All you need is Love

Hello dear friends!

I find my self once again in an overcrowded, swelteringly hot internet café. Most people are bent over the keyboard trying to figure out how to type and every now and then will look over my way to stare. More often then not as I walk around town I have the song “Take Me Or Leave Me” from Rent running through my head, looped to the part where Moreen sings, “I walk down the street, I hear people say baby (muzungu) so sweet, Everybody stares at me, boys girls, I can’t help it baby.” It is becoming more tolerable as I am growing to realize that it is nothing personal and that they are just curious. Heck, I’d probably stare at me too. Haha. I am impatiently flicking back and forth between web pages, trying to make the most of my time here. I don’t think how much I really love the internet until I came to the Big U. Often I find myself wondering what it must have been like to be in the Peace Corps in the 1960s; no cell phones, no internet, it must have been much so harder. I am so incredibly grateful for little miracles like facebook, blogs and the like. Can facebook be considered a miracle? Hmmm, well perhaps a miracle can be defined by the circumstances one finds oneself in. Certainly every day here I see many miracles much more worthy of noting then the joys of a PC and internet cord, but right now, today, that is what you get to hear about. :-)

Currently, I am at a two week long IST (in service training) with the girls from my training group. It is so good to be baclk with them, and to be able to talk fast! The Peace Corps has put us up in a swanky hotel located in a semi big town which has internet! Okay, so the hotel definatly wouldn't qualify as swanky by American standards but it does have a toilet and.....electricity!!! You all know how I love toilets these days.

After three months, I think I have finally settled in at sight. My village of Sanje is beginning to feel more like “home” now, although it will never feel as much like home as Empire Ct., East Bay or IWU does. Some of the village kids are even starting to learn my name, Ndagire, and will even call me by that instead of “muzungu.” Oh, by the way, I’m not sure if I told you all but my Luganda name is Ndagire (in-dah-gear-i). It was given to me by my host family who I stayed with in Luwerro during our training. Things are going well and I am staying healthy despite the fact that my diet is mainly posho and beans which been supplemented with junk food (and some disgusting health food) from care packages. My luganda language skills are still limited but I think I am learning a little bit every day. Sure, some days are still incredibly hard and stressful and lonely, but I know that I will get through them. These days are broken up by incredibly good and rewarding days of teaching, or by phone calls and letters from loved ones back home or my new friends here in Uganda . It just proves that in life you can get through anything if you have a little love. All you need is love!

Till next time!
Much love!

Ps. More new pictures can be found under the link “my photos,” enjoy!