Goodbye Africa :(

I'm leaving my second home on wednesday and its going to be even harder than i thought! I am so sad to leave Africa and all of my amazing friends. Its been an incredible experience that has changed my life so much! Wow. I don't have a lot of time, so i'm just going to end by saying that I'll never forget my friends here. I need Africa a lot more than Africa needs me. Goodbye!
Njagela Uganda!!
-Nampijja

Terrorist attacks and lock down

It has been a very sad and scary week since i last blogged. Maybe some of you are not aware, but Kampala, Uganda was bombed sunday night. 74 people were killed, including one American. It was so sad. I copied some of an article below about it online so i didn't have to explain the news part of it.

Monday we spent under lock down at the house. They expected more bombs to go off, and it was a pretty scary situation since foreigners had been targeted watching the world cup at a restaurant. we didn't know if we were going to get flown out a week early, or if the us embassy was going to do anything. i've never felt so trapped and vulnerable, wow. before i go on, know that everything is okay here. we are out working again and just being very cautious. it makes me so sad to think about all the conflict and hate that targets innocent people. before i came to africa, i would have read about the uganda bombings as a headline on the internet and just thought it was really sad and forgotten about it in an hour or two. but now, the conflict directly affects my friends. i know the people here, and i love them. it makes my heart ache to think that if things got worse i would be taken care of and able to leave the country and return to safety, but my ugandan friends would be the ones to suffer. and it is all because there is corruption and so much hate. its just really sad.

the good news is that we are safe and still able to work now. we started our big EYE CAMP on tuesday and it has had incredible success. on Tuesday we did 34 surgeries and gave out 100 pairs of glasses. wednesday we gave out another 100 pairs of glasses and did 25 cataract surgeries. On wednesday i spent all day out in Naggalama helping and even got to go into the surgery room and watch them remove the cataracts! it was soo cool but really strange to see at the same time! but i figured it would be neat to see what my dad does every week in the hospital so i went for it. kim, the girl i went in with, actually ended up fainting into my arms haha. she was fine, it was just kind of funny. on wednesday though at the eye camp i was able to do vision screening! so i'd have them read the letter chart that you do at the eye doctors office, and then i'd record their prescription on a piece of paper and send them on their way. it was a really good experience and i'm glad we have every day until monday to keep doing it! we've already screened over 600 people, its great!

well, its my last week here and i'm going to make sure i finish working hard! i love Uganda, and i'll never forget all the amazing people i've met and what they have taught me!
-ashley

New al-Qaida threat: Somali group claims blasts

By MAX DELANY and JASON STRAZIUSO, Associated Press Writers Max Delany And Jason Straziuso, Associated Press Writers – Mon Jul 12, 7:14 pm ET

KAMPALA, Uganda – East Africa saw the emergence of a new international terrorist group Monday, as Somalia's most dangerous al-Qaida-linked militia claimed responsibility for the twin bombings in Uganda that killed 74 people during the World Cup.

The claim by al-Shabab, whose fighters are trained by militant veterans of the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, resets the security equation in East Africa and has broader implications worldwide. The group in the past has recruited Somali-Americans to carry out suicide bombings in Mogadishu.

Al-Shabab, an ultraconservative Islamic group that has drawn comparisons to the Taliban, has long threatened to attack outside of Somalia's borders, but the bombings late Sunday are the first time the group has done so.

Rage said a second country with peacekeeping forces in Mogadishu — Burundi — could soon face attacks. Fighting in Mogadishu between militants and Somali troops or African Union peacekeepers frequently kills civilians.

The attacks outside Somalia represent a dangerous new step in al-Shabab's increasingly militant path and raises questions about its future plans. The U.S. State Department has declared al-Shabab a terrorist organization. Other neighboring nations — Kenya, Djibouti and Ethiopia, along with Burundi — may also face new attacks, analysts say.

Despite the threats, the army spokesman for Uganda — an overwhelmingly Christian nation — said the county would not withdraw. "Al-Shabab is the reason why we should stay in Somalia. We have to pacify Somalia," said Lt. Col. Felix Kulaigye.

