A huge thanks to our supporters for your prayer and financial help. We are constantly amazed by your provision for our family and vision and the orphans at Kyazanga. We are planning a large Christmas package of school resources and materials for Kyazanga which we will drop off in a few weeks. We depend on your prayer. Sharron and I have to make decisions daily which require plenty of wisdom and so we have felt your prayer as we learn how to survive and breathe in this challenging environment. Last week we ran out of cooking gas, the TV went fizzzz because of power cuts and fluctuations in electrical current, the car battery went flat – things that can be rectified with a phone call in NZ - well we were blessed as we tackled these head on and each time God put us in contact with the right people and we were able to get what we needed on time!!! The electrics in our house are scary - the hot water cylinder in our bathroom is falling off its brackets and the bolts have torn out of the wall – so Sharron and I shower in trepidation – the plumber has not returned to fix it after I showed him that the main water outlet pipe from the dining room sink was blocked by concrete, the toilet in the other bathroom is leaking from the cistern and the sink is falling out of the wall!!! The walls are made from a soft powdery concrete plaster so very few bolts hold!! The landlord says it is my problem since we agreed to rent the house!!! These issues may escalate. I am afraid there are no building codes or inspectors here – I am it!!! I still have not fixed the power sockets in the kitchen where the kettle plug melted into the wall socket after a massive overload and blew the kettle. That was our fourth kettle!! We decided to use gas instead – much safer but of limited supply. I am working on power protection devices – the last three power protectors burned out themselves!!!
Good news is I have recently found a really good electrician I just need a plumber who is skilled and turns up!!
As you can see one is challenged to remain patient and peaceful although I have to say that I lost my cool on the way home from school – Sharron was driving carefully and for some heavenly reason – thankyou for your prayer over our travelling here – I told Sharron to slow down a bit as we approached a T intersection – she was well under 50km – an idiot drove at full speed into the T and never looked left or right – he ended up one centimetre from my window – the whole neighbourhood heard me (no swearing) luckily Sharron kept moving. You cannot take anyone here on the road for granted – it is so important to go slow and be patient.
I am continually challenged by the plight of young people here – especially those millions in the 13 – 19 age bracket who cannot afford to start or complete their education. There is no free education here – all schools are demanding more and more fees from poverty stricken families. I have been helping one these young people over this year continue with his cooking chef course but in the multiple deluges of rain we have had each week (been raining each day for 5 months!) his mum’s mud house was flooded and he ended up on the street squatting in the 1000s of unfinished buildings with untold others. I discovered him and took him in for a night – but Sharron and I realized through some lively reality discussion that we just could not fit him into our house or bear the burden of a fifth (22 year old) child so I had the difficult task of dropping him back in town to find his mum and seek help from where his mum was staying temporarily.
I have mentioned before that at some point one has to realise what one has already got in his hands to look after – we have three new children plus a growing (fast) Moses. Sharron and I have realized that we have enough on our plate and these children are top priority and need everything we have. To take on more in our physical house hold is beyond our capacity. Herein is the difficult task of saying No to preserve and capture or experience truly what we do have! Hence we say thanks to those of you who pray for our wisdom – it is very easy here to let the heart and emotions travel on before reality and wise logic!!!
The 16 week term (whew) is coming to an end in two weeks and we as a family are well due for a break just relaxing together without commitments. Our school days are quite different to NZ; getting up at 5.30 to be a school by 7 am. This way we miss the traffic jams and some heated exchanges!! The children have had sporting events after school so some days we have not returned until 6 pm. It has been rewarding as the children have done really well in basketball. Moses and Denis team won the 7 and Under final 21/6 - Moses and Denis scored most of the points! They are very aggressive accurate players who won’t bow down on court! Nicholas is in the 9 and under final tomorrow. Pauline played in the basketball but she had to withdraw because of her fast growing age!! Her birth certificate is being redone so that she is 9 not 7 – people get birth dates wrong here for many reasons!! She is going to take up swimming – she is a real natural in the water with a long powerful body and stroke so we will get training for her as she just loves the sport in between frequent trips to the mirror to check her birthday braids!!!! Drives me crazy!!! All children are excelling at school. We have had to move Pauline up two classes (because of birth certificate changes) which is a major challenge to her academically but there are two others in her class of similar need. She is adapting better because she is now with same age peers, which is much healthy compared to hanging out with 6 year olds!!! I struggle teaching her English – especially written English – she had no exposure to the written word in text or books for her first five to 6 years and this is always a shaky foundation to build on because she cannot recall any familiar sound or word patterns. It is going to take shear hard work to rebuild her phonic categories and sentence structure. The boys are shooting ahead because there command of phonics and the written word is much better.
