A certain Luganda praise song keeps me up at night. Nothing matches. And words can't cut it.

I just finished doing homework with Sharon under a mango tree. Enough said.

I had to print out a paper on Friday, and I don’t think I have yet mentioned what that’s like. There are mini-shacks all around campus, down certain roads, that have barely enough room to turn around in, yet there are printers and photocopiers. You pay by the page, and hand them a CD with your stuff. Very cute. It is much like buying air time for your phone, which again, you pay by the minute. Mini-airtime shacks/stands everywhere you go. In fact, that is Celtel’s slogan, I think. The commercial has stuck with me: “everywhere you go.”

I learned how to count on Friday. I mentioned this a few weeks back, that Rebecca had taught me. But really, she had just written all the vocabulary down in my notebook. I don’t learn that way; I need to speak it and learn via conversation, and later rereading.
I was having tea with mom, eating groundnuts (G-nuts), and I separated them into groups of eleven, just for kicks. Then I decided I should teach myself to count that way. And I did. Emu, biri, satu, nya….real good stuff.

I ate chocolate on Friday. We went to the store, and I already had the candybar wrapper opened within feet of the door. It was amazing; beyond that, I am speechless. And today. Today we are having cheese. We are walking to the Colline Hotel, which has food, and ordering a plate of four pieces of cheese and four crackers for 6,000 shillings. This is ridiculously much, considering a banana costs 100. But in American money, 6,000 would be…what? Four dollars? I am ready for this. I have dreamt of this.
(Colline Hotel: Kyle went there last week for a one hour full-body massage. Hah. And for 8,000 shillings. Less than ten bucks. Hilarious).

I forgot to mention that last week, and all the time really, we saw/see what I guess I will call music trucks. They are like icecream trucks, minus the icecream, and plus the DJ. We’re talking microphone in the driver’s seat, or in the truckbed, and massive speakers also lining the truckbed. As we were walking home, Caroline bet us that they would say something about the Mazungu into the microphone. A second later, the DJ in the truckbed talked over the Kiganda music: “Hah! Mazungo!”
I keep thinking what Julia told me about “rockstar.” White rockstars. It sucks.

Also Friday: we watched Amazing Race as a family. And afterwards, Rebecca and I watched the Bachelor. So refreshing, American TV.
In the Amazing Race, there were about 15 or so teams still. As soon as I saw the soccer Moms, I called them out, said they would lose. Sure enough, they were the ones released that episode. My family wanted to know how I knew. It is hard to explain a soccer Mom to an African. No offense, soccer Moms. (Aunt Sharon, this doesn’t include you. You are a Soccer Coach Mom, which is much different. Much different. Very “I would win the Amazing Race if I entered” sort of different).

Great conversations came out of that TV session. Such as: for part of the race, the teams had to travel via donkey. Rebecca got such a kick out of this. She basically kept falling in her chair, laughing like crazy, saying such phrases, which I wrote down word-for-word in my moleskin:
“A donkey? They do not know what they are doing on Earth.”

“The most unserious animal I have ever seen. Serious work, but unserious face. You tell it to stand, it goes. You tell it to sit, it stands.”

“A donkey needs someone patient to ride it. Someone like Jesus.”


There was a news special on coffee during commercial breaks. Mom sighed and smiled. “When I hear the word coffee, I get so happy,” she said. “Coffee is in my blood. I was raised on coffee money, I went to school on coffee money, my life was built on coffee money.” Simply interesting.

Rebecca has developed nicknames for me. “Steadman,” which is probably my favorite, “Nani,” or “Nina”, after the football player for Arsenal who she has a crush on, and “Ohio beauty.” I purposely don’t answer when she uses “Ohio beauty.” That, or, I say, “Tuswaala,” which means, “Stop already; you are shaming us.” My family still can’t believe that Rebecca taught me this word. Aida says she is teaching me bad Luganda. The other day, Mom was imitating a hand motion I made in our music video, and I told her, “Nswaala,” conjugating the verb, and saying I was ashamed. They laughed for a while.

I call Rebecca “Salty,” “Blue,” and “Nanteeza.” Nanteeza is her Luganda name. It means something like gift/mercy/God’s provision. Blue is her favorite color, and Salty: like Sweety, but Salty is better. Salt of the earth. Preservative. Necessary for all foods. She learned this in a sermon on Sunday.

Saturday was…I can’t remember what happened on Saturday. But what didn’t happen: I did not get a black eye from an oar, or lose my two front teeth. Which happened to others during the rafting trip. Instead, I did laundry for two hours in the sun, and a whole lot of homework. I was reading outside, and some visitors came. The boy, like most everyone, asked how I could stand the sun, and said, “Me, I will not do it. I fear getting blacker.”
When I was hanging my clothes on the line, I had an entertaining conversation with preteen boys walking through the backyard:
Boy 1: “Mzungu, give me my money.”
Me: “Sirina sente.” (I don’t have money).
Boy 2: “Mzungu, what are you doing?”
Me: “What does it look like I am doing?”
I mean, really.

