Adventures of the McJJ's Abroad: A Year with Fulbright in Uganda

Time is really speeding up now, snowballing downhill it seems. Three months from today we will be back in Grand Rapids, reuniting with Migo, and preparing for 4th of July family celebrations. But first, let us share how life has been here for the past couple of months. Zalina had a school break of about a week in February, so we took a truly magical trip to Tanzania, including the island of Zanzibar. It was the first time that all 3 of us were experiencing a new country together. We left Uganda on a Saturday, splurged on the Kenya Airways lounge that included air conditioning, "free" food and drinks (including adult beverages), and Netflix for a 4-hour layover in Nairobi, and landed in Kilimanjaro airport in the early evening. We had booked an "airport hotel" and were so pleasantly surprised that it was a cozy lodge where we could catch glimpses of Mr. Kilimanjaro from the pool area. Our wonderful guide Godson picked us up on Sunday and we made our way over 200 kilo...

  From Kampala to London to Katunguru and Back   Much has happened since our last post .   Zalina’s school break started a week earlier than expected on December 2 nd , as the government continued to ensure the Ebola outbreak was under control. That, along with other measures, seems to have worked as there have not been any recorded cases recently .       We had planned to take a mystery trip to London before Christmas, a tradition we started last year with a surprise trip for Zalina to Washington, DC.  We wanted to provide Zalina with some winter weather, since she was missing the snow and cold, and everything else about the holidays at home in Michigan .   It was unusually cold for London, we mostly had highs in the low 30s and it even snowed once while we were there .                                     ...