We got back from Kampala just in time for dinner tonight. We were successful in finding ice cream, and we did ourselves one better even. We got chocolate and strawberry milkshakes, and a banana split with chocolate ice cream and chocolate sauce. (which, needless to say, was AMAZING) Ellie said that it was the best chocolate milkshake of her life. We haven't had any serious quantity of dairy in such a long time, however, that our stomachs rebelled a little. We didn't get to go swimming in the pool because it started to downpour and thunder and lightning, but the banana split made up for it by far. Then we went over to the Davises for a relaxing evening and late dinner. Jenny and Ellie and I went to a neat place to get fabrics. It is a school for the physically handicapped, and they teach tailoring and tie-dying to the kids, both to give them self-worth and useful skills, and also to generate revenue for the school. When I heard "tie-dye" I pooh-poohed it a little, because I was thinking of the normal simple spiral pyschedelic pattern that most t-shirts have in the US. Well, we were pleasantly suprised to find quite beautiful patterns. We got some for me to make a shirt. It was really hard to see the kids; some had cognitive and physical impairments, or some just physical. If you think life is hard for the handicapped in the US, just come here and you will have a different perspective. Accessibility isn't even an issue. Some kids were there in wheelchairs simply because they would never be able to make it around a Kampala high school. A lot of times on the streets you'll see guys with little to no legs who have a tricycle converted to hand power.
We got to say goodbye to the Davises for the last time, because they are headed to Kenya for a conference, and we will miss them when we leave the country. We had a really nice time of praying together for each other before we left.
It was quite odd to sit on a toilet that flushed, and take a shower. The shower was very needed for me, because I had had two long days of travel with no shower. Just riding the streets of kampala makes you really dirty. Obviously the red dirt gets everywhere, but I was thinking that my arms looked tan...until I scrubbed them in the shower, and all the diesel particulates came off. It was gross.
Speaking of gross, we got back tonight and I was really hot and dirty again from traveling (packing 19 people into a mini-bus the size of VW bus doesn't make for a cool comfortable 3 hour ride). So I went to shower but we had no power to turn the light on over the shower. No problem, I say to myself. I'll just put the lantern on the ledge and shower by lantern light, and I'll put it up high so that the bugs are attracted UP, and not near me. There is a nice saying about the difference between theory and practice that applies here, I'm sure. Anyway so I turn on the lantern and start to disrobe. Now, I'm at least 1/2 British so my skin makes a pretty good lighthouse reflector, and the bugs saw the light from the LED and then saw another, almost as bright but much larger very near surface, and decided they would go for slightly less bright and warmer. After 4 or 5 half inch flying ants had landed on my neck and I had swiped them off, I decided that standing wasn't such a good idea. Taking a shower out of a basin while squatting and swatting bugs on your wet body is not easy, let me tell you. It is at this point that I look up at the lantern, and it is crawling with bugs. Tactical error #2: the lantern was next to my towel and my clothes, therefore they too were covered in flying ants and beetles. So I decided to go for it and turn off the lantern to take away the attraction source. Oops, Tactical Error #3. They now had no reason to stay up, so they all came down (onto my towel and me). Having just rinsed the shampoo out of my eyes, I decided that my shower was over, shook the bugs out of my towel, and decided to take advantage of the fact that power was off (it is really dark around here with no moon) and make a run for it with my towel around my waist (something I would never normally do; always fully clothed.) Tactical Error #4. I am a big man, with a small towel, and on my third step out of the shower power comes on and everyone's outside lights come on, including ours. My quick walk increases to a hobbled towel-holding sprint, and I dive in the door, and Ellie knocks off the 10 or so bugs on my back. I went back to the shower after I had dried off, and found about 200 flying ants lying on the ground. I don't think I killed that many, but they were definitely swarming me. Luckily they dont' really bite.
Ellie got to ride a boda-boda for the first time today. She was quite a good sport about it. We had already been riding for quite some time when I remembered that she had only ridden a motorcycle once before, and that was with Ben riding very easily and carefully on smooth roads in the US. I am accustomed to both riding and driving them, so I didn't give it a second thought, then realized how brave she had been afterwards.
