Thursday, August 27, 2009

Jesca

It is extremely common here for people to have “house help.” The daily tasks of cooking and cleaning take 3 or 4 times as long, because there are no modern appliances and cooking is pretty much from scratch. And people here are in desperate need of jobs, so if you can afford to give someone work, even if it’s just a few days a week, it’s pretty much expected that you will help someone out in this way.

Jesca has worked for me and Kelli since we moved into our house in February. She is a precious woman who can make amazing chapattis (a tortilla-style flatbread) and French bread, washes our clothes by hand, and pretty much keeps our house from being covered in inches of dust and dirt. She also serves as my sous-chef and is a huge help to me in the kitchen! Jesca, like most people in Uganda, goes to church but is not a believer. She has been taught that as long as she goes to “prayers”, is baptized, takes communion, and lives a good life, she will go to heaven. The Catholic and Anglican churches have indoctrinated the people here in the gospel of salvation by works; Jesca doesn’t even know she’s lost!

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