In Washington, President Barack Obama spoke with Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni on Monday to express his condolences for the loss of life in the bombings. Obama offered to provide any support or assistance needed in Uganda, said White House spokesman Robert Gibbs.

Gibbs said that, while the FBI is assisting in the ongoing investigation, the U.S. believes that there is "no clearer signal of the hateful motives of terrorists than was sent yesterday."

The death toll in Sunday's twin blasts rose to 74 on Monday, Ugandan officials said. Investigators combed through the blast sites, one an outdoor screening at a rugby club and the other an Ethiopian restaurant — a nation despised by al-Shabab. Investigators found the severed head of what appeared to be a Somali suicide bomber.

The United States worries that Somalia could be a terrorist breeding ground, particularly since Osama bin Laden has declared his support for Islamic radicals there.

GULU

hello! its been over a week since i've blogged, and so much has happened that i can't possibly catch up on all of it. this last weekend i traveled with 6 other girls on my team to Gulu, a region 6 hours north of Lugazi. there is a lot of history there and i will try to give a quick background about it as best i can. so in 1986, the Lords Resistance Army was formed and Joseph Kony became the leader shortly after. They want to overthrow the ugandan government. to accomplish this, kony's army abducted thousands and thousands of people into the LRA for two decades. it was in gulu that the army targeted the acholi tribe. they would come at night and force people to become soldiers in the army. when i arrived in gulu thursday afternoon, i could instantly feel the difference there. you could just tell that a war had happened there. i was surprised by how developed the area was though. even more surprising were the stories i heard from the people i met there. every single person i met was abducted into the LRA at one point. when i asked dennis, our contact there who took us around the city for the weekend, if anyone escaped abduction he simply stared at me. "dont you understand? everyone was either abducted, or killed. if the army came for you, you were taken." one of the people we met was james, a teacher and friend of dennis. james wrote his story and it was put into the newspaper. he gave us a copy of it and i will copy it and post it here for you to read, rather than me rephrasing it.
--------------------------

"My name is Kilambus Charles. I come from Gulu district, which is found in northern Uganda. This district has been affected by the continuing civil war that has made great impact on the people living in the region.
"I was abducted by rebels together with my wife in the middle of 2003 and stayed with them for 3 months.
"It was around 9:00 p.m. and I was asleep in my room. Suddenly we were surrounded by rebels and I heard a kick at the door and was ordered to open it. Two rebels forced their way inside my room and tied my arms behind my back using my shirt. They looted my clothes, mobile phone, camera, bed sheet and many other things including the original of my exam certificate. They ordered my wife to carry all those properties and bring them out while the other rebels were busy looting properties from my mother's and brother's house.
"They took us to join about 70 other people who had been rounded up. I was tied around the waist with one person and they put my wife close to me and ordered me to take care of her. If she escaped, I would be killed.
"They too k us to the next village and put us there while other rebels went back to collect food that was given to us and carried it with them.
"We walked a distance of 50 kilometers that night without resting and carrying bean seeds of 75 kg. Those who were unable to carry such weight were killed.
"On our way, two of the former rebels whose feet were swollen and the skin was peeling off were killed and they told us that the same thing may happen to any one who could not walk.
"We were going towards Sudan straight away. We walked for four days without eating anything and with the heavy load. I got tired and my feet started to swell and peel off as a result of walking a long distance. I was weak already. Life was terrible.
"The rebel commander ordered that we had to increase the speed of walking because the Ugandan army, UPDF, was following us. But I couldn't walk. So I was beaten seriously and they ordered me to run quickly if I didn't want to be killed. SO I had to do it.
"During the process of beating, I was given dislocation in the bone and seriously injured in my body.
"When we entered in the camps, we were welcomed by other rebels. In the morning the rebel commander ordered us in line. They started selecting young girls who were 10 to 15 years old to be the rebel's wives, which is a violation of children's rights and at the same time is child abuse. Those who were not beautiful or had problems in their legs or body so that they could not manage what ever was needed, must be killed and they did it.
"Now, with those serious killings we found it normal. Staying with them, I started learning from them how the rebels behave compared to home. But there was no way I could escape.
"Once day around 10:00 am we were attacked by an army helicopter gunship. We continued moving and taking cover in the tall grass and under trees.
"The rebel commander ordered killed people who were dressed in white and red since those colors would easily be seen by the soldiers in the helicopter. Two of the abducted girls were killed there and then. I had on white shorts and a green t-shirt. I feared I was the next person to be killed. But I was ordered to remove the shorts and remain half naked. I had to walk like that in the tall grass until we arrested some civilians who had a good pair of trousers.
"This is how I escaped from the rebels: One day I was chosen to be among the 150 people to participate in a battle with army soldiers. When we met with those soldiers and the battle was terrible, I was among the 30 abducted who luckily narrowly escaped death."
--------------------------------------------------
James was one of the very lucky ones. Most of the people who were abducted were children because then the LRA could brain wash them into thinking they were the good guys and that their families at home were all dead. We met another man when we were in Gulu named John. He also was kidknapped into the LRA, but he was only 12 when it happened. They told him that his family was all dead and that there was no point in returning. So he stayed with the LRA for 9 years and worked very closely with the leader Jospeh Koney. He ended up getting shot in the leg and because he had been such a good soldier they let him go home instead of being killed. He was very lucky. But because he had been in the rebel army all that time, the whole community looks at him as an enemy now. It is so sad.

