Lugazi: noun the most beautiful place on earth

I lied. I thought that Mukono was the most beautiful place every, but when we arrived to our house in Lugazi, I discovered that it was more beautiful! It is a much smaller town than Mukono and so it feel a little more relaxed since there are less things going on. But we live in a village called Nakasade and we are literally in a village. It is amazing! There are goats, chickens, cows all just running around with a ton of kids. The roads are all like little trails and when the Muzungo's (us) walk down the road for any reason, it is like a parade! Everyone comes out of their houses and yells to us or the children run up and grab your hands. Once we arrived at our house, we did a lot of cleaning to get everything set up. It is actually brand new, although you would never know it. We also were able to go to a restaurant for the first time, called the Patron. They gave us the VIP room and were so kind to us. I ordered fish and chips because I heard that it was good! I was suprised however when they literally brought me a whole fish, bones, scales, eyeballs, and all! People were eating their fins and I could hear them crunching. . . . but I did finally get the guts to pull off the fins and eat some! It actually wasn't bad at all! On sunday we had an amazing experience because we were able to travel to JInja to go to the branch there. I have never felt the Spirit like I did there. It was a beautiful building and they left all the doors open so throughout the meeting, you could hear tropical birds in the background and roosters crowing. IT was also amazing to talk to the missionaries who were there. Some of them were at BYU! We also had the opportunity to go to Young Womens. It was awesome! We had a lesson about family history and they took it from a different angle than we would in the states. I learned that each person in ugand belongs to a clan. Each clan also has an animal that they consider their sacred animal. It is important for them to know the name of their clan so that they won't marry anyone from their same clan, because that is considered disgraceful. It was awesome though because the Young Women remembered some people who I know who cam in the past and they were just asking about them. After the lesson, they actually asked us if we would prepare the lesson for next week. It is going to be quite the experience but I am excited! ha ha but it was funny to hear their leader hassle them about personal progress. . . . young women are the same everywhere! O also as we were driving to church we passed through this amazing forest (more like a jungle if you ask me) and we crossed the Nile river! That night, we had our first Ugandan feast! Our cook spent about 9 hours preparing it for us. We had chicken (which we walking around our yard that morning. . . I couldn't really handle that), matoke ( plantains that are cooked in bannana leaves all day) Irish potatoes (homeade tator totts) beans, noodle stuff, fresh fruit, cabbage and I can't even remember what else! But our cook Rose did an amazing job and tonight she is cooking us Chipatti which I am very excited about! Then today, we were able to go and do our first project. We buildt an adobe stove for a family! It was super fun!! by the time we got to the site, there were at least 20 kids following us and they were such good helpers. We had to get all this clay and pour water over it, take off our shoes and stamp it! The kids had a blast and so did we! It is just amazing to see the people who already have these stoves and see how much they have impacted their lives. It helps not only limit the amount of smoke they inhale, but allows them to boil their drinking water, cook breakfast ( because it shortens cooking time) and cook more than one thing at a time. With the time they save they are able to plant gardens or find other ways to help earn money. I really wish that I could upload picatures onto this blog for you all to see the amazing village we live in, but because of computer viruses, it isn't really possible! But the houses have cloth doors and are made from homemade bricks they make from the soil. We have some great plans for the week! Can't wait to share them!