A Weekend in Jinja

Good morning!

We had such an exciting and exhausting day yesterday that blogging wasn't even on my mind. Yesterday was our tourist day, so it was pretty packed with cultural things.

We began the day with a tour at a place that weaves rugs. They showed us the rug making process from the very beginning, but I didn't catch all steps because the man had a pretty thick accent and talked softly. Watching the employees work, though, was fascinating.

After buying a few things from the weavers, we headed to THE NILE RIVER. The Nile has two branches, the Blue Nile and the White Nile, and I think we were on the White Nile. They actually call this section the Victoria Nile, because it originates from Lake Victoria. So we took a few photos of us at the bank of the river and then took a boat ride out into the river and took photos of us by a sign labeled "The Source of the Nile." I'll add photos when I've sorted through them.

Janine and Bruce then took us to a local restaurant called Mama Sophia's and we had some authentic Ugandan foods: metoke, rice, beans, posho, cassava, yams, and dodo (we think it's cooked chard). The dodo, yams, and rice all had great flavors, but the posho, metoke, and cassava are pretty bland. All are very starchy, though, so I couldn't finish everything. Even so, the experience was fantastic. The place was a little whole in the wall and the women cooking cooked all the food in huge vats right by the entrance of the restaurant. And of course, they cook with charcoal, so it's all open flame. And when I post pictures, you can see just how much American common sense would tell you not to eat there, but the line was out the door when we left.

We also got to tour the three story Jinja market. Naturally, they took us in Gate 6, where they display the meat. It smelled pretty awful.mthe most interesting part was that they sell every part of the animal- brains, intestines, liver, hooves, etc. On a more palatable note, the colors of the fruit stands were so vibrant. Hopefully the pictures later will do justice.

The rest of the afternoon was spent playing with Hannah, Erin, and Dion, the three girls living next door. We played salon, school, exercise, cartwheels, drawing, and more salon. It was wonderful. For the most part, they entertained themselves.

We were all so tired after that, we just ate dinner and then watched Gifted Hands, the story of Ben Carson. All in all, a great day.

Time to get ready for church now. Tomorrow and Tuesday are our last days with the school and then we fly out Wednesday night. But we're not going to dwell on how fast our time has gone here and how soon we'll be back in the States.

Till next time,

Sarah