I survived the first week!

So far we have been in Africa for almost a week and I have learned and seen so much I could write a mini novel. We left my parent’s house last Wednesday at around 3pm then spent the next 48 hours either in a car, taxi, airplane or airport. It was a whirlwind of airplane food, new sites and some intense new smells. Traveling for that long is stressful for me, so I am not surprised I broke down in tears the first night, but stress was not the only emotion that was ripping through me then. I am beginning to feel a little settled in but occasionally it is hard to wrap my head around the fact that I will be living here for over 3 months, mostly because I have no idea what is going to happen during those three months.
Every new day I learn more and meet more people and have crazy new adventures. We spent the majority of last Friday in a private taxi, which drove us from Entebbe to Bududa, a trip that normally takes 6 hours but it took us 10 hours because we made so many stops. There were six of us in the van: myself, Mike, Barbara (the director), Sabia (the Peace Corp volunteer), Danielle (the intern) and Rasheed (the driver), along with 180 mosquito nets, all our luggage, and groceries. Needless to say that is how you travel in Uganda, pack in a lot in little spaces. The other way we get around, besides on foot, is on a pikipiki or boda-boda, which is a motor bike, which is a little scary because the roads are so bad and they drive fast. It amazes me that all the local women ride on them sitting side saddle without falling off, one day I will try that but I am a little scared to. Mike and I went for a quick run through the village today and I think it was the best entertainment the locals had seen all week. Everyone looked at us, some people said “mulembe” (hi) and a couple kids found it exciting to follow us for a bit. It felt like a trail run because the road is dirt with tons of little rocks jetting out of it, but you also need to be careful about getting out of the way when the pikipiki come by.
One of the best parts of living in this area is the local cuisine. The land is so fertile everything grows well here. We eat pineapple, avocado, mango, papaya and passion fruit almost on a daily basis and it is all fresh, local and probably organic.
That will be all for now. I will soon write again and I will include more of our adventures and more about the culture here. I am doing my best to take it all in, but it is hard to find the time and the words to write it all down, (good thing Mike is also contributing, he is a bit more eloquent with words and he has different adventures than me).