Things I love…

• Groundnuts
  
• Sugary soda after a sweaty day
  
• Loud rain
  
• Obnoxious yellow color of M.E. quarters
  
• Mosquito nets that act as impenetrable barriers against all of creation
  
• Feeling completely safe and at home
  
• The sky, the grass, the dirt, the view from the hill
  
• Buying pineapples from the woman on the corner
  
• Feet stained with dirt
  
• Cold bucket shower after a long hot day
  
• My lying brothers
  
• Cockroach free shower room!
  
• Being in the dark at night, being wet in the rain, being hot in the sun. Nature.
  
• Long phone calls from home
  
• Being a part of a family and all that entails. Sharing, cooking, laughing, goofing off.
  
• Little kids waving and yelling "bye mzungu"
  
• The look on an African's face when I tell them any of the following; I live with no electricity, I wash my own clothes, an apartment in America costs 12 million shillings a year. All get the same shocked and unbelieving response.
  
• Carrying two jerry cans home (almost NEVER happens) and getting told "well done" by every Ugandan who passes.
  
• Even better, having two guy friends offer to carry your jerry cans home (almost ALWAYS happens).
  
• Skipping lunch in the dining hall in favor of fruit and bread or anything bought from the canteen. Even those hard stale strange donut things.
  
• Seeing a Ugandan wearing an ace bandage or a band-aid. Some products were made with white skin in mind.
  
• Sitting on the ground, near the trash, not carrying what crawls on you. If you can't see it then it doesn't exist.
  
• Feeding American friends some American treats that I can cook over the fire. Such joy.
  
• Seeing 3 moneys on my way to school
  
• Being made fun of by Ugandans for loving monkeys. Crazy white people and their love of monkeys.
  
• The freedom that comes with being a foreigner. Freedom to be as weird as you like and have people excuse it as mzungu behavior.
  
• The intense craving for vegetable I have developed. Or any food that is not drowning in oil.
  
• The guy on the street who sells sausages and nicknamed himself "candyshop". Yup. Sausage selling Candyshop…
  
• Stunning views from the hill
  
• Sunsets over the hills of kampala
  
• Giant puffy winter coats that the boda boda men wear when it is 70 degrees
  
• Being called "smart" for the way you dress
  
• Animals on the money
  
• Coffee that you roasted yourself. YUM.
  
• M.E. family!
  
• Never having enough power convertors!
  
• Plants and trees that look they came out of a Dr. Suess story
  
• The cool shape of the country
  
• WATERFALLS
  
• MILK biscuits for breakfast. Everyday!
  
• Holding hands. Or even better seeing two guy friends holding hands. OR even better having a Ugandan guy try to hold an American guy's hands. Love it.
  
• Staring out the window during class. Being distracted by birds flying in the classroom.
  
• Adeline's pearls of wisdom.
  
• Who wants to be a Shillionaire?!
  
• Halvsies
  
• Iki maki man!!!! (monkeys) (They need to be on here twice)(Once in my language)
  

To be continued