I must apologize for my absence, though please believe, I was thinking of you the entire time. You will forgive me once you hear about my road trip to the capital city Kampala and the tourist heaven Jinja for my exciting weekend with a friends family for Easter weekend and a conference about restoring traditional religion at the source of the Nile River.
I have found that my English has become a bit cumbersome as of late, I am so used to speaking in broken Lugandan and in explaining myself in alternative ways when speaking English so as to be understood. Even talking with my boyfriend David back in Canada has required a bit more effort on my English language abilities. Although in Lugandan my abilities to tell everyone I have diarrhea and require the assistance of a nurse is very clear, if only because it gets a laugh out of everyone: the students, JaJa, Caroline, and the URF staff. So apologies if my writing is not quite the same as it used to be.
I bought a Lugandan/English Dictionary and wander the halls of Hope Integrated Academy School asking the secondary school students to help with this word or that, the conductor and people in the taxi to Masaka because they are trapped in a car with me and can not escape, and even the waitress Rita, who I am happy to say has given me her number and insisted I meet her parents. She asked me if I was lost and I started talking to her in Lugandan, the conversation ended with me inviting her out to Ambiance Nightclub for this Saturday with the girls and I.
My friend Caroline and I have gotten rather close as of late and I happily accepted when she invited me to leave the rural village of Kyetchyme and accompany her to her apartment in Kampala and then Easter weekend at her parents home with her 8 siblings. She left wednesday morning and I was set to meet her in Kampala for thursday night. I left after work in a car driven by our friend and driver Yassein with the other interns Greg, Leandrea and Rohan and except for a flat tire we arrived safe and sound in Kampala by 7pm after a 3 hour drive.
To get to Carolines house we drove on the highway (the highways have been under a lot of construction lately but now we are reaping the benefits of a newly paved and speedy road) and then into the outskirts of Kampala. She shares a house with some of her eldest sisters and they all pay a little to keep it and drop in when they like. The house was surrounded by a cement wall that had a small door, no bigger an opening than meant for a hobbit. Inside the wall there were washing lines and 6 apartment style houses connected in one long row and at the end of the row were 6 latrines, each with a lock on the door. Inside her home were two rooms: a livingroom with a tv and fridge and a bedroom with an open space shower. Her walls were painted a beautiful torquoise colour, but what I was most impressed with were the many shoes, purses and earrings coating the walls.
As night descended on the city I watched the many buildings on the distant hills light up, indistinguishable from fireflies.
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