Hello everyone!<br><br>
Now i finally made it to Uganda! Unbelievable! It all still seems very strange and
sureal to me! Right now I'm sitting in a tiny boiling hot chamber with lots
of other people, dealing with the very slow connections. Guess it
belongs to the whole experience...<br><br>
After a very long flight I arrived in Kampala on tuesday. There I recieved a
warm welcome and some instructions. The city is rather big (about 2 Mio), busy
and quite in an economic uprise. You can get almost everything there and you
can even go to a fancy pizzeria! It is said to be the safest city in Africa and quite agreable.
On wednesday we went to an aethiopian restaurant to watch the game (Portugal,
France). It was very amusing to watch the locals watching the game, they are
very supportive fans...a cheerful crowd.<br><br>
On thursday a 5 hour jeep ride brought me to Gulu. I did not yet have time to
do a lot of sightseeing here, but I hope I'll be able to do that soon. The town
seems to be very nice and safe and you can get a lot of things here that people
from other missions can only dream about...<br><br>
Yesterday we went out for a little poolgame and a cold beer. The african beers
are not the best in the world but well drinkable and refreshing.
The team seems very funny and nice. It consists of 2 germans, 2 japanese, 1
swiss, 2 danish, and one french. The germans will leave Gulu soon and will be
replaced by my new boss from Kenja in a couple of weeks. It's a big team, but
that is actually quite nice because then you don't have to hang around with the
same people all the time.<br><br>
Accomodation is very luxurious for MSF standards. The house is quite new with
shower, proper toilet, kitchen etc. I'm sharing it with Kyoko, a japanese
mid-wife with whom I'll be working together quite close, Taro, our japanese Financial
administrator and Patrick, a swiss doctor. We get along well.
For the meals we always go to the other guesthouse, where the others live. Lunch
and dinner is always (except on the weekends) prepared by our housekeeper and is
always ready when we get home. She is a good cook, so there goes my plan for my
diet...
Tonight there will be a big goodbye party for the germans and I'm really looking
forward to that.<br><br>
Next week I will finally learn more about my working areas. First I'll go to the
camp on a daytrip to meet all the people, then I'll be shown all the hospitals
in the area and on thursday I will spend the night at the camp. I will have to
spend some nights at the camp every now and then because of security reasons. The
army patrols are only on the road untill 4:30pm so we would have to go back
before 3 pm the same day, wich wouldn't give us enough time to fulfill our tasks.<br><br>
Otherwise it's very quiet here right now. Not much happening in the area and the
people here don't expect anything to happen in the near future. Seems like the
elections have passed well.
There are a few cases of cholera around but it doesn't seem to spread around. It
is the rainy season though and it can change quickly.<br><br>
The weather is quite nice to get used to. It's often cloudy and rains every now
and then. It's not too hot and it still gets cool at night, wich is very comfy
to sleep. The number of mosquitoes is increasing now and I have already been
bitten, lets hope that I'll make it back home without malaria!<br><br>
Sweat is pooring down now, so I better get going. I'll let you know as soon as I have more news!<br><br>
Take care Anne