December 2009

Sekukulu enungi!
Yes, ‘Happy Christmas’ in Luganda. I hope you all had a good time over Winterval / the festive season / or whatever politically correct term we are now supposed to use.

Santa came this year (possibly for the last time, as a certain person will probably be too old next year) and we managed to remain ‘unwoken’ until 7.30am. We opened the presents and then didn’t really see the children for many hours as Jordan played a new computer game and Kira watched several DVDs.
In the afternoon we went round to a house dubbed ‘The Pink Palace’ – a pink house, rented by several people we know. This was the meeting point for many muzungus from Jinja, elsewhere in Uganda, and overseas, who came along for a shared Xmas meal.
We didn’t stay long as we had our Christmas meal with some friends. They are a French family, and they had also invited their neighbour who is English and a friend who is from Chile.
We had a lovely meal of tilapia - a local fish - as two of the people work at the tilapia fish farm. We also had a treasure hunt in the garden which was not only in the dark and involved Jordan climbing onto the roof, but was also in French … mon dieu!

The weather was strangely un-Ugandan on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. The sun didn’t shine at all for 2 days - very unusual. People were even wearing cardigans!

John Bosco our house boy has gone home to his family in the village for Christmas. Good grief, we now have to do housework! We’ve divvied up the tasks and I have the job of doing the washing. We don’t have a washing machine so I have to do it all by hand. Crikey!

I was a bit disappointed this year as Jinja seems to have discovered Christmas decorations. The mini supermarkets were selling tinsel, baubles and Christmas trees. Even some stalls in the market were selling decorations. Last year there was no evidence of Christmas at all.
Mind you, by western standards it was very low key, and as we don’t watch TV we had no adverts to sit through either. Christmas next year when we are in the UK will be very different.

Earlier in the month Jordan had a bad dose of malaria. He had been felling unwell, but he has been like this before and has become fine by the next day. I did a malaria test on him and it showed negative, so we left him overnight.
However in the morning he was in a bad way so I took him to the doctor’s surgery which has an on-site hospital and they admitted him straight away.
He had a temperature of 40 degrees, rapid heart beat, vomiting, dehydration and was delirious. They had to sort out all of these before they could start malaria treatment. When delirious he couldn't understand even simple things like 'clench your fist' or 'sit up', and was saying very unusual things. He tried to take the drip out of his hand and tried to get out of bed to leave hospital.
Kira got upset seeing Jordan so ill and was crying so I had to take her to a friend's.
He has never been able to master the skill of swallowing tablets so that made things more challenging. They gave him quinine in a drip but it made his blood pressure drop so they put him on artinam, which they gave by injection.
Jon stayed in hospital with him overnight. He was in for a day and a half then came home and was very weak afterwards. He’s probably recovered now. It’s been two and a half weeks.

As we arrived at the hospital, a strange looking man was crossing the road. As I got near to where he was, he threw himself on the road in a very melodramatic dive and started shouting out in Luganda, as if I had run him over. As I was near the hospital, I parked on the road just a few metres from where he was.
“Oh that’s just great” I thought, “I’m sorting out a very sick child and now someone is trying to claim I ran him over.”
Fortunately a Ugandan man was walking past. He looked at me, looked at the man and raised his eyes.
“Oh good” I thought, “He isn’t going to convince any Ugandans to go and call the police.”
The room Jordan was in looked out onto the road. I could see him from where we were, and he sat in the middle of the road for ages.

Although the room we were in was very basic, I think it’s the best room in the hospital. There are two beds there and when we arrived an old Ugandan lady was in one of the beds. I assumed she would be there for a while as she looked pretty ill. She had quite a few of her family members there who looked like they had camped out on the floor overnight, they had brought some mats to sleep on.
It took a few minutes to get Jordan sorted – to explain what was happening (though he didn’t understand) and to stop him trying to run out of the hospital. When I looked round the old lady and her family had gone. I think they had moved her to a communal ward, because muzungus tend to take preference for the best things …

I have been having Luganda lessons from Vicky, Kira’s teacher. I want to learn some basics so I can communicate with people, and so have been learning how to ask for things like ‘two kilos of potatoes’ from the market, which you translate as ‘potatoes kilos two’, or how to say ‘good morning’, which translates as ‘did you sleep well?’ Luganda is nothing like any other language I’ve learnt and so I can’t work anything out, I just have to learn the words.

Many Ugandans in the towns go home to their family in the villages over Christmas. I asked Vicky if she would be going to her village. She said she wasn’t because she didn’t like to see her Mum and Dad or Granddad. None of them are alive.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
Apparently it’s very common to bury your relatives in the garden, and she doesn’t like to stay at her Grandmother’s house, because when she comes out of the front door she can see the graves.

And so the Panto – Aladdin – went very well again this year. Many people from last year were in it again, plus a few new ones. Jon was the pantomime dame again - Widow Twankey – and Jordan and Kira were in the chorus.
Unfortunately Jordan was recovering from malaria at the time of the performances and so wasn’t able to take part. He had been rehearsing for about 3 months, so was very disappointed.
I was due to do the makeup, which was a bit of a challenge, as you can’t really find makeup in Jinja. I had to borrow some foundation, use some of my own makeup and brushes, and make all the eye shadows myself. I used cornflour, body lotion, vegetable oil and food colouring.
Anyway I got everything ready and someone else had to do it instead, as I had to look after Jordan.
Somehow he managed to drag himself along to watch the final performance. He hadn’t eaten for five days, was very thin and weak, and two hours beforehand had been so hot that I had to sponge him with cold water.
Anyway, the performance was great, and the audience loved it.

Our car insurance was due this month. Jon had sorted it last year so I asked where he’d got it from and went along to renew it. The office was closed, so I went back later and it was still closed. Kira and I peeped in through the lock in the door and it appeared to have closed down. We went to another insurance company. Companies produce a certificate for you to stick on the inside of your car window.
“I can’t give you your certificate” the woman said after she’d taken my money “my typewriter is broken.”
So we got in the car and went to another insurance company. They were out at lunch, so we went to yet another one (the fourth one I’d visited). Fortunately the woman there had a typewriter which was working perfectly and I managed to get my car insurance. Then I had to take the woman back to her office.

Some Ugandan ways we find difficult to deal with as they are very different to what we are used to. For example I was standing in the queue at Umeme, the electricity company, to pay my bill. A man was before me getting served. While I was waiting, another man came to the counter and stood next to the man who was being served. As the first man left, the other man pushed in front and gave his bill and payment to the woman behind the counter. I told him I was next, so he moved aside and stood next to (not behind) me. I gave my bill and payment in, and then a woman came in between us and pushed her bill and payment in front of me on the counter for the assistant to deal with.
Another time I was at the bank (aarghh, banks! aarghh) and when I got to the counter the man behind me in the queue came to the counter as well and stood beside me. He was very big and stood so close that I couldn’t actually get to the counter window as he was blocking most of it.
Sometimes if there is a queue Ugandans will go right up to the front and go behind the person working at the desk and get served there in front of others in the queue.
One thing I’d never really thought about until I came here was how men will always let a woman go first through a door. Here it’s vey different, men don’t let women go first, in fact they rush to get to the door before you or push you aside!

