The Highlights of 2016!

God's faithfulness and the generosity of friends

It has certainly been a year of ups and downs and we've had some financial struggles but God has always provided. We have always had enough, in fact plenty! This car was an absolute blessing and made possible through many generous gifts.

Revelation Life

This year has really been a year of things settling into place and dreams being realised. The first dream centre was opened and went from a shoe box design on our kitchen table, to a reality in the slum. This has been a place of meeting and community for many different groups. The family centre, to support vulnerable families with new skills and a chance to re-locate out of the slum, has gone from strength to strength with 2 more intakes of families. Many other exciting things have happened with nutrition groups, raising champions in the slums and giving much new training.

Times by the lake

We have had the opportunity to escape from Kampala city life on a number of occasions to a beautiful lake where we camp, cook over a fire and swim. We feel so blessed to be able to do this and know how important it is for us as a family to re fuel. We really feel so at home here. We're not city folks at heart!

Seeing family and friends in the UK

Was wonderful to be able to return to the UK again this summer and catch up with many friends and family. It was a rich time of rest, reconnecting and fun.

Cleverley time - traditions and games

This year we have really made an effort to have family time, playing games, reading the Bible and starting some new traditions. So important for us while living so far away from our extended families.

Horseriding with Mayah

Mayah turned 9 this year and is growing into a real beauty! She mainly loves to read and take care of her very special doll Charlotte. She is excelling at school and has some lovely friends. Her Birthday treat this year was horse riding.

Quad-biking with Ava

Ava loves life as much as ever and is extremely kind and compassionate. She turned 7 this year and went quad biking with daddy for her Birthday treat. She loves to play, climb, create and laugh!

Bruno and Brian

Both boys are now at boarding school and have really progressed well in their studies. They are both still in primary education which can be a challenge for their self esteem but we continue to encourage them to persevere. We have been really happy to see how Emmanuel and Millie have  really stepped up to parent them more, as they now live very close to them. This has always been our dream, for them to be loved and part of a Ugandan family so we are very thankful for this. We continue to have the boys for dinner every Tuesday in the holidays, visit them at school on visitation days and financially provide for them.This picture was of their Christmas treat with John - climbing and zip line in Mabira forest.

School

School has continued to be a safe, happy and fun place to learn and work. There really is a fantastic family feel there and I (Sue) feel privileged to be part of the teaching team. I continued teaching year 3 last year and had some memorable times from dissecting goat intestines to dressing up as Vikings!

Biking adventures

John loves to escape every other month or so on a mini adventure to be alone with God, escape from the noise of Kampala and give himself a challenge. 

Men's breakfast, women's Bible study

Both John and I are part of small weekly groups. For me this has been such a place of support, safety and spiritual growth. Being part of this group is certainly a highlight for me and a place for me to be challenged as well as encouraged. John has also been hugely encouraged through his men's breakfast group where they journey life together and share deep thoughts and feelings and spur one another on! 

They are the Champions!

I really have no idea how to start this post as two versions have come out all a bit too cynical and negative. So, let's start with, there are loads of really great organisations in Uganda, doing really good work...

Unfortunately, it's often the 'westerners' who are the 'heroes', the ones who people say of on Facebook, 'what you are doing is AMAZING, you're such an inspiration to us all!' (too cynical?). I get pretty fed up of this, mind you I might add that I don't get that written on my wall. Hang on, no-one finds me inspirational? In the words of Hillary Clinton, 'sigh'.

Is that his name or does he think he caught a real man?
If you are intrigued by this image, check out 'Humanitarians of Tinder' for a giggle.

Now, to withhold a rant for me is hard at the best of times, but I'm doing what I can. Of course, people do stay in Uganda (often for a bit) and do some really good stuff that really impacts lives, but let's face it, self-sacrifice and overall 'going the extra mile', generally belongs to Ugandans. The ones who take kids into their families, who pay relatives school fees and naturally come together in a crisis. By far the most giving and sacrificial people I have met, are Ugandan. Now, I'm not going to go the other way and romanticise Ugandans either, they're just normal people like us and do some pretty crap things too. But that's really my point, we're all pretty 'normal' and some people are a bit special in that, but still rather normal deep down.

