This weekend I had the opportunity to visit an orphanage in Wakiso, a small town about thirty minutes northwest of Kampala. The village is very nice, well kept lawns as well as wonderful classrooms and living facilities. Right now there are about one hundred children living on site, a few of them were nice enough to take a picture with me. The one at the lower left has only been there for a month, they tell me that he starts to pick his nose when he gets scared.
The medical officer who showed me around has lived here for several years with his family, they were nice enough to host me for lunch (Kraft mac and cheese and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, I was in heaven). When it came time for me to leave, they were nice enough to not only give me a ride back into town to catch a taxi, but let me drive their car from the village to the taxi park. I can cross driving on the opposite side of the road off of my list of things to do here in Uganda. One marked difference I noticed is that the turn signal is on the opposite side of the steering column, they all laughed when I turned on the windshield wipers and looked surprised.
Hanging out in Kampala for the weekend was a lot of fun, I hadn't been back since I arrived in early June. I took some time to visit Garden City, a place that is virtually indistinguishable from the US (ie - parking lots, malls with elevator music playing, food courts). It was quite a strange feeling walking around in those stores after spending the better part of three months in Jinja, can't imagine what it's going to be like after I return.
Hey! My friend Jonathan Blanchard is ALSO in Wakiso!!! Have you met the Peace Corps volunteers in Uganda? He's one of them and also a UW alum. - Jia
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