We're Not Alone

On Monday, I went to a networking meeting for people who are interested in “member care,” i.e., supporting the missionaries in their organizations.  This is something that I’ve become really interested in pursuing for our office, so it was helpful to make some contacts in other organizations.  I was able to talk to one person about work permit questions, another offered her organization’s “Welcome to Uganda” info packet, and a couple people are willing to meet with us so we can swap ideas about how to care for or be helpful to the new folks who come to work with us.

I think my favorite part about the meeting, though, was just realizing that I’m not alone in this.  There are other people out there just like me, working in Kampala!  We at EMI don’t need to figure everything out on our own.  There are other organizations that we can share ideas with!  This was the first time that I had really met with people from other missionary/aid organizations in Uganda (other than the ministries that EMI works with).  It was refreshing to realize what a large community of organizations we are, even if we don’t get to see each other very often.  

It also served as an encouragement to try to reach out to other organizations and to share our resources and knowledge with each other.  We don’t have to keep reinventing the wheel.  This organization that hosted the meeting is based in Nairobi, and a network of Christian aid organizations has just started meeting there.  They were encouraging us to start doing something similar, or at least to start an email list that we can use to share information, etc.  We’ll see what happens, but it’s exciting to think about the possibility of continuing these networking-type of gatherings.  It reminded me a lot of when I was involved with running an AmeriCorps program.  There are hundreds of organizations all over the US that are running AmeriCorps programs.  I loved going to conferences and trainings and realizing we were part of a larger movement and also getting the opportunity for different programs to share questions, ideas, and lessons with each other.  It was extremely helpful and encouraging.  It would be great if something like that could start happening in Kampala amongst Christian and/or aid organizations.

In other news, the power has been going out a lot more often lately.  For the first couple of months I was here, it seemed to go out only once or twice a month, but for the last few weeks, it’s seemed like it’s about every 3-4 days.  I’ve been getting a lot more use out of my candles and flashlights.  Fortunately, my laptop battery is usually able to last through two TV episodes before I have to turn in for the night.  

The power has often been going out from around 8-10pm, which is when most people are using it all at once.  It could be that our area has just hit that point where so many people are using the power, that the system just can’t take it (like New York City several years back).  But I’m also wondering whether it’s “load shedding.”  This is where they intentionally turn off the power to a whole area to prevent overloading the system.  I think maybe they rotate areas each night.  I hope this doesn’t mean that we’re on some rotation and that it will keep going out every 3-4 days….  Oh well, it makes me grateful for the electricity that I do have.  (I’m so thankful for refrigerators and hot water showers!)

The plumbing, on the other hand, has been driving me crazy!  My shower faucet has been leaking ever since I moved in 3 months ago.  And my toilet has been overflowing for the last 2 months.  Fortunately, the plumbing is installed with easy-to-access shut-off valves.  Every time I flush the toilet, I turn the water valve on, wait for the tank to fill, flush, and then turn it off again. Every few weeks, I forget to turn it off at night and I wake up to a flooded bathroom…. =(  Fortunately the plumber is here right now with new parts, that should (supposedly) fix everything!  (I’ve heard that about 20 times before.)  In all fairness, this is somewhat my fault.  I wasn’t getting enough water pressure for my shower to work (because they installed the water storage tanks too low), so I had a plumber re-route my water supply to come directly from the city water so that I could take a shower.  Now I have a TON of water pressure, which I guess fixtures in Uganda aren’t made for…

Oh, the Things You Can Eat!

Sorry that I haven't blogged for a month!  I appreciate all the "where'd you go?" and "how's your kitten?" questions I've heard about.  It lets me know that people are actually reading this thing!  =)

Mostly, I haven't blogged because nothing too exciting has happened.  I've finally settled into life as usual, so maybe I'll start sharing more about what is "usual."  I've been very busy at work, which is nice.  I've gotten to work on office budgeting; organizing logistics for a small team that is coming in June; helping another project team finish, edit, and format their final report and appendices; communicate with incoming staff/volunteers on things like housing and work permits; visit potential apartments for our incoming folks; and even revamp our office lunch menu! 

An interesting tidbit about my life is that our office employs a cook to make lunch for us five days a week, and we all sit around a big long table (in what used to be the garage) and eat lunch together at 1pm every day.  Currently our office lunch menu looks like this: Monday: beans, rice, chapati (flat bread), avocado; Tuesday: spaghetti with ground beef/tomato sauce, cooked greens; Wednesday: mashed potatoes with meat sauce (chunks of beef), toast; Thursday: beans, rice, freshly-made beef samosas (many people's favorite day); Friday: soft tacos with all the fixings; and every day includes a big bowl of fruit for dessert (pineapple and sometimes banana, mango, or watermelon, depending on what's in season).

I've decided that what characterizes North American food more than any particular ingredient is VARIETY.  We don't just eat European or even regional American foods; we eat Mexican, Indian, Chinese, Thai, Japanese, Korean, Middle Eastern, and Ethiopian food.  This variety can even be found at the local food court.  At EMI, we've already altered our menu a little to add more "mzungu" (foreigner/Westerner) foods, but now I'm working with our cook and a couple others to expand our rotating menu schedule from 5 meals to around 15 meals, adding more mzungu foods as well as as wider variety of Ugandan dishes.  Instead of having a weekly meal rotation, I hope to create a monthly food rotation, which will even include fish and chicken (maybe) once a month! 

For some reason, chicken is by far the most expensive meat here.  It's sad because that's about all I cook in the US, but I'm learning to make mostly vegetarian dishes at home since I often get beef at lunch.  In fact, I just bought chicken at the grocery store yesterday - my first time ever in Uganda!  Instead of splurging on chicken, I occasionally splurge on good cheese (also very expensive here).

On an unrelated note, which I thought of after I came up with the title of this blog, it is now grasshopper season.  This means that you can buy fried grasshoppers along the road for a snack.  People will even walk up to your car window to sell you a small bag-ful for only a few cents.  They're actually not as bad as they sound.  They pluck off the wings and legs first, so they're not really crunchy.  It's kind of like eating greasy popcorn....  Still, not my snack of choice.

My cat is doing well and growing.  She still drives me crazy a lot of the time, scratching and biting me, trying to eat all my food, and occasionally semi-destroying something in my house.  She's now big enough to get up onto every surface, so I have to be more diligent about what I leave out on the counter or even on the stove. Within a couple seconds, she'll be eating my breakfast or my freshly-baked cake!  She also likes to carry away small objects, so I've lost a couple things around the house that way.  But she's still a nice companion to have around.  My across-the-hall neighbors have a little girl, and a couple weeks ago they had some friends over with two more kids.  The three of them were fascinated with the cat.  I brought her to my doorway and let them pet her (although the boy just wanted to pull her tail and hit her).  Eventually they followed her into my house and were trying to pet her and play with her.  (I had to watch her closely to make sure she didn't start playing with her claws.)  Later, they pounded on my glass door to get her attention - kind of like a kid at the aquarium - they didn't quite understand that loud noises would scare her away.  Anyway, it was a nice chance to interact with the neighbors a little bit.