Days 6 and 7

Mom, sorry I didn't get a chance to post yesterday. I am alive, don't worry about it :)

It's been a very busy couple of days here!!
Yesterday we left our resort bright and early to head to Queen Elizabeth National Park in southwestern Uganda. On the way to the park we stopped at a tea farm to see how it works. It's crazy, the people have these cutter thingys that they use to cut the good leaves off but the good leaves are only the highest 2 leaves of each plant for some reason (i think it may have something to do with the sun) and the people spend all day picking the leaves and they end up getting about $2.50 a day! yikes.

We arrived at the national park and headed straight to the boats for another boat tour that took us to Lakes Edward and George (see a pattern here? they're named after British people, haha). On the way down to the boats, a girl from Drake and I got into a conversation about God and whether He is the same God between all religions. It's for sure a conversation that I will continue with her later as we were interrupted by the goings on here so you can pray for that!
On the tour we got to see a lot of animals (hippos, elephants, alligators) and later we went on a game drive (just a drive through the park) where we saw about a million antelopes, a bunch of warthogs and even some monkeys!

On the bus on the way back to the resort, the older couple, the Phillips that I mentioned before, asked me to come to their seat then they handed me an evening devotional book by Joyce Meyer and in the cover the wrote something like "it's been a pleasure getting to know you on this trip. You are live you faith and are a fruitful witness." Wow, that was so encouraging! They are so sweet!!!

We didn't get back yesterday until about 9 and this morning we were supposed to start at 630 so i went right to bed and that's why I couldn't post last night.

Today we went to a primary school to visit and paint one of their buildings for them. The professors asked for people to come early to help set everything up before the rest of the group got there later in the morning. So the three of us volunteered, what a great way to serve the group! We went to the school and started sanding and moving things. The kids were sooooo cute! They had purple uniforms on and they would just stand and stare at us "muzungus." They helped a little for a few hours while we were sanding everything down and when the rest of the group got there they held an assembly to introduce us to them and thank us for what were were going to do. It was a lot of fun!

After the assembly, we got to hang out with the kids before we started working and all they wanted to do was take pictures of themselves and look at them. They were fascinated by seeing the pictures of themselves and they were sooooo cute! I will put pictures up asap.

So we started painting (and got it allll over ourselves, good times). It took a long long time, all day, and we were exhausted afterward but I'm so glad we got to serve like that while we were here. In the middle of the day, we had our lunch break and during lunch, I got to have this awesome conversation with a graduate student who is here with us. We talked about churches and the Bible for awhile. She's great, i love her a lot. She and her husband don't have a church now but I think she may be open to trying one so I'm excited to invite her to Walnut Creek when we got back. She claims Christianity. I'm really excited to talk to her more about Jesus!!

Anyway, we went back to the school and did our thing-paint paint paint, go to the bathroom in a hole in the ground, paint paint paint. When we were finally done, we got to hang out with the kids a little more and we gave out lots of candy (we were swarmed when we got the candy out, the kids all went crazy!). I was one of the last to leave because my project took the longest and when I was finally getting ready to go, some of the older kids (about 7th or 8th grade equivalent) came up to me and asked if I had anything to give them. And from that came two stories, one funny and one actually substantial, haha:

Funny story: A group of the older guys asked if I had any American money and I thought I had some coins in my wallet so I started digging for it. And the surrounded me, about 15 of them waiting expectantly. I then realized that I had actually taken the coins out that morning and stuck them in my suitcase because I didn't need to have them. But I did have a banana left over from breakfast so instead of coins, i pulled that out. they all got a kick out of that and laughed a ton, haha.

Substantial story: After the run in with the guys, the girls from the same grade came up and asked if I had anything for them. I went digging in my bag again and realized I had a New Testament with me, praise the Lord! It is the money looking NT that has the way of the master in it. So i gave that to one of the girls and told her it was a Bible. I asked if they knew what that was and they said they didn't (sad!) so I got to explain to them that this was God's Word that God sent for us so that we can know Him and I told them that it told the story of Jesus (they said they did know who he was). They were absolutely fascinated by it, it was amazing! I really wish I had more, they all wanted one but I only had one in my bag at the time. So please pray for the one that they did get!!!!!

Well it's off to bed, we're in for a long day of traveling tomorrow back up to the northern hemisphere (and I still haven't seen the toilets flush backwards btw. the resorts toilets flush in a weird way so the water goes down rather then around so you cant tell and there aren't really toilets anywhere else besides here, oh well).

Prayer Requests:
-soft hearts
-more conversation opportunities
-discernment and wisdom
-that we would stand out
-faithfulness with our quiet times
-that we will sharpen and encourage one another

Love, Loren

and ps, we're 1/3 of the way done with the trip today!! weird! it's gone by so fast and so slow at the same time.