Tour of Uganda

Today (Tuesday) Pastor Daniel took us on what he semi-jokingly called a “tour of Uganda.”  In the morning we went way out of town into a very sparsely populated rural area where Daniel owns some land. 

Man harvesting rice in rural Uganda.

On one plot (1 1/2 acres) he has a small house and a few unfinished buildings. There are many holes dug in the field on his property in preparation for the planting of his planned plantain plantation 🙂

Pastor Daniel’s “village.”

He let’s a widow named Mary live in the house and on the land with the 6 children she takes care of. He bought her groceries at a market on our way to the farm. Mary’s older children go to school and are able to speak some English. Pastor Daniel also does what he can to help the elderly widow neighbor and her children, who live in similar very poor conditions (the children in that house had nothing to sleep on but some bed sheets bundled up on the hard cement floor). This glimpse into the lives of the poorest in the rural area of an already very poor country was heart-wrenching. At the same time it is heartwarming to see Daniel’s generous and genuine care for these families. The family lit up when they saw us arrive and despite some initial shyness from some of the younger ones, the children were all eager to greet us too.

At first the youngest one was not scared of me or the camera…

Mary (3rd from left) and a few of her children (the youngest was now hiding from me & the camera).

After I got a safe distance away the youngest was brave enough to come out again and wave good bye :) 

Pastor Daniel then showed us his second plot of land, a half acre across the road that he hopes to give to the church and eventually build another church on it since there isn’t one near this area. 

Land where Pastor Daniel hopes to build a church one day. 

After our visit, Pastor Daniel, driver Dan, Pastor G., and I headed to to the city of Jinja for some afternoon touristy activities. Jinja is located at the northern edge of Lake Victoria (the 2nd largest freshwater lake in the world, behind Lake Superior located in the great state of Michigan…also bordered by Wisconsin and Minnesota and Canada, but most importantly, Michigan!). Jinja is also the location of the source of the Nile River. The four of us took a scenic and informative 1 hour boat tour down the river to the Nile’s source and then toured part of the shoreline of Lake Victoria (we even saw a Nile crocodile!). 

Mahatma Ghandi’s ashes were immersed here at the source of the Nile in 1948.

The source of the Nile. Note the waves and current indicating the start of the river.

This drum commemorates all the nations that were (or are) in the commonwealth of Great Britain. The U.S.A. is not listed on this commemorative drum. 

Can you spot the crocodile? 
(Had to fully zoom in so the picture quality isn’t great. Even in real life it took a very observant tour guide to spot this young croc for us. 

Pastor Gurath, driver Dan, Pastor Daniel, and me.

Some fun facts that we learned while in “de-Nile”:

-The Nile River is the longest river in the world, stretching more than 4100miles (6650 km) from Lake Victoria to the Mediterranean Sea. 

-It takes an estimated three months for the water from the source of the Nile to reach the Mediterranean.

-Only an estimated 10% of Lake Victoria’s water comes from underground springs or the tributaries/rivers flowing into it. 90% of the lake’s water is from rain water. 

(These facts courtesy of our tour guide, Ivan. He seemed knowledgeable enough so I feel like I don’t need to verify these facts via Google. I think he “Nile(d) it.” 😏 Ok, no more river puns… or they’ll just keep flowing on, and on, and on…ok NOW I’m done. You can “bank” on that. Ok, seriously, that’s the last one…).

Tomorrow we head to two more Ugandan cities: Bulandani and Busia and visit with Pastor Tannas and Pastor Absalom and their congregations. We hope to be back in Kenya and the Moi’s Bridge area by nightfall tomorrow (which here near the Equator is around 7pm).

-Pastor Luke