We all becoming a family more and more and learning to enjoy each other. We have plenty of conflicts and fights but these are small in number in contrast to the good times. The four children have very different personalities – Dennis is our theatrical, Pauline is the wild village girl being tamed, Nicholas is much softer and laid back and Moses is somewhere in between although his emotions can ride very high at times when certain ones are teasing!!! They play hard in sports which I enjoy – there is little let down – I humour them with a little physical rough it up stuff!!! Pauline had her 9th!! birthday party last weekend so we invited three of her school friends to the local swimming pool only to find it booked by a wedding party so we ended up at kalifa pool and a lot of fun. Pauline did not blow her candles out she snuffed the flames with her fingers to the horror of her friends – village ways!! I have included some photos on the blog. The children have had their fair share of extravagant birthday parties over the last 2 months – our kids get stuck in and have a jolly good time while mum dad enjoy a little socialising!! They have never experienced such wealth before so they get involved to the max and enjoy every minute – and why not – they need to be blessed after going without for so long – just hope it doesn’t go to their heads and they start getting their noses up – not with me around!!!!
I am writing this blog while sick with a horrid throat infection picked up at school that has turned into tonsillitis – so I am horizontal for a few days. We get these bugs in NZ but not as fierce. The smog and pollution don’t help – but this is the challenge of being in an over populated capital city. Strange to think the entire population of NZ is just down the road!!!!
I am so looking forward to spending Christmas with my oldest son Josiah. He arrives 24th for 3 weeks and our children are certainly getting excited – he will be bowled over with their love and energy. We are planning some camping and safari for him. He had better be fit!! Hopefully Shama can visit one day before we return. We will spend Christmas here in our house and involve our neighbours who are good friends and also very poor. The children usually hang out at our place on Sunday and play together. Last Sunday we all roasted grasshoppers and ate maize – the grasshoppers were very nice – similar to BBQ shrimp. Sundays are becoming more of a time to be with neighbours sharing the word singing and playing. Seems to be more in line with Jesus call!!
Happy new year friends - our God has been so faithful in his protection and provision we give thanks to Him for hovering over us and hearing ours and yours day to day prayer. Please see the photo albums below to go with this blog note. We are in the thick of the dry season averaging 35 degrees with soaring food prices and a 36% increase in power costs. We have just had two days without power which means swapping food to other fridges at school to save it. Our house water is being turned off daily so I have given up watering the vege garden – I will wait for rainy season. My neighbour fetched only a small amount of water in his 20 litre Gerry cans but I could not even offer him water from our dry tap. Actually while writing this blog the water tap has sprung into life so I had better go get my neighbour. My real estate friend has a landscaping contract in the southern Sudan and he tells me that all water has to be purchased there!! Drinking water is shipped in from Uganda! I have just finished reading “God grew tired of us” – about the lost boys of Sudan and what a great book about God’s mercy on an individual – albeit for the benefit of millions as it turned out. This book gives a personal account of the horrors of civil war over the last 20 years in the southern Sudan but ends with a fantastic account of God working through an individual to bring much healing to a destroyed nation.
My son Josiah flew from NZ to celebrate Christmas with us and for three weeks of camping and Safari. God truly honoured our time with fun at Lake Nabugabo near Masaka and then time at the orphanage and school we help support. So much thanks goes to our orphan supporters who create opportunities for individuals that never existed without your support. I would like to do so much more for that school in terms of stocking the library and finishing buildings half built – but first things first. Their last milking cow died but thanks to the big hearts of a NZ couple we will be able to get them a new cow, which is quite expensive now.
