Saturday night was the International Students Day Dinner and leadership handover. Since I haven’t attended any of the international students association meetings, I was a little embarrassed to attend, but desperately needed some fun (and good food). Both was had by all, and I’m glad I went.
There were students from Kenya (the largest group), Tanzania, Congo, Sudan, Burundi, Nigeria, and the US (just me and Dan Button, the patron). Naturally, there were speeches in the handover, and we had a time in which each nationality sang one verse of their national anthem. We learned that there are about 500 international students on campus, and the administration will be creating a coordinator position for us, and providing an office. My American is quite surprised it wasn’t there before, but I’m thrilled that it’s coming to pass.
I don’t know the second verse of our national anthem. In fact, I’ve not sung it in so long that I was actually wondering if I would remember the couple words that were fuzzy in my head. Dan had the smashing idea of singing “America the Beautiful” instead, since it’s actually about the country, and not a battle with Britain. I also noticed that though everyone else’s anthems were sung in their mother tongue, they all included the name of their country. Except us. Hmm…
And the food at the Mukono Resort Hotel is very good. I had rice, meat, chicken, greens (collard, which were fairly bitter), pasta, chipati (akin to a tortilla), pineapple, and watermelon. And a soda. Ahhhhh. Oh, we had cake too. Ugandan cakes are notoriously dry, and the icing is very similar to fondant, but way sweeter. What a treat!
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