It's the hero-worship and raising up of people doing good stuff that is getting my goat. And we all know that one must choose one's heroes wisely, to my shame I posted a positive image and comment about Jimmy Saville when he died - flippin heck. I'd say that in the three and half years since being here that I've heard disappointing things about at least five pretty big, western, names and organisations. Now, this isn't a hatchet-job, I'm saying that these folk tend to be held up, but not necessarily held to account. And it makes me question why they were held up in the first place. We are their enablers.

Now I look at this, I actually used to look a bit like Robin.

So, what's the solution? A while ago I read a great article about not being the hero, but being the Robin and not the Batman (darned if I can find it now). I like that way of expressing the idea. Is the westerner the AMAZING Batman in the forefront, or the Robin doing cool stuff mainly in the background. Now, this is a bit naughty of me, but I'm managing not to be too cynical so please allow me this. I have a little test to see if I think someone is a Batman or a Robin type. And I have fallen foul of this test myself, so I think there is a bit of pub-politics level accuracy to it at least. When you see a picture of a westerner with a Ugandan, who has their arm around whom? Is that too close to the bone? If the western arm lovingly and paternally cradles the African's shoulders, my hunch is that they are the 'parent' in this relationship, essentially 'the hero'. That's not my bag, cup of tea or thing.

Doing it right. Good arm placement.

Right, anyway, where do we go from here? I think being aware of this dynamic is key and we all need to help each other with this. And I was going to talk about our work with Revelation Life and raising up Champions in and from the slums, but that all seems a bit like, 'we're the only ones who've got this sorted', and of course, that's not true.

But I would encourage you to support people and organisations that tell you who they are, but who don't seem to revel a little too much in the gorgeous glow of the limelight and admit to things not going as planned once in a while. It feels good in the light, but part of the responsibility of having some light on us is to direct it to those who often get ignored. These are the very people that we are all trying to help in the best way possible. And as the recent hoo-hah about the missions organisation that managed to offend a big group of Ugandans with their 'We're bringing Missions Back video' (Justin Timberlake cover, clever eh?), getting this stuff wrong can really piss local people off. 

Highlighting 'normal', yet extraordinary local people has to be better than doing a bad impression of Batman for the folks back home.

If you think I may be onto something then I ought to now point some light to TMS Ruge and his scathing, but truthful posts about the 'White Saviour Complex' which helped to form some of my thinking on this.

And if you're really into this, on a roll, and want a good laugh, check out Barbie Savior (it's ok, SFW), if you haven't already.

Highlights, highlighted (highlit?)

Well, after a years' blog-drought, here's little flow in the form of a few highlights from the last year! 

Setting up our first Community ‘Dream’ Centre
This has been a great project to create a place for Community Groups to meet and people to plan and pray together in Kinawataka Slum. The centre is made from an old shipping container, wood and recycled materials and hosts health training, group meetings, discipleship groups and children’s work all week round. As the community uses the building more and more, we’re confident that things will now change at a faster pace in the slum and that people will be able to work towards their dream of a good life.

Training Community Health Champions
We want to make sure that local people are the change makers in their communities, and so Revelation Life has been training health workers from the slums to do home visits, assessments and alert us of malnourished children. We call these people ‘Health Champions’. This has been a huge confidence boost for mums who now have a role in seeing their neighbours saved from malnutrition and diseases such as typhoid, pneumonia and malaria.


Seeing changes at the Family Centre
Ten vulnerable families from the slums have been through our programme at the Family Centre this year. Their time on the site has seen them: acquiring new farming skills; learning how to relate better to family members; opening up during discipleship sessions and understanding how to keep their families healthy. It has been a real joy to see families come together, make plans for the future and begin to heal before they leave the slum.

















Setting up a building course 
With all of the challenges of poor housing in the slums, building skills can be a great way for people to make money and improve living conditions. We started a pilot project with ten community members for seven months, taking them through the basics of building. We’ll then move on to alternative building techniques that use local, low-cost materials such as old tyres, plastic bottles, oil drums, mud and old pallets.


Family life 
The girls continue to thrive at school and are very much seeing Uganda as their home. They love having friends from all over the world and get stuck into all sorts of school activities. Sue still enjoys her role at the international school three days a week; balancing that with feeding in to Revelation Life discussions and a great women’s Bible study group. John has also really benefited this year from being part of a men’s group that meets each Thursday morning.  As you can tell, we have moved into some exciting areas in the last 12 months, and there are great plans for the year ahead. We feel that God has good things planned for the slums that will see them no longer places of despair and disease, but places of health and hope.