Our safari to Murchison Falls National Park with the Nile River boat trip and across Lion country was a real winner. I have posted a few photos on the albums below showing some awesome images of wildlife. The highlight being Josiah driving as we came across over 60 giraffe nosing around the road and lining the horizon like tall trees. We are still to spot a lion but this was not really disappointing as we stumbled on parades of elephants crossing the road – wow they are fast careful giants. Our boat cruise up the Nile to the falls was majestic as the river was a metre higher than normal but crocs still basked with open mouths on the riverbank and literally thousands of hippos clogged the riversides. It is an environment rich in bird life and other animals drinking their fill keeping their eye out for a croc!!!
We took Josiah on a hospital trip and that was rewarding. The boy I have been helping get into the Corso hospital for a new leg finally made it to the clinic for assessment but sadly they could not find enough stump to attach a new leg so we are investigating other options. The number of acid attacks is on the increase as domestic violence and revenge intensifies. The damage done to acid attack victims is horrendous and vicious. It shears off their face and skin and leaves them permanently disfigured. I do not know how anybody could inflict such suffering on people. A married couple were in the burns ward. They were the victims of an unprovoked attack leaving them both terribly burned on face and shoulders. Both shared the same bed with relatives sleeping underneath to provide food and toileting. Both and Josiah and I were greatly humbled by the share magnitude of suffering - yet they had a smile when we handed them a hot chipati and an egg with the love of Jesus – most of them know Jesus and are simply waiting to meet him – what else is there worth waiting for? The children from one family who all lost limbs in a bus accident were getting plastic surgery when we visited so that was good news. It is still hard to get your head around a “public” health system which demands that relatives pay for the medication, change the bed, do toileting, change clothes and let the nurse do the IV!! So if you don’t have the money for medication – you die – very publicly!!
Josiah had a few days with John our sponsored student before he left – I must admit there were a few sad faces when Josiah boarded. The boys really enjoyed having a young man around to fight, wrestle, play cricket and do music with – they can’t wait to see him again!! They had some solid drumming sessions.
We have had a few neighbourhood dramas – the latest was the killing of two people who tried to intervene in a land dispute. The owner attempted to evict people without warning, people got heated, the bodyguard opened fire and that was it – two dead and others seriously injured with gun shot wounds. Guns are touted everywhere here – some loaded, some World war 2 rejects, many AK automatic weapons carried by young security boys and all the police – life is treated cheaply here. On the way back from Murchison in the most horrible night driving conditions – Sharron driving – my contacts had expired – there are no road markings to guide you and most oncoming drivers have their headlights on full blinding you – you simply have to slow to a stop and relocate the left side of the road to avoid a head on and to avoid invisible cyclists and boda drivers – it is nightmarish – we came across numerous smashes and breakdowns – one of them a terrible one – an articulated truck had rolled and hit a tree demolishing the cab. Police were guarding the contents of the truck as thieves closed in. Later the next day we heard the shattering news that a full bus including children had crashed head on into the rolled truck at night killing most passengers and the police guarding the truck – the result of no street lights or road markings!! How much does it cost for road markings? Only the main roads leading to the Presidents farm and other MPS house have road markings!! Sorry I am getting a little irate!
