20,000 Ugandan Schillings is less than $10

Hey Everyone,

Happy Sunday!

Laundry from Last Saturday

A common question that I've been asked today is whether or not I've gotten the chance to worship. Sadly, my team and I haven't had the opportunity, so I wrote a blog post instead. Hope you guys enjoy it!

Before I start recounting my experiences since Wednesday night, here's a picture of my laundry from last Saturday. Apparently, we all did ours wrong and let out clothes soak in soapy water without properly scrubbing them. Next time, it'll be a longer process. We've become masters of waiting down here, though, so it'll be no problem. 

Last time I updated y'all, it was Wednesday and we were finishing up out budget for Carol, Sam, and Francis to take a look at. After we made it up, we went to Carol a piece of paper with our rough calculations on it. Stuff like this happens when you work with Google Docs and have no internet. Regardless, we sent it out to them later to take a look at it, and they seemed to approve! It'll be exciting to buy all of the materials and put everything into action. Hopefully we'll be doing that this week in addition to field visits. The wifi should be back up in the office tomorrow, too!

Sugar Cane and Me

On Thursday, we went out to a testing event being held by Health Alert Uganda. Although I can't quite recall the name of the community, I can say that it took us a good amount of time to get there on pretty uneven roads. At the event, we tested a total of 180 individuals, 7 of which were HIV+. The event started at around 11 o'clock, and people were pouring in from all over, which was inspiring to see. Before things got into full swing, Josh, Clara, and I helped ourselves to some sugar cane. Turns out neither of us ate it properly. Josh was given bite sized pieces to chew on, while I just went at it and chewing and gnawing off the stringy parts. Clara managed to eat it properly as she took it easy and went one string at a time. By the end of it, my hands, face, and legs were covered in natural sugar. But it was well worth it!

After sitting around for another hour and witnessing person after person being tested, I asked if I could help in any way possible. Carol said I could help with documentation, which required that I sit next to the doctor for six straight hours without food, looking at the results and recording them on their respective forms. It was difficult to sit there on a hot day with an empty stomach, but it was worth it. Admittedly, it was a both exciting and scary to sit there and watch the results come in for everyone. The majority of those tested were negative, but, as I wrote before, a few were positive after being tested twice. As I wrote their results down, I couldn't help but say a little prayer for them. Even though HIV/AIDS can be treated and knowing their status is important, the possibility of their lives being affected negatively is just terrible to think about. Thankfully, HAU offers education and counseling to HIV positive individuals. I only hope for the best for them. 

HAU HIV/AIDS Testing Event 

When everything finished up, we watched a couple of old guys dancing shamelessly in front of everyone to the same music we've been listening to all day, with pouches of gin or vodka in their hands. One song in particular, "African Queen", has become our team's favorite. There's also "You Can Be My Wife". If you're really interested, try Youtube-ing them. Also, an old man stole my wild berry sour patch on the pretense that he'd share it with everyone. I'll never forget that. 

HIV Testing Materials 

Old Guy Dancing at Testing Event

After a long day, we went right back to the hotel to wash up and get ready for trivia night at a local place called BJs. We went with two HAU staffers, Julius and Emma. Our team's name was "Julius Maximus". We were sure we would win at first, answering the first few questions like "What organ in the body produces insulin" and "What does the 'L' stand for in Samuel L. Jackson's name." We really wanted to win a case of Nile Special or Green Mirinda, but sadly we didn't do well enough. It was alright, though, because the musical stylings of Nickelback and Macklemore managed to cheer us up.

On Friday, I finally understood the definition of "Gulu time". Emma and I had to go to a meeting at 9AM at CVAP's headquarters to discuss preliminary planning for the event with each other organization. Being American, I pushed to leave as soon as possible, so we got there around 9:30. Turns out that HAU would be the only other organization there until 11, when we finally started the meeting with 6 out of the 12 partner organizations. In the mean time, I got a chance to chat with one of the volunteers, Natasha, about our lives, work, and experiences with traveling and living in Uganda. Once it started, the meeting lasted over an hour. It was great getting to know the other organizations in the area, like Red Cross, the Gulu Youth Program, the Disabilities Center, though once I got back to the office I was exhausted. The journey back was a little rough. Following a pleasant visit to Gulu University to pick up Emma's transcripts, our motorbike broke down two minutes away from the office. We walked the bike back to HAU, where a couple of mechanics immediately jumped to work on it. Emma gave me leave to go eat with the team at our favorite Ethiopian restaurant. After lunch, we split and went to grab wifi to check emails, Facebook, and complete our personal tasks. 

Later that night, we successfully met up with the GROW Team at Columbia University. They arrived Wednesday night, and we grabbed a pork dinner at a local hotel. It was a pleasant visit and a nice opportunity to get to know them and Franny, another project officer from GWED-G. After dinner, we went back to the hotel to pass out early. 

Yesterday was nice as well. Each of us went out to the marketplace where Josh, Clara and I ordered more custom clothing to be made. Awesome shirts made to our measurements, costing about $10? Who would pass that up? Pictures are still being worked on for those shirts, so be prepared to see them in all their glory. After, we went to grab a quick lunch then headed back to the hotel for a bit, where I waited eagerly to Skype with my NumberOne Ceiling Adornment. We talked about random stuff for a couple of hours, and it was good to see her again. I'm sure she felt the same way :). 

Following the Skype session, I ran back to the hotel to change into pants and my African shirt. The plan was to go to a place called Diana's Gardens, though it started raining and we opted instead to go to Pagoda, where we usually go to abuse their wifi. The match started around 9:30 PM and was between Bayern Munich and Dortmund, with Munich winning in the end. Josh and I also had planned to get hammered, which we had successfully done. I'll spare everyone the details, but let's just say 20,000 schillings is more than enough to do the job. Again, everything ended up being under $10!

That's pretty much been my weekend with a lot of Game of Thrones reading done in between. Today has been relaxed as well: we've just been to breakfast, and I am now about to head back to the Diamond to enjoy some more reading.  Hope you enjoyed this post with all of its pictures! I'll keep you guys posted twice a week as I've said before, so look out for the next entry on Wednesday. 

Thanks for reading!

Zach (Lala)

GoT: 500 pages into the third book! I've finally caught up with the show, and as such I've been pressing myself to read even more because it's become that much more exciting. I really love how George Martin doesn't deal with any romantic Hollywood love crap. It's been no holds bard, and he never lets up on the struggle felt by each character. The book has become particularly exciting because at this point everything is coming together - Bran, Jon, Arya, Brienne above all. Sadly, not much more can be said because if small details are discussed, it may ruin the story!