More Pictures

Arua, Uganda Lugbara language group with teachers

Arua, Uganda A view of the Congo

the road to the hospital

hospital waiting area and registration

hospital laundry

hospital laundry drying

Tom's secondary job

September 18

Greetings from Arua in the West Nile district of Uganda. Previously closed to volunteers because of the Lords Resistance Army and the fighting against the Ugandan Government. President Museveni has successfully kicked them into Sudan and they have not reappeared so the area is heavily guarded and very safe. (or so I am told) The mud of Waikiso is a distant memory as the red dirt here has more sand in it and the run off is quicker then the clay of Waikiso. Arua also has a garbage service so the trash is much less. We also have a golf course and landing strip so when any and all, come to visit they can skip the 9 hour bus trip and just fly to here. With 6 flights a day you can come anytime and it is all for the low cost of 135US one way. Is it worth it? Well, just sit next to a woman with a child on her lap in your smaller then coach class airplane size seat that is covered in plastic (so you can really sweat) with only the leaky windows for fresh air and the baby throws up, and you have 7 hours more to go on the bus and the bathroom stops are every 3 hours a a gas station where the men go in he field and you go in a concrete trough that everyone else uses. Hint, wear shoes and not sandals if you choose the bus route. Then decide if the flight is worth it. Just keep the thought. Although you will miss the wildlife view from the bus window if you fly. And the landing strip is grass and a little rough I heard.

For wildlife I have found a great guide who will use any budget you have and drives. You do not want to drive yourself here, they drive on the L and have 3 lanes of traffic when there should be 2 and the boda bodas are whizzing past with 3 people hanging on. Ah Africa! No worries about police here unless there are more then 14 people in the taxi and the children and chickens are not counted as people in the taxi. Are you ready for the experience? I think it is quaint and funny and am so grateful that I grew up in the US to know that it can be done differently. Not as cost efficient as far as gas is concerned but less squished... Back to Arua. The town has 45,000 the district is large and the surrounding area is flat with the Nile close by and Lake Albert to the south. It is more grassland and agriculture done with a hoe so the fields are not “round up ready” but rather cared for by the locals in a sustainable way. The houses outside the city are the round concrete huts with thatched roofs in a cone. They are clumped together and I believe the water comes from a borehole near the huts. They never notice if the power is out and they still cook with wood. There are more trees here but it is mainly grassland now as it is rainy season. The town has 2 markets and when we tried to speak Lugbara (the language am learning for the area) people would say “I am not from here” in English. Because of the war lots of refugees settled here and a lot of trading takes place across the Sudan and Congo border which are about 50 miles away. The city is know for the 100% cotton dyed fabrics from Congo called “Katanga”. They are absolutely gorgeous. Cotton is grown and woven in Sudan and the thread count is high so the cotton is good grade and the colors are stunning. The market has all the veggies we have as there is a large Indian population here so the food has variety. I am anxious to get my own kitchen. The hot season here is December, January, February, March. So make plans now for your visit as gardens die and people lay low because of the heat. I will let you know what “heat” means after I get here for good. They have 2 churches Catholic(better choir) and Protestant (British Anglican) both well attended and English speaking services as one of the 3 service options. The art on the walls of the Catholic has depictions of villages being massacred, body parts laying around and Jesus in a cloud above accepting the saints into Glory. Then the homily is about forgiveness and reconciliation. So I am seriously pondering my faults of the week like how much I detest all the people I am traveling with and seeking forgiveness for my wicked thoughts and I look up and see the art and think how much others may actually have to forgive to have peace in their hearts. I have so much to learn about faith and forgiveness. I think this will be a good place to learn it and the people here are more friendly then Waikiso so this will be a good place to live and I love it here. Tom is of the same mind. We will see how he does when the heat comes.

