Tuesday

2:00AM: (approximately) What are my bedroom lights on? WHY ARE THEY ON? I am squinting at the bare florescent bulb through the haze of my mosquito net. Ah. The power has come on, thanks to some benevolence on the part of the electricity gods here in Kampala. Of course one might be up in the middle of the night and find the electricity useful NOW. I'm guessing i forgot to flip my switch off last night when the power went off (and I was using the lights) which is why I am now awake--I untangle the net, stumble across the floor, off with the lights..blindly try to tuck the net back in to where it was. sleep....
5:30 AM: The alarm is going off. Already? Yup. I can hear Rebecca getting up to bathe, say prayers and start boiling tea water.
5:50: really, time to get up. I light a candle and start the morning office.
7:10: I am struggling up martyr's hill again. Two months, you think this hill would be getting easier to run up. The same kids are still greeting me, though, as I pant and sweat up the hill, the same shop-keeper is still staring at me like I am a blooming idiot(which, actually, I am--come to think about it), and yes, there is the bodaboda that always tries to run me over. And I am still in pain.
7:50-mentally thanking God AGAIN for the miraculous MSR coffee filter the Coats' gave me before leaving. Caffeine, a wonderful drug.
8:30-Arrive at work, on time (amazing)Breathe deep, get ready to lead prayers. This AM we are looking at Ecclesiastes 4:8 and following-our call as believers to live in relationship. My coworkers seem mildly interested (or they are just pretending well this morning). We are praying every day for our sick coworker Ann, for peace in the northern part of the country, for the expansion project for our department (we are woefully short of space for counselling and seeing clients).
9:30-I am grabbing some free time on the computer to check email and make changes on some MCC paperwork while at the same time trying to get ready for homecare (I try and have a verse ready to read to the clients and have it written out in Luganda). Because multi tasking is not my strong point I copy the wrong verse (it is difficult when writing in a language one does not know) something out of Job (now that would be uplifting for an HIV patient!)Finally get it right and go in search of a kind soul to help me learn how to pronounce it.
10:15-Is it tea time yet? (by far my favorite time of day-I usually go and buy groundnuts from Salima, one of our clients). Henry comes in search of me. Asks me if I have a "minute." Inward groan; a minute to henry can mean hours of hard labor behind a computer...turns out he has a scanning project. I point out to him that just because i have white skin doesn't I naturally have scanning ability. He ignores me and confidently begins trying to make the thing work. I'm watching, offering unhelpful advice, as he tries to make the inane software do the job. A few more people join in the fun, all offering advice. Ah, life is never without excitement.
12:30-We are finally leaving for homecare. We drag the suitcases of drugs and IV equiptment out the door, to the pickup truck where Christopher the driver is waiting.
1:00-Bouncing along the bad roads at incredible speeds; Christopher's driving skills amaze me. We have a new patient, which means it will take a while to find. OUr directions usually say things like "turn left at the third mango tree, stop at Caliban Salon, ask for Mama Samuel or Teddy." So we make a lot of wrong turns but surprisingly, almost always find the patient. This family is deep in the slums, to find the house a man leads us through narrow corridors (walking sideways) over heaps of trash and around naked babies. We find the man sleeping, emaciated and obiously exausted. His children play around the outside, near the sewage that flows right outside. Wilson and his wife are both HIV+, both also are being treated for TB. I ask about his children; he says they are all negative. We talk for awhile, Francis (the medical officer) writes some prescriptions for vitamin supplements and an antibiotic. Christine (the other nurse)goes to get the drugs. I offer Wilson the scripture I have brought for today, from Psalms 3. I read in halting luganda, hoping that through my bad pronunciation he understands some of it. We talk about the Lord being our shield, and the lifter of our head, what that might mean for him and his family. We pray. As always, I hope, wonder, pray, beg, that God will use this small thing, bring provision that this family needs. That they would find hope.
2:00-We have seen a few more clients, are heading for Irene-the client I know the best. She has huge, beautiful eyes and a smile that doesn't bear forgetting. Her English is good ,and I enjoy the chance to pray and read with her more freely. This day, though, we find that she isn't home. Her son tells us that she has been admitted to the hospital. I groan inwardly. This is not a good sign. She has been struggling, and developed a condition in the last week where she has a fistula from her rectum whereby she has continuous leakage of stool. She cried telling us about it, about the indignity and discomfort. I hope she is admitted to try and get the condition corrected, but I am afraid that something else is wrong.
3:30- Finally heading back to the hospital. I am ready for lunch!
4:00-my favorite lunch today, Kalo and beans! Kalo is millet and cassava flour made into a stiff porridge. It is rather flavorless alone, but becomes amazing with a good bowl of beans.
4:30-I have decided to try and start walking home (the long commute-1 hour-to go a distance of 4 km is killing me, plus i realize i could save 1000 shillings -$.50 US!! a day!)The walk is hot-the distance feels a lot longer here than it does in vermont! I'm walking past the usual assortment of children getting out of school, market ladies selling various vegetables, bodaboda drivers trying to convince me to give up my walking ways and ride home..at one point a group of children swarm me, holding my hands and talking a mile a minute. I enjoy their chatter and they eventually leave me when we get far from their home. As I pass a school, about 50 children all begin chanting in unison "mazungoo BYE!" over and over again. louder, and louder. yikes. i feel every eye on me as i try to walk as fast as possible.
5:30-home. a relief! busega's quiet is soothing to my tired spirit. I find my host mom home, peeling potatos for dinner. Sharon and Daniella are home too, Daniella as usual running around chasing the cat, or chicken, or trying to escape through the banana trees to the neighbors. As she is 18 months old, she requires constant surveilance!
7:30-Rebecca and I sit down to dinner. I have made the chapatis tonight; I am slowly learning how not to make them the consistancy of shoe leather, but the process is slow and my host family generous with their compliments. Rebecca made the sweet potatos and groundnut sauce. Yum!
8:15-working on my meditation for tomorrow (by candle), as usual struggling with the closing. I tend to start strong and then just kind of drift towards and ending. I have a whole new appreciation for preachers these days. It is tiring coming up with new and interesting material everyday-and I only have to talk for 10 minutes!
9:00-I am going to bed, as we don't have power tonight the temptation to stay up and read by candle light is low. Sarah comes home (she has long days at the hospital as an OB/GYN) followed soon by Jennifer, who has, it seems, a rather busy social life.
9:30-Sleep! Tomorrow, another day...

