The craziest weekend of my life.

This weekend was crazy. I had planned to write a bit about the Trade Fair before I talked about the circumcision. I still will, but after the past two days what happened at the trade fair, just seems like so much less of a big deal.

Right after class on Friday a group of us headed out to Kampala. There is a trade fair once a year with all sorts of fun stuff. I was able to get a lot of my presents for people. I still have some more I am working on for family, and a few more things I want for myself – of course haha – but I was able to get a lot of what I needed. Trying to get into the trade fair was insane. There were huge lines of people. It is an all week event, but apparently the President was there that day so it was even crazier than a normal day. People were pushing and shoving like crazy. This is a place where people really do not understand what I line means, and it becomes even more apparent as I was shoved everywhere. Trying to get through the doors was even worse. Our group was all shoved practically on top of each other and people we did not know. I thought at one point I was going to get torn in half as men were shoving past us and I was caught between a bar and air. I was being pulled in different directions.

We finally got in and the security guards wanted to take our cameras – and there was NO way I was giving these guys my camera. They finally got sick of us I think, and told us to go stand somewhere. So we did for about a second, then just left. We found out later from a Ugandan friend, they it was because the President was there so they did not want photos taken. We just kept them in our bags.

Shopping was a lot of fun. I would love to list all the cool things I got, but that would ruin Christmas! But we had a great time, and I am quite glad we got to go.

The rest of this weekend was… well an experience. Eight o’clock Saturday morning almost all of us loaded into our bus. It was field trip time for my African Traditional Religions class. I have to say, none of it really went as planned for them, or expected for us. And I am not going to go into detail about everything, because I do not feel as though it all needs to be said over my blog.

We drove about three hours and got to Mbale. We were shown to our various rooms, and the two bathrooms for all about 35 of us. Then we had tea. A speaker came to talk to us about circumcision, the African culture regarding it, and how Christianity now fits into it. He was a little hard to understand, but we got the gist of it all. They we had lunch, and got back in the bus to head out.

We had to drive about an hour to get to the site. My professor was worried, cause we were late, but since it had rained everything was delayed. However the rain also provided us with probably the most Africa experience ever, that many people were expecting their days to be like here.

We were in a VERY rural setting, and therefore, all dirt roads. Well, when it pours and pours and pours, dirt roads turn into mud roads, which also means our bus cannot drive down them. So we walked about 2 miles to get to our place in the mud. I have to say, that mud walk was probably the best part of the trip – maybe even of our time it Africa. It was insane but so much fun.

We were so gross. I ended up taking my shoes off cause I was sliding SO much. I could hardly walk. Then we had been told to wear skirts, so I am in a floor length skirt that I have now rolled up. We stopped after a little bit and our guide got someone to give us sugar cane. We must have been such a site. If you have never had sugar cane, you have to peel it before you eat it. But you have to use your teeth to pull the outer layer off, and they bit off pieces of sugar cane. And you do not actually eat the sugar cane. You basically bite and suck the juice out of it, then spit the rest of it out. It is so good though.

We had to of looked crazy. All the Africans were laughing and following us. Every time one of us fell they thought it was the funniest thing that they had ever seen. For at least an hour this went on. I can only imagine what 35 Mzungus looked like walking down the mud path ripping pieces of sugar cane and spitting them…

Then it got even better. We went off the dirt road into a weird like field/grass/dirt jungle something. I am not even sure. Then even better, we had to cross a bridge. Well not a bridge… The ‘bridge’ consisted of a two by four. And keep in mind, it is muddy and wet and gross. So the two by four is ALSO covered in mud. I was so thankful for one of my guy friends. I was like great I’m gonna die, and he just kept going its ok you can do it, until I got across. We went up and down hills, crossed another two by four – this one had ridges in it, that I tried to walk in to keep from falling.

We finally got to our destination. I finished eating my sugar cane, and I have mud up to my knees at this point, all over my skirt and hands. Then I am sticky from my wonderous sugar cane. A man came around with water and a bucket that we washed out hands in. My feet and shoes were so caked in mud, I could not of physically put my shoes back on if I had desired to.

I am not going to really talk about the circumcision a lot, just because I do not want to gross anyone out. If you want to know more, please just shoot me an email and I can explain their rituals and what happened that I saw as best I can to you.

The whole village was there though. It is really a community thing. And it only happens every two years, so the boys are about 15 when it happens, and it was what symbolizes their becoming a man. They cannot get married, until this happens, and apparently girls will not marry a ‘man’ if he is not circumcised, because in this culture it means that they are still a boy – forever. It is hard for me to really wrap my head around because if the boy flinches or moves he shames himself and his family for life. Everything about the entity of his life rests on this one event.

One funny story from it however – one of the girls had scratched her face not realizing that she had mud on her hand. So she had a big streak across her face. So then she put her hand on another girls face. The Africans in one of the lull periods thought that this was a great idea. So he decided that he should take mud off of his boot and touch us all to get mud on us. So I ended up with mud on my face, neck and chest. And it did not happen all at once. No, he put some on me then apparently that was not enough and needed to come add some to me. It was so crazy we were all such a mess.

That is all I am going to say for now. I am not sure what all would and would not e appropriate for this, so again, if you want to know more just send me an email and I’ll tell you the long version…

Well about this time, we are reaching sunset. Almost. So the trek back begins. However the probably 400 – at least – villagers are also walking back. The laughter at the white kids begins again as we all slip and slide. I only had to cross one bridge this time as we went around another by jumping the creek at a different part. It was such a crazy walk. I did make it the whole way without falling though.

On the walk back it began to rain. On a really bright side, we saw one of the prettiest sunsets ever. And it was pretty cool to see it and lightening all at once. Some of us got picked up by the van which may or may not of been a good choice. Riding back was literally like a theme park ride. Someone compared it to the Indiana Jones ride, which was pretty much perfect. It was too bad we did not have a jeep cause that would have made it all the more better. The roads were still muddy and a taxi was in front of us (taxis here are vans) swerving all around. He got stuck for a second so our driver sped past him. Have you ever hydroplaned on ice? Well, that is what this was like, but with mud. We were all over the road, it was SO crazy.

We got back to the bus safe and sound with so many great stories to tell. We drove our hour back to the place we were staying, all of us literally covered and caked in mud. When we got back it was pitch dark and we were shown to a spigot to rinse off our feet. Some of by that point did not even realize that it was raining from how wet we already were to the spigot drenching us. A few of us pretty much just stood there and washed everyone’s feet and legs since that seemed to be the most effective way to go about it. Then we sat and washed all the shoes, each of which took quite awhile as they were also caked in mud.

Our group leaders did apologize for some of the conditions of the day, as it is not really in the programs plan to have some of the stuff that happened happen. However, at the end of the day we all had a good time, at least on the walks, and it is an experience I will never forget. I am really glad we got to experience everything that happened. It really gave us a lot more exposure to African culture, and I feel like I learned a lot. It was a moment I will surely value, if only for the experiences we got from it.