Please pray for our precious very poor neighbours who are becoming more disillusioned as the economic crisis caused by presidential over spending hits home. Sharron and I have noticed a marked change in their demeanour and attitude to life – it is just so hard to earn enough to eat and pay rent. We help in small ways to keep their coffers supplied but not to the point of making them dependent. A time may be coming when they will be very desperate and we will be open to supporting them as much as possible to stay alive. These are people who work two jobs 10 hours a day. The wife of our closest neighbour works 8 to 6pm cleaning a hotel for $2 NZ per hour. Her husband sells clothes from a rack on his back as he walks the markets sweating it out, then comes home to make bricks and raise a few pigs – keeps me humble these people. He is making mud bricks without putting them through a kiln this time so he can add a room to his tiny mud hut. Firewood is too expensive at the moment to bake bricks. I respect these people a lot because they do not complain – there is no time to complain – survival is at stake and food must be found to feed their child. I am investigating ways to get them both into hairdressing – she can braid – he is good at selling – so I am thinking a small shop for him to sell clothes and cut hair. The local training outfits want 600,000 ugx (300 NZ) to train him in basic men’s hairdressing which is just a big rip off here. How much training do you need to complete a No 2 with an electric razor on most men who have very little African hair anyhow!! God help me to think outside of the box for my neighbours to help them find avenues to create a living that will sustain them. These people represent the large majority of Ugandans who have a low level of education (because they could not afford school fees) and so they suffer at the hands of the corrupt upper levels of bureaucracy and politicians who extort as much money as they can from contract bribes and outright theft! I have no doubt that those who have ignored the labourer’s cries for their rightful wages and turned a blind eye to the atrocious public health and education system will suffer terribly on their final day before our God who gave them every chance to bless the poor and use money wisely that was entrusted to their care. God is very clear in his word what will happen to those who accept bribes and manipulate the system to their own ends!!
How grateful I am and full of praise for my blessings as I report that our new children are doing so well at school. Sometimes Sharron, I and the children (after being with our neighbours or at the hospital) sit at the dinner table and simply stare in wonder at the abundance we have on the table – even if it is bread, honey and apples or mangos or pineapple or bananas – we represent the top three percent of wealth - we have access to better health facilities because we pay insurance and we have a nice house and car – all we can do is praise him and share our blessings where ever we can within Gods wisdom. Having a car and being to go places is such a blessing. Most people walk to work or cram into a taxi with 15 others. In fact last year I got into a taxi in Kyazanga – 9 people including two large Indian ladies filled the Toyota Corrolla – I thought that was it until they pushed a man onto our laps in the back seat. I asked if I could put the windows down!!! No wonder there was a strong smell of rubber from the back tyres! A good sense of humour is vital for survival in Africa!
Football season has started. I am coaching the 9 and unders’ which includes Nicholas, Dennis and Moses a formidable combination and very fiery. They are in a team of slightly older boys who are very talented so they will learn to take more of a back seat playing half and defence positions. What a privilege to be at my school which is clearly one of the best primary schools in Kampala. Thank you to those who have supported our new adopted children at my International School. The adoption process is meandering along at the usual snail pace as I collate the correct documents. We certainly made the right decision to live here and understand the culture of our adopted children and they begin to understand us in their setting. There are so many misunderstandings to work through but with the grace of Jesus and plenty of forgiveness and having fun together we are becoming a close knit family. Sharron and I have certainly found a common ground with our children in sports, music and art – which all the children so enjoy. They are very talented sports people. I have made a badminton court outside so that is the craze at moment in between cricket and soccer mixed with plenty of fun fighting. I thought I was good at badminton but I get beaten every night!!
After Josiah left we had a lovely visit from our NZ newly weds – Glen and Monique Storey – we so enjoyed their presence in our house – they fitted in with the children and played all the sports and just had fun – and the cooked a marvellous meal – lucky man Glen. It is so cool when you can have people stay and there is no sense of pressure or extra demands – we really appreciate them and hope to see them many times in the future.
Please pray for my mum Rosa who is now nursing my dad before he passes. Dad has lung cancer now together with skin cancer so I do not think he has long before he passes into the hands of our Lord. He has endured a long period of suffering and operations. I had a previous selfish prayer that he would stay alive to greet our new family home but I do not think this will happen now. He can watch from heaven and share his wisdom with our Lord on directing us! Dad loves to have a good chat about his ideas!!! My mum’s email is rosa.caldwell80@gmail.com
It was my Dad’s funeral today 26th April - a strange feeling not to be there but then I know and have experienced the sheer wonder of God’s timing in providing and allowing us to meet with Dad over two weeks before he passed. A huge thanks to Phil my brother and his wife for looking after the funeral arrangements with mum. When I look back over the last 2 months what an amazing mix of Gods works and miracles – I can say that He is faithful, full of loving kindness and compassion.