It’s very common to have geckos on your wall, both inside and outside the house. They are good to have around as they eat flies and mosquitoes. However, they do leave pooh around the house, and you need to check surfaces in case any has appeared overnight.
One day I decided to make myself pancakes for lunch while Jordan was at home recuperating. I made up the mixture and then popped in to see that Jordan was OK. When I got back a mozzie had landed in the mixture. I threw it away and made up some more. As I was making it, a fly dropped into the mixture. I decided to take a risk by taking the fly out and carrying on. I cooked a pancake and as I turned it over, discovered it had gecko pooh in it. We’d left the frying pan on the cooker overnight and I hadn’t noticed because the base of it is black. Groo!
I guess I wasn’t meant to have pancakes that day…

I’ve been quite creative recently, not only have I been producing some paintings for children which I’m aiming to sell, but have also produced a Haiku e-calendar with a verse for each month and a photo taken by one of us. If you would like a copy which you can print off, go to http://www.successfulspeaking.co.nz/products/

We are off to one of the national parks on 30th for three days. Will let you know how it goes













Jon has finished his masterpiece now – very impressive!

November 2009

At the beginning of the month I was being driven mad by the lack of variety of food here, and had got to the stage where I was hardly eating anything, as I couldn’t face another meal of mince and rice, or corned beef hash yet again. Jinja has much less variety of food than Kampala, added to which I don’t eat wheat, along with the fact that the supermarket food here is expensive.
A small tin of tuna costs 5,000/- (£1.60, $3.70), a biggish box of Kellogg’s cornflakes is 23,000/- (£7.40, $17), 500g of cheese costs 24,000/-, Heinz baked beans cost 3,200/- (£1, $2.40) and a normal sized pot of cottage cheese 16,500/- (£5.30, $12). And bear in mind that Ugandan income is usually lower …

Food from the market is cheap, and while there are many stalls selling fruit and vegetables, they all sell the same goods. There will be stall after stall selling onions, carrots, green peppers, potatoes (which they call ‘Irish’), tomatoes, bananas, mango, paw paw and pineapples. You can get apples and oranges (‘orange’ oranges, not the green Ugandan oranges which are quite bitter) though they are imported, and aren’t cheap.
You can’t however get any berry fruits, grapes, peaches, plums, pears, broccoli, celery or mushrooms here.
To maintain my sanity I decided to learn how to cook a few different meals (eg lentil dahl), and splashed out on some expensive items (eg muesli).

It is, apparently, grasshopper season at the moment. You can buy them at the market either raw (green) or cooked (orange). There are people cooking them in big vats and selling them for 500/- per cupful. I wasn’t tempted, even if it would have made my diet more varied!

As I hold the lofty title of ‘Jinja representative for the British Residents Association’, it was my role to round up the local British people for the Remembrance Sunday event, which this year was held at the Jinja African War Cemetery. I have never actually been to a Remembrance Sunday event, strangely enough, and found that it was a really nice ceremony. The war cemetery is small and beautifully maintained and there was a nice crowd of people attending. It was however very hot, and the area where we had to stand had no shade. A woman fainted with the heat. One of the people attending was THE doctor from Kampala that all white people go to. He took one look at her, said “Lay her down in some shade” and then left her to it! He had presumably seen it many times before, and sure enough she was up and about in a few minutes.
During the two minutes’ silence at 11am, I heard a little boy’s voice shouting “WHAT ARE WE WAITING FOR?” I turned round to look, and saw that it was the British High Commissioner’s son!

Another thing I have never done is have my hair cut since I’ve been here. I’m wary of using a Ugandan hairdresser as they don’t generally deal with hair like mine, so I usually get Jon to trim it with my dressmaking scissors. When I was back in the UK Jon’s mum (who is a hairdresser) gave me a proper style. Thank you Carol!
However, that was in June and I haven’t had anything done since. A hairdresser from NZ is now working here, though she is quite a way out of town and charges 40,000/- for a cut. One day I was waiting with Jon and Jordan while they had their hair cut by the barber (yes, Jordan finally decided to get his mane cut!), so I had my hair cut there too. It seems to be alright and he only charged 20,000/-.

Jordan’s main homeschool tutor and her family have gone home to the States for a month, so I’ve been teaching Jordan a lot.
Kira’s school term finished on 28th November. As it’s a parent-run homeschool centre, we choose our own dates. We have three terms, and had a short mid-year break so we could finish earlier at the end of the year as two of the children (ie almost 1/3 of the pupils!) were going home to Australia for two months. We had an early school nativity show on 17th with singing and dancing performances, and a school trip to a rainforest on 19th where the children used the swimming pool and had a meal. The local homeschooled children and their families were invited to join, so we had a decent turnout for both events.
It’s all very different to how we lived before.

One day I took a ‘snapshot’ of a morning we were having:
It's 11am, Jordan has just come back from a 2-hour sports lesson. This week it was golf training at the golf course, with the local Ugandan sports tutor Ronnie whose golf handicap is 0. He came back on a boda boda (motorbike taxi), got a drink of water and jumped back on the boda boda to go off for a Maths lesson at his Maths tutor's house. She is a Zimbabwean secondary school Maths teacher who is here for 2 years.
Jordan is very good at sorting out prices with the boda boda drivers - much better than me. “Mum you don’t ask them how much the fare is going to be, you tell them how much you are going to pay!”
Jon is working from home again today as it's the 6th day there has been no electricity at the place where he works. It's a challenge being an IT specialist in a country where there are regular power cuts.
I've been homeschooling Kira from 8-10am, and then took her to the homeschool centre she attends (only seven children there).
I'm about to go to Kampala this afternoon, staying overnight with friends, in readiness for a two-day course there tomorrow.

Jordan has started another carpentry ‘apprenticeship’ with a different Ugandan carpenter. Has made computer desk – very handy – and is now making a ‘geek workbench’ which Jon designed. Both he and Jon are planning to use it in the garage to do and make geeky things.
He’s supposed to be going to carpentry twice a week, but cannot go if it’s raining (not sure why… everything stops here when it rains). It’s the rainy season at the moment, which hampers things a bit. Today he was meant to go but the carpentry workshop has had no electricity for a week, which doesn’t allow him to do the work he needs to next.

