luke & amy

From the Desk of Mrs. Templer

2006-07-05T06:58:00.000-07:00

We're married!
Hooray!

Well, we're leaving for our honeymoon today, but at the moment we're sitting in the student center using the internet. Why, you ask? Why are we hanging around our very non-sexy university and ol' Siloam Springs when we could be on our way to sunny South Carolina? Because of the federal government.

See, I need to fill out my FAFSA (Free Application for Federal Student Aid). We had to wait until we were married to complete them, and now that my last name has changed, I have to get a new pin number to access the site. Yesterday being a holiday and all, it's taking a little longer than anticipated to get said new pin, so...alas, perhaps I will never get a Pell Grant.

So, if I'm waiting on my pin number, and it's not here yet, why am I still sitting around Siloam Springs? At the moment, Luke is copying driving directions so we have at least some idea of where we're going today. Also, we must return quite a large pile of dirty tuxedos to the shop, which wasn't open until one minute ago. Oh, and we rented Shrek the other night and forgot to bring it back early.

On an entirely different note, we went shopping yesterday. We had to return a few things that we got multiples of, but mostly we used our gift cards to buy everything we need to survive. It was so exciting! We got a microwave and a vacuum, a toaster oven, a big kitchen trash can, even an ironing board that barely fit into Luke's tiny Paseo. Thank you all so much for your gifts.

Speaking of trash cans, I've decided that it's entirely too difficult to change one's name when one's permanent address has suddenly shifted states. Do I tell Texas? Do I tell Arkansas? Do I tell the passport commision? (The answer to this one is a definitive No for now because they make you pay for a new passport!!) Also, internet driving directions are very silly.

Well, I think I've rambled on long enough, and it seems Luke has finally given up the search for the perfect route. Thanks for reading.
-Amy

The Countdown Begins

2006-06-21T08:08:00.000-07:00

Well, there are only ten days left until the big day, and Luke and I finally got jobs. We're serving food in the cafeteria at school, which is nice because we've worked there for five years (put together) so we know our way around. We've only worked for a week, but tomorrow is our last day because we still have so much wedding planning to do. Still, it's nice to make a few hundred dollars so we'll be able to buy food on our honeymoon ;) !
At the moment, Luke and I are on a break between breakfast and lunch shifts. He's sitting next to me picking out music for the reception and making fun of Nat King Cole's Spanish and French accents (so maybe linguistic snobbery is our one sin...). We're going this afternoon to pick up my wedding dress from the tailor (an amazing little Hispanic woman whose shop, Lethal Lure, is crammed with plastic bags, mate-less shoes, and lingerie) so that Dani and I can take bridal portraits together this weekend. I'm really excited--we're going to take them someplace unusual, like a junkyard or a laundromat.
Alright, I'm going to be productive now. Thanks for reading.

Bonjour!

2006-06-01T14:21:00.000-07:00

Hello!
Welcome to our webpage. You're probably here because you've received an invitation to our wedding, so let me show you around.
Over there ---> are links to our wedding webpage (detailing the ceremony and reception sites, the menu, the attire, and hotel arrangements) and the RSVP page, as well as information on the programs in which we participated last semester. You can also find links that will help you email us directly and find our registries online.
Below this post are various entries from the past four months, including stories from Costa Rica and Uganda. This is where we put breaking wedding news, too.
So, as the Whether Man would say, welcome, welcome, welcome, welcome, welcome.
We're glad you're here.
Amy and Luke

Holiday Inn Update

2006-05-28T18:25:00.000-07:00

Amy and I went to the Holiday Inn Express this week, and the deadline has been moved from 30 May to 7 June. Also, to make it easier for you all to make your reservations, we have confirmation numbers for each room so that there won't be confusion about whether you are with our group or not. They are:

(# rooms)
1 Single (1 King) Smoking- 66551517
3 Double (2 Queen) Smoking- 66551966
5 Double Non-Smoking- 66554752
2 Single Non-Smoking- 66551786
1 Single Smoking- 62699327
3 Double Smoking- 62700029
4 Double Non-Smoking- 62700659

Please, please make your reservations here. We must fill these 19 rooms by 7 June in order to get the discounted room price.

