Traveling About

I've wanted to share with you some photos and stories from my recent journeys...Finally! I'll start with this weekend, the exciting event was an Italian jazz concert brought in by the Italian consulate from Mozambique. They played at this very unique venue in the "Valley" about 30 minutes from where I live. I really didn't know what country I was in listening to Italian Jazz via Mozambique in Swaziland.....

More exciting than that though have been my two trips outside Swaziland. The first was to St. Lucia, a beach in South Africa. I was hoping for some sun-bathing and scuba diving on a three-day-weekend. Instead we got rain, rain and more cold rain. When someone explained it as, "March on the Jersey shore" that made more sense...too bad I didn't plan better. Instead all ten of us had a Euker tournament that lasted most of the evening, sometimes by candlelight as the electricity was highly questionable. I'll try to post the driest photo of the beach I can find...

I just returned a week ago from Uganda. I was there for a conference; Baylor hosts a conference twice yearly with all the countries with Baylor clinics participating. It was quite an interesting week. Kampala is a true African city with more than 10 million people and not one stoplight that we could find. The drivers asked us routinely, "Do you have jams like this in your country?" Nope, our traffic jams are definitely not like what we experienced during our 10 day stay. My roommate Erin and I then stayed a few extra days and trekked to see the chimps (gorillas were sold out....). A fascinating morning as we strolled through forests, mostly off the paths, in search of these chimps as we first listened for sounds of them calling and then found them mostly high up in the trees. I got a couple good photos though, I'll try to post one now, along with the beautiful countryside showing coffee and tea fields as well as their main produce, bananas. Don't get too excited though about the coffee there...it is still instant. They must ship all their beans to the US.

Just so you are not confused, I am still working....there are plenty of interesting stories about work but I'll save them for another day. That could take a few hours!