Sunday school was lovely again. I just love Susan. I will call her Susan 1, since she was the first Susan I met. This is relative-of-mine Susan, fellow Sunday School teacher Susan. Susan 1. I met a little girl named Patience, and then one named Peace. It got me thinking about other “series” names for kids. Like “Denver,” and “Houston,” and maybe even “Springfield.”
“Little Rock” would be the dog.

Sunday afternoon was far lovelier. We went to Rose’s house, my sister, the mother of Daniel and Joshua. We were celebrating Daniel’s success and departure for boarding school. (Most kids, who can afford it, go to boarding school. Such is where the good education is found). Speaking of which, I pass a school every morning and evening on my walk. A bunch of uniformly dressed young boys, running around a courtyard—which I see through a barred gate—playing football, or soccer. The “barbed wire” is pieces of glass lining the tops of the walls. Anyway, it makes me think “Dead Poets Society” every time I pass it, and there’s nothing like thinking of Robin Williams and literature in the morning. An unexplainably delighting combo.
Anyway, my point: Daniel is 13. And Daniel is by far the most respectful, well-behaved boy I have ever met. For instance:
Rebecca was sitting in front of the TV, which was boasting a Spanish soap, while she was looking through a photo album. She was engrossed in the album, if you ask me. Not even watching the TV. Daniel wanted to play PlayStation, but of course, he wouldn’t come out and say it. Instead:
“Aunt Rebecca, are you watching that?”
“Yes.”
“Alright.”
“You want to play?”
“I can wait until you are finished.”
Gosh. I want Charlie to meet this kid. Daniel didn’t even break the PlayStation into two pieces.

AIDA IS BACK. That is what happened Saturday. That is what happened Saturday and mattered.

I got to spend a lot of time with my sister Jackie this weekend. It was most enjoyable. We talked about poverty, Canadian sentence tags like “-eh?” and Luganda’s “banaange,” (“my friends”), and other things. But Jackie has been to Scotland. So, most often, I just want to ask her about that. Repeatedly.
She was complimenting me on how fast and extensively I was learning the language, and Rebecca told her how I think they sound like they are singing when they talk, where they put their stresses, and just the sing-song-ness of it all:
“WebaLE,” “KAAAAALEEE,” “GYEEEEEBAALEEE KOOOO,” etc. Jackie protested, and said it is me, us, who sing when we talk. And with each one of my one-line protests, she pointed out how I do rise and drop my voice with different words. While I say, “That’s funNY,” she said, “I just say it flat. That’s funny.”
I bet none of that made sense, because you can’t hear it, only read it. But it’s interesting, that’s all.

Sunday I was walking with Rebecca and Rose’s house-girl, Annet, to buy soda from a small shop. We made this walk a few times that day. Rebecca and I were disagreeing about the color of the dirt. I insist that it is red, especially when it rains. “No, no. It is brown. Look, it is brown.” It isn’t brown. It’s red. Then she said,
“Hmm…one day I will walk here and remember that I once shared the red dust with Danielle. And I will cry.”
I told her I will come back to visit. I said it, and I meant it—and that makes it official: I am coming back.

My favorite time of day, anywhere, not just here, is around dusk. But it’s not dusk—it’s different. The sun has left and the moon is still undecided on whether or not he’ll be joining us. As the sun exits, it leaves behind some extra light that will last us a few minutes or so. It’s like a generator of sorts. Anyway, it is perfect here. Because the smell and feel of the air matches what it looks like. That’s something I can’t explain, so I’ll stop.

Last night. An adventure. A most unpleasant adventure. I had a History paper to write. The power was out, so I had to handwrite this paper (which is allowed, just slower). The bad part was having to write it without music. I shut off the music, Spice Girls’ “Viva Forever,” (really the only justification-song for Spice Girls ever being around), when I thought someone was about to break in. Noises are nonstop outside—and I still can’t tell which is the goat and calf and which is an intruder. And robberies aren’t rare. So, surely I didn’t want to sit in the dining room anymore, right by the door, with everyone asleep. I’m the kid who slept endless nights at the foot of my parents’ bed. Uncomfortably but feeling safe.
So I went to bed with all my books and paper and my flashlight, and even grabbed batteries because I could sense it was that time, time for it to run out when I needed it most. Which happened. But I tried changing the batteries in the dark, and realized it is a one-use flashlight. Suck. So I stumbled to the bathroom, where we bathe, sat on the floor, and finished my paper. (I wasn’t going back into the dining room, of course). It was just a pain, both literally and figuratively. Things I take advantage of at home. Convenience.

