Oli Otya?

Oli Otya = how are you, in Luganda aka the language I will be learning in just over a month! Time seriously flies, and I am getting so so so excited to just get over there. It's really hard to keep my mind on school work when I'm constantly researching the cheapest chacos I can find, trying to find suitable skirts, attempting to make a packing list, reading past volunteer's blogs about all their experiences, or trying to earn money for the trip..the list could go on and on! I've been attending lots of trainings to get prepared for the new culture and various projects I will be working on. So far I've gone to orphanage work, in-country safety, project planning, TESOL (Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages), and public health trainings. It is making it so real to me to hear all these stories from past trips..I can't wait to have experiences of my own to share! These trainings are with everyone associated with HELP International, not just those going to Uganda; it's so fun to meet the other volunteers going to places like Figi, El Salvador, and Guatemala. We've had a couple group meetings with just the volunteers going to Uganda, however, and those have been awesome! We're slowly getting to know each other; it's crazy that in a month these people will become my family for the next 12 weeks! The most recent meeting we had, 5 or 6 volunteers from last year came to answer questions and give us advice about everything. They were so so happy, and grateful for the opportunity to talk about their life-changing time spent in Lugazi. It was so awesome to see how excited they were to talk about it! I can only hope that I will have the same experiences.

I wanted to say thank you SO much for all of the support I've received. I am so grateful for the help, and I could not have made it to this point without all of the generous donations. So thank you thank you thank you.

Sooo here's a video that pretty much sums up why I'm so excited to go haha. Ashley, one of the country directors last year, decided to teach some kids the "soulja boy" dance. It's great. ENJOY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpW3Cbluonc