Empty Canvas

Most will never understand why woodworkers get so excited about raw wood, and the choosing of it. No doubt it has to do with the anticipation of what that raw wood could become. I'm sure it also has to do with an inner childish desire to get filthy dirty playing with machinery, tools and dust. But if you go a bit deeper, here is what I believe, and what I share with our students when I'm teaching. Our God is a Creator, and in creating humanity He imprinted a bit of Himself into all of creation, including us. It is obvious that He enjoys creating - just look around and start to take notice of the beauty that surrounds you, even in the strangest of places - so if He enjoys creating, then it follows that we enjoy creating so much because He imprinted that upon humanity. Yesterday I got a call straight from Cochin, India from a friend, Dave Murray of Dehradun Guitars. Dave was in Cochin, after travelling 2400 Km (49 hours on the train!) to pick out rosewood for his shop in Northern India, but also for ours in East Africa. I love that DA and Dehradun are partners in a sense - we are both doing a very similar thing, and we have similar customers, but we choose to work together instead of in competition, for the good of the poor whom we serve. These pics are of the rosewood in Cochin as well as the Mugavu we've just processed in Uganda. It's a beautiful day. Looking forward to your comments! jd

Where Have All The Epic Guitar Solo's Gone?

Driving the family van on the weekend, trying to get three toddlers to take a nap and listening to country radio to lull them to sleep. It occurs to me that despite all the amazing players and talent in Nashville, I never get the urge to air guitar when a big guitar solo comes up. Then it hits me - this might be because there just aren't any big guitar solo's anymore!! Whatever happened to the Jimmy Page's, Jimi Hendrix's, Eddie Van Halen's and David Gilmour's of the music world? Has pop music finally killed the guitar hero?? Everyone I know loves to throw their hands up and pretend to be a crazy guitar god when Eruption comes on the radio - but there are not many inspiring guitar moments on the radio these days. I miss it! Anyone else? I know I'm not hip anymore, and I'm sure we'll hear from someone about the latest and the greatest player out there, but really, how is it possible that music has been robbed of the joy that takes place in a young man's heart when he lifts up his imaginary axe to shred until his fingers fall off? Pop music is really missing out. FYI I am totally aware that there are now far better guitar players than the old guys - but we never get to hear them really show up. Pity. Nevertheless. Lets hear from you. Your favorite air guitar solo of all time?

Define The Relationship

So it's been on my mind this thanksgiving weekend (yes, Canadian celebrate a month early!) to pose the question to all our guitar playing friends out there - exactly what IS your guitar to you? Is it a prize you show off to friends? Is it an old friend you share inside jokes with, or is it a voice that helps you express yourself in ways no one else will ever quite understand, like a therapist who know you better than you know yourself? Whatever it is, we'd like to hear from you. Your voice is welcome here... send us a pic of you and your 'friend'!

