Day 6: Jinja

A lot of interesting and good things happened in Jinja. But since we're a little behind and really tired, I'll try to make it really brief.

Hot water. You have to order it specially. We were told the night before that they would bring a jerry can full of boiling water at 6 am. Really, you have to ask for it at the front desk in the morning, and then wait 30 minutes for it to heat up. You smell fire outside, to discover later that they actually did use fire to heat up your water.

Batteries. When a car doesn't start, they don't necessarily have jumper cables lying around. They do, however, have actual batteries with connectors on them so that you can give yourself a jumpstart.

Poverty. Okay, we're in Uganda. We've both worked in international development. We know that serious poverty exists here. However, seeing two little kids and an elderly women staring at us in fear because we were about to drive over the flour that she was salvaging from the road was a really ugly sight. Emmanuel saw the situation for what it was and gave about a dollar for her to buy more. As we drove off, he explained that she is too old to work, but her children/grandchildren have dropped off their kids for her to care for. Just down the road, we paid about 50 cents to some boys who were filling holes in the road. Emmanuel wanted to pay them to support the work that they were doing.

Malarone. Can cause nausea. Really not pleasant when riding on rough roads and already experiencing stomach issues.

Mexican food. Doesn't so much exist here. Which is fine for us, because as much as we love it, we're only gone for 5 weeks. But for a missionary that has gone five months without, a Tex-Mex restaurant in Jinja is something pretty close to heaven. I settled for Sprite for the nausea and only a few bites of Andy's rice because of the stomachache. Sarah, on the other hand, drank her Dr. Pepper (also not to be found elsewhere in this country) and ate her chips and salsa with a joy that brings back fond memories of eating at the Mexican restaurant in Dublin after living in Germany for five months and not knowing how to cook it for myself.

Boy's schools. Women stick out at boy's schools. They stick out even more when they are also the only white people. But Emmanuel hadn't been back to his school since he left some 10 years ago, and he was positively giddy as he showed us around. The whole thing was lovely.

And there's my observations from our Jinja trip. Last thing: the source of the Nile turned out to be some beautiful scenery. Go if you have the chance.