Greetings everyone! I hope this message finds you all happy, well, and enjoying the spring sunshine! I must say, that while I feel blessed to have wonderful weather all year round, I am jealous that you get to enjoy the first warm day after a long winter. I am sorry I have been long, but the good news is that my computer is finally fixed! So, I should be updating my blog more regularly.


I have been rather busy for the past month. The students at the teaching college have been at various primary schools student teaching and I have been supervising them. It was lots of fun for me and felt like “real work.” Some of the student teachers were some of the best teachers I have seen in Uganda. They would have even been superb teachers in the states. There was one student that’s lesson ran short, but instead of having the pupils sit quietly he had them sing a song and dance. One kid played the drums on his desk, while the teacher called students up to sing a part of the song and dance for the class with him. They loved it. I loved it. There were even students outside his classroom wanting to get inside. It was the first time I have ever seen students in Uganda having fun in the classroom along with their teacher. While it was fun to supervise it was also somewhat frustrating. At the end of each week we would meet at the college and talk with the other supervisors about what needs improvement. Their complaints were almost always about the students’ teaching files. While yes, I believe lesson plans are important, I do not think they are more important than how you teach and interact with your students. When I would first come into a classroom I would look at previous supervision sheets filled out by fellow tutors to see what they felt were the teacher’s strengths and areas to be improved upon. Some of the comments were ridiculous making complaints about ties not being on straight on so on, but usually they were making some ridiculous complaint about the teaching file. While I would stay for the whole forty minute lesson, my counterpart and other tutors would stay in each lesson for maybe twenty minutes before moving on to the next which I find completely unfair. Usually the last fifteen if not twenty minutes is dedicated to giving an exercise. How can you give a student marks when you don’t even seen their teaching? Sometimes I feel like they enjoy watching students fail.

The library is finished! The carpenter came Easter weekend and built the shelves and on Friday we were able to move all the books into the library. Thanks to my cousin and his wife, Shane and Christin, we now have story books for the children to read! On top of that, the school was donated text books awhile back, but were not used. They were kept in boxes covered in dust. I knew we had some good books, but I didn’t realize how good. They are from the states and there are enough math books for the entire p7, p1, and p2 classes! It is awesome. I am so excited to begin using the library! Oh, and for those of you who bought the paper beads when I was home. That money paid for the book shelves! Thank you!

I am broke this month. Half of my monthly allowance went to fixing my computer and I am now remaining with fifty dollars for the entire month. Fifty dollars is what some teachers get paid a month. I’m going to try to make it on fifty dollars, but I am not sure if I can make it without taking money from my American account. I don’t have a family to support, however the dogs probably eat better than most children here. There are two things working against me. 1. Other Peace Corps volunteers. 2. The fact that I don’t grow my own food. I guess we will see if I can live on the salary of a local. I must add, that many Ugandans do not even made fifty dollars a month.

The other day I was talking to my Ugandan friend Gerald and somehow we got on the subject of fatness. All the sudden he says, “When you came back from America you were fat! I don’t know what happened....I guess you liked your momma’s cooking.” Thanks Gerald.

Dog stories:

One day I am out front acting like an Ugandan turning my front yard into dirt when some kids around start hitting each other. It is a rare occasion that I will yell at a the kids, but I get so annoyed when I am pouring sweat and I have kids beating each other. So, I put my hoe down and started yelling at them about how there is no hitting allowed at my house. However, it was in my broken luganda and I am already looking like a nut when Mugezi decides to jump and bite my skirt. As my luck would have it, her tooth gets stuck and pulls my skirt off. Now, when I said they were kids that might not have been the best description. They were fifteen year old boys and they were shocked. We laughed for a bit, I pulled my skirt back up, and continued yelling.

