(Please bear in mind that this post was written on Tuesday 9th September but I haven’t managed to upload it until now. I have actually now left Uganda. I will give you an update on my last few days in Uganda as soon as possible.)
And indeed there has been more excitement! I forgot to mention that the candidate classes (classes sitting O-levels and A-levels in October so S4 and S6) went back to school on Monday 1st September. Then yesterday (Monday 8th September) all classes went back to school. This means that I am now teaching only at break, lunch and in the evenings, as well as sometimes during school time when students can get out of class. On top of this, quite a lot of the students have not yet returned to school since going home at the weekend. This is quite worrying given that our final concert is in 3 days! Hopefully it will work out in the end.
On Friday (5th September) evening, Frank, Brenda, Alex and I went to the National Theatre at the UNCC to see a show of Ugandan dances from all the regions in Uganda. It was amazing to see all these different dances in the one show.
Then on Saturday (6th September) I was treated to a Ugandan wedding. In Uganda, weddings take place over three ceremonies: the introduction of the groom to the bride’s close family in the bride’s home, the introduction of the groom to the bride’s wider family, friends and community in the bride’s ancestral home, and the legal wedding ceremony in a church. The event on Saturday was the second of these ceremonies. This ceremony is traditionally more important than the legal wedding itself. The bridge was Bridget, one of the first students at Tender Talents. The ceremony involved a representative from the groom’s family and a representative from the bride’s family taking turns to boast about their own tribe’s culture in a tongue-in-cheek style, making the event like a comedy. Unfortunately for me the ceremony was entirely in Luganda so I missed all the jokes. But the music, dancing and traditional dress was brilliant. I borrowed one of Brenda’s traditional Rwandese dresses to wear. And the ceremony was held in the countryside so I got to see a bit of western Uganda.
On Sunday (7th September) we paid a visit to Kaka’s (Granny’s), again in the countryside but this time in the east. There were a lot of grandchildren there so Grace and Reuben had a great time playing.
I can’t believe I only have 3 days left here. I really don’t want to leave. I’ve been accepted into a second family and this place feels so much like home to me. I’m definitely going to cry when I leave on Friday (12th September).
But for now I’m looking forward to the concert. The students are steadily getting ready for it and the orchestra’s sounding amazing! So happy that it’s worked out so well.
Till next time!
Isla 🙂
Isla Ratcliff 