Still interested? Take a look at a video about Revelation Life's work in Uganda - it explains a lot about what we do.

So, hopefully not so long until the next post ;)

Muddy messages

This technique is one that we use at Revelation Life - making murals out of mud. It's something I came across a while ago from this guy, but hadn't been able to try out until we lived here in Uganda.

Many people are a bit nervous when you ask if you can paint a health message on the side of their house and understandably so. But these mud stencils disappear after about three months, which is just right as most advertising has a half life of a couple of weeks. Added to that, they are free and even make use of old x-rays for the stencil.

I think they would work really well just about anywhere as they even last quite a while in the 'power shower' rainy season here. Why not give it a go?

The Top Ten Amazing News Items from the Cleverleys.

Well, it's been a busy year so far with all sorts of developments for Revelation Life and our family. So, in true Buzzfeed style, here's a list of our Top Ten Pieces of News (you won't believe number 7!)

1 We moved house. A very generous Simon and Nicola made it possible for us to live in their 'old' compound, with a spacious garden for the girls to play in and a great indoor space for relaxing after a busy day's directing.

Our compound - great for fun and parties (rolex chap and cassava lady not normally present).

2 Our family finally got to dress up 'Ugandan' (well, central Ugandan specifically) at a friend's 'Introduction'. That's a kind of engagement party, but lasting about 14 times longer, and a great deal more sitting and a lot less champagne. I managed about four hours.

This is our serious Ugandan photo look, 'Blue Posho'.

3 With the house, came a dog.

Sandy in name and colour.

4 We started forming Community Groups in the slums. We're doing all sorts of training and awareness raising with them to help them change things for their families and communities. Here are the kind of practical things that we're training them in.

Murals made out of mud, using x-rays as stencils. This one's about how to prevent typhoid.

5 John maintained his role as Director. No coup d'etat in this corner of Africa. All is going well and we've just taken on a new Head of Social Development, Rosemary, who worked with Send a Cow for 15 years. She knows her onions, but we have no need of cow-know-how in the slums.

John 'directing' some dancing.

6 Sue came second (again!) in the female staff race at the Acacia School Olympics. She continues to teach at the school until she reaches the number one spot.

It's not the winning, it's the taking part that counts. Notice the 'faller' near the back? 

7 Mayah followed in my footsteps of being very safe, whilst being VERY dangerous. In fact she topped any of my feats by running across some grass from one 4x4 to another. Not very impressed? There were lions tearing apart an unfortunate antelope about 25 metres away.

This is the very lion.

8 We are extremely close to setting up our first 'Community Dream Centre' in Kinawataka Slum. Just a bit more negotiating, funding and a lick of paint and it will look something like this.

This shipping container never had it so good.

9 The first families are starting to arrive at our aptly named 'Family Centre'. It's very exciting to see people start to inhabit this project, which has been a long time coming, but will now see families part of our four month programme to set them up for a good future.

10 John took part in his first mountain bike race for nearly 20 years, on the edge of Mt Elgon. The hills were simply too much for his poor legs, but it was worth it for the singletrack, the views and a bit of bloke time.

I came 5th. Out of 9. Still, it's the taking part that counts isn't it?

So, there's our news. Hopefully we'll get better at actually updating the blog with some more meaty info in the coming months, or just hone our BuzzFeed style and get the traffic flowing on in.

The highs and lows of my life in Uganda

Highs – I have just chosen a few, but my list could have gone on and on!

1. Living in another culture and having genuine Ugandan friends here is such a privilege. Ugandan culture is warm, welcoming, full of colour and hustle and bustle and I feel honoured to be accepted into life here. I have formed some really special friendships. One friend I want to name is Harriet. We have shared life together ever since I moved here, walking through the highs and lows of life together. Even though we are from such different backgrounds and have such a diverse experience of life there is a deep love, respect and care for each other. It has been wonderful to share Birthdays, Christmas and other events with our 2 families. I love watching the friendship develop between her girls and my girls. Such different experiences of life but true friends.

2. International Education for my kids. I love it that my kids can run around barefoot at school and then go into class and be with kids from all over the world – China, America, South Sudan, Uganda, Nigeria, Tanzania, Australia.

3. My next high follows on from the previous one. For my kids, being part of such an international group of kids lowers the peer pressure and “fitting in” culture that can be so apparent in the West. When all the kids are so different from each other and have such different cultural backgrounds, there is no norm. Most trends and crazes reach Uganda eventually, but to a much lesser degree so the kids can opt in or out. Yes frozen and loom bands made it here but were both very short lived and NO – one direction has not made it here – yet!

