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Sometimes You Have to Surrender Before You Win

3.7.10

Ever read a book and feel like every word is jumping out at you? Every sentence speaks to exactly where you are? Right now I am reading a book called Shantaram. It’s about this man who escapes from an Australian prison and ends up in India. I’ve been doing a lot of praying. To be honest with you, Africa is testing my willingness to pursue God. I wish I could say that on Sundays I go to church, but instead I go swimming. I have my reasons. Ever been to a Ugandan church service? They last forever. Ten to one to be exact. Far too long for me. They do translate into English but its really hard to understand. But for too long I’ve been using all of this as an excuse for my lack of enthusiasm and effort. I know that church is not the only important part of my faith but I can see how, without it, my faith is suffering. I’m living in community with people all right around my age but I’m not taking advantage of the opportunity I have been placed in. I guess this is just me processing aloud to you.

But anyways, back to this book I’m reading. Right now it is taking place in India, a country I have been to, which isn’t exactly Uganda but in many ways I feel like I can really relate to him. At one point they are in a terrible taxi accident. His Indian guide frantically rushes him out of the destroyed taxi and away from the quickly forming mob. The driver of the taxi they had been in had caused the four-car accident. The mob pulled him out the taxi and proceeded to beat him almost to death. Many times in Uganda I have seen things very similar to this. But I never stood up to it. I’ve watched mobs beat the innocent and guilty and husbands hit their wives and children. Although outraged, I say nothing. As a young woman I have felt powerless trying to stand up to the violations of basic human rights that I have seen. After seeing the crowd carry away the dying taxi driver he writes, “it happened in seconds. I told myself, as I watched the beating, that it was all too fast, that I was dazed, and there was no time to react. What we call cowardice is often just another name for being taken by surprise, and courage is seldom any better than simply being well prepared. And I might’ve done more, I might’ve done something, anything, if it had happened in Australia. It’s not your country, I told myself, as I watched the beating. It’s not your culture…” So many times I have felt this exact same way. Powerless. Completely powerless. This isn’t my country, it’s not my culture. Instead of focusing so much on the things that frustrate me about Uganda, I need to focus on the things that I love about Uganda. In many ways the things I love are also the things I hate. I love that pace is slower in Uganda, yet I hate to wait on Ugandans. As I have said before, more than anything, Uganda is teaching me patience.

Another point in Shantaram that really spoke to me was before he left on a five-month trip out to an Indian village. A friend said to him “Sometimes, in India, you have to surrender before you win.” This has been very heavy on my heart. The idea of surrender. Surrendering myself. Surrendering my culture. Surrendering everything I thought I knew.

Things at Musana have been awesome. This term it feels like we have a million children running around. There are now close to two hundred children enrolled in our nursery and primary school. We are renting the second floor of a building and opening a café as a self-sustainability project. An 18 year old, named Morgan, from Boulder, Colorado raised 11,000 dollars to start the café. Musana could not be more excited to add to our community and have another income generating project. Ryan Mcgraw, a friend I grew up with, is here for a few months developing our chicken project. We have another volunteer named Pete who has built soccer goals, a swing set and wooden box cars. Already it has been an exciting spring!

We had a group of fifteen from Texas come to Musana for the day yesterday. The kids sang and performed dances for them. After playing football and hanging out with the kids we all ate lunch together. Then they divided the kids into groups and played games with them. It was a great day and such an encouragement to Musana!

Recently one of our favorite things to do with the kids is have massive water fights. We gather around the borehole and fill basins with water. If you’re not wet you can almost guarantee that someone will dump a basin of water all over you. With how hot is gets here some days I’m tempted to dump a basin on myself! The other day during a water fight I got completely soaked with water. The older girls at Musana took me into the dorms and were searching for dry clothes I could wear. They each brought almost all the clothes they owned and were arguing about what outfit I should wear. They finally decided on a light blue strapless sundress. The only problem was I needed to get from the dorms to the art room, right through the “battlefield”. I ran out of the dorms with all the older girls surrounding me protecting me from getting wet again. Unfortunately, Pete and Ryan saw me running in new dry clothes to the art room. They grabbed basins and poured water all over my dry clothes. I thought the girls might kill Pete and Ryan. We ran back to the dorms in search of new dry clothes for me. This time they didn’t pick out the most fashionable outfit for me. I ended up wearing traditional Ugandan shirt and skirt. It was a hilarious end to a good water fight.

This morning, during a giant rainstorm, a few kids and I were stuck in the art room. I got out paint and paper and we began to create together. The rain was such a blessing in disguise. It was a great morning at Musana.

Thanks for reading!