jawlines, goats, obama, etc.

I wish I could find you all a picture of ronnie, too. He’s not bad looking, and he’s not aggressive in person at all (unlike in his emails).

So as of last night, it looks like I am, indeed, going to Gulu for my practicum. I’m excited but kind of sad….i was looking forward to hangin with my fam for awhile longer. But it will be good to experience a different part of the country. I’m still not sure what organization I’m going to be working with, but I should find out Monday. “Should” being the operative word here, because, as everybody says, T.I.A. [this is Africa] and nothing ever happens the way you expect it to. Alas.

Because I don’t have any particularly big story to tell, and because I don’t have the energy to put my random anecdotes together into one coherent story, I’m just going to write a bunch of random blurbs/comments/observations/experiences. Yay!

-people here have THE MOST impeccable bone structure. I swear to god, I don’t think I’ve come across a single person who didn’t have a jawline that could cut metal. Totez jealz.

-it’s HILARIOUS to watch people negotiate here. If two people are arguing over the price of something, they’ll just kind of stand there and not look at each other for longer than you could think possible, and somehow by doing that things get worked out. It’s SO confusing to watch. I will never, ever be good at negotiating. It’s just not in my blood. Not only because I’ve been conditioned to accept that everything has a fixed price, but also because, when I’m arguing over the price of a pineapple that costs 3000 shillings (about $1.50), I can’t help but think, “um, idiot, that’s $1.50. they obviously need that more than you do.” Also, there’s the muzungu price for everything, which means that even if I negotiate to get the price down, it’s still likely a helluva lot higher than a Ugandan would pay. Oh well.

-every once in awhile, I’ll pass by someone and make eye contact, and all they’ll say is, “obama.” That’s it. No facial expression, so comments, no expectation of a response. Just, “obama.”

-people here have this habit (which I’ve adopted wholeheartedly, so don’t hate me when I come home) of doing this half grunt half “hmm” sound when they’re listening to you. I do it ALL the time now. It’s so great, because you know they’re listening to you but they’re not actually interrupting you like so many muzungus love to do (myself included).

-hand-holding here is SO different than in the u.s., and it really threw me off when I first got here. People of the same sex hold hands all the time (like, ALL the time) and it has NO sexual connotations whatsoever. It’s just a friend thing. (btw, the gayz can get LIFE in prison here). Also people have such different attitudes toward personal space. Sometimes you’ll see 4 people crammed onto one boda-boda (motorbike taxi thing), and I’ve been in taxi buses with 20 people shoved in (they’re only meant to carry 14, and even that’s pushing it).
-when we were in the rural homestay, our father took us all around his village to see schools, orphanages, microfinance meetings, village chairpersons, etc. one day we visited a primary school, and our father left to do other stuff while we were talking to the headmistress. When we finished we decided to head home cause we didn’t know where he was. It was lunchtime when we were leaving, so there were like 500 kids playing on the front lawn. As we left, they ALL started following us home, like literally, down the street and into our family’s compound. We didn’t speak the language and we had NO idea what to do, so it was just 2 muzungus with a herd of 500 kids streaming along behind us. SO AWK. Finally when we got home our little brother came out with a stick and chased them all away.

-we did indeed end up buying goats for our rural homestay families. Some people got chickens. We had to tie them up ourselves and then some got tied to the tops of the vans and some got shoved under the seats inside the vans. So during the drive to our homestays I kept feeling a goat licking my ankle. EW. Apparently one of the goats fell off the roof of the other van. I know it’s not funny, but LOLOLOLOL. Also, I convinced my partner to let us name our goat Leonard. Even though it was a girl. And she agreed. And Leonard is not going to be killed and eaten, but rather is going to be bred to make a bunch of baby Leonards. Yay!

-today I did laundry again and it took me 3 hours and I have sores all over my hands and jethro sat there the whole time with a running commentary about how I was doing everything wrong and wasn’t squatting properly for a girl, etc. etc. he’s going to his auntie’s house until tomorrow, and I’m not gonna lie, it’ll be nice to have a break from the kid.

