This song has been a powerful reminder for me during our journey in Uganda. I can’t help but stop and sing when it comes on my worship playlist. We have been incredibly blessed by so much prayer, encouragement and support along the way, and we have felt God with us throughout everything. Continue reading
Author: Gina Sawyer
Days in Africa (Part 2)
The previous list got too long for one post, so I thought it would be fun to continue the differences we’ve discovered so far. And the interesting thing is that most of these realizations are day-to-day living and not even cultural differences. Those would need many more posts and would still be hard to find the words to express… We hope you enjoy getting a glimpse into our new world. It’s been a fun adventure! Continue reading
Days in Africa (Part 1)
Now that we have been in Uganda for 6 months, many of the things that came as a shock or caught us guard have now become the norm. I kept a list of the many different things we deal with on a daily basis. Here are many unique things we’ve encountered, all for your reading pleasure… Continue reading
Always trying so hard
A while back, there was a popular song by Colbie Caillat called “Try”, and while the chorus is lacking depth, the lyrics are pretty true about the struggle of living in a busy, always look your best, put your game face on, comparing, overachieving culture. Continue reading
Living in Weaknesses
I went walking a while ago with a new friend here in Mbale and we talked about the transition of moving to Africa. She’s been here about 6 months before me, so we are at a similar stage of life adjustment. The thing we realized is that everyone who comes as missionaries all come from different places in life, have different roles and expectations here, deal with things differently, have different family dynamics, settle into life differently, have different needs and have different relationships with God.
With that being said, there’s an element of living in a place completely foreign to your “norm” that people can’t fully understand until they experience it for themselves. It’s challenging to try to explain how different every day life is. Continue reading
Come all who are weary…
This past week, I had the pleasure of attending a women’s retreat with other missionaries from around East Africa. What an experience! Being the newest person in Africa, I didn’t feel worthy to be in the same room as these women who have spent 2 years, 5 years, 10 years, 15 years, etc. serving in Africa. Continue reading
Our New Home
For your viewing pleasure, here are some before and after photos of our new home in Uganda. We love it and it’s perfect for our family. We look forward to building many relationships here and we pray this home is a place where people feel God’s love. Continue reading
A Glimpse of Life in Mbale, Uganda
We drove through town and realized several people would probably like to see what we see every day. So here is a small glimpse of our life… Continue reading
The feeling of being overwhelmed…
We were told about it and we were trained for it, but nothing could prepare us for the feeling of total helpless in a place so new and so different.
We have had to rely on our team for housing, for food, to go anywhere, to help clear our container, to schedule picking up our dog, to know who to contact to help get our new home ready, to go to the market or to the bank or to the supermarket… Continue reading
The Move is Here
What a whirlwind of travel and emotions! We spent our time the weekend before alternating between stressing over packing all of our stuff, finding time to see family and friends one more time and enjoying quality time with our parents before we left. We were blessed to have parents who enjoyed hanging out with Adalyn while we packed. It turns out it’s a lot harder to pack to move across the world than we imagined… 
And this was just the stuff we accumulated after we shipped our container. But we did it with 9 free bags and only 1 of them overweight. Once we made it through the weekend, it was time to say goodbyes and that was so difficult. Continue reading
Sawyers In Uganda 