Schools out!

In Uganda, the school year ends in December and the kids are on holiday till February.  I miss seeing the village kids that come to GSF for school, but it has been a nice break having 200 less kids to look after.  Now that the GSF kids main source of structure is gone, they run free around the campus and somehow always end up in our living room.  I love having the time to cuddle with the kids, read them stories, try to learn how to Ugandan dance, and cook with them.  Unfortunately, this means our home is a disaster all the time.    It's amazing how fast the kids can make a fort with the couch cushions, open every game, get out crafts, and get into anything in sight.  Before long, our place has turned into a zoo.  This has been a lot of fun, but a lot of work as well.  It is quite an endeavor cleaning things up.  My housemates and I are so thankful the kids feel comfortable in our home, but are realizing how important it is for them to learn good manners and be respectful in a home.  It is so exhausting staying on top of behavior and being consistent with rules, especially when the kids and are so cute and creative with their excuses.

One thing I've learned is that kids are kids no matter where they live, they're genuine one minute and manipulative the next.  They want attention and love and need discipline and structure.  Knowing how to do this well for 91 kids is such challenge, especially because I've never been a parent and the kids tell me I look 15 years old.  I've been so encouraged by God's word as He desires us to come to him for wisdom (James 1:5).  I love that this verse is not specific about what the wisdom needs to be about.  It can be as small as how to discipline a child after they've disobeyed or as big as deciding whether a child should be resettled into the village.  I've been amazed at how God really is faithful to his promises and does grant wisdom to a situation.  That is a God worth putting my trust into.

Let's catch up!

      I can’t believe I’ve been at GSF for almost four weeks.  Caring for the kids here has been a lot of fun, but exhausting.  My day begins at 6:30am and ends around 7pm.  I do morning rounds where I administer medications and check all the kids to see if they’re sick.  Having 91 kids in close quarters, it seems nearly impossible for all of them to be healthy.  The kids will also come up with all sorts of ailments in order to get medicine or a bandage, so I’ve been doing a lot of teaching regarding that.  During the day, my teammate Sarah and I will also care for the students at the primary school at GSF (around 300 kids).  We will also take kids to doctor’s appointments or take them to the hospital when needed.  Sarah and I are also doing a lot of teaching with the Ugandan house moms regarding hygiene, feeding, positioning, and medication administration and so forth.  As you can tell, there’s a lot of work to do here. 

     The first week I was here, this all was new and exciting and I loved it.  As the weeks went on, I became frustrated as I felt all of my time here was consumed with nursing duties.  I was called to be a disciple of Christ, not just a humanitarian.  I really desired to live life with the kids and build relationships with them.  Thankfully, as time has gone on here, Sarah and I have become more efficient in how we do things and have been able to create time to hang out with the kids.  I of course love playing with the little ones, but really feel like my heart is with the teenage girls.  Realizing a lot of the teen girls are not walking closely with the Lord and will be leaving GSF soon has pushed me to get to know them more.  This all seemed very intimidating as the girls are standoffish and hard.  Last week though, a lot of walls started to come down.  Since the girls finished their school year and are on break, they have a lot of time on their hands and are always looking for something to do.  I've taking this opportunity to have them work with me.  The girls will hang out with me at the clinic and do small tasks.  They will also be my translator when a patient does not speak English.   This has allowed me to spend quality time with them while doing my job here.  In the evenings, I've also been able to eat dinner at their house or have them over to mine.  I've been encouraged as the girls have started to open up.  Behind their hard faces and “I don’t need you attitude” are scared, fearful women who want some form of security in their lives.  Through these conversations, I now know how I can be praying for these women and encouraging them.  I really look forward to what God will do in these relationships.  

My new home, GSF

Hello friends! I've now been at GSF a week and I love it here.  There are 93 kids and they are all so sweet.  I'm in the process of learning their names, but seeing they all have shaved heads it can be difficult to tell them apart. As I'm trying to learn their names, they are trying to learn mine.  My parents almost named me Rachel and this is the time I wish they had.  The kids have the hardest time pronouncing my name.  I gave up introducing myself as "Meredith" and resorted to "Mer", even that is difficult for them to pronounce and remember.  Thankfully I'll be here plenty of time for them to nail my name down and I theirs.

Here are some highlights of the past week:
*Sarah and I were able to jump into doing morning and evening rounds giving meds, doing dressing changes, and LOTS of teaching.

*I turned 23!  The kids decorated my home with toilet paper and pictures they drew.  That evening all the missionaries got together and had a Mexican potluck.  Later my housemates and I carved green pumpkins.  Overall, it was a great day.  Thanks to everyone who wished me a happy birthday! 
*Having dinner with my housemates.  I live with three other girls and they are all wonderful.  We all mesh really well together. 
*Whenever I go into the toddler house, the kids run to me smiling yelling "visitor visitor"
*Eating fresh pineapple almost every day.  Pineapple here is 50-75 cents.
*Hearing the kids sing in church.  I sometimes don't know if they're singing in English or Luganda, regardless it's beautiful.
*Being able to skype with family and some friends!  Skype rarely works out here, so this was quite a treat.
*Everyone at the orphanage can drink the water straight out of the tap!  This is pretty unheard of in Uganda and for most of Africa. 

Prayer request: ENERGY.  Since  I live at GSF, I'm never really off duty.  This gets very draining. 

Anyway, there will be more to follow.  I just wanted to give a quick update on life thus far. 

mer

Arrived!

Hello everyone! 