-also EMILY the other day I showed jethro a picture of miley (don’t ask me why I have a picture of that roundhead on my computer) and the FIRST question he asked about her was what color her poop is. LOL.

latest installment of the ronnie saga

keep in mind that i never responded to his last email. also keep in mind that i told him i was ENGAGED.

----

Am really sorry not to attend to you some times but it because of the trust the the Boss has in me where by i move in every department in the the Hotel.
While i love to sit with you and have fun together but that's the only problem hence i care for you a lot.
Who gave you that name Ashley, it sound great in my minds.But still we can chat on Phone +256-772-467193
Take care
Ronnie

----

sit and have fun together...? our most adventurous interaction has consisted of me asking him for a soda..... annie, there's his number -- go for it girl!

chaos

everything is crazy. it will work out, right?

i know i still haven't written about the eastern excursion. i'm sorry but i think i'm just going to have to let it go. it's overwhelming me for some reason and if i keep telling myself i need to write about it i'll just never end up posting again. maybe someday i'll have a burst of inspiration and then i'll write about it. and i also know that i haven't properly thanked you all individually for what you sent me. all i can say right now is MY GOD THANK YOU. when i go home stressed at night i just look through it and it makes me feel so much better (and sometimes worse, but i a good way, y'know?)

our final practicum proposals are supposed to be due tomorrow. mine pretty much changes every 5 minutes, so there's no way in HELL i'm going to have it finalized by tomorrow. these people are CRAZY. in the last 24 hours i thought i was going to be living in kampala, then it changed to teso, then it changed to gulu, and now it's at the point where i might just be going all over the damn country not actually working with any specific organization at all.

the internet's not really working anywhere so i'm at an internet cafe. i should probs be doing more productive things. also i've kind of screwed myself over in terms of the internet at the hotel near my house. this is kind of a funny story. maybe. there's this waiter who works there who's always really welcoming and friendly to me. he's probs in his late 20s or something. finally the other day he asked me my name (you can see where this is leading) and then my email address. i decided an email address is no big deal, it's not a phone number or anything, right? so i gave it to him. within FIVE MINUTES he had friended me on facebook, sent me 2 facebook messages, 1 email, and tried to connect with me through yahoo chat.

this is what his email said: (this might be mean of me to post this, but oh well)
Am called Ronnie ,
It's a surprise that to email you know After long challenges of getting your E mail.
how is life in Uganda for you i hope you are enjoying it.
.About me, Am single, staying alone,Understanding and greater black guy.I liked your character.you look a caring lady.
Ashley tell me more about your self dear
Take care

i have no idea what he's talking about re: the "long challenges" of getting my email. so i emailed him back and told him i'm engaged (from what i've gathered, ugandan men tend not to believe there's anything between "single" and "married"....everything else appears to be negotiable for them). this is what he wrote back:

Hi Farnan,
Am so happy for you that you are looking at some one. But on another side am sorry for myself because Am single and Am looking for some one who will be my everything.And if you were single it's could be great for me. but still i promise to be greater friend of yours.
while my dream is to marry someone outside Africa and i will fast and pray for that.
I liked your ways, life and you look cool person to me
Take care
ronnie


should i feel really bad for posting this? i'm in a mood, so i'm doing it anyway.

okay my internet sesh is about to expire. talk to ya'll later.

p.s. ANNA OMG TELL ME IT ISN'T SO!!!!!!! coffee depot is finally going down?????? i seriously teared up when i read that. aghhhhhhh where am i going to spend every second of my life when i get home?!?!?!?

nvuddeyo!

