Day 6: Amazima and Nile River Tour

Wow, there is just so much packed into a day here, it is starting to run together or blur in my mind!
First off, I made a big mistake and left the boys dorm room door open last night when I left after checking the internet in the hall! Male mosquitos (the non-biting kind, i learned only females bite) flock to the light and thousands upon thousands came in and died in the hall way. After sweeping, this is the damage I left behind. Wow. Thankful for bug spray. That is all mosquitos in that pile. No dirt. The other picture is our bedroom at Canaan's childrens home. Im on the top bunk which makes for a tricky bathroom run in the middle of the night! This is our girls devotional at night in the room.

After breakfast we walked about a half mile up a dirt road to Amazima- Katie Davis' ministry.  It is quite an operation. It is several acres with an open pavilion for worship.

They also teach community seminars there about Jesus, hygiene, nutrition, feeding your kids, teaching skills, etc. There is a playground there that is amazing! Saturday is a day for only sponsored kids. There are approximately 600 in Amazima's sponsor program.  These kids receive 300$ a year and that provides meals on saturdays with a worship service, a bag of food for the week, and school fees. It was amazing to see these men bagging up rice and beans for the 600 kids to take home with them to provide food for their families.

Who needs toys in Uganda? They find their own entertainment.

Then I watched the ladies preparing lunch while the worship service was going on. These ladies were cooking enough rice, beans and chicken to feed 500 kids! Amazing! Everyone got a hardboiled egg to eat when they got there at 11 to hold them over until 1:30 for lunch. 

cutting the chicken

 Then it was time for praise and worship.  It was amazing to hear all those sweet voices with lugandan accents echo in the pavilion with songs to Jesus. They learned revelation 3:20 as their weekly memory verse and heard a message.

Then it was time for playtime! I was pretty excited myself to check out this awesome playground. The kids got to just be kids as they ran, climbed, swang and jumped rope. It was amazing to see their joy and enjoyment amidst hearing some of their stories as we waked too. 15 year olds caring for their aging grandmother and 4 siblings, 8 year olds whose dad had died of HIV, etc.

It was soon time for us to get in place for the assembly line of lunch. A pot of rice that weighed more than me, beans, and a piece of chicken with a cup full of chicken broth on top. The kids would bow as we filled their plates and say "sank you" as they'd walk away. I can't tell you what joy I got from just filling kids plates with chicken broth. The simplest thing, but I was just so grateful to be a part and to help a child get a warm meal and full belly.

We walked back and got showered up for our touristy "night out". We drive down to the king fisher lodge for a boat tour on lake victoria to the source of the Nile river. It was so much fun to end our week together, seeing Uganda in a different way. Despite the fact that it poured rain (thankfully our boat was slightly covered), it was neat to hop out on the island and see the spring of the Nile river rippling and bubbling up joining lake Victoria as it started flowing, rather quickly.  It is the only river that flows south to north. Pretty amazing and beautiful! Lots of fun wildlife and a delicious fish dinner! A fun night to end an amazing week!

love this picture, this was on the back of a beached boat

source of the nile!

see where the current changes to the right? Lake Victoria is to the right, the nile starts from the bubbling on the left and flows left.

fishing village on Lake victoria

half of the team

the other half of us

not sure why Safari is in the name. The only wildlife we saw was birds ;)

I haven't even begun to process through the tens and tens of take aways and lessons God has taught me through this trip. For now I am simply working on getting over jetlag, loving my family well, and praying through all I have seen and heard from my time in Uganda. Thanks for your prayer, support and journeying with me on this season of life!