What's this?

Today's first new experience was eating jackfruit for breakfast. It's an ugly green fruit, quite large, covered in bumps. It has individual packet-like things inside, each with a seed. The fruit itself tastes good, but the texture takes some getting used to. Each piece looks kind of like a clove of garlic, and is quite smooth.

It was cool when we woke up, but within maybe 30 minutes it got really hot. We decided not to go out this morning, but instead to organize a meeting at the clinic with John, the clinic manager, Charles, the nurse and Sophie, an assistant, to talk about the clinic's needs. While we were waiting for them to be free, we started doing research on possible solutions, such as spring boxes and charcoal from sugar cane.

The clinic's biggest need is definitely electricity. They currently have no lab equipment because it all runs on power, and are unable to admit patients for overnight observation. Electricity would dramatically improve the services they are able to provide, and would allow them to become a vaccination center (refrigeration).

It was interesting asking about water, because Charles said that he would like the community water supply to be cleaned because many people come in with GIT, or other preventable diseases that come from water. The clinic does need sterile water though, because they currently have to use some of their saline solution meant for rehydration to clean wounds because other water is not suitable. This is expensive, and is an unnecessary cost.

After lunch, John took Helen, Becca and Paruavi out to ask about costs of basic necessities in the trading center in Ddegeya and to get samples from two new (very small) ponds. The store we stopped into was connected to the grid, which powered the refrigerator full of sodas. We saw racks of sun-dried or smoked fish hanging on the walls. A bit shocking to see for someone who is vegetarian. It kind of reminded us of the way meat hangs in the windows in Europe (Spain, specifically). The store sold supplies such as flour, sugar, bread, sweet rolls, donuts (Ugandan version), soaps, school supplies, curry powders, etc. We bought a passion fruit in the trading center. On the way to the pond, we had an agriculture lesson, with John showing us all the different types plants and trees, some of which included banana trees, yam plants, pineapple plants, mango trees, papaya trees, guava trees, avocado trees, peanut plants, cassava trees, eggplant tree/bushes, tomatoe plants, strange cucumber like things and many, many other new plants that we had never seen before. This is the result of urban living in the States.

While Helen, Becca, and Pauravi were out, Peter dug a soil pit near the pond by the clinic to observe the different layers of the soil. He saw two layers of dirt, but his digging did not intersect the water table as we had hoped. We will try again tomorrow.

When we got back, we took out the samples from yesterday, and many of them are presenting with much more coliform than previously. The rainwater was especially surprising. Our first rainwater samples had only 2 coliforms, but this time there were maybe 80 on each. We don't know what would cause this to happen, but is very suprising to us, and we think that perhaps the rainwater tank heats up when it is hot, causing bacteria to grow. Maybe we won't take a bath today... Baby wipes sound good, don't you think? We started to also notice a distinct smell from our water bottles so we decided it was time to treat them with some iodine tablets.

When we got back from the trading center and ponds, Tom, Monica, and Peter were making chappatis to have with dinner. They were very good. They had some onions in them too, which added to the flavor. Pauravi also helped roll a couple chapatis. They were very round, and would make her mother proud. Dinner was again the same foods, but this time with chappati. We also had the passion fruit after dinner, and it was delicious.

Tomorrow we are going to Masaka to try and go to a larger clinic, price the cost of construction materials, and buy some food (we want to get a lot of the fruits we saw today). It will be good to see another part of Uganda (or town at least).