well... I just uploaded a few photos with captions from when I had some friends over to my house for lunch on our last day... I think it's pretty self-explanatory...
enjoy!
http://picasaweb.google.com/JustinStruik/DinnerWithFriendsAtMyHouseOnOurLastDay?authkey=NDlYSzr2nOU#
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
Matooke
Hey Everyone,
This is a bit of strange post, but in my search to find out if plantains and Matooke are the same thing, I found this interesting article that explains in detail the importance and preparation of Matooke in Uganda. I know some of you were probably wondering what the heck it was, and I think this will help you understand, since it is kind of hard to explain...
http://www.ugpulse.com/articles/daily/homepage.asp?ID=539
enjoy,
Justin
This is a bit of strange post, but in my search to find out if plantains and Matooke are the same thing, I found this interesting article that explains in detail the importance and preparation of Matooke in Uganda. I know some of you were probably wondering what the heck it was, and I think this will help you understand, since it is kind of hard to explain...
http://www.ugpulse.com/articles/daily/homepage.asp?ID=539
enjoy,
Justin
Friday, December 19, 2008
Home...
Hey Everyone...
I made it home yesterday... Safe and sound and a day later than planned... Our flight was late from Amsterdam and so we missed our flight out of D.C. It would have been close anyway.... but when we were late it wasn't even close... our flight got in ten minutes after our next flight was supposed to leave...
So we tried to go and get another flight, but the only one available was at Reagan(across town 40 minutes away) at 8PM , and it was 7PM when we worked this out... So, we grabbed a taxi and tried to make it... The guy had told us it was a Delta flight, but when we got there the lady said it was a Northwest flight, and NWA is in a different terminal, so we caught a bus down to the next terminal, but alas, we were too late... At this point we were tired a bit frustrated, but the NWA guy, Ben was super nice and helpful. He set us up with new flights leaving the next morning at 6:40AM to MN... Since it was a technical problem with the plane being late, they put us up in a local Hilton motel, and gave us vouchers for supper and breakfast... and we got a free shuttle to the airport... It was glorious... :)
I was able to get a good transfer flight to DSM and was home by 11:30 AM, only about 12 hours later than what I was originally supposed to, and a whole lot more rested...
So, anyways, I am home now, beginning to try to get my body to adjust back to my normal time... although my body thinks I'm still in Uganda.... ;) I'm really tired right now because it's the middle of the night there..
I've gotten most of my stuff unpacked and now it's just sorting through it all and trying to know where to put it... catching up on stuff from the last four months and trying to know where to start in telling stories...
Just like going to Uganda, the way things have been coming back different things have surprised me than what I expected. I had thought about things and different things that would surprise me, but a lot of what expected to surprise me hasn't and other things I hadn't expected, has... but that's all part of the process...
Anyways, I'm sure I'll have more to say later... if you have any questions you want to ask, just email me and maybe I can blog about it for everyone...
well... back to cleaning up...
Justin
I made it home yesterday... Safe and sound and a day later than planned... Our flight was late from Amsterdam and so we missed our flight out of D.C. It would have been close anyway.... but when we were late it wasn't even close... our flight got in ten minutes after our next flight was supposed to leave...
So we tried to go and get another flight, but the only one available was at Reagan(across town 40 minutes away) at 8PM , and it was 7PM when we worked this out... So, we grabbed a taxi and tried to make it... The guy had told us it was a Delta flight, but when we got there the lady said it was a Northwest flight, and NWA is in a different terminal, so we caught a bus down to the next terminal, but alas, we were too late... At this point we were tired a bit frustrated, but the NWA guy, Ben was super nice and helpful. He set us up with new flights leaving the next morning at 6:40AM to MN... Since it was a technical problem with the plane being late, they put us up in a local Hilton motel, and gave us vouchers for supper and breakfast... and we got a free shuttle to the airport... It was glorious... :)
I was able to get a good transfer flight to DSM and was home by 11:30 AM, only about 12 hours later than what I was originally supposed to, and a whole lot more rested...
