Happy New Year Everyone!
I had a wonderful New Years Eve surrounded by other missionaries and having a game night! Cassandra and I made lots of yummy appetizers and it was all in all a good time!
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| Cassandra's mocktails recipes |
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| Cassandra mixing our non-alcoholic drinks! They were quite yummy! |
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| I was pretty happy with how my appetizers turned out - these are stuffed cucumbers |
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| I also made egg plant topped with tomato, cheese and garlic - YUM! |
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| With my friend Julie Matthews - who just got engaged yesterday when her boyfriend arrived! So excited for her! |
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| The Girls - Julie, Cassandra, Me, Bobbie |
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| This little trooper., Cole, made it until 10:15 - much past his bedtime :) |
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| I learned to play Ticket to Ride - so much fun! |
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| At midnight with our party hats on! - We were able to watch the fireworks around the city from her neighbors balacony |
Since New Years, I spent 3 days sick with the African flu. Ugandans call a cold the flu. I have been trying to stay in my house because when I go outside I am surrounded by kids and I want to contain my germs. I have taken sometime while stuck inside my house to research some of the wars going on in Africa.
When I first arrived I borrowed two books from the AIM library. I first read "A Long Way Gone" by Ishmeal Beah and I am now working on "Aboke Girls" by Els De Temmerman. Both have been very interesting as they are personal accounts of wars in Africa that abduct children and use them for soldiers. I strongly recommend these books although they can be a bit gruesome, they are real life and true stories about horrors that young children have faced. I felt very naive about the wars in Africa, I have always known they existed, but never really understood the weight of them. We are taught very little about them in American schools even though the age of the children fighting the wars are the same age of school children in America.
I first learned about the war in Uganda as a freshman in college when
Invisible Children came to my University to speak out for child soldiers and displaced people because of the Lords Resistance Army (LRA) in Uganda... truthfully that might have been the first time I had heard of the country Uganda (who knew 7 years later I would move here!). Thankfully the Lords Resistance Army led by Joseph Kony have moved out of Uganda, but they still terrorize parts of South Sudan, Congo, and primarily Central African Republic (CAR). Here is a good article from 2011 about the history of the LRA if you are interested:
Lords Resistance Army History
There is also a major conflict in Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) over many things, but one is a mineral called coltan that is needed for most electrical devices especially cell phones. I tried to learn more about this war today from my Ugandan friend and he explained to me that the Congo government is so corrupt that some people even prefer the rebels to be in their cities even though the rebels groups rape their women and abduct their children. He also explained that Rwanda and Congo support the rebel group (M23) under the table since they cannot fight for resources and other things in Congo themselves. Not sure all that is 100% fact, but my friend's parents are Rwandan and he understands more about the US government than I do, so I have a feeling he knows what he is talking about.You can read more about what has been going on in DR Congo from
Wikipedia (sorry to send you there, but it is the most up to date and in line with what I have been hearing about in Uganda). According to this
Article the "Congo is often referred to as the worst and most neglected humanitarian crisis on Earth.
Many of you may be aware of all of the wars going on in Africa, and many may not. I was one that vaguely knew but didn't understand the harshness and terror of them. I hope you read the above books if you have not already, and try to pay more attention to the world news on the wars in Africa..... I have no ideas for a solution nor do I even pretend to remotely understand what is going on in all of these countries, but I am sure that being educated on these things and lifting up these countries in prayer is a start!
