Home Sweet Home

I've been living for about a week now at what is to be my new home for the next 2 years.
Last week we wrapped up training and had our swearing in ceremony at the U.S. Ambassador's residence, after which we split up and shipped off to our respective new homes with all of our luggage, miscellaneous stuff needed to fend for ourselves at site, and accumulated Peace Corps books and equipment. Our group is a good bunch of people and it was kind of sobering to say good luck to them and step off into the fog of this next part of life here.
There's a lot I could say about the PC at this point, and my fellow volunteer colleaques will attest to that, but I won't because you would have to understand the context.

So when I arrived at my site a week ago Friday evening, there were hundreds of people everywhere camped out around the health center and parish. I had no idea what was going on and I thought this much be a much more happening place than I had first thought on my initial visit a few weeks ago. It turns out that there was a week long revival at the church. Who knew the catholic church was so evangelical, with some of the revival led by a charismatic catholic priest, even. The father of the parish told me there is usually many more people at these revivals but some people had stayed home instead of travelling to the church for the week because the rains have come late and the crops aren't doing well. Everone dispersed last Sunday, so I haven't been stared at by hundreds of people at a time since then, only the normal number.

So what's it like being at site? Imagine if you will, being a young white American guy somehow finding yourself living in the rural mountains of Uganda; the only person with glow in the dark skin for miles and miles, not knowing anyone, knowing few words or phrases of the local language, trying to figure out what work you can do here to meet needs without causing more problems and trying to find someone to work with while trying to explain just why you are here if it isn't to bring funding from America or Europe and what you think you will do here for two years in a way that doesn't sound totally ridiculous. Of course it's not really the way you would imagine it. There's no way for you to accurately know unless you were here with me. Of course by you being here with me, it would change the dynamics so it wouldn't be the same anyway. Ah, Heisenberg, you've got us again. (Sorry for the ((actually incorrect)) reference to Heisenberg's uncertaintanty principle; that's what being at site will do to you. I guess it's better than turning into a night dancer. Now I'm going to have to explain the legend of night dancers. Stay tuned friends, maybe in another post I'll explain it and tell about by own encounter with such.)
There's not much in the area of interest, or for that matter a place to buy any kind of food (including produce), get mail, buy much of any supplies, or do about anything but see the health center or go to mass at church (which isn't in english). But of course you can buy a warm coke or beer at the small shop next to the health center. I'm lucky then that the priest's cooks will also cook for me and I will eat 3 meals a day with the priest and friar. The downside of that arraingement is that for the past week I have eaten, and for the next 2 years I will eat, for lunch and supper, rice, beans, goat, and bananas or sometimes pineapple. It's also an almost surreal experience to find myself eating supper with two Ugandan priests in rural Africa while they watch the Family Guy on satellite TV run by a generator in the only building for miles that has electricity or lights glaring, but then not much surprises me here anymore.

This last week I've been climbing up the hill to see if by chance there's any text messages on my phone from the outside world, reading, writing, listening to music or the BBC (including a great CD of piano solos by my my grandma), and I've met with the father and sister to discuss what I can do here (with a tentative plan to start with, sorta kinda), and I met with some local leaders to introduce myself and tell them I'll be working in the area. Also, the father drove me down the road in his van and introduced me to the head of an area development project office of World Vision, and I'm hopeful that I will be able to work with them some. So I'm making some progress on finding projects to work on and people to work with. This weekend I am visiting friends for a bit of a break from things.
It takes a lot of energy to try to meet people and start becoming part of the community and get people used to me being there. I don't really have anyone to be my guide to the community, but mpora mpora (slowly by slowly) I will become a part of things here.

Soon to be an actual Peace Corps Volunteer

I am including some pictures here, but I don't know how well they will post. Hopefully you can see them and read the text, too. There is a picture of me swinging from a vine on March 11 in Entebbe Botanical Gardens, fellow peace corps trainee Angela with my homestay monkey (which hated me, but finally let me touch it on the last day I was living with my homestay), a view from my future house at my site on a foggy morning, a view of my site from the hill I will have to climb to get cell phone reception (the health center is the group of buildings to the left), me at Ssezibwe Falls on April 15 on a trip to Jinja and the source of the Nile River at Lake Victoria (the pic is not on the Nile, but at a place on the way there), and me at our homestay thank-you ceremony with my host mom on the left and host sister on the right (I am wearing a traditional formal garment called a kanzu. It's not a dress, it only looks like one).


We are about finished with training. I am in Kampala this week, and we will be sworn in as full fledged Peace Corps Volunteers on Thursday. I know where my site is, and visited it for a few days week before last. I've had some "Peace Corps" experiences that I might tell about in a later post.
My site is in the very southwest of the country. The nearest town of significance is Kabale, but it will take me an hour or so to get there, I think, using public transport or private vehicle. I am assigned to work with a health center that is run by the Catholic diocese. It has 7 nurses, a midwife, and a lab tech. A nun is the in-charge and will be my counterpart who theoretically I will work with on projects and will be my main co-worker. My superviser will be the parish priest, who is also a major political figure in the area. The village consists of the health center, a primary school, a girl's secondary school, a small general shop, the catholic church, and small farmers scattered over the surrounding hills. The nearest market is about a half hour drive away. I will live in a room in a house at the health center/parish which was built to house a doctor if one is found to work at the health center. A person who works at the health center also has a room in the house. I will have running cold water of sketchy quality, but no electricity. The electric grid has not yet reached the area. There is running water because of the Priest's connections. I don't know what kind of work I will find to do or what kind of projects I will find to work on, or who I will find to work alongside on the projects. I will get it figured out in due time. The area is beautiful. It's mountainous and has amazing views. The weather is very nice, but some people here consider it cold.
I might get a PO Box in Kabale, but you can still send things to the address I posted earlier and I will get them.

Thank you all for thoughts, prayers, letters, and emails. Keep me in your prayers, and I will do the same.