bletch

July 2^nd-3^rd : Thursday – Friday

It’s been a rough last two days. Definitely the lowest point since I’ve been here. Thursday and Friday at work were unfulfilling. I painted and help to weld the roof of another banda. These jobs felt unfulfilling. Mainly though I miss people. I have felt very lonely the last two days. 

The Tricaricos are gone to Kampala so the house is kinda empty and no James at work. That meant though that Jim and the RP team and I went to their house and watched a movie Friday night after dinner. We watched To End All Wars. It fallows the struggle of a group of soldiers imprisoned by the Japanese during WWII. The movie war really interesting. There were two different fractions of the war camp. One led by these two men who survived by starting a “jungle college” were they met and studied with smuggled books. Another group survived by thoughts of revenge and escape. After thinking about it and talking to Jim I guess I agree with either group. The majority sought to work hard on the project. Building a rail way through the jungle to India. They seemed to lose their pride and desire to fight. They were reduced to groveling for books and sought ways to please their captors. They seemed to lose their integrity and become less than human. The rebels however weren’t right either because they survived to exact revenge. They were fueled by hate and rage. 

Dr.'s Corner, Korean Food, and Dr. Seuss

June 29^th-July 1^st: Monday-Wednesday 

Woke up at 4:45 and left Mbale. I slept all the way to Namalu. I felt bad because Jim was all on his own. He couldn’t believe that I slept on the really bumpy roads but I was tired. He said I was bouncing all over the car. 

Monday poured concrete for the footing. Incredibly hard work. Then painted the metal roofs of the bandas Tuesday and Wednesday. The metal structure for the bandas is made by welding8, 12 foot metal tubes together with a 30 degree slope. Then welding rebar spiraling down from the top. The roofs are then covered in grass, which is bought from the locals. Craig has to hire local women to do the work because the men refuse to do it because it’s women’s’ work. Had to knockoff early Tuesday and Wednesday because we had really heavy rains around 3 both days and you can’t weld, paint or pour concrete in the rain. 

After pouring concrete all day went on a really long run with Jim and Johan Monday. About 8 or 9 miles. The first part it was raining heavily but it slacked off towards the end. The longest run I’ve every been on. Ran again Wednesday. Did the Doctor’s corner run, which means we run through the back country tell we intersect the main road at Doctor’s corner, a bend in the road and then follow the road back to the mission, a short half-hour run. Apparently it’s called Doctor’s corner because a doctor rolled a vehicle there 4 0r 5 years ago and killed some locals that were riding with him. Bob Wright had to give the doctor a lift to Mblae that night because the families if the died men would have killed him in revenge. On the way back Jim had us do 4 sets of 20 lunges. I’m going to feel those tomorrow.

Tuesday night we ate at the Tricarico’s. Johan’s mom sent about half the gross annual food export for Korea with him in his suitcase. So Tim used all this stuff to make some crazy Korean meal consisting of really good meat stuff, rice, and cabbage. I think it was called boshagi? You take an ear of cabbage and put the rice and meat inside and then eat. Also had this hot paste. Really good spicy stuff that came out of a tooth paste tube looking deal!? After dinner I just wanted to be on my own, or at least around less people. So James and I collected a half dozen Dr. Seuss books and I read them aloud. We read Hop on Pop, Sneetches and other stories, The Great Butter Battle, Red Fish, Blue Fish, and also Go, Dogs Go! Everyone ended up listening. 

Sometimes I get overwhelmed with constantly being around people here. I enjoy large get togethers but not often. Here a lot of the time I am with a lot of people and I can’t get away from them. I need time alone or at least only with one or two people. I love being able to go out and run or spending time alone in room 4. Also being able to leave the compound and go on runs with Jim keeps me from going insane. 

Since Jim and I bought passion fruit in Mbale I have eaten at least three every morning since then. Wednesday afternoon Emily and I made bread. Actually all I did was knead it. The dough made three loaves and it was delicious. I have been really craving bread here because you can’t really buy the sliced bread. Well you can find it in Mbale but its disgusting and dried out. That night we watched Hoodwinked and ate bread and jam. Hoodwinked is a really good movie. The plot and storytelling are very clever as is the script. The animation is pretty poor quality. It was obviously done on a budget but everything else makes up for it. 

Milk: Why I Went To Mbale And How I Got There: A Cautionary Tale

June 27^th-June 28^th: Saturday and Sunday 

Woke Saturday morning at 5:30 and used Jim’s computer for a bit tell six when he and I went for a short run. Felt so good; I had so much energy. Then ate breakfast and Jim gave me some chocolate banana bread that had to be eaten because he was taking the Pravius to Mbale later that day. Also gave me some frozen bananas which tasted amazing and is the closest thing I’ve tasted to ice cream here. Collected agragrit all morning. The rest of the team and the Tricaricos had gone to Namalu that morning and brought me back some mandazi, which are fried dough balls. I ate about ten and it took at least ten years off my life. All that grease and fat, so good though.

