Today marks one month of being home. Exactly one month ago, I woke up in our little Holiday Inn in Atlanta at 6:10 AM, rolled out of bed, went downstairs and split a cinnamon roll with Jenny. Thus the start of some hard goodbyes, one bye one until I was sitting by myself in my terminal trying my best not to cry. Then hopping on the plane, my short little 2 hour flight full of nervous jitters, huddling up in my Africa smoke scented sweatshirt (still haven't washed it), and praying to God to help me with whatever I was going to encounter when I got home. The flight ends, I grab my sleeping bag and my purse and sling it over my shoulder. I walk bravely off the plane, but as I glance around my heart leaps up into my chest and I think it would be best if I took a bathroom break first before meeting whoever is meeting me. I walk into the bathroom and smile to myself because of AMERICAN TOILETS. Afterwards, I know it's time to get going, so I start walking and keep my eyes open for whoever is meeting me. I see two people running and then a split second later I recognize them as my friends Christina and Morgan. They are holding this huge sheet of construction paper:














Haha thank you Kristin. I see my Dad walking up and we all hug. It's a bit surreal. I'm home.


Except home isn't home anymore. I wish I could explain it to you and make you understand, but I can't. For the past four weeks, I've been constantly thinking about Uganda. Something will remind me of someone from my team, or something that happened and I'll gush about it to the first person that will listen. I've tried countless times to imitate Pastor Thomas, or to describe Faith's personality to someone, giving my very best African-English accent that I can and never doing it justice. Some mornings, I wake up and lie in bed and just think about the taste of chapati. And I just miss it. I miss living out my big ugly orange bag, I miss seeing my teammates faces every morning at breakfast. I miss living simply, eating the same thing every day, wearing the same clothes over and over. I miss living in our little community where we shared everything, clothes, toothpaste, shoes, hair ties, peanut butter, febreze. I miss the kids, always present, and always reaching out their hands to be held. Words aren't enough.

But the one thing that I miss more than anything from that month is dependency on God. God was in everything. When someone was sick, we prayed healing. When I had had it to the brim with crowing roosters, crying babies, mosquito bites, and the squatty potty, I would pray for that little extra boost of patience. When I was scared, I would open up my bible and verses would just pop out at me. God wasn't an option. He was my everything, and I needed him. In Uganda, I would constantly repeat this verse to myself:

1 Thessalonians 5:16-18
Be joyful always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.

Being home is hard because of this. It's harder than trusting God to come through for you. It's hard because it feels like God isn't the same here, even though he is. He is the same God that walked down the dirt roads with me, sat in the van with me as Faith's knees were poking into my back, comforted me on the first night of training camp when I felt more alone than ever with this group of strangers, watched me wake up in the morning to the various sounds of Bugiri, who held my hand as I walked through the hospital wards. He's still that God. But in America, when I'm surrounded with comfort, it's like I don't experience God that way anymore. And that's what makes it hard. Because I don't want God to become just an option for me, I want him to be my everything, to be constantly dependent on him in every situation he throws my way. So I'm going to keep that verse on repeat in my head. God, give me joy even though a lot of the time I don't feel like being here. Help me to be in a constant state of prayer, and thank you for bringing me home because I know this is where you want me and where I need to be now.

Being in Africa, yes, it definitely was hard. But coming home was much harder than anything I experienced there.



-Emily

I know I've been long due for a blog post, but I've been struggling to find words for what I want to say since I've gotten home. There's just too much, and one of the first things I discovered the day I got back was that no one will ever be able to fully understand my experiences. The last few weeks have been a roller coaster of good and bad experiences, sleepless nights, a lot of time spent thinking, stress, culture shock, processing.

So, I've found that most people who I've talked to about my trip have asked a lot of the same questions. So much so, that I've even started to have a sort of robotic, memorized, planned out answer for them when they ask :) I decided that I should just answer them here. So... here we go, my FAQ's. :)


What did you do over there?

We did three main types of ministry. School, street evangelism, and hospital ministry.

School ministry: We went to so many different schools I can't remember all of them. But we would go, and split us up into groups and split the kids up, then spend some time playing games with them, singing songs, and just hanging out. After we would tell a bible story in the large group.

Street evangelism: Usually during the afternoons we would go out into the community, and attempt to build relationships with people nearby us. We would talk and pray with them.

Hospital ministry: Once a week, we would go to the hospital in Bugiri and pray for the people staying there. This was probably the hardest ministry for everyone, simply because there was so much hurt surrounding us.

Where did you stay?

you're about to get the grand tour. (sorry that the video is flipped the majority of this. hahaha)




What was the weirdest thing you had to eat?

<--- This is called Ugali. It's made of (if I'm right) cassava, flour, and water? Well anyway, it has the weirdest consistency, it's stretchy/squishy, and has no taste. It's like a giant booger.

Did you have running water?

Nope!


Did you see lions/giraffes/elephants?

No, but we did get to feed wild baboons bananas.


Did you get sick?

No, I was one of the few that didn't. Over half of my team got sick while we were there, and it was a lot of stress and struggle for us but it only drew us closer together.


What did you learn?

When I was in Africa, nothing really jumped out at me and said "I'm learning this", in fact I remember on the plane ride home not really feeling like I had not learned much at all. But, after arriving home, I feel like that's when the learning started. I'm still learning, and right now I can't really give you a bullet point list of main things I've discovered, but I'm planning on writing about some things later on on here.



And that pretty much sums it up :).


I also wanted to take some time to say thank you to everyone who has supported me, whether that be through sending in money for me or praying for me before I left and while I was gone. None of this could have happened without you, and I want to thank you for giving me one of the best months of my life.


-Emily