Kibaale students make great teachers!

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted 20 days

ago

Life Lately

We emailed our latest newsletter out today, if you did not receive one and would like to be added to our list, let us know!  - dyckuganda@gmail.comHere is just a little update on the past couple of months!The schools in Kibaale are doing really well overall, there have been a lot of cases of Typhoid recently reported and this is the season where Malaria increases, so please keep the health of our staff and students in your prayers.A special gift was just given for a new mud house for one of our vocational students. Our family was able to participate in mudding the new house with the Grade 6 students in Kibaale as well some of the kids teachers and classmates from Masaka spent the

day helping out.Our kids are pretty happy to be finished school for the summer!! They are loving more time to spend in Kibaale with friends. While at the Timothy Centre they are helping out with yard work; raking is a lot harder than it looks they commented!The agriculture projects we are working on are all doing very well. Acres of maize is being grown in Kibaale to go towards the lunch that is cooked for 1200 people each day as well given out as famine relief. We are especially impressed with the almost 100 families that are coming to help out in the fields on our community work days!!

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

3 months

ago

Living in Uganda by Avin Dyck

My name is Avin Dyck, I am in grade five and I am 11 years old. I live in Uganda, which is in East Africa. When I first moved here at the age of 4 I lived in a place named Mpigi. In Mpigi we lived at an orphanage for 54 kids, I loved staying there and playing with all those kids. We still visit sometimes and I love to see my friends there.Now I’m living in a place named Kibaale. In Kibaale we have a school for almost 1,000 needy kids. It’s one of my favorite places in Uganda because of playing with all the kids at our school, especially getting to be with my sponsor child and friend Stella who is the same age as me and also wants the same future as me as a Doctor. Also we live right by the staff daycare where I love to help out and to see one of my favorite babies in Kibaale, her name is Patience!  I also get to go on home visits to give students and their family’s gifts that they really need like goats, food, shoes, or a bicycle but the best is when they get a new house and we get to be part of making the mud house! I like to join in with the Kibaale school when the students go on outreach in the community, they sometimes help fix houses, give away school supplies to schools that don’t have enough or visit hospitals. Part of the week we also live near a town called Masaka; we stay at the Timothy Centre, a high school for girls. I love all of the space I have to play there and to spend time with our puppy Tipper that lives there. I love playing with her and cuddling her, with me she is very calm but with my brothers she is very playful. In Masaka I go to a school on Mondays and Tuesdays for missionary kids. I also have online school for English and French; I love my English course and am really enjoying learning French but am thinking of taking Spanish next year. I also have homeschooling with my mom, brothers Joel and Finn, and little sister, Mazzy. I get to help with teaching Mazzy, we usually do Math together, she loves Math so that is fun to teach her.What I miss about home is my friends, my school, and actually my old house. But what I love about Uganda is my new friends, my new school, and my 2 new homes. I might really miss Canada but if I had to choose where to live it is Uganda, no contest! Some of the reasons Uganda would win is the way I feel God is much more with me here than He ever was before, I feel like He really tells me how to care for the people living here. I also love the heat every day and of course the lovely babies, I am so thankful that there is always

cute babies around for us to cuddle and help take care of. Also every morning you’ll wake up to see the birds flying by chirping, and seeing the sun every morning shows me that today will be even better than yesterday! Also posted on www.jeffshan.blogspot.com with more photos.

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

3 months

ago

Living in Uganda by Finn Dyck

My name is Finn Dyck. I am in Grade 4 and I live in Uganda. I first moved here when I was 2 years old to a place called Mpigi where there is a children’s home for 54 orphans that is part of our church at home, Peace Portal.Now I live in a place called Kibaale, it is 4 hours from the city. There are 1,000 students that come to our school every day.  My favorite thing to do there is climb trees and play soccer with the students. I also like to play with the babies at the staff daycare. My