Gulu taught me a lot about the people of uganda. they have suffered unimaginable horrors, but they are strong. as i sat in several homes in gulu, i listened to the stories of people who had been forced to kill. yet, you knew they had the kindest hearts and have left their abduction in the past. they are so sincere and positive, it is almost hard to remember that they were under kony's reign and lived in the bush in constant fear. they are the perfect example of not letting a situation forced upon you determine your future. the entire city is focusing on rebuilding and rising above the emotional, physical, and mental destruction that the LRA caused.
we saw the IDP camps, for internally displaced persons, where thousands and thousands of people came for refuge during the war. dennis told us that one of the camps we passed held 30,000 people. there were probably only 50 huts.
we also went to WORLD VISION, which was a really cool center. it was made for all the people returning from the army who needed counseling, rehabilitation, and therapy to adjust back to normal life. many people were abducted into the army as young children and spent all their teenage years there. so they need world vision to help them gain skills and counseling to be able to survive and adjust to normal life. i was happy to see that they are not as packed with people there now. same with the IDP camps, the only people that are still living there are the elderly and the physically disabled. most of the people have gone back to their villages.

my time in lugazi is wrapping up very quickly and i am not sure i will ever be ready to leave. the longer i'm here, the more i think i could live here forever. ugandans are happy, humble, loving, giving, and just plain awesome. i am really going to miss it. as i've been thinking about my time here, i have realized that while i signed up for this trip to help change people's lives and do service for the poor, the one changed the most was myself. my heart has been opened as i've been treated with love and friendship. i've learned more about humility, gratitude, selflessness, and dedication in these last 3 months than i have my entire life. i want to be more and more like the ugandans every day. i will never forget the lessons i've learned here. i wrote this quote in my journal the other day and i think it is a good thing for me to remember about my time here. sorry, i didn't mean to go off on a tangent about my love of africa, it just happens :)

"They may forget what you said, but they will never forget how you made them feel."

Tomorrow is the Youth AIDS Megafestival!!!!! i am so excited. all week long we've been going to schools and doing assemblies to award the winners of the writing contest. its been so fun! we surprise the kids in front of their entire school and it made all the work doing it worth it to see their smiling faces as we gave them their prize. ahh! so much fun. the four grand prize winners are going to read their entries at the festival tomorrow. it starts at 10 am and goes all day long. there will be school dance performances, free hiv testing, some hiv/aids awareness lessons, music and lots of fun! oh and i can't forget about the mzungus dancing!!! hahaha we've been learning this traditional african dance that requires a whooole lot of hip shaking and feet moving! its going to be quite the sight!

okay gotta go! have a lovely day everyone!
p.s. i really want some raw vegetables right now.....