Thursday when I went into Kampala to get screws turned out to be quite a day. I was thinking of just going in morning, getting my stuff and taking a taxi back. We were supposed to leave between 8 and 9, and silly me I rush through breakfast and get there at 7:59. Long story short, we left around 11, and didn't get into town until 1, and didn't get our money from the bank until 2. VERY long story short (imagine hiring 3 porters to carry heavy building materials from a store 5 minutes away all around the taxi park, looking for taxi for an hour that will take us and our pile of stuff home, which we never did.), we didn't get home till after midnight. AND, i didn't even need to be there, because the construction supervisor was there the whole time, and I actually make it harder for him to get good deals because they see me and they think big bucks.
We have little Nicholas staying with us tonight; he is two months old.
Here are a couple pictures from last week.
This is Kayesu, she is awfully cute. we call her tweety bird
This is Rose, whom I've mentioned before.
This is Eva, whom Ellie has sponsored since she came here last.
This is a John who hasn't shaved in while.
A storm is coming, so I'm going upload this while I still can. Hope you all are doing well.
March 19th
I finished the weight bench today. I have been supervising abu and james from afar, which is nice because it gives me a bit more mobility. On the other hand, they don't move quite as quickly as when I'm around. So after I finished the bench, I went to the the computer building and helped IT Sam with the technological side of things.
Today is wednesday, which means staff fellowship. Today was special, because we went to the vocational school and the maize mill. Jeff was going to give us a tour, and started to do so when a downpour started. We hung out in the textiles department, which was way cool. They have a business weaving fabrics with two looms, and they plan to make two more looms. The fabric is quite nice, i think i will get some. their plans for the mill are also quite impressive. Right now they have about 300 acres of commerical farm that they grow various crops on, including corn. So all the posho (corn meal) that they feed the students and staff here is grown on the farm. But they have to pay to get it milled. Even the locals who sell their corn to the middle man buy it back at a much higher price after milling. So New Hope hopes to become the supplier of posho for the region, will pay the farmers more than what they normally get, sell the posho cheaper, and dump the profit back into the organization. The same goes for the timber milling business, the textiles, the clothes, the auto repair shop, and the building program. It is really neat, and impressive. I will go back another time when there is not a torrential downpour and check it out.
I am going to kampala again tomorrow to get more screws and washers for the roof nails. Hopefully this is the last trip for materials before the roof is done. I'm getting a little tired of it. It is a bit silly driving three hours there and three back just to get a bag of screws, but it is what we need to finish the project. Welcome to Africa.
Ellie and I are going to go to Kampala again on friday as a little vacation, and we will see the Davises for the last time because they won't be around when we are back through on our way to leave. They have been amazingly kind and accomodating in letting us stay at their place, both in planned and unplanned visits. We'll see if we can find some real ice cream in Kampala, and maybe find a few nice places to eat.
march 17th
So i welded some of the weight bench today, and it looks like it is going to be quite a task. They don't have any thin welding rods, and as before mentioned, the welder isn't exactly fine-tunable, so I was blowing through the steel like whoah. So I learned a new trick to cope, but it will still be difficult.
March 16th
I asked Abu and James, the guys that I work with, about what their day is like. james ( 18 years old) lives with his brother, who doesn't have a job and is 25. He gets up around 6, drinks tea, hangs around until he comes to work . Abu (19) lives alone, and gets up at 5 exactly to take his 3 cows to pasture at a field far away. It takes him from 5 until 8 to walk his cows to where they go and come to work. Think about that; he walks at least an hour there and an hour to work. I'm pretty sure they don't make that much working for New Hope. At least they feed them lunch here.
I was sitting talking with Joseph and Rose tonight in the Institute, and all of the sudden something fell from the ceiling onto my shoulder. Thinking it was a bug maybe, I brushed it off before identifying it. Turns out it was lizard poop. Sure enough, we looked straight up, and there was a nice pinky gecko at the very peak of the institute ceiling who had dropped his load onto me. Pooping upside down is quite a feat, especially with a tail.
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