"Our Love and Labour We Give"

Chanel keeps pointing out that despite health care and all, they must have some great genetics when it comes to teeth.  Almost everyone has perfectly white, straight teeth.  We should start trying to mix more and hopefully we'll get those genes and stop with all these braces and headgear and child teeth torture devices.

Anyway, other than the usual, today we learned how to do laundry (well sort of).  They have a washer here (at least we think they do), but they use it only for sheets and towels as far we know.  We can pay to have them do our laundry, but we figured we may as well try to do it on our own.  Becca showed me where the water is and how to scoop it out with a small bowl into bigger bins.  Aside from that, we were on our own.  We had bought soap already, so we scooped water into the big bin and washed in there and then used the smaller bowl to rinse in, refilling pretty often to have clean water.  I'd like to watch sometime to see how they do it if it's a bit more efficient.  (Maybe that'll be a photo essay).  At least I don't have to worry about hand wash and hang dry because that's all we've got.  I'm just hoping nothing flies away since there was already a lot of laundry hanging so all the clothespins were taken.

I actually had a really nice conversation with Becca when he showed me what to use for laundry.  Apparently, to get through Senior school (I'm not sure if that's high school?) he paid by doing photography.  He would go around to houses and knock and doors and ask if people needed portraits.  If they did, he charged 1,500 shillings (a bit more than 50 cents) per photograph.  It was cool learning he'd done photography.

He was also saying how he loves what we're doing, and how we're teaching the women to fish so that they can sell the fish and then get more :).  It was a nice way to think of it.

He also told me about the national anthem.  So there's the Ugandan national anthem, which the kids say at the end of every day of school, but that can be said in Swahili or in English.  In addition, there is the newer East Africa national anthem, which is so new not everyone knows it by heart yet.  Apparently when politicians are at events they generally say both.  I'm hoping to learn the Uganda one at least.

1.Oh Uganda! may God uphold thee,We lay our future in thy hand.United, free,For libertyTogether we'll always stand.2.Oh Uganda! the land of freedom.Our love and labour we give,And with neighbours allAt our country's callIn peace and friendship we'll live.3.Oh Uganda! the land that feeds usBy sun and fertile soil grown.For our own dear land,We'll always stand:The Pearl of Africa's Crown.