I found myself thinking today, as I was walking home from a meeting, how many colors of green there are here. It's not the forest primeval or the most lush place in the world, but it is different than what I have seen before, and so I notice. Bukoba is settled in a deep valley that feeds into the lake, so it's green everywhere you look.

I also notice bird life. Like, crazy birds! There are ibis all over the place - the Bukoba version of crows, really - and then pelicans from the lake roosting on the scaffolding of the cathedral renovations. Tiny, tiny little birds that build round nests that hang in the fronds of the low-growing palm trees. Cormorants on the water, too, and hawks or kites of some sort.

Today between meetings I walked around the market and found banana seller central. Here, green banana functions like potato, or cassava, or rice - your basic starch. The central open space in the market is the banana market. Big huge bunches all together, 4 feet long and very wide. There will be photos.

I also saw three little boys running along with tire innertubes and tires -- like the shots you'd see of 19th century New York, stick ball and the like. The littlest one had the biggest tire, but they were having a blast.* I realized that that's kind of an indicator for me of how safe a place is -- do the kids play outside? I get attention and hello's here, but the people who talk to me are mostly schoolkids, curious tween girls, and people in shops, rather than the random "hey sweetheart" of Dar. Dar is friendly in an urban way, bustling, but Bukoba is just a completely different world, at least in terms of the town. And a fraction of the size, admittedly. Here, I feel like a curiosity sometimes - kids whisper or call out "mzungu!" and one touched me lightly on the arm as I passed today - whereas in Dar, just sort of a tolerated interloper.

Tomorrow is field work day two - Father Indispensible** and I going to a village called Kigarama close to the Uganda border, about 45 km away. There is a Catholic parish nearby and a Lutheran parish in the village, and a hundred years ago, it was the chief sleeping sickness camp in the area and the main research site on Lake Victoria. Every constituency involved has a different story of why they were working there, how the diseases came there, who decided to treat the sick. Suffice it to say, I am STOKED. We leave at 8 am.

Oh, and the bishop was awesome. Friendly and unpretentious and full of information. There is another bishop in Dar who has done some of the same research as I have, and so that's an appointment I'm looking forward to as well.




* take note, dear ones with kids, that every kid I see makes me realize how long it has been since I've seen my kidlets, the kids of my friends, children of the people on my street, my pharmacist, whatever. I miss you all.

** not his real name, but apt enough.