So after I left Vacaville, I headed straight to San Bruno where I meet up with a young man named Mike.  Mike was selling something I had been wanting for a couple years now.  I had actually planned on building one as soon as I had a couple of weeks to dedicate in my dad's shop.  Good old dad has all the tools and all the experience to make just about anything.  However, I am still several thousand miles away from Dad's shop, so when Mike showed interest in letting me have this contraption for such a low price, I got pretty excited.

 That's right ladies and gentlemen, I am going to cover 500 miles on a hand crank tricycle.

 Some minor cosmetic damage on the chain guard.  Hand brake and shifter located in the center.

 All Shimano parts, 21 speeds and looking very new.

From the front you can see the foot rests.  It seems a lot longer from this angle.

 From the back.  Under the seat there I have since added a small window sill planter.  I added a few holes to drain water and to zip-tie it on to the frame.  It is mostly to hold my water, map and a few other things.  For the most part, my bags strap on to the seat pretty well.

Me before the trip.  As you can see I have a hard time walking past all the millions of Chinese restaurants without stopping in for a few dumplings.  Lest see how I look in a few weeks.

Tomorrow I will take the train down about 25 miles south to start my journey.  I'm not really keen on navigating San Francisco on my first day, nor am I interested in spending the next day so sore I can't breath.

So, that is the program.  Tomorrow I hope to be celebrating my first day with a cold beer at the house of my good friend Mr. Chadwick C. Conway's house, who has been kind enough to offer me a place to collapse and lick my wounds from the day's ride.

Anyone who is interested in joining me for a day or two of cycling, just let me know.  Also, anyone who would like to purchase this awesome tri-wheel upper body workout form of locamotion should contact me as soon as you can.  I am posting it on CraigsList today.

In anticipation, agony, and ambivilance
Dave

So this time I got really lazy aaaaaand China doesn't like blogspot so I haven't posted squat.  In other news;  I am now in Vacaville California with a good friend from high school, Dominick Severance.  We just enjoyed two very awesome cigars, Legends so the label says, and half a bottle of Black Label.  We have discussed politics, a lot of law, marriage, travels, economics, cigars, sex, more law, and a bit of theology.  Not a bad afternoon.  It is now 2:00 am and I am beat.  Tomorrow I go to purchase a bicycle and start and epic adventure down the coast of California.  If anyone is so inclined, you are welcome to join me.

More to come, but I need some sleep.

Well, I apparently got lazy, sorry for the delay.  After arriving at my new home I put a lot of work in trying to keep construction and maintenance in line, as seen by the pictures in my last post.  Things went well enough for a while, but then I started having trouble with the Head Master (principal).

Here is sorta kinda the short break down of how things went more or less.  Fr. Tony is the director of the school.  He is an American Jesuit, lives at the school, does nearly all the fundraising single handed, does his best to continue to interact with the students, tries to keep construction on track, makes plans for where the school is going and keeps a record of where it has been.  In short, Ocer is his vision and its life is his mission.  Without Fr. Tony at the helm, Ocer would never have become a reality and would surely crash upon the rocks should he leave.

Sailing along with my ship analogy, we have Fr. Jim, Fr. Tony's first mate so to say.  Fr. Jim is the technical man.  He reviews designs, plans infrastructure, orders materials, hires workers, and ultimately make most of the spending decisions.  Unfortunately he is not here all the time.  He has to divide his efforts between this building project and another one in Kenya.  So, I have become a fill in more or less for Fr. Jim when he isn't around.  I spend a lot of time trying to inspect the buildings (though I really have no idea what I'm doing and what real authority I have) and fighting fires.  I fix water mains, repair doors, fix engines, install solar panels, repair lights and other such odds and ends.  Endless work, but enjoyable for the most part.  Especially since Francis, a young local guy, is learning to do all this stuff as my apprentice.  He is sharp and hard working.

Now here is the major kicker.  While Fr. Tony and Fr. Jim are more or less the sail and rudder of the ship, they don't get to choose all of there crew.  The school administration is chosen by the provincial, head Jesuit of the region.  This is where we get a lot of trouble.  The provincial doesn't see any of the day to day activities and doesn't have any grasp of the awesome and amazing vision that Fr. Tony has for the school.  Nor does he see the fantastic potential of what Ocer could be.  He basis his decision for school administration on something else.  I can speculate as to what, but in the end it doesn't matter.