favorite babies are Patience and Julia. We have two houses, Kibaale is in the village and The Timothy Centre with my parent’s offices and a boarding school for girls is near Masaka town. I go to a school on Monday and Tuesday every week, we call it Danish school because Danish people set it up but it’s a small school for missionary kids. On the other days I am homeschooled by my Mom, those days I love when I can do school work on the computer, like my math program or when I can type instead of write.My favorite place to live is in Kibaale because there are families around and I love seeing all the kids come to school every day. What I love about being at the Timothy Centre is going to Danish school with my best friend.My favorite Ugandan food to eat is rice and beans with g-nut sauce, there’s also matooke, which is like a cooked banana, but I don’t like it.  One of the things we do for work is to go visit the student’s homes and see their families, we give away gift baskets and goats or water collectors and sometimes we build mud huts for people that don’t have a proper home. We get to actually make the mud in front of the new house and then put the mud into the wood frame. It’s one of my favorite things to do.I have a dog, Tipper, she is a typical village dog that was a puppy from our security dogs in Kibaale. We named her after a truck in Uganda that would be called a dump truck in Canada.  She loves chasing other wild dogs and squirrel’s which is good because the squirrel’s wreck our gardens. We grow tomatoes, pineapples, lettuce and eggplant that we eat.I love going on safari drives, I have seen lions, elephants, leopards, warthogs, crocodile, hippos, monkeys, zebras, giraffes, and hyenas, but not all in one day!  My favorite animal to see on safari is lions. Once an elephant tried to charge our car but my Dad was driving and he got us out of the way.Some of the things I miss about Canada when I live in Uganda are my friends and my cousins, and I also miss Menchies and McDonald’s but a KFC just opened here which is really good.Also posted on www.jeffshan.blogspot.com with more photos.

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

3 months

ago

Spring Break {with the PA Outreach Team & Wiebe Family}

Kibaale was a full house last week with the Pacific Academy Outreach team and our friend's Cliff and Rachel Wiebe along with their kids and extended family, who all came to work in our school's, help with two mud houses, and see first hand everything that goes on in Kibaale!We began the week with a sports day for our Primary School classes, which is about 400 kids! It took all of our visitors helping out to make it a great success!!  Our own kids even helped out with running stations this year instead of participating, Avin helped with the 3-legged race which is always a favourite for the kids.  Joel was in charge of netball since he was the only one to have even seen it being played before, thankfully one of our teachers helped him as there are a lot of rules to the game! Finn and Jacob Wiebe helped with volleyball, Finn couldn't sit out every game though, he had to join in on the fun! Mazzy and Chloe Wiebe joined a class and went through all the stations together, it was a really hot day but they did great at keeping up! Rachel began sponsoring this Communities of Hope family when she was living (and working as the Director of Finance) in Kibaale in 2009. We all instantly fell in love with this Grandpa who is caring for several of his grandchildren. His home was in very bad shape and actually fell down a few months ago, so we're incredibly thankful to the Wiebe family and everyone that gave towards a new house for this family! The PA Outreach team was also able to mud a new house for a very needy Grade 1 student and her family, they were so thankful!!  The Outreach team from Pacific Academy worked alongside all of the Grade 6 students from Kibaale, it was great to see everyone working as a team and also for the team to get to know some of the Kibaale students better.The team had a great afternoon playing with the kids from the staff daycare in Kibaale, they sang songs together, made bracelets, and gave out some great new toys!We were sad to say goodbye to the Wiebe family but we're SO thankful that they were able to spend this week with us in Uganda! The PA Outreach team is on safari today but we're excited to spend a couple more days with them at the Timothy Centre and in Kampala before they fly out on Thursday night. More pictures of our week in Kibaale can be seen

at www.jeffshan.blogspot.com

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

5 months

ago

Back to School!

February might be one of our favourite months in Kibaale, after the long 2 month break it is amazing to see almost 1,000 students back on campus every day.

