To start things off, let me show you the impromptu kick tournament that cropped up at one of the water harvester installation stops. The guys showed off their cool kick moves and I snapped away. With all that kicking and snapping going on, it was a pretty noisy place to be.
Gideon got the ball rolling. In a matter of speaking, I mean. Wait, no. Actually, he really did.
The shuffle-ball-change-kick.
The monkey-in-the-middle-takes-a-seat move.
The dive with inverted pharaoh hands. Otherwise known as the face-plant. You just know this did not have a glorious ending. Sorry Josh.
The split-and-stomp kick.
The sideways kick.
The twist and toss.
The serve. It's official.
The catch. This is official too.
The strut-while-you-snap-your-fingers kick. Gideon was one cool dude, y'all. You catchin' the Sinatra vibe he's throwin'?
Now then. Now that we have had our kicking lesson for the day, let's move on to something else. Colors! Coloring to be more specific. You should know, colors will be involved.
Just not in this photo. I mean there are colors. To color. And there was color. But I took it out. But I left the colors in. Know what I'm sayin'? The colors... it's in their hands. But not on them. Cause I'm a rebel like that. I say I'm going to give you colors and what do I do? I give you colors without colors. This is pretty deep stuff.
"Why did you take my color?"
Sweet girl, I didn't really.... You hold the ability to color things in the palm of your hand! Yeah, I'm allegorical like that.
Jennifer brought a Bible story coloring book and a box of 24 crayons. It was like the loaves and fishes. First we passed out pages from the coloring book. Then I began passing out crayons. Each child received just one, while kids just kept walking in the door wanting to take part in the fun. Starting to be concerned, I kept right on passing out crayons, hoping the crayons would multiply so every child could have one, but determined no child would receive brown, black, or white as their one crayon.
I eventually had to give out the brown crayon. I watched the little boy's reaction as I handed it to him, expecting to see disappointment on his face. Instead, his face lit up like I had just handed him the best thing ever and he enthusiastically began to color his page.
But that was the last of the crayons. And there were still kids waiting patiently to recieve a crayon! I suddenly remembered packing a few colored pencils waaaaay back when I was packing for the trip. I ran to my backpack, hoping I had put them in my backpack rather than my suitcase (which was back in Kampala), and oh happy day! There they were. So colored pencils were passed out and finally every child had something to color with!
And then something else wonderful began to happen. We noticed that the kids started to trade their crayon with a neighbor. The color swapping frenzy had begun. These kiddos were old pros at bartering for a different color crayon to complete their little Bible story works of art. It was pretty cool to watch.
Another thing. I remember each kid having his or her
own box of crayons in school... And everyone hoarded their
own box of 48 count, or even 96 count. I think I like the Ugandan version of coloring time much better. Sharing. Patience. Resourcefulness. Creativity. But most of all the Sharing.
See that girl in the apron? That's Sarah, one of the teachers at Buloba school. I just loved her. She was always smiling. Always. This coloring day was the first day I met her. She walked up to me, grabbed onto my arms, and just inches from my face, began gushing about how happy she was that we had brought coloring books and crayons for the kids. She kept saying, "How did you all know that they love this?" "Oh, you all have done this wonderful thing. It makes me happy because the kids are so happy."
I couldn't pick between the color version of this picture and the black and white version. You tell me. Which one do you like better?
The other teacher, Faith, getting mobbed as the kids all try to show her their art.
Can I remind you that this is their classroom?
The teacher's desk.
Oh, and before you leave, take a gander at that chart. Proper Lugandan prefixes and suffixes are listed.
...Yes, I am that childish.
See that blue cup? The existing crayons for the kids at the Buloba school were in there. All I know is, back when I was elementary school, pieces that small and used up would probably have been dropped on the floor, forgotten and then thrown away.
The little girl, whose hand is on the cup, quickly dropped her crayon in the cup right before I snapped the picture. Not to put her crayon away... just to make sure I got a picture of her crayon too.
She got a kick out of coloring-time. I got a kick out of the colors and the kicks. We all did.
On second thought, maybe that's not quite true. I seem to remember that there is one person that didn't get a kick.
Better luck next time Josh!
over and out,
ab
