Friday, January 13, 2012

Update

I realize i have a gaping hole in my blog record. Update: I was in Uganda. Now I'm in America, and I have 20 Ugandans with me for a 7-week tour of the States. Pause for immense gratitude. This is a huge dream come true. I had so many sleepless nights while we planned it, and now that it's a reality... well, i'm still up too late planning, and still having those "working dreams" rehearsing tomorrow's plans in my mind, but mainly I'm just overwhelmingly happy that it is really real. For nearly 2 years now, every time I've flown I've walked through SFO airport imagining what it would look like to the new eyes of Ugandan children who have never flown before. Not a week ago, I walked through the same airport holding 20 passports, counting 20 heads, sending 20 through customs and immigration, counting 31 pieces of luggage, calling ahead to the bus driver and my friend Susan who met us on the other side. I was so unstressed and everything went so smoothly that I had to pinch myself again and again to be sure I was awake.
I'm sure the universe has somehow aligned in our favor. Everything feels like a miracle. We haven't lost a single person, passport, or piece of luggage. Another similar Ugandan organization (Watoto) was traveling on the same plane to London, and their kids were puking left and right while our group sailed sweetly through with only a little dehydration and some sore muscles. Yesterday we made an E.R. trip for stitches on a cut (from playing basketball) and they got us in and out in half an hour. If that isn't miraculous, I don't know what is.
At the Ukiah performance (where it seemed the entire town came to see us) I asked one of the nuns what happened - did they publicize the performance widely? She said no, they had hardly announced it. She told me they believed that these people knew to come because they had a spiritual affinity with the Children of Uganda and the work we do.

One of our Ugandan songs proclaims "I'll sing to the Lord, because God is watching over me." My theological training tells me to be wary of statements like "things are going well so God must be on our side" but at the same time, my gut tells me to trust it. Even though this tour is brought to you with a lot of help from our friends, by the seat of our pants and the skin of our teeth, even though we aren't sure where we'll stay next week, I am finally fully willing to trust and just to keep putting one dancing foot in front of the other.

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