Update

2006-05-14T17:54:00.000-07:00

Readers,
We have been working on our Wedding Info page to allow access to our registries, but it seems now to be impossible (or, at the least, impractical).
To solve this problem, we have added direct links to our registries on this page, to the right.
Let us know if there is any other info you would like us to make available.
Luke

Also, we appreciate any hand-me-down furniture that needs a good home.
Amy

Hotels

2006-04-19T06:36:00.000-07:00

Hooray for mothers! Specifically my mother, who reserved rooms for us at hotels in Siloam Springs. Here's what she has to say:

"I have reserved a block of 30 rooms at the Holiday Inn Express, for June30 and July 1, check-out July 2, in S.S. AR. $65.00/night for various kinds of rooms. The reservations must be made before May 30th.
I have also reserved 20 rooms at the Best Western in S.S. AR for$65.00/night, the reservations must be made before June 16th. Mention the names Templer/vanEttinger

Holiday Inn - 479 524-8080
Best Western - 918 524-8898"

So there you go folks, hotel rooms at your disposal.
Thanks, Mom. You're the best.

The End of the Road

2006-04-15T05:34:00.001-07:00

I have four days left on this campus.
That's so exciting, and so weird. I'm nervous about going home.
I went camping again this weekend. My friends Shayna and Michael and I went to the Sesse Islands, in Lake Victoria.
We took a three hour ferry ride to get there from the Ugandan shore, so we were pretty far out in the Lake (the biggest in Africa). When we went swimming, I felt like I was at the very center of the earth--right on the equator, at the heart of a continent, becoming one with the universe.
And I got sunburnt, for the first time since we went rafting.

Let me get a little business out of the way--wedding business, that is. A couple people have emailed me, asking about hotels, and I'm a terrible person and haven't done much about that yet. I'm working on it, but I have a lot to get done before we leave for Rwanda, so that might have to wait until we get back in May. Sorry, guys. But you should know that there are hotels in Siloam Springs, which is the wedding location, including a Holiday Inn and some other cheaper, local options. If you want to go swanky, umm, you might have to stay in another state. Just kidding. Check out Fayetteville.
But, the point is, we are going to reserve hotel blocks, eventually. As soon as we get the chance.
That's all. Thank you for your patience.

Also, thanks so much to those of you who sent me cards and packages. So far, I haven't received anything that was sent after March 8, but if it gets here in the next two weeks, I'll get it. Otherwise, our leaders claim all the goodies. You guys have no idea how exciting it is to get a card here. So exciting.
Alright, I'm going to stop rambling now. I'm uploading pictures, if you're interested. Check them out at the "Photos" link right over there. --->

We leave for Rwanda on Thursday, so I won't have internet access after that. Have a great three weeks, folks, and I'll see you in May!
PS--I'm pretty sure Luke leaves today for Guatemala, so he won't have internet access anymore, either.

I'm Still Here!

2006-04-02T07:29:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm still alive.
Sorry I haven't posted in...er...two months. I've been busy.
Actually, I kind of just made friends and stopped missing home so much.
Wow, so, let me give a quick overview of what I've been up to. After rafting, it was pretty much business as usual on campus. We didn't travel for a full month, except in small groups to Kampala on weekends. We discovered the best places to get coffee, banana milkshakes, and hamburgers that almost feel like home if you ignore the Asian spices and cucumbers. I've learned to bargain, and apparently it shows, because I went to the craft market this weekend and the shopkeepers immediately gave me the real price (about half the marked price). I've bought a lot of crafts. We're going to have a very African house.
Speaking of Lucas, he called me yesterday. It was my first time to hear his voice in three months. It was wonderful. I might have cried, a little.
We spent the end of March in Soroti District. We had homestays for four days, during which I learned just how huge and colorful the sky can be, how to pound groundnuts (the Ugandan equivalent of peanuts), and how to say "white person" in a new language. We walked a lot to visit the members of our papa's clan, and a lot of people strolled awkwardly through our compound to get a glimpse of us. By the end of the four days, Annie and I were a little cracked, mentally, mostly because our sisters (5 and 7 years old) sang to us constantly and our papa, John Henry, demanded that we have a Bible study before every meal (5 times a day). The Bible studies were mostly John Henry telling us why we were sinners while everyone else fell asleep or left the room and Annie and I sang that song about John Henry under our breath--"When John Henry was a little baby..."
After we were finally rescued, we spent a day with a Mennonite organization visiting camps for internally displaced people. We broke up into groups to visit individual families, and my group went to see an old widow who is caring for her blind mother-in-law and trying to send her children to school. It was really interesting, and she gave us a bag full of mangoes from her tree. This might sound American of me, but my favorite part of the day was trying to cram 12 people and a human-sized bag of charcoal in the back of a little sport truck to go barreling through the bush for 20 minutes.
We spent that weekend at Sipi Falls, hiking and relaxing. Except I got really sick, and spent most of the time sleeping or hanging around the latrine. I did go hiking with three other sick people, and we had an amazing time. It started pouring rain half-way through, so we took shelter in some people's huts. The last hut we visited was full of people drinking the local brew from a bucket. An old drunk man talked to us for a long time, and then we took their picture and they got mad, so we gave them some money and decided it was time to leave. Then we ran in the pouring rain for 40 minutes on the top of a mountain. When we finally got back, we cuddled under wool blankets for a grand total of six hours, until bed time.
Now we're back at school for two and a half more weeks, including exams.
Can I just say, I'm so exited that we're almost done?
I hate my classes here, to be honest, except Politics and the class taught by Americans, so it's a huge relief to be done with some of them.
On April 20, we leave for Rwanda. We're going to visit Rakai District, where AIDS first emerged, and Lake Bunyori, where the Pygmies live. I have no idea what we'll be doing in Rwanda, but I know I'll get to speak French, which is exciting and intimidating. We'll be there through the end of April, and then we have debrief for a week. We're supposed to debrief at Entebbe, which is a nice beach town on Lake Victoria, but the convent where we stayed before is booked--full of nuns, of all things! So we might end up somewhere in Western Uganda, or Kampala. We don't really know at this point.
At the moment, I'm searching the internet for places to stay on our honeymoon. You know, it's really frustrating trying to plan a wedding from Africa. I really don't know what I was thinking. Anyone know of a nice, cheap, low-key shack on the beach in South Carolina, preferably with a kitchen?
Alright, I'm going to stop writing now, because I have a paper due tomorrow that I haven't started. I hope you are all staying well, and I can't wait to see you in May (or July, depending on who you are).
I hope this post actually made sense--my brain is a little scattered.