So, anyways, I am home now, beginning to try to get my body to adjust back to my normal time... although my body thinks I'm still in Uganda.... ;) I'm really tired right now because it's the middle of the night there..
I've gotten most of my stuff unpacked and now it's just sorting through it all and trying to know where to put it... catching up on stuff from the last four months and trying to know where to start in telling stories...
Just like going to Uganda, the way things have been coming back different things have surprised me than what I expected. I had thought about things and different things that would surprise me, but a lot of what expected to surprise me hasn't and other things I hadn't expected, has... but that's all part of the process...
Anyways, I'm sure I'll have more to say later... if you have any questions you want to ask, just email me and maybe I can blog about it for everyone...
well... back to cleaning up...
Justin
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
In the Airport....
Well... We're in the Schiphol airport in Amsterdam.... I just bought 24 hours worth of Wireless connection because it made sense than just the 90 minutes... but it was 16 Euros which I think is like $32... OUCH, but oh well.... I just checked more email in like 15 minutes than it would have taken me to check the same amount in like an hour at UCU... It's kind of cold here, but not bad, there's no snow... the flight seemed to go fairly fast... which doesn't make me feel great... it is starting to feel like this whole thing is coming to an end way to fast... and I'm not ready for that...
Our flight doesn't leave till 1:20PM here, so we're going to be here for a while yet... We got in at 5:30AM....
Anyways... I think that's about all... most of you probably won't read this until I'm home... but oh well...
Justin
Our flight doesn't leave till 1:20PM here, so we're going to be here for a while yet... We got in at 5:30AM....
Anyways... I think that's about all... most of you probably won't read this until I'm home... but oh well...
Justin
Friday, December 12, 2008
Finisheding....
I know I know... terrible grammar in my title, but that's pretty much where we're at, we're finished and finishing all at once. My classes are done, I think I did about as well as I could do, all things considered, but a lot of my grades are still out there, so maybe not ;) we'll have to wait and see...
Last night we had a farewell dinner including pretty much everyone who has done anything with USP... so there were a lot of people. It was fun... I had to give a speech, it went ok, it was just short.....
Today is our last day on campus... we're cleaning up everything and trying to turn stuff in... tonight is our last night... and then we leave and go to a convent for debrief tomorrow through Tuesday... Don't know if I'll have Internet, so don't count on email or posting...
I packed last night... it was strange, I didn't feel excited, or sad, or anything, I just packed, and it was the strangest thing ever... I'm wondering when it is going to set in that I'm leaving... and that I've actually been here 4 months. There were times when it felt like forever, but right now, I'm trying to remember what I did for the last 4 months... again... strange.
Well... I have a few more things to take care of... just wanted to give you all a little update...
Justin,
P.S. Jennie, I posted ;)
Last night we had a farewell dinner including pretty much everyone who has done anything with USP... so there were a lot of people. It was fun... I had to give a speech, it went ok, it was just short.....
Today is our last day on campus... we're cleaning up everything and trying to turn stuff in... tonight is our last night... and then we leave and go to a convent for debrief tomorrow through Tuesday... Don't know if I'll have Internet, so don't count on email or posting...
I packed last night... it was strange, I didn't feel excited, or sad, or anything, I just packed, and it was the strangest thing ever... I'm wondering when it is going to set in that I'm leaving... and that I've actually been here 4 months. There were times when it felt like forever, but right now, I'm trying to remember what I did for the last 4 months... again... strange.
Well... I have a few more things to take care of... just wanted to give you all a little update...
Justin,
P.S. Jennie, I posted ;)
Tuesday, December 2, 2008
The Wedding
Hello Everyone,
So, this past weekend, one of my host-brothers, who doesn't actually live with us because he is older got married. I was able to go to this wedding, and will have much pictures and video to share with you when I get back... but until then, I will just tell you a bit about it.
