The Netherlands is famous....

My God where do I even begin! It feels like I've been here forever already not 7 days, yet at the same time I am so lost in most situations!

We got here at 10am on Sunday, totally exhausted after not sleeping at all on the 10 hour flight. We were met at the airport by Emma (a man's name in Uganda) who took us to a shopping center where we were told we should buy things like wellies and mosquito nets. Dreamily we bought whatever we were told with no idea whether the prices were good or bad or what the notes in our hands represented in "real" money - we now know it was damn expensive! Setting out on the road every building seemed to double up as a beauty parlor, furniture shop, hairdressers, bar, clothes store, restaurant and anything else under the sun. The bright pinks and yellows of the buildings painted the colors of mobile phone companies contrasted sharply with the green mountains and red roads. After falling asleep in the van dispite the views we arrived at our training center.

The center is located about 45 minutes from Kampala just off the main road to Jinga. After expecting to be in a city it was a lovely surprise to be in beautiful hills surrounded by green tropical vegetation and dusty tracks (pictures to come when i remember to bring my camera next time!). To be honest, after being introduced to 30 smiling people, shown our dorm rooms with about 9 beds hung with mosquito nets as well as the outside loo, I had a small "what the hell am I doing here" moment. Looking back now it was probably just the tiredness. The longer I stay here the happier I am getting.

The training is quite intense: 9 to 5 every weekday with a half day on Saturday. The most interesting day so far has been the "cultural awareness" session. Pieces of flip chart paper were put up on the wall with the names of all the countries that were represented among the volunteers. We were then invited to go round and write a rumor or an assumption that we had about that place so that the people from that place could correct it. Poor Joyce. She is from the Netherlands and on that paper was written things like "they practice female circumcision" and "there is segregation of whites and blacks". She stood there, totally aghast, explaining that this was totally untrue! On the UK page was written "you are all watched by one big camera which records everything you do". We explained the only thing wrong with that was that there were actually lots of cameras.

Towards the end of the week we have been getting into the sexual and reproductive health lessons we will be teaching in schools. At first it was all a bit embarrassing but Uganda solved that by sending us a tropical downpour. It echoed so loudly on the tin roof that we were forced to shout explanations for erections, ejaculation and wet dreams at the top of our lungs which certainly broke the ice.

I'm running out of time here so let me just say I'm having a fantastic if challenging time and missing many of you. Next time I promise a phone number and some pictures.