The first day!!!!!

hmmmmmmm where to start?

Today was great!! I was really nervous about starting teaching but I got into it really fast. There was no other teacher there to assist me so I just had to jump into it. I tried to tell them about me and to ask them some questions but all they ever said was yes. Cute. Oh and when I entered the room they greeted me with "good morning teacher Muzungu" Which literally translated means good morning teacher white person. So funny! They are now calling me just teacher or teacher Jennifer. Apparently I was told my last name would be to difficult for them. How much harder can Mack be. Oh well.

After talking to all the volunteers I am the one with the biggest teaching schedule. Most of the volunteers work only a few hours in the morning and that is it, plus they get Friday's off. I am there some days from 8:20 to 4:40. I teach 4 or 5 classes a day. On the up side my school is just a few steps away from the house. In fact I can see it from our balcony. So when I have a break I can come home and see everyone.

Aside from teaching I had the kids do name tags for themselves so that I could call them by name. They had a lot of fun with that. I gave them colored pencils and each kid got to chose a sticker. When I pulled out the stickers they went crazy. For some strange reason most of them wanted the St Patrick day stickers. Not sure if it was because they were the biggest or if they just liked them. Regardless the name tags turned out great. I can now read everyones names.

The school only has 15 very small books that the children must share for reading. They have all read them a 100 times, so I thought I would introduce something new. I brought in a kids encyclopedia so that they could choose a topic and read from it. I think it was a bit over their heads so I had to stop that and resort back to the other books. This weekend I hope to go to Kampala to buy everyone their own book. They are so cheap and all the kids will freak out. I was told that most of them have never held their own book in their hands, so I would like to do that for them.

In the afternoon I showed them the video of my apartment and my work. I was trying to explain how tall 15 stories is but I don't know if they got it. Plus I tried to explain an elevator but that went right over their heads. They asked me who lives in the apartment with me and when I told them it was just me they couldn't believe it. It was so big for just one person. They seemed most interested in my cat. Who knew.

The kids want me to teach them a song but I told them I can't sing. They said that later they will teach me a song and maybe a dance. That should be interesting.

So all in all the day was great. I am excited to get back to them tomorrow.

Back to the rest of the stuff. I got a small infection on my finger. Funny how fast it turned to an infection. It is impossible to stay clean here. I had to pop it open and get the puss out before I put some cream on it and a band-aid.

The food situation has not improved but I did find a local dish that is filling me up. It's basically fried dough. Hey, it's something.

Some volunteers and I are planning on taking a safari in a couple weeks. That should be fun. I think next weekend we are going to head up North. Apparently most of the people have left the IDP camps and have gone home. Great for them, but sad for me. I wanted to see them. Don't worry to much about safety because I am going with a volunteer who has contacts up there.

Well, it's about to pour rain here so I better get back. I also need to take a cold shower (or bucket as we call it here)

To sum everything up, I am past being nervous and upset and have moved onto pure joy. They people are amazing the county is amazing and I am having a great time. I can tell you however that I am already looking forward to coming home to a warm shower, real toilets and cheese. mmmmmmmmm. Oh and to all of you;)

Bye for now

Jenn