So the school ends up with a Head Master and Deputy Head Master who are Jesuit brothers, as well educated as East Africa can provide and have no idea the incredible potential they have in there hands.  They grew up in the East African education system, that is all they know and that is all they are willing to work with.  Ocer receives 5 or so volunteers each summer, college students who are on there way to teaching degrees, or we even get people who are professional teachers from the states willing to volunteer for a year or more and they are not allowed to teach any classes.  I would imagine this is because the HM doesn't understand their teaching style, but more importantly he doesn't control them directly.  So it is better to not have them teach.

The end result is this.  Eight million U.S. dollar and counting have been put towards Ocer Campion Jesuit College and as of the time I left, March 2012, the students were not receiving any better an education than the public schools 5 miles down the road.  While at Ocer I was still teaching at one of the public schools (Trinity College) and I can tell you that if you took the top 80 sophomores from Trinity and put them against the 80 sophomores from Ocer, it would be a wash.

How can this be?!?!  Ocer has more resources, they are private so they don't have to follow the inane Ugandan curriculum and they get to choose the best and the brightest students from all over the region and yet they can't even out perform Trinity, a mediocre public school?  Simple, the HM, the administration, the teachers aren't using the resources well.  They are simply meeting the status quo that they grew up with.  The Ugandan curriculum is still used, school funds are used to buy uniforms instead of books, "teaching" still means copying verbatim on the chalk board from the teachers notes (notes that he or she made when in high school), "learning" still means copying verbatim from the chalk board into the students notes.

If the East African education system is so good, I ponder to the HM, then why is it that the Jesuits are needed to come in and reform it?  Why is it no one comes to Africa for higher education?  Well, that was my mistake.  Challenging the African big man, just as I wound up doing in Padibe, got me nowhere.  All it got me was an enemy.  So after suffering through the misery of watching the HM and other school administrators take something beautiful and turn it into shit for a couple of months, I lost heart.  I couldn't do it.  Fr. Tony and Fr. Jim have a level of serenity and peace that I can't imagine.  It makes me cry sometimes to think how little vision the HM has and how that will so easily destroy the vision Fr. Tony and Fr. Jim have.

This came to a head when the HM told Francis, not asked but told him, to cut up a $200+ door in the dormitory so that the students could be served food from behind the door like prisoners.  "Why?" might you ask.  Well, because the students, as kids do, get to goofing around waiting to be served their beans and as it happens some of them got bumped into the pot and burned themselves.  Now, instead of reprimanding the students for horsing around and instead of assigning a teacher or other faculty to supervise, the HM would rather have $200+ of infrastructure altered so that our students could be fed like prisoners, from behind bars.  I lost it.  In no uncertain terms I told him he was foolish and that he has no authority over the infrastructure of the school. If he wants something changed then he must go through me.  He is not to order Francis around as Francis is under my payroll, not his.  Well, I just picked a fight that I couldn't win.  If for no other reason than because I was leaving soon and the HM was there to stay.  So I said enough is enough.  I spent the next week or so doing what I could to help Georg, a Jesuit volunteer from Germany, learn everything he would need to replace me.  I called it quits lest I find a stout ruler and give the HM a traditional Jesuit education.

The next week, I went to KLA to finish my close of service procedures then got on a plane for Thailand.  I was sad, but so relieved.  I wouldn't have to lay in bed at night fuming over how asinine people are and how little I could do about it.

Not the happiest post, but I got some more thoughts on my African life coming.

New Home

So after my a month and a half of touring around Uganda, I contacted the director of Ocer Campion Jesuit College (OCJC), a high school just outside of Gulu in northern Uganda.  You can check out all the work that is going on there at http://ocer.adventuredock.com/.  I had known of the school for a while and had even visited a few months before I had to leave the village.  The reason I wanted to come here is because they are building.  The school is far from finished, infrastructure wise, and that would give me ample opportunity to put some of my $180,000 education to work.

The director put me to work immediately on several projects.  Wiring up some security lights and street lights.  Adjusting and evaluating the solar systems.  Extending and correcting the plumbing.  Helping with the dam to create a big pond.  Most importantly, watching over the builders to make sure they aren't cutting corners and to keep them on schedule.  This is going to take a bit to explain so hold on tight.

First, the school is not using the traditional building method of burnt mud bricks.  The burnt mud bricks are cheap, but they are basically Styrofoam filler in an otherwise cement wall.  They use an inch or more of mortar on all sides of the bricks because they are not uniform at all.  Getting a level course is damn near impossible.  The bricks themselves can just about be broken with your bare hands.  Not only this, but it takes an enormous amount of fire wood to cook the bricks.  In the last ten years, Uganda has lost almost 40% of its forest.  Trees are on a serious decline.  Add this in with how expensive (both in dollars and environmental effects) cement is and the traditional building method is crap.  Plus the buildings fall down in a decade or two.

