Indulging on May Day weekend
on Volunteers Abroad (Uganda), 03/May/2009 17:08, 34 days ago
Over the May Day holiday weekend Danny and I were guests at the homes of dear friends - onefamily on Friday and the other on Saturday. (The goat in the previous post was one of the courses on Friday. And he was delicious!) The home is deep in the mountains in theBushenyi District- a 30km drive down a rocky and sometimes very steep road. The scenery is simply spectacular with lush greenery and tea plantations and mountains.Very few white people travel down this road as there are no colleges or NGO's and the roaddoes not lead to any tourist destinations. It would be safe to say that most, if not all, of the younger children had never seen a white person (mzungu) before. One child age 2 or 3 saw us driving down the road and she ran screaming and crying to her mother, tripping along the way. We were the object of much more attention than we normally get, which is quite a lot anyway.The home we visited is high up a hill overlooking beautiful scenery. Our friend/colleague has a tea plantation and grows other crops as well. Many members of the extended family were there so we enjoyed meeting many people. The parents who are in their 70's did not speak English so there was a bit of interpretation needed. They were pleased that we spoke some of their language - Runyankole.The food was plentiful, extraordinarily plentiful, and very delicious. It's customary in Uganda for the guests, senior male members of the family and the elderly to eat first while the females and children eat later.Our meal the next day was a much quieter affair and we ate with just the husband and wife. Food was again plentiful and very delicious. (ebyokurya nibirungi - the food was good).I'm beginning to feel very sad about leaving certain people here...actually, Ugandans in general, but certain people in particular.. We plan to return and see everyone on a holiday but that will likely be a long time in the future. Several people have asked us to extend our placement, but longer than 2 years is just too long to be away from our home.It's a shame that people who visit Uganda cannot partake of a meal with a local family. Someof my family will be visiting in a couple of months and we've racked our brains trying to figureout how to arrange this. Unfortunately, our itinerary doesn't allow time for it.Photos I took in Bushenyi will be uploaded to my photo album in a couple of days. The album will be called Bushenyi.