Anna of Africa!

There have been many adventures for our niece Anna, who arrived on July 6. We promised her parents we would take care of her, but it's hard! First of all, her bag did not arrive with her. After many, many incantations of "NIE" (Nothing Is Easy), she finally got it on July 10. Adventure number 1.

Then, just after she got here I took her for a walk in the neighborhood. We walked up the road by fancy houses, then into a slum area, then I saw out of the corner of my eye something I thought she would find culturally interesting. I whispered to her to look in a small mud hut to see some men drinking this weird drink made of dried millet called marua (sp?) out of a pot with long straws made of weeds. The drink looks like mud, honestly. We were spotted, and some guys pulled us into the hut (literally - I thought my arm would come off). The lead guy then pulled a straw out of another guy's mouth and offered it to me. Uh, no thanks. I mean, the marua would have been interesting to drink, but not quite out of that straw! (I had just that day read how people contract TB from those straws.) We backed out of the hut, apologizing for our bad manners, and walked on back home. Hmm. Adventure number 2.

Then on Sunday we went to the Kampala Pentecostal Church. This church is famous for 45 minutes of singing before a fire and brimstone sermon, so we thought it would be another cultural experience, which it was. She held hands with some other women and they all prayed for each other, and the minister talked, complete with big-screen graphics copyrighted by Encarta and Microsoft, about "standing your ground" against Satan. All well and good. And then he talked about the dangers that homosexuals pose for Kampala when the Commonwealth Heads of Government meet here in November. We aren't sure how the two are related, but whatever. After two hours we felt very ready to stand our ground with our shield of faith and sword of truth, etc. Adventure number 3. Good thing she was still jet-lagged.

I had scheduled Anna to coach some basketball with a friend's group, Sports Outreach Ministry. So on Monday evening we went to a boarding school called "Never Again," where some high school-aged former street kids were awaiting her. They were big - but she just dove in and started them doing drills. She was great, and they listened. Soon she had them waving their hands in unison and moving in lines. Until they decided it was just more fun to shoot baskets, and then it was sort of chaotic, but they loved having her. And afterwards I asked one of them how the coaching was, and he thought for a few minutes and said very seriously, "She is good." They didn't want her to leave, though it was dark and no one could even see the basket. We had a little trouble getting out of there.

I'm not sure if it's part of Adventure number 4 or a new adventure, but it took us an hour to get to the other side of town where we live because of the usual Kampala traffic. At one point, I think I heard Anna yelp, but otherwise she was brave in the midst of boda-bodas, taxis and crazy drivers. Even Bill, the driver, looked kind of nervous in that jam!

There have been more adventures, like having Goretti the tailor make Anna an outfit (I mean, she didn't have any clothes except mine and her travel ones for four days!). The women at the tailor shop worked hard on a head cloth for her, and her new outfit looks great. And then the Murchison Falls van breakdown - but she can tell that story for herself, we've already had a similar one in the blog. And at the BeadforLife village she was "blessed" by the women with blue beads.

It's so much fun to have Anna, and we are TRYING to take care of her, but this is Africa, after all.