ok i'm off...

Ok. I'm off to Uganda...

I will be working with the hope foundation.

http://www.hopefoundation.ug/

and we will be staying in and around Kamuli:) Near Jinja... and possibly some time in Kampala...

I'll let you know I'm alive as soon as I can get access to a computer.

our swedish lovleyness...

Me and Cecilie went on a walk for a few hours in the freezing freezing cold!

Ok... so this is the continuation of the last post... Our boys (the swedish ones) came into our rooms early saturday morning to wake us up! It was quite exciting but at first i was quite confused as to what was happening... It was so fun though... They even gave us lovley cookies just like the swedish tradition. It was so nice. I was surprised at how beautifull their voices were but maybe it was just that I was so so tired... I didn't even remember if they sang english or swedish to us:)

St Lucia's Day - A very swedish tradtion.

Ok... so here is some background information on St Lucia's day... so that you willl understand my next post. Happy reading...

Around Christmas time in Sweden, one of the biggest celebrations is St. Lucia's Day (or St. Lucy's Day) on December 13th. The celebration comes from stories that were told by Monks who first brought Christianity to Sweden.

St Lucia was a young Christian girl who was martyred, killed for her faith, in 304AD. The most common story told about St Lucia is that she would secretly bring food to the persecuted Christians in Rome, who lived in hiding in the catacombs under the city. She would wear candles on her head so she had both her hands free to carry things. Lucy means 'light' so this is a very appropriate name.

St. Lucia's Day is now celebrated by a girl dressing in a white dress with a red sash round her waist and a crown of candles on her head. (Normally electric candles are used for safety!) The crown is made of Lingonberry branches which are evergreen and symbolise new life in winter. Schools normally have their own St. Lucias and some town and villages also choose a girl to play St. Lucia in a procession where carols are sung.
In homes often the eldest girl plays St Lucia for her family, bringing them 'Lussekatts', St Lucia's day buns flavoured with saffron and dotted with raisins which are eaten for breakfast. This is how the family is woken up. Other girl siblings also can help!

Good Morning.

My room is quite fun in the morning. We often have trouble getting out of bed. We used to have a bit of a routine but as DTS has gone on we've thrown our routine out the window. It used to be Helena first up, then Me, then Anna, then Hanna... but now its different everyday. Hanna is even sometimes first! sometimes we all lay in bed and we look at eachother and then its a race for who can get out first... I usually loose that since i am on a bunk bed... not the top but its still a ladder in the way of just rolling out. I am quite sad to say goodbye to all my roommates. I thoroughly enjoy or mornings filled with lafter and moaning before getting up. I like our fights for the mirror and sink and the countdown to "prayer time" Its quite funny. Yesterday morning I was only half ready before be prayed... so i was sitting down in the middle of my room with my hair in a towel holding my makeup bag.

Now i will tell you a little kinda funny Heidi moment. Yesterday was a very busy day for me with lots of one on one talks. I first met with my one on one from 1-2 then from 2-245 I had a one on one with my school leader, and then from 3-4 I had a one on one with our speaker. I also had 1 hour of prayer for my Uganda team and yeah lots of other stuff througout the day. Problem was that i was not feeling so well in the evening. After our prayer time I wanted to just spend some more time journaling in the prayer room so i was there for about 1 hour but felt really sick so i decided to come up to my room and put my pjamas on.. it was only 8 oclock.. then i felt so so sick i didn't want to go anywhere or do anything so I just layed in bed. My roommate was skyping and was like, "are you goign to bed already" and i was like, I'm not sure. I think i'll jsut take a nap. So i layed down, she left quite confused by me... and I went to sleep. At 8 oclock. Then at 9 occlock i woke up still feeling sick but a bit better and i got up... and I finished getting ready for bed... talked to my roommate and my friend for a while.. and went back to bed at 1030. Who in the world has a nap at 8pm? I dont know... but it was wierd... I dont think i was thinking to clearly. I just wanted to lay down! But now i am feeling much much better and ready for a new day.

SNOW

Go God.

So this friday night we had evanglism. I have to be honest with you that i was not at all excited to put on my winter coat, gloves, toque, scarf.. etc and head out into the dark cold streets of uddevalla to share the gospel! I was tired... and I was cold... and when we got there and were praying before we were sent out it started to snow.. and it was WINDY... it was really very very cold. I was also not so excited about evanglism because its hard to start conversations becasue i dont even know if the person speaks english or not. Finally after a lot of prayer walking and praying to God to please warm up our insides and help us think positivley we decided to just go ahead and talk to someone. The first person we talked to inside Mcdonalds was not too keen on talking but it was a good warm up. After that we decided we'd venture out into the cold again and find some more people to talk to. The only problem was, that being a cold night everyone was heading indoors for the evenign and the streets were getting emptier and emptier as the night progressed. I then saw a man and I said to my 2 evanglising friends... "lets go talk to him..." so we did. We went and approached him and shared the gospel with him. NOt like the whole gospel or anything but we got to talk about who Jesus is to us and what he means in our lives. It was really cool. The man had some crazy new age religeon and was homeless but he was so nice and it was so cool to be able to pray for him. We also met another one of our teams on the street and told them to go and try to talk to the guy in Mcdonalds that we did not have much sucess with him. We thoughd it would be cool if two teams tried to talk to him. AFter the night when we were debriefing my friend was like... thanks for leading us to that guy... it was so cool... he was so open to talk to us and she started to talk to me about their conversation and i was like... Lina... it is definitally not the same guy. It was so cool because God totally used our time in Mcdonalds to help them talk to this christian man who just really needed someone to talk to and feel loved by and know that the church is a body and we are there for one another when life sucks.