"kulikayo" means "welcome back" in luganda, and the response is "nvuddeyo" which means "i have returned."

so i'm back from the east. but before i can even begin writing about what went down there i have to say

OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD I GOT MY PACKAGE TODAY I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHAT TO SAY OH MY GOD.

seriously. i got it and opened it and the first thing i saw was the j.crew catalogue and i couldn't even go on. i had to set it aside and wait a few hours. literally. and then i sort of began rummaging through it and as soon as i started getting a sense for how intense it was i almost started to cry so i set it aside again. i'm afraid i'm never going to actually be able to look at everything without wanting to die. it's so amazing i feel guilty. i don't deserve you all, but for some reason you seem to like me so i'm just gonna go with it. all of my muzungu peers were SO JEALOUS of me this morning. i think they're all living vicariously. i looked through the jcrew catalogue like 10 times with 10 different people and it's so covered in drool it's falling apart. god you guys are amazing. clearly i don't have the words to thank you properly. hopefully i'll be able to get through it tonight and then tomorrow maybe i can fully acknowledge how damn lucky i am. mama, i did see what you included for jethro....you are so cool. he's going to die. i already told him that everyone back home wants me to bring him back with me, and i think he's down.

seriously i'm so overwhelmed by the package that i can't make this a proper post. i'm just going to post some pictures and that will have to suffice for now, k?

first, here are some pictures of my living room and dining room and bedroom (complete with mosquito net) in kampala:




here are pictures of the eastern excursion/rural homestay

(1) the house i stayed in with my partner and 2 of my sisters (we didn't stay in one of the grass huts because it was pouring rain the whole time and they said the huts leaked)

(2) our bathroom (there's a hole in the corner where you squat and pee but the ground isn't slanted enough so it's basically impossible to pee without peeing all over your feet. there's a pit latrine outside for things other than peeing, but you damn well better not have to poop during the night because it's pitch black and likely pouring and you have to walk across the compound to get to the pit latrine). this is also where you bathe. 1-stop-shopping!

(3) our sitting room

(4) the grass huts that the rest of the family sleeps in

(5) family portrait

(6) 1 of my 15 rural siblings, faye -- the cutest little girl EVER (she also had ringworm, i think, which made me sad)

(7) my rural homestay partner, stephanie, and i

(8) our typical dinner (unfortunately they don't eat much matooke in the east, so i'll have to take a photo for you here in kampala where we eat it at EVERY MEAL. i've actually come to really like it and i missed it last week)

(9) the obama calendar our rural homestay family had hanging in their sitting room

too cool for school

right?

that's jethro on top and his best friend bona below and for some reason my alarm clock is being used as a phone. also, note jethro's AWESOME barbie sweatshirt.

never again will i take a washing machine for granted

we were supposed to go visit zerrida today at her school but apparently there's been a big swine flu outbreak there so they cancelled the visitation and have all the students quarantined in the school. yikes.

i think i've physically exerted myself more today than i ever have in my life (or at least since i've been here). i will NEVER, NEVER AGAIN take for granted a washing machine, dishwasher, or mop. dear lord. these people are amazing. so first i did laundry. doing laundry entails putting your clothes in these little basins, filling them with water from these huge jugs (they call them jerry cans), rubbing the clothes with a bar of soap, and them rubbing the clothes together vigorously for what feels like eternity until they're clean. luckily my family has a water tank thing in the backyard, because most people have to walk like 1/2 a mile to fetch the water before they can even begin doing the washing. the past few saturdays, i've started doing my laundry on my own, but something has always come up to pull me away from it so the housegirl or my mother have finished (or maybe my mother has come up with an excuse to get me away from the laundry, both because she feels bad for what a lame-o i am and because she knows she can do it 1,000 times faster than i ever could). today, however, it was all me (save for the few times my mother came up and watched me, laughing hysterically). i probably did a really half-ass job, but i don't really care too much (i know ya'll are familiar with my general disinterest in cleanliness and hygeine). one girl came into school a few weeks ago with her hands literally rubbed raw from how hard she scrubbed her clothes. there was no way i was about to work THAT hard on ANYTHING, much less clothes that are going to get FILTHY again the second i leave the house.

