flying in

Hi everyone! I'm in my room in Kampala AND CAN ACCESS WIRELESS (...for now anyway). Just wanted to let you all know that I'm here and well. My flight went smoothly except for being proselytized and seated next to a pastor of a 50 person mission trip. At least I was put on a church prayer list.. I can use all the help I can get, right? Almost everyone on my flight was from North Carolina, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, etc - we Southerners have a big heart for Africa. It was pretty weird.

I made my first Ugandan friends in the Amsterdam airport. I saw a group reading Hebrew and of course approached them after presuming that they were part of the Abayudaya (Jewish Ugandans).We shmoozed for the whole five hour layover. They were musicians coming back from a Jewish music festival in Chicago and we exchanged contact info and discussed everything from Zionism to Jewish vegetarianism. I also have unlimited Shabbat invitations to their houses while I'm here. Anyways, when Kate picked me up from the airport I told her the story and it turns out that the leader of the group I was talking with, J.J., is her "Ugandan father" and she stayed with the whole family during her first time in Uganda. She then preceeded to tell me that the group had been nominated for a grammy and is slightly famous (family - I'm pretty sure we have one of the CDs from the Abayudaya). And I'm friends with them now, how cool! Maybe I'm a little too excited about this, but what a small world!