Laura Leach ‘95 worked as a Peace Corps volunteer in Uganda for the past two years. She has been sending updates to KWConnect about her experiences in Africa — this is her last post. Click here to read her story from the beginning.
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Welcome Home!

O-F-Z-Q-P – I flew through the eye chart with my left eye. I was in the middle of my close-of-service physical exam, and it seemed impossible that my two years were already up, but here I was just two days from flying home.

When I switched to my right eye, everything looked blurry – really blurry. Since I’m the last remaining member of my family who is not yet sporting a pair of glasses or contacts, this made me nervous, but Karen, the Peace Corps Medical Officer, assured me my vision was fine.

What I was soon to discover when reaching home is that I was now going to see things clearer than I ever had before. That’s what happens when you spend two years in a foreign country and come home. You see things differently and notice details that have gone unnoticed for years.

Now I was going to see things clearer than I ever had before. That’s what happens when you spend two years in a foreign country and come home.

I left Uganda on April 28. There were walk-to-work demonstrations going on in Kampala that day, and I was a little bit nervous about getting from Kampala to Entebbe to catch my flight, but the Peace Corps driver got me safely there in plenty of time. My flight was from Uganda to Amsterdam, where I quickly devoured a lot of cheese during my layover, and then flew to Detroit.

In Detroit, my sister Kelly surprised me at the airport. It was my first time back in the U.S. for more than two years, and the first time I had seen anyone from my family during that same period of time. I was stunned (in a good way) that she flew from New York to meet me.

The two of us flew the last leg of the journey together and were met at the airport by my Dad, Mom and sister Lisa. As soon as I saw my mom, I started to cry. It had been a difficult week saying goodbye to the friends I had made, the work that gave me such a sense of fulfillment and the country I had grown to love, but now I was home!

What I Learned
The number one thing I’ve been asked about my experience with the Peace Corps is if I am glad I did it. The answer is a resounding YES! I learned so much from this experience. I learned how much I take for granted every single day while people on the other side of the world are so grateful for the very little bit that they have.

I was greeted with enthusiasm, acceptance and joy almost every single day while I was in Uganda, and I wouldn’t trade that for the world. Certainly things in Uganda were not perfect, but the things that bothered me while I was there seem so insignificant now that I am home, I can’t imagine why I let them bother me so much at the time.

I was greeted with enthusiasm, acceptance and joy almost every single day while I was in Uganda, and I wouldn’t trade that for the world.

I also learned a lot about the challenges that women face in other parts of the world – domestic violence, an inability to exercise their reproductive rights, unequal access to education and good jobs, and I could go on.

I learned about life for children in Uganda where many children are treated like property, or neglected, or sexually abused, or fail to receive an education, or are living in poverty, and yet they are so light hearted and full of joy. I became good friends with a little girl who was HIV+ and learned a little bit about the challenges people who are HIV+ face as well as their families and communities. I even learned a little bit about myself along the way, too.

What You Can Do
I have enjoyed sharing my story with the KWC community. The Peace Corps was a wonderful experience for me that I would recommend to any students finishing their academic career. You will learn about the world, about yourself, and develop important skills that will help you in your future careers no matter which path you chose. To learn more about serving in the Peace Corps, you can go to their website at www.peacecorps.gov or you can feel free to email me at lauraleach38@yahoo.com.

Thanks for reading!

Laura. Uganda. Kids. Perfect.

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Laura Leach ‘95 is working as a Peace Corps volunteer in Uganda. She is sending updates to KWConnect about her experiences in Africa. Click here to read her story from the beginning.
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A Big Move
Although I was excited that the VSLA was doing well, I was still feeling very isolated from my organization and underutilized. In December of 2009, I went and spoke to the director of MIFUMI about how I was feeling. He agreed that the physical distance between me and the office was serving as an obstacle, and they would look for a place in Tororo town for me to stay.

