Sunday morning means…. you guessed it…. MASS TIME! Mass takes place at the boarding school/convent every Sunday morning, where locals from the villages around the school may also attend. Dominik & I are not exactly avid church-goers (trying to choose my words kindly here), and attend out of respect to the nuns and the children, but boy do the Ugandans know how to put on a show. Everyone turns up in their Sunday best and it’s GLAM - high heels, evening gowns, and even a two year old boy in a smoking jacket. But it’s not only the fashion that convinced me to get out of the bed early on a Sunday morning. The school choir alone would make it worth it.
After mass we stayed around chatting the girls because they always have so many questions for us. One girl asked me if I had children. I said I hadn’t. And then she asked “but what age are you?”. I said “32” and she just looked at me bewildered. I feel like she thinks I should be a granny at this stage. I get literal fan mail from the girls now too. It’s the most adorable thing and I love receiving them and reading them (who wouldn‘t). They make little envelopes and put their letters inside and give them to me when they see me at the school. I need to start writing back now, but first I need to improve my handwriting - the girls put me to shame! All of the girls keep their heads shaved when they are in school, so one day this week they asked if they could play with my hair. I gave in. Arguments broke out over who could do the best ponytail, and I nearly had the head pulled off me. At any one time I had around 20 pairs of hands on my head. One girl asked me if I could bring my hairbrush next time. Not sure I want to put myself through that…
The beautiful Ankole cows are native to this region of Uganda, and are seen as a status symbol. The ones we met happened to belong to the Minister for Agriculture (see, status symbol). They produce very little milk, but it is thought to be very nutritious. People usually use it to “fatten up women for marriage”, and I’ve already been offered it a few times. It’s a very strange feeling to be asked “why are you not fat?”.
Lake Mburo is not far from here and a few of us went there for a day. We saw so many animals and birds including hippos, giraffes, zebras, buffalo, and lots more - it was pretty cool. But my favourite animals I saw were the Mongooses. I thought they looked like cute little wild puppies, but apparently they are extremely viscous predators. One of the highlights of the day was our tailgate picnic, complete with tea in china mugs and sausage sandwiches - nuns know how to do a picnic. Also, have you ever tried to eat your lunch and fight off a warthog? We have…
Now you might think the next photo was taken in the back office of Tony Soprano’s strip club, but I can assure you it wasn’t. That is a photo of Dominik & “Generous” (or “Genie” for short) counting out millions of Ugandan Shillings in the iPhone-lit office of “Roma Motors”. And that’s the big news of the week - we bought a car! We’re now the proud owners of a 20 year old dark green Subaru Forester. The whole process was an interesting introduction to Ugandan bureaucracy and a story that Dominik wishes to detail in a separate post. I secretly think that Dominik loved the challenge, and now he has a new friend called Fiona who works at the tax office and conveniently (and somewhat worryingly) conducts business via WhatsApp.
In other news, we finally got to try the famous “Rolex”. You don’t wear a Rolex here, you eat it. It is in fact an omelette rolled inside a chapati with either a meat or veggie filling. It’s delicious! Egg rolled, rolled egg, rolex… Dominik got a haircut at the “Step-in” Saloon in Mbarara. It’s really impressive to see what kind of haircut you can achieve with a blunt paper-scissors. It was just one step away from using a knife and fork. Fair play though, it doesn’t look half bad! Dominik is in full IT consultant-mode here in Uganda and has fixed or set up every laptop, printer, phone, and e-reader he could get his hands on within a 20km radius. He even showed the employees at the tax office how to use Microsoft Word. And finally, the Irish couple who were here with us for the first two weeks went home. It’s now on me to keep the kettle boiled and the flow of tea going. It was fantastic having their company for the first two weeks here, and we’re missing them already. That‘s it for now. Peace out!
