I love Thanksgiving. I especially love being in Nashville for Thanksgiving, the weather is perfectly crisp and it’s always good to see and catch up with friends and family. So I was pretty disappointed that I would be spending Thanksgiving away from my family and in a country where most people don’t really have any idea what Thanksgiving is. But things have a way of working themselves out here (sometimes), and my turkey day turned out extremely well.
After spending the past few days in Kampala gathering info about Refugees in Uganda from the Refugee Law project and trying (and failing) to talk to government officials, Whitney and I decided that we wanted to be back among our friends here for Thanksgiving. We thought that keeping it a secret would be fun too, so that’s what we did. On Thursday morning we packed our bags and we hopped on a bus to Gulu. It was a long trek, and after about six hours we arrived in Gulu just as it was getting dark. We hurriedly grabbed our bags and scurried to a nearby hotel where we got the only available room. We tossed our bags in the room and then made a call to group. We wished them all a Happy Thanksgiving “from Kampala” and asked where they were celebrating the holiday, found out they were at the SIT office and said our goodbyes with our cover still intact. They mentioned that they were about to sit down to dinner so time was a factor. We made our way swiftly over to the office and quietly entered the compound. We made a casual entrance. The shock on everyone’s face made the long Thanksgiving Day trek absolutely worth it.
They had prepared a downright feast! Some of the crew had slaughtered two or three chickens that served as our African Turkey. There was stuffing, mashed potatoes, peas, coleslaw, pasta with sauce, garlic bread, vegetable soup and delightful amounts of wine. Whitney and I made it just in time to sit down and join them for dinner. The food was fantastic and it was great to hear about what everyone had been doing in Gulu and it sounds like people have some really cool ISPs. Mary is looking at Traditional Dance and modern dance (specifically break dancing), Hannah is looking at the IDP camps, Stephen is examining the opportunities for education in the North, etc. Cool things are being done.
We did serious work on the food but in true Thanksgiving fashion, there were a good amount of leftovers.
After the meal it was time to head to BJ’z a local bar to end our celebrations with something we all love to do: quiz night. Thursday night is quiz night here in Gulu. Historically we always place third, it happened in Kigali and it happens in Gulu. We can’t seem to break out of our third place rut but every Thursday we try our best to attain the lofty position that is first place. This evening we came in with the most passion and drive yet because for us Americans on Thanksgiving it was time to prove ourselves. There were 40 questions, four sections, and no discernable theme. Over the next two hours we attentively listened to the questions and put our knowledge of the obscure and useless to the test. Then the time came to turn in our answers and hear the scores. They read off the scores from lowest to highest, the lowest score was 7 out of 40, the highest was 37 our of 40. And on Thanksgiving Day, 2010, The Americans in Gulu made our country proud as we claimed the highest score of 37 out of 40. We won by a margin of seven and a half points and proudly claimed our crate of Nile Gold, a local brew.
My Thanksgiving started on a bus with one traveling companion and ended at a Quiz night with eighteen friends. I might have missed a traditional celebration at home but I certainly had a Thanksgiving to remember.
-Muzungu currently in Gulu, incredibly thankful for his family back home in the States and for all the support they have given him over the past 21 years of his life, thankful for old friends from Nashville, Bowdoin and all over the world, thankful for new friends in Uganda and Rwanda, and thankful for Thanksgiving in Uganda.
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