Weekend in Entebbe

It's nearing 6pm, and Grace and I are still in the office. I'm a little hungry and tired from being at the office since 8 this morning, so I'm not quite certain what's going to come out of the end of my fingers as I try to blog :) But I'll try to hit the highlights of the weekend here before we go home...

Grace and I have been taking the boda (motorcycle) all over this weekend. It's been great fun, but, well, to tell you the truth, I'm a bit of a wimp when it comes to sitting on the back of a fast moving vehicle. And on Sunday, it was raining as we were getting ready for the journey to church. So, being the wimp that I am, I was voicing my concern about the rain and the mud and the slippery roads...

But actually, we ended up having a great ride over to the church, not a speck of mud on me, and not even a wobble on the bike. It was all very clean and safe :)

After church (which I'll write about later), we jumped back on the boda and went to Entebbe town to get a SIM card for my phone and to eat lunch at the Chinese restaurant. Again, we got there safe and sound, and what does Tanya do as soon as she takes a few steps with her own two feet? Yup, sploosh, right into a little mud puddle. But I enjoyed our sweet and sour chicken and pork in garlic sauce quite a bit, even though my toes were squishing a bit in the mud on my sandal! The funny part of eating in the restaurant was the fact that at the table next to us, a Chinese woman (presumably the owner) had a bird eating it's birdseed off the table... But I haven't died of a strange bird disease yet, so I guess it's ok to eat in a place with birds running amuk in them...

We had a lovely lunch, then jumped on the boda and went back down the hill to Grace's house, safe and sound.

Later, we decided to go for a little walk with Bridger. It was a lovely day - quite cool and fresh from the rain. So off we trot down the road. And what does Tanya do, but fall flat on her face in the mud. I think I'm just turning into an old person who falls down a lot. At least I didn't break my hip. And I really have no idea how I fell - didn't seem to trip on anything. I just suddenly found myself on the ground!

Being the compassionate soul that Grace is, she burst out laughing. And Bridger, since I nearly fell on top of him, started growling at me! So I've been cruising all over town on the back of a very dangerous peice of machinery... and then I get all muddy and hurt using my own two feet! Oh well. Good thing we stopped for first aid supplies on the way to the airport. I now have liquid bandage covering my left index finger AND my right knee. Actually, I didn't get hurt too badly - just a bump and a bit of a scrape on my knee... But I have to go and wash the mud out of my trousers tonight, since I had to let them soak overnight...

Anyways, for any of you who are still reading this, I'll now tell you a bit about church. It was really a wonderful service. I got to meet some of Grace's friends that she's been telling me all about, and they really do seem like rather cool people. The church is held in a tent on a little plot of land right next to the lake! So you can peer out the sides of the tent, watching the boats and ferry go by on Lake Victoria during the service! The worship was great - a mix of good English songs and some Lugandan songs (is that what the language is called here?!). The preaching was also quite good. The sermon was about an hour long - they'd never stand for that back home! And it was all about Persecution. Have I mentioned how many sermons I've heard lately on the persecuted church?! I'm starting to wonder if God is preparing me for something, or just helping me to understand the situation that my friends back in E-land are suffering through.

Anyways, it was a good service, and the pastor kept preaching away, even when the sides of the tent started blowing up and the rain started blowing in! Everyone just skootched their chairs over to the other side of the tent and he kept right on preaching! I couldn't help but wonder what would happen if something like that had happened in church at home!

Later in the day, after my little tumble on the road, Grace and I walked up to town again and got some chapatis for dinner. You really can't get chapatis much fresher - the guy on the corner was mixing up the dough in a big plastic bucket. The other guy was standing over his little frying pan over top of a charcoal stove. And the woman in the middle was taking the money and packing the chapatis in little plastic baggies. We got them fresh right off the frying pan, all hot and greasy and delicious!

We took the chaptis home and baked them in the oven while we played some frisbee in the yard. You don't normally have to bake chapatis - they come ready to eat off the frying pan :) But we wanted to make them into chips to eat with the guacamole that I made. So we had a regular little Mexican feast right here in the middle of Uganda!

I made the guacamole with the veggies that I bought at the little Entebbe market on Saturday. Grace was pleased when her neighbor came around on Saturday morning to ask if we needed anything from the market. I jumped at the chance to go to the market, and I knew that Grace would be too lazy to take me herself :) Actually, for some reason, Grace just really doesn't like markets. Maybe it's a Montanan thing... but I love markets! And this market was wonderful! It was quite small, but lots of fresh fruits and veggies available.

Oh, we're gonna pack it up here and go home for some dinner... more tomorrow, unless I tumble off the back of a boda tonight on the way home.