A few generic questions I was asked I thought I'd throw out for everyone, as there's probably some general interest. Food here is horrible. We all do our best to escape it. Breakfast is cold, stale bread and an egg or two, fried or boiled. I am now able to get toast easily where I stay, and peanut butter and tea. They have tea plantations everywhere but getting a cup of tea is no mean feat!
Lunch is some combination of matooke or rice with beans or g-nut sauce. Matooke tastes kinda like potatoes, a bit sour but not too bad. G-nuts are like peanuts, for the most part, so g-nut sauce is kinda like a thin peanut sauce, without the varied taste. I described the meals as bland and they just don't stop, which everyone agreed with, there's no spice and no variety, which is hard to understand. Its a tropical heaven in many ways, warm and wet, things must grow like weeds, you could probably plant basil and never run out here, but they don't. So we go to the muzungu restaurants and get chips and sandwiches. They do have one redeaming thing, alleymeat, basically kebabs of chicken or goat (not tender cuts, stringy and boney) which are quite tasty, and sold with alley deep fried chips. Not too shabby.
The locals are great here. Most everyone I have met has been very friendly, people on the road will wave a hello (here its how are you, which is the translation of their greeting, they don't have a "hello") kids are always calling out hello. The hospital is a catholic run hospital and the nuns run around in their full habit, and some are nurses, some in administration, others floating etc. The docs have been very friendly to me, and the nurses when they come on the ward always greet with a smile and "Hello Dr". Of course its pretty laid back too. No one runs. Ever. Which can be frustrating, but its how they do it. I've really been amazed at how friendly everyone is. I even got to go over to the convent to watch a movie with the nuns last week! It was "Our Lady of Fatima" which was followed by "Miss Congeniality" but I couldn't make it through a poorly copied, black and white version of a Sandra Bullock movie. We had juice and tea
and little pastry things (quite tasteless actually) with the movies and a great time. They had the most hilarious reactions, and would start cheering when everyone said the Hail Mary together, or hissing
at someone blaspheming etc.
I'm staying in a nice little hostel. Its St Joeseph's Hotel, right across from the hospital. I have a room with a bed, mosquito netting and enough room for a tiny desk beside it. But the batthrooms are clean, I think they clean them 3 times/day, and the people are very friendly. The Drs all live on the compound of the hospital, pretty basic accomodations but again, clean and solid. Concrete floors, simple kitchen, but its kinda the right style for the weather here, its hot and the houses stay coolish, and they protect from rain. What more do you want? The locals live in everything from apartments to shantys with thatched rooves, or maybe a bit of corrugated iron. But they live in the tropics and that really does work as housing,
although I think they'd prefer a bit more.
So that's the generic stuff. Cheers.