It is especially fun to see the brand new Nursery students, stay tuned for information on sponsoring them very soon!!We are very excited to be back to routine with the start of this new school year and are so thankful for all the teachers and staff committed to Kibaale, please pray with us for an amazing year!!More photos at www.jeffshan.blogspot.com

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

5 months

ago

Kibaale, Masaka, Mpigi & Jinja {with Grandma!}

We were recently blessed to have our first personal visitor, my Mom just spent 3 weeks with us in Uganda! Spending time in Kibaale was definitely a highlight, especially getting to see Jonathan who Mom has been sponsoring for 6 years now.While in Mpigi everyone was getting the maize ready to be milled into flour, Mama Rose gave our kids a quick lesson so they could help out. It was actually a lot of work and they ended up with blisters, but they had a lot of fun!Last stop, Jinja! It was great to have a couple days to just hang out before Mom flew out, but we were also so thankful for the opportunity to meet up with a friend from our home church in Canada, she is also living in Uganda, serving at Ekisa, an orphanage for children with special needs. It was a beautiful and peaceful home that is having a huge impact in Jinja!Thank you Grandma for a great visit, come back soon!!More photos can be seen at www.jeffshan.blogspot.com

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

6 months

ago

All is Bright

Today in Denmark they celebrate Saint Lucia Day, where young women carry lights and pass out sweets, it is the start to their Christmas celebrations. Since the expat school our children attend is run by a Danish family they were able to learn about this holiday at school and then participate in the celebration!We went first to the babies home which is always a lot of fun, the little kids loved the cookies and attention! Later this evening they were also able to perform at a barbecue, it was very pretty in the dark with their candles. For the first time this year it is beginning to feel like Christmas!

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

7 months

ago

Christmas Cup

Jeff has been looking forward to this tournament since 2011! The 3 previous years we spent living in Uganda we sponsored an annual soccer tournament with the grand prize of a cow to one of our neighboring villages, The Christmas Cup. Kibaale Community Centre won the chance to compete in the final game!GO KIBAALE!!!

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

7 months

ago

Happy Saturday!

First thing this morning the girls in Economics at Timothy Girls High School were out in the yard checking on the cabbage they are growing as part of their class. This garden is right by our house so the kids went out to see what they were doing and ended up getting them to play jump rope with them. It may have distracted them a little, but they really did take turns working and playing! 

Gift Giving {PA Team}

An amazing group from Pacific Academy School was here last week to help out our Sponsorship office in Uganda at their busiest time of year! They worked with the staff here to organize special gifts; putting together hundreds of gift baskets, giving out gifts to the students, taking photos and helping the students write their thank you letters. It was so helpful to have their extra hands at this busy time and also so nice for us to see some familiar faces from home and to meet some new ones too!!THANK YOU to everyone who gave so generously this year, every child in Kibaale will receive a Christmas gift!!!

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

8 months

ago

Kibaale Daycare

The staff daycare in Kibaale is one of our favourite places to hang out, there are 37 kids that are cared for each day. In the mornings it's usually pretty calm with the babies and toddlers, but at lunch time 15 nursery students join in and it can get a little wild! They spend most of the afternoon outside in the yard playing games, soccer, or on one of the swings in a tree in our backyard. Our kids love to help out and play along with them. More photos at www.jeffshan.blogspot.com

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

9 months

ago

Celebrations!

We were able to take part in 2 celebrations this past week. At the Timothy Centre we had a Leavers Party (aka Prom) for the S6 girls. They have been running around planning and getting ready for this day for weeks now! It was a beautiful day and it was especially fun to see them all dressed up. There was a special band for the day and after lunch they ended with a great dance party!This week was also Uganda's Independence Day! The Secondary School Patriotism Club in Kibaale had a celebration at school the following day where many of the local politicians and representatives of the army came as special guests.The secondary students marched several times around the field, there were some special songs, speeches and we finished with lunch. It was really fun to see the kids so involved in every step of the day from set up to take down, and the obvious pride they have in their school and country, it was quite a privilege for us to be part

of the celebration!More photos at www.jeffshan.blogspot.com

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

9 months

ago

The Jeff Cup

Today at the Timothy Centre we hosted the First Annual Timothy Centre Netball Tournament aka The Jeff Cup! We invited serval

schools to join us from the surrounding area, and of course our Kibaale girls team came out too! It's a great way to promote our school for next year, giving students from other schools a first look at the Timothy Girls School!We were able to host almost 200 students here today!Congratulations to our Timothy Girls who won first place and to our Kibaale girls who won second place!!!More photos at www.jeffshan.blogspot.com