So OCJC is using interlocking stabilized soil blocks (issb).  These issb's are pretty sweet.  They use a hydraulic press to compress sandy soil with a little clay and cement mix.  The result can be seen here: http://www.hydraform.com/ImageGallery/Index.asp?IGImageCategory=Walls+and+Stables.  In the end, it is cheaper to use the issb system because you don't use any mortar between the issb's or cover the inside and outside with mortar like they do with traditional burnt bricks.  It ends up saving you about 30% of the over all cost.  So it looks like some engineers do get to play with Legos when they grow up.

But that brings to the builders.  Unfortunately the issb's have only recently been introduced to Uganda so not a lot of people know how to lay the blocks properly.  So the school hired a construction crew out of the capital city to come and do the work.  In my opinion they are gouging the school really bad.  For every person I see working, I see another literally sleeping on the job.  No shame, no effort to hide, just flat out on his back snoring.  It isn't really allowed, but no one does anything to stop it, except me.  Only, I don't really have the power to dock wages or fire anyone so I end up being all bark and no bite.  I'm working on that though.

We just finished, for the most part, putting up the classrooms and are now working on the boys dormitory.  In Uganda, it is quite common for secondary schools to be boarding.  The girls dorm was already finished when I arrived.  At the moment, we have only the freshmen and sophomores because the school just opened three years ago and we are taking in one class at a time.  Most of the girls dormitory is empty so I get to have one of the prefect's rooms.  It is convenient and the layout of the dorm keeps me pretty separate from the girls.  I moved in all my bamboo shelves, the bed was already there and the door has a lock.  So now I'm all set.  Oh, and living on campus means I get to eat with the students.  My diet isn't all that varied, but I don't care so long as I don't have to cook.  Mostly beans and cornmeal with rice on some days and meat usually once a week.  Compared to other schools, we are living pretty high on the hog.

Well, there is a lot more to explain but we just had two rain showers back to back in the middle of the dry season.  It is both a relief and a curse.  Relief because the heat and dust were killing us and we were running out of water.  Curse because right now the mosquitoes are eating me alive.  Time to crawl under my mosquito net and read "Lies Across America."  Excellent book by the way, but if you are interested in it then I would suggest "Lies My Teacher Told Me" first.

While I've been writing all this, I've also been letting some pictures load.  I hope this helps to shape my descriptions into something comprehensible.

Dude putting together the re-bar for the wall beam of the boys dorm

That giant hole will be an underground cistern for rainwater.  Roughly 20' across and 15' deep.  It ought to hold about 15,000 gallons.  However, 300 students will still make short work of that during the dry season.

George, a volunteer with the Jesuits from Germany, and the construction bosses

Finishing up the classrooms.  It is a square with a round hut (soon to be thatched with grass) and under the hut is the rain cistern, just like the dorms only smaller

Just outside the classrooms

The boys dorm will have a urinal, latrine, bathing area, and washing area separate from the sleeping areas.  These are the foundations of such.  The owner of the construction company is Lawrence in the kaki shirt, his right hand man Moses is in the blue jumper, and George.

Finishing up the walls.  The blocks stack together so easily.  As long as you keep things level, one man can lay 1000+ blocks in a day.  Well, that also assumes you can keep him awake and working.

Cistern getting deeper

Common work practice: everything stops to say good morning, ask about work, ask about home, ask about kids, ask about crops, ask about the weather, and ask about extended family.  Its actually a very nice practice and helps to keep the community strong, but it sure can get frustrating when you want to get stuff done.

I like working with the women the most.  They are usually more dedicated, hard working, and willing to learn than the men.  Part of that is because they are accustomed to taking direction much more than men in African society.

Hut (soon to be thatched) and water tank for the girls dorm.  The cistern is also under the hut just like the boys dorm.  The boys and girls dorms will be just about identical.  You can see a small water pump for getting the water out of the cistern.

Just outside of the girls dorm.  When we have freshmen through seniors living here, all the rooms will be full of girls.  I will not be living here at that time, praise the Lord.

Just outside the classrooms

Fire in the distance and a storm coming to put it out.

This is the scene 3 - 5 days a week at 4:00 pm during the rainy season.  Amazing!

More blocks.  I love Legos!

This shows how the blocks lock together, both vertically and horizontally.