Jon and I have finally got round to painting the canvases we bought a few months ago. We had to get the paints from Kampala, and it took us three trips to find the place! We bought just five colours, red, yellow, blue, black and white, and are making all the colours we need from those.
My canvases are 40cm square and are quite simple. I painted the colours to match the sofa, the cushion and the lamp. I want to sew small beads onto each canvas in a pattern that signifies the three parts of the world I’ve lived in: the UK, NZ and Uganda. For NZ I will do a koru shape - ie spiral, which is a shape significant to Maoris. For Uganda I will do the crest of the Crested Crane, the national bird of Uganda. For the UK, I did think of doing the top of the Catholic Cathedral in my home city of Liverpool, though it will look very similar to the bird’s crest, so I’m still thinking about that one. Any suggestions you may have are most welcome.
Mind you, I don’t think you can find any beads here, so it may be a while before I can do it. The craft tutor at Kira’s homeschool centre got some, but he had to ask a friend to bring them from Kenya. Whenever people travel to a different country, they will always have a list of things that people have asked them to bring back.
Jon’s canvas is huge, 1.5m by 1m. He’s drawn a rough sketch and has just started painting it.

We have started to put curtains in our house. The house was newly finished when we moved in and had no curtains at all. We put sheets on the bedroom windows and have managed without curtains in the living and dining rooms. The landlord said he would let us choose and pay for the curtains, and then take the money off the rent. However we have been hoping to buy the house, and if that happened we would put good quality curtains up. We have been asking over a period of months if we can buy the house, but the answer has been ‘no’. I don’t blame him though, I wouldn’t sell it either, it’s in a good area and will increase in price.
So we’ve now started curtaining the place and it’s amazing how different the rooms look with curtains. They’re something you normally take for granted, but it’s been quite an exciting experience for us.
I’ve been mainly using a local curtain shop to buy the material.
There are many, many people here who sit in the market or outside shops with treadle sewing machines (as you don’t need electricity for them) making a variety of items. The curtain material shop has a woman who sits outside with her machine and makes up the curtains. We chose the material and went back an hour later and they were already made.
However, we have had our usual challenges of making ourselves and our ideas understood, and I’ve ended up with not exactly what I asked for, but they are curtains and they are mainly OK.

Today I went to order curtains for the living and dining room. The sewing machine lady was asleep on a mattress at the back of the shop and we had to climb over her to see the material. The average Ugandan working in a shop or market stall, works very, very long hours and it’s very common to see people asleep at their place of work. The Monday to Friday, 9 to 5 mentality is a world away from how most Ugandans live. Their work is virtually their life, and they live and work long hours, in a community setting. Some friends or ours came back from a party at 3.30 in the morning and there were still many roadside stalls open.
There have been times when I haven’t been able to buy things from the market because the owner of the stall has been asleep.

As we can’t buy the house we are living in, we have been looking around for another one to buy. We don’t want to live in it, as we are happy where we are, but want it as a rental property. We have found a nice one, and it happens to be one we looked at (once) last year when we were looking for a house to rent. We met with the owner and asked if we could look round it again. He was surprised “You have already seen it. It has not changed.”
He didn’t arrange for us to have a look at it, but we know the people who are living there and had a look anyway. We are now in the process of getting some reports on it from the electrician and builder.



This billboard poster never fails to amaze me, every time I see it.
I cannot understand why you would be drawn to join a bank which assigns you a GIGANTIC banking consultant who produces a tape measure and measures your boob ….



Jon went to Kampala for an internet conference for a couple of days. I don’t know what it is about him leaving, but things go wrong when he does. Just after he left Jordan used the mixer tap in the kitchen. It had been leaking slightly, but it now started leaking a lot, spraying water everywhere. Jordan had a go with the wrench and almost stopped it, but at this point it broke and the water came shooting out, soaking him, then me and the kitchen. We had to switch the water off at the mains. As it was Sunday evening there was no point calling a plumber, as we needed a new mixer tap for him to be able to fix it.
I called him the next morning. I think he must have been walking past our house as he arrived almost instantly. Anyway he went off into town and got a new mixer tap and fixed it.
“You need a new washer” he said “this one is too hard. It needs to be flexible.” He showed me the old, brittle washer and then showed me the new flexible one he was installing. I thought it unusual that it was red and yellow. Then I looked on the floor. There was half a flipflop / jandal there with a circular hole in it. That’s what he had used to make the new washer out of!

One of the things that I find quite affronting (if that’s a word) is the tone of the wording on the electricity and water bills. Even though I always pay our bills when they come in (we pay by cash or cheque – I wouldn’t trust the banks to sort out APs or DDs) I never feel they really appreciate my custom or willingness to pay promptly:
Water bill: ‘Dear esteemed customer, we would like you to enjoy our services without any inconveniences. We encourage you to urgently settle your water bills to zero upon receipt of this invoice to avoid being disconnected. Please expect no further warning.’
Electricity bill: ‘Thank you for keeping your account up to date. You are however advised to settle the current bill by the payment due date.’ (Why do they need the ‘however’?)

Similarly when I saw the school reports of the three children we sponsor, the wording seemed very old fashioned and harsh. It was like looking at the school report my Nan had shown me. My Nan was born in 1911 and her report was from around 1916. There were no positive words, no words of encouragement on the children’s reports. Just words telling them they weren’t performing well enough. Even the report of the littlest one, aged 5, who came 2nd in class said ‘Try harder next time’.

The people who asked us to look after their dog, Lotte, were due to come back to Uganda in November. However the woman is having a baby and as they are German they are going to go to Germany to have the baby and will return in August next year. This is good timing as that is when we plan to leave, and they would like to have the dog back.
The man, Jens, came back for a week recently and came round to our house. Lotte hadn’t seen him for a year but recognised him as soon as he came near, and was very excited. It was very sweet!

I’ve been doing some presentation skills training in Kampala for the British Council and am fortunate that I can stay with our ex-neighbours Eric and Lindsay, and Lindsay’s teenage twin children. They have 4 dogs, one of which ate a hairy caterpillar recently and came out in a bad rash all over its face. Another one ate a dead rat and as a result got botulism. It has been lying paralysed, unable to move. Over a period of weeks it has started to regain some movement and is now using its front paws in order to drag itself around.

One of the things I like about running presentation skills courses is that people often give interesting speeches. One of the attendees on one of the courses – James - told us about an incident that happened when he was 4 year old. He used to live in a village 260km from Kampala. His father was the village chief and was invited along with some others to go to Kampala. As James was the oldest son, he got to go too. None of the villagers had been to Kampala, though they had all heard that it was a place where it never went dark. Visiting Kampala was such a momentous occasion that the night before the group left, the whole village came out to celebrate.
Early the next day the group walked for 22km to the bus stop. They arrived at 8pm and slept at the bus stop until the bus came at 5am. The bus only seated 35 people, and while the driver allowed 70 people to get on, there were too many people, so one almighty fight broke out to see who would get on the bus. James and his group got on. All the children sat on the floor, and it took them a day and a half to travel. They had a great time in Kampala then had to do the whole trip in reverse. James is now 48, but because it was such a momentous event he remembers all the details very clearly.

