When two people or a group of people come together, from different societies, stories, and different backgrounds, there is need to understand how to blend together so that at least one party doesn’t feel left out. I started seeing myself connecting with a family that came to support me and sponsor me. At first it fealt like this normal sponsorship. The child is told you have a sponsor and you will be taken to school from today; your parents won’t be paying your fees and that’s it. It has happened that way and the idea is that consistent. The thing Sponsors need to understand is the fact that such kind of person needs a sponsor, and that’s the fact, but above all, this child needs more than a sponsor. This child needs someone to call ‘Mom,’ someone to call ‘Dad’ and maybe someone to see as a sibling. A child that is sponsored is 95% an orphan or with a guardian, single mom or any Good Samaritan. This child needs a sense of belonging and have pride in it. This is what we overlook and rush to the idea that children need fees to go to school and study. Children need someone they can rely on as they grow.
I was introduced to sponsorship and I was taken to school. This brought a feeling that someone miles away wants me, a hopeless African child to go to school. Yes, I needed that. I had to go to school because we were promised that education is the key to success. The sad reality is that those that said this keep on changing the padlocks . This family that took in my brother and I, might have prayed about it. They became a family from a far. They would pay tickets across the sea and come visit us in our single ramshackle room. This may sound so basic to you, but it was so important. Growing up without a father to teach you how to repair a broken pipe, ride a bike or tell you what a guy must do, makes you feel lonely. You needed someone you could think of as a dad. This is what this family brought into our lives. At least you would sit down and know that even when things are tough , as a man, I have an earthly father who can speak to me and a Heavenly Father who I can reach out through prayer.
Lonely Human
I am a lonely human. I like sitting alone and just observe the world and figure out why people do what they do. When ideas of visits from our American family came in, I knew this wasn’t my thing. Even the first day of meeting, Simon was busy running around with Dad Charlie Brewer and I , on the other side was seated in a corner, holding my small math book and figuring out numbers. I didn’t have the motivation and morale to go mingle with this group of whites. They were so fresh and smelt nice and I didn’t feel the need to be included. I felt that I wasn’t fit for this. Poor boy! It’s these thoughts that kept on making me Deny myself of the many things that the Lord was showing me that I actually didn’t realize. Sometimes we just deny ourselves people and things that we actually need. I could remember Dad Charlie, but I am 100% sure I didn’t see his daughter, Lashae Bowen that trip. I was so consumed in being me and living life the best way I knew how – Lonely.
I am an introvert. I also give myself a lot of time before engaging with anyone. I understand that I can’t associate with anyone before knowing how they do stuff, how they react to a situation or how they control moments in their lives .
Learning About Americans
When our American Family started out taking care of us, school fees and visits at least every year, my mind slowly started opening up to the realities of life. Just because you are born in poverty, doesn’t mean you should ignore the blessings God has brought ahead of you. I started wanting to learn more about Americans , what taboos they have, why they do the things they do, what is their idea about life. I learnt all these through the lens of the Brewer Family. They had this blog called “Brewer Bunch Happenings.” I am a reader, every time they were planning a visit, they would go and write about it and ask people to pray . In that blog, they could include who they would be coming with . My job as a young man, was to go, read this blog and start searching about the different people they were coming with. I don’t want to associate with someone I had no clue about.
Why Spend All This Money To Come Visit?
Sometimes, I would ask myself why do they need to pay all these dollars and come to visit me in Africa? They can send this money to go towards helping several children like me, is what I was thinking. I even researched about the money spent paying for a plane traveling to and from Africa to the United States. Little did I know that these are the things that really matter; going to places and being the hands and feet of Jesus. If Charlie didn’t travel, they would not have met us. I started seeing these visits as important as sponsoring a child. Who wants to grow up without a place to call family?
Their Visits Would Freak Me Out
The visits where at least once every year, and they would freak me out. I was a tiny boy, short and standing beside a fellow boy below my age, and taller and more healthier than me made me feel like we are not the same . These people are from a different planet. I really learnt a lot from my American Family. I had watched American movies and I thought things would be just like that. For example, in American movies, you would see a boy, by pass a girl and mistakenly knock her, and her books fall down. Then the guy goes down to pick them us, gaze into the girl’s eyes and at the end of the year, they would be their prom date. This kind of behavior wouldn’t actually feel right where I grew up from. The societies we grew up from have different beliefs and cultures.
In our society, you don’t talk to a parent while standing. In my culture, you can’t call Elders by their name. That would earn you some beatings. It’s termed as a sense of undiscipline. In our society as well, you don’t reply to parents or someone older than you when they are saying something. Through these visits, I got to realize that Americans where very free with this. They understood that a child is a human and maybe their opinions had to be heard as well. I was the one that normally stayed home with mom, while Simon headed with the family to any places . It was really a relief to me because I was still studying the type of people I was calling a family. It was hard, especially to someone like me who had a low self esteem about themselves. I was introduced to many new ideas from this family .
They were Americans but one thing that stood out, was the love they had for Jesus. I got to witness this from Reece, one of the sons, who had travelled to Uganda at a young age; this kid could speak and you would know that this was Jesus speaking through him. I think it was due to the way of being brought up at home. I loved this about him.
Naming Myself
These continuous visits kept on opening my eyes to life outside my small society. I got to see the world above my narrow lens. I got to understand that God made us as humans, and his creations. He didn’t make an American, an African, a black or white, but a Man. All my experience with Americans, made me see the beauty about this world, the compassion in this world. I gave myself the name “Brewer” which was a family name. I wanted to be part of this family , not as sponsors but as a family. At one point I said I wished this family came early, I would have registered this as my name. I used the name on my social media and I wanted to have pride in it as my name.
