Hi everybody! Just wanted to tell you all that my mom and dad soon are coming to visit me! Yes, from 9.-16.dec. I'm just so looking forward! :) So if any of you would like to send me a letter or something, you could absolutly send it with them...;) Hehehe... But of course; no peressure! ;)

Here is my ugandan phonenumber; if anybody wondered... ;)
00256 773087325

Joanna is looking smart! :-P






This is my daily view from my bed… My mosquitonet! :-)







Maggie is ready for a night with Patrick Swazye... “Dirty Dancing”!









We found a great ice cream in town, but it looks funny…









It actually rained a lot more than the picture shows… It rained really heavy!









Our beloved bathroom









Sunset at Kyambogo University








3 pieces of a happy Team Uganda!








Maggie! You smell!! ;-)

We actually didn’t realize that we mached until we came to the office.

I've been here for 7 weeks now! :-D

After 7 weeks in this beautiful country we have started to get some order in our schedules. There have been many changes and many things that have been unsecure, but we have finally got up with something that may work. This is how a normal week for Joanna may look like:

- Monday: Eirik and I have”Campus Work” at Makerere Univ. We are still socialising and making friends, which we also can do some shepherding with. We also attending each our biblestudy group in the evening.
- Tuesday: Training and biblestudy at the office. We are also planning different events and conferences on these days.
- Wednesday: “Campus Work”, similar to Mondays, and we’re also attending a Fellowship at “Afrostone”. (A Fellowship mixed with people from “Africa” (only girls) and “Livingstone” (only boys)
- Thursday: Study day. I try to read and write as much as possible this day.
- Friday: My day off! Do whatever I feel like. :-)
- Saturday: We attend the “Child Project” at the FOCUS office. Here we mostly just play and having fun with around 100-150 children for about 7 hours. The children also have different classes in the subjects: health, life skills, english and biblehistory.
We are suppose to be teachers for these children later on, I have only had one class in english until now, but more will come.
- Sunday: A day for church at daytime and fellowships in the evening.

Our evenings are dedicated to different things. Everything from hanging with friends, making new friends, surfing on the net in town, going out for supper, reading books, having biblestudy, watching movies, washings clothes – with other words; plenty of things to do! :-)

So yes, I hope you maybe understand a bit more of what I really am doing here in Uganda, but as you may understand and think, every week is different and unique. ;-)

The Incredible Hair Day!

Monday 19.nov -07 (my babysisters birthday!) two beautiful girls, with their beautiful hair went for a trip to the salon where a mystic lady were working.

- “Oh, please can you help me to look even more beautiful?”, one of them said to the mysterious lady.
- “Can you help me too to be more beautiful?”, asked the other one.

The lady was just so helpful, and asked the girls about what they’re wishes were. The beautiful girls told the lady their deepest dreams and wishes about how they would look beautiful, even tough they were very different from eachother.
When they were finish talking, the lady looked at the girls and said:

-“Fine, I can help you both, but it’s gonna cost you!”

The girls became a bit scared by this lady now, but they looked hard into their pockets and found what they needed. Even though it was almost too much, this was what the girls wanted the most; to become beautiful.

So after six hours in a chair and at the floor, with both paining in their heads, backs and buts, their wishes were about to some true… Would they really be beautiful?!
They first looked at each other, and then they looked in the mirror…

- “Oh no! What has she done!”, they said to each other. Looking nervese and frustrated into the mirror.
- “This is not what I wanted”, one of them thought.
- “This is not what I wanted either”, the other one thought too.

But both of the girls smiled polite to the lady, paid their expensive price, and left. More disappointed than happy, because the lady hadn’t made them more beautiful… She had made them to a couple of twins!!

So yes, this was the sad story about the two girls who went trough a long and painful process, for nothing! They did not get what they asked for, and they did not get it for a good price either. And maybe the sadest thing of all is… That this story is true!!