Got to cover the blocks as they cure so they don't dry too fast.  Too fast and they crumble.

This is the shop, the place I call home during day light hours.

This is Ojok Francis, the carpenter whom I work with nearly everyday.  One of the few men I've meet who is nearly as concerned with learning new skill as he is with getting paid.  He's quick and hard working.  I would say he is my apprentice, but he has taught me far more than I have taught him.

Just outside the shop

Tool room on the right, office in the middle, loft up above where we keep all the big stuff, pvc pipe, sewage line, lumber and such.

I climbed up the water tower we have and snapped a lot of pictures.  Right below is the solar array that runs the pump that fills the water tower.  The solar array tracks the sun, its a really nice set up.

Far left is the temporary shower room for the boys while we finish their dorm, middle is the toilet, and the far right is the corner of the shop.

Shop, the four tanks on the corners each hold about 3,500 gallons which then feed the buildings down hill with running water for everything but drinking.  The water tower gets ground water from 100' down.  We get it tested every year and it's what we drink.

Far right is the roof of the boys temporary dorm.  It will become classrooms when the dorm is finished.

Down the hill towards the left are the classrooms, on the right is part of the boys toilets

Far down the hill on the right is the girls dorm, just up from that is the Jesuit's house.  That is where the priests and brothers live.  The nuns live in an apartment that is part of the girls dorm.

Far center is the construction of the boys dorm.

Neighbor's house and cows.  They are pretty well off, that is how they were able to afford donating the land that the school is being built on.  Their cows are even part Holstein, that is a major sign of wealth.

Neighbors

Top of boys temporary dorm

Road headed to the nearest trading center (group of shops and houses) called Unyama.  It'a about 2 miles away.

Other neighbors, they are all related though.  Cousin brother's wife's sister's mother-in-law's aunt.

Nice house, very cool during the dry season.  It costs about $40 to build a house like this, and that is if you hire someone to help you.  Usually you just get family and neighbors to help out, then when they go to build a house you return the favor.

Eucalyptus trees grow straight and fast, sell for good lumber or telephone poles and repel mosquitoes.  The downside is that they soak up water like it's their job and will quickly dry up your soil.  It is best to plant them in swamps that you want to dry up, or in dry areas where other trees won't grow and you can't farm anyway.

Storm blew itself out before it got to us.  Good thing too, cause half way up this water tower was a small wasp nest, so I wasn't going to make it down the ladder until some one gave me a pole to knock down their nest.

And that's all for now.  I'll add words soon.  I don't have any more pictures.

Not that well after all - June 2011

So after this amazing adventure, I try to settle back into my routine.  I go to school, garden, tinker and read stories with the little kids on my front porch.  This is a nice easy time for me.  The beginning of the term means that I and the vice principle are the only ones at school for the first week or two.  So I spend most of the day in the library organizing and reading.  Hang up some more maps.  Put the encyclopedia in place.  Simple things.  I have big plans for starting a book club when the students get here.  We don't really have enough copies of any one book, so I was thinking that during lunch time I would go and read short stories to the students who want to listen.  Maybe after a week or so of this I can convince one of the students to take over.  Maybe let one of them take the book home and practice reading a few pages so they could come back the next day and read it out loud very well.  It seemed like a plan worth trying.

Unfortunately, the fun and excitement of my adventure didn't end with arriving at home safe and sound.  Our illustrious driver was hounding me for money.  I told him I didn't have any money for him and even if I did, I would expect my fuel back first.  After a few confrontations, surprisingly civil I might add, I thought it was over.  I thought he had finally given up and realized that I was not the one in the wrong.  Turns out he didn't.

Instead, he went to the local council.  The lowest/closest form of government and elected officials are the local council.  He went to them and submitted his plea.  I was informed in writing that I need to attend this meeting.  I respectfully declined because I didn't see it as being worth my time and I was advised by friends not to.  I didn't think he had any legitimate claim, which he didn't, and the case would be closed regardless. Besides, what could he do to me, send me to prison?  The headmaster (principle) of my school even scoffed at the idea of me going to the local council meeting.  I wasn't worried.  But I should have been.