Transition

2006-03-08T13:01:00.000-08:00

Hello again, everyone. I apologize for leaving you all in suspense about my trip to Nicaragua. It has been a rather busy 2 weeks since then. This week, I earned 52% of one of my classes for the semester, but, luckily, it´s one more class that we have completely finished now.

Nicaragua was an amazing experience. We spent the first three days in Managua, learning about the history of Nicaragua and its relations with the United States. The values of the Nicaraguan people are beautiful. Nicaragua is a country where construction workers and farmers are honored among poets and warriors.

My homestay was in a small town called Buena Vista in the Rio San Juan area (the border river for Costa Rica and Nicaragua). We were supposed to arrive there Thursday night, but the journey was somewhat more difficult than was foreseen. We woke up Thursday morning at 4:30 am, and caught the bus to San Carlos, in hopes of arriving there before the last river boat left at 6:00 pm. As it happened, our bus broke down 2 hours into our trip, so we had to wait 2 hours for our back-up bus to come from Managua to pick us up. It was a really good break--we found a hard-shelled fruit to play soccer with until the fruit broke into pieces too small to play with anymore.

We ended up arriving in San Carlos at about 6:30 pm, and had to find a hostel to stay the night in. Our room was underground for the most part, but the ground level was about 2 inches below the ceiling of our room, and these 2 inches were entirely open to anything small enough to enter. We turned the lights out at about 7:30 to keep the bichos (little green flies, or large green gnats... one can´t be sure) from swarming into our room, and just slept in our clothes, because it was the easiest thing to do. I shared this room with one Nicaraguan pastor, one LASP-mate, 3 salamanders (that we know of), one 4-inch cockroach, and one huge spider. It was just like sleeping outside, except with walls.

After this 11-hour bus ride, we had a further 2-hour boatride to get to the town of Sábalo, where we could catch our jeep-taxi to Buena Vista, which is the end of the driveable road. My host family was really cool. My padre nica and my hermano nica were both really smart, self-taught, and asked me questions all the time like, "Lucas, ¿qué sabes sobre el Día de Acción de Gracias?" (What do you know about Thanksgiving?), "Lucas, ¿qué significa 'funkytown'?", and "Lucas, ¿qué es un virus?" (This last was from my brother. I gave him biology lessons in Spanish.) I also learned a lot from them, but it was by virtue of their knowing what to teach me rather than my knowing the right questions to ask.

There are a thousand more stories to tell from my stay with the Coca family, but I will not force you all to read them here. Rather, I will force a few of you (who desire to hear them) to listen to them all later. After our homestays, we had 2 more nights in Nicaragua, one of which we spent in Granada, and one of which we spent back in Managua.

