Hi Everyone!

I imagine you are all getting into the Christmas Spirit over n the UK? Here in Uganda the sun is blazing down and no one has even mentioned Christmas yet. The Ugandans do celebrate Christmas if they are of Christian faith, but they don’t really think about it until a few days before, other than making plans to meet with family.

It is now only 8 days until I leave Uganda and head back to Tanzania to see some friends who live there and visit their pineapple juice factory! It is the end of the school year here, so this week the children have been doing end of year exams. Then they will be on school break from December 5th to February 5th. You are probably thinking “wow! a 2 month holiday!?”, but for many of the children this break from school will mean working very hard to harvest crops and help their families with farming. Of course they will have some time to play, relax and visit family and friends, but December to February is a very busy time for Ugandans. Uganda is an agricultural country, so the majority of people here earn their living from growing and selling crops, they also grow food to feed themselves.

The past few weeks I have been assessing schools, which has not been an easy task. The good news is that the 8 schools I have been working with have all done well, so it has been great to see them and celebrate with them 🙂

Last weekend my friends and I visited Murchison Falls Park. We took a boat cruise on The Nile River and saw lots of hippopotamuses and even a Nile Crocodile! Then we trekked to the top of a waterfall, it was wonderful, especially because there were many rainbows where the sun met the spray from the waterfalls. At night we stayed in a Banda, which is a traditional mud hut. There were lots of creepy crawlies, so I kept my mosquito net tucked in tight! At 5am on the Sunday morning, we got up for an early breakfast then crossed the Nile into the Game Park. Once we arrived, we did a 4 hour Game drive. This is when you travel in a van or jeep and try to spot the wild animals. We were very lucky and spotted water buffalo, giraffe, a lion, many prey animals and even a herd of elephants! I was nervous, yet excited to be so close to real, wild animals. Luckily the lion was very relaxed and not too interested in trying to eat us for his breakfast…

So, my African Adventure is nearly over, and it has been a truly wonderful experience. I look forward to talking to you about it when I get back to Brecknock. I will be in school on the last day of term, so if you see me, come and say ‘hello’ or ‘oli ota’, which is what they say here 🙂

Bye bye and see you soon!

Beth