This ex-friend/driver of mine was the only person in the village with a vehicle.  There is a reason he was the only person in the village with a vehicle, he is the chief's son.  More than half of the local council are his family members.  He is nothing shy of bull of the woods around here and I told him to f*** off.  Not good.  I immediately informed PC about this, being the good little PCV that I am and was told to let my headmaster handle it.  My headmaster wasn't around so the deputy went to the local council chairman instead. This is when the my lucky stars really came into help me.  It just so happens that the local council chairman was my ace in the hole that I didn't even know about.  He was too old and tired to care about what the chiefs son thought of him.  The chairman had nothing to loose in prestige or esteem as far as he was concerned.  Not only that, but it seems his family and the chiefs family had some land disputes a while back that never got settled.  So he was more than happy to help me out.  He simply refused to hear the case.  He postponed the meeting indefinitely.  Without a meeting, nothing can go on.  The police won't even do anything until the local council has had its say.  So looks like I'm safe.  I inform PC, but apparently they had also called the HM to get his $0.02 on the matter.

My HM stuck with me the whole way, but apparently something had happened between me talking to the HM and the HM talking with PC because all the sudden he was kind of worried about me.  I never did find out what exactly happened, but I think someone informed the HM of just how big of a head honcho this chief's son is.  I wasn't worried, but PC was.  I talked to my boss over the phone for a bit and convinced her to let me stay and wait this out for a little bit.  So I did.  It was awful.

In a matter of two days, I went from being the most popular guy around to being an untouchable.  When I would go to the market to get my onions, tomatoes, and cabbage, the little old ladies would all call me over to their stand so I would buy their produce.  Now, I was lucky if anyone would return my greetings.  Keep in mind, this is an African village.  Greetings here are everything.  The shortest greetings take minutes and some are an entire conversation about how everybody and everything is doing.  It is considerably rude to not greet someone and even more rude to not return a greeting.  I was being shunned.

It is really sad to know how quickly people can turn against you.  Especially when you aren't even in the wrong.  This chief's son turned the majority of the village against me in just two days.  I don't know if they knew the truth or not, though I have a feeling it wouldn't have mattered.  I know it is shallow of them, but to be honest, it was also necessary.  The village community is so tight that everyone is, in one way or another, dependent on everyone else.  To be shunned from the community means no one is going to lend you anything.  No one is going to cut you a deal on your purchases.  No one is going to buy from you.  No one is going to look out for your home or your stuff when you're gone.  No one is going to care what happens to you.  No one will visit you when you get sick.  No one is going to look out for your kids.  To be shunned is to be cut off.  To be cut off is to perish.  If anyone would have sided with me, the chief's son would have turned on them too.  They could choose what is right and side with the white guy who is going to leave in a year, or they could choose what is wrong and side with one of the most influential people in the area who they will have to deal with for the rest of their lives.  With a choice like that, I can't fault them nearly as much.  There is an African proverb that says:  "When two bulls fight, it is the grasses that suffer."  That was exactly it.  The community was going to get trampled on if me and Mr. Big Shot got into any farther than we were.

Then I got a phone call.  My boss wanted me to leave immediately.  She said I would only be gone a week while my headmaster sorted stuff out for me.  I was so furious at this time, I really wanted to get a piece of rebar and knee-cap this guy, but I didn't.  Instead I left.  My boss told me I would only be gone a week, but a week turned into two, and then a month, and then two months.  Turns out she just told me that to get me out of there as fast as possible.  My HM wasn't sorting things out for me, he called and told PC that it might not be safe for me while this issue is so tense.

So for the next two months I pretty much toured around Uganda.  I went to any official PC event we had going on.  I visited a whole lot of my fellow volunteers.  I helped out at a science day.  I answered questions at a health day.  I took down names at a clinic for people getting tested for HIV.  I went on a few hikes.  Enjoyed the fourth of July at the base of Mt. Elgon with some friends.  It actually wasn't too bad, but only because I kept thinking that I was going back home.  Turns out I wasn't.  All this time, my boss had been working on finding me a new place.  She had already made up her mind.  I had to find a new home.

