Time of Transition

Uganda, Uganda…wow, I don’t know quite where to begin.  My transition back to Kampala has been so up-and-down that if you were to ask me what it’s been like, my response would be totally dependent on the circumstances of that particular day.  Today I’m feeling pretty neutral, so hopefully I can paint a fair picture of life here.  J

Let’s start with the basics.  I live in a small village called Busega, about thirty minutes from the city center of Kampala.  The ministry I am working with consists of a home for girls, a home for boys, a primary school called Royal Hope Academy, and some discipleship groups that normally meet at the girls’ house.  I live in the boys’ house with another missionary from the U.S. named Ashley.  We have our own room and bathroom, which is a HUGE blessing.  Even though we have to share the room with a family of cockroaches, we have more space and comfort than expected.  In place of a shower, we have a tub where we take bucket showers.  It’s not too bad, although we are currently out of water, so no showers today….

For the first couple weeks, the boys in the house barely spoke to me but instead looked at me as though I were an unwanted intruder.  Our only interactions were when one of them knocked on my door to notify me that a meal was ready.  At first, I didn’t understand how the meal system worked here or whether or not I was supposed to be doing something.  I would simply hear a knock on my door, but when I answered, “Yes?” or “Come in”, I received no response.  When I would open the door, I would see that a meal had appeared on the kitchen table.  The boys would all gather, mumble a prayer in Luganda, eat, and then scatter.  I desperately wanted to speak with the cook and thank her or to speak more with the boys, but instead I experienced mostly awkward silence.  I felt incredibly out of place and never really knew what was happening for probably two weeks or so.  I was very thankful to have Ashley there with me, but she was also new and didn’t know what was going on either. 

Often, the boys, Ashley, and I all paraded down to the girls’ house, a fifteen-minute walk from our house, and hung out in their compound.  Visits there were nice, as their home is bigger and nicer and homier than ours.  The girls usually received me with a bit more warmth, so the vibe was a bit better, but I still felt overall unwanted and confused.

Initially, my mornings began when the music outside my window was blaring so loud that I could no longer stay asleep.  I think it’s fair to say that our house is across the street from the most annoying bar in Kampala.  They blare music nonstop, from early morning until the wee hours of the night.  Fortunately, I’m getting better at falling asleep with the noise, but the first week was miserable.  I would just lie in bed, feeling exhausted yet unable to sleep.  I’m sleeping normally now, but my current struggle is finding quiet time throughout the day.  When I want to quietly pray or music, all I hear is the day’s tunes.  Some days it’s 50 Cent; some days it’s Celine Dion; sometimes it’s oldies; sometimes it’s African or reggae.  No matter what, it’s annoying and nonstop.  It’s so loud that I feel like I am inside the bar when I am sitting in my room, even with the door and windows closed.  The noise is maddening, but I’m trying really hard not to go crazy.

To be honest, I thought moving back to Uganda would be an easy transition and was pretty upset when I discovered quite the opposite.  I wrongly figured it would be smooth and simple to return to a familiar place after being all over the globe for so many years.  I thought it would be quick to readjust, simple to make new friends, and easy to jump back into my old life.  However, the reality is that my old life no longer exists.  So many of the people I once knew here have left the city – both foreigners and Ugandans.  It is bizarre to see a familiar place with memories of specific people and to know I will likely never spend time with those people here again.  The Kampala I knew seven years ago no longer exists either.  There are new restaurants and stores people refer to that I’ve never heard of.  Some places I do know have been renamed or relocated, so I’m relearning old places.  All the prices have drastically increased since I left, so even though I feel like I should know Kampala’s money system, I have to constantly ask questions to make sure I am not being ripped off.  The independent girl who once knew the price of every taxi, mango, and street purchase now knows nothing.  Every day, it seems like I find another area of this culture where I have to start over.