Lindsay is one of the committee members for the Caledonian (ie Scottish) Society in Uganda. Every year, to celebrate St Andrew’s night on 30th November, they bring out a Scottish ceilidh band - three people, who play the fiddle, drum and accordion. The Society get funding, this time from a cellphone company, and give the band an all-expenses-paid trip out here. The guys love it. They get to leave the frozen Scottish wastes and come to a wonderfully warm and sunny land. Their flights are paid for, people provide accommodation, and all they have to do is entertain people for a few hours. They party till after dawn and get taken out to barbeques and get-togethers. They do some sightseeing, all of which is paid for. Last year they went on safari. This year they went on a boat trip, a light aircraft flight, a visit to an animal sanctuary, along with a trip to Jinja where they did quad biking. All this to do something they love doing - and they get paid for it as well. I went to the ‘do’ the night after the St Andrew’s day event which was held at the sailing club. We got a boat over there. The scenery is just stunning. Very beautiful.
They were a good group of guys, and they did a good ceilidh.

We plan to be around here over Christmas and then go to Queen Elizabeth National Park (a game reserve) over New Year. We will be staying at Simba Safari camp http://www.ugandalodges.com/photogallerysimba.php We will share the photos with you.

October 2009

Fairy tale: A Happy Story
Chapter 1
Once upon a time there was a nice man and a nice lady. They lived with their nice son and nice daughter in a land far, far away.
At first they lived in a big city, but it was too busy so they moved to a nice town by a long, long river.
One day while they lived in the big city, they decided to apply for a Driving Permit.
Can you say that children? Try it after me “Dri-ving Per-mit”.
Well done.
They enjoyed every minute they spent getting their Permit. They enjoyed travelling the long way between the nice town and the big city to visit all the different offices. They hired a nice taxi driver to drive them there in his shiny car and they paid him lots of money. This made the nice taxi driver very happy, and so the nice man and the nice lady were happy too.
Chapter 2
One whole year passed, and the nice man and the nice lady had to apply for another Permit.
“What fun we had last year” said the nice lady, “Let’s hope it is as much fun this year too.”
Unfortunately they didn’t go to the offices in the big city any more so they couldn’t do all the long journeys again, nor pay the nice taxi driver lots of money. This made them sad. But they decided to visit all the of offices in the nice town lots more times instead.
When it came to the last visit to the offices to get their Permit they were very sad. Very sad indeed. They wished the process could go on longer.
But The Luck Fairy saw what was happening. She is the fairy who brings good luck to nice people who are feeling sad.
She decided to help them.
So when they went into the Permit office for the seventh time, The Luck Fairy switched off all the electricity. This made the office lady very grumpy, and she held the nice man and the nice lady’s Permits in her hand and wouldn’t give them the Permits because she couldn’t use her computer.
“How fortunate!” said the nice lady “The Luck Fairy must know all about us. She helps us a lot and now she has helped us again.”
The nice man and the nice lady, however, pretended to be a bit cross. They said big words like “Inconvenience” “Customer service” and “Incompetency beyond belief.” They said the last words very quietly in case the grumpy lady heard them. The words were so clever that it might have made the grumpy lady want to speed up the system for them.
But the nice man and the nice lady weren’t really cross at all. Inside, their hearts were singing with happiness.
The nice lady felt so lucky that she cried with Jon. er … with joy. She cried with joy.
This meant that the nice man and the nice lady could go into the office four more, happy, times.
One time The Luck Fairy didn’t turn off the electricity, she stopped the Network from working instead. The nice man and the nice lady were overjoyed when the grumpy office lady held back their Permits once again.
The following time The Luck Fairy made the nice lady feel unwell and so the nice man asked if he could pick up the nice lady’s Permit instead, and showed the grumpy office lady a letter of authority from the nice lady. Fortunately The Luck Fairy’s power was strong enough to make the grumpy office lady refuse.
However The Luck Fairy then had other work to do and so the nice lady picked up her Permit on the eleventh visit. But the nice man and the nice lady had both had such a joyful experience that they were very happy. Very happy indeed.
The End.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

I have discovered that I am vey delectable. At least to mosquitoes. They like me - a lot - and flock to be around me, ignoring all others.
Jordan likes to sit next to me as he knows that any mozzies will by-pass him and come and commune with me.
One evening time, which is the start of mozzie-coming-out time, I was doing my usual, trying to protect myself from getting bitten, and sitting on the couch looking like Eskimo Woman. I was wearing a high necked sleeveless top, a long sleeved cardigan with sleeves so long that they come down to my knuckles, ¾ pants and Jon’s long winter socks. I was boiling hot.
Jordan was sitting next to me, almost naked, wearing only a pair of shorts. The mozzies avoided him completely and bit me on the finger tip.
Other than wearing a spacesuit, I really don’t know what else I can do.
I feel a bit like Pig-Pen from Snoopy, who calls himself a dust magnet. I’m a mosquito magnet and seem to have my own personal entourage wherever I go.

I guess it was only a matter of time until I was bitten by the wrong sort of mosquito – a female who has bitten someone with malaria.
Half way through the month I got malaria, something I’ve dreaded happening since before we moved here.
I was in bed for four days feeling dreadful – aching all over, headachy, extremely weak, having strange dreams, and writhing in pain. Having to sit up to drink in order to take medication was almost impossible without Jon helping me.
Fortunately I have seen enough muzungus here who have had malaria and recovered quickly, to not get worried.
Many of them have had malaria enough times to self diagnose and treat themselves. When we first came here to have a look-see before we moved over, we asked people what they did about malaria. Most said they did nothing, and when they got it, took a few pills and came right pretty soon.
We keep a malaria testing kit and tablets in the house so were ready in case it ever happened. There are different kinds of treatment and the one muzungus use is called Coartem. I took it and came right after 4 days
Apparently it’s not used in the UK, and so people there tend to have a more challenging time recovering.
Anyway I’m a lot better now, but it’s certainly an experience I don’t want to repeat.

John Bosco and Geoffrey have both had it recently too, though they recovered more quickly than me because they have had it a number of times before.

The landlord has had a power line put in to their houses so they now have electricity there for the first time – must be very exciting for them. It’s rare for small Ugandan houses to have power.
Mind you we have to pay their electricity bill, so we had to tell them not to let the whole of the local community come in and take advantage of it.

And so our little kitten, Ginger, who Jon thinks is male, is growing. He is about half as big again as he was when we got him a few weeks ago, and has now started running and climbing. Lotte and Ginger get on well together which is a relief. He loves to eat the fish we buy that is found in Lake Victoria. It has a number of names, one of which is ‘baby fish’. They are very small, and are sold in the market very cheaply. We buy them dried, so soak them in water for a few minutes to make them easier for him to digest.

Generally we have a fairly cruisy life over here at the moment. Jon’s contract is for around three days a week, he teaches IT to Jordan et al, plus Kira and her schoolmates for one afternoon, and the rest of the time is his own, except for some private IT clients.
I do quite a bit of homeschooling. I do 2 hours each morning from 8-10am with Kira, and 3 afternoons a week with Jordan. I run some training courses from time to time, organise things at the homeschool centre, and the rest of the time I spend writing books.

