Eat, Pray, Peace Corps: Mukurike Omwaka!

Mukurike Omwaka means happy new year to you all! New Year's Day and the days following, everywhere you go people were saying this, with smiles on their faces hopeful for a good new year! I was very lucky to have my first visitor here to Uganda, my good friend Anna, who spent the end of 2014 and the start of 2015 with me! We became friends and bonded, as she always tells people, while changing the diaper of one of our patients..lol. She was a nurse at cottage hospital when I worked there and we became good friends!

So, she arrived before Christmas and spent two weeks here in Uganda celebrating Christmas and New Years with me. It was so exciting to have a visitor, while at the same time stressful having to deal with all the frustrations of Uganda.....I wouldn't say this is a place on the top of the list to vacation! We began the two weeks with a safari in Murchison Falls, my first safari! My friend Jen, who is also a PCV came with us and we were put in a group with 3 others for the 3 day trip. As we made our journey first to see the waterfalls, the safari van overheated and who else knows what was wrong with it! We sat at a gas station in the burning heat for an hour, waiting as our driver kept reassuring us with a smile on his face, "everything is fine!" They always say that! As we sat there I was angry, we had spent a lot of money for this safari...thinking back, why was I surprised? It would've been a miracle for nothing to have gone wrong. I continually have to remind myself...Chelsea you're in uganda! Luckily we made it to the falls and spent the night at the rest camp near the Nile in big tents supplied with beds. There were warthogs all around the camp, staying busy getting into trash cans and looking for food. At night there were hippos that would come from the water to graze in the camp! In the middle of the night there was one right outside our tent chomping away on the grass! We did a 4 hour game drive and a cruise on the Nile river seeing elephants, a crocodile, Uganda kobs, jackson's hartebeest, cape buffalos, hippos, giraffes, hyenas, baboons and many birds. Unfortunately no lions or leopards :(

From murchison, we headed back to Kampala and spent a few days relaxing at my site in Kitanga. We then traveled to the other side of the country to Jinja in the east, and celebrated New Year's Eve with some other PCVs. Early morning on the 2nd I was sad to say goodbye but also ready to be done traveling for awhile and be back at my site!

2014 was filled with lots of happiness, excitement, new beginnings, as well as lots of frustrations. I am looking forward to what 2015 will bring and am hopeful to begin many new projects in my community!