My second smaller God story is this. If you know me at home and my messy room... you can imagine what my bunk and desk look like here. absolute chaos. So today Malaria medication day.. and we were supposed to take our pills with lunch... however I could not find my pills.. and we were rushed for time... i was freaking out... so then i sat on the bunk and was like "God please open my eyes and show me where i left my pills..." then i was like... man i need to look in my suitcase again... and i opened my suitcase... and then i remembered that they were tucked safley away in the front pocket of small bag inside my big suitcase! Go God... we all took our medication and no side effects so far. Yeah!

Its the little things that count.

This week has been extra good for a few little reasons...
I think the main reason would have to do with food. On weekends we get packed lunches because we only have a hot meal for dinner becasue there is no afternoon work duty to make lunch. I am getting very very sick of the bread here (its homemade and its really heavy... kinda like a cakeish bread) and I eat it with Jam and cheese which is also getting pretty old. So anyways on saturday a family on base had open house from 10-1... so at 12 i went there for some coffee and cookies... and so i was full and I just ate an apple for lunch! (packed lunch went in the garbage... ) then on sunday I had lunch with my 1 on 1 and small group which was so good! Then monday night for dinner I also did not have to eat in the dining hall! My outreach leaders cooked us a special dinner as a surprise. It is the first time since holland that I got to eat a nice big piece of chicken that I could actually tell was chicken. The rest of dinner was also delicious! Then tuesday I ate in the dining hall and it was hotdogs... which are disgusting in my opinion so I just ate the usual breakfast food for dinner... yummy yummy. Today is wednesday and I am eating with another family on base. It is an old couple who invite all the DTS students over for dinner in small groups one time during the course of their DTS and my turn is this week. I hear we eat waffles which is fabulous in my opinion. Tomorrow night is family night on base and all staff host students and cook for us! I will be eating with the Darby's who have two small boys and the mom is swedish and the Dad is from California. they are such a nice family and their home is so cute and so homey which is something you really miss living in dorms.

so yes! It is things like visiting a home, eating yummy food and having fabulous fellowship that really make you smile...

oh and i also talked to my parents for an hour this week... and my sister sara for over and hour... and Justin for an hour! so lots of lovley chats to make my week splendid too...

and a package from my church for Christmas! What an amazing surprise! I was so so happy.

FUN NIGHT...

This week we had a fun night. On saturday night there was a base wide talent show... and I participated. Because I am going to Uganda for outreach I have been going to some fun African DAnce lessons on Sunday nights and the girl who leads it was persistent that we who attended her lessons also perform with her in the talent show. The only problem in this arrangement is that us backup dancers are quite obviously white and cannot move or shake like a black person. It is so unnatural to me. After our performance i was quite releaved to rejoin the audience and then after a few more performances the MC said "Miriam and her crew are up for another piece... " and i was like... "um... we are?" so i had to go to the front to participate in a dance that i have only practiced a few times... but was not at all prepared to do in front of the whole base. It was a little embarassng but not too too bad...

then after the talent show was finished we moved to the Cafe for some games and of course a dance party! I was a little sad at first becuaes i was in the middle of Settlers of Catan when the dance party broke out... and we all know how much i love to dance! AFter my game was finished i jumped onto the dance floor and had a fabulous time with all my wonderfull friends here. Then it was time for some chatting on the sofas:) It was such a fun night, but i went to bed too late! It was justified though because we only have two weekends left so we need to really fill them up!

all in all it was a lovley night of fun...

Swedish culture... lets fit in.