then, once i finished the laundry, my mother suggested that i mop my room. let me tell you that "mopping" is a VERY relative term. mopping here consists of a wet rag that you wipe across the floor, over and over and over again. it was EXHAUSTING. mom -- i told my mother about how, at home, whenever you ask me to do chores and i come back and tell you i've finished, you always ask me whether i've done it according to my standards or yours, because i'm lazy and do everything half-ass. she laughed a lot. (and probably concurred)

but really, the hardest thing about all of this wasn't even the physical labor required, but the amount of squatting and bending over that everything entailed. people here squat SO MUCH, and make it look so easy, and IT'S NOT. i squat for like 30 seconds and already i have cramps in my feet and calves. sometimes i can hardly finish my bath because i get so tired from the damn squatting.

i have a 6-8 page paper do tomorrow that i haven't started. uganda isn't exactly bringing out my academic seriousness/dedication. i should be working on it now, because the power has been out at my house all day (and all day yesterday) so i haven't been able to charge my laptop, so i'm at the hotel down the street and have limited time and need to be using it wisely. instead i'm blogging.

tomorrow we're leaving for the eastern excursion. we'll be spending roughly 3 days with a rural village family, and it's going to be HARDCORE and i'm SO EXCITED. no running water, no electricity, and little to no english or luganda spoken. we've been paired up for our homestays, and i'm satisfied with the girl i'm paired with, and we're going to bring a goat as a gift for our family. YES. they're buying the goats for us in kampala and they're going to strap them to the roof of the van for the drive to the east. i'm trying not to think about that.

my practicum is starting to come together and i'm feeling so much better about it. i'm going to be doing my research on the first topic i wrote about a few posts ago -- about UN security council resolution 1325 on women, peace, and security (the resolution that PeaceWomen Project, where i interned in NY, was involved in advocating for and implementing) and how it has or has not been implemented in the northern ugandan peace processes. it looks like i'm going to be staying in kampala for most of it and will be going up north to gulu for a week or so near the end. i think i'm going to ask my homestay mother if i can continue staying with her. i'm pretty sure she'll say yes, but i'm TOTEZ nervous about having that conversation, especially because the issue of monetary compensation will have to be addressed at some point and it's gonna be AWK (i think the s.i.t. homestay coordinator lady will help out with that, though). i think my mother and i have gotten a lot closer/have kind of become friends because last week i had to do a family tree assignment and the issue of her divorce came up while i was interviewing her and we had a great convo about her life and how AMAZING she is. (you're more amazing, mama, DUH)

okay i gotta do my paper now. btw i ended up getting the lion king yesterday and so far jethro has watched "finding nemo" THREE times and "lion king" TWICE. i love this kid.

uncle dane -- i didn't hear or see anything about that slum being turned into a "modern eco-city"...that's so strange and interesting and possibly scary. i'll definitely keep my ears and eyes peeled...

bobby -- i don't know if you're still reading this but the other day we were talking to this semi-powerful chairman guy and i couldn't concentrate on a word he was saying because he was wearing a "home improvement" windbreaker and it was AMAZING and hilarious. i thought of you.

snichols -- i've got my fingers crossed! but i want a mountain day toooooooooo!!

jas -- i'm sorry, love, but i'm out of king for good. you're gonna have to trek out of quad-world if you wanna see me. ;-)

liz -- have your fingers un-frozen enough to play your celtic guitar? :)

sarah b -- "moonlight sonata" kills me and i can't stop listening to it

annie -- the other day i went into this really american-ish supermarket and there was SO MUCH toothpaste and it made me think of that one time in cvs. i laughed like the crazy muzungu i am and of course everyone was looking at me.

nana -- i do remember you mentioning those contacts before. i don't know that i'll make it to arua, but if you want to email me sherry's contact info i might be able to chat with her!

auntie c -- when did you learn luganda?!?!?!? can you help me???

ellen -- our herstory WILL continue DUH. p.s. a little bird told me that you had a certain london-friend visiting you at the beginning of the semester. we have a lot to catch up on, honey.

j -- poop scoop

drinkin with the boys

I can’t BELIEVE it’s already October. We’ve been here almost 6 weeks already…SO crazy. Though I can’t think too much about the fact that it’s October, because then it makes me remember that I’m missing Fall, and then I feel homesick. I hear that it’s already freezing in Noho, though, so maybe I’m not missing it too too much.