September 16

The director of the nursing school daughter died 2 days after I got to Arua. She worked at a private nursing school down the road from her mother and was also working at a research institute studying diseases. She had worked all day and went to bed fine, got sick, went to the hospital and was dead by 6am. Because men have more then 1 wife sometimes (Muslims have 4 wives as children are your wealth)(even if you can't feed them) people often think when it happens so suddenly that the husband poisoned the wife so he wouldn't have to support her but he was having seizures that AM at the hospital too and he was not known to have seizures before. Sound like a LeCarr novel? The Accidental Patient maybe. So the director of my program was back in her village for the week of funeral and feeding of the mourners who come calling. Really, it lasts a week. The director lives on the compound I do just one house over and her mother stays there too. The accountant who was my guide said the directors mother suffers from memory loss. She doesn't look any older then 50 but must be at least 65. So the duplexes on the grounds are filled by people working at the hospital or the nursing school. I am not sure but maybe 20 duplex's so 40 homes. Anyway the woman who was to be my counterpart was in Kampala 8 hours south doing interview for incoming nurses on the government grant program, while directors from other schools were in Arua doing interview here. Confusing...

September 12 - Our new home

In October, we will be living in a compound in a concrete duplex with the kitchen walls shared. It has 3 10X10 bedrooms so we have room for company but you may have to bring your own mattress for the floor. It is being painted a light yellow throughout and I hope to decorate when I get there in October. Before that there will be improvements like new window with bars and screens. Perhaps a study area built in too. The kitchen has running water but the hot water heater is older then me and was broken during the war. Not sure which war since there have been a few in this area. The nursing school handy man is doing the work for us and seems very helpful. In Uganda people are very polite and seem very accommodating but there is a statement “Keep time” which means they keep there own time and it is not European or American. So, they do what they want, when they want, and may not do it at all. The average meeting is scheduled for 10 and people may not come until 2 and it is expected. But if you are serving snacks Ugandans tend to keep US time. So, I am sitting in the Principals office for my orientation with the accountant @ 8, and it is 9 and he has not come. I am to meet the director of the hospital this AM and he leaves at 10, I am told, so I may not see him today. I have to remind myself that I am in Africa and it is different.

Sanitation has a whole new meaning. The hospital works by the standard of, if you are sick, someone helps you to the hospital and brings blankets, buckets, dishes, as they are the primary care giver and the nurses that work do just patient medical care. IV, blood, meds. The care giver does the activities of daily living and some of those activities are sketchy. If you have dysentery and only one blanket and it has to be washed your care giver has to find something else for you to cover with while she goes out to do the laundry and hang it on the fence to dry. Guess how long it takes a blanket to dry in the rainy season. That anyone gets better is amazing to me. There is a outdoor kitchen area which means caregivers share the charcoal fires to cook the food for themselves and for the sick. The dishes have to be washed in cold water and dry in the sun. But you have to be careful where you put them so someone else doesn't steal them. The Africa system is taking a little to get use to. I won't start my job for another month and ½. So I will have time to get use to it maybe another term is “somehow somehow” meaning it probably won't happen. We are going to buy a modem today and should be able to communicate better once this is in hand. I am reading all of your emails and thank you but cannot respond until I get a modem. So I will try skype as soon as I figure out what plan is the best for data... Help John! 9:16 and the interview committee for nurses has convened so I close to write more later.

September 11

Happy 80^th Mom! Remember the party we had for you when you were 70? I do, dad was mad at me the whole time I made him keep the secret. Then he drove like a mad man to get you to the party so he didn't have to keep the secret anymore. And Cindi was pregnant with Lexi! Happy birthday Lexie!

