We are the zoo exhibit in town. Our home is a small, essentially unfurnished guest house less than two blocks away from the Taata Kids school. It is surrounded by a cement and iron gate, with iron gates covering all windows, a total of four heavy metal front doors with multiple latches and more iron, and all seemingly vacant except for Katy and myself. Katy did find a pantry in the kitchen housing plates and a mattress, so maybe someone else lives here too. Our room contains two beds which we pushed together, striving for any possible floor space. Each has a bug net, Katy's is white, soft, and dainty - the Sleeping Beauty bed. Mine is bright blue and rough, but stretches out thus eliminating any droops or feelings of claustrophobia. It's almost like we have one big fort! Our closet has a couple shelves on one side and hanging space on the other. Maybe one day we'll get hangers to utilize it. Then there's the bathroom...It's less than 3 ft by 5 ft, with a sink possibly smaller than your "house kitchen" setup back in preschool, and a squatty potty that's still difficult to situate. I've never paid more acute attention to my emptying out. The space is narrow and shallow, and I have yet to master the Asian squat needed for such a performance. The shower is right above the "toilet", and the water's temperature is very slowly but surely losing its intimidating, buckling chill. Now we know what other travelers were talking about when they were in ecstatic disbelief over our bathroom situation at the Backpackers. Outside of our bedroom, the house has an entrance room with several small tables and chairs, a large desk, and a fridge (which is rarely plugged in, if ever). I wonder if the owners have plans to finish furnishing this space, or if this is plenty for them. The house IS overall in much better shape than any other building I've seen in town. Being behind all these bars, having every meal brought to us by mystery market women and Abraham, and confined to our locked room by dark every night sparked an excellent connection by Katy: We are like Jasmine in the movie Aladdin! Always excited at the thought of living out classic Disney films, this similarity was an amusing alternative viewpoint.
Children are constantly playing just outside of our house gate. The trash-filled ditch where I saw a dog relieve himself yesterday seems to be their favorite spot for reasons I have yet to figure out, second only to being on the gate itself. Whenever they see us, there's one shout of "muzungu" before a dozen small children are halfway up the whole front gate, nearly able to squeeze their heads through. It's hard watching them literally rummaging through garbage piles as their playtime, dressed in tattered clothes, and the screams and crying that we hear at night and see attracting zero attention by the heavy foot traffic always passing by. It's hard driving by babies being taken care of by children just a few years older, and it's hard only being able to give them a smile and wave as they stare. But, as the poster in Abraham's office states as elements of a successful worker, I must take it all one step at a time. That is one difficult element.
Katy and I, stir crazy from only being either within the Taata office or our room, went for a short walk around the house yesterday. As is always the case to Ugandans old and young, we were bombarded when our cameras were seen. These people LOVE getting their pictures taken. Even more, they find it infinitely entertaining to review those pictures, pointing and laughing at how they look on the small screen. So, our walk wasn't able to begin until we sufficiently snapped shots of all the adolescents on the block. It's a win-win, since these buggers are adorable and we don't mind the cuteness overload on our cameras. The rest of our walk consisted of weary strolls past large herds of cattle, goats, chickens and roosters, and a tour of the market behind our house where Abraham's cosmetics shop is. The grand finale to our evening escapade was ice cream and bananas. Sadly, our cameo in the mini market for the ice cream was extremely unwelcome by a baby girl who cried in terror at her first view of muzungus.
We are on a quest to immerse ourselves in these new cultures, and today that meant going to the Sunday church service with Abraham. It turns out that we have both always wanted to attend church in an all black congregation, and how awesome that this got to happen in AFRICA! We practiced our movie-based "Oo Lordy!" and "Mmm-mm! Aamen, sista!" while waving our fans the night before, so we were ready to fulfill this bucket list item. We ended up sitting through two services, the first by a quirky UK pastor who was always just barely off the mark on his comedic timing but gave it a great try, and the second by a very passionate Ugandan woman. The singing and dancing in between was just what Katy and I hoped for. It was awesome. Not as awesome was the impromptu speeches we had to make on stage in front of the huge crowd...twice. But once again, we were showered with greetings of welcome and gratitude. Following the cumulated three hour service, we were invited to the lead pastor's office. He is a close friend and mentor to Abraham, and Abraham wanted his blessings and prayers over our recently decided project. Pastor Andrew was encouraging and helpful, and his prayer over us and our project as we all held hands felt like an empowering moment. This community is so excited about Taata Kids and steadfast in their confidence in it reaching all set goals. There's a chance I agreed to a single's retreat/seminar with this church next Saturday as one more means of cultural immersion...great story sure to follow.
Oh yeah! We also got to hang with about 15 hilarious rugrats in a muddy alley for a couple hours taking goofy pictures and dancing to TLC and 50 Cent, and we saw a goat stuck on a roof in town. He was flirting with the ledge as he maa'd for help and as I made the bad joke, "we got a jumper!" This city is so random and Katy and I love it.
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