Monday, January 16, 2006
Fall Festivals Were Successful
Halloween is not a holiday that is celebrated or even known about here in Uganda. As Americans, we had to come up with an alternate plan for celebrating this holiday. So, on Sunday October 23rd (yes, I know that’s a whole week BEFORE Halloween), we had a “Fall Festival” for all of team and school kids. It was kind of interesting--that is, trying to explain these crazy American customs-- to our Korean and Japanese students.
The kids showed up in costumes, and we played lots of fun games, earning candy as prizes. In adddition to the traditional carnival-type games, there was apple-bobbing (my personal favorite), face-painting and even cookie-decorating. (Man, I wonder who was the unlucky person who had to make so many pumpkin-shaped sugar cookies!)
After the children exhausted all of the game stations, they piled into Danny’s trailer which was filled with HAY! Haha…just kidding! It was filled with BANANA LEAVES, the next best thing! They drove around town a bit, singing some silly songs and just having a grand ol’ time. While they were doing that, most of the adults were busy preparing our supper by cooking “sausages” (read: “hotdogs”) over a bonfire, which we ate with homemade hotdog buns…since you can‘t get them here in Mbarara. We had all sorts of interesting picnic-type foods, including home-made potato chips and jello salads.
Great time for the kids and I think some of the adults even had fun! See the pictures I’ve posted at my picture website: http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/bethellent/my_photos
The following weekend, we put on another (very similar) Fall Festival for all the missionaries’ kids at our quarterly meeting in Kampala. This one was much closer to the actual date of Halloween. We didn’t get to go on a “hay-banana leaf ride” but we did have a MOONBOUNCE! Some of us even took the opportunity to wear a DIFFERENT costume! (For those of you who know me, you know how much I hate Halloween, primarily because I hate coming up with good costume ideas. So in Mbarara, I was dressed as a fly-swatter…complete with a couple of dead flies hot-glued to my shirt. In Kampala, I was dressed as a “twin” to Hannah’s African princess. We later decided to call me the “African Queen” and Hannah the “African princess.”
The only thing missing from our Halloween celebrations was decent candy… Reeces anybody??
The kids showed up in costumes, and we played lots of fun games, earning candy as prizes. In adddition to the traditional carnival-type games, there was apple-bobbing (my personal favorite), face-painting and even cookie-decorating. (Man, I wonder who was the unlucky person who had to make so many pumpkin-shaped sugar cookies!)
After the children exhausted all of the game stations, they piled into Danny’s trailer which was filled with HAY! Haha…just kidding! It was filled with BANANA LEAVES, the next best thing! They drove around town a bit, singing some silly songs and just having a grand ol’ time. While they were doing that, most of the adults were busy preparing our supper by cooking “sausages” (read: “hotdogs”) over a bonfire, which we ate with homemade hotdog buns…since you can‘t get them here in Mbarara. We had all sorts of interesting picnic-type foods, including home-made potato chips and jello salads.
Great time for the kids and I think some of the adults even had fun! See the pictures I’ve posted at my picture website: http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/bethellent/my_photos
The following weekend, we put on another (very similar) Fall Festival for all the missionaries’ kids at our quarterly meeting in Kampala. This one was much closer to the actual date of Halloween. We didn’t get to go on a “hay-banana leaf ride” but we did have a MOONBOUNCE! Some of us even took the opportunity to wear a DIFFERENT costume! (For those of you who know me, you know how much I hate Halloween, primarily because I hate coming up with good costume ideas. So in Mbarara, I was dressed as a fly-swatter…complete with a couple of dead flies hot-glued to my shirt. In Kampala, I was dressed as a “twin” to Hannah’s African princess. We later decided to call me the “African Queen” and Hannah the “African princess.”
The only thing missing from our Halloween celebrations was decent candy… Reeces anybody??
# posted by beth @ 12:11 PM 