...that ends well

June

So the next morning I and a couple of folks who had been at the goat roast decided to go adventuring.  After breakfast we enlisted the help of the only person in my village who has a car to drive us up into the mountains so that we can enjoy the scenery.  I offer to pay, but he insists on driving for free if I cover the gas.  So we load up, put gas in the car and away we go.  The road going up to the mountains was pretty rough, but we were able to make it.  Though, once we got up into the mountains it was a different story.  We were in an all wheel drive station wagon, but really we should have been in a hummer.  The road we absolutely ridiculous and our driver was quickly demonstrating the fact that he had not owned the car for long.  We would try to get him to stop so we could get out and push before he entered a bad spot so the car would be less likely to get stuck, but he would just gun the engine and plow right in.  Then we would get stuck and have to push him out.  This happened at least a dozen times.  We even suggested that maybe we turn around and go back, but it seems that his pride was hurt a little at the suggestion that he couldn't get us there, and we really did want to reach the valley down the other side of the mountain pass, so we pushed on.  After a lot of grunting, sweating, playing in the mud and pushing, we finally arrived.  A beautiful view of an incredibly green valley made all the struggles worth it.  Only way off in the distance could you see any sign of people.  A small hut was tucked in among the rolling hills some three or four miles away on the other side of the valley.  It was so amazing to have this little Shangrala of rolling hills, multiple little streams and waterfalls, giant mahoganies just 30 miles from me.  The rest of the landscape in my area is flat and grassy.  There are some trees, but because people cut them down for firewood, few of the trees get very big.  But here in this valley we were surrounded by a huge thick forest of giant trees, impenetrable stands of bamboo, and mountains rising up on all sides.  So we marveled and marveled.  Slowly we made our way to the village on the other side of the valley and meet Fr. Richard, a friend of mine.  We feasted on some of the largest and sweetest lemons, oranges, and mangoes I have ever had.  Even the lemons were as sweet as candy.  It was absolutely amazing, but our day light was running out, so we turned around and headed for home.

Again we played in the mud pushing and grunting, heaving and hauling, and finally made it to the apex of our mountain pass.  After this it was all down hill, but not in one day.  Our prideful driver wouldn't let us get out and guide him in a particularly narrow part of the road and we wound up in a ditch.  The car had slid off into a small stream bed that the rain had cut right along the road.  For over an hour we fought and struggled to get this car out of the stream.  Eventually we had to lift the back end of the car up, slide it onto the road and then get in front and push the car, very carefully mind you, onto the road.  If we went a little too far then we would be in the ditch on the other side of the road.  Success!  We finally got our little wagon out of the ditch and were excited to not be spending the night in the mountains in the middle of nowhere.  Or at least we thought.  The car wouldn't start.  I don't know why or how getting stuck in a ditch would cause the car to not start, but it seemed that it did.

So now what?  What could we do?  We were in the middle of the mountains, its about an hour from sun down and we have a car that won't start.  So we send the fastest of us running back to the village to ask Fr. Richard for some help.  Fortunately Fr. Richard was a little better equipped than we were and so he brought his big Land Rover to the rescue.  It was getting too late to do any repairs by the time he arrived, so he loaded us up and took us back to the mission with him.  After we got back we were offered a hot bath, dinner and clean beds.  We came to him begging like a troop of raggedy vagabonds and Fr. Richard treated us likes kings.  It was probably the best hospitality I have ever experienced in Africa.  The next morning we were treated to freshly baked bread, omelets and hot tea.  We got a few more mangoes and lemons and with a mechanic driving we headed for the car.

The car was still there in one piece, and nothing was stolen from it.  I was a little surprised but happily impressed never the less.  So with the mechanic and three engineers we were finally able to diagnose the problem.  It turns out the driver, who is openly cursing me at this point, had failed to get his gas pump repaired properly.  It seems that it had been replaced once, but the fuse that protects the gas pump had not been replaced at all, instead it had been jumped.  This of course will get you to the nearest town where you can buy a proper fuse, but unfortunately this was not the case.  Instead, the 25 cent fuse was not put in and so now the $60 pump will need to be replaced... again.  So with no chance of getting all that in the middle of the mountains, Fr. used his Land Rover to pull us to the nearest village on the other side of the mountains.  Slowly, and with a lot of jerking and stopping we finally made the 15 mile journey to the next village.  Wow, what an ordeal!  Fr. Richard couldn't take us any further as he has his own program for the day, so we pool all the money we have on us and give it to Fr. for the food, lodging, and fuel to pull us this far.  His hospitality warranted more, but that was all the money we had.  Our driver, of course, felt no need to pitch in and went so far as to demand that I pay for another tow to town where he could get the car repaired.  I wasn't so agreeable to say the least.  So with a temper high and no money, I just started walking.  Its 22 km from there to my village and I wasn't about to sit and listen to the driver piss and moan about how this was all my fault.  My friends and I walked the whole way to my village.  At some point in the trek the driver passed us on a motorcycle and took time to try and argue with me some more.  I was getting fed up to the point that I could have just about kicked his face in right there.  I wasn't the one driving, I told him to let us get out and push or turn us around and not go any further, I wasn't the one who jerry-rigged the gas pump fuse, and I wasn't the one who's pride took us all the way out to BFE in a vehicle that wasn't up to snuff.  I and my friends had already payed twice what it should cost to get his car to town and repaired and he still had all the fuel that I bought in his tank.  I couldn't comprehend how this SOB could continue to blame me for his mistakes.  But I guess logic doesn't matter, what mattered to him was that I was white and consequently rich and so obviously I should pay.  So again, I started walking, without kicking his face in.

