Matatu

Everyone: make it a habit to click on the title to follow the attached link.

Another "famed" Ugandan vehicle is the matatu. It is basically a cross between a taxi and a public bus, and is probably the most used form of transportation.

The reason that I said that it is a cross between a taxi and a public bus, is because it holds 15 or more people, like a bus, but doesn't follow a scheduled route, and stops for individual people like a taxi. It is extreeeeeemely cheap, and will take you just about anywhere.

And check out the new poll...who's gonna win?

How to...Manually Start a diesel car in Africa

Yesterday, our 1990 Mitsubishi Pajero completely died on us, and the old piece of junk...I mean the fantastic car... refused to move. We knew it was coming, since before this it took numerous tries to get it started, but this was terrible. We couldn't do anything for the rest of the day, and had to get a USAID mechanic to sort out the problem. My dad and I went to get some motor oil at a local gas station, and the mechanic showed my mom how to manually start the diesel car/truck(get moving, pop the clutch, and vroom, usually), who was very happy when she got it right. We found that we simply need a bigger battery to start up the huge mass, but it took a while to figure out. Until we find a bigger battery, we are parking the car on the downhill (facing out).

Poll Answers/Results

Well, after the poll, you guys thought that Jack was the most likely to have an entire village on his back. Well...YOU WERE RIGHT!!! When we went to Sipi Falls, we encountered several villages, almost all of which, Jack had wrapped around his finger and under his command. It was hilarious! He had them included in dances, songs, and everyone was laughing. Anything that Jack did, most of the kids were right behind him.

Sipi Falls

Even though we really like our house, we decided to go on a tiny safari to Sipi Falls. It is one of the waterfalls in Uganda that produces some of the water we drink. When we went there we went on a hike, through caves, waterfalls, and a lot of villages. Even though it was a five hour drive, it was worth it. Now that CHOGM is coming we are thinking that we should go on another trip somewhere. We are still not sure yet where we are going to go (if we go). We will let you know if we go, and where we went.

Monkey Attak

Hey, everyone! We know now that we're definitely in Uganda, with all its fantastic wildlife, because, as many of you have already found out.......WE GOT ATTACKED BY MONKEYS! Matt took a couple of these great shots, and these are super! However, the monkeys were in a good mood at that point.

So, we had heard from our dad that there was a pack of monkeys living at the top of our road, or "close" as they call it in Uganda. Just me and my brother went out during the afternoon, thinking that it was all just a joke, when we see no less than 10 monkeys, and little baby monkeys! Matt whips out the camera and starts snapping away (these are the best of the pictures). Then, the monkeys start getting closer, and then, I, by mistake took a picture with flash. The monkey froze for about 5 seconds, then bolted up the wall. At that point, we didn't really notice, but the little devil was cooking up a plan. Then, I threw a piece of this potato that was lying on the side of the road to two monkeys (STUPID!), and Matt had the clever idea to take a video (you've gotta see it). The two monkeys fight over it for a while, and then Matt and I feel a WHOOSH! go past us, and a thud of a rock on the ground, and Matt saying "O, Gese!!!" We look up, and what else but the monkey who I took the flash picture of was standing on top of this rock face, with his arm elevated like he just threw a rock. We bolted home, and didn't stop until we were safe inside our house, laughing along the way.

We think that the monkey was just playing, but still, a little bit better aim and it could have really hurt Matt.

And, we went scavenging later on and found the exact rock that was chucked at Matt, that you can see, if you look closely enough in the video. Check out the picture.