Since then, I haven´t been doing much other than working on my final paper for Core Seminar, which I turned in Monday, studying for my final Core Seminar exam, which I took yesterday, and preparing for my final Core Seminar group presentation, which we gave today.

Next week, I start full-time biology study, which I´m pretty excited about. Almost every week, we leave the Central Valley on Monday morning with a backpack of stuff for the week, travel to different types of ecosystems in Costa Rica, and return home on Friday. It´s going to be a lot of traveling, and a lot of hard work.

2006-02-09T07:38:00.000-08:00

So, this is my last week of Spanish classes. It seems kind of surreal, looking back at the last 4 weeks and realize that I´ve already earned 6 hours of credit (and will finish three more in 2 more weeks of classes). This is also my last week in San José for awhile. On Monday we leave to Nicaragua, where we are going to do homestays in Nicaraguan communities.
For the Nicaragua trip, we got to choose our preference concerning where we are placed in relation to Managua (which is "home base"). The choices range from "just let me stay close to electricity" to "the closest road is an hour away". Naturally, I´m hoping to stay in the rural environment. Also, for these two weeks I get to bring that which I can fit in my backpack. It´s going to be amazing and difficult.
The downside (or upside, depending on how you look at it) to this is that, as the closest road will be an hour by horse from my house, I will have neither Internet access nor electricity nor running water for this time. Hopefully we´ll have a river or something close-by for bathing.
Well, this has to be all for now. I have my last Spanish homework of the semester to prepare--a 15-minute speech on whatever topic I want.
I wish everyone the best of the two weeks to come.

Nile Adventure!

2006-02-08T03:52:00.000-08:00

This weekend, I rafted the Nile.
The White Nile, to be precise.
Let me tell you about it.

The USP directors don't organize any safaris or rafting trips because they'd get in trouble if someone died. So Emily, one of the other students, organized the trip for us. Everyone but two people went!
The company bus came to pick us up early Saturday morning, handing us brochures as we boarded the bus. A lot of us had never been rafting before, and several of us (including me) were absolutely terrified about it. The brochure was full of photos of rafts going straight up in the air, people flipping out of them. We took a lot of pictures with our scared faces and tried to reassure each other by reading scripture. It didn't really work.

After breakfast, the rafting guides showed us how to put on our gear and then divided us up into rafts. Sarah, Amanda, and I were all seriously considering joining the Safety Raft, commonly known as the Chicken Boat, but we ended up with a team of four others, all completely psyched at the idea of being thrown around in white water for six hours.

We walked, barefoot and swimsuit-clad, to the little lagoon where our adventure started, and our raft guide explained how to row, how to hold on, and what to do if the raft flipped. It went something like this:

Guide: So, eef da raf fleeps, you haf da rope and if you don', you go...haha! If da raf fleeps, and you fine yawself in da watah, keep you eyes opan, an' you go like dees, and you coun' to fife, and afta fife, you come up, okay? So, if you don' come up, you pump, and den you come up, okay? If you stuck unda dee boat, den you come out, and if I heet it, den you come out. In da wata. We goin' practeece. No, no! Okay, ready? Let's go.

Me: ...........ummm........I think I might have a question.....

At this point, Amanda and Sarah moved to the chicken raft, but, deciding to be a big girl, I stayed in the real raft. We started going. The guide explained that the first rapid was called Bujyagali Falls, and was a grade four rapid. Apparently, someone took a photo from the bank at this point, but as the photo can prove, I was concentrating on the water.
We hit the falls, and I was absolutely terrified. I was in the back of the raft by myself, behind the guide, so he didn't even notice when the raft tipped sideways and I fell out. All I saw was foaming water rushing beneath me, and deciding I would rather swim than be crushed by an overturned raft, I stretched out my hand and let go.
Apparently, the same wave that threw me out also threw Bethany into my seat. She started yelling, "Amy fell out! Stop! Amy fell out!" to which the guide responded, "Paddle hard."

I was immediately sucked underwater. I must have closed my eyes, because all I remember is floating in the dark, thinking, "I'm going to die. One...
I can't believe I remembered to count. Two...
This is really scary. Three...
Four...
My head feels lighter."
At this point, I put my arms up and opened my eyes, only to take a wave right in the face. I was above water. Hooray! Then another wave came, and I realized I still couldn't breathe.
"It worked! He was right! *splash*
Ack! I need *splash* air! No *splash* way did I come through that *splash* only to die *splash* on the surface!"
Really, I didn't say any of that. I was hyperventalating.
Finally, I saw the rescue kyack coming to get me. Relief! But he couldn't get to me. He was paddling hard, but he couldn't reach me. I was going to die, right here in sight of safety! I made a huge lunge and frantically grabbed the handle of the kyack. I pulled my feet up onto the boat like they told us and tried to keep my head above water, sucking in air.
The kyacker asked me my name. (I later learned that he was Bob.) Then I said, "Take me to the chicken boat."
"That's where I'm going," he replied.

