make it happen

The PCVs are coming! The PCVs are coming!!!

PCT Visit

Jacob and I received some fun news last week. We were DEEP in the village visiting a school with Africare when my cell phone rang. It was Shirley from the PC informing us that we will be receiving 2 Peace Corps Trainees (PCTs. If you haven’t figured out by now the Peace Corps LOVES acronyms) They will be visiting in a little over a week and will be staying for 3 days. Jacob and I haven’t been here long, but we are well integrated into the community and both of us are busy with our organizations. One of the best part about the PCTs coming to visit is that they will be sincerely interested in what all we are doing. They will have only been in Uganda for about 3 weeks, so it will all be new to them. It’s nice to have people visit who have ‘been there, done that’ in the sense of getting into the Peace Corps, plus it’s fun to have some new people to show around our town. We’ve been planning and preparing since receiving the news of their future arrival. I remember Ed telling us in training that for some volunteers it’s the only ‘outside visitors’ they receive in their 2 year service. Plus you do bond with who you visit. I constantly was texting Jenna, whom I visited, with random questions about stuff like ‘what soap to use to wash dishes’. We have a lot to offer here, too. Electricity almost 24/7, DSTV at the Sky Blue Restaurant, a good restaurant that has more than 3 options on the menu (one guy recently referred to the 2 page menu at Sky Blue as an encyclopedia…no joke!), FREE High Speed Internet Access at Africare, movies on my laptop, Jacob is a 5 star chef, plus 2 Peace Corps Volunteers who are actually doing work with their organizations.

Goodbye Alice the Nurse

Alice has left for greener pastures. She’s taken a job at a hospital near Mbarara she told us. I thought she was doing a super job with the kids, but she said her interest was working with expectant mothers. She has her specialty in nursing as a midwife. She had a tendency to take extra days off work, though. When you are taking time off in Africa and it becomes a problem with your organization… you’re really pushing it. Here you are maybe supposed to be at work at 8am… you can show up at 10, no problem. And you can leave an hour or 2 early as well. No explanation needed, just walk out the door. It’s funny. Jacob works with a guy whom he has given the nickname Figment because he doesn’t think he really exists, that he’s merely a figment of the imagination…

Random factoid of the week

The divorce rate in this country is exceptionally low. Something like 3%. However, it’s legal to divorce your wife if she is not producing children. This reeks of King Henry VIII, don’t you think?

That’s it for this week. Birthday wishes to Henry Y and Morgan B!

posted by Brian R Dunn @ 2:53 PM