The monkey and the boys

So this past week I saw another monkey by my house. I was walking back from the school down toward my house and here is this monkey in broad daylight eating the white ants. For those who don't know about white ants, they are a particular breed of ant that flies out of the hill. White ants are considered a delicacy here in Uganda. Anyway, so I am getting closer to this monkey and he is paying no attention to me at all, he is just trying to catch these ants. While I am debating whether or not to dash to my house and get my camera, a few of the primary school boys finally notices this monkey. When they realize this monkey is eating white ants, the boys come running and screaming at the monkey to scare it away. Once the monkey has fled back into the jungle, the boys set about catching and eating these white ants. this sort of scene is something that is quintessential Uganda.

Girls Empowerment

Last week I had the pleasure of going up north to a fellow pcv's site and participating in a day of Girls Empowerment. WE had eighty girls attend and participate in the workshop style activities. The day consisted of four different sessions all led by different female pcvs. The sessions included HIV/AIDS, goal setting, paper bead making, and how to make a re-usable menstrual pad. I taught the re-usable menstrual pads to the girls and each girl made their own. This is second time I have worked at this type of workshop and I really enjoy it. I hope to be performing the re-usable menstrual pad workshop at my site very soon. It is truly amazing to see how much more confident these girls become when they are armed with information they believe. I feel that my biggest contribution during my service here in Uganda will be the work I perform with young girls and women. Encouraging them to seek higher goals other than the culturally expected norms. As well as empowering them to choose their own future and giving them the hope that they can actually achieve their dreams;)

Riots and Safari Ants

So a few weeks ago, Uganda finally made it into the news although not for anything positive. The day the riots started I happened to be in the capital, Kampala, to do my weekly grocery shopping. I had been downtown all day and nothing seemed amiss. Around one I went to grab a bite to eat at the Ethiopian place by the taxi parks. I happened to be the only one in the place and as I was eating my lunch, the lovely Ethiopian woman comes into the room and locks the door. She turns and says to me, " something is going on outside. we are both foreigners, we must be careful." I found this somewhat odd but just thought she was paranoid. I finished my lunch and headed out to meet my friend Amanda. The Ethiopian lady told me to go safely and may god be with me. When I got back onto the street nothing seemed out of the ordinary but as I headed to the taxi park I started to notice people standing around which was unusual for this area and time of day. Next thing I know Amanda is calling me and yelling at me to get out and head for the PC office. So I decided to cut through the old park to get a taxi to the office. As I am walking through the park, I see this mass flood of people pouring down the steps into the park. I am standing there thinking of what I should do when a policeman starts to wail on this guy in the park. Once that little fight passed me I headed for the stairs to get out. Once I exited the park, I saw a police vehicle with many men armed with tear gas guns headed to the park I had just left. I made it to the last taxi leaving for the office and ended up being sequestered with 20 some volunteers for the next five days.

Once I returned to site the following Monday, I started to get back into my groove. I taught extra lessons to make up for my absence in Monday and was looking forward to relaxing Thursday and Friday. However, the Ugandan ecosystem had other plans. I had just woken up to a light rain Friday morning. I began to fix my breakfast when I noticed some large ants crawling on my wall. Then I noticed there were thousands of them crawling through my window. I was under attack by safari ants (aka army ants). They had invaded our school and were coming in a mass movement through my house since it appears my house was in their way. My headmistress sent a student down to help me and we ended up drenching my house in paraffin(kerosene). Apparently these ants abhor the smell and since they are blind they move away from it as fast as they can. Once the attack lessened and the ants moved on to some other village, I began to clean all their dead corpses out of my house. It was a great way to end my week;)