If A Tree Falls In The Forest

Well its been years since I've attempted to blog, but it's time to begin again. The past few years have just whistled by like the wind on a cold December day in the middle of Winterpeg. We've had ups and downs, heartaches and reasons to celebrate. But here, today, we are starting over. Its like spring time, but in the fall. I hope you'll enjoy the coming posts. I sure hope this doesn't become a rant. Its way to easy to just point the finger when things are hard - and trust me, things have been hard for the past four years. They have also been amazing. Take my wife and kids for example. Right now, my beautiful wife and I have 3 amazing kids, all under four years old. All boys, and all full of vim and vinegar. I'd post a pic here, but we fear the wierdo's on the net, so I probably won't be posting any family pics anytime soon. But trust me, we are one good lookin' group ;-) In the past two years we have lost three people who were really important in our lives. We lost Irena's father, then my mother, within two months of each other. Then on Feb 1, 2013 we lost our shop manager and very good friend, Mwesige David to liver cancer. Loss can be devastating. But the one thing it does is create room for growth. Or it kills you - I guess you get to choose. A favorite line from the Shawshank Redemption - '...get busy living, or get busy dying.' There's just no sense in wasting time. The past four years have been a trial like I never want to see again. DuncanAfrica is the smallest charity ever. We don't have large corporate donors, or believe in using guilt to lure monthly donors to support our work. So when the recession first hit 4-5 years ago, we actually weren't too worried because we had a waiting list for our guitars. As the recession dragged on though, the orders slowed right down to a crawl and the cash really stopped flowing. How did we survive? God was listening, when I would find the time to talk with him. He supplied for our needs like manna in the desert. And still, I still struggle to find faith that tomorrow He will provide - even though I know He has done so for the past number of years while we struggled so much. I know that many, many people will be able to say amen to that - I think He allows us to go through these times to draw us closer to His heart. If I was really smart, I would just learn the lesson once and for all and stay close - but I'm prone to wandering. Fast forward to this week and I am really thankful for time spent with some fine folks who really know marketing, story telling and social media. In one of our sessions I was confronted with the question of what my role in DuncanAfrica is. In terms of story telling (and we are terrible at telling our story), I had always seen myself as one of the hero's in our story - but I was wrong, dead wrong. My role is the Gandalf character! The one who calls the actual hero's out to the adventure!! Imagine my relief when realizing that I'm NOT a hero. Wow. And even better, now I am free to champion those who are the real hero's, those who sacrifice more than you will ever know, just to learn to build some amazing acoustic guitars. My hat's off to all those who have entered into our story at the Suubi Trade School in Uganda. These guys are really impressive, and they have overcome a lot of obstacles to be where they are today. And I'm happy to tell you that the waiting list for these guitars is getting longer every week. What an amazing problem to have. On that note, here is a pic of our new shop manager, Simon Adyaka, with logs of Mugavu wood, freshly cut. These three tree's will produce between 200 - 300 guitars. This creates thousands of hours of paid work for local people, and maybe 100 years of enjoyment for all the musicians and music lovers who will enjoy the finished guitars.

I love what I do. jd

Home At Last, Home At Last

The students at Suubi.

Such a short trip - so much time spent in the airports. Remind me never, ever to do that again. Uganda to Ethiopia, to Dubai, to London, waited for 12 hours, flew to Boston, slept in the worst airport ever for 12 hours, to Dallas, and finally home to Vancouver.

I thought it was going to be an adventure, but it turns out I'm not really up for that kind of adventure. I also caught an African flu the day before I left and its turned into bronchitis. Yuch.

In London I met a man who also runs a trade school or something in India. He was a US Navy Seal until he retired a few years ago. He studies Buddhism but wouldn't go so far as to call himself a Buddhist - interesting. He said that Buddhism is being embraced by the untouchables caste in India because it frees them from the clutches of the caste system and Hinduism. I was amazed because I thought thats exactly what Jesus was doing in India too.

Somehow, I think Jesus freedom is way better than Buddhas'.

Anyways. I'm glad to be back, but we have a lot of work to do. We need power for our school, and we fell behind in paying our electricity bill - so they have cut off the power. Help?

Coming Home

ahhh coming home is the best part for me. can't wait to see Irena and Noah again. skype is nice but its not the same.

got a lot done here on this trip, but not enough. lots to do back home now. we have our AGM coming up, a fundraising banquet on May 14, i think i'm opening for a band called Abel at House of James on April 10 and the list goes on.

when i get back i'm going to upload this great video of David giving you a tour of the shop here. its eye opening and hilarious.

til then, may the Lord of heaven and earth expose you to His great smile...

in Jesus

jd

And Again

Hi - not to be a downer, but it happened again. Ina village called Kalagala, 3 km from our school, a young man tried to steal matoke, or bananas for you newbies, and a mob beat him to death. This place just makes no sesnse to me. Where does it say its ok to beat someone to death because they stole your bananas??? Shouldn't the mob be put in prison???

Enough of that. Things are going well here. We've been learning to set up the guitars like a pro would. Very nice. Today we're focussing on painting the guitars and the art of spraying a sunburst.

And in big news, David and I created a blog yesterday for him and the students to blog with; http://suubitradeschool.blogspot.com/2010/03/welcome-to-suubi.html

So check it out!

And lastly, thanks to British Airways for always getting me here. I'm sorry they felt the need to strike - and I'm even more sorry that my flight home had to be moved up a day and now looks like this...
Entebbe/Uganda to Addis Ababa (sp?) to Dubai to London (sleep over in the airport) to Boston (sleep over in the airport) to Dallas to Vancouver.

oh it will be nice to be home again.

and lastly, a big thanks to our Heavenly Father who answered prayers that Noah would have a good nights sleep.

jd