2 YEARS in UGANDA or…ask me about cobalt mining!

October 26, 2011 · Filed under General

In a country where people rarely remember their own birthdays, my two-year anniversary of Peace Corps service in Nyakasharu, SW Uganda slipped by unnoticed by all of my Ugandan friends.  Always eager for a good ego-deflation, I reflected on the remote possibility that the mere fact that I have survived in their generations-long homeland for two years is not a terribly big deal.  Come to think of it, how did I even celebrate my anniversary?  I’m pretty sure I cooked up a nice pot of peas.  Kicked back with a little Jane Austen.  Some sugar-free caramels (thanks Mom). 

But it’s true!  After 10 weeks of training, I traveled to my work site on October 15, 2009.  Sometimes I look back at the person I was two years ago and blush (the only surprised response I could muster in local language to a drunk’s comment of “white girls have no ass” was “well, you don’t have good manners!”).  Sometimes I cringe (I didn’t do anything when a friend got drunk, stripped naked, and chased a hippopotamus).  Sometimes I laugh (waging war on cockroaches with hiking boots, a headlamp, and a plastic bag of Ugandan banana gin…)  But usually I’m just confused (why did I buy so many basins?).  The truth is, as it is for anyone, that it’s not easy to distinguish exactly how I’ve changed throughout this experience, except sometimes in direct comparison to new volunteers, or just in fleeting moments of self-reflection.  Granted, those usually occur after time-matured, newly calmed reactions to situations such as getting sneezed on by a sheep.  (Just keep walking.)

Well, since I’ve clearly veered off course of nostalgia or any kind of meaningful recounting of life’s lessons learned, I’ll take you down a different path instead.  To prove that, after 2 years volunteering in Uganda, the place is still as nutty-crazy-cool as ever…here is a list of new things I’ve still managed to do lately for the FIRST TIME:

1. taken a ride in a bread truck!
2. had my butt grabbed by a mad man wearing half of an electric tea kettle on his head
3. met a kid whose very alive parents named him “Orphan”
4. been aggressively called “muzungu!” by a half-white kid
5. incidentally, the first time I’ve called a Ugandan 4-year-old “stupid punk”
6. ate two kilos of peas in less than three days- hell yeah!
7. literally out-ran the rain.  No, you don’t get it.  Justus and I ran FASTER than the rain moving directly behind us.  Then it swamped us but, before that, we were pretty incredible.
8. used the Runyankore word for “to fart”
9. wrote my first crossword puzzle (word nerd alert!)
10. found out I’m a giant pansy when it comes to walking in the national park.  Jen says if I run into a buffalo, I’m supposed to lay face-down on the ground like a human doormat.  I’m pretty sure if I run into a buffalo, that is not going to happen.  I don’t know what I’d do, but it would probably involve running pretty fast.  Maybe some zig zags.  Some panic.
11. the roads were so bad, I actually traveled to work in a boat!
12. bought yarn in the local language….tricky
13. actually hiked above the clouds (oddly, also the first time my mind could be said not to be IN them)
14. mistakenly called our Sub-County Chief the Sub-County Thief—Freudian slip!
15. finally bought a world map so I could DREAM BIG, but really just ended up wanting to go sit on one of those equatorial Pacific atolls that disappear on either side of the margins.
16. drove through a wildfire.  Through it.
17. reenacted a crime scene
18. bribed the police (….unrelated)
19. high-fived a local politician  (definitely related)
20. held my phone above my head while trying to send a text message in an area with poor phone network and bellowed “I send you to the heavens!” …..well, the first time I’ve said it out loud.
21. killed cockroaches as they ran up the inside of my pants
22. read up on cobalt mining
23. made a toothpick cannon

Okay, I realize things got a little bleak there toward the end.  Maybe I should’ve stuck with the nostalgia crap.  My electric meter says 168kWh.  I remember when it was only 9!  Yeah, I’m not very good at that.  Also, not very good at using more power than a 70-year-old single lady whose only companion is an electric kettle. 

My social life may not be thriving (maybe I should make friends with Orphan?) but I’d say my life life is pretty okay.   Happy 2 years, myself, and more power to me!  Ha ha….ha.