I was pleased by how our talk went, but I refused to get my hopes up because at one point there had been discussions of moving me to Nagongera, and that had fallen through. Most things tend to take quite awhile to organize and execute here, so I was really surprised when I was moved into my new apartment in Tororo town before the end of the year. Everything was about to change.

Laura's home in Tororo: "The middle doorway with the gate is mine, and it is a small front room that I use for my kitchen. The back part of the room is where my bed is, and I have a bathroom with a Western style toilet, shower (cold water only) and sink."

VSLAs Expand
When I made the move to Tororo town, they switched my counterpart at MIFUMI as well. Now I was going to be working with Dinah Atim, who at the time was the head of organizational development, but soon was switched to the head of enterprise, and later was promoted to the programming officer for the organization. Dinah and I worked together to get VSLAs started within each women support group MIFUMI works with.

 When I came to MIFUMI there were only 10 advice centers, but during my first year here, they expanded their service so that there was an advice center in each sub-county. This meant there were 21 women’s groups that needed to start saving. I ended up doing most of the VSLA training because Dinah was busy working to transition the groups to community based organizations.

 Instead of my earlier fear coming true of not having enough members interested or able to save, the opposite actually occurred. By the time I got one group trained and underway, they would have the next 30 women lined up to start another group. This is a terrific problem to have because it meant the program was popular and spreading, but it also created a challenge for me because I couldn’t disengage from one center and move on to the next.

 So far I have made it to 14 sub-counties and am working with 37 VSLAs. One of the highlights of my service was when that first group in Nagongera completed their first savings cycle last September. I got a gomesi – the traditional dress worn by women of Uganda – made for the occasion. The women laughed and clapped when I arrived and stepped out of the vehicle in my gomesi. It was a fun day with a lot of laughter, hugs and a few tears of joy as well.

A Ugandan woman named Betty hugs Laura during the ceremony marking the successful conclusion of the first savings cycle of the Nagongera VSLA.

As I sat there and watched each woman receive her savings, I thought back to that first meeting I had in Nagongera and how overwhelmed I had felt that day by the weight of the women’s problems. I’m sure many of those problems still exist, but they weren’t there that day. I am so proud of the women of Nagongera mostly because their accomplishment was their own. They were not given the toolkit – they bought it. They were not given any money – all of the money saved and used for loans was their own. They just needed me to give them a little guidance, and I needed them to find my sense of purpose here in Uganda. In the end, we all walked away a little richer from the experience.
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Laura Leach ‘95 is working as a Peace Corps volunteer in Uganda. She is sending updates to KWConnect about her experiences in Africa. Click here to read her story from the beginning.
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VSLA
During our pre-service training, two volunteers came to talk to us about a program called VSLA which stands for Village Savings and Loan Association. This program is designed to give people who live in a rural area and do not have easy access to formal financial institutions the opportunity to save money and borrow money.

Here’s how it works: around 30 people get together, buy a metal box with three places to lock it, and meet regularly to save money and give out loans to group members from their savings. There is a separate fund that members contribute to weekly that exists for emergencies that pop up such as sickness or death in the family. Loans taken from this emergency fund are not charged interest. Members choose a base amount for savings, which we call their share value. Then at each meeting, members are supposed to save from one to five shares per meeting.

The good things about the program are that it encourages savings in a culture that typically does not save, it gives members access to loans that they can put into business ventures, the interest paid on loans stays within the group rather than going to a bank and it is self-managed. I was pretty much sold on the concept by the time the volunteers left our training session, so I was excited when the women of Nagongera mentioned that they wanted to learn how to save.

The Toolkit
Despite the good sales pitch by Josh and Eric, I was still nervous starting the VSLA. The last thing you want to do is start a project that flops, especially when you are dealing with someone’s hard-earned money. The toolkit consists of the metal box, three locks, 30 passbooks, two bowls, ink pens, a record keeper journal, an ink stamp pad, a bottle of ink, a stamp and a ruler. It all costs 90,000 shillings (about $45), so I was worried about the women having the money to get started.

