June and July---ish

July 2, 2015

Hello Family and Friends,

Well, the moment has finally come: school’s out!!!

The kids and I (Becky) had our last day of classes a few weeks ago and now we’re off! I still have some things to finish up at school like packing up all of the posters and doing a full inventory of the science lab and packing everything up for the summer.

This has been an incredibly strenuous year for Jay and I: my work and service with Acacia International School, while a fabulous ministry, ended up taking up much more of my time than I had anticipated and putting much more strain on our family. By Christmas time, things were really rough, although I don’t think the kids noticed, and so for January, I was busy pulling back in all sorts of areas of areas of our lives so that we could establish some sort of “normal.” HA! My goal these last few months has been finishing well, and I am so pleased to say that we have made it through by God’s grace and strength. The funny thing, of course, is that despite the difficulties of the year, I really loved doing it: getting to teach Science at an international school is one of my dream jobs, and the students and staff have been incredible!

On that note, I’ve just signed on to teach at Acacia School again in the Fall: I’ll only be teaching one class, which will hopefully be a great balance for our family. I’m excited to be able to maintain some of the relationships with students and my coworkers. Another new role I’ll be taking on will be mentoring a Ugandan teacher who will be teaching many of the other courses. When we head back to Canada in the Spring, this teacher will be taking over my class for me.

God’s timing is so good: just as my work at Acacia School is winding up, Jay’s work at the airfield is intensifying. The office project he is managing is set for occupancy in August, and between here and there, the site supervisor is going to America on a much needed furlough so Jay will be wearing two hats and spending much longer hours on the project. By the time my parents come to visit in September, we will be very ready for a break and some sight-seeing!

This past weekend, Jay and I were able to celebrate the wedding of one of EMI’s local employees. Our friend was the first person in his family to get married. The most interesting cultural difference was the respect that was shown to us guests from EMI: we were seated in places of honour along with the groom’s family. It was interesting to see how big a role that EMI has had in his life. That part was really encouraging: we know we do an awesome job at building and designing great buildings here in East Africa, but to be reminded again of the huge impact that we personally have in the lives of men and women here was incredibly encouraging.

Prayer points:

1)      We are now 16 months into our 2 year term with EMI and looking forward to being back with family and friends in the Spring. That being said, the number one question we are getting asked now is if we are planning on returning to North America permanently or if we are planning on coming back to Uganda. Please do be praying with us as we seek God’s leading and direction. To speak frankly, we are really happy here and the kids seem to be thriving, despite their desire to be with family, but we’d also like to go home and be with family once again. That being said, we want to be sure that we are attentive to and obedient to where God is leading us. Again, please do pray with us.

2)     Please pray for Jay and I in our work. Pray for Jay as he finishes up the MAF/EMI office building: that he would have wisdom and endurance in project’s final 2 months. For me, pray that I will find a good balance between my new position at Acacia School and my family.

3)     Please pray for our financial support. Over the last few months our support has started to dip down due to a large pledge that has not come in. We are currently processing through our options and really need God’s guidance. Am reminded of “Seek first His kingdom and all these things will be added unto you.”

4)    Please pray for Jay as he travels to The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) mid-July to follow up and consult on a project he visited last fall with an organization called UCBC. Please pray for safety as he travels and for wisdom as he meets with the contractor there to get the work started.

Thank you to all our family, friends & supporters again. We appreciate you all very much.

Please feel free to email us anytime with what’s going on in your lives. We would love to hear. (jaywhisnand@gmail.com / becky.whisnand@gmail.com)

Jay, Becky, Nathaniel & Bethany Whisnand

If you would like to contribute to our support account, please go to http://emiworld.org/donate.php. There are options for donating from the US or Canada. You can donate by CC or check. If you have any questions, please send us an e-mail.

Some current pictures of us:
 

B getting ready for a day trip at the zoo.

Daddy walking with the kiddos.

Hello!

How completely sweet is this guy!

Performing at school and representing both Canada and the USA.

Dancing for Canada: look at that joyful face!!!

Also dancing for Canada: there are nearly 10 nations represented in their preschool!

The start of summer vacation.

My students and staff from this year (a few students are missing because they went home early.)

B and our house-helper Dorothy sorting rice.

Lego-mania has arrived at our house and we are loving it!

My summer reading list...I may have devoured two books the first weekend off!

Richard and his wife Lydia: we were honoured to attend their ceremony.

Jay with many of the site workers at Richard's weddding.

Celebrating Canada Day with good friends, and even a few Canadians;)

May Update & Pictures

Hey Everyone!