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

9 months

ago

Planes, Trains & Automobiles

We had been planning a trip with a few of our co-workers to Kenya to visit a project, Free the Children that is running programs very similar to those in Kibaale and the Timothy Centre. When the dates were finally confirmed we realized it was perfect timing to add a family vacation to the trip! It worked best for us to go first on our vacation to the Kenya Coast and then meet up with our co-workers. On our last full day at the coast we were saddened and shocked by the news that there was a terrorist attack at Westgate Mall in Nairobi. We decided it would be best to postpone our visit to Free the Children, we hope to reschedule a few months from now when things have settled down.We had some last minute rearranging of flights to organize and we were surprised at how easily things worked out, but of course on the day of things weren't all that smooth. It ended up taking 27 hours to get from our hotel back home to Uganda, but it was a fun adventure!!We had always planned to take the train overnight from Mombasa to Nairobi, it's a bit longer journey, but less money than flying and the

kids were really excited to try it! It should have been a 14 hour journey, so when we woke up at 7am we were expecting to be nearing Nairobi, but were told that the train was not traveling at full speed due to a complication with the locomotive and we were still 6 hours away. That would have had us 2 hours late for our flight! The manager of the train came to talk to us and said if we got out at the next stop he'd arrange a taxi for us and we should be able to drive to the airport in 3 hours. This would be cutting it really close, but Jeff's phone was dead and mine out of airtime, so we couldn't change our flight again, we thought we might as well try! We were able to check in just in time and the airport isn't near the city centre, so we felt safe the entire time!We are now back in Uganda and are so thankful for everyone who was praying for our safe return!--More photos at www.jeffshan.blogspot.com

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

10 months

ago

Teacher Training

 During Term Break at the Timothy Girls College our students return to their homes and the dorms and classrooms are used for a

Christian teacher training course, offering a Certificate in Christian Education. Our colleague Arleen has been working for years developing and writing the curriculum for this course. After years of traveling all over Uganda and East Africa teaching and visiting other schools it was with a lot of excitement that we began hosting this course at the Timothy Centre 2 years ago. This is a 2 year course held during each school holiday, which is 3 times per year. The class we just hosted was in their last term and have now graduated the program! It is such an exciting part of the work we do in Masaka, education is an amazing gift we can give these children, but to have the opportunity to work with the teachers, and to strengthen their ability to teach from a Biblical Worldview is a tremendous gift!

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

10 months

ago

Mazzy's Malaria

Mazzy woke up Thursday morning completely herself, but by 10 am was under a blanket and asleep on the couch, and it was a very warm day! Within the hour she was at the clinic, we are not on anti-malarial medication because we are here long term, so we immediately get checked at the first sign of a fever. We were shocked to hear that Mazzy had Severe (or complicated) Malaria. With a parasite count so high you'd think she'd have been feeling sick for days!!She was moved to the hospital in Masaka and treated with an IV drip every 8 hours, when her blood was checked again on Saturday the

malaria was not gone, so they continued with an injection treatment. This morning her fever broke and her blood test was clear, she has a few days of oral medicine to take and can now just take it easy at home and regain her strength. THANK YOU to everyone who has prayed for Mazzy these past few days, we have felt such peace knowing she was covered in prayer by friends and family here in Uganda and back at home!!!

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

10 months

ago

Kibaale Weekend

It is term break again in Uganda! We have been very busy with work in Kampala and at the Timothy Centre this past week, but are thankful to have spent the weekend there to check in on the projects going on!As the school is closed it is a great opportunity to get maintenance work done. This term break we are fixing the dining hall, putting new improved stoves in the kitchen and painting the primary school.

