Opening the Term

The new term and new year are now in full swing here in Uganda. The children and teachers seem to have generally settled well into routines and the kitchen staff have got used to my regular enquiries about hot water for tea!

Despite this, it has not been an uneventful start to the term. Last Friday we were paid a visit from the local schools’ inspector who certainly made his position felt, threatening to close us down (which he does have the authority to do) but it transpired all he really wanted was an update on the school building project. Rainbow is the person who holds all of that information but wasn’t onsite at the time but a phone conversation the next day smoothed everything over – apparently, they have known each other for years. The inspector popped back yesterday to take some photos of the school in action and was much more pleasant about it. To add to all the fun and games, both times he arrived I was in my painting clothes from making a big board that will be a Biblical timeline and overview. I paused the project at the start of the week as he said he’d come back on either the Monday or Tuesday, by Wednesday I knew I needed to be cracking on and of course that’s when he arrived! I have apparently surprised various people at Shalom with my (actually very rudimentary) DIY skills – from owning and operating a drill to planning through how it will attach to the wall.

Life hasn’t been all about school though – the Sunday before last I decided to attempt to make a roast dinner for the 6 people that live on the farm compound. After calculating how I could do this with a small oven and single burner, I bought a live cockerel on the previous Friday when I was in town (the usual way to buy chicken here). He spent a couple of days roaming around our farm, generally staying quite close to our house and well-protected by the high barbed wire fence. I was sure that this and his clipped wings would stop him from escaping and with a bit of help would be fairly easy to catch. However, on Sunday it was as if he knew his time was up and was nowhere to be found! It took 4 or 5 of us looking for over half an hour, with me wondering what else we could have for supper, before he was discovered hiding in a bush. Hunting for the chicken before you start cooking it does put a slightly different spin on the term “from scratch!” The food largely went down well, although I forgot how much dried peas expand as they are cooked and so we had them coming out of our ears!  

Just a quick note to finish, I changed my number on WhatsApp a couple of weeks ago. This is because I’m anticipating that my UK line will get disconnected since I’m not using it. If we have an existing conversation on the app, you should have received a notification to tap that will take you to the new number. If you are having any difficulties, please comment below and I’ll send you a message. I really do value having personal conversations and not just these public blog posts!