Friday and Saturday - Wooly Days!

May 9, 2009

Yesterday and today have been full of orphanages and fun! I woke up in Friday to the sound of monkeys running around on the roof on the house next to ours. Since we are still not sleeping fully through the night, we were tired at 7 am. I couldn’t go back to sleep and I could think of nothing else I could do without waking Ross and Rachel that I laid in my bed and watched the monkeys. They are always fascinating and really they are just eating off of the tree and running around, but they crack me up every time. There were at least six of them jumping from branch to branch. There were also two puppies chasing a bigger dog that looked like he had escaped since there was a long chain dangling from his neck.

Once we woke up, we walked down to the market to get some breakfast from Hot Loaf Bakery. Although it all looked good, that was about as far as it goes. The cakes and muffins are super dry and you need a sip of water or something every time you take a bite. We then walked down to the markets to show them to Rachel and collect a few souvenirs. I didn’t barter at all, even though I knew I should have. A huge mistake is converting everything into dollars because you think you’re are getting a deal. I paid 31,000 shillings for a batik (painting on canvas), two necklaces, a scarf, and a small stone elephant. This is really only about $15 US, but I probably should have paid no more than 25,000. When I return I will remember to barter and keep in my head shillings rather than dollars. Rachel is an expert barterer even though she hasn’t done it before….she’s pretty much a natural at everything she does. I’m so glad she’s joining the family!

We met up with Angella at 3:00 and went to the Sanyu Babies Home. It has been around since 1929 and the set-up the have is great. They have room for up to 50 babies at one time, so the age limit is 4 years, however, recently the age limit is down to 3 or sometimes 2 ½ to make room for newer and sicker children. The home first tries to send the baby to family, then to an adoptive family, or, as a last resort, they send them to another orphanage run by a bigger organization. The home has many buildings. The staff includes nurses, an administrator, an accountant, a social worker, launderers, seamstresses, cooks, teachers, mothers, and probably more that I am forgetting. It is a big job to care for that many children, and they manage their resources well to be able to care for so many children. One of the teachers showed us her classroom for children starting at six months. She has a shelf to help them hold themselves up or learn to walk, toys are spread out so kids have to learn to crawl to different ones, and if they cry they will sometimes put them in front of a mirror or mimic them to make them stop. The also teach them to share and that in order to apologize you must run the person on their shoulder or arm to show true apologies. The teacher said the goal is to give the babies life skills and be successful on their own, whether it be with a mother or at another home with a whole new group of kids.

After that we took a surprise trip to see the Woolies. We stopped at a gas station to get some food for the home because Angella said she doesn’t like to go empty handed. Although we all agreed it is good to bring them stuff, we also decided that it is sometimes good to come with nothing except ourselves. The kids, especially Ruth, come up to you and are expecting that anything in a bag or in your hands is for them and they are disappointed when you don’t have anything to bring. I know that when we return over the next three weeks we won’t always have something to bring except our love and hopefully we will start to show them that they don’t always need to get something.

The kids have definitely grown up a lot. Trevor, Arthur, and Kenny all go to school thanks to some sponsors in Kampala. Henry and Simon will soon be old enough and the got sponsors to start in a couple of months. None of the children speak English until they get to school. You can tell that the three older boys are getting better and better at it. They were doing their math homework on Friday. Arthur was showing me how good he was at math. Kenny and Trevor were working with Ross and Rachel. They seemed to struggle a bit more, but were still starting to catch on. Overall, the kids were very quiet, but it may be because they were all just napping before we came. Irene was the biggest surprise. She is a completely different kid even from the first time that we came. She is friendly and jumps in people’s laps. She smiles and sings and even though you don’t know what she’s saying, you can tell she is trying to communicate something to you.

Oh yes, on a side note, on the way there we took a shortcut through the “ghetto”. Angella said you shouldn’t go there at night because you might end up in the river and even the cab driver rolled up his window while we were driving through it. On the way back a chicken almost through the open window. I’m lucky it wasn’t all the way down or else we would have had scratched and chicken feathers all over the place. We just say, TIA, this is Africa.

We promised the Woolies we would be back on Saturday and left with Angella to get some dinner. We ate at an Indian restaurant near the Crocodile. It’s amazing that we can eat at some of the best restaurants and still only pay about $10 US.

