SO Peace Corps

I know I know, I have been awful about putting up blog postings-about a month and a half without one! I have been very busy with my teachers I’m helping get their certificate while working, conducting workshops, finishing building fish dryers for my masters’ thesis, having meetings regarding education in my district and grants I’m working on, and many other things. This is time when Peace Corps says I’m ‘in the thick of things’ because all of my various projects are coming together now.

During one of my week long trainings that I was conducting at various schools, one day I was biking to a nearby school, only a few miles. I have to preface this story to describe the condition accurately: I’m biking on a dirt road going through small villages on a mountain bike which about 5% of people in my district have and I’m wearing a helmet. Not only am I Caucasian which makes kids go crazy anyways, but I’m in a skirt on an unusual mode of transport with a helmet on. Then it starts raining. People in Uganda are scared of the rain, for many reasons, mostly because they associate rain with sickness because there is no other time the temperature goes below 80 degrees. So I’m already looking ridiculous when a light sprinkle turns into a downpour in about 4 minutes (which is very typical here). People are looking at me from under trees or verandas or home doorways and looking at me or shouting at me to wait for the rain to stop. I don’t want to wait because I know I will be late and even though everyone in Uganda is late to everything, I don’t want to set a bad example, and I figured I’m wet anyways, why not just get drenched? I’m about 50 yards from the school when the rain stops and I ride into the compound. The teachers are looking at me from inside the doorway and yelling ‘Bambi!’ which loosely translates to ‘oh, dear, sorry, too bad.’ I had to first wring out the bottom of my skirt and button down shirt, then went to a classroom to wait for more teachers to come in with a pitied look on their faces.

The next day I went to a ‘deep’ school, or a school that is a bit difficult to get to because you have to go into a very rural area by small pathways. I had no idea where I was going and had to ask people along the way. I was quite a sight again as I was biking with a helmet, and being Caucasian, but at least it wasn’t raining! I tried using as little luganda as possible so they didn’t confuse me while I slowly wandered around finding huts to ask directions and find the correct paths to the school.

Both of these days while on the bike I thought, wow, I don’t even have to do these seminars; I’m trying so hard not to be late while knowing for sure I won’t start for at least 30-40 minutes after I arrive; and of course- what am I doing here. The ever present thought in my head was, ‘wow, I am SO Peace Corps today.’