Good God!  What an adventure!  We made it home safe and sound that night and my friends were able to go their separate ways the next morning so I guess all is well that ends well right?

First term and goat roasting - from May 2011

If memory serves me correctly, my last writings were on the adventures of Sully and Dave climbing Mt. Elgon.  If this isn't the case, then I'll let Sully post an entry on that when he gets a chance.  Regardless, I have fallen way behind.  So let me start catching up.

After Sully left at the end of January, I went back to my house to find everything in complete disarray.  Termites had made short work of big sections of my fence.  Neighbor kids broke my clay posts, goats and cattle destroyed what little greenery I might have had and somebody - according to the little boy next door - had come by during the night and tried to pick my locks.  Dang!  Can't a guy go a way for two months without everything falling apart?  So I spent the next month slowly putting things back together.

I've decided that trying to be all natural on the fence issue isn't going to work.  I was using bamboo and thorns, but that isn't holding up.  So now I'm going to try soaking the ends of the bamboo in either poison or used motor oil.  Then I'll see how that goes.  Once the bamboo is woven together it is really strong, hence why they make their houses out of it.  However, no one told me that before they coat their bamboo walls with cow shit, they also poor several gallons of poison on the bamboo and in the ground around it.  I don't know what health risks there might be in this tactic, but it does seem to work really well.  Now I just need a few hundred more pieces of bamboo and some poison.  I'll let you all know how it turns out.

Aside from the fence, March and most of April have passed without any developments at home.  At school on the other hand things went a bit south.  First, the term was supposed to begin in early February.  Most of the teachers - except me and the Deputy Principal - didn't arrive until mid February.  But then again , only a handful of students arrived as well.

Notwithstanding, by the end of February we were in full swing.  Then in the middle of March, oh beware the ides of March, we started having problems.  The trouble is definitely two fold.  First the S2 and S3 (sophomores and juniors) became "very indisciplined."  Basically, they weren't coming to class or if the did they were late, out of dress code, lazy , unresponsive, or just rude.  Try to understand that there is only one exam at the end of their senior year that determines their fate.  When you're a kid, one or two years before the most important exam of your life seems like plenty of time.  So there isn't a whole lot of reason to take classes too seriously.  Plus, they aren't S1 (freshmen) any more so they are getting a little big for their britches so to say.  Combine all of this with a few bold kids who really don't care at all and of course you are going to have problems.  The second fold is that the teachers are pretty dang lazy.  Most of the teachers didn't really want to be teachers, but if they didn't do well enough to go to university, then going to a teachers college at least buys you some time, gives you possible job options and is usually free or cheap.  So of course the teachers aren't going to show any great concern or passion for the school, students, or teaching in general.  They will , however, go to great lengths to tell you how lousy, lazy and indisciplined the students are.  So now we have poor teachers (who are paid regardless of their performance), students who are only at school as a way to get out of chores at home and parents who know nothing about it because they only made it to the 3rd grade.  KABOOM!

The explosion happened when the administration (principal) finally started coming to school and doing a decent job as opposed to doing something somewhere else.  He really turned things around on both students and staff.  Now all this time I was doing what I could to be a good example.  I took roll call, graded homework, gave weekly quizzes and called students by name.  You would think this would be good, in fact the other teachers commented that these are "serous teaching tools."  Not that any of them tried to emulate though.  But no, the students hated it.  I was making them do more work and because of my record keeping and knowing their names, I was able to hold them accountable.  Their anonymity was gone and they were really in trouble when I brought it to the attention of the principal.

So parents were called, blame was passed around like a hot potato and in the end we made a step forward but potentially two steps back.  My physics students (juniors) said I wasn't giving enough notes (they don't have text books so they really do need notes) and said I wasn't covering enough material.  What they really meant was that I wasn't giving them notes verbatim on the board for them to copy for 80 minutes and instead required them to participate.  "Teaching" means you give students notes and problems to memorize.  Anything outside of this isn't welcomed by teachers or students.

Then the students voiced complaints about other teachers not coming to class, or having the students do yard work when they didn't feel like teaching.  The parents raised a fuss that we weren't caning (beating with a slender branch) enough and the administration said the parents need to check and make sure their kids are actually studying at school by looking at the report cards.