For Jordan we have had to construct a timetable for him, and at the moment he is taught by Sandy, me, Jon, Rowena (a secondary Maths teacher from Zimbabwe), Ronnie the sports coach and a Ugandan carpenter called Richard.
He studies on Sunday mornings so he can have an afternoon off during the week.

I’m still giving him driving lessons and we decided to have a change from driving round in a circle on the open ground, so went next door to the Showgrounds - a large area of land, which most of the year is fairly empty. Everything went well the first time and he is picking things up very quickly. The second time we went, I drove in, then we swapped seats. At this point an older man and the guard came over. The older man was instantly very angry. He looked into the car, then pointed to the guard and said “You give this man some money. You give him 1000 shillings. He has not eaten since yesterday.” I said “We do not have 1000 shillings”. The man ranted on for a while, during which the guard looked very sheepish.
The man said “Who gave you authority to come in here?” We told him it was a public place and that we had been there often without trouble, which we have - at least without the car. At this point another car, driven by a Ugandan, went past us. “Do they have authority?” I asked, but knew it was pointless as they were not muzungus. Eventually we left them and went for the driving lesson.
As we went to leave, the guard came over to us. The older man had gone and the guard was no longer sheepish. He said “I have spoken to the management and they say you have to give me 1000 shillings or I will lock you in.”
“We do not have 1000 shillings” I said, “I really do not have it so I cannot give it to you.” It was true, I didn’t have it.
“You give me 1000 shillings or I will lock you in.”
“I will go home and I will bring it back for you” I said.
Jordan was appalled. “This is blackmail” he whispered “Don’t give it to him.”
Although I wasn't scared, given that the guard was standing there with a rifle, that Jordan and Kira were both in the car, and that he was asking for such a small amount of money (32p, 68c) my main aim was to get us out of the situation safely.
He let us drive off, on the promise that I would bring the money back.
Jordan was beside himself. “It’s corruption! It’s blackmail! It’s wrong!”
He was right, of course, but we were out safely, and part of me felt sorry for the guard. What must life be like for people who have to threaten others in order to get such a tiny amount of money?
“Do not go back!” yelled Jordan “Do not give him the money.”
He was very upset over the injustice of it all.
I tried to explain my viewpoint to him. “I will go back, and I will take him 1000 shillings” I said, “because I said I would and I don’t tell people lies. Plus, we only live over the road from the Showgrounds and it would make me feel safer knowing we didn't have an unhappy guard nearby.”
We had to go somewhere first, and then went home so I could get the money. As we arrived at our gate we saw the guard. He walked right past our car on his way home, but didn‘t seem to recognise us. It was pointless going back to the Showgrounds now.
Jordan told Jon about the incident, still very aggrieved over the wrongness of it. We all talked it through and tried to establish the various aspects of the situation.
The next day I went back to the Showgrounds, this time leaving the car outside!
The guard wasn’t there, but one of the Showground managers came over to talk to me.
He said “You confused us yesterday when you came in”, which I decided to take as the nearest thing I was going to get as an apology.
“You cannot have driving lessons in this place” he carried on.
“That is fine” I replied, “We will not come here again.”

And on a slightly lighter note, it’s now the rainy season, and when it rains it comes down in torrents. Fortunately it rarely lasts long, though the red earth becomes extremely muddy.
I took one of Kira’s friends home. She lives down a long, long dirt road. I’d only gone a few metres when I got completely stuck in the mud. Even when I changed into 4 wheel drive I couldn’t manage to get out. I called Kira's friend's Mum but she didn’t answer, so I called her Dad. He had to come home from work to get me out. Not only is he used to his driveway, he’s also a diesel mechanic. Very handy!

The rains and storms don’t help with the electricity supply. This means you can’t charge your mobile phone (it’s very rare to have a landline here), and when coupled with some drop outs in the internet connection may mean you cannot have outside connection at all for a period of time.

And finally, one of the things that I quite like is that Ugandan young adults and children often have what we would call old fashioned names, such as Agnes, Gertrude, Florence, Ethel, Humphrey and Godfrey. We know a couple of little children called Nellie and Cedric.
Cute!

I finished off the training in Tororo at the beginning of the month. The others came over on the last day and we went away for the weekend to a place called Mbale about an hour from where I was working. We stayed in an older hotel, though it was nicely maintained.
The children liked it as they had their own room, complete with TV. Heaven only knows what time they got to sleep.
The first evening we ordered our evening meal, it took an hour and a quarter to arrive. We decided to be clever the next day and ordered our food an hour before we wanted it, while we stayed in our room. They called us through after an hour and a quarter for our meals, but Jon’s wasn’t ready. Even though he had ordered an ordinary meal from the menu, they thought he might want a variation on it. They hadn’t contacted him to ask, which meant they then had to go away and prepare it. He had to wait 2 hours in total!

On the Saturday we went to a place called Sipi Falls, a well known tourist spot which has three separate waterfalls. We used a guide to take us to one of the Falls. It was very impressive.
We spent the afternoon at a local guest house, having lunch and reading. It’s a new place and is decorated in a trendy yet homely fashion. We loved the living room, which had several book cases. Given the lack of ‘real’ libraries here it was a rare treat to be able to sit and read.

The scenery in the west is different to here and on the way back we drove past a small forest of thin trees.
Builders here use wooden, not metal, scaffolding.
“I didn’t know you could grow scaffolding” remarked Jon.

And so, not only did the shops not have any low fat milk, they had a phase where they hardly had any milk at all. We were reduced to buying the tiny 250ml cartons of milk, the ones that come with a straw!
Anyway a shipment must have arrived in the last week as supermarkets now have the longlife trim milk again. Excitement!

You may have heard in the news that there were riots in Kampala. Uganda has a president. It also has kingdoms with rulers of each kingdom. The ruler (kabaka) of the Buganda kingdom and the president don’t always see eye to eye which ultimately ended in riots flaring up over a proposed visit by the kabaka. Most of the riots took place in Kampala over a period of a few days. The city centre was virtually closed down and a number of people were killed.
Jon had been to Kampala the day before the riots started, and had seen the beginnings of unrest. The Buganda kingdom starts just outside Jinja, and apparently there were some minor riots on the outskirts, though we didn’t see anything. Things are back to normal now.

Jordan has decided that he is never going to cut his hair and has developed a mane of hair now. I said I’ll need to get the door widened so he can get in. He is several inches taller than me now, so must have shot up over the last year.
He is always talking about driving so I’ve started giving him driving lessons. We go to a grassy area over the road from us. Jordan is pretty competent and is doing really well. He picked up the basics easily in the first lesson. There is a path we can drive around and after we’d driven round about 230 times (in first gear) we decided to follow a track through the grass. Jordan drove about 100 metres down the track until we realised we were on the golf course!
Given that he’s only 13, I’m not exactly sure what he’s going to be able to do with the driving skills he is acquiring. He claims he’s seen a 12 year old boda driver, but I’m not convinced.

And talking of which, Kira and I were on a boda. It stopped a few hundred metres from where we were going. The driver had run out of petrol!
“The petrol, it is lost” he said.

