Saturday, June 16, 2007

feels like home (6-6-07 – 6-8-07 highlights)

Many of the things written here are captions for pictures that I will add later.

First of all michelle wins for the first call from the states. Michelle I am so sorry that I talked the whole time but I know you wanted to know all you could. Next time I promise I will let you talk and ask questions.

We went to lubiri secondary school on Tuesday and oberved classes like I said. Well I didn't say that we met jacob from the video. That's right the young man who spoke about his brother and cried and touched your heart. He is finishing school and getting ready for his exams.

Wed I woke up and took a shower/rain shower, notice the hole in the ceiling.

we left Kampala around 11 and took mutatoos to gulu. Mutatoos are like van taxis.

It took us 6 ½ hours! The road was soo bumpy and potholey. We saw baboons!

And we crossed over the nile.

Getting to the house finally was great. It was so great to unpack and feel a little more settled.

Today I got up and had breakfast (the cook doreen is the best cook in gulu!) and we had a language lesson with brenda. She taught us a lot of lwo and we have been practicing it with eachother and in the city.

Then we met with jolly (from the movie—opening bottle with teeth) and norman (her dad). They spoke to us about acholi culture and history. She told us little helpful things like don't show your knees to your belly, apparently men here are all about the thighs but breasts do nothing for them. Women will walk around topless but never show their mid section or thighs. She told us that if we go to someone's house we should expect to eat and sit on the floor unless told we can sit on a chair. Her dad told us about traditional dances and history of culture. They were both so elequent and proud of their heritage.

Then we went to diana's garden for lunch. It was a buffet and so good. It had cassava (potato), metooke (smashed plantain), green beans and carrots, beans, rice, g-nut sauce (crushed peanut), chabatti (flat bread stuff). We rode bodas to the restaurant. It's a dirt bike that you ride on the back of. We didn't ride on them in kampala because it is so crazy and packed and they have more accidents.

Then david, the liaison between us and the ugandan teachers, came and spoke to us about colonialization and education. It was very informative.

That discussion went way over so we decided to skip one of the sessions and go tour the IC office and venture into the town a bit. We rode bodas there but walked back. At one point some kids came up and held our hands for a little while. They were soo sweet. I am sad we didn't get any pics but we will be sure to next time. Me and catherine and margo split a pineapple and it was delicious! It is so different here because everything is soo fresh. The pineapple is lighter colored and not tough at all. It is so soft you can eat straight through the core.

Then we decided to go to the blue note, a bar in town. It is owned by jeoffery who works at IC in charge of the mentor program. It was kind of crazy to be in a bar with american music playing sometimes. It was fun though to unwind a bit and then MICHELLE CALLED (: we rode back on the bodas and I just looked up at the star filled sky and said "I cant believe I am on a dirk bike in africa!"

I love you and thank you so much for praying. I will try to keep informing you of things as they happen so stay tuned!

ps my address here is Plot 101 PO Box 1123 Gulu Uganda

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