A standard VSLA box kit

I quickly discovered that my worries were unfounded. These women were serious about saving. They had their money collected for the box kit and all of the members recruited and in place at our first meeting. The first few meetings you have, nobody saves, because you are training and setting up the VSLA. At each of those first few trainings, the members were so eager to start saving. They elected officers, and soon saving was underway. I came to all of the meetings I could make during the first few months, but soon the women needed very little guidance from me.

Next time: A big move … and VSLAs expand!

Laura Leach ‘95 is working as a Peace Corps volunteer in Uganda. She is sending updates to KWConnect about her experiences in Africa. Click here to read her story from the beginning.
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Another False Start
The second false start came when the women said they were interested in being trained in poultry keeping. There is an organization in Uganda called the National Agricultural Advisory Services (NAADS); their sole purpose is to educate and support Ugandans regarding agricultural practices. I went to the Nagongera sub-county offices and met with the NAADS officers and asked them if they would conduct a training for the women in Nagongera on raising poultry as an income generating activity. The NAADS officers agreed and said they would make sure to spread the word that there would be a training.

I had notified my “counterpart” at MIFUMI to let her know when the training would take place, but somehow wires were crossed, and a domestic violence advisor training session was scheduled for the same time as the poultry training. This meant that the two women that I counted on to help me with translations would be gone, and Hellen, who was also very helpful, would have to be at the Advice Center and also could not attend the poultry training. I was disappointed by this but still felt optimistic about the training.

Food and Payment
The morning of the scheduled session, I went to the office. When the women began showing up for the training, they were asking where the food was. One of the local officials came and told me the women were hungry, and that I should provide some food. Well, there was a budget of zero for this event, but I hopped on my bike and rode down the street and bought a bag of chapattis for the women. They were quickly gone, and as more and more women arrived, the same official told me we needed more. I told her the food was only for people who showed up on time, and we needed to go ahead and start with the training.

It wasn’t that simple though. The two men from NAADS asked me for their money. Um, what money? It turned out they wanted me to pay a “facilitation fee.” This was news to me, since when I arranged for the training no one mentioned any sort of fee, and providing advice to their community members regarding agricultural practices was precisely what their job was suppose to be.

I was angry, frustrated, and near tears, but with over 100 women who had traveled quite far waiting for a training, I agreed to pay their fee. Being the nice guys that they were, they agreed to give me a “discount” since no one had mentioned the fee prior to the event.

What Did He Just Say?
I’d like to say the money was well spent, but the men seemed ill prepared. The training was in dhopadhola, so I didn’t know what was being said most of the time except for the brief summaries the men would say to me. I do know at one point the guys were talking about sex instead of poultry, so I think it is probably best that I couldn’t follow most of what was being said.

After they finished, the men asked me to pay them in the privacy of their office, which just made the whole encounter feel even creepier. They were all smiles and handshakes and told me to let them know if I needed them for any future training.

At this point, I was down, but not quite out. I had one more idea before I was going to throw in the towel … and this one was a winner!

Laura Leach ‘95 is working as a Peace Corps volunteer in Uganda. She is sending updates to KWConnect about her experiences in Africa. Click here to read her story from the beginning.
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Breakthrough
My breakthrough at my site came when I met a lady named Mary Asili. Mary was one of the domestic violence advisors in Nagongera and also worked with a group of women called the Nagongera Women’s Guild. Mary was the first person within the MIFUMI organization that I met who genuinely seemed interested in working with me, and I was definitely ready to grab at any opportunity that came along at this point.

We scheduled a meeting for me to go to Nagongera to meet the women Mary works with and talk to them to see if there was some project or goal that I could work with them on. The day of my meeting, Akoth Thereza, who is a volunteer at the Mifumi Village Advice Center, hopped on her bike to lead me to Nagongera. It was about a 45-minute bike ride.

