Today we began our first attempt at growing fresh vegetables here in Uganda. We started small with only four different kinds of plants—squash, zucchini, green beans, and sweet corn—but if this garden ends up being anything like our one in the States, it will grow exponentially each growing season! This also makes us feel more Ugandan, at least partially. Most Ugandan families have a garden surrounding their house, but they typically grow things like matooke, kasava, and lumonde (white sweet potatoes) in their gardens. Somehow I don’t think we’ll be planting those things anytime soon.
As we were working outside on the garden, Nathan noticed a clump of over 150 fuzzy caterpillars all huddled close to a tree by a big water tank. Later, we came by again and they had all lined up on the hose from the water tank. One of our security guards told us they were trying to get to the leaves on the tree, and they must have thought the hose would take them up there! We watched the line disintegrate as they realized that the hose was taking them farther from the tree rather than closer. Since these caterpillars can give you a nasty sting if you touch them, Nathan had some fun setting them on fire to prevent them from spreading over all over our compound!
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