Writing Contest Entries and Giraffes :)

I wanted to write a poem that was written by Apio Lynette Ogwang Aine. She attends St. Mary's College, Namagunga and is 16 years old. This is her poem entered in as the AIDS topic. She is one of the two winners from her school.

---------------------------

TONIGHT.

A woman cries tonight,
Her only son, dead,
Her only daughter cries,
She cannot sleep tonight.

A woman weeps tonight,
Odious acts committed by a depraved mind,
Upon her daughter,
Her only daughter defaced,
She cannot sleep tonight.

A woman wails tonight,
AIDS has sunk its teeth into her family,
Ebbed it away-one member after another,
And now they all lie in the shackles of the eternal sleep.
She cannot sleep tonight.

A woman moans tonight,
Cursing the life she did not ask for,
The only momento left of her loved ones
Is a few dreary graves.
She cannot sleep tonight.

A woman sobs tonight,
Repentant to her creator,
Psychologically disoriented by her guilt,
And looked upon with scorn
By those around her.
She cannot sleep tonight.

The woman is silent tonight,
She sheds no tear,
She weeps not,
Wails not.
In an inaudible whisper,
She fades away.
She sleeps tonight.

-----------------------------
That is just one example of the entries we've received for the writing contest. These kids aren't afraid to tell it how it is. I'd love to write some of the stories but they are longer so i'll have to do that when i get home.
Here is another poem written by Opio Denis. He attends Parents International College, which is a secondary school. He is in grade Secondary Six.

-------------------

THE RITUALISTIC CORRUPTION IN UGANDA

Corruption! Corruption! Corruption!
Why do you exist in our society
making the youths to suffer.
When I turn around and
look at each and every angle,
I just see life full of corruption
leaving the economy of Uganda
in a desperate moment.

The poor are taken advantage
by the rich class.
The dull are taken advantage
by the clever people.
The nonmaterialistic are taken
advantage by the materialistic people
making the Ugandans to
live a misery life.

Corruption,
You are found everywhere
at schools, homes, hospitals,
churches, places of work and
everywhere I don't know.

Neither lawyers nor members of parliament,
neither teachers nor doctors,
neither sheikhs nor pastors,
are corrupted people.
Making Uganda to be like
a desert-drought stricken
yet not a natural phenomenon.

If corruption can be
managed and combated,
then Uganda will
rise and shine from
Genesis to Revelation.

Yes, fellow Ugandans,
corruption is a combated issue
Therefore, my comrades
outside there,
let's get united, join our hands
together and combat
this social evil, corruption.

------------------------------

That boy is probably around 15 years old. Many of the stories we have received tell of personal experiences with disease, corruption, lies, teenage pregnancy, rape, etc. It's been almost shocking sometimes to sit in the office reading about these things. But of course, there are positive ones as well. Many students wrote about the things they love about Uganda. The range of entries we got was quite large. I'm so excited to meet the winners from each school! We're planning on writing up a bio of each winner and take their picture to put in our book of stories that we'll try and publish when we get home.

Well, my weekend was really awesome! We went on a SAFARI! After 6 hours of traveling to get to Murchison Falls, we made it! The waterfalls were incredible!! So much power and erupting water. Crazy cool. Early the next morning we got in a legit safari jeep with no roof and drove right through the grasslands! It was really cool to get to see a different landscape of Uganda. I've said that Lugazi and everywhere else I've been in Uganda is a lush, green tropical jungle. Well, the best way I can describe where we went on a safari was how it looks in LION KING with the cool trees and savanna land. So cool! I saw tons of giraffes, elephants, warthogs(aka pumbas), african cobs, antelope, baboons, fish eagles, water buffalo, crocodiles, hippos oh my! pretty much the ONLY african animal we didn't see were lions. But one of the other jeeps in our group did! their pictures and videos are so cool! jealous, but really glad they got to see them.

Tomorrow we are heading up north to GULU! Its the war torn region of Uganda where the LRA were a couple years ago. There are tons of IDP camps for children that were abducted. Ever seen the documentary Invisible Children? Go to youtube and watch it if you haven't. That is where it took place, up in Gulu. The youth need a lot of counseling and we're going to do a lot of service up there until Monday. It'll be a 10 hour bumpy taxi ride but it will be worth it in the end! I just decided today that I'm going. Thats whats nice about Uganda. You can just up and go take sporadic trips to anywhere in the country without prior planning.

