Bus ride

So today was a pretty boring day until I was summoned by Florence Dongo to accompany Samuel on the bus to take home the nursery class students to their homes. I have been on previous bus rides, but not to take the younger students home. I wasn't really sure what my role was. I only knew that I was taking the place of Ddembe who usually rides with Samuel. They told me that I needed to help the students cross the street so that they would not get hit by vehicles. Easy enough. Remember though that these kids are maybe 5-7 years old.

The kids were jam packed into the bus. I think the outside of the bus says something like "licensed for 29 passengers". There must have been at least 50 kids in the bus. So many kids that I had to stand near the door of the bus. So off we were on our trek. The kids were standing when they were supposed to be sitting, hitting each other, crying, arguing...every crazy thing you can think of. At one point, a kid tried to make her way to the front and got her leg stuck in between two chairs. I had to try to rescue her as she cried but couldn't explain to me what was wrong. Finally, I was able to free her leg.

However, the most memorable part is when we made one of our frequent stops. It seemed like we were only supposed to only let 1 student out there, but all of a sudden, many students started exitiing the bus. To my surprise, there was a purpose. I turned to look outside and just a few feet from the bus door a girl was squatting down to pee. I was a little in shock, but then one after another about 10 kids pee'd on the side of the road. One boy made an attempt to pee as high as he could...all I could see was a stream going in the air.

But such are things in Uganda/Africa. I'm sure this is not the biggest surprise that I will see in my time, but it was definitely entertainment for the day.