So, I spent the rest of the day on the chicken boat. Enoch was our guide. You might remember him from the Bible--God saved him from death. We did all the rapids, but Enoch used his giant wooden paddles to move us and keep us safe. We always went through before the other rafts, sometimes avoiding the roughest parts, and then turned around to watch them flip and pick up survivors.
It was a blast.
Sarah, Amanda and I spent our day watching exotic birds, swimming in the current, slathering on sunblock, and singing praise songs on the verge of every rapid. We had lunch on a cliff overlooking the river, learned about Enoch's and Bob's families, and took care of the other rafts.

The culmination of the whole day was the last rapid, aptly named "The Bad Place." We had to stop and let the naked boys playing in the river carry our raft past some class six rapids, so we thought our trip was finished. The safety raft doesn't do the Bad Place, right? We're safe!
Nope.
In the confusion of all the rafts grouping and loading up after the walk, Enoch ran up to us and yelled, "Let's go! Come on, it'll be okay!" And we believed him.
We ran down a jungle footpath barely wide enough for my shoulders to the place where the other rafts were loading, and just as we arrived, Enoch sailed past. We stared at him as he rowed the boat against the raging current up to a large rock near us and then yelled, "Come on! Jump!"
So, I jumped. Barefoot, in a swimsuit. From a rocky footpath in the African jungle. To a raft frantically twisting in the current over a huge waterfall. On the Nile. Holy Crap.

And here I am. Surviving. I only fell out twice, and Amanda and Enoch cared for me. We felt like Moses, barrelling down the river in a pitch-covered basket with only God's hand for protection.
It was wonderful.

That night, I slept outside on the riverbank. See the photos.
I have to go to class now!

2006-02-07T01:51:00.000-08:00

More photos are up! My computer dies in 10 minutes, so I'll update later about the exciting Nile Rafting of this Saturday, perhaps even with pictures.

2006-02-01T04:35:00.000-08:00

They've moved our internet. Right now, I'm sitting in a giant, open-air classroom where an economics class is going on. I'm just lurking in the back, typing quietly and occasionally catching sentences like, "America sneezes and you get warning!"

My homestay ends on Friday. It's been pretty good. Our family has hosted other internationals before, so I think they view themselves as a hostel, not a cultural experience. They are arguably the richest family hosting someone, so Emily and I have our own little cement room in the courtyard behind their house. The house has a real toilet and shower (no shower stall, so you have to be careful not to soak the TP), but at night they lock the door after feeding us tea and juice five times a day, so we have to use the squatty potties at 3 in the morning. We eat well, with meat and fruit much more often than we get it on campus. Our mami and taata are gone most of the time, and the other kids just watch TV (usually in Luganda, the local language), so Emily and I sit around a lot. One of our brothers, Reagan, is our age; he's the only person who actually seeks our company, and we like him a lot.

On Saturday, Reagan, Emily, and I went across the street to our aunt's house. She is hosting two other USP students, so we hung out with them all day. Aunt Flo randomly wrapped us up in material and took us to a burial, which was awkward and interesting. Being white gets us a lot of attention, and we were late (which is normal here, but makes people more apt to notice us), so everyone stared when we walked up. The funeral part was outside the man's house, and when we got there, some men brought the couch out of the house for us to sit on, right in front of the casket, even though almost everyone else was sitting on rocks or tree roots. Then we walked out into the bush for the actual burial. The dead man had been very young--only 32, I think--and his only son was sitting in front of us with a headwrap on.

Afterwards, we had tea outside Flo's house. The boys threw ground nuts (like peanuts) at us and I felt very much like I was in 6th grade. Then we taught each other dances. I learned the Baganda dance, and taught the Boot-scooting Boogie and a cheerleading dance to my very large brother.

Woah, I have class in 8 minutes, and the economics lecturer just called me up to the stage to explain to the class about Hurricane Katrina and all the poor people in New Orleans. I had to talk into a microphone, and they are apparently all coming to Texas to visit me now! Mom, be ready!