I wish I was there to spend time with all of you celebrating. Rather I am in Aura. We got our site announcements Wed. and got a bus ride Thursday to the area we will be for our term of employment. There are 46 trainees and we are evenly divided into community health and economic development so we are known as the CHED volunteers. We were all given assignments throughout the country. There are also education ones serving too but they come at a different time. So, 6 education volunteers are in the area already and we will get together with them tomorrow evening for supper. The job I received is being a Health Instructor at Aura School of Comprehensive Nursing. Guess the orientations I helped with at Sleepy Eye are going to come in handy. The job purpose is to instruct and give supervision to trainees during lectures, practical lessons and community outreach. I meet with the principal of the program and the person who will be my counterpart (go to person) in the organization Sunday. Until then, the 7 of us assigned to West Nile where Arua is have been having language immersion. First we had a 7 hour bus ride to get here on Thursday. The area around Wakiso and Kampaula where we have been is very high hills almost foothills but the further N we came the flatter the land got. As we crossed the Nile there were elephants out eating along the river. Reminding me again, I am in Africa. I don't know why I forget. The ride was long but the countryside is very green and the landscape has more open space then I have seen previously. Aura town has no infrastructure so there is trash everywhere and the majority of the people are subsistence farmers. The countryside houses here are the huts you would see on Wild Kingdom when I was a kid. Round structures about 8 feet high and a thatched roof forming a peak. When we drove into town the school of nursing is affiliated with the area government hospital. Government hospitals here often run out of funds before the end of the month but this one has the European Unions support to run it and it was beautiful. It is a large complex with grass, separate ward buildings, living quarters, sidewalks connecting and a large fence around the whole area and guards. Reminds me of the VA grounds in St Cloud just add a couple guards and razor wire on top of the fence around it. Security here is taken very seriously. The banks ATMs have armed guards at all of them. I think Tom said the guns are middle eastern made. So far haven't seen them used on anyone. Hoping to keep it that way too. The place we are staying for our immersion is great. We have our own room with a flush toilet and hot water and sprayer so you can take a hot shower. It is bliss. Tom and I are running the hot water out. Just having our own room is great. Privacy. The short king size bed with the foam mattress is nice and mosquito net is delux and all for the low price of 46,000USH ($16.63) This includes bottled water and breakfast omelet and passion fruit juice or corn flakes with milk. It is also right next to a golf course that the cows & goats mow. A whole herd were there yesterday. The area officials live next to it, so, the security here is very good. We keep hearing that and our teachers walk us everywhere so I wonder who they are protecting us from? Today we went to the market. Did I mention it is rainy season and when it is raining it is cool about 55-60 and when it isn't raining it is hot. Like 80 with some humidity. Even the teachers are sweating. We were go to market and talk and bargin but everyone wanted to speak English to us. ( Good for me but the language test is coming soon so I am going to try again tomorrow) I didn't see any beautiful fabric but right now I don't want to have anything else to haul around so I wasn't disappointed. We are going back out tomorrow, hopefully earlier before it is so hot. We are staying about 2 miles from the market and we walk everywhere which is ok unless it rains, which it is doing now. Our hotel windows overlook a garden and stage where there is singing until 11 and the Ugandeans love loud music. They themselves speak very softly but they love loud music. The power here is better regulated because there is a dam on a river that generates power for this area. But, the internet is not very good due to the rain. I don't know what the connection is, but I am hoping to have my own modem soon. Not that that will help as it is rainy season. More to come...

Pictures

Botanical garden and zoo in Entebee

Mykiel Suzy and I walking to school

food day language immersion

The internet is out so I borrowed a modem will write again soon.

Thank you again to all of you writing me during my Methloquin depression.

Marc

September 3

Labor day weekend. For our language class we had immersion sorta. We went to market and got our food supply's and Saturday starting at 9 we prepared food we wanted and our teachers cooked food from the area we will be going to. George stopped at the market and got 2 chickens which he brought to our hosts house and we were taught how to slaughter, pluck, gut, cook and eat fresh chicken. Tom and I paid close attention as we think we may get a few birds when we go to our site in the N. After the initial shock of what we were doing it was pretty easy. The gizzard is the most prized part of the bird so the oldest guest is to get to eat it. Fortunately, the house owners were older and they got the prize... We made curry for our dish and chapati with guacamole and fried potatoes, the teachers made chicken, dried fish in sauce, and casava dough stuff they called bread, but it was not baked just casava flour in hot water that you mix until it is thick and pasty. It was pretty bland. We had way too much food to eat and no refrigeration but were assured our host family could finish it off. The Ugandean people have huge appetites. I have not seen people eat this much except at buffets back in the states. They do a lot of physical labor so I guess they need the carbs. The electricity is out again so our solar lamp is about out of juice so I say goodnight from Uganda where the stars are shining bright tonight because the power is on in Kenya.