In the British tradition, the day after Christmas is a public holiday in Uganda known as Boxing Day. No one I spoke with seemed to know the origins of the term, but with a little Internet search I found it. It's a day when gifts are given to the less fortunate. The day is also known as St. Stephen's Day for the feast day of the first Christian martyr. For me, it's my mom's birthday. This year is a big one--80.
Once again, the day started with mass. While the church wasn't packed today, all the seats were taken. This is not the same as saying the church was full since the back third of the church doesn't have seats. When the seats are filled, people spread mats on the floor and sit on their mats.
I tried to sit in an obscure pew, but the catechist motioned me forward to sit in the sanctuary. I would have ignored him, but then he would have sent someone to get me. I sat up front.
There were actually more people in church when we arrived today than on Christmas Day. When we pulled up in the car the now familiar beating of the drum began, summoning the faithful. The drum serves the same purpose as church bells at home.
The catechist had told Fr. Henry that there would be a few baptisms, like maybe five. Right. Henry asked the parents of those who were to be baptized to bring their children forward. Over thirty babies and a few toddlers were brought to the front. I've never seen that many infants in one place outside of a maternity ward.
Moms and dads were dressed in their best and babies were in their baptismal finery. "Best" varies from traditional Buganda dress--the Gomesi--for the women and the men in their robes and suit jackets to thoroughly modern fashions that would blend in on the south side of Chicago. The men's traditional clothes look more comfortable than the women's traditional dresses--why am I not surprised?
Most of the babies were quiet, looking totally disinterested in the whole affair. As might be expected, some were howling their little hearts out. Surprisingly, the howlers didn't set off the rest of them.
Fr. Henry went around to each one in turn--signing them with the sign of the cross, anointing them with oil, baptizing them with water poured from an enameled metal cup into a basin, doing the thing with the white cloth and finally, passing the candle telling them to keep the light of Christ burning brightly until the day of judgment--or whenever.
Today, Henry had sent Dominic, a local teacher, to sit with me as a translator. Besides translating key points, he explained that people wanted Fr. Henry to baptize their children since he came from the community, sort of local-boy-does-good. They consider it an honor to have Fr. Henry baptize their little ones.
Christmas time is a popular time to have children baptized since many family members have come home from the city (translation: Kampala). Finally, many people bring their babies home from places like Kampala to have their children baptized in their home parish. All told, this makes for lots of baptisms.
I remembered my camera, so I took a few pictures and had my picture taken with other folks, including a group of women in traditional dress. I'll try to post some once I get them downloaded. After a minimum of protesting, Bry’Chell took the picture.
In general, I have found people to be incredibly warm and welcoming. It was even more so at church.
After church Fr. Henry took us--several nieces and nephews, Bry’Chell and I--back to the house while he had a meeting with the Board of Directors of the parish health center. I'll say more about the health center in another blog. The meeting lasted longer than he expected so I had some time to go for a walk.
Pontian, Fr. Henry's ward, and I went for a walk. Pontian went to the high school seminary for "O" level but then Fr. Henry decided he should go to a co-ed school for "A" level. Basically, "O" level is the first four years of high school (8th grade through 11th) and "A" level is the last two years.
Pontian was not happy about leaving the seminary, even for a couple of years. I don't know Henry's logic--whether academic or just social--but I think it's a wise choice. The kid needs to be around girls. He's as normal a teenage boy as you'd find, but being around girls as an equal is healthy for a young man who wants to be a priest.
Pontian is pretty focused. He told me that the parish priest took him to his new school and told the girls to keep their hands off him because he was going to be a priest. The girls, of course, thought that was pretty funny and proceeded to tease him to no end. He, in turn, encouraged them to become altar servers and to attend mass more often. In the mean time, they've become friends.
I told him that I though it was good for him to be around girls. If he was going to be a priest he'd better know how to relate to women as human beings or he'd be in trouble since more than half of his congregation would be women. Strangely enough, he seemed to believe me.
Pontian is an orphan. Both his parents died while he was very young. I don't know the whole story, but he asked Fr. Henry to be his guardian some years ago. Henry agreed.
This is no small responsibility. Henry has several of his own nieces and nephews who have lost parents. I know he helps his own family as much as he can. His mom is elderly and frail, but still, he's taken responsibility for another child. This means he pays Pontian's school fees at boarding school and sees that he's taken care of during school breaks. Of course, he also keeps the boy on the straight and narrow.
Henry's family has taken Pontian in as one of their own. At first I thought he was another nephew, he's treated the same as all the other boys. He's not family by blood, but the family has taken him as one of their own.
When we returned from our walk it was lunch time. Once again, we ate leftovers, pretty much the same pattern as at home.
After lunch Pontian asked me if I would go with him to the family cemetery to pray for family members who were buried there. Sure, why not, I'll pray for anybody. I figured it would be Pontian and me. Not so, by the time we headed off it was a regular procession of probably a dozen people. I prayed and lead the others in the usual Our Father, Hail Mary and Glory Be. After the prayers and a moment of silence people started pulling weeds from around the grave sites. I asked Gerard, being the eldest present, about some of those who were buried.
First, was Gerard's father who is also Henry's father, their father's first wife, who didn't have any children, five of Gerard and Henry's siblings and five of Gerard's children. The children who had died ranged in age from 3 to 27. Several had died while they were away at school--either primary or secondary school. One of the siblings was Henry's immediate older brother. He died at age 39 and left behind 16 children. One of them, Timothy, was present. He was a student at Makerere University, but had to drop out for lack of funds. He hopes to go back but needs financial help. There is no financial aid here, only private sponsors. He doesn't have one. Because of the way the course work is set up, it's not realistic to work and go to school at the same time. University is three years and students take seven classes at a time.
Henry was stuck in his meeting longer than he expected, so he didn't get lunch until he returned about 4 PM. By the time he ate, packed and stowed everything in the car, it was after 5. Several nieces and nephews wanted rides--actually needed rides--since there is no taxi (read: mini-bus) service to their village. Henry's car is a Toyota RAV4. It seats five. There were seven of us and a ton of luggage in the car. Four crammed in the back and Bry’Chell on a pillow between the bucket seats in the front. It was cozy to say the least. Add to that twenty miles of rutted dirt road before we reached the highway (read: paved two-lane, pot-hole-studded road) and you have quite an experience.
When we arrived back in Nkozi after dropping off the assorted passengers, the power was out. Joy. We'd been gone since Wednesday so this meant no hot water. I had turned off the water heaters before we left. Oh well, I heated up left-over tuna casserole on one of the gas burners and we ate by candle light.
Since it was Mom's 80th birthday, I tried to call. I guessed that she and Dad would be at my sister Kathy's house, but it was too early in the morning and they had yet to arrive. I told Kathy I would call at 7 PM. That meant 6 AM our time, so I went to bed.
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