I never would have done that in America...

Hello family and friends! time for a little update on how the week has been! it's only thursday and so much has happened! we have spent time this week meeting with parter organizations and influential people that will help us with projects and make them productive. tuesday was quite the adventurous day for me. so we went with kizza, pronounced like chizza, and saw a mushroom house. about 15 people share them and provides a great income for the families because the market is so high for them right now. BUT! i have to tell you. the mushroom house wasn't in use because it's not in season right now, so they were dark and full of cobwebs!! it was seriously a spider shack. i never never never would have gone inside in america. but i was brave! and went inside! there wasn't much to see but kizza showed us how to grow them and build it. next we went to a woman's group that runs a business called Musana Jewelry. they are awesome. the local women make beads and necklaces out of paper and wood and all sorts of random things. they make beautiful things, its really cool. anyways, it is a great way for them to make money and we want to start more projects like that.
well, we got our first rolex's today! they are literally, rolled eggs, but the way ugandans talk it sounds like rolex. they are delicious! just eggs, tomatoes, onions all rolled up in a chipatti. they are 900 shillings so like 45 cents in us dollars. everything is so cheap here. its crazy!
after lunch nicole, our country director (cd) needed someone to go with her to meet with robert about buying a fridge. i went with her and it was quite the experience! i had been to roberts house before, his aunties are so funny and loud. well we were meeting in their living room discussing the cost and one of the aunts brought out a huge plate of..... GRASSHOPPERS!! yes my friends, i ate multiple grasshoppers. my eyes went wide because i knew i could not refuse them. we looked at each other, and dug right in! we had to pull off the legs first. they really weren't that bad! i was surprised. you could not pay me enough to do that in america. i feel like i keep saying that, but its true! we had a good time laughing about it and brought home the extras for the other volunteers to try.
I had yet another first that day, i hand washed all my clothes. let me tell you, that is not an easy task! especially when they are stained red from all the muddy clay all over everything. they still aren't dry, and the colors leaked so i have blue spots on all my shirts haha. oh well!
by the way, our water was off from saturday until tuesday! amazing how much you can't do without water. we didn't have any reserve yet either so we all got pretty smelly in those four days! we had the hugest thunderstorm ever that night too! the power went out for a while whch was kind of fun. oh uganda!
yesterday we built adove stove number 2 for a family. it turned out great! we're getting good at building them. they take about 4 hours to build.
then we went to Kowola hospital and met sister josephine. she is incredible. she's decidated her life to promoting public health and has worked at the hospital for 39 years. she took us around to every part of it and introduced us to all the main doctors and head workers. this was one of the nicer hospitals in uganda. that is so scary to me. dad, you wouldn't believe how unsanitary it is. oh my. we all felt like we were going to get a disease in the few hours we were there. the worst was when they took us to the mens unit and we went into a room of sick patients. as we stood in the middle, the nurse pointed out that the area to our left was the tuberculosis section. there was no distinction from the other areas and we all instantly held our breathe. it was a little scary. it makes me appreciate healthcare in america so much though. i can't imagine having to go to a hospital like that wehn you are sick. it was very sad. we visited the maternity ward too and that was fun. we got ot talk to the mtohers with their newborn babies. they were just beautiful. so much hair and they were just perfect.
today we went to ssanyu school and met with pastor francis. he told us all about the problems that the teachers and locals in general deal with. we are getting so many ideas for projects that will help these people. we are all so excited. me and suzanne, another volunteer, have been brainstorming about a teacher training project we can do. we are both english majors so it's something we are really interested in and the teachers are eager for training. we also want to sponsor a writing contest to get the students interested in writing. it will also help improve their english skills. we want to capture their stories about their culture, because none of it is written down. we were thinking we could find a way to publish a book out of it and create an income for them to buy more books. we have a lot of planning to do and need to meet with more of the teachers to make sure we can create a sustainable project for them. that is what i have learned the most since coming here. we need to start or refine projects that the people want and need. we saw how a few projects from last year fell through after the volunteers left and we don't want that to happen again. its been really cool to go aruond meeting people and thinking of projects to do.
well everyone, thats it for now! i don't know if anyone besides my family is reading this haha. if so, feel free to leave me a little comment! sharon, i would like to thank you for your fantastic email the other day! it was great to hear from ya! guess what, cows and goats and chickens run wild here and it reminds me of you. a cow circled us today... it may or may not have totally freaked me out! oh, and i caught a chicken! ya! i took pictures, don't worry.
katie liddiard- will you call my parents and pick up the books i didn't have room to bring over? we are definitely going to want them! actually we have a list of a million things we want you to bring so get ready for that haha.
mom and dad- it was great talking to you on sunday! so fun, i look forward to talking to you again next week! i love you all, goodbye!