Talked to Jim about picking us up some milk in Mbale and he said if I wanted some I had to come get it myself. So I asked Craig and he said it was fine so I went down to Mbale with Jim and the Pravius that afternoon. We dropped of the Pravius who were leaving for Kampala the next morning and then ran a bunch of errands. We traded in our empty soda and beer bottles and bought new ones. Went to the market and bought chicken feed, which stank up the car for the rest of the weekend, onions, milk, some hot sauce for me, and a kilo (2.2 lbs) of passion fruit. 

That night for dinner Jim and I ate with Andrew, another missionary stationed in Mbale, and some guy named Charlie. Ate atop a rooftop in downtown Mbale. Incredibly cool. Had delicious Indian food, although it was really hot but so good. Tried a Nile (light beer) mixed with a krest (which is a sour lemon drink) 3 to 1 ratio. It tasted really good. Really fun conversation. Andrew and Charlie are really cool guys. It has been really cool here because I’ve gotten to be friends with guys that are a lot older than me, almost my dad’s age. That night we watched the beginning of a movie about the Nuremberg trials and it was really good but I went to bed because I was tired.

Sunday slept in tell 8:30. Ate a couple muffins and apples that we bought a Happy’s Grocery yesterday. Really dry muffins. Supposedly were mixed fruit but they each had like two raisins on top. Bletch. Played with the fridge magnets. I made a face, a camel, a butterfly, and a caterpillar. Walked to church and met a bunch of people. Sat with John Knox who spent all the prayer times watching me and making sure my eyes were closed. That kid is so funny. He was feeling kinda sick so he ran around after church tagging everyone and yelling “now you’re sick!”

Decided to spend the rest of the day in Mbale and drive back early Monday morning. We ate lunch with Andrew and Martin, an employee of the Proctors. Ate at a restaurant in a hotel called the sunrise. Waited an hour and a half for the food and it was pretty iffy tasting. They didn’t even give Jim what he ordered. When he asked about it they said, “Oh, yes we didn’t make what you ordered, we up graded it.” Whatever (eye roll).

That afternoon I read and went with on a walk with Jim. We had a really good talk about a lot of stuff. He’s easy to talk to and is very wise. I’m really glad that we’ve become friends it’s such a blessing. That evening we went to pray and singing with the missionaries. After that Jim and I had Indian food one more time at the Landmark. Had African tea which tasted really good and also had a really weird dessert. These fried little dough things. They were the size of rice krispies and really sweet. When you bit into them they released all this juice and then it was really grainy and chewy. Weird. 

Crikey! Look at the Size of that Sucker!

I would now like change from our regularly scheduled program and talk about some of the wild life that has been in my life. To begin with there are three dogs that live here on the Tricarico and Eldeen compound were I am also staying. These dogs are all Karamojan local dogs and look like mutts and coyotes. Mickey, named after Mickey Mantel is a bowel legged, tattered ear, black mutt looks like he’s been run over five times because he has been run over five times. He has been driven over, backed over, you name it. Foxy then is a reddish brown and fat. She also has the most ticks of the three. Last is Zorro the only good looking dog. He is slim and black with brown feet and a few spots. Zorro though is the most annoying of the three and also the worst behaved. The Wright and Akken compounds also have several dogs and periodically, usually at night and in the pre dawn hours of the morning, all they dogs will start howling. Kind of a ritual neighborhood shout out that is both nerve racking and sanity shaking. 

As for the creepy crawlies we share the kitchen with a large colony of cockroaches. These are just the little guys, about half and inch long or less. Also down at the clinic moving rocks and tearing down the building I have seen a half dozen scorpion’s witch I promptly kill and cut of their tails whenever I see them. Scorpion stings aren’t deadly but incredibly painful. Also I have seen some humongous dragonflies with 3 inch wingspans and wasps that are bright orange, red, and black. Also several centipedes which I understand to be the non venomous, as opposed to millipedes which are. 

Snakes here are very common. They have green and black mambas, hooded cobras, puff adders (which are the most venomous) and a large variety of non venomous snakes. The Karamojan believe that all snakes are venomous and apply the same treatment to all snake bites which is to grind some herbs and tie that to the wound. My second day here, Friday, Tim found a cobra in the clinic. It had curled up inside a folding table (a plastic one that folds in half) in one of the examining rooms. The uproar that followed Tim’s discovery was hilarious. Everyone fled the room but only to the next one so they could see what was going on. Then one of the guards arrived with a bow and arrow and promptly began shooting arrow through the table. The Karamojan next drove the snake out of the table and began trying to hit it with sticks. One lady went a stole a blind man’s walking to stick. The snake had been hit by one of the arrows and was trailing blood everywhere. The Karamojan chased the snake around the room, knocking over dividing curtains and tables, until they had beaten it to death. Then they removed the snake from the building. The Karamojan believe the snake’s venom is in the blood so they all refused to clean it up, so Dr. Jim hade to. Meanwhile a couple of the women who work at the clinic had taken sticks and resumed beating the dead snake for another ten minutes. Eventually calm was restored and the snake was measured at 4 feet. 