When I got there I was greeted by Margret Rembo, the other domestic violence advisor at that site; Hellen, who is a volunteer at the center and also a young mother with a baby named Obama; and Betty who was one of the leaders within the Women’s Guild.  There were probably between 30-40 women there for that first meeting.

Nagongera Women's Guild

I introduced myself in dhopodhola and went as far as I could on my own before I sought help with translation. At first the women were quiet, but when I asked them to tell me about themselves, one by one, women raised their hands to tell me what challenges they were facing. One of the biggest concerns shared by most women was inability to pay school fees. Some women had been abandoned by their husbands who were now not contributing at all to provide basic needs for the women or their children. Some women had been chased by their husbands, after their husbands had married a second wife. Some were widows who didn’t have any help or any way to provide for themselves. Most of the women who spoke had experienced domestic violence in some form or another.

By the time the women were finished, I was completely overwhelmed. I remember trying to compose myself to say something coherent, but I also remember wondering what I could possibly do to help these women with their problems.

False Start
I have to admit I had a couple of false starts before I actually found the right project to work on with the women of Nagongera. First the women showed me a kitchen that they were given by the Catholic Church in Nagongera. The Nagongera Advice Center is located next to the church, and the Nagongera Women’s Guild started out as a prayer group for the women.

I need to clarify what I mean by “kitchen” It was an empty building – no electricity, no stove, no furniture…nothing. But it was a “kitchen” to the women, and they wanted to start a catering business from this kitchen. The first thing I asked the women to do was to make a list of everything they thought they would need for this business and the price that it would cost.

At first the list started off with the typical things you would associate with a catering business such as pots, pans, plates, bowls, cups, etc., but soon that list was several pages long and included jewels and gowns for their catering uniforms. I’m not sure where that list ended up, but I made it the responsibility of the group members to search out the prices of the items for the business, and I never saw that list again.

Next time: The Pay-Off takes place …

Laura Leach ‘95 is working as a Peace Corps volunteer in Uganda. She is sending regular updates to KWConnect about her experiences in Africa. Click here to read her story from the beginning.
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Work was another challenge for me out in the village.  I was supposed to be spending time learning about the work at the advice centers, but one counselor at the center was hardly ever around. She was from Tororo town, and apparently village life wasn’t for her either. The other counselor would leave me behind at the center while she went out on case handling. I read quite a few books those first few weeks out in the village.

Soon a solution presented itself. The school Greg was volunteering at didn’t have an English teacher and wanted to know if I would be interested. I went to James Ochola Memorial Secondary School  (JOMSS) the very next day, introduced myself, and informed them that I had never taught in my life, had absolutely no training, and would be delighted to try to teach the kids if they still wanted me. That first term, I taught all four grades, S1-S4.

It was a huge challenge to say the least. I’m not sure what the children learn regarding English in the primary schools, but it isn’t punctuation, parts of speech, grammar, writing or reading. I bought a local grammar book during a visit in Kampala to help me come up with lessons. There weren’t books for the students to use, so the only information they received was what I put on the board.

Another challenge I had besides not knowing what to teach was discipline. Caning children is supposed to be illegal here, but it definitely goes on. I think the children were excited to have two white teachers visiting them. JOMSS is a government school with very few resources, but it was definitely a status booster to have two teachers (and I use that term loosely regarding myself) from the U.S.

I think this excitement coupled with the fact that they knew neither of us would cane them, and also my own inexperience in the classroom, led to challenges with discipline. Classes were also huge, with over 60 kids each in the S1 and S2 classes. I survived the first term somehow and agreed to teach for a second term but only to S2 and S3.

At the end of the school year, S4 students have to take a national exam, and those scores determine whether they would go on to S5 or not. I felt like the S4 students needed a Ugandan who was familiar with the exam to prepare them. As far as S1 goes, there were just far too many students and they were far too undisciplined for me to continue teaching that class.

Something else was happening too…I finally found work with my host organization.

