Home Street Home

February has been one of the most hectic months we’ve had out in Uganda. And unfortunately Nathan had malaria for part of it. He’s now fully recovered but not nice at the time. We knew something wasn’t right when he started wrapping himself in as many clothes as he could get his hands on; he was freezing despite the temperature being close to 30°C. Thanks to everyone who called, left messages or sent out chocolate for him- always the best medicine, I don’t care what the doctors say!

Last weekend was a big celebration of The Tigers Club Project being a registered charity in Uganda for 10 years. The boys at Tudabujja worked with a cultural organisation to create a play. They began by telling their individual stories to the team who then created one story which was creatively told by the boys using drama, dance and music. The result, Home Street Home, was amazing. The current boys are an incredibly talented bunch and were able to portray funny moments and dreadful times in a really moving but entertaining way. We were so proud! The boys absolutely loved doing it and the response was excellent. Two international schools have asked us to take it to them next week and many more people have renewed or begun supporting Retrak in Uganda. Another memory for the boys was the excitement of being able to drink as many fizzy drinks as they liked for the days of the show as Coca Cola had sponsored the event! Not so healthy but lots of fun! To top it all off, the show received a dazzling review in the local rag, The New Vision.

This last week has been really interesting. 3 candidates for the post of Retrak CEO visited the Tigers Club. Nathan and I were part of the assessment activities lined up for them. Everyone will really miss Andy, our current CEO who was key in the development of Tigers then Retrak, but the candidates were great so we know there’ll be a great new person to lead Retrak into the next exciting stage.

We also had 2 visitors staying with us who are interested in taking over from us when we leave. It really made me realise just how little time we have left here. Only 4 months to go!! How time flies. It’s going to be incredibly hard to leave, especially for me as I don’t have anything lined up job-wise yet. Nathan is really excited about starting his course though, and we have a house sorted out in Oxford. It’ll be great to see all our friends and family again, especially our nephew Ben.

Lots of people have suddenly realised that this means there’s not much time left for free accommodation in Uganda (!) so between now and the time we leave we’re almost fully booked. It means the rest of our time in Uganda is busy and fun, so not much time for getting depressed about leaving behind the fab people and glorious sunshine of Uganda.