The KLA!

Some last minute thoughts on Nairobi:
-My friends Sharon and Sarafin in Jikaze told me not to eat avocados or eggs while pregnant. Otherwise, the baby will be very big and the "arrival" will be quite painful. I wonder if they understand how big American babies are in general....
-Eric's housekeeper, Flora, did our laundry on Friday. Glorious glorious clean clothes. She is a saint among women.
-My shoes are still wet from Thursday's onslaught of water (four days later). I think there are things growing on the outside. I'd throw them away but I feel bad asking where the garbage is for my shoes from people who usually don't wear any...
-Did we mention you don't need prescriptions for most drugs? And that police don't have cars? Or guns?

We left Nairobi Friday night (June 4th) -- the bus was late, we were early, it started raining. Again. Needless to say, we were pretty excited to get on board. The trip is about 13 hours and the conditions were nice enough, but a little cramped (they allow you to  put your chair way too far back for the comfort of the person in front of you). What wasn't awesome was going to the bathroom at one of the rest stops. A wooden shack with a hole in the ground. It took me about 3 or 4 minutes to figure out the best way to approach it. Without going into too many details, I'm not sure I settled on the ideal way. But I'm pretty sure I used some muscles I haven't used in some time. Just so you know.

When we got to the Kenya-Uganda border, we had to get off the bus, physically walk across the border, and then stand in line at immigration for our visas. Luckily we had American money (the currency demanded), because there were money changers offering some absurd rates. Some poor small American had to acquiesce and she was pretty upset about it. Standing out in the cold at 5am, in the dark, waiting in a really long line wasn't the greatest thing in the world, but it wasn't the worst. What was the worst was when the Muslim call to prayer came on over a loudspeaker and the bus starting pull away. Now standing in no man's land in the third world and watching your bus pull away -- that wasn't so awesome. Luckily it was just relocating and we made it to Kampala (KLA) without any other problems. Although some man (a passenger? a guy we picked up off the streets?) gave long impassioned speeches about the pimple cream and antacids that he was selling in a loud voice from the front of the bus for the last 45 minutes of the ride.

A woman we have come to know as Mama Flora came and picked us up from the bus station and took us to meet the brothers, and then to her home, where we are staying. She is incredible, and quite possibly the nicest woman either of us have met. She takes in refugees and abandoned children and treats them as her own (see Augustine, age 18 months, son of a mentally retarded woman) even though all her biological children are grown and either at university or on their own.

The Brothers are also incredible. And incredibly nice and welcoming. We got the chance to witness over 100 baptisms on Sunday (at the second of two Masses we attended). Also....we're both now godparents to small Ugandan children who used to be Muslims (when you have over 100 baptisms -- and another few hundrend coming next month, you get so desperate that even such lowlifes like Brian and I are acceptable). Also, either because of the language barrier, or because we are like zoo exhibits as white people around here, they got baptized as "Sharon" and "Brian B-----" [avoiding last names, because the internets can be weird places, but yeah, the little boy got Brian's first and last name]. Seriously, I couldn't make this up. We're also in about 5829052139 pictures after the baptism with the families of our kids, the kids themselves, their extended families, random people, more random people, and other random people. Everyone wanted a picture with the mzungu. What made it more interesting is that there was only one guy with a camera. There's also a great picture of just me, Brian, and baby Sharon. It looks like we the two of us somehow created a small black baby (but a beautiful baby, and with a great name to boot). Unfortunately that's not on my camera -- I can only hope that the Brothers get a hold of it and can send it to us.

There's much more to tell, but that might have to wait until next weekend! Which might be the next time we have internet.

-Sharon