Well it's about time I updated this and fill you in on the last couple of weeks. Last weekend I had my housewarming party. We decided to have an Oscar night theme, so dressed the house up with a red carpet (made out of crepe paper), lots of sparkly stars and candles throughout. Everyone got very dressed up and even wore heels, which is a bit of a rarity here, considering the state of the roads with all the potholes and lack of tarmac and the like.
School is going on ok, but still has been full of dramas. The kids are still great - they are all very good at English (many native speakers and the ESL ones are fluent - no more 'miss, he is molesting me' or 'it is that I need to go to the bathroom'! The admin, however, is a bit of a shambles. The woman in the bursar's office is so off the rails that she makes the head of hr from my last job look like Mother Theresa. We are all a wee bit concerned that a couple of weeks ago, the bursar did a midnight shift a flew the country back to India, leaving the office and his house in a real mess (and for the house I am talking total devastation - dirty plates of food left around being attacked by maggots, clothes everywhere and loads of old furniture all over the place.

Sunday

Today I’m feeling a little dazed and sun stroked. This morning I got up early to take a walk up to the Bahai Temple up the road. I can see it from my room and it’s a big landmark in Kampala. The religion is a bit of a mixture of all different world religions and there’s just one temple on each continent, so I thought it would be rude not to bother to go up there and see. To be honest, it looks much better from a distance, it’s just very simple inside. The gardens surrounding it are very pretty and it’s a lovely and peaceful place to visit. Unfortunately my new walking shoes rubbed my feet and am now suffering from massive blisters and am not sure whether I’ll be able to make the running hash tomorrow.

This afternoon, for the first time since getting here, I had time to go down to the pool and lay out in the sun. It’s brilliant to have the free membership to the club – I’m swimming a lot after school, going to the gym and also have had a few tennis lessons. The only downside is that most of the families from school are also members, so as I walked in today I could hear 3 little voices yelling ‘Miss Crosbie’ – aaaahhhh teacher’s nightmare to be relaxing by the pool in a bikini, only to be greeted by your kids charging round and throwing each other in the pool!

Last night my friend had a barbeque on her outside terrace. I think we girls can be very proud of ourselves for successfully cooking everything on the bbq with no male assistance whatsoever.

Now for a little bit about the next drama in school. On Friday we were called into the staffroom for (yet another) emergency meeting. This week’s big shocker is that the principal has resigned, probably with immediate effect. Whether he jumped or was pushed is another issue, so watch this space for what happens next. So now we have no principal, but they have managed to replace the bursar (who made a midnight dash back to India about 2 weeks ago), so hopefully we should get paid this month.

My group of friends and I have now firmly established Friday night as restaurant night. Each week we’re trying somewhere new. There are loads of great restaurants here, all with really good food. We went to the Turkish this week, which is lovely because there are lots of comfy sofas to relax on and it’s all outdoors in a park. We’ve also tried out the Thai, the Belgian, various Indians – we think Mexican may be the next on the cards.

Now I wonder if anybody can figure out his little conundrum for me – my friends and I have tried, but we are no closer to reaching an understanding. When you want to buy soft drinks here, they come in the returnable bottles – all well and good so far I hear you say. However, when you try to buy one in the shop, they won’t allow you to buy it unless you have a bottle to return. Nor will they let you put down a deposit. So if any of you can think of a solution – answers on a postcard to …