So we’re back at the resource center today and done with our slum visits. It’s been quite an eye-opening week. On Wednesday we visited Naguru slum, where a lot of refugees from Northern Uganda have ended up. Apparently this particular slum is known for its waragi, the locally-brewed alcohol made from either millet or maize flour. We got to see the area where the women (yes, it’s the women who do ALL the work almost everywhere) brew the alcohol. It almost made me throw up just watching them – this work is SO labor intensive and these women are so strong and they can pretty much touch fire. (my homestay mother likes to say that African women are fire- and heat-resistant, and I think I believe her) Then the man leading us around (he’s called a Key Community Volunteer [KCV] and he volunteers with Slum Aid Project; their structure is so amazing and effective because the volunteers live in the slums, so they actually know what’s going on and how to best solve problems from within the communities) decides it might be interesting to go into the “bar” right next to where the women are brewing the alcohol so we can talk them. It’s actually just a little hut with about 10 (very drunk) men crammed around a tiny table downing this stuff that has, like, 95% alcohol content. (they tried to get us to try it, and some people did, but even with the glass like 3 feet from my nose my lungs were already on fire, so I think I would have choked to death if I had actually had a drink.) So all of us muzungu girls (and one muzungu boy) file in and squeeze amongst these men and our leader explains that we’re there to study gender relations and domestic violence. You can imagine what kind of reaction THAT elicited. So then the men start yelling about how Museveni has overempowered women and women don’t know their place anymore, etc. etc. etc. Half the time we couldn’t tell what was going on, but they were passionate and angry enough that I managed to get the gist of it. And what was so perfect was the fact that there was a window (or hole in the wall, to be more accurate) across from where I was sitting that gave me a picture-perfect view of the women outside working their ASSES off while these men sat inside, complaining about how women have too much power and drinking the liquor that the women are making with the money that the women have earned from selling the liquor elsewhere. Beautiful.

Yesterday I came across a video store and decided to try buying a cartoon to watch on my laptop with Jethro. He’s been asking me since I first brought my laptop home if I had any movies. The only movies I brought are “V for Vendetta,” “Lost in Translation,” and “Amelie.” Finally a few days ago I figured “V for Vendetta” might work for the time being (I think you’ll agree with me that that was my best option, right?). Let me preface this story with a little info about Jethro’s obsession with violence. I don’t know if this is something all 7-year-olds go through or if it’s just Jethro, but he is OBSESSED with violence. EVERYTHING he picks up becomes a gun. He even bites his bread into the shape of a gun so he can pretend to shoot people with it. Pen caps, stuffed animals, table tennis paddles – everything is a weapon. It’s really disturbing. He mentioned something about wanting a water gun a few weeks ago and I was considering getting one for him as a goodbye gift, but HELL NO. So I put on “V for Vendetta” and let him look at the scene selection menu to see if it looks interesting. From just looking at those tiny thumbnails that appear on the scene selection menu, he was able to pick out precisely the scenes that contained the most violence, and that’s ALL he was interested in watching. So when I went to the video store and decided to buy “Finding Nemo”, I was a little nervous that it wasn’t going to be quite….exciting enough for Jethro. But he loved it, thank god. He even laughed at a few parts, though I was laughing way harder than he was through the whole thing. It was really uplifting and I think it made me feel a little less homesick. (although yesterday I was in the taxi and a Backstreet Boys song came on the radio and THAT made me feel homesick. Go figure, huh?) I think I’m going to buy “Lion King” next to watch with him, though more for my sake than his, to be honest.

Okay we’re supposed to be having some sort of briefing about the eastern excursion, though one of our academic directors has malaria and the other’s daughter just got out of surgery for appendicitis, so I don’t know who’s going to be conducting this debriefing….

P.S. seriously I love you all so, so much and I hope you know how happy your comments make me. They’re the first thing I look at in the morning when I get to the resource center. It takes 700 hours for the page to load, but dammit I wait it out.