4. The weather. Uganda is on the equator so it is pretty much summer all year round. We have dry season and rainy season which seem to be changeable as to when they happen but pretty much all year the temperature is between 18 and 28 Degrees Celsius. This makes for a great outdoor lifestyle. I love being outside so this suits me!

5. Community. As well as having some great Ugandan friends, we are part of the ex pat community in Kampala. Since living here, I have met so many really interesting people from all over the world who do so many great, inspiring and sometimes unusual work. I have felt privileged to be part of this community.

6. Revelation Life. Being part of a work where beautiful people full of potential (who happen to have been dealt a very challenging card in life) are being empowered, trained, loved and equipped is so special. It is such an honour to be part of an amazing team, serving people in the slum communities.

Lows – Challenges of my life here

Often the lows we experience are the flip side of the highs!

1. Traffic and Commuting. We live in Bweyogerere which is on the outskirts of Kampala. This means a commute to school and pretty much anywhere else we want to go. On a good day, school takes 30 minutes to get to. On a bad day, I think my record is 4 hours to get home – sitting pretty much not moving for 2 hours. When I asked the traffic police why – they responded with “there is a jam, too many cars!” The traffic in kampala is notoriously bad! Some days I just feel proud of myself for reaching my destination - negotiating the lorries overtaking on the wrong side of the road, boda bodas (taxi motorbikes) weaving in and out with their huge and often unusual loads and other simply crazy drivers! Lack of air con in our car is also a huge low!

2. Muzungu! Muzungu! Everywhere we go, especially in more local areas kids shout at us – Muzungo muzungo (white person) or simply ‘bye, bye’. I have also encountered terrified children being forced to greet the muzungo as we walk by as if we are royalty. It gets a bit tiring. I don’t want to be treated like royalty, as an equal is fine by me!

3. Living between worlds. Living in the city gives us opportunity to live a Western lifestyle if we wish. Although our lives are simpler here in many ways, we do still shop in a supermarket, visit malls and on the odd occasion go to the cinema. This is great but also confusing. It is not easy living between 2 worlds. Visiting families in slum conditions and shopping in the supermarket on the same day can be confusing and emotionally draining for me to get my head around.

4. No seasons. Although having summer all year is great in many ways, there is something special about moving through the seasons. There is a sense of the passing of time and the comfort of colder, shorter days and the excitement and anticipation of longer, warmer days. Summer is great but I do miss Autumn, Winter and Spring.

5. Some days are just not simple. All the little challenges of African living are manageable until they all happen at the same time! Power cuts, no water, fleas, mosquitos, traffic jams, beaurocracy, loud music bellowing in from a local church, a constant stream of visitors at the door etc etc Some days are normal and others are just a challenge!

I hope this gives you a little insight into my life here. I love living here but there are definitely highs and lows!

Family Centre construction

Some of you may be aware that we've both been really involved in spearheading the development of a 'Family Centre' on nine acres of land owned by Revelation Life about an hour's drive out of Kampala.

In a nutshell, the centre is a place for vulnerable families to stay for about six months to get back on their feet and is on the lines of the 'Alternative Care' movement in Uganda - essentially saying that children belong in families, not orphanages or institutions. So, we should be doing all we can to support families and extended families to care for children at home or with relatives (on this note, HUGE news this week - Watoto, famous for its Children's Villages have committed to a complete turnaround in policy towards alternative care).

To get it up and running has been quite a task, but a really fun and creative one and it feels like we've been on Grand Designs or something, but with a lot less knowledge but more back-of-a-fag-packet sketches. So, here are pictures of the bare bones of the new structures on the site that we will be adding to and developing. It's been a steep learning curve and we're still on our way, but we're pleased with how much we've got done so far and excited to see the first families stay in a few month's time.

The five family homes on the hilltop

The Hall for training families and the local community

Shipping container office and overnight space 

We've tried to keep the materials local, use natural materials like rock and mud and recycled materials where possible and plan for interesting developments that inspire. But more on that another time.

Although it's been great to see rough sketches turn into real buildings in just a few months, the main excitement and reward will come as we see families on the site, re-building their lives.

To find out what that might look like,  read my 'Letter from the future' post about a fictional family who stay on the land.