Needless to say, weddings in Africa are just totally different from any American wedding. The wedding was supposed to start at 1PM, so we left the house at 12PM knowing that we wouldn't get there on time. No worries, weddings never start on time here, along with every other function. We have learned about time being centered around the event in Africa, and this was definitely a prime example. Basically the bride and groom just show up whenever they want to for the wedding, more the bride than the groom. I honestly don't understand why anyone would want to be late to their own wedding, but here that doesn't seem to matter...
Sooo... when we got to the wedding at 2PM because the traffic was bad, we were totally OK... nothing had started yet, the choir was just busy entertaining everyone.. and the sound man was busy trying to destroy all of our hearing(side note the only thing sound men know here is loud and louder, quality of the sound doesn't matter, just as long as it's loud, seriously... ) So, we sat and listened to the choir for a while until the Bride finally decided to show up at 3PM.... 2 hours after the supposed start time... The pastor was a bit peeved, which was a bit surprising, as he was hoping to be already heading to the reception by that time. The wedding finally started and parts of it were very similar to an American wedding, with the vows and such... it was just that they had so many of them. It seemed that they said the same thing 3 times, but again, repetition is the spice of life here. So, finally they were married, and we all had to go and congratulate them, and then they walked out of the church... very slowly, and took pictures... During this time we took off for the reception to wait for them. I had told our drive that we had that we would probably be done 6:30, however we didn't get to the reception till 6PM, so that was out the window.
Anyways... we waited for a while at the reception, they brought us Pop to drink, and the DJ's came and set up way too many large speakers for a small room. It is very interesting how they set up the reception. The wedding party is in the middle then on opposite sides they put the families of both the bride and the groom, kind of like a face-off of sorts... The direct families of the bride and the groom get to sit at a table on either side, so since I'm part of the family, I was there. They also have someone videotaping the entire wedding and taking pictures, so because I was at the front, I feel like I am going to be in a lot of photos and video of this wedding reception... hope they don't mind :) They videotaped us doing pretty much everything, sitting, drinking, eating, talking, pretty much everything.
Finally, the bride and groom showed up, and we all had to get up and get excited for them even though we were all super tired. My dad told me it would probably take them 5 minutes to walk from the door to the table.... and he was right. Everything that happens at the reception is done through dancing or super slow walking, there is nothing that is done with just plain walking... Once everything got started, there were like 8 different speakers they had planned to give words of encouragement to the bride and groom, which also took forever. My dad had to speak, which he wasn't even ready for, so he just made some stuff up and didn't talk very long, which was good. The emcee kept asking the DJ for "a very good number" and the DJ kept failing, which brought some humor to the night, but I feel like I was the only one who was laughing... at one point the emcee said "DJ, I have no idea what you are doing, I want a good number..."
They eventually served us food..and a lot of it.. .which was good, because we were hungry... Interestingly, they served the cake first, and the bride and groom go around and give a small piece to everyone at the reception, so you can imagine how long that took... The cake had 12 different parts, but we only ate a few of them... the rest were handed out as gifts to families and special guests....
Eventually, it was like 9PM, when we had planned to leave at 6:30 and we finally left. I was really tired, and slept part of the way home, but the traffic was thick and all the diesel smell made it hard to breathe, but somehow I slept... unintentionally.
One thing that I was particularly confused by was the seeming lack of excitement by family about the wedding... In the U.S. a family would not even think about missing a wedding, but half of my family couldn't even go because of transportation issues, and it didn't seem to bother them that much... Plus, at the wedding my family didn't seem all that excited, which I was also confused by, but maybe they just hide it well. All-in-all, it was an interesting experience and I definitely learned a lot, just not sure how to understand it all right now...
Well, I guess it's time for me to go home...
Hope all is well...
