Welcome to Kakooge!!!! (Saturday)

First things first - all of the patients we saw at Makerere and in the villages have consented to us taking their photos and them being used/posted by us, and if they did not...we didn't take pictures! :)





Now back to Uganda: Leaving Kampala on Saturday afternoon – we had no idea what to expect.  We had heard that Kakooge was various distances and that it would take anywhere between 1 and 30 hours to get there.  Father Marian, one of the friars who works at the Greyfriars Mission Uganda and Marc’s Uncle Johnny, who is also a friar, were meeting us in Kampala so that we could caravan with our minibus and our driver, Sande.  They were only meeting us because they needed to go to a grocery store….which made us think if they have to drive ALL THE WAY to Kampala for groceries – what were we in for!

Playing in Kampala before heading out to Kakooge

We met the friars at Garden City after having lunch and checking out the craft market and buying souvenirs – including Muzungu T-shirts of course.  Father Marian told us to expect simplicity, which is something that we had very much gotten used to at The Edge House in Kampala.  When we arrived, about an hour or so later, at the Friars’ compound, we could not believe how nice of a set up they have!  It is right outside the heart of Kakooge and living inside the compound are three friars, a few up-coming friars, and a cook.  The children that the friary supports live on the adjacent land belonging to the school in dormitories and we got to take a tour and meet all of the children!  The friary has set up multiple side projects to get income for some of the families in their villages – they grow bananas, pine trees for wood, and many other healthy fruits and vegetables.  They also have a well with clean water that they allow village members to use, since children and women are responsible for supplying water to their families. 

The group meeting some kids from the school!

Expecting that we were missing American cuisine, Marian and Johnny asked the cook to make us spaghetti and got us treats like Oreos and Snickers and then….they asked us to eat ants, a Ugandan treat. Marc, Dan and Dr. Farmer say they taste like sunflower seeds – Katie and Uncle Johnny ate theirs more like a pill, so they may not be sure how they taste.  After a delicious snack, we settled our plans for the rest of the week and heard from the Uganda Dental Association that they would send SIX dentists and supplies to help us with our outreach in Wednesday’s village!!! THIS WAS GREAT NEWS! We had been warned about the multitudes of people who will show up this week and are incredibly excited to have help and support as well as to be able to see as many patients as physically possible with so many hands to help!  We also decided that we would see 15 patients on Sunday to have a run through of what would be happening the rest of the week and make sure that we were all up to speed on all of our skills. 




Uncle John savoring his ant, and Katie grabbing a chaser



The men being really manly and enjoying their ants.