Quick Update

2006-01-30T15:57:00.000-08:00

The promised photos have arrived!

All of them were taken in my house--the orchids are all in the garden outside my window.

2006-01-24T16:32:00.000-08:00

Following is the account of a typical day in my life this semester.

6:00 am - Wake up
6:05-6:30 am - Shower, get dressed, and get bags packed for the day
6:30 am - Eat breakfast (mandatory in my house)
6:45 am - Begin walking to bus to LASP office (roughly 2 miles)
7:15 am - Catch bus to LASP office
7:45 am - Begin Seminario Base
11:30 am - Finish Seminario Base
11:30 - 12ish - Lunch
12:15 pm - Catch taxi to ILE with four travel buddies
12:50 pm - Spanish classes begin
3:30 pm - Spanish classes end

After class ends, we usually spend some time in San José, but since it takes an hour and a half to travel from ILE home if we go straight there, we usually only hang out for a little while. The above is my schedule for M W F, and on T and R I have a bit more time because I don´t have SB in the morning.

Have a great week, everyone. I´ll talk to you again in a few days or so.

Morning Mourning (I'm so clever)

2006-01-18T22:35:00.000-08:00

As always, I don't have as much time to write as I would like to have. I'm going into town in 20 minutes, and I haven't done any of my homework for today. I thought academics would be negligible here, but each lecturer expects us to read about 6 chapters every week (I'm not exaggerating) and books are rather hard to come by.
Yesterday I was very, very homesick. It's all Dani's fault; she sent me this wonderful email about wedding plans and senior projects and movie scripts that made me weep for hours. I just want the smell of familiar skin, a warm shower, a pair of trousers, and electricity for at least 50% of the nights. I was tired of rice and beans and posho and matooke at every meal, every day.
By the way, I like beans now. Or at least, I don't notice when I eat them. Just in time, too, since I leave for my first homestay tomorrow, and I know they'll force feed me.
Anyway, we had a welcome dinner last night with our friends from the Honors College (the dorms where most of us are living), and they served three kinds of meat (!) and chipati, which is sort of a fried tortilla, and fried bananas. And we always have banana, pineapple, and watermelon. Oh, oh, and last night, they had this sort of coleslaw that tasted like vegetables!!
And Cokes!
So, that made me feel better. All the Ugandans who saw me crying are taking extra care of me, with very concerned eyes.

So now I've mourned the things I'm missing this semester, and the things I've left behind, and the things that have run away to Costa Rica without me ;). After the party last night, I cleaned the room and put things away. I found a place for all our crap, and made a home, because I'm here for three and a half more months, so I better feel comfortable.

Anyway, to let you all know, I'm going to be staying at a home for the next two weeks, so I might not be on the internet as often. I'll do my best, but you should all definitely send me snail mail to compensate. Just in case you missed it the first time, the address is
Amy vanEttinger, Uganda Studies Program (UCU)
PO Box 4
Mukono, UGANDA

I've also got a cell phone on which I can receive calls, so if you'd like to call me, send me an email and we'll set it up.

Oh, by the way, David and Owen, if you're reading, I've met your Emily and like her muchly. She showed me a picture with you in it that made me miss you. Actually, I think she's in one of the snaps from Monkey Hill. Short hair now.

Una semana completa

2006-01-17T08:43:00.000-08:00

It's hard to believe that I've only been here for a week. It has been one of the most challenging, frustrating, humbling, and rewarding weeks of my life. All of us in the program feel as though we've been here for a month already because we've learned so much in so short a time. It's amazing to me how much more comfortable I am with Spanish after one week of living with a family of costarricenses.

I'm staying with the Wo Ching family (the father's father was Asian) in Moravia, and I feel very welcome here. The family is comprised of the father, Antonio (53), the mother, Roseanne (50), and three sons, Antonio (23), Diego (22), and Daniel (14). Antonio the younger and Diego aren't here as often as Daniel, don Antonio, and doña Roseanne, because they both go to school and work. Don Antonio is retired, and doña Roseanne is a professor of English.

I'm thankful that my family is mostly guys, because our LASP group has a ridiculously high girl to guy ratio. We are 45, and only 8 of us are guys. I was standing in a group waiting for my family to come pick us up, and I realized that I was the only guy in the group... and then realized that I was going to be surrounded by girls for most of the semester. Luckily for me, my concentration has the most even ratio of guys to girls--only 1:2. My concentration also has the smallest number of people, which I think will come in handy when we're making hikes through the mountains and only have 9 students to keep together.

