The Construction Worker Named Becky

Today I have been in Uganda for almost a full month. In addition to teaching, I have been working on Construction Projects around the clinic. Since school ended for summer holiday on August 15^th I have been only working on construction projects around the clinic. First, we finished stacking the bricks and estimate that there are about 8,000. In addition we have taken many of the broken bricks to the road in wheelbarrows to fill in all of the pot wholes. The road looks marvelous. Second we dug out the laboratory building that is currently under construction. This meant we had to dig up the dirt that had gathered over the past four months from around the building itself. In addition, we removed about four inches of dirt and broken bricks from each room inside the building. All of this dirt was wheelbarrowed all over the clinic’s compound and any broken rocks or bricks were separated out and taken to the road. The laboratory is now ready to have its concrete floors put in. Phew! That took a lot of work. It was very hard, but I think I held up beautifully, and I am able to take more and more dirt in my wheelbarrow every day. I don’t think, however, that I will ever be as strong as Hudson. We have nicknamed him the machine for good reason. The other day Fortunate (John’s sister who lives in Kampala but is on summer holiday and staying at her father’s house in what is commonly called “The Village”) helped us work. It was comforting to find out that I can take just as much dirt in my wheelbarrow as she can J.

I really like Fortunate. She is one of the interpreters hired when the medical missions come. Unlike Susan she is not shy and therefore talks to me a lot. It is nice to have some female company. In addition she is very independent. She lives in Kampala and works as a secretary.

I decided that I needed another skirt. I only brought two and although women in the cities wear pants, women in the villages only wear skirts. Therefore, my two are getting quite a lot of use. On Thursday the 21^st, Hudson, Francis, Fortunate, Steve, and I all went to the biweekly market about half a mile from Engeye to purchase a skirt. The market is held in a large field about the size of a soccer field. The vendors split themselves up by genre. For example, all of the dried fish vendors were in one section, which was surprisingly popular considering the smell. Francis, Fortunate, and I split off to go find a skirt. This was relatively easy. We found a plain black knee length skirt in no time. Then we bargained. Seeing me, the man asked for 20,000 USh. Francis looked aghast, remember 20,000 USh is 12 US dollars. We then walked away and the man brought his price down to 9,000 USh, much better. However, when we tried to pay with a 10,000 USh note he refused to give us change. This happens a lot. And I plan to go to Barkley’s Bank next time we are in Masaka and load up on 500 shilling coins. So I got the skirt for 10,000 USh or 6 US dollars. After buying the skirt we ran into Steve who was looking for an extra paraffin bag for Hudson. Hudson had decided to buy us some pork.

So we all went to find Hudson in the red meat section. We found him next to a shack made of bricks and aluminum roofing with wooden rafters placed along the ceiling. From the wooden rafters hung, hug pieces of very fatty pork and a scale. The vendor was cutting off large chunks of meet, weighing them and then throwing the pieces on the floor covered in banana leaves. He then chopped the pieces he threw on the floor against a log and unceremoniously popped them into a black paraffin bag provide by the customer. Hudson got two kilos of beef for 3000 USh and we headed home. Back at Engeye Fortunate prepared the pork. I’m not sure how she prepared it, but she managed to burn off most of the fat. Steve and I were given some to eat with our dinner. Although it was much fattier than we are used to I did not think it was bad at all.