Ugandans love to give me advice on how to raise dogs which I used to find entertaining and now find annoying considering that almost everyone in this country is scared to death of dogs and the ones that do have them are starved. Some of my favorites are as follows:

You should put hot peppers in Mugezi’s food so she will be very fierce. (I find this one the most amusing. They are scared to death of her despite how friendly she is and they are giving me suggestions on how to make her mean?)
You should keep her tied up all day so she will become very fat.
You shouldn’t let your dog play with the big dogs or she will become pregnant. (a. she is a baby. b. I can’t choose my dogs friends for her when there are no fences in this country c. she is fixed (okay not yet, but next month)
Defense is teaching Mugezi bad manners. (This one is annoying for so many reasons that I cannot talk about without getting upset, but I will say that it is not true. Defense and Mugezi both have good manners...most of the time)
You should hold her upside down by her back legs for a while so she can become very fast. (This is just ridiculous. Every time the man who tired doing this to Mugezi comes over she starts crying and peeing. It has taken weeks of him bringing her meat for her to stop fearing him.)

As a puppy, Mugezi loves to play bite and chase anything that moves. However, that was proving to be a nightmare once the primary school was back in session. Mugezi has a brother, Defense, that lives across the road that I would bring over to play with Mugezi to give the kids a break. However, Defense has sort of moved in and I cannot say I blame. I love Defense, but sometime having two puppies can be a bit overwhelming to say the least.

Case 1: One day I call a meeting at the school with the school management committee and the PTA about starting a poultry project. When we start the meeting Mugezi sees me and comes running in the classroom. I pick her up, carry her back to my house, and lock her in. Once I get back to the meeting Defense sees me and comes running in. Again, I pick him up, carry him back to my house, and lock him in. I get just around to the front of the school when I hear horrific crying from one of the dogs. I turn around to see Defense dangling from the security bars of my window after a failed attempt to escape through the window. I panic and start running yelling his name. Once I get to him he is as happy as can be wagging his tail. I soon realize that he is stuck and the only way to get him out is to pull him back through, but I need help and no one is around. I stand there waiting holding his front half. Eventually, the head teacher sees me from the meeting and comes to help. Once he starts pulling him back through, Defense starts peeing all over my shirt. Perfect. Once he is out I decide to leave them out. I come back to the meeting covered in pee with two dogs tailing behind. We had to close the door and place a chair in front of it. Anytime someone would leave I would have to carry two dogs back outside. Ugandans have always thought I was a bit crazy, but even I am starting to believe it now.

Case 2: I let Defense stay at my house all day and don’t feel guilty about stealing my neighbors dog as long as I send him home at night to defend their house, hence his name. For a while he would come at 6:30 am with a couple of quiet barks. It wasn’t a problem because I get up then anyway. However, he then started coming at 5, then 3, and sometimes 11. The only way to break him of it, that I know of anyway, is to ignore his barking. The problem is that it will wake up all the teachers and their children resulting in the probability that they will poison him (I am told this happens often). So, every night I wake up to let Defense in whenever he chooses. Now, Mugezi has a baby mattress she sleeps on and when Defense comes in he tries sleeping in it with her resulting in a fight. So, Mugezi started jumping in bed with me. At three in the morning I am in no mood to fight with her, but a twin size bed and a dog that loves to cuddle is getting a little old.

Anyway, I hope you all had a wonderful Easter full of peanut butter filled eggs and pastel colored peanut M&Ms!


Peace and love,

Autumn

p.s For those of you wanting to send me something and make my month here are some things I love!

Trail mix. Anything from Trader Joes. Dried fruit. Head bands. Any clothing item that you own that you think is old I would probably think is the greatest thing in the world and wear it extensively. PICTURES of YOU. Things that would make me look like the hippie I wish I was, ex. head scarfs. Hot chocolate. Music. Beef jerky. A book you love. Dog treats. Jewelry. Taco and other mixes of any sort. Taco Bell mild sauce. Letters. Music. Soup mixes.

For those who have sent me packages recently; thank you soososososo much. You are wonderful!!!!!!

p.s.s. my battery is going to die so I am using that as an excuse to not proofread!