my taxi ran over a baby goat. It frolicked the wrong way into the road and gave a dying bleat as it clunked under the wheels. Everyone in the taxi started laughing. I felt like crying.

living in Gulu is like living in weird NGO world. There's the city proper, a dusty grid swarming with bodas and airtime vendors, and then there's the NGO village up the hill, with offices of ever major NGO and UN committee in the world. It's surprisingly easy to do research here. You just make a phone call, set up an appointment, show up, ask your questions, and repeat. No one denies you, everybody wants to help. I'm having the problem that my project is almost too easy; I'm going to have to focus to make sure I don't get carried away on every little issue.

we're finally moving into a house today, after a week in real estate hell a.k.a. flooded hotel rooms (it's the rainy season). It's been hard looking for places that will rent only for one month, and have a security wall, and have electricity/a water source all at the same time, but I'm looking forward to having a permanent place to live. The other day the managers of our hotel actually called Katie, Ben, and I into a meeting; they were, of course, trying to tell us the room cost more than it did. We were not fooled. I'm a little sick of basically walking around with a $ sign on my forehead.

yesterday I went down to Lira, a couple of hours south of Gulu, to talk to the World Food Programme office there. I met with one guy, Michael Besigye, for our appointment, and when I went outside the sky was a terrifying thing to behold. The clouds were low and dark and maliciously contorting. Mr. Besigye yelled at me to get on his motorcycle so I wouldn't have to call a boda to the bus park, so I awkwardly hopped on until the rain and wind started coming down like a hurricane. Ten feet out of the compound we made a U-turn back. Luckily, just then the World Food Program Land Cruiser came barreling down the road, and the driver said he was picking some stuff up to take to the Gulu office, so Mr. Besigye arranged to me to catch a ride. Now, I may deride NGOs for thinking that no operation is complete without a shiny white Land Cruiser, but the prospect of riding in a vehicle with those baby blue UN letters on the side thrilled my inner IR nerd. I was sitting in the backseat, gloating at not having to pay the 10,000 shillings back to Gulu, when into the front seat comes Gilbert Buzu, the head of the Gulu Sub-Office. Twenty minutes of small talk later, he knows my name and life story and has invited me to 'pop in' to his office anytime to see about observing some projects in the field.

this is so much fun.