
The termites are harvested and roasted.

Baptismal font at the side of the Mpumadde Branch. I know it looks somewhat like a dumpster...well it is a dumpster. There was a baptism we attended on Sunday.  They have to check the font for snakes and critters before you can send your investigators in it.

Mpummedde Branch  - a nice building used for Sunday services.  No air conditioning or kitchen, but quite comfortable.

On the Nile - the Falls.  They call it the source of the Nile

in the white water people will ride with their kayaks or just jump in and ride the waves

It's hard to see but there are people riding in the waves

And by the way, you can't watch them for free, this is their livelihood, so someone is on shore to charge you for the show

Justine is an investigator.  We went with Elder and Sister Shipley to teach him a lesson about the Sabbath in his one room home made of brick with concrete floors.  It was clean and he had set up four chairs for us two couples and he sat on the floor on a mat.  He has a wife and 10 children in another city, as he is here to work.  He was not able to get baptized yet because he hasn't finished paying the dowry to her parents, or to the clan or tribe as we would call it.  He has a testimony, but these are the obstacles the missionaries have to deal with.  Even if he was to get married legally after all these years of them raising their family, the tribe would ostracize his family for the delinquent dowry. But he can't afford the dowry.  So.....baptism is a tough sell here. 

ON OUR WAY TO AFRICA

Rock and I arrive at the MTC in Provo

with the Robinson's who are in our old stake.  They will leave to Italy.  She was piano teacher for Sage and Ben when they were little.

All the Senior missionaries that checked in on June 6, 2011.  We met some wonderful People

Our District.  R to L Farr's (off to Kirtland) , Stott's (off to Lansing Michigan),   and Ballstaedt's (off to Uganda)

THE MTC

WE VERY much enjoyed our time at the MTC where we ate lunch with all the Elders going out to the world.    We truly felt like we were part of the "Army of God" while being there.  We learned so much about teaching the Gospel and how to bring people to Christ.  What a great experience, I would recommend it to everyone!

THE AIRPORT

OKAY I KNOW....but they told us that if we were going to want something for the next 2 years we better take it with us.  So we did.  Interestingly, we've been here only a few hours and I have already remembered about 10 things I wished I had brought.  However, see all this overweight luggage?  As it turned out the desk clerk was so frustrated about what to do, she only charged us an extra $60.  We got off easy.

We were in transit for 48 hours.  (SLC to Chicago.....Chicago to London....London to Entebee...)  arriving at the Mission Home in Kampala on Wednesday morning at 10:00 AM.  It wasn't 48 real hours because we lost 9 hours heading east.

Needless to say, our jet lag is about what you would imagine.  I took a sleeping pill but still managed to pop up out of bed by 2:00 AM.  That's about the time our neighbors the Roosters start their crowing.  But luckily the dogs stopped barking about 1:00 AM so we got some real quiet time there for an hour.

WE moved into a temporary apartment in Kampala.  It's very nice and comfortable.  We will only be here two nights, but it has a King bed and notice the mosquito netting over the bed.  We have to be very careful to follow the rules about avoiding Malaria.

Our biggest adjustment so far has been the heat and humidity which I am sure will take some time, even though they have told us this is a "cool spell".  There isn't air conditioning here, and if you leave the windows open too long the "farm" smells get a little strong. 

While driving down the road in Kampala, there are many things to see along the side of the road. Vendors place their wares out where all can see.

 The traffic is notoriously crazy.  No traffic rules apply,  just every man out for himself however you want to do it is fine. There is some sort of expectation that most people will prefer to drive on the left side of the road like in Europe, but it isn't a hard fast rule apparently. 

I prefer to sit in the back seat somewhat blocked from the view of the front window so my leg won't hurt so much from using my imaginary brake every five seconds.

We met with some of the other couple missionaries and went to a very nice restaurant for dinner with them.  It was great to get to know them.  Two of the couples work in the Humanitarian mission, and the other couple is the office couple.  Today we will be trained by the PEF missionary couple so we can understand how to help with that.

Tomorrow we move to a different city and stay in another temporary apartment.  Our permanent home will be in Jinja starting in July when the other couple leaves.  It appears they extended their mission till July.  It will give us time to be trained about what they do.

We miss our family!  Love to everyone!