I apologize for the length. But I need to write the following for the sake of processing thoughts, and for the sake of sharing how cross-cultural and how intricate our God is.
As departure for Uganda was approaching last semester, I met worry. I’m not used to worry, really, in its strangling form. It was new for me. But my mind was consumed for weeks on second-guessing and wishing I could control things I couldn’t control. I tried feasting on Psalm 131, the weapon against worry:
“I do not concern myself with great matters or things too wonderful for me. But I have stilled and quieted my soul; like a weaned child with its mother, like a weaned child with its mother is my soul within me.”
Weaned children rock, as in, they rarely cry in their mother’s arms (yes, moms, that’s debatable). But when a child is weaned, he knows by now that his mom will provide. He doesn’t necessarily need to cry when he is hungry. He trusts, he knows. He is content, and reasonably enough.

As much as I memorized and prayed over this passage, it helped very little. But what did help: my suitemate Talia and I had a sort of prayer meeting with her family and some friends one Saturday night, just before I left. It was a “just because” prayer meeting—it wasn’t connected to my trip at all.
I had just met this woman, also named Danielle, that night. Yet, after we prayed for a bit, she told me, “Worry is all over your countenance. It is all over you. God wants you to trust Him. The Holy Spirit doesn’t want you to have to go through this. Just stop worrying about what you can’t control anyway.” Dang. I told her, obviously, that she hit it on the nose, and so another of the ladies was praying for me. As she did, I silently prayed Psalm 131 over and over. In the middle of her prayer, she sort of started to laugh, or giggle really. She said she felt dumb, but “God, I keep seeing Danielle, a child, sitting in your arms. You are holding her, and she is fine.”
Psalm 131 for sure. It was all so wonderful, being confirmed in that way, by the Holy Spirit Himself, working and speaking through someone who barely knew my situation and didn’t know the importance of the Scripture I was praying simultaneously. I wasn’t surprised, though. Our God is like that. All the time.

Anyway, I was encouraged. After that night, trusting came a lot easier. I was a weaned child. But now. Now it isn’t worry so much that is wedged between us, but it’s disobedience of sorts. The fact that I’m simply not as determined as I once was, in terms of making an effort to know Him. He’s been on the back burner lately, and when we talk, our conversation is basically constant apology on my part. That’s no way to pray or live; guilt is binding, but I can’t get around it, can’t battle it effectively. Because this is what I am thinking: Yes, I am your weaned child. But what is keeping you with me? Yes, your grace abounds, as does your mercy, but when is enough enough?
I keep thinking, and almost hoping, that He’d give up on me. His kindness can be too much; if I were Him, I would’ve stopped listening, stopped loving, a long time ago. Yet He keeps forgiving me. I keep thinking of Hebrews 10: “If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left” (so true: Christ died so I could get away from this bondage. What more can He do for me?) The writer of this passage then refers to such sinning as trampling “the Son of God underfoot” and treating “as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that sanctified him.” I am counting Christ’s sacrifice as crap, keeping my distance like this, putting other things before Him like this. So I do not deserve His kindness.

And now my point/how God is using Africa and my African family to combat this struggle: A few weeks ago, Rebecca and I were cooking and talking about Mother’s Day and Father’s Day. Thinking of mothers, she shared with me one of her favorite passages: in Isaiah 49. “But Zion said, ‘The LORD has forsaken me, the Lord has forgotten me.’ Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne? Though she may forget, I will not forget you! See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands…” As great as that was, I didn’t think about it for too long.

This Saturday night, Rebecca pulled out her Bible and walked around the room, reading this whole chapter, squinting and straining her face and voice when she said, “Though she may forget,” “Though she may forget, I will not.” She loves that part.
The next day, we were sitting on mats on the grass at Daniel’s party. She grabbed my hand and looked at the lines on my palm. She was looking for an M, because there is one on hers. She showed me an M, a Y, and a backwards K on her palms, formed by the lines of her skin. “M is for Mukama. Y is Yesu. And K, Katonda.” The names of God. Written on Rebecca’s palm. I thought of Isaiah 49, of course.

And to top it off: as the party ended, Daniel’s dad prayed, we sang, and he grabbed his Bible. He said he wanted to talk about what the pastor talked about that morning. He opened His Bible to Isaiah 49. Rebecca and I looked at each other, much like my best friend Jenny and I looked at each other every. single. day. sophomore year as Romans 7 kept popping up for us both, just when we needed it. And so he read that passage. Can a mother forget her child? No. But even if she did, I will not, God says. You are written on my hands.

Isaiah 49 has been for me like a Psalm 131 Part II, after a horrible intermission between. Weaned child becomes disobedient child becomes forgiven and not forgotten child.
I had been weaned, but because of my disobedience, I have been expecting Him to push me off His lap. To stop holding me, stop feeding me, stop treating me as His. But He will not forget, He cannot forget. He will not walk away from His daughter. And I am sick of being the one who walks away all the time—and away from something so good!
I love that this is what I am learning in Africa (Give me weaned or give me forgiven; distance from Him is death).
And I love that He doesn’t only teach me in my context, but wherever we happen to be together. I love that I followed Him here, that He was on the plane, and off the plane, waiting. He didn’t stay as I walked through security. This is how He is. And it makes me love Him more.

Post Script:
We have returned from cheese. I think I’ll wait for America’s version next time.