I have found a couple of students that live close to me in Moravia, so we did a few things together this weekend (our only entirely free weekend for over a month). On Saturday, I had plans to explore Moravia with the person who lives closest to me, whose name is Breanna, but my family decided to go to the "club" on Saturday, so we went there with them instead. It was a lot of fun--kind of like a country club in the US, except golf isn't popular at all here, so instead of golf, they had volleyball, basketball, and football. We left at about 10 in the morning, and returned at about 4:30 in the afternoon, full of volleyball, sun, and helado. It was a good trip, because it was a pretty long drive, from the province of San José, through the province of Heredia to Alajuela. (A short story about the province of Heredia: The people from Heredia really like to use the street for walking rather than the sidewalk, and as a result, anyone who costarricenses see walking in the street they call herediano) Also, we got to pass by INBioParque, whose website I have had bookmarked on my computer for two years. Visit the web page--it's amazing. Hopefully I'll get to visit the vast collection of orchids and butterflies in INBioParque sometime this semester.

On Sunday morning, my family wasn't going to church, so Breanna's mamá invited me to come to church with them. Attending the Costa Rican service is the most amazing experience I've had in church in a long time. We sang several songs in Spanish (including Cambiaré Mis Tristes, the Spanish translation of Trading My Sorrows), and the best part was that, included among the instruments, there was a saxophone and a trombone to give the music a Latin feel.

Public transportation here is organized quite differently here. You can take a bus to get anywhere you need to go in downtown San José, but as you move away from downtown, buses go only back and forth from the center, like spokes going out from the center of a wheel. Because of this, it requires two buses to move between any two of the three significant to me right now (home, the LASP office, and Instituto de Lengua Española (ILE))--one to San José central, and one back out to the other pueblo.

In any case, this has grown to a rather long post. I hope you believe me when I say that I've left out so much for your sake that I could write 4 to 5 more pages if I included it all.

To conclude, I want you all to know that I gave my 14 year old host brother Daniel (who everyone calls Dany) silly putty today, and he loved it. Please ask me questions about my experience, and I'll gladly answer them as time and money (my only internet access is in Internet cafes) permit.

A Quick Note

2006-01-13T06:52:00.000-08:00

No post today, but check out my five new photos! That's all I had time to upload, but more are on the way. Be sure to read the descriptions if you want the background info.

Update

2006-01-09T18:36:00.000-08:00

Photos from my sojourn at the Preissman house are now on our photo page. Recorded in those photos is the first encounter I have had with Simon, so I know a few of you are interested in seeing those.

Also, it has come to my attention that no wedding registries appear through our wedding web page linked at right. Amy and I have registered at three stores: Target, Pier 1, and Bed, Bath, and Beyond. The Knot wedding registry list claims to search these three stores, so I don't know why these haven't shown up before, but here you have them--direct paths to our various registries.

Have a great four months, everyone. Enjoy Wal-Mart and McDonald's for us.

Life Lessons

2006-01-09T00:49:00.000-08:00

Hi friends!
Well, I'm finishing up my fifth day in Africa, and I already feel at home. Classes began yesterday, but I've only had one so far, because the schedule is so tentative that none of the professors show up for class! (You have to wait 30 minutes for your professor instead of 15 in Africa, because everyone walks so slow and stops to talk to all their friends.)
Right now I'm sitting on the veranda of the USP office. The school sits on the side of a hill, and this office is almost at the top, so I have a lovely view of the jungle below me. The only thing higher than this office is Monkey Hill (aptly named), where lives a very rich man who cooks steak and 15 adolescent boys in an Irish orphanage.
The people here are incredibly hospitable, and so polite that they won't tell you if you do something stupid, even if you ask. It's been an adjustment, as a lot of them, especially in Mukono, see us like zoo animals or celebrities. I'm grateful for the girls in my hall that answer all our silly questions, and the people at meals who sit extra long just to talk with us.
Since it's suppertime, here's a quick list of things I've learned how to do so far:
-hand-wash my laundry
-cross a busy Mukono street
-greet everyone with "howahyou," the typical Ugandan salutation
-iron my knickers to ward off Mango fly eggs, which imbed themselves into your skin
-take a frigid shower with a smile
-wrap a mosquito net
-pretend I know the words to the Lunganda songs in chapel
-brush my teeth with bottled water, even though most of the students don't (I thought my wisdom teeth holes might be a little more susceptible to buggies)
-eat meat by ripping it with my teeth, and beans by taking one bite for every two bites of rice (Today I bought some peanut butter, so I won't have to eat as many beans to maintain my protein!)
-recognize that every crying baby, cell phone ring, alarm clock, or dying moose I think I hear is actually a large bird in the tree outside my window
-sleep through the night.