When I lived at an orphanage in 2006/7, the children were all from a northern tribe that spoke Acholi.  However, the children I’m now living with speak Luganda; therefore I am tackling a new language – a hard one.  Every once and a while, I’ll understand a phrase or sentence and get really excited.  Then I remember that I still have the vocabulary of a two year old at best.  In 2011, I was teaching ESL at Cal State University; now I have children teaching me the most basic of words – like how to say “rice” or “please.”  Any sense of pride is being daily knocked out of me.

There’s so much information to take in that sometimes my brain feels like there’s no room for another language.  Since arriving, I’ve learned the name of the nineteen kids living at the children’s homes, the names of every teacher at Royal Hope Academy, and the name of all the missionaries working here.  I’ve learned how to navigate the dirt road labyrinth I live inside to reach the girls’ home, school, church, and the main road that grants me taxi access to the city.  I am learning the ropes of a new ministry, and now I’m trying to shove a gazillion new words into my overloaded mind.  It’s tough.

When I originally planned to move back to Kampala, I felt like I had already “paid my dues” to Uganda and wanted to continue where I left off in 2007.  In 2006/7, I was the only foreigner living in the orphanage; I ate all the local food; I used squat toilets; I walked and took local transport; I had more African friends than American friends.  It took me many months, but I gained the respect of the staff and children at the orphanage, and they made me an honorary African.  Yet, in this new village and ministry, no one knows me.  They don’t consider me an African; I’m just some new white girl who showed up.  I haven’t proven anything to them yet, and they don’t know my motives or my heart.  I am realizing that this process will have to start all over again.  It’s a long, slow, and humble one.  So here we go again…

I am learning hard but valuable lessons.  I am forced to humble myself constantly, being in the position of a learner all the time.  Every day I am learning to surrender more pieces of my life.  I am remembering that getting up and eating a breakfast I choose for myself is a luxury.  I no longer can eat what I want or when I want.  It’s a blessing to have someone who cooks for all of us, but I have no choice over my diet.  We mostly eat carbs and carbs, with a side of carbs.  Some days I can get it all down; others I can barely look at it.  I would love to cook for myself, but the tiny charcoal stove outside doesn’t give me much freedom to do so. 

I cannot move about the city safely after dark.  I can’t drive around to meet up with friends.  I don’t even know how to make friends.  I cannot easily use Skype and communicate with the people I love the way I would prefer.  I cannot go to the church I want to go to, and I don’t understand 90% of what is said in our village’s church.  No one can pronounce my name, so I have to respond to a variety of names that aren’t my own.  “Kaaaay-TEE” or “Kat-a-leen” is as close as it gets.

I cannot dress in the clothes I want to wear.  Jeans are considered sexually provocative in the village, and shorts are absolutely out of the question.  I can’t choose what I wear or what I look like.  I hate hate hate wearing long skirts.  I don’t feel like Caitlin; I feel like a frumpy weirdo.  It may sound so trivial, but it’s hard.  It’s hard to not be in control of my life.  I have to surrender to a culture which doesn’t really make sense to me.

My life is not my own.  It does not belong to me, nor has it ever belonged to me.  It’s easy to say that our lives belong to the Lord when we still do whatever we want, when we are comfortable, when we are allowed to make choices and feel like we have control over what is happening in our lives.  It seems that no matter how much time I spend on the mission field, I am constantly re-learning how to die to myself and to remember that my life is not my own.

But that brings me to the thing that’s more important than all of the sacrifices – the thing that causes all of these inconveniences to fade into the background.  God called me here, and that means that there is purpose in being here.  There’s purpose in eating weird foods and taking bucket showers and daily battling cockroaches.  It’s a purpose that I cannot yet fully see; but slowly, slowly, slowly, more of it is unfolding.  Like an onion, I keep peeling back layers and am confident that I will ultimately fall in love with Uganda all over again as more and more of its beauty is unveiled.  Some days, it’s still pretty hard, but I constantly remind myself that I am meant to be here and that patient love yields much fruit in the end.  Heidi Baker always says, “Love looks like something,” and it’s true.  Right now, love looks like eating foods I don’t like and playing with kids and helping at a school that really needs help and being patient with teenagers that have a lot of walls up.

