Day 14

July 14, 2011

Day 9

Lugazi!!!

Last night I flew from London to Paris to Nairobi to Entebbe. I got to the Entebbe airport and got my picture taken for my visa, then was approached by several people wondering what I was doing there and asking to see my passport and everything else. One woman even asked me if I was carrying any drugs in my bag, and went on this schpiel about how someone brought in 3 bags full of expired drugs into the country, and how angry she was about how this is ruining africa... and i was kinda freaked out, but she stopped eventually... after a few minutes. I went outside, and Ari and Jesse were right there waiting for me! Such a happy sight to see. I found out that I was the only one coming in 3rd wave... there are like 8 or so people leaving in the next week, and then theres like 11 more staying. Plus me. I felt kind of stupid... I thought there were going to be more volunteers coming in the 3rd wave, but apparently they all bailed. Luckily there are some people staying from the 2nd wave, otherwise I'd be completely alone. We hopped in a big van/taxi, with _________ who the team has often hired because of his reliability. The driving was still pretty crazy. Not as crazy as london, but that's probably just because it was at night and there weren't any other cars around. About halfway into the 2-hour drive, we got a flat tire. So the boys hopped out of the car, and the taxi driver's friend started running towards the street, and it kinda freaked me out, cause i thought maybe he was running away? or something from the car fell of? He needed to pee. So he did it, right on the side of the road. We put on a new tire, and then headed back to Lugazi and to the team house. We live in a little 2-bedroom duplex. There are 3 triple bunk beds in each room, and 2 more in the living room. The bathroom is comprised of a toilet a sink and a shower, but the shower isnt divided from the rest of the bathroom, so when you take a shower it gets in the toilet. Theres also one more little room with a sink... I guess its "the kitchen", cause theres pots and pans in it. But no counterspace or oven or stove or anything... I got the bottom bunk. Ha. There's probably about 18 inches between my bed and the bed above me. I can't sit up at all. When the 2nd waver's leave i'll definietly schnike one of the others' beds. At around 6 this morning, there was someone at our window saying, "hello? hello?" Kinda freaky. I went back to bed, somehow, and eventually woke up and everyone was already up, most of them had left, and there were 5 girls in the living room just kinda chilling. I met them all, and one of the girls' projects is doing seminars with teenage girls, teaching them about sex education, peer pressure, and relationships. So we had a meeting with a youth outreach coordinator named Wilson. He was an hour late, haha. But so friendly. We are teaching this curriculum to girls in a bunch of different high schools almost every day this next week. Another project that's going on is called "Happy Children International" This guy named Francis, who is a local ugandan started this organization to help local kids in Lugazi. A lot of families are comprised of a mom and like 8 kids with no dad. So the kids are having to just be raised on the streets by other kids, because the mothers just don't have time to teach them or raise them with all the work that they have to do. So Happy Children International gets all the kids together once a week, teaches them a lesson (like about germs, or goal-setting) and then they just do group activities. The team leader for this one is leaving with the 2nd wave, so I really want to get involved with this- working with kids is my favorite. So I walked out the door this morning, and it was just unlike anything I had ever imagined. The roads are dirt, and they are all red. There are green plants everywhere, very jungley. We walked down to the office to meet with Wilson and kids were just running around everywhere, yelling "Muzungu! Muzungu!" (white people!) Some of them would come up to us and go "bonga!" (pound it- hahaha) So we bonga-ed and just kept going. If they didnt run up to bonga, they all would wave, and say bye. They never say "hi" its always "bye!" After the meeting with Wilson, we went down to Musana, which is a organization of women that makes jewelry, One of the girls here (Abby) is like their American representative and helps them with their business skills. I have a sinus infection, so Abby told me to keep a little bit of a distance with the women, because some of them have AIDS. It was so sad; the first AIDS victim I've ever seen. Her name was Harriet, and her skin on her face was peeling and her limbs and fingers were all very frail. It was heartbreaking to know that a year from now, she might not even be here. Abby had one of the women in town sew a "gomez" for her; which is a traditional african dress, its really fancy, made of silk. So she put it on and showed it to all the women, and they started singing the wedding march song, and she paraded down the street in it, all the people just pointed and laughed saying, "muzungu gomez!" many people came up and said, "you look so smart!" (pretty), some also said, "You are Ugandan now!" and then some just came up and touched the fabric.

On the way home, a group of young boys started following us, pointing and saying "muzungu" whispering to each other. A lot of times, the people just kind of talk behind your back because they know you dont understand Lugandan. So I turned around to them and said, "WANJI??" (WHAT???) And the immedietly stopped with shocked little looks on their faces, because they thought I knew lugandan, and thus had heard all their little comments about us, so they were like, "pardon! pardon!" haha. I got them :) Then they were like, 'we will be your escorts!' so they followed us back into town, and ran away somewhere along the road. On the way home we got a chippatti. Chippatti is like a burrito, just a flat piece of bread made from just flour, salt, and water. They're not very good alone, but we also bought some bananas, and ate bananas, peanut butter, nutella, and chippatti. SO GOOD. The two girls I was with (Abby & Kellie) told me that the ones we were eating weren't very good, not fresh, but I really liked them anyway. And wonder of wonders, we are going to Harry Potter tomorrow!!! I thought I was going to have to wait 6 weeks to see it!

Also, I got to go in a taxi today to Mukono... The taxi's are kind of crazy... They are 14-seater vans, and you go to this big lot where all the taxis wait, and hop in a van, but you have to wait until the van is PACKED before they will leave. packed as in like... 20 people. So we had to wait 40 minutes for the taxi to leave, because no one wanted to go to Mukono... Taxis cost like 1500 shillings (like 75 cents). when we finally got there, we met with Francis, who is SUCH a nice old man, who is the founder of Happy Children International, and we just talked about some of the plans for the program, and I am getting so excited to get started here! The other thing about taxis... There are like a TON of people that just have motorcycles and will take people around for cheap. They are called boda boda's and they are insane drivers.

Well that is about all for my first day. I still kind of feel like I am watching a movie... This doesn't quite seem real to me yet. Maybe when I havent showered or shaved for a week, and get malaria it'll sink in... (4 people on the team have gotten malaria already. yikes!)

Anywho bye!