Well, I should go now, as supper's half-over and we have a meeting at 8. I wish this weren't so ridiculously oversimplified, but I just can't find an opporunity to use the internet for long. I promise pictures and the account of my first day sometime in the near future.

More Contact Info

2006-01-05T08:33:00.000-08:00

I've made it safely down to the Preissman's place, and everything is quiet for now (Simon is napping). Simon and I have hit it off pretty well--he even came to sit with me by the conveyor belt while mom was sitting with our bags. I'll be here until Tuesday spending time with Preissmen, practicing my snorkel skills, and completing the few remaining errands to ready myself for Costa Rica.

While I'm in Costa Rica, the best way (in all respects) to reach me is to email me. The second best way is to comment on this blog. However, if you insist on sending me something tangible (written material only--no packages), here is my physical address in Costa Rica:

Luke Templer
Programa de Estudios Latinoamericanos
Apdo. 54-2070
Sabanilla, San Jose
COSTA RICA

This will not be a truly efficient means to reach me, except in the first 6 weeks of the semester. Anything sent after that time will get to me, but there is no way for me to say how quickly I will get it, since we will be traveling to Nicaragua and Guatemala, as well as various locations in Costa Rica.

Contact Info

2006-01-03T00:17:00.000-08:00

Well, my trip officially begins in 3 1/2 hours (and it doesn't seem real yet). Here's my mailing address in Uganda, in case any of you want to send me a Valentine or a small package of chocolate:

Amy vanEttinger
Uganda Christian University
Uganda Studies Program
P.O. Box 4
Mukono, UGANDA

Letters and small packages (like bubble envelopes) go directly to the school; larger packages are something of a hassle, so please, none of those. I just found out that we should have wireless internet access, so email is probably still the most reliable means of contacting me. Use the link over there -->
or write me at vanEttingerA@jbu.edu.
See you all in four months!

P.S.

2005-11-22T07:29:00.000-08:00

Happy birthday, Mom!

une mise à jour

2005-11-22T07:06:00.000-08:00

After a long battle with the system, JBU has finally decided to let me take my financial aid package to Uganda with me. That's good news, as I had no idea how we were going to afford plane tickets, spending money, and a wedding in July. But now, I see the solution: Student Loans.

In other news, I got my giant information packet for USP (Uganda Studies Program) the other day. It's pretty big. In fact, it's called the BIG. According to it, I'm supposed to bring 2 skirts, 2 dresses, and 1 pair of shorts. So my suitcase, apparently, is not supposed to be big.

Thanksgiving is this week!
Hooray! Only one class left!
(I'm actually supposed to be in class right now--American Studies--but I woke up so much earlier than normal this morning that I decided to sit and read, and drink some tea, and then be late for class...So, rather than walk in 5 minutes late, I decided to just not go! (In Uganda, class-skipping is not allowed. Neither is not-doing-your-homework. (What a funny word 'neither' is. Especially when we use it as a subject.)))

Our friend Ki, who took our engagement photos to beef up his portfolio, has apparently published us on several websites (including the JBU forums). I must admit, this kind of freaked me out at first, and then I remembered that we signed our lives away for Ki to take our pictures for free...So, no complaining here.

Mmm...I should probably go do something more productive than writing on this blog with no readers. Have a lovely Thanksgiving, all!

I Second That.

2005-11-08T08:42:00.000-08:00

Yes, Welcome to all of you readers-who-have-yet-to-be-informed-about-the-existence-of-this-blog. We're glad you're here.

Umm...I don't really have anything else to say now.... (It's kind of wierd to know that we're going to send this address to every member of our families; I feel like I should write something really profound, but I can't think of anything.

So, right now, you should think of the most amazing thing that you can, and then pretend I wrote that thing, right

here.)

Welcome

2005-11-07T21:50:00.000-08:00

Welcome, friends, to the blog of Luke and Amy. This is the first post--Amy and I are in Siloam Springs, and we've recently been accepted to attend our respective off-campus programs in the spring. Amy and I will both be publishing to this blog--she from Uganda and I from Costa Rica. I hope that you all can enjoy this site while we are away, though, I know, it is a meagre replacement. Please leave your comments liberally, email us, and keep us updated about your lives as well when we leave.