some of my week in Rackoko
Oli Otya!(Luganda for hello/how are you)
Ok, finally figured out how to upload more than one picture at a time with this new program I just got. Well, i am back and i must say it is good to say that i am home. This past week was amazing, and hard, and fun, and sad, and beautiful and ugly all at once, and i dont know if i can even do it justice via blogpost but i'll try.
This first picture breaks my heart alot, but i'll explain the background. We went to a child dedication service at the church on saturday afternoon (which is just a big piece of canvas tied to some eucalyptus poles basically fashioned together like a big tent), and were place in the seats of honor (which i didn't like very much at all). It was hard having 7 white people sitting behind the pulpit and not getting to enjoy the service from in front. But the hard part was being exalted by a people's that shouldn't exalt us at all. It really was humbling to be lifted up by them because it made me feel so uncomfortable. But there were kids just crowded all around us, many of which had probably never seen a muno (the Luo word for white person) in their entire lives. So I was seated on the end and i got to play with alot of kids during the service. It was fun, but man these kids don't smile like american kids, or even like Kampala kids, you can see how much hurt is in their lives in their eyes at times. This kid just broke my heart though, I mean that bandaid is probably covering some infected wound and i guess for most people in this part he's even blessed to have a bandaid to keep the flies off of it. Even though all of these kids absolutely love cameras and having their pictures taken etc. I couldn't get this kid to smile for it either. The saddest thing i saw all week though was during this service as well. Steve and I were watching a kid chew on what we thought was Posho (made from maize flour) but turned out to be styrofoam. We watched him for awhile and saw him swallow it too. I wanted everythign in me to go over to him and stop him, but then i realized i woudl basically be saying, "no dont eat that, but i'm not gonna give you anything else to temporarily stop the hunger pain you're feeling." Needless to say this week was full of alot of eye opening experiences.
This picture is basically to prove to all of you back home that kids do like me, ha! I just thought it was awesome. When we were surveying we attracted kids in an insane way. Apparently three white guys in the middle of a field next to town with no shirts on and a bunch of weird equipment is very interesting. So the three jobs of our survey crew were as follows: one man on the instrument, one man on the rod, and one man on kid duty to prevent the kids from bumping the instrument or the tripod. There was one point where I was on instrument and Mark was on rod and i couldn't see the prism so i sent Alan out with like 30 kids to get some of the tall grass out of the way. By the time he was done he had all the kids chanting over and over, "Bad grass, bad grass!" and im sure almost none of them knew any english at all.
One last thing i want to mention today is that the last two days I was there I got to walk with pastor Harrison through the camps and talk to people about Jesus. I have never known or been able to understand when Jesus said, "the harvest is plenty but the workers are few" until this week. In the course of two hours over two days I got to be instrumental in leading 7 people to Christ!! How amazing is that? You tell someone who basically has nothing and feels hopeless that there's a better way, that there is a god in heaven who loves them and a Jesus that wants to hold them and love them and they say, "yea that sounds good!" It was absolutely incredible, I did real missionary work this week and i am so thankful for that.
So I leave you with the names of your new brothers and sisters to pray for, cuz they are gonna need alot of God's blessings and provision, not to mention alot of faith:
1.Tiger
2.Margaret
3.Carmela
4.Josephine
and darnit i forgot the names of the other three
but they all need to be lifted up so please do.
Oh i just realized I didnt' even tell you where I was all week. The town is basically an IDP camp in the Pader distrcit south of Kitgum called Rackoko (pronounced Rach-co-co) and I look forward to relating as much as possible to you over the week.
So to end with here's another picture from the site, as you can see i've been playing with closeup shots on my camera and have discovered it can do some cool things.
Much love!!
Appoyo!
(Luo for thank you/hello/goodbye/how are you)
Ok, finally figured out how to upload more than one picture at a time with this new program I just got. Well, i am back and i must say it is good to say that i am home. This past week was amazing, and hard, and fun, and sad, and beautiful and ugly all at once, and i dont know if i can even do it justice via blogpost but i'll try.
This first picture breaks my heart alot, but i'll explain the background. We went to a child dedication service at the church on saturday afternoon (which is just a big piece of canvas tied to some eucalyptus poles basically fashioned together like a big tent), and were place in the seats of honor (which i didn't like very much at all). It was hard having 7 white people sitting behind the pulpit and not getting to enjoy the service from in front. But the hard part was being exalted by a people's that shouldn't exalt us at all. It really was humbling to be lifted up by them because it made me feel so uncomfortable. But there were kids just crowded all around us, many of which had probably never seen a muno (the Luo word for white person) in their entire lives. So I was seated on the end and i got to play with alot of kids during the service. It was fun, but man these kids don't smile like american kids, or even like Kampala kids, you can see how much hurt is in their lives in their eyes at times. This kid just broke my heart though, I mean that bandaid is probably covering some infected wound and i guess for most people in this part he's even blessed to have a bandaid to keep the flies off of it. Even though all of these kids absolutely love cameras and having their pictures taken etc. I couldn't get this kid to smile for it either. The saddest thing i saw all week though was during this service as well. Steve and I were watching a kid chew on what we thought was Posho (made from maize flour) but turned out to be styrofoam. We watched him for awhile and saw him swallow it too. I wanted everythign in me to go over to him and stop him, but then i realized i woudl basically be saying, "no dont eat that, but i'm not gonna give you anything else to temporarily stop the hunger pain you're feeling." Needless to say this week was full of alot of eye opening experiences.
This picture is basically to prove to all of you back home that kids do like me, ha! I just thought it was awesome. When we were surveying we attracted kids in an insane way. Apparently three white guys in the middle of a field next to town with no shirts on and a bunch of weird equipment is very interesting. So the three jobs of our survey crew were as follows: one man on the instrument, one man on the rod, and one man on kid duty to prevent the kids from bumping the instrument or the tripod. There was one point where I was on instrument and Mark was on rod and i couldn't see the prism so i sent Alan out with like 30 kids to get some of the tall grass out of the way. By the time he was done he had all the kids chanting over and over, "Bad grass, bad grass!" and im sure almost none of them knew any english at all.
One last thing i want to mention today is that the last two days I was there I got to walk with pastor Harrison through the camps and talk to people about Jesus. I have never known or been able to understand when Jesus said, "the harvest is plenty but the workers are few" until this week. In the course of two hours over two days I got to be instrumental in leading 7 people to Christ!! How amazing is that? You tell someone who basically has nothing and feels hopeless that there's a better way, that there is a god in heaven who loves them and a Jesus that wants to hold them and love them and they say, "yea that sounds good!" It was absolutely incredible, I did real missionary work this week and i am so thankful for that.
So I leave you with the names of your new brothers and sisters to pray for, cuz they are gonna need alot of God's blessings and provision, not to mention alot of faith:
1.Tiger
2.Margaret
3.Carmela
4.Josephine
and darnit i forgot the names of the other three
but they all need to be lifted up so please do.
Oh i just realized I didnt' even tell you where I was all week. The town is basically an IDP camp in the Pader distrcit south of Kitgum called Rackoko (pronounced Rach-co-co) and I look forward to relating as much as possible to you over the week.
So to end with here's another picture from the site, as you can see i've been playing with closeup shots on my camera and have discovered it can do some cool things.
Much love!!
Appoyo!
(Luo for thank you/hello/goodbye/how are you)
posted by Kercho at 12:16 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home