A Big Day – February 16th Update – An Epic Adoption Story
So, here is where we stand today. We have an Embassy appointment at 2:00 pm, which would be 6:00am Eastern. Which means we’ll likely be done by the time you read this. I also hope to get the signed ruling from the judge today.
What has transpired over the last two days is a testimony to how things typically work in Uganda. I spent two whole days either in my lawyer’s office or at the Embassy. On Moday, the Thompsons had their Embassy interview. Their judge was rather quick in getting them the signed ruling, while ours has been less than accommodating.
I’ll need to wait and reveal details of the Embassy interview for the Thompsons, but I can say that it resulted in us having to arrange for every family member to return to Kampala in order to sign another irrevocable release yesterday. Most travelled through the night to arrive using public transportation. The experience of public transportation is beyond my ability to describe, but my sole experience ranks as one of the most uncomfortable four hours of my life, and many of the family came from further than I did. I also waited until 4:30 pm for our ruling to be released only to have our lawyer return being told to “come back tomorrow.”
I’ll tell more of that story later, but for now I will leave in 15 minutes to go back to my lawyer’s office to await the release of the signed ruling. I then will attempt to get that ruling to the Embassy before 10am. If I fail to do so it could jeopardize our receiving visas by tomorrow. We’ll then return to the Embassy for our 2:00pm interview where we hope to hear that our visas will be ready on Thursday. We have initially booked a return flight, but I won’t reveal details until I have visas in hand.
February 13th Update – An Epic Adoption Story
On Friday I went to see a dear friend, Jimmy. Jimmy was arrested last February on charges of murder just prior to an Adopt Uganda team’s departure. It seems that he was arrested on the sole fact that he was in possession of a brown jacket. It is not clear if the police were trying to obtain some bribe money from the Mzungus, or if was just a simple mistake.
In any case he has now been in prison for a crime he did not commit for a year. He is in the Torroro Prison Farm. I was happy that his wife was able to join us for the trip. She had not been able to visit since December 6th.
While Jimmy was happy to see us it was obvious that he was also somewhat discouraged. It now seems that another person has been arrested for the same crime, but Jimmy is still in prison. A hearing is scheduled for March in Mbale, and it is now our hope that bail is set and met so he can enjoy freedom again.
February 12th Update – An Epic Adoption Story
Well, we’ve spent Tuesday through today in Busia. Some has change, but much has remained the same. The gas station in front of The Cool Palace was just having its foundation dug when I was here in 2007, and now it is doing business. The church has begun a school and has 320 students enrolled. Most of them cannot afford school fees. I got tours of a fish farm, the new orphanage building, the tree, pineapple, and coffee farms, and of course the school.
On Thursday I went with Lucas, Francis, and Kelvin to a village deep into the Bugiri District in the village of Bukatu to do some fundraising. It was a long trip over some pretty difficult terrain (about five hours round trip). We had a worship service first and then went into a fundraising effort where goods like eggs, casaba, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, detergent, soap and maize were brought as offerings. These offerings were then auctioned off to the highest bidder. A Ugandan auction requires the whole congregation to participate. Instead of hearing the auctioneer call, “Going once, going twice…” he repeats the bid in concert with the congregation and on the third repeat if someone calls out a higher bid then it begins all over again. There was a lot of showmanship and storytelling that went into each item in order to coax people into bidding.
As the auctioned carried on I went outside to be with the children eventually coaxing them to sing some songs thanks to Samuel’s leadership. He’s the one with the soda on the far right. He’ll be hard to spot, but the Mzungu should be easy. I tried to win some friends by sharing a Cliff bar, and belive it or not I was able to split it in about fifty parts. Lunch was Mzungu rice (the most expensive because it is stone free), chicken, broth, bread and a coke. I found myself even more appreciative of Lucas’ work here.
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