Here are a few highlights, a few prayer requests and some pictures.

Highlights

• First, we want to thank everyone who read our request for some extra support on our last update. We know it can be an awkward subject but Becky & I really believe that God wants us here and we see all of our supporters as our partners in this. Just as a pastor is supported by his Church, we feel privileged to be partners with everyone who is helping us to be here.

• Now regarding that request, we have received our support updates for last month and we received about half of what we need. We are in need of about $2,000 more to meet these needs. Thank you all so much for your help and helping to keep us in Uganda for our commitment.

• For the past few months I (Jay) have been using a friends motorcycle (*see picture) while he and his family are in the US on furlough. It’s been great to sharpen my motorcycle skills and this has enabled me to get my Ugandan motorcycle license which I just received a few weeks ago. Woohoo!
  

• Becky & the kids were on Spring Break from March 30 through April 10! They had a great time off from school and our family went out of town with some friends for a few days over Easter weekend. We went to a town east of Kampala, named Jinja, to a guesthouse that has a great pool for the kids. We had a blast. The highlight of the weekend happened one night after dinner. We went out with our friends that night and were on our way back to our guesthouse. It started pouring and I do mean POURING. When we got to our guesthouse, Becky & I ran while carrying the kids back to our room. We got absolutely drenched. It was the kind of event where you are so wet that you can’t keep from laughing (*see picture).

• A few weeks ago we went on a day trip with our church to some local schools outside of town. We have a family in our church that makes & distributes sand water filters to households, villages, schools, etc. They brought a few water filters and we spent the day taking these to these schools, playing with the kids (*see picture), singing songs, finding chameleons (*see picture) and eating lunch. I think most of us fell asleep on the way home that day but we had a lot of fun and it was great to be a part of getting clean water to those kids.

• The last highlight was a huge high point from March. Most Wednesdays on our construction sites we organize a chapel or devotional time for our site guys. We shut down the construction site and usually have one of our foremen/managers give a talk. Well this week it was my turn and I was so pumped (*see picture)! I talked about ‘Loving our Neighbor’. I gave 2 examples from the Bible on how God wants us to love others and how we were created to live. The guys got involved in the talk and seemed to enjoy it. I pray God uses those verses to make us more the men He created us to be.

Prayer Requests

• First, please continue to pray for our work here and for our family.

• Second, please pray that we would have all the resources we need to complete our commitment here.

• Third, we would ask that you would pray with us in what God wants us to do after our commitment is up with EMI. We have given EMI a current commitment of 2 years which will be up in early 2016. That seems like a long way away but we have informally set a goal for ourselves to have a decision made by September so we can start planning. Now even as I am typing this out, I am reminded that following Jesus usually does not follow our plans, but it’s good to have goals nonetheless. So maybe God wants us to stay with EMI, maybe go home (Vancouver/Texas) or maybe do something totally not on the radar. We’ll see where He leads.

Thank you to all our family, friends & supporters again. We appreciate you all very much.

Please feel free to email us anytime with what’s going on in your lives. We would love to hear. (jaywhisnand@gmail.com / becky.whisnand@gmail.com)

Jay, Becky, Nathaniel & Bethany Whisnand

Support Info

If you want to contribute to our support account, please go to http://emiworld.org/donate.php. There are options for donating from the US or Canada. You can donate by CC or check. Any questions, please email.

The kids & I on the motorcycle I have been using.

Becky & the kids soaked & loving it after our run in the rain.

Becky at one of the schools we went to with our church.

A chameleon one of kids found while we were there.

Jay speaking at a chapel on the construction site.

Bethany's birthday party in March.

 

Jay took the kids out for some soft-serve ice cream one Saturday.

Happy African-versary!

Happy March everybody! I hope everyone is doing well in the different parts of the world that are presently cold and require everyone to bundle up. I keep waiting for our kids to ask why the kids, in the books we read with them, put on a bunch of clothes before they go outside. In the meantime, the Whisnands are enjoying our sunshine and the beginning of the end of the dry season.

African-versary, Birthdays & loving work!

• First, March 13^th will mark the 1 year anniversary since we arrived in Uganda. Wow. Seems like a surreal statement. In some ways, it seems like we just got here and we are still in the Matatu (think of a 15 passenger van for hire) at 1:30 in the morning driving to our place after just flying in. And in other ways, so much has happened in the last year and we have built great relationships. I have recently learned that an expat friend here will not be coming back to Uganda as originally planned. Their family went back to the US for a bit and while home they have felt God leading them in another direction. I’m excited for them that God is leading them to new things and that they are following His leading but I was bummed my friend wouldn’t be coming back. It’s funny living in a place that people come and go so much and even we have only committed for 2 years, but you still get to know people and build relationships because that’s a lot of what life is about: the people around us. It’s not great when people leave or when you leave but I guess that means the relationships meant something if it’s hard. Anyway, we can’t believe we have been here a year and we are looking forward to year #2.