Justin
So, this past weekend, one of my host-brothers, who doesn't actually live with us because he is older got married. I was able to go to this wedding, and will have much pictures and video to share with you when I get back... but until then, I will just tell you a bit about it.
Needless to say, weddings in Africa are just totally different from any American wedding. The wedding was supposed to start at 1PM, so we left the house at 12PM knowing that we wouldn't get there on time. No worries, weddings never start on time here, along with every other function. We have learned about time being centered around the event in Africa, and this was definitely a prime example. Basically the bride and groom just show up whenever they want to for the wedding, more the bride than the groom. I honestly don't understand why anyone would want to be late to their own wedding, but here that doesn't seem to matter...
Sooo... when we got to the wedding at 2PM because the traffic was bad, we were totally OK... nothing had started yet, the choir was just busy entertaining everyone.. and the sound man was busy trying to destroy all of our hearing(side note the only thing sound men know here is loud and louder, quality of the sound doesn't matter, just as long as it's loud, seriously... ) So, we sat and listened to the choir for a while until the Bride finally decided to show up at 3PM.... 2 hours after the supposed start time... The pastor was a bit peeved, which was a bit surprising, as he was hoping to be already heading to the reception by that time. The wedding finally started and parts of it were very similar to an American wedding, with the vows and such... it was just that they had so many of them. It seemed that they said the same thing 3 times, but again, repetition is the spice of life here. So, finally they were married, and we all had to go and congratulate them, and then they walked out of the church... very slowly, and took pictures... During this time we took off for the reception to wait for them. I had told our drive that we had that we would probably be done 6:30, however we didn't get to the reception till 6PM, so that was out the window.
Anyways... we waited for a while at the reception, they brought us Pop to drink, and the DJ's came and set up way too many large speakers for a small room. It is very interesting how they set up the reception. The wedding party is in the middle then on opposite sides they put the families of both the bride and the groom, kind of like a face-off of sorts... The direct families of the bride and the groom get to sit at a table on either side, so since I'm part of the family, I was there. They also have someone videotaping the entire wedding and taking pictures, so because I was at the front, I feel like I am going to be in a lot of photos and video of this wedding reception... hope they don't mind :) They videotaped us doing pretty much everything, sitting, drinking, eating, talking, pretty much everything.
Finally, the bride and groom showed up, and we all had to get up and get excited for them even though we were all super tired. My dad told me it would probably take them 5 minutes to walk from the door to the table.... and he was right. Everything that happens at the reception is done through dancing or super slow walking, there is nothing that is done with just plain walking... Once everything got started, there were like 8 different speakers they had planned to give words of encouragement to the bride and groom, which also took forever. My dad had to speak, which he wasn't even ready for, so he just made some stuff up and didn't talk very long, which was good. The emcee kept asking the DJ for "a very good number" and the DJ kept failing, which brought some humor to the night, but I feel like I was the only one who was laughing... at one point the emcee said "DJ, I have no idea what you are doing, I want a good number..."
They eventually served us food..and a lot of it.. .which was good, because we were hungry... Interestingly, they served the cake first, and the bride and groom go around and give a small piece to everyone at the reception, so you can imagine how long that took... The cake had 12 different parts, but we only ate a few of them... the rest were handed out as gifts to families and special guests....
Eventually, it was like 9PM, when we had planned to leave at 6:30 and we finally left. I was really tired, and slept part of the way home, but the traffic was thick and all the diesel smell made it hard to breathe, but somehow I slept... unintentionally.
One thing that I was particularly confused by was the seeming lack of excitement by family about the wedding... In the U.S. a family would not even think about missing a wedding, but half of my family couldn't even go because of transportation issues, and it didn't seem to bother them that much... Plus, at the wedding my family didn't seem all that excited, which I was also confused by, but maybe they just hide it well. All-in-all, it was an interesting experience and I definitely learned a lot, just not sure how to understand it all right now...
Well, I guess it's time for me to go home...
Hope all is well...
Justin
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