Our houseboy and gardener have started a chapatti business in the garden. They cook rolexes for 800/- (chapatti with omelettes in them) and chapattis (200/-) for local folk. Quite often Jon and Jordan will order them for their lunch. Much more convenient than having to prepare food yourself!

Jordan and I decided to use the library again to see if there was any chance there would be a book on Mussolini for a project he was doing. We went along and discovered that it was ‘Reading Week’, where the aim was to encourage adults to read so that their children would also read. There seemed to be a bigger selection of books this time. We chose 11 and took them to one of the staff. “You can’t take books out, it’s Reading Week” she said, “come back next week.”
Given how long things take here I didn’t want to go through the hassle again and asked if we could take them.
“Have you got a card?” she asked.
I said I had been in once before, had filled in the application form, paid 10,000/- and assumed I could pick the card up this time.
“Go and see the Librarian” she said. I went to see her. She was having her lunch and told me she wouldn’t have my card and that I had to see the Secretary. I went to find the Secretary. She was out for lunch.
Anyway it went on in this vein for quite a bit longer and I began to realise that taking books out of the library was a very unusual occurrence. I also discovered that the system has changed and they don’t use cards now. Apparently the woman who had asked me to fill the form in last time had been dismissed. Use of the library is free and I shouldn’t have paid 10,000/-. They told me to find her and ask for my money back.
In total 5 staff members dealt with my query, including the Secretary who had come back by this time and asked me for 500/- so she could go into town to photocopy the application form as I had to fill another one in.
She came back a lot later. “Have you got a pen?” she asked, “No” I replied so we went into her office - the one with the typewriter – where she asked another woman for a pen. The woman rummaged through her handbag and found one. I filled in the form while the Secretary sat and watched me.
“How long do you want to borrow the books for?” she asked.
“How long do people usually borrow them for?” I replied.
They looked at each other, shrugged their shoulders and said “Two weeks”.

Eventually they deemed that I was a suitable person to borrow books, at which point another staff member took them and made a log of them in a notebook. He spent so long that I thought he was writing the books out word for word in case they never came back. I then had to sign my name 11 times against each book.
Exhausted, we finally left the library without any books on Mussolini.

Reading the newspaper is always an education as they often write about issues that we’re not familiar with or have viewpoints very different from ours. For example there was an article about a cow suckling a dog. I thought it was quite amusing, but the cow owner’s view was that this was an abomination and the animals would have to be killed. He wouldn’t be able to kill them himself in case it brought a curse on his family and so had to get another person to do it.

Another article said that ‘A young man reportedly ran mad last week after charms were poured on him. The man, only identified as Umar, was bathing in a makeshift bathroom when an unidentified person poured the contents of a pot on him. Residents said the charms included chicken heads, human hair, claws and a mixture of blood and herbs. They said Umar began squeaking and growling and refused to get out of the bathroom. He was then taken to a shrine after doctors reportedly failed to treat him. The residents said a man whose son was jailed over a debt with Umar, could be responsible for the incident.’

Sometimes Ugandans talk in ‘Ugandan time’ and we have to work out what they mean. For them the day starts at 6am and the time is calculated on that basis. So 7am for them is 1 o’clock as it is 1 hour after 6am, 8am is 2 o’clock and so on.
One day I took the children from Kira’s school for a cookery lesson in the afternoon. I asked Vicky, the teacher, that morning what time we were leaving. “We will go early” she said “at seven thirty.” “Seven thirty?” I said “that’s pretty late.” I then realised she was talking in Ugandan time and that we were leaving at 1.30pm.

One of the sessions we have arranged at Kira’s school is Community Service. Those children who want to, go to help out at an orphanage after school once a week for about an hour. Kira loves it. She has got to know most of the children there, and while they mainly play with the orphanage children, it’s a big help to the staff there.

We have started to go to dance classes now. An Australian woman has started running classes. Kira goes to ballet and jazz dance, and I go to the same jazz dance class. We are even going to do a short performance in November.
Unfortunately there is no ballroom dancing here.

However the squash court has finally re-opened, it has been in renovation since we arrived here a year ago. It’s now the sport I play instead of tennis. Much easier as it’s indoors and you don’t have to cope with the African sun.
It’s also a sport Jon and Jordan enjoy so it’s become the family sport (or at least ¾ of the family!).

Some friends of ours, Bob & Sue from NZ, have been in Uganda recently, a place they used to live in during the Amin regime. It was nice to see them. It’s always good to catch up with people we know and hear news from the Outside!

And yes, it’s coming up for Panto time again! It was such a success last year that the newly named Jinja Community Theatre is holding another one in December, this time Aladdin. Jon is obviously becoming known as the man in Jinja who is happy to wear a dress as he’s playing the part of Widow Twanky. Watch this space…

Last week it was Kira’s half term break and the two of us went to Kampala to do voluntary work with an organisation helping women with HIV and people in the local community. It was set up by a woman called Moureen and she has done a great job of being able to provide help to a range of women in the villages.
As Kira is underage – and also the first child to be a volunteer – we were restricted in the number of things we could do. However we made health & social education posters and went to schools to give them the posters and explain ways to keep healthy and safe. We helped plant trees and shrubs around the health centre. The organisation is linked with Red Cross, so we would wear the tabards and meet with school groups who wanted to be Red Cross volunteers. Kira gave out weekly food rations to women with HIV.

The people in the villages are very poor and their housing is very basic. They can buy water from a tap at 100/- for a medium-sized jerry can and 200/- for a large one.
The women clients we met were very nice. Some of them had formed a singing group and gave us a rendition at the office. A blind guitarist from Entebbe had offered to join them.

Moureen is organising for someone to buy pigs for the group - 1 male and 3 females - as an additional way for the women to raise money. She asked if I would contribute as the women had decided to call one of the pigs ‘Kira’!

A couple who are both nurses from Belgium were volunteering too. They have been here for 7 months and have done a lot to help out. Moureen has no funding and relies on volunteers helping her. We paid 150,000/- per person per week ($109, £40) which covers our accommodation and evening meal. The rest she uses to fund the charity. She urgently needs volunteers, so if you know of anyone who would like the experience of being able to make a difference, let me know and I can give you the contact details. There are a wide range of activities people can become involved in.

I did a couple of things I said I would never do. Firstly go on a boda boda in Kampala because of the traffic, and secondly go on a matatu (minibus). However I didn’t have the car with me and there was no other way to get to the villages. We were fine.

