Living in the Time Zone

I think we all deeply yearn for connection.

We want to be a part of something bigger than ourselves. The problem is, we also want the freedom of having absolutely nobody telling us what to do with our lives. We don’t want to be on anybody else’s timetable. We don’t want anybody else to use what we’ve carefully rationed away for ourselves. We don’t want to share because we see sharing as giving something of ourselves away.

The thing is, when we are able to share we actually gain more than we lose.

Today our manager told us how his supervisor described muzungu time in comparison to African time. Muzungus, he said, run their lives according to time and Africans, in contrast, run their lives according to relationships. He continued to say that both are beneficial, and we should learn from each other.

The thing is, when you put like it’s relationships versus time, I think most of like to think that we do put relationships first. We, or at least I, get slightly offended. I think I get offended because it’s true. In some ways North American’s value relationships by valuing time. When we are on time to a meeting we show that we value the people who are at the meeting and when we’re on time to a date, we show that we value our date. However, I also think that we’re not all that good at valuing relationships. If I value people so much why do I have such a hard time with sharing? Why do I have a difficult time adjusting to Ugandan time?

I want to learn to value relationships more. The deep connection we all yearn for isn’t going to be filled if we keep walking down the path we’re headed down. I’m talking about at home in North America but also about my time here.

It’s been really hard to connect with people and to make friends and I think, partly, it’s due to the fact that I do often view time, my own comfort, and my own ideas as more important than relationships. Thankfully I’ve got five more months to work on this, to learn more about putting relationships first and to learn more about befriending Ugandans.… though skipping the friendship stage and jumping straight into marriage is apparently a fairly viable option ;).

Akatare Days

We have officially been in Uganda for over a month. In the grand scheme of things a month is not a long time, but so much has happened this month. I don’t mean so much in terms of, like, things actually happening. Honestly, I spend a significant amount of time here just sitting and waiting. Rachel wrote about waiting last week so I’m not going to do that all over again, instead I just want to write a little about what life is like for us here. This week I’ll focus on shopping, maybe next week on our living situation, transportation, or relationships.

The best thing about being in a different culture is that, at least at first, literally everything is new and exciting.

The equivalent of a trip to Safeway is a trip to the fruit/veggie market (akatare in Lukiga). I have never had such an exciting trip to Safeway or Save-on-Foods as every trip to the market is here. Kabale is a pretty small town- we’re talking one main street and a few side streets- but it happens to be the center for all the villages in a two hours radius so it can get pretty busy. The veggie/fruit market is pretty huge and, unfortunately, surrounded by butcher shops. There’s nothing quite like smelling fresh(ish) meat while you’re on your way to purchase veggies.

At the market we can purchase tomatoes, cucumbers, eggplant, beans, dodo (like bitter spinach), pumpkins, onions, garlic, ground nuts, watermelons, mangoes, apples, green oranges, pili-pili (hot peppers) and passion fruit (my personal fav). You never quite know what you’ll find at the akatare but these are the basics. It’s a vegetarian’s dream and if you love farmer’s markets or you’re a fan of ‘buying local’ you can be pretty sure that everything you can find was grown nearby.

 For those of you who have trouble making decisions this is probably not the place for you because there are 30+ people selling the same things. Good luck deciding which tomato is the perfect tomato. Not only that, most items are sold by the kilo so you better choose carefully because a kilo of green beans happens to be quite a few green beans. Rach and I have started making shopping lists just to avoid the fresh off the boat look of not realizing that a whole kilo of peppers is waaay too many peppers for just the two of us until they're packaged and we're trying to fit them into our bags. (Not that that has ever happened ;).

Photo: Just found this artwork at a market in Kampala. We are here for the weekend to get Rach drugs (it's a pretty unfortunate story) and I figured I might as well do a little shopping while we're here.... and eat some mexican food and take a hot shower. City life yo. Gotta love it.

Making a Home

Bushara Island is home to 80+ species of birds. One of these species is the weaver bird. I’m not a huge birder but these guys are awesome. On the occasional morning when I wake up early to catch a little extra quiet time I like to go and sit on one of the docks and watch them build their nests. They build their nests to be fully covered with a tunnel-like entry. There’s one nest I’ve been watching for almost the entire two weeks I’ve been here and they’re still working on it.

Building a house takes time, and we expect it to take time, but building a home also takes time. I’ve been working on making this house and island into a home since the day we arrived and there is still a long way to go. I’ve hung photos on the walls (most of which have fallen down), placed notes and cards from friends on my windowsills and swept the spiders out of the corners of my room but this isn’t home yet.

This island will be home when I stop second-guessing every other word that comes out of my mouth, wondering if I’ve said something culturally unacceptable. It will be home when I can speak enough Rukiga to confidently greet my co-workers who don’t speak English. It will be home when I feel comfortable enough to let loose.

The hugs I received from the kids at church yesterday, the greetings I’ve already learned, the already familiar laughs and smiles, the battery-powered Christmas lights hanging over my bug net, the constant sound of birds, and the bag of guava a co-worker gave us. These are the things that are already making this island into my home.

I’ve learned this lesson before. No matter when or where you move it’s going to be hard. Community takes time to form and every place is different. I think I’m finally starting to learn to embrace the process. It’s messy and often unpleasant but the end result is fully and completely worthwhile. It’s worth fighting through the discomfort of moving and meeting new people because it always ends with another place and group of people to call home. It always ends with a heart that has been stretched and, as a result, has grown.

Photo: This is the one of five docks on Bushara Island and by far the best for swimming. The Island you can see across the water is Bwama Island. It's owned by the Anglican church and houses two schools, a church, the agroforesty plot where Rachel works and a medical clinic that you can see on the far right of this photo. Bwama Island is one of the biggest islands on Lake Bunyonyi and used to be a leper colony. My goal is to be able to swim there and back by the time we leave... it's further than it looks.

