My friend! (common ugandan expression)

Michelle has told me to blog more, so I am. I sort of can’t remember what I have blogged about and what I haven’t. So here is much randomness.

Family - This past weekend I got to spend a whole day in Kampala with my sister, Sarah. We got lunch and saw a movie at the Cineplex. It was glorious. The movie sort of looked like it had been produced in the 40s… it had scratches and pops on the soundtrack and lines running through the screen, but still, I had diet coke and sat in a comfortable chair, it was fantastic. Sarah is the member of the family who I am closest to. She is smart and fun and very hard working. It seriously amazes me how much she works. Cooking over a fire in a tiny smoke filled room is a huge pain. We have no fridge so there is no heating up the leftovers. Actually there is even no storing of food for meals. Before we cook one of us is sent out to the store to get produce and green plantains, or whatever else we need that we haven’t grown ourselves. Normal things are so much work here. Sarah does most of our cooking and a lot of the cleaning. Cleaning involves getting a rag and mopping all of the floors by bending over and pushing the rag around with your hands. This is done like twice a day. Kevin and Joshua are in school from like 7:30 – 5:00 so they are not tons of help. Sam is on a break from school, he spends a lot of time making bricks for us to sell or playing soccer with himself. So Sarah and Toto do most of the work.

Friends here – There is not much to tell. My Ugandan friends are goofy, a quality that I love. I have a friend here called Susan who reminds me constantly of my Haitian friend Sinese. Susan tells me all the things about Ugandan culture that I can’t ask my host family. I am closest with Susan, Monique, and Dilly and have managed to find a couple non creepy guys to hang out with.

Friends at home – I miss you all and SO appreciate the long emails about your lives. I got the world’s best care package from Sarah Mulder last week. It had an amazing mix cd and much embroidered goodness. I carry it around in my backpack with me. She wrote a prayer for me on a piece of cloth and I have it tied around my wrist as a bracelet. Love you Sar! Also I randomly got a computer battery from hong kong! Compliments of my father, but a total surprise for me. Best thing about an extra battery is that when my siblings drain mine watching Lost, I can still use my laptop. Yay! Living without electricity just got easier.

Future travel – I am going to be spending ten days in rural Uganda staying with a host family there. I leave this Friday. Will write more about that later.