I've just got 6 days left until I leave for Uganda! Yesterday, I even found my Ugandan sim card that I used 5 years ago on my first trip there. I liked my attitude from back then, why throw something away when you're definitely going to use it again! The eternal optimist :)

This trip is just 4 weeks, and it's half work and half play. I'm doing a study for my degree in international health. I'm very excited for it, although preparing for a study in a foreign country, where participants might not even speak English, is quite daunting. I like the challenge though, it's why I picked this course. I hope that I will do this study justice, and that the results can be used to the benefit of the specific community I am focussed on. That's the aim in research anyway. To ask questions in a safe environment. Put simply.

There is one thing I'm not looking forward to though. The clothes! Uganda recently passed a bill banning skirts above the knee. Women aren't allowed to wear shorts either. So my hopes for bronzed pins are dashed. I have one strand of hope, however. There is a pool at my accommodation - a cheap hotel or a posh hostel, take your pick - and I hope that this will be a safe haven where I will be able to pick up some rays without insulting anybody.

I'm so incredibly disorganised. 2 days ago I was skyping my friend and she was asking me about my flight details. Apparently I'm meant to know which Heathrow terminal I leave from? I don't. Apparently I'm meant to tell my bank I'm going to be using my card abroad. I haven't. There are lots of other things I am meant to have done, but haven't. Has anyone heard the phrase: failing to prepare is preparing to fail?

I can prepare for a 4 week trip in 6 days, can't I?

 

Zeke's present's have all arrived! I'm so excited to see him again. The last time I was in Uganda I worked with Watoto Childcare Ministries at their Baby Home in Kampala. I met Zeke there when he was one and a half years old. His story, however, is not mine to tell. He's going to be 6 now! I'm not sure how I'm going to take a walking, talking Zeke! I'm bringing games and books so hopefully we can have non-awkward times. I've definitely decided against being that adult who, when you were a kid, attacked you hugs and told you how much you've grown. Like, who are you exactly? And can you get away from me please. Exactly. That's what's not going to happen with Zeke. Hopefully. If I don't burst out crying!