I’ve learned an interesting fact here. Roosters don’t just crow in the early morning hours. They crow all day every day. The worksite at the clinic is located around several bandas were people live and their chickens and roosters wander around the area. These damn roosters are driving me crazy. They crow and crow and crow. Every time I see one I throw a rock at it but unfortunately they’re not retarded because they’ve started to avoid me. Hiding in the bushes where I can’t see them and crowing. I will kill them yet. Mark my words. 

Rain, Mud, and Labor Strikes

June 24^th-26^th: Wednesday-Friday

It rained for the first time Wednesday afternoon. It has rained once before since I’ve been here but compared to this rain it wasn’t even wet. Jim and I went out running we had run up and around through some hills and were about two miles from the compound when the first drops fell. Just a few at first, they arrived brought by a string wind. Fortunately the wind came from behind us and propelled us forward. Then the rain really started with thunder and sheets of rain. We were both soaked to the skin in about a minute. The mud here at first turns really sticky and clumps to the bottom of your shoes and weighs you down. However after a few minutes it just gets incredibly slippery. We were sliding all over the road. It started to hail when we were passing the clinic about a quarter mile from the compound. I got hit in the head about 8 times and it really hurt. The wind had been pushing us along but to get to the compound we had to turn and run perpendicular to the rain up the drive and it just about blew us away. Got back just sopping wet and showered in Jim’s room. The girls were all at BS (bible study but they shorten it on the board to BS) so the guys had made chicken and cheese roll sandwiches; cooked in the oven. And Jim whipped up some salad and green beans. Jim also broke open his boxed red wine and we all had some. It was very warming. 

Wednesday we finished the mazungu (white person) trench and the karamojan trench had about another 6 inches but the storm that night had caved in the walls and flooded the trenches. So when Craig showed up that morning all the workers refused to work except Tom, the untitled foreman and Craig’s main man. So Craig sent them home and Tom, Dan and I spent the morning draining the trenches of water. I jumped in the trench and sunk mid calf into mud and knee deep in water. That afternoon we decided to pour concrete and as we drove back to the clinic Craig saw two guys walking that he knew and hired them. So with our new team of six we poured the concrete for the base in about three hours. Craig hoped that by hiring these two guys and working anyway would show the work crew that we didn’t need them. He also said that he can hire a new crew every week and not run out of people. 

We spent the next day and morning collecting enough agragit to pour the other banda base. The Karamojan make the agragit, these stone which are about the size of little eggs, by breaking much larger stones apart with a hammer or another stone. They then pile them up into 2-3 foot tall piles and sell them. We would go around with the tractor and a trailer and buy these piles. On Saturday we were collecting a couple piles by this well and all these little kids were getting water. Well they all came over and started poking us with grass. So Dan and I would chase these little guys around and around. They were really funny; they would come up and touch my leg because I have hair on my legs and the Karamojan don’t have any hair except on their heads and some guys have little wispy beards. They kept looking down my socks like they were trying to figure out exactly how much hair I had.

Had yet another community dinner Friday night. We ate Indian food. It was incredible. Some one even made naan, the fried tortillas like bread, and it was pretty good. I drank a dark beer and south African castle milk thing. It was pretty good. Kris made these amazing brownie and caramel cookie bars. I had seconds of those. 

Of Blisters and Road Kill

June 22^nd-23^rd: Monday and Tuesday 

I have 13 blisters. Some are new. Some are old. Some are red and some are white. Some hurt and, oh they all hurt. We finished laying bricks for the banda on Monday and are now digging the foundation for another two bandas. Most of the Karamojan workers here are very lazy. They have been digging a trench since last Thursday and in one day we have almost caught up with them. 

James Tricarico and I have been trying to make some home made beef jerky. The plan was to buy some dried meat from the market. Apparently the locals say antelope is the best. Of course it is also illegal to kill antelope here. James has been trying to get a hold of some for about a week and on Tuesday he succeeded. Its cow meat thankfully so we won’t have the Ugandan army bursting in and arresting us for illegal activities. James showed me the meat and it looks like road kill. And it smells like African road kill. It also tastes what I would imagine road kill would taste like. I think it’s road kill. We decided to marinate it over night. We concocted a marinade consisting of BBQ sauce (for flavor), liquid smoke, pepper (for kick), salt (to preserve it although I think it already smells rotten but James assures me it’s fresh), and pineapple juice (to tenderize) We’re keeping our fingers crossed. 

