Thanksgiving – jazz festival

First off I was blown away after receiving a call from my family on Sunday evening, it was great to hear them all together. This past week has been great! I have been in Kampala camping out at my friend Tyler’s and enjoying such amenities like showers, toilets, and a stove! On Saturday I made a cake and Sunday I made brownies. So the food this week has been great, I also made Tyler and his roommate Aafke a great pasta dinner on Friday. On Thursday Ugandans celebrated their national independence day, a bunch of friends and I went to the beach to throw a Frisbee around and soak up the sun. Swimming was not an option as the water was unsafe. Friday and Saturday was the first ever Ugandan Jazz festival which was at a beautiful resort on a beach just outside Kampala. The vibe there was infectious and penetrated the muscles in your legs as they moved in ways no one could ever believe they could. It was a good release, and we danced for hours to a large variety of talented African musicians... well worth the money. Saturday and Sunday were amazing I did absolutely nothing, woke up walked to a Rolex stand – I don’t think I have ever introduced you all to rolex, the new found greatest snack here in Uganda. Essentially it’s a breakfast burrito, made of chapatti (a crepe/pancake type thing) with egg wrapped in it mixed with onion, cabbage, and peppers in it. It tastes like nothing I have ever eaten before in my life, personally I think it is the dirty little fry pan they use that gives the rolex its tasty kick. So I eat those now as much as I can and they only cost 1000 shillings which is less than a dollar...anyways... my weekend was spent eating rolex, and relaxing, I brought my guitar down and played for a while, sat around some more, watched some movies and baked some great treats!

Work this week is going well I really feel Beacon of Hope is running in a positive and progressive direction, however I think I need to start looking for a new job. Beacon of hope does not have the capacity to continue to pay me and I don’t have the capacity to stay here if I don’t receive some sort of compensation for my living expenses. I have sent out several resumes to various ngo’s in Kampala and am hoping to hear back from one of them, keep your fingers crossed. I will still work for beacon of hope but on a consultancy basis only. I think it will be better for them this way as they can take what I have set them up with and operate on their own and develop further. I am hoping that I can get a job with the Canadian cooperatives Association apparently they are hiring a new gender officer - I would be working with womens groups in rural areas and helping them to establish sustainable businesses of sorts.

I have had good news from the Bolton Enterprise, they are going to publish an article about me in the paper, I am hoping that it will bring greater awareness towards Beacon of Hope and the good work they are doing for disadvantaged youths. I will let you all know when it’s published so you can get a copy.

Other things to note…

I have bought a wicked awesome bathing suit for a couple of dollars, its pink and black and says Bermuda bill on the side, if only my name was bill. I wore them pretty much all weekend, they have become my lounging/swim shorts. I have also bought a authentic African shirt sort of like the one I have at home the embroidery is beautiful and the shirt is light weight and extremely comfortable.

Tyler and I bought some steak on Saturday to fry up, before the butcher handed it over to use he beat it first with this stapler looking thing in order to make it tender, hmm, how attractive for the customer.

For those of you interested I have posted the article I submitted to the paper on the beacon of hope website – www.freewebs.com/beaconofhopeuganda/ and its under the title – the beacon blog

Lots of love to you all,

Matt