Babies...and What Am I Doing Here?

Hello all!

So it's been about two weeks since I last updated. In that time I can't say that things have been incredibly eventful, but a lot has been going on (if that makes sense). For the past two weeks I've been in the office working on the design for the secondary school and training center, like I've been doing for a while now. It's a big project and the civil design has lots of different elements, so that gives me plenty to do. A lot of this stuff is new to me, so it's a learning process as I go, but it's been good. From an engineering standpoint, I've definitely already picked up a lot of practical knowledge that I'm sure will be useful in the future.

So last weekend I and the other interns took a trip to a babies' home in town. A babies' home is just an orphanage for babies and toddlers, by the way. We went there because a few interns had an interest in helping out, and we all decided it would be a great thing to do. So we went. I should preface this with saying that although I love kids, I'm not so good with babies and toddlers. If I can't carry on a simple conversation with them, I have issues. So I knew this would be a stretch for me, but it turned out to be great. Basically we just showed up and starting playing with the kids. There were about 20-30 toddlers there (only one real baby actually) so we had plenty of kids to play with. Of course since it's an orphanage, none of them have parents so the only kind of parental figure they have are their house mothers. So no real guy influence at all for them. The more I thought about their situation, the more it hit my heart. So we just played with them in various ways and let them climb on us, we held them, etc. The orphanage seems to be low on money, because none of the kids had any diapers on, which made things interesting. A lot of them had self-control issues and relieved themselves all the time. So we all got relieved on a few times. No big deal. But in the end it was great to just go and love on these kids and serve. We got recruited to move some firewood as well, so there was some manual labor involved.

Also in that weekend I got to spend more time hanging out with Jordan, the son of a woman that lives with my supervisor. He's a fun kid, and we had a great time playing around at the pool and playground. Hopefully I'll be able to have some positive influence in his life. With no dad around, I know how that can turn out, and I don't want that for him (not to say that everyone who grows up without a dad is second-class or anything, but I think everyone could really use a father-figure).

This past week I was in the office again working on the design for the school. It's coming along, but there's still plenty to do. Along with that there's opportunities to go out to villages for projects, so the pressure of finishing enough work to go can be stressful. In the midst of working on the all the engineering work, I've realized that it's really easy for me to lose focus on why I'm here. I've honestly had time were I've wondered what good I'm doing sitting the office working on the computer all day. I'd like to be out in the community more, serving in a more practical way, but I had to realize that's not where I've been placed. Plus the work I'm doing is serving in a practical way, I just haven't been looking at it that way lately. I let the tediousness of the work distract me from why I'm here. Did you know that around 5000 children die a day from lack of clean water? Or that 40 billion work hours a year that could be spent doing something else are spent carrying water in Africa? Or that 884 million people don't have access to clean drinking water? Also...it takes abut 10 US dollars to provide someone in a developing country with clean water for a lifetime. That's how much I spend on iTunes buying a CD, when I already have hundreds. So it's things like this that led me to be here in Uganda, and they remind me of why I'm here. Sure the work may be tedious sometimes, but someone has to design this water system so that these girls and future teachers don't have to walk miles for clean water, but instead they can get an education. That's why I'm here. To serve those in need just like Christ has called us to serve the least of these. In this case He's put me here as an engineer to design the necessary water systems. In the future I may be serving in a completely different way, but I'll still serve. It's what I'm commanded to do.

So no pictures this time around. No cameras were allowed in the babies' home, sorry. But know that great things are happening here in Uganda, and that this place is beautiful and full of wonderful people.

Running this race,

Kyle

PS: So I've decided to run a 10k downtown in November, so be expecting to hear more about that later. I've never ran more than a mile, so a 10k (6 miles) will be quite a feat! I ran for the first time today and did did 2 miles and felt pretty tired, but I think I can make it up to 6 by the race!