Talk to you all later! Bye!

"AIDS AIDS AIDS"

Good afternoon everyone! its been an excellent week here in uganda.
on monday i spent the day picking up all the entries for the writing contest!! i've been looking forward to this day since we started the idea back in the first week of may. we went to 13 schools and had our backpacks full of essays and poems galore. i was so excited. i just wanted to run home and read them all that night. but we gave them to wilson and he kept them in the office for us to start on tuesday.

we spent several hours on tuesday, thursday and today reading the entries and separating out winners from each school. we had to sift through many reports about aids information or how many trees are uganda... stuff like that. there were actually a TON OF ENTRIES that had the line "AIDS AIDS AIDS" in it so it became a little repetitive ;) but overall we have some AMAZING pieces that i can not wait to award. the topics were aids, or uganda. we got poems and personal stories about aids that were so moving it almost put all of us in tears as we read them together in the office. these kids are not afraid to express their emotions. the experiences and insight they have are just incredible, terrifying, and uplifting all at the same time. i can't wait to post some of the winning pieces on my blog. it will have to be in a few weeks... if i even get the chance while i'm here. i'll do my best! sorry i haven't posted pictures either... just wait! it will be worth it! :)

wednesday we woke up early and took boda bodas out to PAUL AND ROSE'S orphanage. twelve of us made the hour journey there on the dusty roads. i wish you could've seen our dirty faces when we got there!! we all had a nice "spray on tan" that consisted of orange dust caked to our face. always looking good here in africa! anyways, the kids were just incredible and it was one of my most favorite days spent here in africa. one of the first girls i met was 15 year old MAURINE. we were talking and i asked what she wants to be when she grows up. she wants to be an english teacher! just like me. so we instantly became friends and i spent a lot of the day talking to her. Paul and Rose picked her up four years ago when they were just starting the orphanage. she was 11 years old at the time and had been living on the streets for 2 years. her parents had died when she was just a baby and had been living with her grandma. but when her grandma died, maurine was 9 and had no where to go. i just imagined my little brother connor, who is 11, being on the streets alone. i can't imagine what these kids have gone through. it just amazes me that they regardless of their hardships, they are so full of love. holding our hands and hugging us and smiling all day. they are so happy. maurine asked if there were street children in america. it was hard to explain that while there are children who don't have parents, we don't have the same problem of thousands of children living on the streets. i'm really grateful i was able to meet all the kids. maurine is just one story, they all have experiences like that. paul and rose are so awesome for giving those kids a place to call their own. not to mention feeding them with the food they grow on the 10 acres of land the orphanage sits on.

well, thats all for now i suppose! i'm going to a meeting for the eye camp at kawolo hospital in half an hour so i need to head out! we're learning how to screen eyes! cool huh dad? i imagine it will be similar to what i did for your patients when i worked at your office. i'll let you know! oh and i'm happy to report that we have enough money for our eye camp now!! An organization called Sight Savers has agreed to sponsor the rest of the funds for the entire camp. yes! thanks to all who donated! have a great week! we leave for our SAFARI tonight! welaba!

p.s. last saturday a few of us went to the zoo with wilson and godfrey! and i RODE A CAMEL!! haha it was making this weird groaning noise the entire time so that was pretty hilarious! oh africa :)

African Twisty Twists!

Good morning friends and family! its a beautiful rainy day here in lugazi. i love the rain! yesterday a bunch of us were walking home from a project and realized we were locked out of our front gate. so we took off to find the person with the keys when it started to downpour! it just comes out of nowhere, that african rain. so we ran for shelter under our good friend Alex's chipatti stand. its a tiny open hut with a stick roof and a tarp over it. so while we were somewhat covered, we definitely all got wet under there! It was fun though because we got to talk to him and watch him cook random things. Anyway we ended up having to run all the way home through the rain because it wasn't stopping. By the time we got home we were wetter than if we'd jumped in a pool!

