Gone are the days of clean feet...

Well, for those of you who read this (if anyone)and haven't already heard, I made it to Uganda safely. After a long journey through Chicago and London, I arrived at Entebbe airport early Wednesday morning. I met someone from WGM and she drove me to my new home in Kampala. An hour or so later, we went to the school, where I saw my classroom and started decorating. I had some orientation, but have yet to be fully filled in on what all goes on at the school and what my responsibilities are. Slowly by slowly, I continue to learn more. After a long day at school, the other WGM missionaries went to a leader's home for dinner and spent much of the evening talking and laughing. It was a relaxing, but tiring first day.

Now, for those of you who have been asking, I'll talk about the house. For starters, WOW! Life here as a missionary in Kampala certainly looks much different than life as a "local" in Mukono looked last year! I live in a 3 bedroom, 2 story house. Ours is gated all the way around and has a guard on duty 24/7. From what I understand, there are various missionary houses all around here. Currently I have one roommate, Kristi, from California, who also just arrived and will teach 6th grade at Heritage. We will gain another roommate in September. We each have our own bedroom, and Kristi and I share a bathroom. For four months last year, my "bathroom" was a hole in the ground, but rest assured, this time I have a real toilet. I also have electricity, running water, HOT WATER (if you turn the heater on 1 hour in advance), and a fully furnished kitchen (stove, fridge, microwave, etc). We also have wireless internet throughout the house. We have a housegirl who cleans twice a week and does our dishes and laundry if we ask her to. Apparently this is very common here, but it seems a little strange to have someone else doing all of the work for us. In some ways, it almost feels as if I'm living in America, until I walk outside, or take a look at my feet, which will likely not be clean until a year from now when I return home. The black shoes I wore to school today are now stained red, as are my feet. I'll be cleaner than I was last year when I showered from a bucket, but there's really no getting rid of that dirt. No matter how much you clean, everything is dirty. Everything. Now, I imagine I should be excited and very thankful to have such wonderful living conditions, but in all honesty, I think a part of me misses the simplicity of living as a Ugandan. I can already see what the missionaries we spoke with last year meant when they talked about living in a "bubble" and having difficulty really engaging in the Ugandan culture. Other than my 10 minute walk to and from school, I could easily stay inside and keep to myself if I so desired. Hopefully that will not be the case. All in all, it is nice to have a place to come back to at the end of the day and just relax.

I'll provide more details of the school setting later, because its almost time for dinner (we're eating at another missionary's house again tonight...tomorrow night we'll go grocery shopping and start the adventure of cooking for ourselves), but for now I'll just ask everyone to pray for the start of school on Monday. My classroom is mostly decorated now, but I am not entirely sure what to do for lesson plans, as we are not supposed to really start teaching until week 3 due to many students arriving late. Pray for peace, as starting a new job obviously causes a little bit of nervousness. Pray for the students as they get to know me and I get to know them. Pray for positive relationships to develop.

Thanks, as always, for your continued prayers and support! More to come later, for now, time to eat (which is another story for another time, but the food as a missionary is also drastically different than as a local)!