I walked to Mbale one day from my house. It’s about 30 Kilometers! (that's about 17 miles) It was way too long, and once I arrived in town I felt like someone had taken a pole and beaten me down with it. Haha. Really though, the adventure was fun until the end… Along the way we (me and Julianna) stopped to eat some jack fruit on the side of the road, and the woman was so nice, she brought us a grain sack to sit on and water to wash our hands once we were finished. Very kind. We stopped for a few waters along the trading centers and everyone seemed to think we were crazy for "footing" to Mbale. About half way, my friend got a blister and had to go home. The rest of the way people would come up to me and walk for a few minutes, or even a few kilometers and we would talk... One man was on a usual walk, 5 km home, another woman I talked with was on the way to the hospital to see her sick sister, and I was reminded once again that God and prayers will save us all. Near the end, there were these 2 little girls, no older than 6 that follwed me for about 2km until they finally trailed off somewhere...

My neighbors live in one house with 5 teachers, which is actually 5 independent families in one house, probably the size of 2 of my living rooms back home. It is so small! Total, there are 5 teachers, 3 wives, and 9 children, which equals 17 people in one small house! The rooms are somehow divided by the walls that reach only a certain height because of course there are no ceilings, so surely you can hear everything, and if you wanted, you could throw something over and it would reach the other families room/house.

The kids here are so crafty, and I would love it if some of the kids back home would learn a few things from using creativity to make toys rather than spend tons of money on these things that are bad for the environment anyway... The kids here make jump ropes out of vines from trees (and they work rather well), they make toy guns from just about anything (one kid was using an aloe vera plant), they make balls from plastic bags people have thrown away, they use tops from bottles as wheels for cars they've made out of pieces of old wire, they were using old grain sacks like a sled and pulling each other across the lawn for fun... really, I always love to see what they will invent next.

I went to Soroti to work with some primary school girls on a psychosocial art therapy program. I really enjoyed working with them, and I think they had a lot of fun... at least I hope so. Getting to Soroti was an adventure... We took a taxi to begin our journey, and after riding for about 1 hour, the taxi came to a stop, but we were still 20km out from Soroti. Then we got on bicycle boda bodas (one man is driving the bike, and you sit on the back overtop of the back tire, but on a cushion), and they took us about 3km through about 6 inches of water covering the road. The next mode of transport was a wooden canoe that had to take us across the flooded road until we eventually reached a part of the road that wasn't completely flooded and we got back in a taxi to take us the rest of the way. It was fun.
On the way back, we decided to go the "faster way" according to some... however, we went around through a dirt road, and it ended up taking 4 hours! Way too long. The roads were so dirty that when I would wipe my face, literally you could see a layer of dirt come off and on to my hand. The inside of my ear looked like someone threw dirt at me, and oh, my nose, it definitely was loaded. haha. My friend said they could even see the dirt on my eyelashes and eye brows... beauty queen time.

Say some prayers...

Sipi Falls is beautiful, see.

Rough week buddy:
This week at school, one day I visited a primary school and 4 out of 10 teachers were present, I even, well my eyes started poofing up in the office just especially because when I think about the kids... it can be hard to think about. One of the teachers, actually he was the deputy, so this is like the principal, he had taken his class to his own garden to plow during class time, grr... it made me mad. Another class was without a teacher all morning, and I'm just like woah dude.

I think there is this cycle. ... Uganda is living life as a circle, and I suppose as we all are...
A circle that goes around and around, and only can be stopped or broken if someone actually steps up and does something... please God, do something someone. haha, I am trying, but not sure if I can manage this large task.
"Corruption is killing our souls", and yes, it really is. I always see corruption everywhere here too... I see it in town, at the police station, even in church.
Some days, I am not sure if there is anything I can do, but some days I think I can... when I got to a good school, I think woo, now we are getting somewhere.

Let's all look up.
I had a random conversation with a Kenyan man on the street the other day... we got into a usual conversation about life here, and what the answers/ solutions were to some of the madness going on.
He told me, "the only answer is prayer"... he said that the only thing that would save any of us would be to look to God and hope for the best.
haha, at first this made me laugh, because I am thinking, well of course there is more we can do than just say a few prayers, even Jewel says, "We pray for peace, but if praying were enough, it would have come to be."... and she is smart, so I was thinking there is more we should do.. who knows.
But then sometimes I think about the power of prayer, and the power of positive thoughts, and everything like that, and maybe that is the answer... maybe just enough people aren't involved. So let's all get involved and do some praying. hehe. Seriously though, do it.
Pray for us here in Uganda, and everyone else in the world that faces the hard times of poverty, disease, sickness, sadness, etc.
Ok, I'll start...
Now your turn. woo!

Night time heaven
The stars here and the sky always are amazing, I love them so much. I think I can surely see when I look up like that. This weekend I went on a trip to Sipi Falls, it is a place in the mountains of Mbale and it is lovely, lovely. There were rainbows almost daily, and one day there was one that arched completely over a waterfall, and it looked so beautiful, I thought maybe it wasn’t even real. Haha.
We tented out over this cliff and at night it got so freezing. I tried to wrap myself up, but it never worked... yes, it does get cold in Uganda, although this is rare.

B-dubs

My dad says he is going to Buffalo Wild Wings this weekend, and man, I miss that place.
I was thinking death was such a sad subject, i better spice this blog up with some happiness, so B-dubs makes me happy, there we go.

Death is this crazy thing here. It comes and goes like the wind. Every time I turn around, it's there, right in your face. Right there, always.
Here they tell me that when you die, you don't really die, but you live on. You live on through other people.
This morning I was supposed to go visit a school, but my counterpart messaged me saying he couldn't come because his niece had just died. Like today I'm starting to become not as surprised, but sometimes it just hits me differently. Today, it made me sad.
Just yesturday, a P.7 girl at my school asked me why there is so much death here? She told me she hears that it's not as much or as often in other places. I told her that death is everywhere and sometimes we have no control, but that other times it was based on knowledge and how to take care of yourself through washing your hands, sleeping under a mosquito net, etc.
Death really is this crazy thing here, and sometimes it is overwhelmingly present. I wish sometimes I could play God and stop it just for a moment, at least when the children are taken away.