Later in the day a few of us took off to Hope Orphanage and did some activities with the orphans there. I love those kids so much. Its really fun now because we actually know the kids and have become good friends with them. We brought bubbles that the boys just loved, and fingernail polish to paint the girls nails. They had so much fun! We even showed them how to do it and they painted each others. I brought picture books and we read them to the younger kids as well. We helped them read after a while and I was very impressed with their English for their young age.

There is one girl named Resty that is my best little buddy there. we hang out pretty much the whole time and talk about her life and what she likes and doesn't like. She is the happiest girl and is always smiliing. These kids make you feel like you can change the world and do anything you want. In america we have sooo many opportunities that these children just don't have. and it breaks my heart to listen to them talk about their plans for the future and know that they only see it as a dream. When i graduate from college and eventually become a teacher, that is one thing i will always be telling my students. You can be anything you want to be. Follow your dreams! There are so many opportunities in the world just waiting for you. Never let anyone tell you that you can't do something. You can. There will always be someone that will support you and help you achieve your dreams. Well that's all of my little -follow your dreams- tangent for now..

SOOO I have officially gotten an AFRICAN MAKEOVER. On wednesday afternoon I up and decided I wanted to get my hair plaited! Cecilly, a girl on my team, did it a couple weeks ago and it looked pretty sweet. So Molly went with me to walk around town finding an open salon to do it. Everyone was busy and we weren't having any luck... when we ran into Wilson and Godfrey!! YES! haha so i had them take me somewhere to get it done. So the lady, Sophie, doesn't really speak English I'm told. So wilson negotiates a price and takes off! I literally sat down and they just went to town. I didn't even know what they were goign to do. I ended up getting AFrican Twisty Twists!!! hahahaha. Oh my gosh. What they do, is take all this fake hair and twist it into tiny strands of my own hair. It took 5 hours!! oh my gosh. i have too much hair for these kinds of things. oh and i almost forgot, it is almost to my waist! soooo long! they did this cool curly thing to the ends of it... i'll have to put pictures on my blog of all of this when i get home. its hard to describe! just know that i look like an african now :) love it!

sorry i have been neglecting our projects lately. its been crazy with second wavers here this week. but good of course! we're transitioning to new schools for teacher training, and suz ally and i got the writing contest proposal passed yesterday!! we didn't even have to use any team funds because suzanne's amazing in-laws-to-be donated 200 dollars to the contest! they are so awesome. did i mention suzanne is engaged?? yep! she got engaged the DAY before she flew here! haha crazy girl. i love her though, we pretty much spend all day every day together doing education projects!
we are going to collect all the writing contest entries on monday and i can not wait any longer!! :)

***********We're also working really hard as a team to fundraise through home to get more money for the eye camp. we just need 1,000 more dollars and we'll be able to HELP TWICE AS MANY PEOPLE! so if anyone is reading this and would be willing to donate just a little more money to the camp, we would be so grateful.
To make sure the money gets to our team, you have to send it to HELP INTERNATIONAL and make it specifically towards the LUGAZI EYE CAMP. thank you so much to anyone who donates! our tipping bucket fundraiser worked so well and we just wish we could have anticipated the extra funds before so we could have gotten it earlier.

well i have to go, but i hope everyone at home is doing great! i love you all! so mom, should i leave my african hair in until we meet you in paris?? ;)
HAPPY FATHERS DAY ON SUNDAY DAD!!! I LOVE YOU!

Fluffy bunny. Or in other words... THE BAD PLACE

GOOD MORNING1 i can't for the life of me figure out how to use exclamation points on this keyboard... so thats why you will see a lot of ones in this post haha. okay okay okay i am so excited to write about my weekend11 i wasn't planning on going river rafting this weekend, but my whole team was going practically so i decided the night before that i would go for it1 ahhhh. i know i thought that repelling down the waterfall was adventurous and life threatening... but thats got nothing on white water rafting down the NILE. oh myyy.

