normal..... what's that?

Last weekend the crew from Kampala went up to Gulu for a Halloween party. This was the fourth annual Halloween bash that was hosted at the Invisible Children house, and I've been hearing epic tales about this party since I arrived in May.... stories of Celine Dion and her back-up dancers.... the Village People... orange haired trolls.... the list of amazing costumes went on and on. We knew that for the 2010 party, our costume idea would have to be huge. We went all out.

Yes, we were Oompa Loompas from Willy Wonka. I think we pulled it off pretty well. These were pre-party pictures... As soon as we left the house to go to the party, it started pouring. We were sopping wet Oompa Loompas sprinting down the road in the rain. And the whole time we were running, all I could think about was what the locals were thinking. We passed by a bunch of waving kids on our way and everyone else was just staring at us from the shelter of their houses.

There are a lot of muzungus in Gulu, so I'm sure the Ugandans there are used to seeing Americans like us doing crazy things. They have probably gotten used to ridiculous sights like we were running down that road in our costumes... Just a typical day in Gulu.

The idea of a typical day here is a funny concept in and of itself. I've gotten used to odd things happening here... My roommate, Dani, actually just wrote a post last week about how things around just seem not quite right sometimes.... But what I think is funny is that I could describe my day in a completely "normal" way, and it would sound just like anyone else's day. Or I could describe the exact same events to make my life sound as strange as it is.

I'll give a couple examples.

Last night I ate dinner with my roommates, read a book, took a shower, and went to bed..

OR ... Last night I went down to the vegetable stand outside my gate and bought a dozen tomatoes for 50 cents to add to the pasta I was making. While my roommates and I were cooking, the power went out so we scurried around looking for candles and matches to finish cooking our meal. Then I grabbed my head lamp and used it to read a book for a bit. After that, I hung the lamp from a nail sticking out of the wall in the bathroom so I would have light to take a "shath." {Shath is a term that was coined in our house to describe the shower-bath combo we have to partake in. The water pressure is so low, that we have to sit in the tub and let it get filled as we use the hose that's connected to the faucet to try and wash ourselves... Did I mention the water is cold?} After my nice cold shath, I crawled into my bed, tucked my mosquito net around my bed, and fell asleep to the sounds of the Glee soundtrack blasting from the dorm building next door.

To start my work day, I went to a meeting at Cornerstone. Then I went to buy some fabric from the market in town and headed home after making some purchases.

OR... After waking up to the sound of our neighbor's obnoxious rooster, I start my work day by heading to Cornerstone. I walk out my gate and there is Denis the boda driver waiting for me. I hop on the back of his bike and ride through town. At the first stop light, I encounter a bunch of hawkers, trying to sell me anything from car chargers to maps of Uganda to live goldfish. We speed past them as soon as the intersection clears and I make it to my meeting quite windblown. After my meeting, I hop on another boda to go into town to the fabric market. After weaving through traffic, we make it near the taxi park and I opt to walk to rest of the way because the jam is so bad (yes, instead of abbreviating "traffic jam" as just "traffic," people here call it "jam"). I walk into a store where I'm a regular, and am greeting by the lady behind the counter asking me how America is and when will I get her a job. She thinks I'm Liz (my boss), because many Ugandans can't tell muzungus apart. {Often I'll be walking down the road or through Owino market, and someone will call me Jennifer because some white girl named Jennifer was once their customer}. After buying the fabric I was looking for, I push my way through the crowds to get on a taxi home. After weaving through the park with my arm-full of fabric, I find the right taxi and wait for it to fill up. Once its full (about 16 people fit in these "matatus"), we head off on our bumpy ride toward my neighborhood.

"Normal" life here can sound like normal life in the US.... or not so much. But life is life, wherever we are. And our concept of normalcy can adapt quickly.... Whether you're a Ugandan watching an American with green hair, an orange face, and white overalls hauling it down the road in the rain, or an American girl trying to make it through her work day.