I still miss my cats in NZ and a couple of days ago we got an email from our neighbour there, Shirley, who has taken our cats, giving us an update. The cats are doing really well, thank you Shirley and family.
Just after I read this email, Kira and I drove to the shops. We saw a tiny little kitten crossing the road. It was so cute and so much in danger.
“Oh mummy can we have it?” asked Kira.
“If we can find it when we come back” I replied.
We drove back, parked the car and wandered around trying to find it. We eventually found it down a back alley by a small house. A Ugandan boy of about 11 was by the house. I asked if it was his kitten. He said it was (though you can never be sure) and said we could have it.
The kitten had a bad eye infection, its eyes were closed over and the fur around the eyes was dirty and matted. I wasn’t sure if it was his to give away so asked if there was someone else we could speak to. There didn’t seem to be.
We called Jon to see if he was OK to have a tiny kitten. Kira was saying “Please Daddy” and held the kitten up to the phone so he could hear it mewing away. He couldn’t really say no.
“You give me 1000 shillings” said the boy “and you can take the kitten.” We brought it home and I called the vet. He does home visits and so came to give it antibiotics. We cleaned its eyes and it looked a lot better. We don’t know if it’s a boy or girl yet, though it looks like a girl. It’s a gingery colour and because we live in Jinja, Kira has called it Ginger.
It is tiny and very cute and seems very much at home. Even though she’d been living presumably wild and not looked after, she took to using a litter tray straight away. She is too small to eat solids so we feed her with a syringe using milk, egg yolk, oil and warm water mixed together.
Jon pretended not to be interested, but he researched the kind of food we could give it and has been out buying things for it.
Jordan loves it and has made a box and given it a ball while Kira has it sleeping in her bedroom. Even Lotte the dog has been OK with her.

The next day Lotte was spayed. The vet came back again. He gave Ginger more antibiotics and performed the operation on Lotte in our garage. He mustn’t have given her the right dose of anaesthetic as she woke up during the operation and was in a lot of pain, so he gave her some more. I sat with her while she ‘came to’ afterwards and she was in a bad way, crying out loudly. When I went to close the garage door there was a group of Ugandan builders working at the house next door. They were standing and staring, wondering what the commotion was.
Anyway that was yesterday and Lotte is a lot better now.

So we now have a dog, kitten and geckos in the house, and goats, a cow, cockerels and hens next door. John Bosco and Geoffrey have bought some hens and a cockerel which live in our compound and sometimes wander into the house. Never a peaceful moment!

August 2009

We’ve had a little mouse in our house for a while. It was a bit elusive when we tried to catch it, so we just let it roam around. It would come out of an evening and run from behind the TV to behind the bookcase and into the spare room. It wasn’t really a bother so we just left it, especially as Kira and I had been reading a book about a little mouse who just wanted someone to look after him and feed him.
One evening Jon noticed two mice behind the bookcase. Hmmm, two mice can mean potentially lots of mice, and pretty soon afterwards he found a whole family of them living in a box in the garage, and then we started to notice different sized mice running around, albeit one at a time.
Jon mentioned it to a few Ugandans who all recommended Mouse Glue. We had never heard of it, but on asking for ‘mouse glue’ at the supermarket we discovered that it’s a very common item. Basically you spread the non-toxic glue onto pieces of cardboard and leave these out in the evening in places you think the mice will go. The next morning we found 4 mice stuck to various pieces of cardboard. I didn’t want to see what Jon did with them, but suffice it to say they are no longer here…

Unfortunately a little gecko got caught on the glue as well. We took it off and left it on the windowsill overnight. In the morning it was still there and we realised it couldn’t move because it had glue on it. Jon decided to do an ‘animal rescue’ and got a cotton bud and washing up liquid to clean the glue off. He then covered the gecko with talcum powder. We weren’t sure if it could open its mouth. This would have been a bit of a problem if it couldn’t eat, so we tried prising its mouth open with a blunt knife. It could open its mouth so we let it go free in the garden.

I still struggle at times to know what to do when people ask for money. Sometimes it’s easy because people ask just to try their luck, but other times people seem very needy.

We support John Bosco’s two nephews and a niece through their education – they go to boarding school - as they are orphans, and were hoping that we wouldn’t have to make decisions about financially helping other people as it’s too difficult to decide who to help and who not to, but things aren’t that easy.

A man came to our gate. He said he was from Rwanda. As he spoke fluent French I assumed he was telling the truth. He told me he had HIV, hadn’t told his mother but hoped that she would accept him when she found out. He had been employed by the local hospital, but when they found out he was HIV positive, had asked him to leave. He needed money to go back to Rwanda. He didn’t ask for money, instead asked if I could give him some work and pay him. He asked if he could clean the car. John Bosco and Geoffrey had just cleaned the car, and we already pay them to do work for us, so I couldn’t offer him work. Instead we gave him some clothing to sell and the children’s tithing money. It wasn’t very much, and I felt uncomfy.

The next morning I was in the ATM queue when an old lady came and stood in front of me. Without words she begged me for money.
I was the only muzungu in the queue. It does get a bit tiring constantly being asked for money because you are a muzungu, so I said no. But then she asked the Ugandan male next to me, who gave her 30/-. I asked him what she’d said. She’d said that she had no food. I told him that we are asked for money almost daily because we are white. He said it’s OK to give to old people, not youngsters. Old people may give you a blessing. She had gone to bed without food.
Now I felt really bad.
It’s very rare you see old people and she had looked at me with old, old eyes. I drove round to try and find her. I drove round and round the streets several times but couldn’t find her. I went home and cried.

And so the shops in Jinja don’t have any trim / skimmed milk at the moment. We’ve been to almost every supermarket and there is none at all. There is such a limited range of food we can get here, so losing one item is a major deal!

Most of the time recently I’ve been working away, running 3 weeks’ training on behalf of the British Council in a place called Tororo on the Kenyan border.
A taxi took me on Monday; I stayed in a hotel for 4 nights while I was working Tuesday to Friday, then the taxi picked me up again on Friday. It was very nice being away, staying in a nice hotel and working from 8.30 - 4.00 then having the evenings to myself.

I hadn’t been to that part of Uganda, and the trip over there took about 2 hours. We went through rice fields and through a forest where baboons live. One time there were about 20 baboons at the side of the road, including a tiny baby. They are fairly people-friendly as they are used to people stopping and giving them bananas. I got quite close to one to take a photo and it didn’t seem bothered. One time a matatu (minibus) overtook us and got very close to one of the baboons. It ran to the side and then turned, looked at the matatu and pulled tongues!

For the first couple of days of the training, Richard the training coordinator from the British Council was with me. He had booked us some rooms at the largest hotel there. However it’s an older hotel and quite run-down and there was hardly anyone there. He had asked for the best room for me and they gave me the ‘suit’ (ie suite), which was basically two rooms that had been joined together. It still had two front doors to it and two bathrooms. One of the bedrooms had stayed as a bedroom (complete with a round-shaped bed), while the other had been turned into a living room.
We went out to see the hotel where we would be running the training and when we got back there was no one on reception so Richard went behind the desk and rooted through all the drawers until he found our keys!
At meal times we were the only people in the very large dining room. We were amused at the part of the menu which said ‘bona petit’.

When we tracked down the receptionist we asked her to order a taxi for us for 7.30 in the morning. Ugandans aren’t generally known for being on time so she said she would ask the taxi to come early. “I will order it for 6am.”
He was there at 7.30 and tried to charge us 35,000/- ($11, $25) to go two kilometres, a ride that should only cost about 5,000/-. We were appalled, but his view was ‘it’s a fixed fee’.

