Nze Katie: Easter

Easter is not just a one-day celebration here at Noah’s Ark; this time, the festivities lasted a full five days, as we had both our normal Easter programs and some fun additions thanks to a generous supporter and friend to the organization. Here is what our long weekend in April looked like:

Thursday

10:00 a.m. :: Easter Carols

The New Horizon schools put on Easter and Christmas carols every year as a chance to share the Bible stories with parents and people from the community. Each class gives a presentation with its own part of the story conveyed through dance, drama, songs, and poems. This year Christian and I were called upon to play music for the nursery school’s portion of carols. For a couple of weeks prior to carols, we visited the nursery school everyday to practice their song and try playing background music while they acted out the Easter story. Those little kids were pretty good actors! We then got to accompany them in the performance, which is always fun.

After carols in the morning, the students had lunch and then school broke off for the long weekend.

Friday

9:00 a.m. :: Bouncy Castles

There is a businessman from Kampala who has fallen in love with Noah’s Ark and the children and loves to bless them. As an Easter treat, he sent three bouncy castles to us for four days. We set them up at the primary school and the children were down there as often as possible in their free time. Even the toddlers, who usually stay at home, were allowed to come down and bounce in the smallest one while the older kids enjoyed the huge slides in the bigger castles. I also went down a few times—purely for the children, of course.

5:00 p.m. :: Walk with the Cross

Traditionally, on Good Friday everyone on the compound from primary school up take part in a walk with the cross. This year we started near the children’s home, where Pastor Adrian told us the beginning of the crucifixion story. After hearing that, the older children carried three crosses in front of the rest of us while the marching band played as we walked.

We marched around the compound together, making stops along the way to hear more of the story and reflect on what this day is about. It is supposed to be a somber, meditative walk, but with so many children who don’t understand the meanings of somber and meditative it is always a bit more lively than intentioned. We ended at the church, where Piet gave a short talk and then everyone dispersed for supper.

Saturday

9:00 a.m. :: Bouncy Castles

One day was not enough!

11:00 a.m. :: Egg Painting

I’m not sure if we do this because it is a Ugandan tradition or a Dutch one, but the children have fun all the same. This was the only part of which I was in charge this year, which was nice. We opened up two classrooms at the primary school and very nicely set out watercolors, paintbrushes, newspapers and water, which of course only stayed nice until the first group came in.

We called in one class at a time to paint their hard-boiled eggs. The watercolors don’t work as well as real dye, but with over one hundred children painting we went with what most easily fit the bill. Amazingly, it only took about an hour for them to paint all three hundred eggs, and a few of them even looked nice!

2:00 p.m. :: Bouncy Castles

Because what else would they do in the afternoon?

Sunday

9:00 a.m. :: Sunday School

Every Sunday morning the children from the home and family units, from toddlers up to P.7 (the oldest primary class), have Sunday school. They start as a big group with praise and worship and an introduction to the lesson for that day, and then they break into smaller groups by age for a more in-depth lesson and age-appropriate activity. Aunties and uncles from the compound volunteer to teach different classes, as well as some teenagers who are growing in their roles as leaders. It takes a dedicated group of servants to regularly teach the Bible to that many children, and Christian has been planning and overseeing all of Sunday school for a couple of years now.

11:00 a.m. :: Easter Egg Hunt

After Sunday school, the children return home and we lock them inside so they can’t find the eggs on the playground. Of course, an entire wall of the living room in the home is windows so locking them up doesn’t completely help, but it’s better than nothing.

Starting from the toddlers, we bring out one group of children at a time. They get to wander around the playground and find two eggs, bring them back to the tray and go inside. Some of the young ones need a lot of help managing that. Actually, they were hidden so well this year I think I found only one egg before a child did. It was sad.

The found eggs are counted to make sure we don’t lose too many outside, and some are re-hidden to make sure all the kids get to find something. After that, everyone gets to eat one with lunch.

2:00 p.m. :: Church

Our church services are always held in the afternoon, partly because Sunday school is in the morning and we want the older children to be able to attend church as well. The kids get to come to church when they turn six years old; everyone under six takes a nap in the afternoon. We start with praise and worship led by one of three groups: adults, teenagers, or children. After that comes testimony time, where anyone can come up and share a short story about what God has done in their life in the past week. This gets a bit misconstrued by the children, who like to come up and thank God that everyone is dressed nicely every single week, but it is also cute to hear them thank God for swimming and that we are all still alive. We often have presentations of songs or dances by groups of people, and then Pastor John gives a message. (Pastor John is also the pastor of another church down the road. He is not at Noah’s Ark during the week, so Pastor Adrian, our youth pastor, is known as the campus pastor as well. Sometimes they take turns giving the Sunday sermon, but most of that responsibility lies with Pastor John. I have learned a lot from him.)

4:00 p.m. :: Bouncy Castles

How did they go most of the day without them?

6:00 p.m. :: Barbecue

Four times a year the children and some staff have an outdoor barbecue together: Christmas, Easter, and Piet and Pita’s birthdays. There is a good mix of Ugandan and western food: hamburgers, sausages, chapatis, coleslaw, and soda. We set out over a hundred chairs in the playground and get to mingle with kids of all ages as we eat and laugh and accidentally make a mess. We now have five dogs (“we” meaning Noah’s Ark, not me and Christian) who very much enjoyed an outdoor meal with kids who drop things.