All Volunteers Unite!

Its been a long 2 1/2 weeks since my last post. I apologize and am kicking myself in the butt for it because I have soooo much to catch you up on it may take more than one post.

September 5th through the 8th we had our All Volunteer conference in Uganda. This means exactly what it says... its a conference where all the PCVs around Uganda get together for a what? A conference. The 5th was our travel day to Masaka where the conference was held at a pretty nice hotel with decent food, a huge conference center with really nice but crooked stairs along with other crooked structures that still managed to look nice and a big fat cement hole in the ground in the back where the pool will be/ is but is not nearly finished. Bummer. I know. I lost track of how long the bus ride was because I usually just zone out except I did get to see a bunch of Zebras on the way! When I checked in at the front desk I kept asking where my room was and they would not tell me which direction I could go in because it was such a complicated path. I was walked out in between the hotel and conference center buildings, in front of the "pool" along a few scattered bricks and boards that I had to hop from one to the next so I didn't have to walk in the mud, through an outdoor courtyard and finally to my room. After 3 days of going back and forth I never bothered to realize how unacceptable this would be back home for a hotel but I thought it was fun. I had a hot shower, hot enough to steam the bathroom and make myself feel almost completely clean and a TV... that of course I didn't even want to touch because what would I watch anyway. I've been getting used to not having a laptop (which was sent home with a PCV visiting the states so he could send it in to Acer for me since it crashed on me)! We were fed 3 meals a day plus 2 tea times which they had really good spring rolls and doughnuts at once! Yum! I got my hair cut back into a Faux Hawk so I look a bit more like myself again (Thanks for the haircut Kendra)! Socialized with a bunch of volunteers that have been here for a while... some are even leaving soon if not already gone home because they finished their 2 years! Congrats guys! Which luckily for me I found a COSing (Close of Service) volunteer willing to sell me their gas tank so I get to pick it up next week!! I won't have to wait 30 minutes for my coals to heat up to cook oatmeal anymore in the morning. Along with all the socializing we did have sessions on things I feel A LOT more comfortable about doing at my site now such as working on Grants and with VSLAs (Village Saving and Loans Association) which is one of my primary projects in the village with the women's group. Oh and one of my favorite things about the trip was that I found Salt & Vinegar Pringles!!!! I felt in heaven every time I popped one of those into my mouth until they were gone the next day... woops. I'm also pretty sure they were stale but I just came from the village.. who cares?! On the final night of the conference I got to play Super Smash Brothers and Goldeneye (James Bond) with a couple other PCVs with REAL Nintendo 64 controllers hooked up to a laptop. You guessed correctly that I will be asking my brother Andrew to send me one of those!

On the trip home from the conference we all booked a matatu together for those who were going in the same direction and I thought we were never going to get home. The drive kept stopping, talking to people, and at one point he actually turned off the engine, got out of the vehicle and hopped on a boda and took off. I think we were all really really confused at that point but he came back a few minutes later and he didn't stop as much. Maybe he needed airtime for his phone... who knows? When we were cruising along the 'highway' there was a man walking on the side of the road with no pants on but rather slung over his shoulder... there is no such thing as indecent exposure in this country or there is and nobody enforces it which is usually the case.While stopping in Mbarara and going our seperate ways I was able to do some MAJOR shopping which included me splurging and buying pickles... real hamburger dill pickles that taste funny but who cares! I also found 'Slim Milk' instead of the whole milk I find everywhere. I was excited about that purchase as well. On my trip back to Rukungiri I was transfered to 3 different taxis and ended up paying twice what I should have. Ugh. I got so fed up with men not leaving me alone that I just started getting real sassy with them and short tempered. If that's what I have to do in this country to avoid harassment then fine. After a while it was kind of fun and I was having a game out of it by myself but it was still EXTREMELY frustrating. After a torturous ride home I got back after dark so I ended up staying with another PCV where we made some amazing veggie burgers and watched a movie and I was greeted by two packages in my PO Box the next day! Thank you Aunt Connie, Uncle Harry, Mom, Dad, and Andrew! Tomorrow was indeed better than the previous day :) Its always good to have something to look forward to!

About 4 days ago I FINALLY got my capa (cat) and he is adorable. Unfortunatly he came with a bonus of + 1 cat which is his sister and a trouble maker but tomorrow another PCV is adopting her. They are 6 months old roughly and litter/ dirt box trained and everything. I just have to stop them from climbing my mosquito net! Pain in my butt. I went from not liking cats... to accepting I want one because I have mice... to temporarily owning two cats. And I still don't really like cats...

 Elend Venture... or Venture-cat I like to say. 

Elend and his sister... cute but pain in the butt!

I found lettuce at the market and this is the closest I will get to having Ranch Dressing (thanks Aunt Connie!)

 From 2 packages... I feel SOOOO loved!

notice the blow up ball, paddle ball toy, and kitty card ha (thanks Mom!)

This is what the view looks like if I look over my fence

This is what the same view looked like on the day it looked like the world was going to be swallowed whole... it was seriously that dark and looked like a wall!

Hope you enjoyed the spoiler for my next post. I'll let you all mull this one over before I start gushing cats and how I'm almost finished with The Hunger Games again and is it bad that I could re-read them a 3rd time?!