we got picked up in a costa, which is like a huge bus, and drove to jinja to begin the day. oh! i just figured out how to use the exclamation sign! haha okay sorry i'll keep going. our river guides were just hilarious, which made the experience all the more enjoyable. one was from new zealand, Sonny. what a character. we had three raft fulls of us going down the river. my guide was Steph, he's from canada and is here with his wife adopting a little boy. very funny guy. he kept making fun of me because i was so scared and asked a lot of questions. most of them pertained to whether i was going to die on the next rapid, and if he would save me if i was drowning haha. well i don't know how to describe rafting down the nile, other than to say i'm glad to still be alive. the different classes of rapids are rated, and the highest you can raft on and still have a chance of living is class 5. want to guess what class the rapids were that we went on all day?? yep. CLASS 5. we went on about 8 rapids during the seven hours we were going down the nile. the first 7 were terrifying/exhiliarating/awful/fun/crazy and insane!! but we made it through without our rafting flipping. including the one waterfall we went down, but before we went down we got stuck on a rock at the very edge. i may or may not have shed a tear of terror as we sat up there with our river guide screaming orders at us so we wouldn't tip off the edge and get sucked under the falls... its even more embarrassing because we bought a cd of pictures from the day! haha oh boy. neevvvveerrr again. never. but this doesn't even compare to the last rapid. we were doing just fine on the long stretch of flat water as we approached the last one. then steph started to tell us about it. he said he's never been through it without everyone flipping out of the raft and essentially being destroyed by the waves. so we asked how many times he's been down it. don't worry, he'd only done it TWICE!! AHH. then he proceeded to tell us that it is called THE BAD PLACE. he said we can choose to go down that way or take the easy way out. i asked how many people go down the bad place. he said probably less than half. WELL NO WONDER. who wouldn't want to go down a rapid called THE BAD PLACE??! of course we picked to go down it because we are all hardcore like that. well, everyone besides me and katelynn i suppose ;) steph, being the considerate river guide he is, told me i could call it the fluffy bunny to make me less scared. he said all you'll see going into it is white rapid spray so its fitting. thanks. well down we went and all i saw was a ENORMOUS wall of water in front of our raft. we instantly were launched out and people went in all directions. i was tossed under the water for a good 9 or 10 seconds and finally got up for a breath only to be thrown under again by a wave. this time, while i was under, my helmet was ripped off my head somehow! it nearly choked me haha oh it was so confusing down there. awful. just awful. and would you believe that my experience was one of the better ones? mike was caught under a boil for 40 seconds (i'm not exaggerating fyi) and our river guide thought he was going to drown. he finally curled into a ball and shot out though. oh my. people do this for fun?? i think i'm done risking my life for a little while ;)
so yep! that was my weekend! we are all little fried lobsters from being in the sun all day on the nile. oh! and i'm proud to say i have swallowed HALF THE NILE. yay for parasites :)

on sunday i went with katelynn to mass at the local catholic church. we needed to announce information about our disability choir we're starting, so the.. head church leader invited us to attend the meeting. i've been to mass in salt lake and some of it was different than i remembered. i loved the music! they had a full on choir with drums, clapping, and awesome singing. so cool. we're running into a lot of barriers with the choir but i'm confident it will work out. we really want to make it a sustainable project after we leave this summer. so we're working on finding someone that can help keep it going.

yesterday me and suzanne and chelsea did another assembly to promote the writing contest. last school! now we're just preparing to judge next week. i'm so excited! its going to be so good! oh did i mention that second wavers arrived on sunday????? whoo! our house now has 24 people in it hahaha. oh gosh. it is so crazy. i really love it. katie is here too! sadly both her bags were lost but we just found out that they arrived in entebbe yesterday so she'll get them soon. lucky duck!

hmm we also did another teacher training at seya school yesterday. i love all of our teachers that we work with. they are so awesome. we have so much fun. then we went to hope orphanage and played with the kids there until dinner time. those kids are incredible. they have so much ambition, when nothing about their life has given them hope that things will get better. i love encouraging them. and i want to take them all home. ahhh.

well thats all for now! i'm going to an eye camp meeting later, working on square foot gardens, teacher training, choir meetings, etc. i love being here. tomorrow i only have 5 more weeks in africa. i might cry. i don't want to go home! i love you all! goodbye!