Uganda 2014: Day 5

Wow!!! Today!! There are almost no words for today! We got to spend time with orphans!!! These orphans live at Destiny Orphanage and school. When we arrived the kids were greeting our group that had arrived a little bit before us. When they saw the bus pull in they all started cheering. It was so loud! As the bus turned off they all ran to is. I was next to the window and was trying to give high fives, but that did not work so well. They ended up just grabbing my arm and pulling on it. I started to think that they were going to pull me out of the window. 🙂

They swarmed us and hugged us! I was in heaven! The sad part was the class bell rang before we could spend much time with them, but one small group of kids was able to stay and we played with and took pictures of them. Their faces lit up while Bria was playing with them. They ran in circles around a tree, danced, and a few other fun things. This did not last long because we were going to walk from class to class and take a tour. Every class told us their motto and maybe a verse or rule. Then they would give us “flowers.” How they did that was to put their hands in the air, wiggle their fingers, and make a shhh sound. Then we had to receive the “flowers” by stretching out our arms, putting our hands palm up, and folding them into us like we were receiving a gift. It was cute! We asked if we could do it back. The guy leading us said no because that is how they were to bless us. While in the classroom we handed out candy to the kids and gift to the teachers. In the last classroom we were in, JB saw a schedule on the wall that showed the kids start school at 6am and end at 8:30pm. There are meals during that time and dinner is three hours, but it is still impressive how long they are in class. The next place we toured were the girls dorms. They had some bunk beds that were three high and each dorm had one or two “moms.” These ladies take care of so many children! We were able to meet a few of the moms and thank them for everything they do. They are such amazing women to be able to take care of all those kids and even live at the orphanage.

We saw the grave of the man who started the orphanage. There was a beautiful building built and he was buried in the middle of it. The next place we went was my (and most of the girl’s favorite), we went to the baby house!!! They were 1-3 ish years old. One of them was standing at the door and saw us coming. She ran out to us and then the rest started flooding out the door running to us. It was so cute! They ran and the grabbed onto us. In no time at all almost every girl had a baby in her arms. I actually had two! 🙂 The girl on my right side reminded me so much of my friends daughter, Charlotte. Right away she found my necklace and started playing with it. This made me want to take her home with me so bad! While I held the two babies I watched everyone else with the other babies. JB and Scott were throwing the little boys up in the air and Ben was holding another little boy. All the girls were sitting or standing and talking to the girl or boy baby they had. There were a couple people that were not holding babies, but taking picture of those of us that were. When our group was told we needed to move on, the boy Ben was holding grabbed his legs from behind as stuck his head in between them while Ben walked out the door dragging him along. Ben, Yelena, and I were the last ones out the door and the babies started crying. It was hard to leave them. Today I learned that Yelena and my heart and plans for life are very similar. Both of us are looking forward to the day we can adopt!

Our group went into a building close to the babies building and talked a little to Mama Eva about the orphanage. It has been around for 12 years. We learned that to sponsor a child it only costs $25 per month and if we were interested we could fill out a form and look through the kids pictures and info. Last year Destiny School and Orphanage had its first graduating class. I believe it was a class of 39 students. Ben asked me how many kids I am going to sponsor and I said, “all of them.” He said, “I am going to sponsor one more than you. I will grab a kid off the street to sponsor too.” Ben, Irena (sitting in between us), and I started laughing. I truly wish that I could sponsor them all!

Once we were done relaxing and asking Mama Eva questions we headed down to the high school for a worship service. Our band was there and had just finished practicing. Sarah (blond) and Spencer taught the students and us a song they wrote today and then they taught the Ugandans a song they wrote yesterday. The song from yesterday says “Jesu, Jesu, Jesu, to akwagala.” This means “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, we love you.” This song gets stuck in your head forever and once you hear someone sing one word of it that is all you sing for hours. The Destiny Saints came up and did a dance for us. These young men were so good! Then three of out team members went up and gave their testimony or a message. Spencer, Bria, and Jessica did so good. Their testimonies were so inspiring to even our team. When we were finished some of the Ugandans and a couple of our girls from our team, me included, sang “I could sing of your love forever.” They sounded amazing, well all of us sounded good! Also, we learned that all the seniors passed their test to get into university! God is blessing these kids so much!