Move-in day (January 20, 2010)

I read in my Bible study today about Jacob and Joseph both ending their lives, and it struck me that I was about to start a whole new one.

A whole crew showed up to help today. Evan (a journeyman), Stan (our team leader), and Jack (his son), put together the beds. This was quite an ordeal

(bed pictures coming when I have time to spend uploading)

Stan, Evan, Jack, and Sandra (a journeyman) hung mosquito nets in all three rooms.

Jack organized my pantry.

Pam (team leader’s wife), Sandra, and Alissa (a journeyman) unpacked suitcases and boxes.

Alissa made lists of things that needed to be bought or done.

Sandra made up the beds after they were put together, and she kept Caleb entertained.

Kylie and Karis each set up their rooms.

Speaking of Karis and Kylie, they are not going to be sharing a room for the first time since Karis was born. Karis and Caleb are going to try living together for awhile, so we’ll see how this works.

Doug and I unpacked bag after bag, looking for places to put things, but most of it ended up on our bed. We have many purchases to make. These houses aren’t built with a lot of storage space, but you can buy shelves in town, and I intend to.

At 12:30, we took a break, and had lunch at Pam’s house, then we had team prayer at Evan’s house at 1:30.

Our team prays together every day at 1:30 at someone’s house. It’s quite an amazing thing to be able to get together so often. We all live within a few “streets” of each other. I say “streets” because they really aren’t. They are one-lane, made of dirt, and never level in one place very long.

After team prayer, Alissa took me to town to show me the three grocery stores they shop at. We started at the only locally owned one. After we found all we could on our list, we went to the Indian supermarket, and then when we had exhausted that one, we walked down to the last one.

They are all three on main street, very near each other.

The first, locally-owned one only has three aisles. I liked it because it wasn’t overwhelming. It wasn’t a matter of “what do I choose,” like at Wal-mart, it was a matter of “what is here than I can use.” Thankfully, Alissa de-coded everything for me, showed me the deals, and allowed me to watch her bargain at one of the doukas selling buckets and basins I needed.

It costs a lot of money, even in Arua, to set-up house.

After our excursion, where I bought a nice shelf for around $10 (thanks for bargaining, Alissa), she and I went to Bible study.

Every Wednesday, a group of ladies gets together for Bible study. At 3:30, the children are led in a study by one of the ladies, and then at 4:30, the ladies start theirs. I’ll elaborate later.

After Bible study, Alissa took me home to unpack groceries, and she helped Doug figure out the internet thing. Now we just need to go to town and buy “time.”

Our first meal was thrown together, but it was SO NICE to have a home cooked meal with just the five of us. Potatoes, blackened cabbage, cucumbers in a vinegar mixture, and sliced tomatoes. There were no leftovers. We worked hard today!