• Second, both Bethany & Becky’s birthdays are this month! Bethany will be 3 on the 25^th and Becky will be………..ummmm……..25 on the 28^th. Feel free to send birthday wishes and cards if you wish. Happy Birthday!! (Just for the record, I’m not turning 25…- Becky)

• Last, the main project I have been working on since being in Uganda is coming along nicely. As a recap, EMI is building a new office building in partnership with MAF (Mission Aviation Fellowship) that will be both organizations’ new home in Uganda for the foreseeable future. For all those construction people out there, we have just topped out the building and are starting our moving along on our masonry. We are trying some new things for EMI East Africa on this project like concrete grinding & polishing, an aluminum window subcontract and a steel truss subcontract to name a few. Anyway, I seem to get busier and busier everyday but we have a great team working together (Shout-out to Steve, John, Richard, Yusuf, Matt, Cossy, Carey and the guys actually doing the work) and I love my work.  I have attached a few pictures below of how the building looks as of last week.

Financial & Support Update

• The past year our support has been spot on. Looking back, EMI did a great job of preparing us to come and helping us make a realistic budget. We have met our budget every month and have everything we need. So this point is a thank you to everyone who helped us this past year. Thank you so much for believing in our family and supporting what we are doing here in Uganda.

• This next year has gotten a bit more complicated. We have made a decision that is going to increase our costs a bit and some unknown/new costs have arisen as well.

• First, as we have talked about before, this year both Nathaniel & Bethany have been going to pre-school 3 days a week. Their tuition was free as Becky was teaching at the same school. Looking forward, Becky is planning to not teach this next year but we also really want Nathaniel & Bethany to stay at this school. It’s been great for them and they love it. But where would we get the money? God knows. In addition to the kids getting free tuition this year, Becky has also been getting a salary. We have saved all this so far. A few weeks ago we inquired about tuition costs for the kids next year and we received a quote for $3,613.60 USD. We then calculated what we will have from Becky’s salary after this school year ends and it worked out to be $3,600! It was a pretty cool situation of God providing and I’m sure we can find the $13.60 somewhere.

• Second, we have been informed by our EMI sending office, EMI Canada in Calgary, that due to the increased amount of Canadian staff that are working in overseas offices, they have hired an additional support staff member to help with all the administrative tasks that come with a support based organization. What that means for us is that, starting this month, we need to raise an additional $200 per month to help support this new office role: this works out to $2, 400 for the rest of our year here.  We need everyone’s help on this. If this is something you would be willing to help with all or part of, please see the support info below.

• Last, as discussed above, EMI East Africa is currently building a new office that we will be moving into this coming August. The location of this new office is about a 40 minute drive away from where we currently live. My current office is a 12 minute walk from where we live and currently Becky uses the car for her work, the kids’ school, groceries and the thousand other things she does every week. Since we want to keep the kids in their current school, we are planning to stay where we live which means I will need to commute. Our solution to this transportation problem is for me to get a motorcycle. We feel it’s a great option as a motorcycle is a widely used mode of transportation here in Kampala and there are lots of new & used options for sale. It doesn’t hurt that it will be awesome as well! I have attached a picture below of a new local style of road bike I probably will get as they are relatively inexpensive, easy to maintain and it would be easy to sell at a later date. When it comes down to cost I am going to need $1,200 to $1,500 to get a bike and some gear (helmet, etc.). If this is something you would be willing to help with all or part of, please see the support info below. I know there are lots of motorcycle guys out there who want to help support adding a member to the group. J

Support Info

If you want to contribute to our support account, please go to http://emiworld.org/donate.php. There are options for donating from the US or Canada. You can donate by CC or check. Any questions, please email me at jaywhisnand@gmail.com.

Thank you so much everyone. Here goes another year!

The Whisnands (P.S. pictures are below.)

A picture of a "Boda" similar to what Jay might be getting for a motorcycle

Here is the project Jay is working on.

Becky's 7/8th Grade class doing a chemistry experiment this past week.

Nathaniel went to site with Jay yesterday and we got to see the planes.

Becky & Jay on a Valentine's Day date.

Bethany & Nathaniel our on way to church (taken this morning).