Uganda Adventure

Monday, September 06, 2010, 7:40pm Bungoma Time

Well today was an experience!  Today was to be a little bit of rest to follow up the last 8 days of going hard.   Today Bishop Ogara and Leonard took me to Webuye Falls which is a natural set of falls about an hour away.  I have included pictures in the FB album called “Webuye”.  It is really a beautiful place and not what you might imagine to find in Africa.  The water comes from Mt. Elgon which is not far away and it flows all year long.  The amount of water changes with the rainy season but right now they say it is about the middle of where it flows.  After seeing it I can’t really imagine what it might be like if the amount of water were a lot more than this.  Getting there was a chore and we did some serious “off-roading” all while the Bishop ate on his roasted corn on the cob.  Yeah, we stopped by the roadside for a snack of roasted corn on the cob which is a normal snack for everyone around here.  There will be women set up all over the place with a little fire and they are fanning the fire to roast the corn and people stop and buy it.  It’s kind of tough compared to what we think of when we say corn on the cob.  So we are bouncing down this rock road and my kidneys are already in my back pocket because of the roads all week long and the Bishop is just cool and calm and grabs his corn off the dashboard and takes a bite and then throws it back up there, Hakuna Matata (no worries).  We headed back and decided to go the border town of Malamba to exchange some currency that I had brought.  Leonard had told me that we could get a better exchange rate for real US Dollars than doing a transfer.  So far we have found that the banks down here will not accept any bill printed earlier than 2000 and if it has the slightest tear in it anywhere they will not accept it at all.  So the Bishop has a friend over in Malamba which is a moneychanger and we went over to convert the bit of money I had left.  When we got over there we found out that they too did not really want the older bills so the exchange rate was very poor but we took it because I can’t get a transfer to go through from here.  Oyvay! So on the way I told the Bishop that I had only applied for a single entry visa into Kenya because I did not think I would be crossing the border and he said ok.  The next thing I know we are crossing the border into Uganda on foot.  Little did I know that if you give the guard at the border 5,000 Ugandan Shillings he will let you back into Kenya without a visa!  But it wasn’t a bribe, we just wanted to buy him lunch.  By the way, that’s about $3 US.  Nice to know my life is worth a whole 3 bucks!  So we went into Uganda and walked around the border town for a while and then the Bishop decided we would stop and have lunch at a restaurant that he knew.  He travels through here frequently since they have several church plants in Uganda so he is very familiar with the people, thank you Jesus!  So we sat down and he ordered for us and all I understood was “mixed” which meant bring us a little bit of everything.  He asked if I wanted fish and I said no that I would prefer beef for this meal.  By the time they brought is a bottled water and a soda the food was right behind it.  I have include a picture in the FB album so you can see.  I had fresh avocado, smashed bananas and yams, rice, irish potatoes, boiled yam and kasava (root) along with my beef stew (their term).  After we had washed our hands outside we dug in.  This was only the beginning of the adventure.  Afterwards the Bishop decided he wanted to go to the local market and buy some fresh bananas because they are much cheaper here than in Bungoma.  Walking around inside the local market was very different experience and after we  had gotten our bananas (and I stepped on a rusty nail that went into my foot slightly…..glad I got that tetnus shot before I left) he decided we take a “shortcut” to get back to the main road and back to the border.  So we cut through where families were living and believe me I got some looks!  My spider senses were on overload as I always tried to keep up with who was behind us and where was my exit at any given point, a practice that I have always had when in an unfamiliar surrounding but this was different.  I didn’t have a clue where I would go because everywhere that I looked it was the same and I didn’t have a clue which direction the main street was because we had twisted and turned so many times.  I was hoping that the Bishop did!  What seemed like an eternity later we popped out on the main drag and headed back to the border where we “bought” my freedom with the 5,000 Ugandan Shillings that the Bishop had exchanged with Kenyan Shillings in town.  Oh yeah, lunch for all three of us along with bottled water and  a soda cost almost $8 US Dollars.  And we thought our economy was bad.  I can honestly say that the trip into Uganda and to the local market there was the only time on this whole trip that I felt really uncomfortable but God was faithful and gave us safe passage.  The hour drive home included passing through two police checkpoints, both of which the Bishop just drove right through.  I asked  him if the stops were for the commercial rigs only which is usually the case here and he said no.  When I asked  him why we didn’t stop he said he never stops unless someone tells him to……..ok.  So we made it back home and it was a long day of adventures.  Tomorrow I head to Musakasa with Leonard as we meet with the other three Pastors to talk about the church and to also pursue the foundation of the new building.  We have masonary guy that is giving us an estimate.  Keep up the prayers, love you guys!

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