Welcome back: You are now shiny and smooth

“Your body is different, it is now shiny and smooth. I can see you have had a happy journey.”

“Spencer, you know I have to say it: you have grown seriously fat!”

“Daniel has been seriously suffering without you. But now I can see he is happy you are back.”

This week I returned to Gulu after a two and a half week visit to the UK and was greeted with these lovely ‘welcome back’ comments. I possibly only put on about two kilograms, maybe 100g for each day. I certainly over indulged in everything dairy, desserts and seafood. One of our neighbours even added further: “If you were to stay out there for one month, you would look like her” pointing to somebody who was about 20kg heavier than me.
Thank you Gulu for your kind sentiments.

I made a last-minute decision to attend a lovely friend’s wedding in Richmond, the UK this month. And I had a blast! To be honest I was a little bit wary: I had feared that maybe I had changed a lot; maybe my friends had also changed; what if I had an emotional breakdown?

No breakdowns (yet – at least it wasn’t Christmas). I had changed, so had my friends, but I felt like I was dipping back into my old UK community – it was absolutely splendid! I don’t think I realized how much I needed it until it was over.

Dan didn’t come with me, I went alone (the timing just wasn’t good for him). By the end I did start to feel guilty that I was regularly sending him photos of me with friends and food. hmmm

Thank you UK for your love, your dairy, keeping me up late, and looking after me. I plan to dive back in to education work here tomorrow. It’s the middle of the wet season and I was a little shocked to see our road deteriorate quite significantly whilst I was away. I guess we need to wait until another election until it will be worked on. We have also moved, about 10m away, into our old neighbours hut, let’s just say it’s the ‘big hut’. Getting used to more space, but quite excited to now have hot showers and a fridge: perfect since I brought back 2.5kg of cheese with me.

Jody