We're also doing a bit of updating in the kitchen in our home as well the main guest house, they are both coming along really well!! The cupboards and tiling should be done next week and then we will paint and put the hardware on ourselves.Mazzy is always very excited to be in Kibaale during the break, her very good friend Esther is home from boarding school!! The Tumwebaze family are our next door neighbours, they have 4 kids, also 2 boys and 2 girls. They are very cute and our kids have so much fun playing with them!! Their youngest, Julia, recently reached for some very hot milk and burned herself. It was hard to see this very happy and content baby girl so sad for a few days. She was herself again though today, she has no permanent damage to her hand and the burns are healing well, praise God!!! --More photos at www.jeffshan.blogspot.com

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

10 months

ago

Goodbye, Mpigi Team!

We were so thankful that before the team from our home church, Peace Portal Alliance, left Uganda they had a chance to visit with our family and see the projects that we are working on here in Uganda.They came first to Kibaale, which is truly the heart of PAOS! It was great to show them around our house and the school compound where over 800 students attend every day! We visited our Nursery and Special Education classes, met with some of our staff, and went out into the community on home visits.We then went by our new project, the Timothy Centre Girls College, for a tour and dinner together before they returned to Mpigi. It was such a blessing to have them with us for the day, to know that they can better picture where we are and what we are doing from home and especially to have them pray for our family before they left.We truly felt blessed by this great day!

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

10 months

ago

Borehole Repairs

We've recently been hearing of boreholes that had broken down during this long dry season in the communities surrounding Kibaale where many of our students and their families live. We are thankful that we received a generous donation this month and were able to repair all 4 of them!! Some of Uganda has begun to get rain already but Kibaale is still waiting, the boreholes are such a blessing during this time!

Mpigi

Last Friday a team of 18 people arrived in Mpigi from our home church, Peace Portal Alliance. We were very excited to go to the 10 acres to spend the day with them, many familiar faces and a few

new ones!!We arrived in time for church which was great, especially since our pastor from home was preaching! The afternoon was spent hanging out with the kids and of course a Uganda vs Canada soccer game. It was a close game that ended in a tie, but Uganda took it at the end in penalty shots!! We're looking forward to a few more chances to hang out with the team over the next few weeks! 

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

11 months

ago

House of James

Our good friends are sponsoring this adorable little boy, James. I had the chance to meet him at the beginning of Term 2 and give him a gift from his sponsors. This week I was finally able to head out on some home visits and made sure I got to his house too!On our way to James house Mugabi (responsible for the Sponsorship Office) says it is just up at staff housing, he stays with Pastor Eric and Peace! I was quite surprised to learn this, although I shouldn't be, since time after time I hear these stories of our staff caring for extra children.Pastor Eric is the chaplain at Kibaale Community Centre and is also the Pastor of the church we attend in Kibaale Town, El Shaddai. His wife, Peace, is the secretary in the Primary school. They are a wonderful family who we admire so much, they have had much hardship over the years, losing 2 small children to different illnesses, but remain two of the most faithful people we know. James, along with his brother Steven and mother, attended Pastor Eric's church in town and that is how they got to know this family. The mother was struggling and knew that she could longer support

her children. She asked Eric and Peace if she could leave them, and return to her home in Tanzania. For two years now James and Steven have been living with Eric and Peace, and there is no plans for their mother to return at this time. Eric and Peace tell us this like it is no big deal.  We are so often humbled by our staff!!! If you are interested in sponsoring a child yourself click the"Sponsor" tab on top of the page at www.kibaale.net100% of your support goes directly to the child in Uganda! More photos at www.jeffshan.blogspot.com

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted

12 months

ago

Good morning, Africa!

"Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid." John 14:27

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted about a

year ago

Mud!!