The most exciting day of training was the day that we were given our work assignments. A week or two before, a gentleman named Dipak came to our training. He is from an organization called Raising Voices, which works to prevent violence against women and children in Uganda. Dipak spoke mostly about caning in the schools and alternative forms of discipline, but he also touched on child abuse at home, sexual abuse, and violence against women. The statistics he shared were startling and the stories heartbreaking.

After his visit, I went to the internet café in town, and looked up the Raising Voices website. I decided that no matter what my primary work assignment was, working against domestic violence was definitely something worthwhile for me to take on as a secondary project. The website listed one partner organization in the Tororo area that was linked with Raising Voices – Mifumi.

Each of us were later given an envelope with information about where we would be living and the organization we would be working with. When I opened my envelope and read the word Mifumi on my paper, you would have thought I won the lottery. All of the volunteers were running up to each other asking, “What did you get, what did you get?”  It was really amazing because it seemed like all of the economic volunteers got placements perfectly suited for them. We were all so pleased and felt like our program manager Jolie had really listened to us during our discussions about what we wanted. 

We were soon on our way to Kampala. We each met either our counterpart or our supervisor for the first time. My counterpart was supposed to be Janet Otte, but she was unable to make the trip to Kampala; instead, Jude Oboth came to meet me. Jude is about the happiest guy I’ve ever met. He had a huge smile on his face when we met, and he made me feel very welcomed from the very beginning. Jude worked as a lawyer at Mifumi. He went over some organizational basics with me to explain about the work that Mifumi does, but as far as getting specifics on what my role would be, I was going to have to wait.

While we were in Kampala, we were given time for a quick shopping trip. I had no idea what to buy because I had no idea what my place would already have. Fellow volunteer Hunter said he was getting a loaf of bread, peanut butter and jelly. That sounded good to me, and I followed his lead. It turned out to be a good move – that’s what I lived off of my first few days at site. 

The next day we had our swearing-in ceremony. I was very emotional during that ceremony and kept crying. Afterwards, we had a group photo taken, enjoyed a meal together and then were on our way. It felt so sudden to be saying goodbye to all of the volunteers I had just gone through training with, but it was also exciting to be on our way to my new home.

Next time: first days at Mifumi …

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 Laura Leach ‘95 is working as a Peace Corps volunteer in Uganda. She will be sending regular updates to KWConnect about her experiences in Africa. Click here to read her story from the beginning.

(Tororo is on the right, just above the box.)

One of the toughest emotional challenges during Peace Corps is losing members of your training class. After that first weekend with our host families, a married couple that we came over with decided to go back to the United States. They had dreamed of being in the Peace Corps back in the early years of the Peace Corps, but they had been discouraged by their parents. All of their kids are now grown, and they had recently retired, and decided to pursue their dream. The wife was an education volunteer, and the husband was an economic development volunteer, and both brought with them a wealth of knowledge and experience.

After that first weekend, they decided they had made a mistake and could not spend two years away from their children and grandchildren. With a bat of an eye, they were gone and there was nothing for the rest of us to do but move forward.

Snacks and Weddings
Things were looking pretty sunny for me at my home stay. I had chosen carrots and cucumbers for my first night snack, and this turned out to be a good move. Ugandans are very warm and welcoming people. They go out of their way for their guests, and as soon as Jane found out I enjoyed carrots and cucumbers, they become a regular part of my diet throughout my stay.

My first weekend at home stay, Jane had a wedding reception she was catering, and I got to tag along. I can’t imagine crashing a wedding reception in the United States and the wedding party being okay with that, but there I was at a wedding reception where I didn’t know anyone and no one knew me, and I was greeted and told that I was “most welcomed.”

I was the only white person there, which means I got a lot of attention, especially from the children. This wedding was a western style wedding being held in Kampala. The main difference between an American wedding reception and this one was that there were many more speeches given at the Ugandan reception, and then the cake was served to the guests by the bridesmaids and groomsmen. I thought that was a nice touch.

