Its here! Im in Uganda! I’ve been waiting for this month! We left Kenya last Friday and headed to Busia Kenya to meet up with the rest of the squad. We were able to stay in a big house where all 48 of us basically just camped out anywhere we could find space. And to the credit of all of our friends in Kenya our last night there was made extra special by each of us receiving our own homemade cake. And if saying goodbye wasn’t hard enough of course I cried when I read my cake had the words “Elaina you are the happiest girl in the world” written on it, haha of course that’s not true all the time but I was glad they thought that ;). Seeing the whole squad was something we were all looking forward to, especially to hear from the other squad members what their months were like. It was a much needed time to come together and begin to process month one, but it still felt like a whirl wind to go from being in Kenya to just not. Busia was fun. And by fun I mean bed bugs, mosquito bites and sweating. But seriously I was laughing thinking about how if I got bed bug bites any other time I would have been freaking out, but for some reason on the race it almost seemed normal.
Sunday morning at 7 (which of course turned into 10:30…welcome to Africa) the entire squad left Busia for Uganda. We were headed to Jinja for two days of hanging out and resting before we started ministry in Uganda. In Jinja we not only got to stay at this amazing camp site right on the Nile equipped with western toilets, hot showers, and a bar and restaurant, but we also had the great opportunity to raft the Nile and go bungee jumping. Now comes the fun part. I wasn’t sure how I would blog this but lets just start by being honest…I was having nightmares about rafting the Nile. I am the queen of irrational fears so of course I was just certain that I would be drowning at some point stuck underneath my raft. I’ve been rafting before but the Nile has massive 5 class rapid, and about 2 tons of water flowing in it at all times so the guides thrive on flipping the rafts into the rapids. Needless to say I was going into my wild rafting adventure with the thought that I would make sure I was on a mild route down the river. Things were looking good and I got myself on a boat with 6 other girls from my squad…we had all decided to go the mild route. Whew that was a relief for me.
And how this story takes a fast turn for the worst. It is the 7 of us and our guide just rafting along as he is explaining to us our first raft, class 4 not the worst but still we might flip. As he is explaining to us what to do we hear “and make sure you paddle hard because the rapid to the right is un-raft able and is not safe to do”. But were in a HUGE boat and there is only 7 of us girls so it happens we paddle hard, harder and now really really hard. Now were going backwards but not fast enough I guess because now whistles are being blown, ropes are being thrown and our guide is trying to grab on to grass to pull us up. None of this works and we hear “GET DOWN.” It is now all craziness after this ending with a waterfall and then a miracle of all miracles happens and we pop back up. Some how surviving the waterfall without flipping??!! Now I wish I could have taken a picture of everyone’s faces when they watched us fall down this waterfall and then pop back up. Safe to say jaws were dropped but not any further down then ours were. Asgdgdhjsagdhjgsdhj omg it was crazy. But what I can tell you is it quickly changed our boat from the mild team to the extreme team. We were now the bravest people ever. The rest of the afternoon consisted of going down the bigger rapids and laughing about our experience. But we shouldn’t of gotten too cocky too fast because this all quickly ended with us flipping in at “the bad spot” (that was the name of the rapid). In the bad spot you basically drown in a massive class 5 rapid until it spits you out and a kayaker comes to rescue you. Yep there is was my biggest fear, being thrown into a rapid. After all this getting back in the boat with the entire middle missing and most of the paddles (the rapid basically punched out the seats in the middle of the raft) was like a battle scene for us. We were exhausted out of breath and terrified. We have that last rapid on video, and its pretty hilarious…I’m not sure if ill ever raft again though.
If all of this excitement wasn’t enough I had already signed up and paid to bungee jump. Standing on the bungee platform not only remembering what just happened rafting but now thinking about how I actually hate heights and how scared I am I had a thought that my body might shut down from all the adrenaline I was exhausting from it today. Didn’t happen though, thank God. I jumped with my friend Olivia which might have been the only reason I actually jumped, but it was honestly awesome. Glad I did it. Ahhh what a day. What a day that I was glad didn’t last forever J. Honestly though I was grateful for the fellowship and time of rest we had there, and even if I felt like I almost died it was all sooo good.
Now its just me and my team again in Kampala. Just waiting on what God has for us here. I am excited to share this month with you all.
Much Love, from a much alive and not drowning Elaina J.
looks like Fun right??! 
more waterfall fun.
this is us. our boat went completely underwater. notice the little paddle sticking up.
taken right after we poped back up after going completely under.
