White-lips: not for the squeamish

The other evening Godfry, our night guard, found a snake (white lips) while cutting the grass...so Josh our office snake expert was called out - and brought the wee snake back into the office for us to see. The first live snake I've seen here. It turned into an interesting experience when (after Josh loosened his hold a little, thinking that the snake might have settled and gotten used to him a bit) it whipped round and bit him...and proceeded to try and eat his finger - about a centimetre or two of Josh's finger actually disappeared down the snake's neck/body before he managed to extract it. He was left with 3 puncture marks on his finger (the snake has 2 fangs and sticks one in at a time, swivelling on that one to stick the next one in further up the victim, this is how it swallows food/pushes it down it's gullet) though he says he felt the fangs go in four times in total (we heard an "OW!" for each time it went in..). This picture that Josh insisted I take is just as the snake is being removed/pulled off - it still has one fang embedded in Josh's finger...



Later, Josh found a toad on the grass outside, so he caught it and fed it to the snake (which he'd kept in a large box). That was also interesting...the snake wasn't hungry at first, and the toad was hopping around on top of it and it almost looked like the snake was scared of the toad. Hmm. But then the snake got interested (with a bit of help from Josh poking the toad to make it jump more) and started striking at the toad...and finally attacked and half-swallowed it before I unfortunately knocked the box, scaring it into regurgitating a still live toad, which proceeded to hop around some more. The snake finally ate the entire toad, which was a relief as the toad was bleeding and in need of some mercy...(!) Here's some pics of that...


The snake and toad appear to be having a 'friendly' chat...this is after the snake half-ate the toad...


Whoops, half the toad's gone now...


Just the legs left to eat now - a French delicacy...


A happy snake - with a tell-tale bulge to show the location of the toad...

For those of you who've been wondering - Josh is still alive - White-lips' venom is not fatal to humans (unless you happen to be seriously allergic to it, which I think we may conclude that Josh is not). :o)

Some photos of Muyenga/Namuwongo

So, Trish and I walked to the Tuesday market at Namuwongo yesterday (about 10 minutes from eMi house) and I took my camera with me - so here's some pics. I've included a couple in my Sept newsletter, but didn't want to make the file size too big, so the rest of the pics are here... We took a shortcut down a path, past some compounds (surrounded with very rusty corrugated iron) and a small girl (maybe about 2years old) stared at us with round eyes, cried out 'Muzungu!' (which means 'white person' in Luganda) and promptly fell over. Aww...


This is the afore-mentioned potholed road - you can see patches of original tarmac and the rest is just dirt road and holes! An ordinary car would struggle to get through this - most vehicles around here are 4 wheel drive. A journey here is very bumpy - frequently when travelling by matatu (minibus taxi - a hiace) I've bounced so hard going over a pothole that I've hit the ceiling and crunched my neck - rather painful!

This is the Tuesday market at Namuwongo: every Tuesday lots of people will turn up and set up their wares all around the regular market, and along the railway line at the back - here you can see the railway line running through the middle of the picture. Just after I took the picture, people started scrambling around, pulling their wares off the line - presumably a train was coming, though we didn't hang around to see it...

There are several types of shops/stalls. This is one that is very common, you find them at frequent intervals at the side of the road, they seem to be family concerns, and will sell mostly fruit (pineapple, bananas, watermelon and avocado are the ones in season right now), and sometimes veg like tomatoes, onions and peppers.

A particularly ramshackle hut!

These shops are a little more upmarket. They sell all kind of local things: beans, matooke (green bananas), posho (ground maize), and even things like tinned jam, margarine, bottled fizzy drinks and airtime cards (for topping up pay-as-you-go mobiles).

And finally, here's the house where I'm living. This is a big two-storey house with an apartment on each floor. Upstairs is the office and a small apartment for Janet (long-term staff) and downstairs is a dining room, kitchen and lounge and an apartment for the Hoyt family (also long term staff). The interns live in what was servants quarters round the back. Quite basic - a row of rooms opening onto a verandah - so to go to the toilet in the night you have to unlock your door, go outside on to the verandah, walk along to the toilet...in the dark...and back again. We have a night guard and the walls are topped with masses of razor-wire so it's perfectly safe, but in the dark, and with all the LRA stories from that day's newspaper fresh in your mind it's easy for your imagination to go a little crazy...if you let it...

A few hasty words...

For those of you who've been checking my blogspot in the hope that I might have posted some photos - I'm sorry, I haven't got around to taking many yet! I'm planning to get some off the other interns at eMi, who've all been snapping away left right and centre. I also plan to take my camera around with me more now, as I think it's about time I got some pics of my own to stick up here - I want to show you how bad some of the roads are round here, especially right near our compound! The people here are so friendly and cheerful - and hassling is minimal/non-existent compared to what we experienced in Gambia and Morocco! In many ways it's not so very different from the other parts of Africa I've been to, so I haven't found the transition too hard or striking, as many of the differences are what I've been expecting. It's been interesting reading the blogs of the other interns and talking to them (none of them have been in Africa before) and seeing it again through their eyes, realising just what the differences are between the US/UK and here! I'm hoping to send out a newsletter before too long, sometime this week, just to let people know I arrived safely (nearly two weeks ago!) and tell you a bit about what I've been doing so far, and what I'll be doing in my next few weeks and months. For the moment, in summary: it's been quite a rollercoaster-ride emotionally, especially in the first few days when I was so tired, but overall I've been having a great time; we went white-water rafting on my first Saturday here, and that was awesome - can't wait to go again! - I've been to a couple of different churches here, but will visit a few more before making a decision on any; I got lost walking back from the local market (I still can't believe I managed to get lost - it was such a simple route!!) and had to phone Josh for a ride home; and my knuckles are sore from spending two hours scrubbing and rinsing all my laundry (and slipping over on the wet concrete a few times) yesterday! Well, I'll try and get those pictures up soon... :o) xx