Heading East
Pre-service training is all leading to you getting your own site where you will live and work. Although we had to wait until our last week of training to find out the exact community where we would be located, we got a big hint when we were divided into our language groups. I was put in the dhopadhola  group with Mary Beth, Greg and Racheal. Only one district in Uganda speaks dhopadhola, and that is Tororo. I would be heading east.

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 Laura Leach ‘95 is working as a Peace Corps volunteer in Uganda. She will be sending regular updates to KWConnect about her experiences in Africa. Click here to read her story from the beginning.

Do you like children? Yes. Do you require a lot of privacy? Yes. I was filling out my home stay questionnaire. During our pre-service training, each volunteer is placed with a home stay family. The idea is for us to interact with Ugandans, learn about the culture, and also learn how to do things the local way – like wash clothes in a basin and cook using a sigiri (small charcoal stove).

I’m sure there is also an emotional element there, too … we hopefully would bond with our Ugandan family, so we wouldn’t bolt and return to the US because we missed the families we left behind. The host families also filled out questionnaires, and the night before we left for Wakiso, Irene (the cultural trainer) was matching volunteers with host families.

The Mom

Laura and her home stay "mom," Jane.

When the big day came, we were all given an index card with the name of our host parents, which parish they lived in, what religion they practiced, and how many children they have. My card said Jane, two children, Catholic, and I won’t even try to remember how to spell the parish now. It turns out the card was a little misleading. Jane is Catholic, but she is virtually a non-attending Catholic much as I am virtually a non-attending Christian. She does have a son and daughter, but the daughter was away at college and the son was away at boarding school. Jane is a school teacher in Mengo, which is a suburb of Kampala. She also has a side business as a caterer. In short, Jane is a very busy woman.

Jane is a widow, but she has a houseboy named Joseph who was responsible for cooking, cleaning, collecting water from the well, opening up the house in the morning and closing it up at night, doing the laundry and running errands. I later learned that Joseph was Jane’s nephew and that it is not uncommon for families to have a relative working as a house boy or girl. Joseph didn’t speak much English at all, and I didn’t speak much Luganda, so we had an interesting relationship that consisted of a lot of laughing, smiling, and pointing.

On the big day when we met our families, all of the volunteers were seated in the dining area at ROCCO, a guest house that had been hired out to serve as our training site. The host families didn’t all arrive at once – they sort of trickled in. I sat and watched the hugging and hellos, and waited for my turn. Those of us whose “parents” had not arrived yet looked like the animals left at the end of a pet adoption day at the local pet store. You could sort of sense the rising desperation that we wouldn’t be picked. Certainly it wouldn’t be unheard of for someone to change his or her mind about having a complete stranger stay in his or her home for 10 weeks.

Eventually my “mom” did arrive, and we sat down and talked a bit with my friend Mary Beth, a volunteer from Missouri whose home stay Mom was friends with Jane. Slowly, host families and volunteers started going their separate ways.

The House

Jane's house, where Laura stayed for 10 weeks.

Jane’s home was beautiful. It was a four-bedroom house with a garage. She had electricity, but no running water. The latrine was outside, but the bathing room was right next to my bedroom, and there was a door that opened from my bedroom into the bathing room, so no streaking through the house in a towel. Yes!!!

There was also a refrigerator, which I didn’t appreciate the significance of at the time, but certainly do now after going a year without having one. After we got all of my things moved into my bedroom, Jane asked me what I wanted to eat. I didn’t know at the time, but how I answered this one question would impact my future happiness for the next 10 weeks.

Stay tuned …

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At the entrance of Lweza

Our first few days in country were spent at Lweza Training & Conference Center in Entebbe. The pace was slow as we were all recovering from jet lag. We met Shirley, who was our training director, Irene, who was responsible for teaching us about Ugandan culture, and Ruth, who was acting as the safety and security director at that time.

Safety
The safety and security session was the most memorable, but then again most scarring events usually are. Seriously, by the time this session was finished, I was convinced I would never travel anywhere within country during the course of my stay.