Our NZ trip (left 25th March to 13th April 2012) was simply incredible – full of loving support from hosts – the Williams {Sharron’s Mum and Dad}, the Annear’s and the Higgins – and all those we caught up with. Sorry to some of you we could not visit we simply ran out of time. Our main goal of visiting Dad and Sharron’s parents was very rewarding. We recovered from an exhausting trip at Sharron’s parents – poor Moses got a vomiting and diarhoea bug which hit in Australia – so it took a couple of visits to the indescribably clean and efficient health system of NZ in West Auckland to get him right. It was very cosy staying at Sharron’s parents!!!! Thanks to them for such love and generosity – Uncle Garry took the boys up the Waitakeres and to Bethels beach – wild and windy but beautiful!!
I can say without reservation – NZ is unbelievably clean (no rubbish lying everywhere) and well organised. I was continually stunned by how easy it was to drive on the well organised roads, breathe the clean air, update my driver’s licence, get access to food and communicate on high speed internet – what a paradise – enjoy if you live in NZ!!!!
The boys had a precious time laughing with Dad only a week before he passed into the heavenly realm. The weather was superb, the boys enjoyed the ocean on bogey boards – first time Nicholas and Denis had experienced sand and surf – they went wild and dived in to have a great time riding waves in sunny weather at Mount beach. Sharron’s brother neill flew up from Christchurch and we visited our favourite fish and chip jaunt on the strand harbour followed by some bogey surfing with uncle Neill. I got a few surfs with Walter (I am a bit surf unfit) and even a magical kayak fish with Steve Arnold – caught 6 snapper and a huge kahawai – even the currents were on our side as we drifted from 2 km out back towards the car!!!!
We will not forget our fun times at the Annears – making our new boys feel comfortable, easter egg hunt, magnificent breakfasts and playing/chatting together and then the Higgins – I think they hosted four dinners for our friends and had many of our friends over for a chat. Our children mixed really well with Janae and Isaac and they look forward to hanging out with them in the future. It was music and nerf gun madness at the Smiths, Cherry was busy feeding 5 teenage appetites. Thank heaps to all who turned up for a chat including my time at the Blokes group – thanks Steve Peddle for your support and all those who had us over to dinner or lunch and who donated towards our projects in Uganda. We received some anonymous donations and we want to thank these precious people who are involved in saving lives through our ministry here.
I had some important time with my children Josiah and Shama - Nicholas Moses and Denis will never forget seeing them at a distance when visiting Somervale where mum lives – they took off in loud excitement to greet them – I miss them a lot and ask for your prayer for them for protection and direction at this time in their lives.
Well, February was full of events including a delightful first birthday party for our beloved Ken (25 years)– the neighbours joined us for a high spirited time of feasting and dancing. Ken was so full of joy and just could not stop rejoicing. Our driveway neighbourhood is expanding as more rural people move into the city because of lack of health and education care in the countryside. We have a new mud brick house at the entrance to our driveway with a whole bunch of needy children – all quite uneducated but hungering for play (and our trampoline). I had to step in the other day as I noticed some of our toy trucks going walky!!! We don’t mind them playing around our compound and using our toys but I draw the line when they assume they can simply take toys away. We were able to bless our immediate neighbours financially as we employed them to guard the house while in NZ. We are planning to set up one of main ladies in the neighbourhood in a baby clothes business. Thankyou to all those in NZ who donated clothes to enable this to happen – we flew back with 5 huge travel suitcases with over 100 Kgs of clothing – now we are looking for a suitable shop to rent at our local market place – Kitentale – please pray for this place.
