A few days ago I was talking with my priest and came onto the subject of my time spent in Uganda. Uganda holds a special place in my life since it was arguably one of the worst weeks of my life, but also one of the most important and formative. I've decided that I want to write this story down since it has been so important to me.

This is the beginning of a series of posts that detail my experiences in Uganda and the impact they've had on my life.

In the fall of 2002 and winter of 2003 I participated in Canadian Mennonite University's School of Discipleship program (currently known as Outtatown). The program is a six month study and travel program with the stated motto of "Knowing God, knowing yourself, knowing the world". The first three months are spent in Canada studying and learning, and the second three months are spent in Guatemala or South Africa learning about Spanish or conflict resolution and apartheid.

2002 and 2003 was the first year the program went to South Africa, and I choose Africa since I was most interested in conflict resolution and the history of South Africa. Africa intrigued me to the point where there was little question as to which country I would visit.

Now I've established that I was in South Africa for three months, but how did I find myself in Uganda?

Back when I was in the program it was run by Wally Schmidt. Wally one of the most creative and imaginative people you'll find. What happened was a businessman approached Wally and offered to pay our airfare and lodging if we spend six days in Uganda doing door to door evangelism.

If you know Wally, you know there is no way he could ever turn this down. Basically he was able to detour the trip to central Africa for a week for free - a pretty good deal.

We were told to write our testimonies for translation into Lugandan while we were in Canada and were provided the general format we should follow. Every Christian knows this format. It goes like this; life before faith, conversion experience, life of faith, [bible quote], invitation to become Christian, and [bible quote]. The pre-defined format bothered me a bit, but I played along with it. We finished our testimonies and sent them off for translation.

Uganda slipped from our minds for about three months until we found ourselves in South Africa and a week before the trip. Wally came to explain to us what this trip was going to be all about. He was a gentleman about it, he took us wine tasting, but after the tasting was done he laid down what he knew.

Basically we were told we would be going to Uganda to act as 'door openers'. We would be paired with a local guide who would go with us and read our testimonies while we just stood there and played along. Easy right? He also took the time to explain that he wasn't entirely sure about our food and accommodations but those would be worked out in time. This was not what we wanted to hear at all.

We were already nervous about leaving South Africa, but being told that not all areas of the trip were finalized came as a blow. Never the less we carried on and a week later drove to the airport for the flight to Uganda.

This story will be continued in two days time, stay tuned.