Floods

Post #3:

 I've felt like things have being a little difficult lately. I burned my hand badly on steam, broke my shoe and my glasses. I also fried my computer charger and I'm finding it difficult to replace... The power has been very bad lately and it often feels like we are camping, especially when all my things are wet (see below).

However, I'm having too much fun to care! Also the fact that I have so much free time (compared to med school) makes the little challenges more fun than burdensome. Everyone here laughs so much it's hard to take anything too seriously. Since I don't have any real updates, here are some aspects of Kampala life:

Nightlife:

Kampala is (self-titled) the African city that never sleeps. But actually this isn’t saying much since the small village in Malawi where I lived never slept either. However, Kampala is famous for having a great, safe nightlife relative to other African cities. I went out to a few places, all of which had fantastic music and dancing with $1 beer and $3 tequila.

There was party on Saturday and we met lots of expats and locals. There are a million NGOs here, and everyone apart from us few medstudents works for them. I also met a guy who graduated Minnetonka High School in 2003 and knows the Shelps...small world! Then we went out dancing and all made it home safely. Knowing locals helps.

Weather:

            Temps range 70-85. All year. Basically you sweat climbing the hills to work, but its not uncomfortable. We are in the smaller wet season, but the (torrential) downpours typically don’t last long and most of the day is sunny. However, yesterday there was a huge storm that lasted hours with hail that broke a window in my bedroom, so my entire bed is wet and my room is completely flooded with 2inches of water…I did have the chance to test out my iphone water-proof case. It works.

The evil storm coming in

another storm coming in over Mulago hospital

Culture:

Well that’s a big word and I’ve only been here a week, but like all East-Africans, Ugandans are very friendly. People go out of their way to help you and greetings take 1 minute at least. The language in Kampala is Luganda. I know a few words but really English gets you everywhere.

As far as religion, most people are very devout Christian, but there is also a large Muslim and Hindu population, as well as Bahai’i. In fact if I were blind I’d think it was all Islam since you can here the calls to prayer from most places in Kampala. I’m going to a Bahai’i service this weekend, apparently the choir is amazing.

Laundry