Anyway the hotel where we were doing the training was newer and nicer so we moved there. It was more convenient being based on the premises and also saved us the appalling taxi costs.
Tororo is known for its Rock, which is a small mountain in the centre of the town. The hotel room I moved to had a balcony with a wonderful view over the Rock. Very impressive, and very nice to wake up to such a lovely view.

In the second week Jon, Jordan and Kira came with me in the taxi on the Monday and we had lunch at the hotel then went to look at the Rock. It is breathtaking to see it close up. Jordan took 30 photos of it.
As we were there a Nun came to talk to us. She lives in the little convent at the base of the mountain and works in the hospital next door. She asked us if we wanted to look round the hospital.
It was very special being shown around. The hospital was as you would expect it to be. Fairly old and very basic. She took us into the children’s ward. The beds were very simple metal framed ones with green plastic coated mattresses. A number of women were there with very small children. It was a sad experience.
(Photo below is of me and Kira in hospital grounds)

Jon has learned some of the language and was talking to some of the nurses in Luganda. They are always impressed, and laugh at the fact that a muzungu can speak their language.
We then all went round the market and then I went back to the hotel and the others went home in the taxi.

The first day in the new hotel, Richard and I ordered an evening meal in the restaurant. “What on earth did you order?” Richard asked as my plate arrived at the table. It looked like two large crumpets.
What I had ordered was a pineapple and cheese salad. I had expected a salad with cheese and pineapple. What actually arrived was two large slices of pineapple topped with grated white cheese … and that was it!
During the meal, two small Ugandan children who were with their family at the next table came over to see us. One was about 5 years old and the other was about 18 months.
Ugandan children are not only very cute, but also very polite. The 5 year old came over to me, knelt down and put his hand up for me to shake it. Then the little 18 month old did the same.
The 5 year old went to do the same with Richard, then called out to his tiny brother “Come and greet this one.”
Choochie!!

Anyway the cheese and pineapple salad was actually very nice so I ordered it again a few days later. This time the hotel had no cheese, so my ‘salad’ was simply pineapple.
Undeterred, I ordered it again the following week. This time it came with much smaller slices of pineapple, a small sprinkling of red cheese … and an ant. This is Africa. I took the ant off and carried on eating.

The food we got on the course was interesting. Often morning tea would comprise a banana and a boiled egg. The lunchtime food was very filling, very carb-rich. They would have rice, potatoes, matoke (liked solid mashed potatoes), posho (very stiff maize and water mix), along with chicken, fish, beef or goats meat.

Quite often the hotel would lose their electricity supply and would provide a generator instead – very noisy! One time the power was off most of the day which meant there was no water either. They gave all the residents a jerry can of water during the day and then in the evening a little housemaid staggered around the rooms delivering a jerry can of hot water to everyone.

One of the things I found a bit unnerving was the fact that the public toilets in the hotel had a bolt on the outside of the door! Whenever I used them I made it a quick visit in case anyone felt the urge to lock me in…

Running training course for Ugandans does have its differences. For example when I asked people what their expectations were, about 50% of them said they expected a certificate at the end. Ugandans generally like their pieces of paper showing their qualifications. One person said she expected a test at the end. Traditional training here is of the ‘chalk and talk’ kind, so they appreciated the interactive and varied nature of the training.
One of the feedback comments at the end was ‘Very active throughout so that I could not sleep off’. Another comment said ‘Feeding was okey’.

Some of the training was on CV writing. Things here work differently and apparently it’s not uncommon for people to send in CVs that are not their own, so part of the interview process is to quiz people on their CV so that the employer can check if it’s genuine!

The course attendees worked in the health field. Part of the field worker’s role is to visit people in the villages and ensure that they seek medical attention when ill. Even when some villagers are ill with life-threatening illnesses such as HIV or malaria they won’t seek help. I asked why. “They have learned to be dependent and will wait for someone to come and help them” they said.

Part way through one of the days all the staff had to go off to a seminar about Weapons of Mass Destruction. Crikey!

Sometimes after the training I would walk into town (a 25 minute walk) and go round the market. They got to know me there after a while. Mind you, in all the times I went I never saw another white person, so I guess it wasn’t difficult.
You can get things very cheaply there, especially if you want to haggle. Often I don’t as the prices seem fair. I got Jon some smart leather shoes for 30,000/- ($22, £9). I bought myself some sandals for 3,500/- ($2.50, £1), both of them without haggling.

As I was buying my sandals I heard someone saying “Food”. I turned round and there was a boy of about 12 standing by me. He said “Food please.” He didn’t look under-nourished but he was shaking. I wondered if he was shaking with hunger or was perhaps ill.
I’d given the stall lady a 5,000/- note for the sandals, and as she brought back the 1,500/- change I handed it to the boy. Again I felt uncomfy as it wasn’t much, but he was very grateful.
Some other stall holders had seen this and were laughing and calling out to the boy in their own language. As I walked away I wondered if they were saying “Well done, you got some money out of a muzungu”, so I turned to look at him, but he just looked very grateful.

One of the things we have to be aware of is ‘muzungu prices’. This is when Ugandans bump the price up because you are white. Sometimes if we don’t have an idea of the price we don’t know if we are being ripped off. Sometimes we know that prices are just way too high, and other times we can tell because when we ask the price, the shop assistant will pause, then they have a certain look on their face – one which means they are thinking ‘If I really bump the price up will they pay it?’. They then come out with a figure you will never pay.
I went into a small shop in Tororo to buy some baseball caps.
“How much are the caps?” I asked.
Pause…The Look…
“Eight thousand shillings.”
I hadn’t bought one here before so didn’t know what kind of price they would be, but absolutely knew that that was a rip off price. I went round the corner to a market stall and got them for 3,000/- each.

During the training course I split people into teams and have team competitions. The team that wins gets a baseball cap each.
I paid for the caps with my money and so the British Council reimbursed me. They asked me to get a receipt so I went back to the market stall, but the man didn’t have any receipts. I gave him a blank receipt I’d taken with me and asked if he would fill it in.
“No” he said.
The man at the next stall looked at the blank receipt and said it looked like a simple form to fill in. “No” the man said.
The man at the next stall explained how easy it was to fill in.
Eventually I worked out that he couldn’t read or write, so we went to another stall where the stall holder filled out the receipt for him, accompanied by 6 other people who had gathered around. There was a part on the form where the man had to put his signature. He didn’t have one, so the other stall holder drew a shape on his hand in biro and the man copied it onto the receipt.

Uganda has many tribes and Tororo has about seven, which is a large number for a fairly small place. There are two main tribes, one which is in favour of splitting Tororo and one which wants to keep it as it is. Tororo has become known for a famous incident between the two tribes. During a presidential visit, a member of the tribe supporting the split, ate a rat in front of the president to show how committed he was to the cause...