Some in Norwegian:
6 timer på rumpa, 4 pakker med løshår, hallelujah, takk og lov for TV’n og såpeopraen!, 2 jenter i huet på en gang, 6 ansatte på det meste i den BITTELILLE salongen, litt lugging, men hadde forestilt meg det enda verre!, ble jo HELT LIKE, er jo megaflaut å gå sammen på gata nå, får desto mer oppmerksomhet.
Kunne så absolutt sett bedre ut… eller kunne jeg vel egentlig det?! Jeg kunne i alle fall ha sett MYE VERRE ut! Det er jammenmeg sikkert!;-)

Wedding & Fuglekunnskaper

Since last time we talked, many things have happened. I haven’t had time to update my blog, and I’m just SO SORRY for that. But just watch out; here I come!!
Many things, no connection; that’s how I like it!;-) (If you say I'm confused when it comes to languages I would say; NO! :-P Sorry guys! :-)

- Saturday 10.11.07 Maureen at the office got married with a man called Arnold. And of course, we were invited as a part of the staff. We were very exited about this since it’s our second wedding here in Uganda and of course because we also knew the bride this time. :-) Maggie and I then went to town Tuesday, no dress to find. Thursday, nope, still no dress even though we got good help from two good colleges. Friday we tried again by ourselves and this day I found myself a dress, shoes and a necklace. At last, on Saturday we went to town and now Maggie found a dress! What a stress! We thought we were early when we started our “mission” on Tuesday, but no, it was just so difficult! I think we both looked smashing in that wedding with each our different, unmatching dresses.
The reception was supposed to start at 4PM; we arrived at 4.30PM… We were a bit stressed (at least I was!), but no. The newly wedded didn’t arrived before maybe one hour after us again! So yes, as we say it in Norway; “African time!” The whole reception was in Luganda, so we didn’t understand a thing. Only sometimes when they talked about us…”muzungu”… It was a very nice decorated white and pink wedding, and they just looked so beautiful!


- Dyrelivet er noe jeg synes er innmari spennende, og jeg har oppdaget at spesielt fuglelivet her i Ugnanda er utrolig rikt. Jeg som til og med har jegerprøven kan jo (evt PRØVER å analysere og artsbestemme disse fuglene) noe som ikke er så veldig lett siden de norske artene mest sannsynligvis ikke står så sterkt i det ugandiske fugleregisteret. Noe av det som har facinert meg kanskje mest er bestanden av ørner her i Kampala. (evt hauker. Er litt usikker…) De er mange og ikke så veldig sjenerte at det gjør noe, flyr ivrig til en søppelhaug langs veien og begynner å grave. Så en dag ca.20 av dem flygende over hodet mitt, var kanskje bare litt bekymra. Jeg skulle bare spørre for sikkerhetens skyld ei dame jeg kjenner (vil ikke nevne navn) om det faktisk var slik at det var så mange ørner / hauker her i Kampala. Da jeg spurte ho om disse små, raske og mørke rovfuglene fikk jeg dette svaret:
Først; ho ser teit på meg, smiler forsiktig og ler:
- ”Nei, det er nok storken du mener! Den store stygge fuglen vi har så menge av.”
- ”Eeee… Ja, det er nok den ja… hehehe…”, sa jeg for å ikke drite ho utJa! Det var nok storken jeg mente! Trodde kanskje ikke det gikk an å bli mer ”lost” enn jeg var, men tro meg; det gikk FINT an!

"Leadership Summit" i Gerenge

Vi var på ”Leadership Summit” 2-4. november på leirstedet til Focus nær Entebbe, kalt Gerenge. Det er et nydelig sted utpå landsbygda rett ved Viktoriasjøen. Det var bare så deilig å komme seg litt bort fra den travle byen med millioner av mennesker og trafikk, til et sted med frisk luft og lite folk.
På dette ”Leadership Summit’n” gikk vi gjennom et tett program med både lovsang, bibelgrupper, foredrag, ”workshpos” og mentorgrupper.
Slik så dagene våre ut:

- Kl.05.30 – WAKE AND WASH UP og lovsang
- Kl.07.15 – Frokost (Denne besto av en stor kopp te, et hardkokt egg og en bolle evt. En smultring)
- Kl.08.00 – Lovsang med tilhørende klapping, gledeshyl og dansing
- Kl.08.30 – Smågrupper med bibelstudier
- Kl.09.30 – Foredrag/undrevisning
- Kl.10.50 – BREAK TEA
- Kl.11.30 – Foredrag/Undrevisning
- Kl.13.00 – LUNCH
- Kl.14.00 – Siesta
- Kl.14.30 – Workshops
- Kl. 15.50 – EVENING TEA
- Kl. 17.30 – Lek
- Kl. 18.45 – SUPPER
- Kl. 20.00 – Foredrag/Undrevisning
- Kl. 21.30 – Mentorgrupper og gruppebønn
- Kl. 00.00 – LIGHTS OUT

Jepp, et temmelig stramt og presist opplegg, var innmari sliten etter denne helga, men kunne se tilbake på mye moro og spennende talere.
(Høydare: jeg har vaska håret mitt i Viktoriasjøen!! :-D)