God laid it heavily on Sharron’s heart in late February that we needed to travel to NZ in the Easter holiday break for 3 weeks instead of waiting until Christmas to use my flight home allowance (my flight home allowance does not cover our two new boys). The challenge we faced was raising the money for Nicholas and Denis flights and obtaining visitor visas from NZ Immigration in Pretoria, SA for the two boys as well as Australian visas from the Australian Embassy in Nairobi!!! And so began the battle of paper and gaining approvals within 3 weeks. I must admit I had sleepless nights battling with NZ Immigration to simply convince them that the two boys were in our custody legally – this took a few trips to the lawyer and photocopying huge amounts of paper. They had delayed my application long enough so I hit red alert on the emails and let them have it full barrel – we were not traffickers, we were not doing it illegally, we have been involved with Africa and the boys including their previous orphanage for many years – finally after reaching the top echelons they asked for approval for the boys to leave from the Ugandan court!! This bowled me – especially only a few days from our deadline and flight times. Thanks to our friendly social welfare officer he arranged for the document. We got approval 5 days out from flight time - the courier turned up to pick up the boys passports and visas in Pretoria only to be told to go away he need a letter of authority for pick up from me to give to NZ Immigration – Oh my what a challenge this place is!!!! We got the visas with 4 days to go to get them to Nairobi to the Aussi Embassy. Why Ugandans need visas for a 1.5 hour stopover in Australia and not leaving the airport beats me!!! Then I get the most distressing email from the Kenyan Australian Embassy – please prove you have custody – Oh boy I had to hold my breath – scan and send without ripping into them that we already had NZ Immigration approval!! I finally got approval but then the courier did not turn up so I let fly with controlled anger and forced the courier to pick them up now and put them on the next flight!!!! We got the boys visas the day before flying and you could have heard my yelling in joy from NZ!! At least I will know the process when we return!! I must admit I drew very close to Jesus in this time – I knew I had to keep pushing those emails and put the heat on – sometimes you really have to fight for what is right and push hard. He is our strength in these times - so don’t give up!!
Our boys made the soccer finals the day before we left for NZ – the result of a whole terms hard work. I was glad we were leaving the next day to distract them and myself from the extreme disappointment of losing in a penalty shootout - I learned a huge lesson as one of the coaches – don’t suddenly change your substitution plans half way through the game – we were up two goals and sacrificed that advantage to play the whole bench instead of rolling subs on later in the game. A lesson for the future – but I felt for the boys who had won all their games and were top points scorers all season!! Finals are very distressing!! Next year as the saying goes!!!!
I befriended a young man who is training to become a chef – a lovely guy who lives with his mother in extreme poverty – a lower level mud home down in the swamp area. We all visited with some food supplies in March - her house is falling down because of heavy rain. The river next door rose up and overwhelmed the house recently so they all had to move out. They are back there now. Mum walks 8 km every day at night to sell premade meat kebabs at a small BBQ on the side of the road at Bugolobi market. She feeds and educates 3 children abandoned by her extended family!! We would like to build her a new brick house on higher ground and want you to pray for the support for this project – it will cost about $1000US for a two room well built house with windows and doors and iron roof.
Well we are back home in Kampala and back into it – home is where we are – we love our neighbours and are very close to them. School is flat out and it is a real good experience having Sharron as my assistant for a few weeks – she meshes in well with my style – I get to kiss the assistant!!
Sharron visited the hospital last Sunday with three helpers while I looked after the children and OH Jesus have mercy on me if I ever complain or worry about my lot!!! The burns ward is overflowing with acid attack victims. One poor woman has all her frontage destroyed – someone filled her container for lighting etc with petrol instead of paraffin!!! The hospital in itself is perhaps the most criminal act I have ever experienced - the largest hospital is horribly and completely neglected – mothers dying daily in childbirth. Statistics quote one mother in 35 dies in childbirth in Uganda. Children and adults dying from lack of medicine and bandaging, no morphine for the cruelly abused attack victims and lack of nursing care – it is worse than a front line war hospital. Our ministry into the burns ward is significant – it touches and brings hope to many people who are simply desperate. Oh Jesus comfort their souls and reassure them that heaven awaits just a step away!!! We encourage all who read this to donate to this ministry - our Charitable Trust Westpac Bank details are on the top of this blog – you will either save a life (physically) or help someone transition into heaven in peace. God will bring justice soon to those who follow Jesus and who suffer unnecessarily - Jesus is all they have and all they will ever need.
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