The Long Silence

I have no excuses for this long of a pause in updating ya'll on my amazingly exciting life!!! Really, the only excuse is the lack of time for writing interesting stories for you to read. So the other option is just to tell you what I've been eating (intestines, yum), about the amazing taxi rides I get to take every day(the one where I sat next to the lady with the baby, the suitcase and the chicken on her lap was the highlight so far) and about my most favorite adventure, "navigating the taxi park after dark." Seriously, if you ever thirst for adventure, please come to Kampala and I will introduce you to a game that will make every thing else in life seem tame. On Thursdays I go and hang out with the Bakulye boys after work(previously introduced to you as the orphans who live in a garage but have a great brass band, play some wicked football, raise chickens, carve wooden things to raise money, and of late, make this MCC volunteer sweat with such science-related questions as you have never heard the likes)..anyway--so I tend to have to go home after dark, and thus the taxi park. So I am dropped off at the western end of the park, and the objective of the game is to make it to the far east end of the park without 1)having my bag stolen or 2)being run over by a taxi. These may seem like easy objectives. They are not. The first thing is to assume the "tuck and run" position. Head down, bag to the chest, now focus! I forgot to mention that what makes the game more difficult is that there are no real roads patterns to the way the taxis drive, they come from nowhere, very fast, sometimes from all directions at once. Screaming will not help, my friend. No, you must just be strong. The addition of being blinded by the headlights makes things especially fun. One must be diligent to ignore all of those attempting to distract from the objectives by hollering "mazugoo!" and offering many cows in return for your hand in marriage, or trying to sell you their delicious fried cassava. Do not be tempted! The reward for reaching the east end of the park is to get on the bus going home, and then sit in it for an hour while it is stuck in traffic. Ah, life in Kampala. Never dull!

Other transportation news: When I visited Hoima several weeks ago (town several hours to the west), I had the opportunity to experience "bicycle bodas." Now, remember a boda boda is a motorcycle taxi (which I ride with great trepidation and only as a last resort). So a bicycle boda is a bike (duh) with a seat on the back. Hoima, being a bucolic little town (about 30,000 people), is a great place to experiment with riding these environmentally friendly taxis. The bigger bonus is riding them after dark when there is no power. What a rush! Eric has admired the skill and prowess of these wizards of navigation for several months now, and when I visted he decided he could try and ride me around town on his bicycle. I had watched several people mount bikes as they were already going, so I decided that I could try this, as I wasn't sure eric could begin peddling with my hefty weight already on the back. So he started peddling his MCC bike as slow as its tortured frame and un-truewheels would allow him to go..and I tried to jump on. We both ended up in the dirt, much to the amusement of his family and neighbors. Second try, it worked. However, he was so winded by the end of our journey I declined a ride on the way home and chose to walk. We celebrated our semi-success by making banana bread over a charcoal fire (the most challenging part was getting the charcoal fire started!!). We mixed the dough, put it in a pot wrapped in banana leaves, and then put that pot inside a bigger pot with some water in the bottom, and covered the whole contraption with a big lid. What resulted was steamed semi-bread--you might think this sounds gross--but for us, heaven. We actually made it twice in a row, it was so delicious.
Other Hoima adventures included delivering two babies at the local hospital and building a duck house.

I'll have to leave it there, though... keep it real, my friends. I'm missing you!