Shrines and Waterfalls

Friday, September 7^th, 2007

For class on Wednesday we had a fieldtrip. We went to the shrines of the first Christian martyrs of Uganda. One of them is Catholic and the other is Anglican. The first one was the Catholics one, which had a beautiful church. There were paintings and carvings everywhere which told the story of the martyrs. The martyrs were canonized as saints. Toward the end of our visit Julie sang in the church. She sang softly, but it carried though the whole church and was beautiful because of the acoustics. Then we went to the Anglican shrine and saw the simple church that rested above the martyrs’ ashes. There was also a model (with dummies) of how the martyrs died. They were wrapped in reeds and burned. Then we saw a model of the house that the executioner would have lived in. it was a round hut made of bamboo and grass.

After we went to the shrines we saw Ssezibwa waterfalls. It was small, but pretty. We had a tour around the place and the tour guide showed us many plants that were interesting. One of them was a small plant which closed up its leaves if you touched it. Another one was called ‘kabaka njagala’ which means the king loves us. The tree grew nuts which were actually pretty good to eat. He showed us a shrine which was used by people who still practice their traditional religion. They brought coffee beans, eggs, and shells as offerings. The shells used to be the currency. They were brought by the Arabs to Uganda. The coffee beans were offered between people to make them blood brothers. The eggs were a fertility offering. There were also many small spears around the shrine.

This weekend all of us girls are breaking up into groups and going on a rural visit with our field assistants. Consequently, on Thursday after class my group went with my field assistant to town to choose gifts for the family that we will be staying with. When we got there, we decided on fabrics, but when it came to asking the men what the prices were, they were way too much. Josephats bartered with the man for about 10 minutes. We kept hearing the words ‘muzungu’ and ‘America’ which clued us girls into the fact that he was trying to rip us off because we were white. Finally, Josephats got them for the prices that we wanted. We left, but then realized that they did not write everything on the receipt. So we went back and the men weren’t there. Josephats said that he found out that those men who were trying to rip us off didn’t even work there! He said they were trying to get us to pay too much so that he could get a share of the extra money from the shop owners. Finally, when Josephats had said that we would leave without buying anything, the shop owner had intervened so that he would not interfere with their business. Argh! On one hand, it was kind of funny that the man didn’t work there, but on the other and, it was frustrating that they would exploit us like that. From now on I think I will have the guts to barter with people because I know that they will probably charge me extra just because of the color of my skin. I hate how this makes me distrust people because I so long to trust people and see the best in them. I do not want to be completely wary of people unless they prove themselves untrustworthy. But I guess this is a lesson.

Then last night, a bunch of us went to a restaurant called Caffe Roma and had pizza and gelato. It was nice to have pizza again and it was pretty good, although it could have used a little more sauce.

So this morning we are off to the villages to spend time with a family and see what life is really like in a Ugandan home. I am really excited about it and so I am sure I will have plenty to write about next time. Thanks for reading. I love you all!

Leilani