As I do these things, I find more and more experiences that make being here worth it.  The boys who initially looked so distrusting of me are slowly warming up to my presence in their home.  What first seemed an impossible feat is looking more and more possible.  The boys and I have found things to talk, laugh, and joke about.  The vibe in the house has transformed from horribly awkward to tolerable to comfortable.  Every day, it feels a bit closer to family.  Last night, we had a family meeting where Ashley and I volunteered to be assigned a chore to help out around the house.  We explained to the boys that we were no longer guests but part of their family, so we want to be treated as equals – even if it means doing extra work.  In a culture where white people are often put on an unmerited pedestal, I think it’s good for the boys to see us serving them.  One of the boys said he was surprised and impressed when he found out that Ashley and I hand washed our own clothes.  Clearly, there are a lot of false perceptions that need to change and cultural damage that needs to be undone.  So maybe love even looks like doing dishes or cleaning our own clothes instead of paying an African to wash them.  And as I learn what love looks like here, slowly, slowly, slowly, I’m seeing walls come down.  I am thankful to say that the initial skepticism of the boys is turning into respect, and I hope that one day that respect will even turn into genuine love.

I’ve continued to visit the girls’ house as well, and several of them are already pretty open.  One of the girls, fifteen-year-old Gloria, has become my personal Luganda teacher.  Whenever I enter the house, all of the girls greet me with, “Good morning, Auntie.”  However, Gloria greets me, “Hello, my student,” as she giggles wildly to herself.  She has given me tests and says I am her top student. (Well, I guess I’m her only student).  On the cover of my notebook, she wrote my name and her name and “Top Class,” which is the equivalent of nursery school level in the U.S.  Gloria thinks that’s pretty funny, and we’ve had a great time learning and teaching together.  After our regular Luganda sessions started, I overheard that Gloria is often teased by the other kids for being bad at English.  They make fun of her and treat her like she’s stupid.  Yet, she is the one who reached out to me and is trying to help me learn her language.  I had no idea just how much it meant to her to be put in the position of the one teaching – to be the one who knows and understands information.  After finding out about the teasing, it means that much more to me every time I see Gloria’s face light up when she calls me her student.

I’m getting to know other kids too, slowly but surely.  It seems like playing games is the way to their hearts, and being unafraid to look like a fool is the way to go.  I’ve also connected with Auntie Tendo, the cook and auntie at our house, despite initial language barriers.  Even though she barely speaks English, and I barely speak Luganda, we spent over an hour together the other night cooking dinner for the boys.  She instructed me through a mix of English, Luganda, and charades, and we cooked a delicious meal together while singing Celine Dion and using the mingling stick as a microphone.  I don’t care how stupid I look anymore.  I already look ridiculous here.  I might as well have fun and make other people laugh while I’m doing it.

When I’m not at the houses, I’ve mainly been working at Royal Hope Academy, our primary school.  Our younger boys and girls will attend classes there when the school term begins in a couple weeks, as well as hundreds of underprivileged children from the community.  To say there’s a lot of work to be done is a massive understatement.  We’ve spent the last couple weeks doing teacher training in preparation for the term, and it’s been eye-opening to see the minimal level of education required to be an educator yourself.  Ashley is a teacher back in the States, so both of us will be checking in with the teachers throughout the term and hopefully doing some individual tutoring for struggling students as well.  This is the first time Iris has had long-term volunteers helping with the school and ministry, so I am excited to see what we can accomplish during our time here.

All in all, even though I began my time in Kampala feeling out of place and rejected, things are beginning to shift to a place of acceptance.  When the school term begins, we’ll really be in full swing, and I’m sure I’ll find my niche.  Between the boys’ and girls’ homes, school, community discipleship, and administrative work, I’m pretty sure I’ll find ways to stay busy around here!  I am constantly dreaming of the future as well, knowing that this ministry is a jumping off point into something more permanent.  My ultimate dream is to start my own home for children, so as I learn from the Iris staff and children, I always keep that in mind. 

This season is a time to learn, to serve, to laugh, to dream, and to love.  It’s certainly full of challenges but equally full of hope.