Uganda - MOH Day 2

Our first full day on the site, has rendered the vast majority of us, utterly shattered. The 9 of us started work at 9am sharp, with mild trepidation that we were simply going to get under foot and generally be the useless 'mzunga; or whiteman.

This theory was quickly despatched as were split into 2 groups and set to work clearing up bricks, organising materials and generally getting stuck in. A few of us were lucky enough to learn some rudimentary brick laying skills. The heat made things particularly tough, especially when i was asked to help collect some more cement, which lived a 10 minute walk away, and required a climb back, up to site, which was exhausting, made worse by the fact that the 15 year old did two turns on the wheelbarrow to my one - i could not hide my envy or mild embarrassment.

We all gradually found our comfort (or non comfort) zone and slogged it out until lunchtime, the highlight of the morning being a small group of very little children, no older than 5/6, joining us to separate and move broken bricks from new. The image of the kids, clambering over piles of rubble, desperately keen to help, is an endearing and lasting one, the video footage and pics are well worth a look, which I shall load up tomorrow (once I've stopped faffing with the photos...).

Lunch was well deserved and some of us decided to enjoy a drumming and dance show, put on by the primary school. Toby and I, returned to the site and helped the remaining workmen, finish off some brick work and helped construct some scaffolding, that would have turned the stomach of any UK health and safety inspector. The work was quick paced and tiring, as the brick layers demanded more cement (delivered up a ladder in 'Wok' like bowls) and additional bricks, that were delicately 'thrown' up to the worker.

By the time 5:30 arrived, i was balancing on some of the aforementioned scaffold, learning to lay bricks, and both Toby and I, felt very chuffed with our work.

As a thank you to the group, the builders offered to take some of us down to the village to watch the Man Utd/Arsenal game. We gathered with most of the male population from the village, in front of a 28" TV, and was in awe of the noise and dancing that surrounded us, when Arsenal scored, i genuinely thought someone had been killed the noise was so shrill, but no, it was but a man, removing his shirt and whooping with joy. Just your standard Saturday night in Buikwe, Uganda.

Uganda MOH - Day 1

Its been a long, long day, but ultimately hugely agreeable. The flight from Heathrow left on time and fortunately it wasn't fully booked, meaning more room for people to relax, myself included. Thanks to a combination of the new Star Trek movie and 3 free seats, the flight went very quickly and we were soon landing in Entebbe.

Our group was swiftly guided to our mini-vans for the hour long journey to Kampala, where we changed some of the Queens sterling into Ugandan Shillings. We congratulated ourselves for navigating the Ugandan bank system with a strong coffee at the supermarket, where we also collected some vital provisions, including numerous bottles of Cola and M&M's.

We arrived at the village of Buikwe, where we are staying at the local school and were immediately blown away by the surroundings. The countryside is beautiful and not even the 10 minute thunderstorm could dampen our high, but sleepy spirits.

We were guided around the school by Andrew from International Needs and met some children who were in over the holiday to study for their exams. Further exploration lead us to the site of the new building, which has grown considerably since Toby's last visit, but still requires a lot of hard work to complete, which we will start in earnest tomorrow morning.

After a full and tasty chicken dinner, our post cuisine coffees were disturbed by a sizeable and rather hyperactive bat, who insisted on doing laps of the hostel living room, to which all manner of techniques were employed to catch him including some of the worst 'towel bull fighting' i have witnessed together with Toby trying to verbally encourage the bat out of the room..... which did not work.

The bat is still in here as i write this. I am going to bed and I'm closing the door behind me.

Flickr

This is a test post from , a fancy photo sharing thing.

The Dog & The Butcher - Jonathan Holt

This is a great little short film, beautifully designed and with some lovely character design, the dog is great and the whole look and feel reminds me slightly of the 60's Tom and Jerry cartoons (when Tom was regularly seen as an evil genius and Jerry had a car.... odd). Thanks to /Film for flagging this up.

The Dog and the Butcher by Jonathan Holt from Jonathan Holt on Vimeo.

Trowbridge Village Pump Festival

Trowbridge-27, originally uploaded by neile2007.

It was only a week ago that we were huddling from the rain, trying not to spill our 'old rosey' cider on each other. Trowbridge Pump is a brilliant little gathering (well, not quite little) with some fantastic alternative/folk & country bands from all over the place.

Sorry to say i can't remember who this particular band is, but it was fun that much im sure - more picks on my Flickr if you fancy it.

Yellow Bird 6 Camera Video

Yellowbird were founded only this year in 2009, but the technology has been a few years in the making. Originally launched as a tech to create a still 3D image. The technology evolved into being able to capture moving image, but it was not until Flash 9 was released that enabled them to properly distribute the content and allow the user to scroll around the video enabling a full 360 degree view. Check it out below and go to the niftily titled http://www.yellowbirdsdonthavewingsbuttheyflytomakeyouexperiencea3dreality.com/

Nice

Coldplay - Strawberry Swing - Cracking Video

Love em or hate em (i happen to be the former), you can always rely on Coldplay to produce a fine music video and this is no exception. Their previous video for 'Life in Technicolor' (directed by Dougal Wilson) was a fantastic puppet based fantasy, and the new video for Strawberry Swing, plays on the slightly childlike theme again, setting a real life (though stop frame animated) Chris Martin against a chalk drawing background.