We have arrived!

Today has been an amazing, but tiring day! We arrived in Uganda around 7:30am (Uganda time.) We had an hour drive to the guest house in Kampala. On our drive I saw several advertisements for GLEE, which I thought my dad would appreciate. When we got to the guest house we dropped off our bags and threw on our church clothes and headed straight to the Watoto church. When we got there we saw how much these Ugandans crave the Lord. They have 5 church services on Sunday and lines and lines of people waiting to get in. Their worship was just amazing, so honest and moving. The pastor preached about money and debt and how it is Africa's time to rise. You can tell he really had a heart for what he was preaching. At times he would get so worked up that he would start jumping up and down. After church we went to lunch at a restaurant. I got a Fanta in a glass bottle and a Grilled Beef Fillet Steak with french fries, they were very good! It was fun talking to the rest of the team and getting to know them. We had two guys who accompanied us today, Patrick and Harry, who were both a hoot! It's nice that everyone mostly speaks English here but it is still sometimes a little difficult to completely understand each other sometimes. Even with the slight misunderstandings its was awesome to be able to joke around and talk to them. After lunch we went to a craft market, which was very cool.  We were told to never buy something at full price, so we quickly learned how to negotiate prices. It was fun, but difficult, to have to negotiate a lower price when to us it was already so cheap. One US dollar equals 1965.10 Ugandan shillings, just in case anyone was wondering. At the market there was a group of children who would dance and sing while a couple adults played the drums. It was very neat and I got a video, hopefully I can upload it sometime. At one specific shop there was a boy working it, and he asked if I was in high school. I told him I had just graduated and he told me that he had one more year left. I asked him how old he was and he told me 22, he returned the question and I answered. He then told me that I "grew up well." I laughed and said thank you. Now if he was just saying that because I had bought several things from him, or if he actually meant it we'll never know. After he got done wrapping the things I had bought he shook my hand and taught me how to play some kind of instrument. I wasn't very good at it so I didn't buy it. But it was neat to be able to go somewhere and have a conversation like that with a native around my age. We spent about an hour at the craft market. I loved shopping but it was hard because usually it was just you and the person working the shop in the little store, so they would watch your every move and if you just touched something they would say "I give you good price" and if you started to walk away they would starting making it cheaper and cheaper. I'm not going to lie, I got sucked in a time or two to buying a couple things that I really didn't need. After we left the craft market we came back to the guest house. I took a quick nap before dinner. We had pizza full of meat toppings, just like my daddy likes it, and fresh pineapple and more Fanta! The pineapple was amazing! After dinner we went back to our room and repacked some of our bags because tomorrow we leave for Gulu for 5 days and then go straight to the safari and they asked that we only try to bring one bag. I surprised myself when I packed all my stuff into my carry on with ease. One of the girls on the team, who I think is my age, invited us to play Spades after dinner. I couldn't turn down an opportunity to play a card game. It ended up being me and two women from the team and then William, and older man from here, and another Watoto worker. It was a lot of fun! It felt amazing to get a warm shower after that and change into some comfy clothes. I just realized its 11:21pm here and that I should be going to bed. Please continue to pray! Please pray that forming relationships with the other teammates will go well and that jet lag wont kick my butt to badly. Thank you guys for all your prayers so far! I am having a blast and can't wait to get to the baby home! I'm looking into stay a couple extra days since we arrived late, hopefully I'll find out if I can soon! Whew, it's been quite the day. 

I am happy to be able to say, good night from Uganda.
Allie