I have to check my dates more carefully....Gail found that last week I said "May" - wishful thinking? We just finished our PC Mid-Service Conference - it was fun to see everyone and fun to get away from PH for a few days.....but I'm more tired than ever!!! Will be happy to see my little apartment again and get "re-organized".
The presentation at Mulago went well. The Head of the Dept., Dr. Atai, really wanted it to be more family centered and it started well - but the Doctors could not resist the Ugandan tendency to "overtalk" and they got really technical....maybe the audience liked that, but it strayed from her intent to talk about malnutrition as a SYMPTOM of a larger dysfunctional system....ignorance, poverty, isolation.... I think I need to study more the effects of long term poverty on people's energy and inertia. I remember from Nickle and Dimed that long term poverty actually changes your brain chemistry and makes you have less energy! Mom came w. the babies but had to go for feeding time - Nakato looks better but still a long way to go. I was incorrect about her weight at entrance (4/9) - she was 2.6 kg (6 lbs)!!! at 2 years - is 8 lb. now.
Before we left Monday a.m. I talked to Fred and Vincent about the "pig class" they took on Friday - they said it was really good!!! We now have a formula to determine how much food/money we will need for the pigs' first year - might just get the 3 females - if we get a male we have to feed him for nearly a year before he even does anything - and then he only has to impregnate 3 females!!! Not productive enough for me! Sister got a call from someone who was selling maize flour for a good price and would also sell the maize bran(the outer portion of the kernel) - prices are rising rapidly because of the drought in e. Uganda and Kenya. So we bought a ton of maize bran (to mix w. our ton of wheat bran)...still need to buy some more items, but the big bulk items are in place. Now thinking we may wait a little more to buy pigs till we find out what the deal is w. the swine flu! No rush.....
I was impressed again w. what nice people I have to work with. Monday a.m. Didas was starting on the 38 pairs of shoes (and Simon is back to help), Moses could handle CBR w. ease, Nelson was a great addition to the Mulago presentation...and yesterday Sister J called me to tell me that it was St. Catherine's feast day and they all prayed for me!!! WOW!
Tuesday a.m. I met w. some other volunteers to be on a planning committee for an All Volunteer Conference set for the end of June - my one effort at helping w. PC Uganda - it should be fun and only a 2 month committment! Lots of programming ideas thrown around at the meeting. Next week I have my one year physical....we'll see how I'm doing. I'm curious about my cholesterol after a year in Uganda.
Not a long blog - the meetings were good, and the food was good, company was great, but not as amazing as life at PH. Hope you all have a good weekend. Big BD week for us - Ben, Dylan and Bert!!! WOW!
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