The inauguration of new things

It’s kind of funny that as the United States celebrated the historical event of the inauguration of the first African-American president, I was here. In Africa, celebrating it with African friends and family who I am nearly positive were far more excited about it all than my friends and family back home. Why is it that everyone here is so happy about Obama? Is it because of his policies? Is it just because he’s black? Why does it seem like the whole world is happy? Is it because the election of a minority shows that democracy truly exists in the US?

While we were in Kampala this weekend a few of us had our own opportunity to witness politics in action. Some of us got bored with the mall-like atmosphere of Garden City where we had gone to exchange money and find food (the pizza was great though!), so we decided to take a walk in the area. Just around the block was a huge demonstration. African Muslims flooded two blocks of the Kampala streets, walking, riding in Matatu (big vans that serve as taxis), and shouting. The roar of their voices seemed like it could have been heard for miles. They were holding banners made of sheets, but we couldn’t make out what they said, so we asked a few fellow onlookers who explained that they were protesting Uganda’s ties with Israel because of the conflict right now. Apparently Uganda has had close ties with Israel since independence.

The rest of our weekend was less surprising but no less interesting. On Saturday Silvia took Laura and I to a small salon to get our hair plaited. The women at the salon were really sweet, but they didn’t know very much English and spoke in Luganda the whole time. It took ALL day and hurt a lot, but it was totally worth it. It looks pretty sweet, and it will be so much nicer to take care of and deal with while I’m here. One of my Ugandan sisters, Rebecca is older and doesn’t live at home, but on Sunday after church she came over to the house and saw us with our new hair. She kept talking about how much she liked it, and Mama Robinah said, “Yes, what beautiful African daughters I have.” Haha. I liked that. Rebecca and Mama both agreed that we looked very “smart”, which here is a really nice compliment meaning you look good (well dressed, etc.)

Sunday after church we had our first experience of washing our clothes in buckets. We soaked them the night before, so it wasn’t nearly as hard as I was expecting it to be, but it definitely still took a while. My favorite part was later that day. USP staff warned us both verbally and in our handbooks that if you don’t iron our clothes we can have problems with bugs. Apparently these things called mango flies come and lay their eggs in your clothes while their damp, and then they later burrow under your skin because your skin is damper than the dry clothes. I guess ironing them kills the bugs. In order to look “smart” you can’t have wrinkles in your clothes, but that was a much smaller motivation to iron than preventing nasty flies from crawling under our skin. But the funny part was that while I was ironing Laura and I were talking to our sister Silvia who thought that the whole thing was hysterical. She had no idea what mango flies were, and had never had bugs under her skin from her clothes. “Your brothers never iron,” she said. Laura and I decided it was an attempt from the USP staff to make us iron our clothes and look smart. Haha. We all had a good laugh at it. We didn’t iron everything.

WARNING: the next paragraph may contain material not suitable for sensitive readers. (Just kidding. Kind of. If you’re really fond of roosters, don’t read this.)

Yesterday we went home early from campus because we were both done with classes by one and we wanted Mama and Silvia to teach us how to make some of the food. Much to our surprise, not only was our Mom, Silvia, and our brothers there to meet us, but also an old lady with a rooster. The lady didn’t speak any English, so we had to find out everything about her from our Mom, who called her “the stubborn old lady that she takes care of because she used to serve the church.” But really, the lady isn’t the main part of this story… it’s the rooster she brought. It was walking around the courtyard the whole time that we prepared dinner, and Laura and I kept commenting on how pretty the feathers were, taking an occasional picture. Our brother William came and said that it was time to slaughter the chicken. We thought that he meant one of the many other chickens that we have, but before we knew it he had scooped up the rooster with one hand and was sharpening a knife with the other. The rooster with beautiful feathers was sacrificed to our stomachs, and we have pictures in his memory. During dinner our mom kept saying, “how’s the rooster,” and “eat some more of the rooster.” Like we needed reminding.

But really, life here goes on just like life goes on anywhere else in the world—normally. True, the normal is relative to Ugandan normal, but as we slowly adapt it becomes normal for us too. Wearing skirts and dresses all the time, eating dinner at 10 instead of 6, drinking lots of tea, using Luganda greetings, walking everywhere, seeing tons of tropical birds, having the power go out, bathing with a bucket, worshiping and praying with our family every night, having kids follow you just to touch your skin… its all “normal,” and I am enjoying it all.

P.S. thanks for all your comments! I like hearing from you all!