So the solution:  I am now teaching freshmen physics, one teacher was fired as an example, four or five students were expelled as examples, and a whole slew of the others were caned by their parents right there on the spot.  One kid, rumor has it, was even arrested for stealing  because he took the money his mom gave him for school fees and went drinking instead.  That pretty much wraps up term I and the end of April.

I spend Easter in the village just north of my house.  It was nice and quiet.  People celebrated, sang, danced, and had a good time.  The next week I finally got time to go and climb the little mountain near me.  Spectacular view of an incredibly flat and vast landscape.  Plains full of grass, bush and trees.  Green and Gorgeous!  That brings me to to my next topic.

Gardening.  April had a few showers, just enough to begin swing the hoe and busting sod.  I let my hands get pretty raw before I put on the gloves Penny sent me (Thanks again Penny!).  I had to make sure I had calluses and blisters to show everyone.  Then in May, I just put in my corn and beans Mom and dad sent with Sully (thanks again Mom, Dad and Sully).  Now I'm working on my herb garden.  I've got lemon grass, ginger and basil.  I planted mint, rosemary, and chives, but it seems they didn't come up.  I'll have to try one more time.  I also gave mustard, collards, swiss chard, carrots, lettuce and beets a shot.  But I put them right before 3 days of hellacious rain.  So I think they got washed away.  Dang.  My pumpkins are looking good though.  I'll be making bies by August I hope.

Then May 10th rolled around and I had to go for PC training again.  It was only two days long, but it ate up a whole week because travel it is 2 days there and 2 days back.  Plus, I stayed an  extra day to get my mid-service medical exam done so I wouldn't have to make the 4 day travel again.  However, as much as I hate going to the capital for training, I do like seeing all of my PC friends.  Its like a reunion every time we meet up.  On top of that, a bunch of them wanted to come up to the North for a visit.  Awesome!  So I said we should have a little south of the border party at my place.  See, its a joke cause I'm right south of the Sudan border. he he :)

So I hurried home to prepare while everyone else went gallivanting here and there as they made their way north.  After a lot of hustle, hassle and harrassle, I finally got 20lbs of fruit, a 40 lbs goat (hanging weight), 35lbs of charcoal, and one case of beer.  Thanks to Papa's butcher knives (razor sharp!) I made short work of the goat.  My neighbors couldn't believe how fast  was going, then I demonstrated how sharp the knife was by shaving the hair off my arm.  Then I have the innards and head to a friend in exchange for helping me salt and stretch the hide.  The heart, liver, lungs, and kidneys I kept though and ground them up with salt, onion, garlic and chili peppers, made them into patties then breaded and deep fried them.  Oh, I made a deep frier and filled it with sunflower seed oil, most useful innovation I've made so far.  Damn were they good!

Mean while, I had a pit, a rim off a 2 ton flat bed and a load of charcoal.  I put it all together with the charcoal in the rim, and the rim in the ground.  Burn baby burn!  By the time I had the goat skinned and all the pinaable and mangoes sliced up, the fire was ready.  So I stuffed the goat carcass with fruit until he was bursting, wired him closed, wrapped him in palm leaves and threw him in the pit.  Then I covered it with more palm leaves and piled on the dirt.  That was about noon.

I spent the next six hours making guacamole, fruit salad, tortillas, beans and potatoes and straining my homemade mango wine.  A little vinigery, but good enough.  Then mop the house and by the time everyone arrived (they had to hire a flatbed truck to take them all to my place and back, some PCV and some ex-pat from Kitgum) the goat was ready to rise again!  We went to lift him out by the leg bones, but instead the leg bones just slipped right out.  So I grabbed some gloves and pulled the wires.  Again, the meat fell away and the wires pulled right out.  So we had to get the palm leaves underneath and lift.  Surprisingly, the leaves weren't burned.  We put him on the table and I ripped off a piece.  Glorious!  I couldn't believe it turned out so well.  Once the moment of truth had passed, the next two hourse was a flash of meat and beer.  Not even the bones were left on the table as people sad around gnawing on them.  Then someone brought out the guitar as the sun finally disappeared and we all proceeded to relax and have a helluva good time.  It would have lasted well into the night, but lightning was on the horizon and a lot of folks had to get the early bus the next day so we loaded them up on and said goodbye.  Three of the guests stayed behind for the night so we could go adventuring around the next morning, but that is another story.

Tune in next time for more adventures as I continue to examine life :)