TODAY – SATURDAY
This morning we ate a hearty breakfast of Malarone (medicine to prevent malaria), Cliff bars, and tea. Then we walked all the way to Garden City to meet up with Angella to get some things for the kids, such as mosquito nets and cough medicine. While I was sitting outside, a boy named Ronnie came up and talked with me. He was probably 18 or 19 and he said he would like to talk to me because I am tall and that we should go to a place called the Iguana. It sounds like a Karaoke bar, and I’m pretty sure that would be a bad idea. I told him I didn’t have a phone and probably cannot go out with him because we are too busy, but I continued to talk with him and learn what he thought of his country, my country, and life in general. Although I don’t advocate talking to strangers, I do like to learn about people and the best way is to speak to them. I know that a lot of times, especially here, there are ulterior motives to get money or something else from you. The biggest thing I got from him is that the people of his country have no voice because there is one government in control of everything and everyone. I can’t imagine living in a place where I feel as though my voice won’t be heard. Even Angella mentioned that although there is a re-election coming up, peoples votes will not matter because the current administration will control the counting and most likely will rig it. She said she lost her voting card and probably won’t bother to try and replace it. She does really like Obama and even called us this year during the inauguration to ask how we felt about him.

After Garden City we hired a cab to drive us to another part of down to get some beans, rice, and a scale to weigh the kids. It was mass chaos but I’m so glad we did it. Ross and Rach stayed in the car while Angella and I got what we needed. We asked somebody for a scale and he didn’t have one but there were at least three guys who tried to grab our attention and lead us to one. We tried to stop at other places and find one on our own, but they insisted on leading us. Angella said if he told us to turn down an alley, we should just keep walking. We had to go to a market to get the rice and beans. After almost getting hit by a taxi and backed into by a truck, we made it to the market (by almost I mean, a safe distance, but coming fast - safe as long as we were paying attention) I think that people tried to sell me mangoes, a pineapple, random Ugandan fruits, even a plastic bag. Angella said I would have never made it on my own so I am thankful that she is here to guide us through the country!

We made it back to the taxi and had an awful time of getting to the orphanage. Not only was traffic at a dead stop, but it was super hot and we had our backpacks and bags of goods packed in the back seat with the three of us. Three people at almost six feet and over don’t fit too well in any car, especially here. We decided to walk and wait until the taxi caught up with us. It was a nice breeze and only rained a few drops. The rest of the drive was easy, but we spent a total of two hours in the taxi for something that only takes about 15 minutes if you go without stopping.

The kids were very excited to see us and were more the energetic ones that we saw yesterday. We gave each of the boys a jersey that our mom had purchased for them. We also gave the girls two dresses, one yellow one that mom had bought specifically for Irene. I bought Irene and Ruth each a Cabbage Patch kids that they were very excited about. The mothers named them Tracy and something else with a T. I’ll remember late I hope. We showed the kids the video of them on Ross’ camera and got them all excited. Then we played a short game of soccer outside until they got tired. Then we just sat around and talked with them and played. One of the older boys who calls himself Henry has a picture of the two of us that he brought out to show me. Angella had told the kids they are going to the zoo a couple of weeks ago, so we are probably obligated to go. Angella thinks it will be pretty easy and less expensive than we thought. Thanks to donations from my friends Lori and Maleah, I’m sure we will be able to go. Hopefully it will be next Saturday.

We decided to get the full Ugandan experience by cramming ourselves into Mtatus to get home. Again, height works against us, but it was still fun. We hit the ceiling in even the high bus, and our knees are always touching the seat in front of us. On the seconds Mtatu, there was some Ugandan music playing in the front and we were crammed next to a ton of people, and I really felt like I could have been in some part of a movie, just driving through Africa. I really love it here and even though there are parts that are difficult, like the smell (of the air and some people), some food, bad plumbing, horrible internet connections in most places, the extreme poverty, and the dirty and crowded streets….just to name a few. It really is a beautiful place full of beautiful people. I pray and hope that I will be back here many times in my lifetime and see good changes happen to people and places.

Tomorrow we will be going on a Safari to Murchison Falls for three days. I hope to see lots of big animals – especially giraffes!

Side note for the day……if you ask somebody here where you are from based on how you talk, the have no idea if you are from Germany, Spain, America, or England. I could easily tell those regions apart because the accents are distinct. I think it must be because I have been exposed to people from those places more. However, people here can tell different dialects and Eastern vs. Western accents apart. I am sure that Tigist (my friend from Ethiopia) has a very different accent than Angella, but unless they were speaking to me at around the same time, I would not be able to mimic or tell their accents apart. This is just my random thought today. Anyone that knows me has had to deal with my random ideas, so I just thought I would let this one be known to all!