Day 13: Dancing Lessons from God

Today was lovely, slow and easy. We had friends come to breakfast and had a good long time to catch up with each other. We ate under Phoebe’s gazebo surrounded by flowering fruit trees.

Phoebe and I packed for Malawi and Zak packed to go back to New York. We played Five Crowns and walked around Phoebe’s grounds to get prepared for long stretches of sitting on planes. We even visited the pigs one last time.

We had a date with Father Francis for dinner. He said an event was happening at the seminary but that we’d have our meal together. When we got there all the seminary students plus a bunch of alumni were outside seated in chairs around an altar. Several young men arranged chairs for us and said they were expecting us. I leaned over to Zak and said this looks like they are set up for Mass. And that’s exactly what we were in for. Being mostly in the local language Zak was totally lost and though I couldn’t understand the words I got a lot of the cadence of familiar prayers. Then there were speeches and gifts given to the returning priests and eventually we broke for dinner.

It was a blessing in disguise, as Phoebe pointed out because we weren’t going to the airport until midnight and chances of us staying awake without a diversion would be pretty slim. The whole thing made for a perfect last night in Uganda.

Dinner was great but best of all was the dancing that followed. 400+  boys started to dance and OMG they were amazing. I love modern dance and have gone to see every dance company I can find. I swear everyone of these guys could be professional. We couldn’t take our eyes off of them but we had our favorites too. We kept nudging each other saying, “look at what he’s doing now”. They danced for an hour and ten minutes and only stopped when one of the priests announced that  it was time for bed, BUT take a shower first.

I smiled through the whole thing. By the time it was over it was time to go to the airport. Father Francis drove us and Zak came along too. It’s always sad to say goodbye and this time was no different.

Kurt Vonnegut once wrote that travel interruptions were “dancing lessons from God”. Boy are we learning to dance! Our outbound flight from Nairobi to Entebbe was delayed. Both Brynn and Zak had to rebook flights home as both their return flights got cancelled and Phoebe and I had to book new flights to Lilongwe because our flights were also cancelled. We had been on a flight that would take us 2 hours to get to Malawi. The next best thing and the one we are now taking is an eleven-hour flight that leaves at 2:45 am. We are patiently waiting at the gate as I write this at 12:43 am. I’m not a night owl as anyone who knows me will tell you but I’m learning to dance and these are the steps.

Next stop Addis and then Lilongwe.