The Debut

Wah - Wah - Wah... There really are no updates as far as the adoption process goes right now. The only thing I can tell you is that our case worker has gone to the Magistrate of Mpigi to discuss Gideon's Care Order again, today. We should hear from him soon. Also, neither court date has been assigned because the courts were at a 'conference' all last week. So, that's that.

In other news, we've had quite the time getting to know Gideon and having him run our lives. He runs and plays and giggles and bosses the other kids around. He's also not quite so protective of his food and is learning more English words everyday. He's quite a demand on us as its often difficult to figure out what he is saying. He's had a decent amount of diarrhea lately and he's also developed some kind of bump on his back. We're thinking it looks like a boil. When the doctor examined it a week ago, it was too small to really tell what it was, so we'll be taking him back in either tomorrow or Thursday. Despite these things, he acts fairly normal. The diarrhea doesn't seem to bother him and the bump only bothers him if it gets touched. 

This last weekend, our host family decided it would be fun to take us to their home village. We left on Saturday morning around 6:30. The drive took most of the morning and into the early afternoon. The kids mostly slept and weren't too annoying. The village consisted of several house-type structures; some small and some around the size of a house in America. There was no power while we were there [although I guess they have it most of the time]. Other than that, there are lots of trees, fields, hills, and livestock. One of the children took Gideon and I to the top of the tallest mountain hill around. It was an awesome view of several other small villages, other rolling hills, and fields. For a brief moment, I thought, "This must be where Lord of the Rings was filmed."

On Saturday evening, we attended an Africa wedding. It was an outdoor wedding and at first, everyone sat in plastic chairs in sort of a rectangular shape. Some man [father of the bride?] spoke for a long time, often cracking jokes [which I only know because other people laughed]. Then, these dancers would come and dance to the same song over and over. I guess they were the 'entertainment'. After awhile, many groups of women were paraded through. This is a tradition in Uganda. The groom is supposed to guess which one is his bride. Obviously, he knows which one it is, but the father of the bride gets to pick on him the entire time this is happening. After awhile, we decided to get up and eat. When we came back, the same thing was going on. Luckily, Gideon didn't feel like sitting still any longer, so we left to go play. All in all, it was sort of strange because there was no real ceremony that I could tell. I suppose it could have happened after we left. The ride to and from the wedding was around an hour and fifteen minutes. We rode in an 8 passenger van ... with 13 people.. including several children... on bumpy dirt roads. Needless to say, we were pretty tired.

The drive back to Kampala took a long time. It seemed like we were stopping every 20 minutes to buy local fruit and meat from the village people [its less expensive in the villages]. By the time we dropped everyone off and arrive back home, we'd been in the car for 8 hours. Between the whiny children and the smell of raw meat, we were both pretty irritable and Kristen was sick to her stomach.

SO, after all this, we decided that we needed to take some time away from our host family. Yesterday, we checked into a hotel, which is more like an apartment. We've got AC, TV, wireless internet, a shower with actual water pressure, screens on the windows [keeps bugs out], and an unheated outdoor pool. We've also got a balcony with a fourth floor view and a kitchen with all the appliances. Its nice to unwind a little from everything that's going on and just take some time for ourselves. 

Alright, because we have no actual updating for you, we decided we would make this Gideon's debut. He calls us mommy and daddy and I'll be a tornado if we have to give him up at this point. So, without further ado, here is the little guy :)

p.s: There are two videos right above. If you can't see them or can't play them, try on a computer. We can't seem to play them on our Ipods.

Thanks,

Derek, Kristen, and Gideon!