I think today is day 13. . . I may be off, but I am unsure. Today I am feeling so much better. I know I am almost fully healed because I awoke naturally at 6 am . . . Every day starts with a blessing, my friends:)
I'm just sitting by the window, admiring the beauty and thinking about life. Life is both very complicated and very simple, you know?
I've been thinking a lot about trying to extend my time here, but I think I won't this time around. Since being here, I've discovered (so naively;) that it's very difficult to accomplish much in a short 4 weeks in a developing country. Yes, many good things have resulted, and I still have nearly 2 and a half weeks, but the most change I've seen is in myself.
I've heard helping in a developing country be described as emptying the ocean with en eye dropper. . . And I now understand a little more what that means.
During sacrament I sat with my new friend Gerald. He was recently baptized and today he was confirmed! He is a good boy, I'm grateful for kind friends like him.
One speaker spoke about eternal marriage and families. Even in Uganda I can't escape people pounding me to get married!! Only joking ;)
In Sunday school we had the same lesson I heard last week in Jinja, but it was still good to hear again. Also, every teacher and group always has their own perspective, and that was cool to hear. They also talked this week about
Do not forget from whom all blessings flow. Some of the blessings are a test: will I continue to follow God even when He blesses me?
Next week: Ruth, Samuel 1
They didn't ask me to teach primary again though, so I got to go to relief society! There weren't too many children at church today; one woman told me she had many children at home but they weren't able to come due to lack of transportation. I think that's a big hurdle for people getting to church at the Mbale branch, because there are so many rural areas far from the church, it would be very expensive for a whole family to pay for transport every week.
In relief society today, we watched the general women's meeting broadcast, you know, the first one ever?! We watched it on a tiny little screen with no additional speakers, so everyone huddled around the DVD player and listened intently. I actually hadn't seen it yet because I had to work the night it aired in Salt Lake City. It was hard to hear and hard to see, but it was just a really cool experience watching it with my African sisters, especially because the a portion of broadcast was about feeling unity and strength in numbers, knowing there are sisters all across the world. Pretty cool experience for me:)
Today we also headed up to sipi falls, to stay the night and then hike the falls early tomorrow before heading back to Bududa. I'm very excited for both!
I also found out today that Elder Melton from South Africa was transferred to Ethiopia! I met him and his companion last week when i was stranded all day at the Jinja branch building. They were SO helpful and SO kind, and I would have felt very hopeless had they not helped me. Anyways, he has only 7 more months, and he thought for sure he would go to Mbale to switch with an Mbale elder from St. George, but the elders here told me the news. God bless elder Melton in Ethiopia!
Pictures from sipi falls and church:
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