Happy Birthday Freddie!

It's my Nephew Freddie's Birthday Today, and I wanted to use my blog to host a mosaic of his First Year.

Happy Birthday Freddie!

Graduation Party, French Class and an Introduction

I've had a very overwhelming week. Alot to do at work and then I moved house into an apartment of my VERY OWN yesterday... but first things first, I must tell you all about:

Patrick's Graduation Party

So a couple of weeks ago, I receive an invitation to Patrick's graduation party and I was delighted to accept. Patrick is a new graduate who has been with my company for a very short time. Educated at Makerere University in Kampala, and achieving a first class degree, he is one of the shining stars in our office. I convinced my managers that they should also attend (and bring along their wives too...!). I was expecting a few light nibbles, a bit of chit-chat and at most some garden dancing. We got a whole lot more.

We arrived at the house of Patrick's parent's right on time. The garden had marquees and rows and rows of plastic garden chairs. I started to worry a little. We sat down, and very little happened for an hour. People poured in and soon all of the chairs were filled. Then a choir began to sing and Patrick and his parents came out of the house to wild applause (Patrick was wearing his graduation gown). There was then a mass mass. All of the proceedings were in Luganda. When a bible was whipped out I thought "phew, at least now there will be some English...", alas no, a Luganda translation bible.

Luganda is the official language of the Buganda people, the tribe from the central region of Uganda. I keep vowing to take lessons... but today I actually rang up the Luganda school, so I'm really hoping that now it might happen. I think it would be a real asset, at least to have some understanding.

I was able to recognise the Lord's Prayer from the rhythm in which it was chanted, but I couldn't tell which book of the bible they were reading from let alone which passage.

The mass was followed by a series of speeches, all in Luganda, including and impromptu one made by my boss (in English!), which went on for several hours.

Following this was some food - it couldn't have come soon enough, because I forgot to have lunch. It was really delicious, the usual buffet style. The problem was, I had selected a seat right in front of the cake and so spent all evening looking at it and salivating... mmm. And I can confirm it did taste lovely.

French School

Now I really must tell you about French School! I'm taking classes at Alliance française de Kampala, and am trying to get my Diplôme d'études en langue française (DELF) A2 certificate this year. Hopefully, I can then achieve a level B1 next year. This is very optimistic, but will allow me to work in francophone countries such as Mali, Côte D' Ivoire, Cameroon etc... and may also allow me to fulfil some career objectives that I have in mind... So the A2 test is in June and I am currently having 5 hours of lessons per week.... Here's hoping!

Me and My Gomesi

On Saturday, I went to my first Introduction. Introductions are like the official engagement part of the marriage process. They are also known as the "traditional wedding" and afterwards you're pretty much married albeit, not legally.

The introduction in hosted by the bride's family, who recieve the groom and a group of his friends/family (notably not his parents, which I found strange) totalling (in this case) about 25. Then there's lots of drama, establishing why the groom's party have arrived (as if we didn't know). Interestingly, the groom nominates a spokesperson, so it's not clear to the audience, until almost the end, which person is actually getting married.

The paternal aunties of both the bride and groom play a huge role in the whole process. I attended as a guest of the brother-in-law of the bride and so was invited into the house to eat after the ceremony. The food was excellent. We had chicken in gravy baked in banana leaves that was so unbelievably tender, it was real melt-in-the-mouth.

The ceremony was all in Luganda again - back to my comment about Luganda lessons... need to get them organised, because too much is lost in translations!

I had a "gomesi" to wear, but in truth, it wasn't a real gomesi. It was a dress that was made to look like a gomesi. A Gomesi is usually wrapped round and round, but this had a zip and was much lighter. To be honest, it still wasn't very comfy - it was SO LONG!! But I love it dearly all the same!

Sadly, I made a very "global" error with the outfit: I wore brand new shoes! Ouch! I was in agony by the end of the day! Otherwise though - Complete success!