Friday we stopped in at the Daily Monitor but he asked us to come back later. Instead we finally bought a mirror! It's so weird the little things you don't think about (though it's not hung and I never pick it up so I basically only ever see my legs in it).
Anyway, the afternoon was really nice with the ladies, though they're starting to experiment, which is ending up with products we don't think we could really sell. We'll have to come up with a nice way to say maybe it's better not to experiment as much. Rebecca also painted some of the ladies' and their daughters' nails which was really cute and they were very excited about. It's really fun getting to know the ladies and joking around with them. I tried to learn how to make the beads but learned I don't really have the patience. Jack and Jessica are much better at those. Elizabeth, Esther, and Martha are very funny, and Aidah is pretty spunky. Veronica is a bit quieter but I'm working on getting through. It's hard because she seems to speak the least English.
On our walk home the girls from school gave me three more notes! I'm trying really hard to remember them better since I wrote a response to the first girl but couldn't remember what she looked like so it was slightly awkward and I ended up giving the note to one of her friends to pass on. Now I'm working harder but there are so many of them it's hard. Hopefully I'll give the responses to the right girls.
We ended up buying a pineapple on our way back which was great. The guy picked out a good one and cut it up for us. It was the perfect way to end the day. Next time I think I'll try a mango. Also, Jessica carried home the ornaments which created quite the stir, with everyone asking for "just one ball"... I think from now on we'll need to hide them on the way back.
When we went back to the Daily Monitor, Mafabi wasn't there, so we'll need to go back tomorrow (Monday).
As evening came in Jessica and I went up to the roof. As it was Friday evening I wanted it to feel like Shabbat, so I took my siddur (prayer book) up and quietly sang Kabbalat Shabbat and Maariv (the Friday night prayers). It was cool seeing the sun setting in one direction. It was also amazing, coming over the mountains were these dark clouds and we could watch the rain moving across towards us. There was a bit of thunder, too, though we couldn't see any lightning. I ended up in a race with the rain, hoping to finish before it hit us. One time, when it's not Friday night, I'd love to set up my camera and take continuous photos of the storm coming in.
Dinner Friday night was Tilapia. Apparently the common fish around here are tilapia, Nile perch (which I looked up and is apparently also Kosher), and I think the third was mudfish, though Saleh said it's not available in the market right now. This time they gave us more matooke than rice, which was not ideal since we all prefer the rice so it didn't really go over well for dinner... Marjani ended up going out and buying us chapates and we hid in our room to eat them. We just relaxed for the night.
Jessica left Saturday morning to go to a class with her adviser in Jinja. Chanel and I basically just spent the day in our room, trying to re-energize for the week. We had a bit of a scare, thinking they might not feed us on weekends, but then we found out they were just late, so it wasn't a problem. Breakfast was actually amazing, with sweet potato chips, fried dough things (mandazi) and omelets. I basically just spent the day reading and napping, mostly in our room, but then in the evening went up to the roof to get a bit of air.
It was a nice night, we had more cow peas for dinner and then played bananagrams and just sat around. We keep talking about baked goods (I know, we're only a week in and shouldn't be craving anything yet but that's just how it is), so now we're trying to figure out no bake cookie recipes.
Today I need to work on my photo essays for the week, since they're due tomorrow. Otherwise, it may be another pretty lazy day, though we also want to work on a few products and see how they'll work. Three more girls are joining us tomorrow, so Marjani, Jack, and Rebecca are trying to figure out the living situation. It's going to be a bit weird since we've pretty much got a routine so it'll be an adjustment, but I'm excited to meet them.
I also got in touch with a guy from the Jewish community. He told me that he comes into Mbale to get stuff for Shabbat, so in two weeks when he comes in he'll pick me up and I'll stay with him and his wife. That'll be really nice. This coming weekend they're actually going to the synagogue in Kampala, which I didn't even know existed. Kampala is the capital of Uganda and the largest city. It's up by Entebbe, so a pretty long drive. He sent me the website and it turns out the synagogue was just built this year, and it's an Orthodox community. Hopefully I'll be able to make it up there at some point as well. It's exciting to start making plans. I realized there are only 7 weekends left, so I better start planning them out to make sure I can get in everything I'd like to do.
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