Our family could really do with your prayers right now. Beckie is down for the second day running with fever and general body ache and my self, am feeling general body weakness since yesterday. We know the power of prayer and that's why we are asking you to cover us in prayer.
Last week was really a great week for me personally. Gathering with friends and family ere and preparing Ugandan breakfast and lunch on Wednesday was fun. My mother-in-law (bless her Lord), woke up at 5 am to start smoking the meat because me and Beckie together with our Ugandan friend were craving for pasted smoked meat stew (this actually turned out very well!). My sister-in-law and her husband had also sent us locally raised chicken for the day as well as two live hens for my birthday! Then to put the icing on the cake, my wife came in beaming with a huge smile on the same day with some precious mail in her hands; my long awaited green card had finally made it and the Michigan Secretary of State had also found it necessary (at least in my mind), to send my State ID on the same day! I couldn't stop smiling and blushing like a little kid; The Lord's timing was just very perfect!
And then the next day on Christmas; was my birthday! My mother-in-law together with my wife and other family members teamed up to make it such a great and memorable event! I must admit it was my best birthday yet and i really feel blessed and privileged and after reading on, you will understand why i am feeling blessed and privileged.
Growing up, birthday was not different from any other day. No one celebrated them and most rural people up to now don't even remember their birthdays; if you ask the when they were born, they will probably tell you January 1st, because that's a date that is easy to remember and most people count their ages from the 1st of every year. My first birthday was celebrated when i was 26 in 2011 when i joined my current church. There, even if it's an African founded church, birthdays are celebrated and i was surprised when the pastor had announced there would be a leaders' meeting that was mandatory for every leader and others who hope to be leaders to attend. Only to enter church and everyone was singing "Happy birthday, we are saying we love you, God be with you till the end of time, we are saying well done". I was shocked, not only at the party, but also the new song, i was used to hearing "happy birthday to you...". They had cake and snacks and my first birthday gift ever was an apple and a chocolate candy, from a dear sister from church. People had not yet learned more about gifts, but at least, this was a good start since the church branch had just opened in my district 6 months before my birthday. I am happy that birthdays are now a big thing among the hundreds who attend our church.
I must also note that, at least among the middle class and university students, birthdays are these days celebrated (in fact while at university, there was a noted girl who always told her suitors her birthday was a week or so away so that they could bring her gifts; she had a birthday almost every month, because she wanted more gifts!). The trends are changing with the new generation, however, deep in the villages, birthdays still remain a mystery.
Christmas in America was more grand than i thought it would be. People here put in a lot into nativity and decorations. Driving through state after state on our way back from California, we saw numerous kinds of decorations; some modest and others so grand. There's no doubt people take it here more seriously (at least from the outside). But i kept thinking whether they take the same way from the inside! Is the Lord that grand in their hearts? Or is it just a fashion statement? Not judging anyone here, but that's just how i thought and i remember sharing this with my wife and we both wondered whether all these homes with these grand decors had a grand relationship with the Lord.
This is not to say that back in Uganda, people are saints; far from it. Growing up, Christmas was more of a day of eating good food (at least from a child's perspective). In most years, it was the only day most families would eat meat and rice or meat and posho (corn bread). And it was also the only day kids and mothers as well as daddies got new clothes. It was also (still is), the only day the whole village went (goes) to church! In most churches on Christmas day, men carry their own chairs to church and women have to carry their own mats to sit on because churches get so full, that other people will have to sit outside and listen, while others stand and peep through the windows! Everyone remembers the Lord on that day.
Christmas is also associated with feasting and drinking. People in villages usually collect what is needed and make local brew in one home where 10 or so families will gather together after lunch and sometimes dinner, to drink the local brew (usually from the 23rd of December to the 5th of December). Children would sit in one place with their own pot of brew drinking while adults sat in the big local tent or shade of a tree to drink. When it became dark, then music would start blaring (growing up, my uncles would play local instruments as we the children danced to the rhythm). However, these days radios and speakers are every where and you can hear sounds coming from different homesteads as the winds carried the sound waves in different directions. We, the children would always have dancing competitions where the winner was usually given about 1 cent! But it was fun!
People planned for the next Christmas on the last day of drinking in January on who would host the next celebration and what would be eaten. Some groups would plan to buy a piglet and raise it through out the year for slaughter on the day and the pork either cooked in one home where everyone gathered or distributed equally to every household for them to cook and eat in their own houses and then gather for drinking in the selected home. Other bigger and ambitious groups would buy bulls for Christmas. Food and drinking and music surmised the day.
It is also a day when family from far came home in the village. Those in distant schools, family members working in the cities and other urban places always return to the villages for Christmas. Public transport fares are always high and in some cases doubled a few days to Christmas because usually there are more travelers than vehicles.
When it comes to gifts, as i mentioned earlier, the gifts are always clothes and shoes and food. Women in the villages always perm or treat their hair during the festive season. The gift that stands out in my mind was how my grandmother would pound groundnuts (what you guys call peanuts here) with salt on it and would give each grandchild a portion in the morning before we went to church! Kids looked up for this gramma's special gift. Nothing like what kids here get, no toys, no painting stuff, nothing. That's one thing i liked about Christmas here. Watching the excitement in the kids' faces as they open their gifts and make grunts of joy as they hold their toys or whatever gift for all to see. That's very nice.
On New Year's eve, in the villages, usually people drink (drink either alcohol or milk tea and soda for born again Christians), share stories and stay awake until midnight. When the clock hits midnight, then ululations can be heard from all directions and shouts of joy accompanied with drumming, burning of car or bicycle tires (poor man's fireworks) and declarations of what the Lord has done for them in the previous year as well as announcing of their new year's resolutions.
Among Christians however, there are usually all night prayer and worship meetings every New Year's eve. Last year, for the first time, we had fire works display in our church during our new year's eve service. It's one of the most important services in the year for me and i am happy that since it's a global service for our church, at least i will be able to participate on line on Wednesday! (thanks to the joys of technology).
I am so thankful and privileged to celebrate the festive season in two different cultures; seeing the good things as well as the bad things of both, it's something that i am looking forward to sharing with my kids and grand kids and you never know, as long as the Lord tarries, may be even with my great grand kids! Happy New Year to you all, thank you so much for being a part of our 2014, hope you will continue being a part of our story in 2015, God bless you all! And by the way, thank you so much for the birthday cards and wishes; i got the biggest number of birthday cards ever!
With much love,
Ruudy and Beckie
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