They had a current volunteer come and talk to us, and much of her discussion was about riding matatus (passenger vans that are used as taxis). Don’t give them your bag.  Don’t get in until you confirm where they are going. Don’t pay them until you arrive. It might be a good idea to copy down the license number before you get in, and my favorite piece of advice … don’t get into an otherwise empty vehicle with someone you don’t know because of the “human sacrifice problem.” WHAT??? Um, we’re new to this country…everyone is a stranger!

During that training session I also became frightened of walking down the street because it was likely someone would try to steal my bag. I also discovered riding motorcycles was strictly prohibited because so many people are killed or injured from motorcycle accidents in Uganda there is an entire ward devoted to accident victims in the hospital. My means of getting around were looking pretty limited at this point. I later found out that I was not the only volunteer terrified by this session, and I believe they have modified it since our group’s induction.

Shots and Language
During our time at Lweza we met our program directors (APCD). My program director’s name was Jolie. She served as a volunteer in Togo. When we met, she was very relaxed and asked things about our trip there, how things were going so far, how my family felt about me coming to Uganda, and what I was interested in doing regarding my assignment.

We also met with our medical officers who reviewed our files with us, and gave us our malaria prophylaxis. I was really surprised because I thought I would have to get tons of shots before I left for Uganda, but instead we received shots throughout our pre-service training.

We also started our Luganda language training during our time at Lweza. We divided into groups, and my group was led by Irene the cultural trainer. I was really nervous before leaving for Uganda regarding learning a new language. I had taken a little French and a little Spanish in school, and had mastered neither of them. We were given access to some basic training materials online before leaving, but I had not memorized anything yet. I found that most of the volunteers shared the same concerns regarding language.

Volunteers on the grounds at Lweza

The Food
Besides getting inducted to our training, and our culture, we also were introduced to Ugandan cuisine during these first few days. My friends had rightfully made fun of me before leaving for Uganda because one of the main crops in Uganda is bananas, and I HATE bananas. Ugandans pick them while they are still green, boil them, and mash them. They cover the pot with banana leaves while it cooks. The result is a golden mashed food they call matoke. I tried matoke once. I did not hate it, but it definitely is not at the top of my list.

Other popular dishes here are rice and beans, posho (which is a starchy food made out of maize and cassava flour), millet bread, several different types of greens, roasted pumpkin, cabbage, fish, goat, beef, pork, chicken, and my favorite, chapatti, which is a flat bread fried and sometimes served rolled with an egg, and called a rolex.

My favorite time of the day is tea time. During training we had breakfast, morning tea, lunch, afternoon tea, and dinner. The tea consisted of your option of regular black tea, African tea that was made with milk and a little spicy, coffee, and Cadbury drinking chocolate. This was accompanied by mandazi (fried dough), doughnuts, samosas (small triangular shaped crust filled with either a vegetable mixture or meat mixture and fried), or g-nuts (same thing as peanuts). It was delicious, and I’m convinced if I wasn’t sick so much during my time at training I’d weigh 200 pounds by now. 

Short Calls
After a few days in Entebbe, it was time to be transported to Wakiso town.  Wakiso is where we would be living with host families for the next 10 weeks during training.  If there was anything I feared as much or more than learning a new language, it was the prospect of being a house guest for the next 10 weeks. I am a very private person by nature, and while part of me looked forward to connecting with a local family, the other part of me dreaded having to share living space with strangers for so long.

On our way to Wakiso, we were going to make a quick stop in the Ugandan capitol of Kampala to do some quick shopping. We were told we all needed to buy a little bucket. Why do we need a little bucket? It is in case you need to make a short call at night. Short call? Apparently it would pose a risk to our host families to go outside in the middle of the night to use the restroom, so the bucket was for us to go in during the night. Again I found myself wondering … what have I gotten myself into?

Tune in next time to read about pre-service training and life with a host family.

Find about more about the Peace Corps.

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