14 guests to stay!

Our 3 bed bungalow has been host to 14 of the White Eagle Boys recently! With the rest of us here, we've had over 20 people round the dinner table... I'll start from the beginning. I've been back in Uganda 2 weeks now, after our emergency visit to the UK to see Duncan's mum. The night before I was due to fly back another emergency meant I took off to Leeds, instead of Entebbe, to spend the best part of a month with family - Duncan had to return to Uganda on his own and attend to the funeral arrangements for Jjaja Rose. I have to be honest, it's been a really really tough time recently, it feels like we've been through the mill.

But, on the first Sunday I was back, Church was lovely, it was so good to be there. Duncan and I had had a short break in Kampala, and we'd decided this school holiday to spend a lot of time with the kids. So from Wednesday to Saturday morning, 14 of the older boys came to stay with us in our home! Each day 2 stayed and work in Bwala our home and 12 went to work on Kibaya Farm. We have cooked lots of food as they have worked really hard - Tim went with them and took photos which you can see. Also he took some good video footage to make a promotional DVD for this summer - do pray for him in this as it's a lot of work!

Then in the evenings we had a topic, teaching and discussions. The first night was 'integrity' - it was great. The second was 'sex and single life' - I put it together and opened the session but then left it to the men to talk men to men! Then the third night they all went to John's home to watch some football match, so they didn’t go to bed till about 1am - but they were up again at 6:30am. The last night's topic was 'money - good or bad' and finishing with watching the Passion of Christ. And on Saturday morning we had a time of sharing what they got out of the sessions as well as looking at employment and work. They all really worked hard, we are so enjoying this holiday time with them!

You can see how hard the boys work. Here's what it looked like before:



And here it is after! All ready for planting crops and delicious food:



You can read Tim's take on the events on his blog

Thank you to all our supporters, and God bless
Mary

The Reverend Ragtoe & DJ Duncan

Check out Tim's latest video - a tribute to the White Eagle's spectacular performance in this year's football tournament. As an added treat, he's somehow managed to get Pastor Duncan bustin' out some beats in a rasta-wig, whilst he raps "get ready for the skill of the white eagle, the kings of football, their skills are regal".

He's a special one.

Go to the River of Life YouTube Channel, sit back, and, laugh or cry, you'll love it!

Remember that newest member of the Church?

When we first started this blog we wrote about little Mercy, so-called by one of our elders because of the Mercy God had shown on her life. We found abandoned in a saucepan by the side of the road - she was so thin and scrawny and obviously undernourished back then, it was terrible - we have a photo of her but it's too distressing to post it here. Anyway, she joined the big White Eagle family here and she is getting on so well, we just had to write about her. She has everyone wrapped around her little finger, chatters away in English and Luganda and is a really bright little spark.

A total transformation compared to how she was when she came to us, praise God! Here she is with Tim, after a chapatti making session...

Fundraising for River of Life's easy!

Did you know that you can set up a fundraising sponsorship page at the click of a button? Just head over to Justgiving and follow the instructions to set-up a fundraising page, and make sure you link it to "River of Life Uganda". Your friends and family then donate through your webpage... and if you're thinking "I can't do a sponsored event - doesn't that mean running a marathon? or doing a skydive? or sitting in a bath of baked beans for 24 hrs? I'm not doing any of those!" help is at hand! Because a casual browse of the Justgiving "Inspiration for Fundraisers" blog entries shows just how creative you can be in designing a 'sponsored' event. Of course here's your Lands End to John o'Groats bike rides and London Maranathon runners, but there are also men who shave off their beards, a team called the 'Urban Ironing Collective' who will do your ironing for a £15 donation, pancake races, and much more besides. A lot of people are setting up 'In memorium' pages for when a loved one dies, or forsaking birthday gifts and asking people to donate to charity instead. We'll be encouraging everyone to do something later in the year when we hold the first ever International River of Life Gift Day Bonanza - here's hoping for loads of wacky fundraising ideas!

As well as using Justgiving, River of Life is set up with MyCharityPage, another online fundraising page, and our building appeal is listed on theBigGive
webpage - search for projects in Uganda, Eastern Africa under £25,0000. Check us out...

I'll be writing much more about fundraising ideas in the near future, so watch this space if you want to get involved...

In memorium Jjaja Rose

It is with great sadness that we write of the death of Duncan's mother, known to many as Jjaja or Maama Rose (depending on how old you were). Any of you who have visited Duncan & Mary will no doubt have either met her, visited her or eaten great piles of matooke and chicken at her house on the outskirts of Kampala. We have all been knocked sideways by her death, which was a few weeks ago now, on March 8th.

However, we were so overjoyed that Duncan and Mary were able to get back to the UK a few days before and have a great time with her before she died. Thank you all so much for all your prayers, and thank you to those who made this unplanned visit possible.

Having had some time to recover, we'll be much better at updating this blog thing. Honest :)

Watch Tim's Videos!

Armed only with a camcorder and his MacBook, Tim's been busy creating fabulous videos of the footie tournaments and life at River of Life in general. The 2006 promo video has been on YouTube for a while, but we're now just beginning to post all our videos there. So head over to our channel on YouTube to see the 2007 promo, our little donate now video and more, as and when I get the footage to post it...

The Communications Revolution is here!

So here we are at last! River of Life Uganda has made the giant leap into the online world, because we want to connect more and better with our sponsors and supporters. So please browse our new website at , find out more about the White Eagles, our Youth Work, the Mercy Missions, our Enterprise work, our work in Reconciliation and our Prayer life, particularly our fledgling Masaka Prayer Mountain for the Nations. If you want to find out more, then why not register for updates?!

This blog is specifically for the growing crowds of people who have been to, heard of, donated to, loved, prayed for, been inspired by, got teary about, dreamt of, and want to be eternally joined-at-the-hip with everyone at RIVER OF LIFE, MASAKA, UGANDA! BRAP!!! I'm writing it from the perspective of a currently UK-based Muzungu who's also a Trustee of Uganda River of Life Ministries, the UK charity set up to support River of Life Uganda. So we'll have lots of news on fundraising, visits, initiatives, developments and all things going down in Nyendo, Masaka, and Uganda. From our new website you can also read Rabu's beautifully crafted Bombastical Badboy Blog, and we've even got Duncan and Mary doing a bit of blobbing...

So make our news Your news, and get involved!