Back in Uganda

Hello alllll and Happy (belated) Valentine's Day,

I am officially back in Uganda as of last Sunday, Feb 8th. I will be here this time until early June. I am excited to be back. It was great to see as many of you as I did while I was home. To those of you I didn't get to see, I hope all is well and expect to see you sometime this summer. First things first, if you didn't notice on the right side of the page there is a slideshow of some pictures! I was finally able to get that to work. So please enjoy. Here is a link to my Picasa web gallery (http://picasaweb.google.com/Josh.Kahane). This is where I will keep any albums I am able to post. If there are any requests for pictures, feel free to write a comment on the blog or send me an email and I will try to get some pics up.

Anyway, I am back to help implement the studies I was working on before. The approval process is underway, and now we need to get things in place. I will be responsible for helping to set up the necessary technology as well as help train the local staff and doctors. I am excited to get things moving, but so far things have been a bit slow. The test wireless device I was sent over with hasn't been working and the integrated voice response (IVR) project is moving slowly as the company we were working with in the States, has been slow to provide us with the assistance we need. I will also be putting together a business proposal for Mass General Hospital and the Uganda Research Initiative because MGH has fronted the money to lease a guest house here in Mbarara. I will be speaking with the head of URI and people at MGH to figure out the best way to run a guest house and hopefully make it profitable for URI.

It is good to be back. It was a little weird because I didn't expect to be so comfortable getting back. Everything was already familiar. It felt just like a brief holiday away. I immediately went out to dinner for some delicious roasted goat at Lord's Bar with Brian, Connor, Annie, and Jacquelyn (Connor gf who is visiting). It was great to be back and hanging out with them again. It was also great to see my co-workers and Ugandan friends as well as some of the other docs and American friends I became close with.

On Wednesday I got a call from Brian telling me that they just bought two baby goats. It wasn't until Friday that I got to check them out, but Brian, Annie, and Connor then had two baby goats (Thelma and Louise) they were bottle feeding and letting roam around their compound. Thelma wasn't able to "bah" so well, it sounded more like some sort of sick bird. They wouldn't let me too close to the goats for a while because of my slaughtering experience. But soon they realized I wasn't actually going to try to slaughter their baby goats, they don't have enough meat on them yet...

Thursday night I discovered that one of my friends, Dean (American), has decided to run a pizzeria out of his apartment on Thursday nights. He ended up making 24 pizzas out of his 6x6 kitchen for all our friends. About 15 of us all ate, drank, and listened to Dean play guitar together. It was a good way to celebrate my being back. Dean also needed to practice because he got himself a music gig at Lakeview Hotel for Valentine's Day. He thought it was going to just be a small thing, but then found out they were advertising it all over the radio. I wasn't able to go to the show, but it sounded like it went well.

This past weekend, Brian, Connor, Annie, Jacquelyn and I all went to Lake Mburo NP to go camping for a night. Unfortunately, we got a little delayed because one of the goats got really sick. Thelma woke up Saturday morning and wasn't able to walk or hold her own head up. After trying to feed her milk, ORS (oral rehydration solution), walking around town asking for help, and taking her to the Vet, Thelma passed away. All of the Ugandans were surprised that Annie was especially sad, because the goat only cost them 20,000 shs (10 bucks) and was so young. It was interesting to really witness this because it seems like it should be such a sad thing, but it is just far too common and inconsequential for people here to really worry about. On a brighter note, Louise has benefitted from the extra attention and is fattening up quite nicely. I was even allowed to feed her last night.

We spent the night camping right on the shore of Lake Mburo. We had a good time lighting a camp fire and drinking some boxed wine to celebrate Valentine's Day. The next morning we woke up and went on a nature walk that didn't really end up being very exciting. We didn't get to see many animals by the lake side because it is the rainy season and the animals had all moved inland. However, we then went on a game drive and saw a whole bunch of Zebras. Lake Mburo is the only place in Uganda that has Zebras. It also had been without Lions for a long time because during the Idi Amin era, they were all hunted. However, within the past month, there have been a couple viewings of a small pride of Lions. This has spooked a lot of the animals that seemed to still be far more comfortable with the car approaching them than in the other game parks.

Anyway, it was a good first weekend back and I am looking forward to what's to come (trip to Rwanda, trip to Murchinson Falls, and possibly a trip to Tanzania).