I'll give you a little outline of the past week
*Sunday evening CityLife Church commissioned me.  My family and several close friends were able to come and support me that Sunday.  I was so thankful the church was able to rally around me in prayer and send me off.  That evening I said my last goodbyes to friends and some of my family.  I was sad, but excited for what was to come. 
*Early Monday morning my parents took me to the airport where I then headed out to NY where AIM headquarters is located.  My flight went smoothly and all my luggage arrived.   Myself and 7 other short termers had orientation together.  We had seminars on the Biblical basis of missions, culture, travel, finances, and spiritual warfare.  It was very brief, but content filled. 
*Wednesday afternoon all 8 of us headed to the airport to begin our journey to Africa.  We all flew together for the first leg to London.  Seven of us had a 12 hour layover so we were able to leave the airport and do some sight seeing.  That evening we headed back to the airport and 4 or the short termers headed to Namibia and three of us headed to Uganda.  Thankfully I was able to sleep a couple hours on the flight to Entebbe, Uganda as I didn't have any sleep the night before.  My teammate Sarah, another short termer Heather, and I all arrived Friday morning along with our luggage.  We were picked up at the airport and brought to the guest house in Kampala called Matoke Inn.  We had a small bit of orientation, but not much as we were all quite jet lagged (I am 8 hours ahead of central time) and exhausted from our over night flights. 
*Saturday we celebrated the national day of prayer with other missionaries in the area by gathering all day and lifting up praises and prayer requests of people serving in all different places in the world.
*I will head out of Kampala Tuesday and make the trek to Good Shepherd's Fold orphanage.  I'm very eager to see what my days will look like there.  I'll keep you posted once I find out!

Thank you all for praying for safe travels and hard goodbyes to go well.  God has been good and showed Sarah and I much grace with how smoothly things have gone thus far.  

*An ongoing prayer request will be safety traveling around the city.  If I die in Africa, it would probably be from a car accident.  The driving here gets pretty crazy.
*Please pray that I would adapt quickly to the culture here (food, concept of time, language, social norms).  Most of the people speak English, but speak Luganda to each other.  I'd like to pick up some of that up.
*Pray that God would give me wisdom beyond my experience.  Pray that I learn quickly and care for the children and GSF safely.  Pray that God would give me wisdom as to how to meet the kids spiritual and emotional needs.  I will have more specifics on that once I meet the kids. 


I've only been here 2 days, but I love it thus far.  The people are very friendly and the country is beautiful.  The poverty and way of living is quite eye opening though.  I'm very eager to begin working with and along side the people and build relationships with them. 

I plan on updating my blog weekly just for your information. 

meredith

My new address

Some of you were asking what my address will be in Uganda.  Here it is!

Meredith Lee
Good Shepherd's Fold
P. O. Box 1281
Jinja, Uganda

One of the staff at GSF said this about sending packages:
*Padded envelopes are delivered much faster then boxes and typically get through customs faster
*Padded envelopes take 2-4 weeks to arrive, boxes take 3-8 weeks
*Around Christmas time, all packages are delayed.  Typically, if it is not sent by the end of October, the package will not be received by Christmas.

Today, I become a blogger

Hello everyone!  It's due time that I start writing in my blog seeing that I leave in six days! 

Here are some of the things I've been up to recently. 
*Speaking at churches.  I had the privilege to speak at Autumn Ridge Church (where I attended youth group in high school), Trinity Presbyterian Church (where I grew up going to church) and CityLife Church (where I attend church in the twin cities).  It has been such a blessing sharing my story with so many people.  I was so encouraged by the number of people that came up to me after the services telling me they'd be praying for me. 
* Support raising.  God has continued to show his faithfulness to me through working in the hearts of many people.  By his grace and the generosity of friends, family, and even strangers, I have reached my financial goal and am 100% supportered!  Thank you to everyone who prayed that God would provide and thank you to those who gave so sacrificially.
* Reading.  I was encouraged to get the book Where There Is No Doctor.  It's a very helpful reference book that talks about rural village health care.  I have been flipping through it and becoming familiar with things I may encounter in rural Uganda.
*Packing.  I typically find packing very easy as I throw things in my room into a duffel bag and call it good.  Looking at my sports bag, it was pretty obvious it would not make the cut for this trip, nor would my summer above the knee skirts as they are considered immodest.  So, packing for 9 months to a place I've never been has been more of a challenage than packing for a trip up north.  All in all, I've found all the things I need and am for the most part done.  I have also been packing medical supplies I received from the Mayo Clinic warehouse as well as from my doctor friend Kate.  I was able to buy over the counter medications the orphanage said they needed such as hemorrhoid ointment and stool softeners (what I have to look forward to:) ) with cash several people had given me. 
*Getting technologized.  Yes, I now have itunes and skype on my computer.  My computer is pretty slow in the U.S. so I'm hoping these things work while I'm in Uganda.  Regardless, I'm now welcomed into the 21st century. 
*Seeing people and saying goodbyes.  I've already said goodbye to Rochester people and now the process begins with twin cities people.  It's hard to think about not seeing friends and family for 9 months, but then I remind myself of where I'm going, who I'll be serving, and why I'm going.  I'm so excited to meet the kids at GSF and love on them.  I'm excited to be there nurse, friend, and Sunday school teacher.  I'm excited to meet my teammate Sarah and then other staff at GSF and serve alongside them.  This keeps me positive and upbeat in a time where many tears are shed. 

So, that's about where I am now.  Friday, my housemates are throwing a going away party for me, Sunday I commission from CityLife Church at 4:00pm , and Monday I leave for New York for orientation and from there take off the 20th to Uganda.  Time keeps flying and before I know it, I will be too :). 

Prayer requests:
*That some difficult goodbyes will go smoothly
*That I would rely on God's truths when I am fearful about this next step
*Safety in traveling

I am so thankful to know I'm not going alone and I have a strong support group who will be praying for me.  You all are great!

With love,
   meredith