After failing two visitors' visa interviews at the US Embassy in Kampala, we were both disappointed, especially my wife, who really wanted me to go meet her family since we had just gotten married. The long process of applying for an immigrant visa started. A year or so later, we were in Nairobi doing medicals and attending interviews. The process got a little bit more longer and frustrating than we had hoped, as most of you who religiously follow us found out from our past publications.
Finally we got all cleared to go to America, praise the Lord! Boy, we were excited and planning started. 9th of September slowly kept approaching and my mind whirled around many things and thoughts. Finally we would be touching America on the 10th of September; and friends kept telling me many things to look forward to, from the much dreaded bad winter, to the glorious food at McDonalds. My greater fear has always been the cold snow. I read in the national papers in Uganda about a Ugandan who visited Sweden and because it was very cold, he contracted pneumonia and a few days after returning, died!
I sat on that plane from Entebbe to Qatar (thank God it was only a few hours) thinking about snow, cold weather, bad winter, someone had posted about a bad weather forecast for the day we arrive in Grand Rapids, etc. My ears were beginning to pain from the effect of the plane (remember this was my first time on the plane, blessed be God) and breathing was also pretty difficult.
Qatar airport is beautiful and the sight of it brought some needed relief, since our next flight to Philadelphia would take more than 13 hours. After security checks, I was properly belted in my window seat and ready for America. couldn't sleep that long and finally we landed in "Philly". The sight of many African American brothers in the airport was calming. A good friend picked us and took us out for a huge breakfast (American breakfast). We left for Grand Rapids where our loving cheering family was waiting for us. I was touched because many family and friends had turned up to receive us, some driving for over 17 hours to be at the airport, never felt this sort of family love before.
My observations so far have been totally different than what i ever expected. Everything here is in excess, the malls have thousands of alternatives to choose from, so do supermarkets. The traffic is crazy, driving on the right seemed strange, and the worst feeling so far has been being the minority. There are few blacks in places I have been so far and catching people glancing at you is a very funny feeling. To make things worse, I am tall and hence an easy pick for most people. I have seen more over weight people here than i have ever seen my entire life (with the food here, don't be surprised if i turn up in Uganda very fat, i bet not). The question in my mind is, do these people know how blessed they are to have all these stuff? are they always grateful to God for this? how can one nation have all these things and yet many other nations, and continents have the opposite? This is still perturbing my mind.
Going to Church yesterday was refreshing, the worship at Remembrance (our home church and biggest financial supporter) was good (thank God they sung a few songs that were familiar) and the Pastor's message went home well (at least to me). One thing that stood out was his passionate call to his congregation to embrace new worship changes as the church embarks on something that appeals to the younger generation. He said some people might leave the church because of this. I was thinking, his can someone leave church because of this?.....
...........to be continued in the next up date.
1 comment:
Beautiful, Ruudy! I hope to meet you while you are in the U.S. Please always keep writing what you are really seeing, really feeling, really thinking. It will help us - if we are willing to learn from you.
Post a Comment