Oh, The Places We'll Go

To move or not to move, that is the question...

Issue IX // October 2024

Every time I think about this blog, I wonder what I can even write about. Life is moving on, and we're in a mixed place of "doing" and "waiting." We're waiting on our next step, waiting to see if we are moving or staying, waiting on the government processes to move forward, and most importantly, waiting on God to see what He wants for us. So how do I write about this "waiting" phase?

At the same time, we're continuing the "doing" part of our lives. We continue in mentoring and discipling youth and children, and planning events for them during the school holidays, which is when our home becomes a bit more squeezed as we take in a couple of the girls. We're attending church and other programs (I even started working at the projection again as Sam takes Nicolette with him to teach at Sunday school!). Sam leads an intensive online through-the-Bible study; they have read through the Old and New testaments a few times over the last year, and are now going into a more in-depth study. I am still involved with the Ladies Fellowship of foreign and local missionary women, where we meet monthly to give different ladies an opportunity to share what they are doing in their lives/ ministry, pray for each other, and link up the various needs in our communities with the organizations that can help them. I have stepped off the organizing committee though, since we are looking at a potential move.

And speaking of the move, it has turned into another instance of "hurry up... and wait." The wheels were set in motion and we thought we were getting ready to move to Rwanda within this very month. Sam began speaking to his committees to prepare the next leaders to step into his place. We had a very casual goodbye "party." We told the students that they would most likely not be seeing us the next holiday, leading to many tears. We were planning what to sell in the house, and what to give away... and then things went awry. The people we were planning with in Rwanda had not understood our circumstances fully, and were not prepared to help with the things we needed in order to move there. All at once, everything came to a standstill again. We had told friends and family that we were on the way, another step closer to our family finally going to America together. But now we don't know. We don't know what is next. Do we look for another option and press on to Rwanda? Do we look into moving to another country, perhaps Tanzania? Do we let go of the idea of moving altogether, and continue "waiting and doing" here in Uganda? It is a strange thing for me to have one government process have such influence over my life and my decisions. My family can't freely move around together until we get the go-ahead signal from the government. The wait has been long (we first began working on the process in January 2022, filed our first documents in May 2022, and had all documents accepted in August of 2023. Now, over a year later, we're still waiting for an interview; just a 5-10 minute interview...)

Home is a fluid concept to me. I can say "home" and mean our house here in Uganda, or the Jinja area, or America in general, or the Pacific Northwest, or specifically Portland, Oregon; my birthplace, and the city where I have spent the majority of my life. "Home is where the heart is," right? So it seems my heart has a few pieces scattered around the world. But most of all, my home is being with my family ‐ my husband and our daughter. I know many couples that have had to be separated during this process, and I thank God that we have been able to go through it together. So whether we go or we wait, we do it together.

Summer ended in America, and Uganda is also leaving the hot/dry season and passing into a cooler rainy season. Our garden at home has really taken off, with eggplants, tomatoes, and local greens (skumawiki) coming up in abundance. One of the positive things about delaying any move out of the country is that we get to continue to enjoy the harvest. Nicolette is particularly excited when Sam allows her to carry the eggplant inside!

She's gone through so many stages in the last (almost) one year. It has definitely been an interesting experience raising a child in a culture that's not my first culture. First of all, I have really seen the community/ village mentality much more. People, even strangers on the street, ask me "how is our daughter," especially when they figure out that she is from the Musoga tribe. At church, I rarely carry Nicolette as she is passed from one pair of arms to another; though now that she's walking, it's more of the younger children taking turns holding her hand and walking up and down with her. When she was first born, people would come to visit and bring "milk money" and gifts of food to support her (and our) growing needs. As we go for walks in the neighborhood, people greet me with "How are you, Mama Nicolette? Thank you for caring for our baby. Well done." I'm used to having plenty of looks living here in Uganda because of my light skin color, and now it's even more with a (somehow) light-skinned baby (though many people who don't know me ask if she's Chinese or Indian). She's a bit of a novelty here, having mixed blood, and so that increases the attention, on top of her being the daughter of the much-loved ANCO Sam. I don't know how many times I've opened my WhatsApp to see that a friend has changed their profile picture to a photo of them holding Nicolette.

I was a bit worried about raising a child in Uganda, away from my family and the many tools in America. However, I've really come to see that an early childhood in this environment has been really beneficial to her development. First off, the weather is almost perfect all year round. That means we can spend the majority of time outdoors, enjoying sunshine and nature. Another point is a lack of "container baby syndrome." I recently learned that many Western babies delay in reaching milestones due to constantly being put in different containers (bouncers, loungers, cradles, walkers, etc), especially those that have lights, toys, and music to keep them entertained/ distracted and in one place. Here in East Africa, as in many similar places around the world, babies are either carried on the mother while she goes around and does her work, or put on a mat on the floor. The floor time really encourages them to move around and entertain themselves. Our girl has been surprising us with her development, and she began walking a week after turning 9 months. I think this is largely attributed to a lack of "containers," as well as her active personality. Another great part of raising children in this culture is the food. Most western food is heavily processed with a lot of added sugar and salt. Ugandan food is much more natural and local, and mostly all homemade. While that makes it difficult to have quick snacks on hand, it does give her and us a majority of nutrients in freshly prepared food.

The hardest part of having a child here, as someone coming from America, is transportation. We have been blessed to borrow our friend's car for a few months while they are out of the country, so that gave us a bit more freedom in taking her out, though fuel costs prevent us from being a mobile as we would like. Otherwise, our options are on the motorcycle or in a public bus (where everyone would want to touch her, even when they are actively sick and coughing). Another difficulty is a lack of places that cater to children. Kids here just "do life" with their parents, tagging along to whatever they are doing. In some instances it is good to expose them to the flow of life, but other times it means they are just sitting in the dirt or other unhygienic or unsafe areas as their parents go about their business. Many mothers even take their kids to work with them, and they sit on a mat for the majority of the day as the mother sells things in her shop, or does garden work, etc. Many young kids are also sent to live with their grandparents, especially in the cases of the many young single mothers here in Uganda. Young ladies, or sometimes girls, often get pregnant and are left by the man/ boy, and then have to leave their kids with relatives as they work to earn a living. Lack of involved fathers is a huge problem locally, and we see the effects in many of the youth that we mentor.

Well, now that I'm winding up this blog post, it turns out that I did have some things to write about. As the Thomas Rhett song goes, and Sam and I frequently sing to each other, "life chaaaaanges!" We take the highs and the lows, each in their time, and pray for the grace and wisdom to go through them peacefully together. Please pray with us for wisdom and love in our marriage and raising our little one, God's hand to work through us in ministry, provision for all of our needs, and patience to only move when God tells us it's the right time. Thank you for taking the time to tune in to a little piece of our lives. May God bless you!

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Which does Nicolette prefer: being carried traditional Ugandan style on the back, or pushed in the stroller?

Answer: Neither! After a few minutes in either one, she just wanted to be carried. But now she walks everywhere herself.

The girls have been wanting to learn to bake so we learned to bake bread together!

Daze of Glory girls

Walk down to the lakeside with the girls

I don't think there can be a time that goes by that I meet up with Rose, and she doesn't want a photo 😂 a lady I am very happy to call my good friend!