There is No Frozen Marie Calendars in Africa

There are a variety of things I never imagined myself saying twelve months ago, or absolutely abnormal situations where now I hardly thing anything is wrong. In a month my mom will be coming out to visit for three weeks, and I'm really excited to get a new person's perspective again on living in East Africa. Here are some examples:

- Seeing four - or the occasional five - people on a motorcycle;
- Needing 4WD in the downtown of a capital city, due to the car-swallowing pot holes;
- Charging your cell phone from a jerry-rigged car battery
- Five people per row on a bus - that's all?
- Ten grown people (I've seen 12) in a Toyota Corolla? I think we can fit another;
- Maneuvering through a herd of cows on the way to work

Last week was the second installment of my baking class with a local woman's group. The first week we made a basic yellow cake, and this last week we mixed it up a bit and added some bananas. I have to admit, it was pretty tasty, and the women seem to be having a blast, too. Since ovens are pretty rare, we have been baking on a charcoal stove dutch-oven style. It's taken some perfecting, but I think we're getting it down. Here are some pictures of the escapades:


Mixing the batter... it's actually quite easy because all I do watch them do the work, and comment occasionally on what to add or what to do next.












Trying the finished product - quite tasty!


















And the woman rejoice!











For a quick overview of my "project," the woman's group wanted to learn how to make cakes so they can make them at home for celebrations, weddings, etc. Ugandan cakes are terrible, dry and stale, so making Western cakes is definitely a change from their normal tastes. There are 18 woman and two men. Included in my curriculum is pricing and costing each recipe we make, in an attempt to teach them how to break down a unit-cost of a product to determine how much it costs to produce, then to figure out how much they would have to sell it for.

Beyond this economic stuff, I think they are really enjoying just getting together, mixing stuff up, and eating cake at the end of the day! On Thursday we're trying out chocolate cake :)