20 Things I'm Thankful for Right Now

1. freshness of visiting new places every week

2. hospitality of the Austrian family that has taken us in and everyone else that has hosted us

3. meeting up with old friends in new places 

4. sunsets

5. metro rides (aka people-watching paradise)

6. baguettes (45 cents!)

7. culture and it subtleties 

8. finally being in a place where the languages are somehow tied to english 

9. being mistaken for locals… because the two completely lost Canadian girls are going to be able to 

give you directions in German

10. the awkwardness of telling someone who has been talking to you for a couple minutes that you didn’t understand anything they've said

11. palaces/castles/ruins 

12. high places with views… every city seems to have at least one

13. wandering around with no agenda (other than to maybe find cheap food)

14. having unlimited time to get completely lost

15. coffee (seriously North America, you're doing something wrong when it comes to hot drinks)

16. the incredibly good and cheap Asian food that is pretty much anywhere... also Kebab stands.

17. the instant bond with every other Canadian (it’s actually really strange)

18. CHEESE… so good... missing good old cheddar, but the rest is just plain delicious

19. snow, if there wasn't any this Europe in winter thing would be extra lame

20. going to church in different places and having the opportunity to meet brothers and sister

p.s. If you experienced any jealousy as you read this you should probably know that I wrote this list because I would give just about anything to be home right now... traveling isn't everything it's made out to be. It's exhausting, boring, and sometimes miserable. Being thankful sometimes takes some thought. Good and bad, I am where I am so I'm gonna give appreciating it my all.

In other news, I'm doing a year long disposable camera challenge. There's a blog coming that will describe exactly what that means and why there will be very few photos in any blogs written in 2014.

When Leaving is Fashionable (UB#8)

I see a trend among my peers towards fixating on leaving home… we are confused when people do not have a plan to leave the place they grew up. There are so many issues leaving home has forced me to face that I wouldn’t take back… but I don’t think seeing more of the world will somehow make your life ‘better.’ It will probably force you to expand your mind and yes, travel will be a temporary escape from what might be eating you up, but you’re going to find more problems and then you’re going to go home to problems and you’re going to be carrying remnants of the problems you found along the way.  Those problems might be the fact that you have found out that your own worldview is not unquestionable or simply that in coming home you had to leave friends you love. Travel is not a cure to life’s problems and if I’m correct in thinking that that is how it is often portrayed something needs to change. We cannot go on lying to ourselves about how wonderful it is to travel. Being gone from home for a prolonged amount of time is incredibly difficult and sometimes even painful yet we continue to pass on the lie that it is all fun and games. It is easy to pass on funny stories about crazy places and unusual people-- it is harder to pass on the power of the emotions that will sometimes overwhelm you when you find yourself thousands of miles away from anyone that has known you longer than two months. We ache to be known by others. Leaving home means sacrificing the craving we have to experience love through being known. We should not go on trying to share the experience of leaving home if we are not willing to share both sides of the experience. It is lying when we are not willing to admit that our experiences away from home are not only positive.  

Compassion (UB#6)

This evening I watched 180° South with a friend. It was interesting to watch a documentary about adventure and then talk about adventures we’ve been on and want to go on, particularly in the context of talking about compassion in class. Since I became interested in hiking and traveling one of the dilemmas that has come up multiple times is the dilemma of whether or not these adventures are a good use of time and resources. I love a good day in the mountains, but if my time could be better spent elsewhere, what is the point of a day in the mountains? Compassion (a book we’re reading for class) talks a lot about relationships, this has prompted me to think about the relationships I have formed through adventure. In my experience adventures have created room for presence in a world that is not always open to presence. As part of one of my classes we read a book called Primal Vision. Primal Vision was basically a book about Christianity in African culture. One of the requirements of my class is that for every chapter and book we read we come up with a ‘takeaway’. Basically, a takeaway is a couple sentence summary that explains what we learned. Many of us found that our takeaway from this book was the importance of presence, the importance of simply being with people. Though the book is far to rich to sum up in a short quote, one of the things Taylor says is “The Christian, whoever he may be, has nothing to offer unless he offers to be present, really and totally present, really and totally in the present” (Taylor 136). Presence is the first step to compassion. In my experience, adventure has opened the door for presence and in turn compassion. I have had many a conversation about God while hiking with my coworkers. Those conversations would never have occurred with those people in the context of work, or even in our dorm. Being pushed to your limit mentally and physically in the context of grand adventures has helped me to learn more about my friends, not only through hearing their stories but through seeing the way they react to running out of food, or being hours away from the trailhead when the sun sets, or realizing that we didn’t bring enough water. Watching people watch beautiful sunsets and bask in the cool mist of a waterfall has not only grown my appreciation for sunsets and waterfalls, but for the creator of those things and in turn for my fellow appreciators of those things. Out of this appreciation compassion has come. Compassion for people whose stories are painful to the point that they don't even want to think about their pasts. When Jesus healed it was because he was moved with compassion, the miracles he performed revealed his solidarity with the suffering of humanity. The good news of Jesus is not found in the individual miracles he performed but in the fact that he suffered with us. Jesus, son of God, shared his presence with us. He relinquished his status as son of God. This was an act of compassion. If we are called to compassion (which I think we can probably all agree we are) then we are called to presence. True presence requires willingness to take on suffering. It requires that we carry other people’s darkest secrets. Full presence is in itself a form of compassion. For this reason, I will not abandon adventure. Adventure has allowed me to be to be present in the lives of so many people. If I really think that presence is the first step to compassion then adventure is something I cannot abandon until it ceases to provide this opportunity.