Enjoying a day of music, mangoes, and memories
This post is about one of my favorite days, and favorite memories, out of all my trips to Uganda. I wrote it after my second trip, and the column was originally published in the Chanhassen Villager on 9/27/12. Although it was close to midnight when we got home the night before, we were on the road again at 6:30 in the morning, traveling from Kampala to Iganga for my 9:00 program. I would be speaking to teachers at Buckley High School, which [...]
In need of a miracle, and of people who care
This column was first published in the Chanhassen Villager on 11/17/11, shortly after I returned from my first trip to Uganda. The young women I wrote about have become the focus of most of our work in Uganda; our goal is to help them build a better life for themselves and their children. You'll hear more about them after I return from this trip. They are beautiful young women. Girls, actually, with many of them between the ages of 18 and 25, [...]
Almost ready for Uganda
As you read this week's blog post (unless you had set it aside for later), I am on my way to Uganda. While I'm gone, I'll be posting some of my favorite columns about previous trips to Uganda. I wrote the following column as I was preparing for my first trip there in 2011. The column was first published in the Chanhassen Villager on 9/29/11. “If anybody offers you sambusa, take it.” That’s one piece of advice that was given to me [...]
Signing off for a bit
This will be my last “live” blog post for a while. Next week at this time I’ll be on a plane, somewhere between Amsterdam and Entebbe, preparing for almost a month in Uganda. We work pretty much sunup to sundown when in Uganda, and email and internet service can be spotty at best, so I know better than to even try to post anything while I’m gone. Instead, if I have my act together and get everything done that I [...]
It’s planting time in Georgia
I know it isn’t like this yet in all parts of the country, but here in Georgia everything’s turning lush and green. The weather isn’t as warm as it should be by now, but it’s been warm enough for me to get outside, start cleaning out the herb garden, and filling planters with potting soil and baby plants that will decorate the deck and – hopefully – give me a bounty of produce later in the season. I don’t have [...]
A road trip brings a new train of thought
106. That’s the number of railway cars there were in the freight train we got stopped by during a recent two-day drive to Chicago. We arrived too early to check into the hotel where we were spending the first night, so we drove around for a bit. It was a small town, much like the one I grew up in, and it took us only a few minutes driving down Main Street to get to the edge of town. We [...]