I have been eating well this week. We have had too community dinners right in a row which is very unusual but Mark the head honcho for the missionaries was here. He took pictures his entire visit. Tuesday evening he took pictures of us playing Bache ball at the fellowship time before dinner. He had us all hide our beers but he caught James stealing a drink of his Dad’s beer behind his back. I lost several pounds shortly after getting here. It’s weird because I think I eat about twice as much here. Jim says that he always loses weight and not to worry about it. So don’t worry about it mom. Monday Emily Tricarico went on a cooking rampage and made tortillas and pineapple salsa for lunch. It was incredibly delicious. 

Trouble in Paradise

June 20^th-21^st: Saturday and Sunday 

This weekend went on a lovely little holiday to Sipi Falls an area of the country between Karamoja in the north and Mbale farther south. Sipi is located up in the mountains and although it is only a little higher is much cooler and gets far more rain generally than Karamoja. Jim invited the RP team, Dan, Tim, and Emily, two Tricaricos, Emily and Maria, and Johan and me. We also met 4 Canadian medical students there, Mark, Shantil, Kyle, and Rebecca. 

Our day started at 5:00 when we woke up, packed (at least all the guys did), and ate breakfast. We all crammed into the back of the mission’s white land cruiser and tried to sleep. Sipi falls consist of three falls. The highest is about 100 to 120 feet. The second is a little larger and the last is the winner falling 90 meters or about 270 feet. Upon arrival we met the Canadians and then set out on our hike to the three falls starting at the end, the top most waterfall. We hiked through banana and coffee fields to reach the top falls were the spray soaked us thoroughly. We then descended to the second falls and jumped in a swimming hole were we found tadpoles, a crab, and a chameleon. At the last waterfall there was the option of repelling off the top and going down right beside the water. Led by our reluctant leader Jim, Kyle, Tim, Dan, Johan, Rebecca, Johan, and I repelled down the side. After that we hiked to some caves that are along the side of the cliff. We clamored to the back of them even though the ceiling varied between 3 and 7 feet and the ground was covered in guano. We say about 15-20 bats, little guys with maybe 8-10 inch wing spans. 

That afternoon when we got back from the hike I had the most amazing guacamole of my life. It was made fresh and had tomatoes in it. They served it with “chips”, which looked and tasted a lot like fried, home made, puffy tortillas. We ate dinner at another restaurant owned by two brits. They served delicious pumpkin soup, followed by cottage pie and salad and topped off with this incredible round, crunchy brownie thing covered in dried banana pieces and chocolate sauce. After dinner I drank a cold stoney and we played Dutch blitz for about 2 hours.

On the way to dinner we had to pop the clutch in order to get it running because the battery was dead. Little did we know that that was just the beginning of our troubles. After dinner we were unable to start the car again. Because the lights weren’t working anyway and because it was past midnight we decided it would be easier to simply walk mile and a quarter back to the hotel and return the next morning. I’ve never seen so many stars. A pre dawn hike found Tim, Dan, Johan, Jim, and me back at the hotel were we woke the watchmen after several minutes fruitless yelling and banging on the metal gates. We then proceeded to push the unreasonably heavy car up the hill three times trying unsuccessfully trying to pop the clutch. After eight attempts in 20 minutes and much useless exertion in the wee hours of the day we decided to try one more time before giving in to hopeless despair and depression. As it turned out 9^th times the charm and we packed and were on the road again by 7:30. However our tale of woe has not yet reached its end for within two miles of the compound and home the car began to lose speed. With the medal to the floor we coasted to a stop providentially at the beginning of the compound road. We had arrived at 9:50 just in time for the 10 o’clock worship service and the swearing in of a half dozen new members. 

That night upon reaching the conclusion that pancakes would lead to my eternal happiness I set out on a quest to track down the dozen ingredients needed to produce the panned cakes. After scrounging up baking powder, butter, and some other ingredients and procuring syrup by inviting the Tricarico kids to eat with us Emily and I proceeded to concoct the delicacies. We fried them up until they were golden brown and delicious (well they weren’t bad).

Warning: Scientific Content Ahead!

For those viewers wondering what all the car trouble was I will now explain. As it turns out the land cruiser is a diesel and has two tanks. The battery died some time during the day probably because Jim left the lights on. Now, because a diesel engine once started can run without a battery we must conclude that the lights didn’t work that night because we popped the clutch instead of jumping the car. Thus the battery never regained a charge. Also due to some mishap (Jim?) we never switched to the second tank so we drained the front one and coasted pristinely to a stop just shy of our destination.