We had the opportunity this week to join the two grade 6 classes on an outreach trip, mudding a new house for one of our Grade 1 students! Our kids love helping out on mud hut days, it is of course a great excuse to get very dirty, but they also love to see how quickly a new home can go up in Uganda!Harriet is the 2nd child in her family with 4 siblings! The house she was living in was falling apart and had a really bad roof with a lot of gaping holes. There was a “Where Most Needed” special gift for a mud house that came in and the staff in KCF found Harriet to be the

most in need right now!More pictures at www.jeffshan.blogspot.com

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted about a

year ago

It's really dry!

For our family that means pumping water at the borehole on the compound every day. We have a rain water collector attached to our house, but with there being months between rainfall we really do need to supplement. The green jerry can that Mazzy is carrying is the amount of water needed to flush your toilet one time, crazy!! We're so thankful for our rain water collector and a borehole steps away, not everyone in Kibaale is as lucky. While walking to Kibaale town we noticed the community borehole was broken, there was a pool of water but you could not pump it out, which meant everyone nearby was getting water from the dirty river. It ended up being a somewhat easy and affordable fix, so it's up and running again which is a blessing during this dry season.

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted about a

year ago

Kibaale Staff Day

This year the staff day out was at an ostrich farm just 30 minutes away from Kibaale! It’s a beautiful property; we can’t believe we haven’t been here before. At times you can ride the ostriches, but they were in a bad mood on this particular day, so we’ll definitely have to go back!!The staff divides up into teams for a sports day; they participate in egg races, relays, tug of war, football (soccer), and netball (similar to basketball) games.Our kids had fun stalking the ostriches, playing Frisbee, jumping rope and learning some new dance moves! It’s a good thing they had lessons earlier in the day, a good Kibaale party always ends with dancing!We’re thankful for this day each year, to see a new area or park nearby and especially to get to know more of the staff in this relaxed setting! More photos posted at www.jeffshan.blogspot.com

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted about a

year ago

Vocational School in Kibaale

One of the schools we help to run in Kibaale is a Vocational School. There are four classes; catering, tailoring, brick laying and carpentry. This school has grown a lot recently, it's almost doubled in size since we left two years ago and now has 78 students! There hasn't been enough space for the students in actual classrooms so they have been sitting under the trees in the courtyard.A week after we arrived we began the construction on a 2 classroom school block. This will give the students an opportunity to do the written part of their curriculum indoors, out of the hot sun, or rain!We thought it would be a good opportunity for the students studying bricklaying to assist with some of the construction and take advantage of more hands on experience! 

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted about a

year ago

Term Break

One week after we arrived in Kibaale the school closed for term break. Since this isn't the long break a lot of the staff stayed in Kibaale which was great, we were able to continue with projects, meetings, organize our home in Kibaale and the guest houses, as well get reacquainted with friends.It's been great to connect with a couple of our sponsor kids already, Stella lives doors down so we see her a lot!! Agnes is on a break from school right now, she is part of the Communities of Hope sponsorship programs with PAOS, and so she came by to visit the other day and tell us how well she's doing in school, she's first in her class!The boys have been keeping busy playing football and soccer. There is a brand new Boys Soccer Academy that a couple of the teachers have started in Kibaale, it is very intense! Our boys lasted a half day on Saturday, which was literally soccer, for half of the day!! They were sooooo exhuasted when they came home.The girls love to help out with the staff daycare, singing songs, pushing them on the swing and carrying them around!We are so thankful for your support and prayers, we have been healthy and loving life in Uganda!!!

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Jeff & Shannon Dyck posted about a

year ago

Home!!!

We have arrived in Kibaale!!!Our first few hours in Uganda both felt familiar and foreign at the same time, but as we entered Kibaale, we felt so welcomed and right at home. Stella was one of the first people to greet us with a huge smile, her and Mazzy have been playing nonstop since then!Only 2 hours after we arrived Jeff was given a uniform and told he

was in a soccer match, I'm not sure I could have played a full game being that tired, but he had a lot of fun!!We are settling in quickly and everyone is doing so well! Internet can be limited in Kibaale but we'll update more soon!!