Arrival

Greetings everyone; sorry for the delay in posting. We have not had internet access for awhile. Since the last post, Rocky joined our group on May 15. We spent the day of May 16 driving from Entebbe to Mbarara. It was an 8 hour drive for us on some good roads, and other extremely bumpy, dusty roads with crazy big trucks playing chicken with us. We soon learned the traffic rules which were basically there ARE no rules! And when a truck is signaling towards you when you are driving towards him it means get over!! We arrived safe and sound, and met Hilda, the program officer at FAOC. She is a strong woman amidst a culture where many women do not stand up for themselves. We really like Hilda and she is going to be a great help on our project. The Sunday after we arrived Hilda took us to church. I loved it. There were lots of people singing and dancing and it was their cultural Sunday so everyone was dressed up in their traditional dress. Church here is a bit different than my church in Canada. We were there for 2 hours and the service is usually around 3 hours long. The congregation welcomed us immediately, escorting us to the front row and hugging us during a song 'I don't care what tribe you are from, you're my sister, so give me a hug'. The pastor's message was powerful, telling us to celebrate diversity, and that if your neighbour looked exactly like you, life would be boring.
There are many other things that we have been up to since, and we will begin to write posts soon. We all live at the FAOC office in Mbarara, and are meeting lots of locals. Today we were in Kiberebere checking out the field office, and visiting some contact farmers. Next week on Tuesday we are going to have a training session to train the contact farmers how to give vaccines and to properly handle them. We have a lot to prepare for, and then a lot to do once our clostridial vaccines arrive.
Everywhere we go, people are asking about Dr. Kenty. They tell us what wonderful things Dr. Kenty did, and how much they miss him. A little boy came running up to us today, asking if we were Dr. Kenty. Hershel didn't understand, and he said yes and the boy flung his arms around Hersh, so excited to see Dr. Kenty. We also met Milton, another good friend of Dr. Kenty at the Lakeview hotel. We are looking forward to teaching and learning from the women just as Dr. Kenty, and hopefully keep in touch with some of them in the future.
That's all for now. . .