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so I know i havent written in a while..well for about a month and under the constant reminder from my father i am writing to udate you on the excitments in my life at present. I know i have missed a chunck from dar es saalam in zanzibar but i promise to write that soon! i am just writing about since we arived back at project 2 weeks ago. we came back a wek before school started to wash alot of clothes, tidy our everso messy bedroon and get used to not being on th go the entire time. The weekend of th 5th brought some of the volunteers back to our project after being apart for just a week as Andrews sister was celebrating her 25th annivrsary of being a nun! it was a MASSIVE celebration with 5 huge tents, over 500 people and more nuns than i have ever seen in my life! it was an amazing and very interesting ceremony with everything draped in blue and white and a very good gospel choir. The family then provided lunch which was obviously a massive affair for that amount of people and the ceremony being at Andrews house, lots of women were brought in to cook. The two days before we were all set peeling carrots, potatoes, maatoke, beans and helping to prepare every type of Ugandan food! It was a lovely way to see the whole family coming together and for a very momentous occasion! The volunteers went back home on the sunday and we were then back at school on the monday. This week then became the week from hell for me! due to having swam in the lake i had got Bilharzia which is where tiny snails bury worms into your skin which then grow and multipl in your stomach...after major seaweed fights in the lake where you could even see the snails we were all suspecting that we would have it! so i managed to get many of the symptoms..unfortunately all at the same time! from fevers and sweating and shivering, migraines, diarrhoea, muscle aches, loss of appetite, feeling sick, and want to sleep ALL the time...i suffered a bit through that first week of teaching!! so at the weekend and after endless packets of paracetamol we went to the doctors in kampala to get the test and treatement. some of the other volunteers were there which was good to see although most of us were suffering from an illness in some way or another!
on arriving at the surgery i was asked for a urine sample and a blood smaple and literally could not give the urine sample!! it was so difficult after making the mistake of going to the toilet before i left! so i stood there downing glass after glass of water before giving the sample...that in itself was faily traumatic! the nurse confirmed i had bilharzia of a concentration of 11% which is extremely high and explained why i had felt so ill and i was weighed and given 6 huge tablets which smelt of poo to take that evening! so on sunday we came back home although i was then feeling really rough again after taking the tablets and feeling fine on friday and saturday which continued to monday so joy of joys i went back to the doctor on tuesday! he told me it was due to the tablets killing the worms and i would feel fine...and being the doctor of course he was right and i now feel perfectly normal!! so i am enjoying being back at school and feeling like i want to talk to the students.
There ar lots of new students as we have a new s.1. class as it is the beginning of the year but lots of new students have joined other classes which has been really good and there are some very clever kids although some not so...we believe there is an 18 year old in s.2. (year 8) who cannot spell his name so as his english teacher i think i need to work on that first! The school is now closed until monday due to the presidential election tomorrow which will be very interesting and some of the students and teachers have travelled home to vote. The current president has been in power since just after Amin and keeps changing his policies to keep him in power so many people are not very hopeful about the government changing as the NRM (current party) are adopting intimidation and so people are scared of the president, Musseveni.
The trustees of the charity who runs the school are coming to visit tomorrow which will be really good and very interesting to meet some other Muzungu's! there are two new classroom blocks currently being built at the school which is really good as the s.4 students are being taught in the staffroom at the moment as there are only 3 classrooms for senior 1 2 and 3.
so we are keeping ourselves busy and still really enjoying it minus my stint of illness!! I promise to write about Zanzibar and our complicated travels back as soon as possible!
Hope you are all well and not too cold! xx
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