Hi everyone!
While most of you were suffering the summer heat in Europe, we had to go through the tropical summer, meaning rainy season. Meanwhile it's raining almost every day, sometimes so hard, that you think you're standing in a river when actually walking on the street. (Footing as they call it here!) It has also gotten cooler now, which is probably the reason why I had to put up with a nasty cold this week. And this is happening in Africa!
Last weekend I attended the wedding of our former field coordinator in the hometown village of her Ugandan husband very close to the Congolese border. We rented a car and went on a very bumpy 5 hours ride. The landscape there is very different from here. Much more "original African" and tropical, being very green and bushy. It's also more fertile there, so all our local staff went shopping like crazy because the food is a lot cheaper there.(1 Avocado here costs around 500UGX = around 0.20 USD and there it was only 100UGX)
The wedding was amazing. There was a huge crowd present. Every one wanted to see the muzungu (white foreigner) wedding. Ceremony was very traditional and religious, with a lot of speeches. The Ugandans love speeches!! It was fascinating but also very long! We muzungus were of course the focus of everyone's attention and the locals were enjoying themselves al lot when we joined their dances. I took a heap of pictures and I hope I can show them to you soon.
Meanwhile the new field coordinator Ann from Kenya and the second nurse Manghild from Norway have arrived this week. They seem to be quite nice and they also bring a long a lot of experience, which can't be bad.
Otherwise there is not much to tell. Being reduced by the cold, we didn't go out to the camp this week but prepared some things in the office. My goals here are getting a little bit more clear now, but I'm still struggling with all this management stuff that comes along. Not my favorite occupation. During the week my homesickness is not so bad because I have a lot to do but the weekends are sometimes a bit hard. So I distract myself with good books and some of the many parties around here. Weekend trips don't seem to be such a good option right now, with this weather and we don't have many choices to go to anyway.
Greetings from humid Uganda!
Anne