My Eyes Were Opened
As much as these visits freaked me out, and I didn’t really want to go spend days with this family when they came, not because I didn’t like them, but because I wasn’t used to this kind of life. I wasn’t ready to experience life that way. When will you be ready to experience life that way, if you don’t experience it at the moment? They could come, sit, talk to me and my mom at home , and they would leave with Simon and then come back to maybe say goodbye. It was one trip where they came and I joined them. It was Mom, Dad, Lashae, Kim Klippert, Alexis, and Brenda and Jenna. I don’t know where I got the motivation but I did join them; and my eyes again, were open to a lot of things. We went to these nice places, ate nice food and travelled in cars almost everyday. This kind of life, I didn’t budget for it in my life. I kept on asking myself why someone would spend a lot of money to buy something they can get cheaply . It was my first time of having a milkshake , which we had at Watoto. If I remember, it was my first time to go to the airport, it was also my first time to go to Cafe Javas. I never imagined myself eating a meal that costs 70,000 Ugandans shillings (about $20) or more . This was money spent by a family for a month. Sometimes I looked at this as wastage. Whenever I was eating this kind of meal, I had this thought in my mind ‘there is a child out there who is going to bed hungry, and I am here having a meal of this price, and I won’t even finish it.’ Whenever I was handed the menu, I made sure I looked out for the cheapest meal and drink. But everything seemed expensive for me. I had to eat anyway and keep my thoughts to myself. It was society upbringing that caused this and made me feel less of myself. Even when we had these moments of luxury, we didn’t give up on doing God’s job, being generous and going where he had sent us and meeting the need there.
Introducing Myself
The other thing that always made me freak out was when in church, you could be assigned the front seats and be taken as important visitors. Then called out to talk about ourselves and the church would make noise and be happy. That made me feel important and feel like am a white skin also 😂. I could with much pride, introduce myself with the name Patrick Brewer. I just didn’t like being put on reserved seats. I really didn’t believe in that. I just think we are all the same before God.
How In The World…..
My thoughts kept on wondering how the world out there is living such a life and yet back here, things are far different. It was until one day when we had dinner with Michael Mozley(a missionary) and Dad (Charlie Brewer) at a place called, The Bistro, that my thoughts had to shift towards some things. I was doing a course about filmmaking, because I believe in stories. Simon calls me and says we have dinner together. Make it to Kireka after school. I took a boda (motocycle taxi) from school to Kireka and they were there waiting patiently for me. We had a nice meal and they had a really great men talk. I think it was so useless for me at that time because I was busy asking myself how it’s possible to be in that place . After dinner, we had a walk through the parking and there was a huge building that was across the way. We headed that way and I discovered later that it was called, Acacia Mall. This was a place that I knew was for the rich families. There was literally everything. A movie theatre, shops that do different merchandise. I passed an Adidas shop that was selling sneakers at $200. I made calculations and I was thinking there is no way in life I am ever going to buy that. This was my first time in this place and my first time standing on an escalator. I always saw it in movies but didn’t have an experience with it until then. Those that were there can tell about it. In the moment, as we were in that place , Dad (Charlie Brewer ) made a statement that forever changed my perspective. My Dad said to us, “I know you boys think this place is for rich people, but if these people, who might even know less about Jesus can come and enjoy this place, what about you boys that love Jesus. Once in a while, understand that this place belongs to you. It’s not special for a group of people. You can come here as well”
Thank You For Today, Dad
They may not be the exact words he used but what he said was communicating directly to me. It spoke to me. It made me feel different about myself. It gave me a different perspective on how I saw and analyzed things. They dropped me around town so that I could head back home. I remember I packed part of what I couldn’t finish of dinner and we got some for mom. As I was leaving, I hugged Dad and told him, “Thank you dad for today. “
I didn’t say that for the meal, but for the experience I had, for the perceptions I saw and for having life in a different place. At the end of it all, I went home, on a chair , and started thinking about everything. Realizing everything and looking at life in another way. These American visits gave life a meaning to me and made me live a purpose driven life through the friendships and connections I had. I had a family, but I got friends through these families. You know someone overseas sending you a message to know how you are. Someone sending you a hand written letter to say hello. Someone sending you money and asking you to buy something you wish you to have, but never bought. Someone who hugs you and tells you they love you. It’s these small things that really matter.
Three Sides To Everything
Every experience has three sides, your opinion, other people’s opinions and the Truth. The truth is that our differences shouldn’t diminish us, they must make us special. People are people, life is life everywhere. We shouldn’t hold ourselves onto what we know, based on how we grew up or where be come from. We should remind ourselves that we need to be willing to learn something new whenever we encounter a new society or someone different from us. These things do not show us on what we need to see, but rather, where we need to go. Sometimes we need to get out of our comfort zone and go experience life differently. People don’t go to nice places or eat nice food of spend because they have money. Some people do it out of love, some understand that once in a lifetime, you need to treat yourself to something special. I understand that just like anyone, Americans work extremely hard to put anything on table. They don’t have the money or the means to make things happen, they make things happen by working hard. I saw Dad (Charlie Brewer) working hard and providing for his family as a man. That didn’t stop him from taking time off to rest because resting is very important. His words always walk in my mind . Sometimes he says them unknowingly but they are the things that keep me moving. One day he said, “I always want my children to be victorious. I want them to be winners and to be always the first.”
Speaking Words Of Life Hold You Up
This is a mindset that you could keep with you and work life with it. It’s something you really need to have in order to be focused in life. Sometimes life gets hard but if you have people in your mind that speak life, or have spoken something to you, It holds you up and helps you navigate the next steps of your life.
