Tomorrow afternoon, the American delegates for the Global Youth Partnership for Africa’s conference on Youth, Development & Health arrive, meaning that blogging time will be limited as I guide American and Ugandan youth leaders around the country.

I probably shouldn’t be saying this, but my public health experience is limited to a basic familiarity with the ABC policy and the knowledge that, generally speaking, clean = good and dirty = things like cholera and tuberculosis. That’s okay, though — it looks like I’m about to get a crash course in health disaster management:

Uganda: Ebola-Like Virus Hits Kamwenge
Uganda: Marburg Feared in Kampala

Oh, goody.

My little brother’s greatest worry when I told him I was moving to Uganda was that I would contract Ebola, a disease he studied extensively in school and consequently fears like the plague (ba-dum ching). If I remember correctly, I laughed, patted his head and told him I’d be “just fine.” Look who’s obsessive-compulsively washing her hands now?

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Well, not exactly. But I did get flagged as spam, which shut down my ability to post until a “human” (I’m quoting the Blogger notice) reviewed JF and gave me the green light.

Thanks, human.

And, now that I’m back, I’ve been tagged by Glenna to participate in the 8 Random Things meme. It feels a bit hypocritical, given my last Global Voices post about the blogren being all fun & games.

But then, what’s the matter with fun & games? So here goes (I’m skipping the rules because everyone’s already been tagged except for Josh — your turn):

ONE.
I hate these. I think they’re a waste of energy, pixels and kilobytes. (Grumble, grumble, arrrgh…. 27th, I’m turning into a pirate already.)

TWO.
Until three years ago, my biggest aspiration was to work for the CIA. In my defense: they teach you languages. For free. And they pay you for the ones you already know.

THREE.
I was supremely relieved (and thoroughly amused) today when I noticed that I’m not the only one who edits local media in my head.

FOUR.
In my book, barbecue sauce is its own food group and should be applied to most other foods, including mashed potatoes and omlettes.

FIVE.
I read so much that as a kid I could never clean my room without constant parental prompting — I’d get caught up in the copyright tags attached to toys, old homework and the backs of cereal boxes.

SIX.
I never travel without my pillow.

SEVEN.
For all the times that I’ve sheepishly introduced myself as a Russian major attempting to work in East Africa, I wouldn’t trade my degree for the world.

EIGHT.
I bought a ticket home this week. Talk about mixed emotions. I’ve lost count of the number of times I have hated this experience, the number of times I have curled up on my bed and cursed everything: corruption, poverty, the Anopheles mosquito, incompetence, bureacracy, misplaced deference, war, rain, matooke.

And then there are the wonderful things: Breakdance Project Uganda, the Nagenda Academy and the visionary behind it, watching the sun rise during the early-morning bus rides north, the French-speaking owner of Maq Foods in Gulu, the youth leaders I’ve met working for GYPA, my 27 housemates (and counting), the blogren.

My good friend Chris recently left Uganda after a year in Gulu. I’ve been reading his blog a lot lately as he grapples with returning to the States, and this post made me miss Uganda already. In the words of Locus Amoenus: “Funny then, how Uganda always seems to redeem itself when you want to lay under the mosquito net and sob.”

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