I also forgot to share about my lovley shower experience. Because we were 150 people for a week in a church with one shower we were given time to shower once every other day at a sports center about 15 minute walk away. We knew that the showers were communal so you were welcome to bring your bathing suits... athough this is not so normal in this culture. they think it is ridiculous to wear your bathing suit to shower. when i told them i wore my swimsuit when showering communaly they asked how i get cleaned.. haha... culture difference right there. I would rather be a little dirtier than shower naked communally... but since i'm here to be put outside my comfort zone i was up for anything. So we were 4 of us in one shower room... and I decided putting on my swim suit was a hassel so i aksed the girls if its ok if we all shower naked and they were like... yeah of course... we would prefer that... but they were gonnna wear their swimsuits for my sake... so anyways i had my first naked communal shower experience. It was quite ok becaue they were all my roommates and we are quite the happy family. My next shower was much more akward. I was with 2 incredibly beautifull swedish girls so i was a little more hesitant to undress. Then people kept coming and there were like 6 of us for 3 shower heads so people just waited for an empty shower... Naked... and just chatted. One of them was my staff One on One... .so it was quite weird just chatting and having a conversation Naked while i showered and she waited for an open shower! Crazyness... i can not believe that i did it! Go Heidi go... That was only one week of "outreach" so I am sure you can expect much much crazier stories during my 9 week outreach to Uganda. I hope God continues his sense of Humor and excitement. Man oh man... I still can't believe I showered Naked communaly. Sorry if this is a bit of a weird post to read.. but i thought i'd share it.

I forgot to add..

I forgot to mention that i recieved the most lovley package from my grandparents today! Thank you Oma and Opa! My chocolate letter made me think of my Christmas stocking... and everythign else was also so thoughtfull and filled with love. It made me day. I also recieved 2 letters today so it was quite the love filled day.. and i talked to 2 friends from home! Wow I really did have the most amazing day ever!

Back in Business.

England.
What a week...

It started out at 2am on Sunday morning with a drive to Torp, a shopping complex 20 minutes from the base. We waited there for the bus that would take us to Oslo. On arriving at a gas statino in Oslo at 430 am we had to wait till 6am to take the taxi because it is cheaper then. So at 6am we took the taxi only 10 minutes to the airport. Then we waited there from 615-1250. what a fun time! We slept... played cards... ate super super expensive pizza...talked...learned Norwegien... laughed... and slept a little more. Then we took a two hour flight to Newcastle airport... then a 20 mintute metro ride... 15 minute walk...and FINALLY ARRIVED at the church at 430 pm on Sunday! what day.

The week was filled! Filled with singing, praying, listening, evangelizing, eating, chatting, reflecting and sharing. We would have lectures in teh mornign and then the afternoons we had evangelism in the City of Newcastle. Then in the evenings we also had evanglism on some nights... or we had some games on one evening. I was so encouraged by how "easy" it is to evangelize. It is much less scary then I imagined and I am so eager to continue evanglizing... I want to make it a regular part of my life.

Now for the funny story...

so on the way to england i was sitting next to my good friend Cecilie and I noticed lice in her hair. I didn't really freak out i jsut told her... i think you have lice. Then during worship the next day i saw more and i was certain it was lice... so I told our leaders. That night we checked all our classes hair for lice and luckliy she was the only one. So in the mornings we would pick the lice eggs out of her hair and one mornign we did the special shampoo stuff to kill the lice. I even found live lice in her hair! SCARY!

so on thursday mornign we woke up early again to check her hair and becuase they did not want the other 100 people at the church to freak out about lice we had to always check her hair in a discreet place... so we chose the handicapped washroom around the corner in the back of the church. seemed like a smart enough plan becuaes no one really used that bathroom... so we checked her hair for about 45 mintues and it was 830 and we decided we should go join the others for breakfast... but were confronted with a slight issue. The bathroom door did not want to open. Uh oh. So i told Cecilie to try. It still didn't open. Being DTS students we decided to ask God to let us out... so we prayed over the door... but apprently God thought it was qutie funny to watch us stuck in a bathroom so he wanted to leave us there a little longer. WE tried alittle more with some pushing shoving... and lots of handle turning but no luck. then we started to yell... I was like "HELP... someone help us... we are stuck in the handicapped washroom." It seemed like a useless effort because everyone was at breakfast and would not be using the toilet... and the dining hall is so loud we didn't think they could hear us... After a little less than 15 mintues i noticed the door handle turning so i was like... Hello? is someone there, and i heard a guy wondering what we were donig yelling in the bathroom... I proceeded to explain our situation and he laughed and said he would go find the director people... so he did. 2 guys came and we were excited because two guys working on a "simple" problem should not take to long but we overestimated there Heroism. They tried for about 40 minutes with no prevail. We were still stuck. They told us to hold tight and they would phone the Handyman... so they did and 10 minutes later he arrived. We were quite excited because by this time we had been locked in the bathroom for just under 1 hour... After 15 minutes he got us out... I was so excited to be free... but we missed breakfast... the tables and everythign were already cleaned up and everyone was at worship! woops. But we still got breakfast and came to worship late. It was quite the morning! I am sure God was laughing even harder than we were... what silly girls getting stuck with two people in one bathroom.. waht must people think... haha!

so all in all it was quite a great week! I wore almost the same thing for 3 days because after we found out cecilie had live lice we had to bag all her clothes and sleeping bag... so that meant she used half of my clothes... and i gave her my warm stuff to sleep in because she had no sleeping bag... and it was cold... and so we both wore the same thing... ALOT... good thing we don't know the people there so well... and good thing we wont see them again soon.. haha...

God is good.