Things I’m Glad I Brought

There is a small group of volunteers coming to Uganda in a couple months, I’m not sure if they will search the web and find my blog, but I figured that I would make this posting just in case they came across it. Before I left I found a website of one of the other volunteers and the night before I left for staging I rearranged my suitcase to fit my large skillet.
In the airport on the way to Uganda, I had the most luggage out of all of the other volunteers, at least in my opinion. But some of the things that I brought that the other volunteers thought were odd have become incredibly useful. Most importantly, I’m very glad I have my large Teflon skillet, rubber scraper, spatula, and my two sharp knives. Yes, Uganda does have these things for sale in Kampala, but with the small amount of funds you are given and the lack of quality that you find in Ugandan products, I am so glad that I decided to bring these things. Even the men at the airport thought I was weird, but it’s paid off. The other thing I am SO glad that I brought is my laptop because I use it all the time and it’s a nice reminder of home with my music and pictures easily viewable. But I also use it for work and typing up monitoring sheets, etc. Also my digital camera is nice even though printing them is expensive. Yes, there are security worries but I have everything insured and I have writable CDs to back up my pictures and other information. I am able to power my laptop about every other day so I can use it a fair amount. Some other things that I know I have used a lot and I believe other volunteers have used is a headlamp, flashlight, radio or I Pod, flash drives, writable CDs, padlocks, leatherman, favorite books, quality maps of the world and/or US (I had mine sent to me), hotel-sized sewing kit, and quality scissors. Also, many people have their I Pods and a must is a solar charger—many also charges a phone (most people have a Motorola or a Nokia). Since power here is at best sporadic and not guaranteed in most areas, solar power is the best bet, especially considering we are on the equator. With batteries, again they have them here but they are expensive and very poor quality, I would bring rechargeable batteries because there are not proper disposal areas in this country and bring a charger for when you do have power (usually about 3 days a week if your village is equipped with electrical wires). The electrical current and outlets are like the British, so bring a American to British electrical converter. Other household items can be found in Uganda like silverware, glassware, books, and furniture. Some things that I would suggest having sent to you are good Tupperware because quality containers are not available here, some good spice mixes, like taco seasoning, the salad dressing seasonings, etc., properly packaged chocolate (the chocolate here just isn’t the same…), measuring cups and spoons, can opener. As for clothing and footware, again, there are plenty of clothes and shoes here, but they are usually not good quality, expensive, or second hand. But for work and for the culture in general, the girls need long skirts and button down shirts, men need nice pants and button down shirts. Granted it is hot here, so you may want to go against all fashion sense you have and buy short sleeved button down shirts. Again for girls, with the long skirts you can wear shirts that are not button down but they must be fairly nice or else at work you may be underdressed or not as respected. Non spaghetti strap tank tops are alright and pants/jeans are alright for when you go to Kampala or Jinja or another large city, but not so much for your village. Shorts unfortunately are not really acceptable or respected for men or women although after a while you may be able to wear them once your village is used to you, but by then you will be acclimated to the climate and won’t want/need to wear them. Lastly, the peace corps provides you with a complete med kit and a mosquito net so you don’t have to worry about bringing those. They also give you a blanket but NO sheets, you have to bring your own. The size of the sheets that you will need depends on the size of the bed that you will get, most people get a single bed but don’t bring any fitted sheets because nothing is uniform here so they may not fit. I’m not sure what else to recommend, but for those coming here, if you see this, feel free to email me or post a comment with a question!