Tuesday 30th and Wednesday 31st July.-Welcome to Kinderkatten

We arrived on Tuesday for our second day at school and found out that we would be officially having our welcome celebration today. But first I would be teaching Maths and English, in maths I was doing my first lesson on picture graphs to the class. The lesson went really well as it was my first maths lesson, and if anything I found it to be a subject that was a lot easier to teach than I thought it would be. After maths and break, I was back in class to teach English, continuing with doing a refresh of the past tense.

At lunch time we were presented a huge meal of posho, Mitoki, beans and chicken. We sat with all the teachers on chairs facing each other across the large nursery room instead of at the table. Once we had finished eating we were given an assembly where the teachers and the head gave some brief speeches about how pleased they were that we were working at the school, and what they hoped we would achieve and enjoy while we were there. After the speeches the children from our classes came in and did dancing and singing to welcome us to their school which were really good and enjoyable. Once it was all over I headed to my class to teach Science and to thank my class for such a good assembly and told them how much I appreciated it.

At 4pm when school was finished I had organised for some football to be played between P4 and Katie’s P5 class which was a lot of fun. Calling it a game of football is a bit flattering, as its mainly just kicking in the direction of the goal while the older kids bulldoze their way through the others, but it was really fun. The view from the pitch of the mountains and fields are really impressive as well. I really enjoyed my 2^nd day at school and am already really looking forward to tomorrow and the rest of the week.

Wednesday was much like Tuesday, I continued with my lessons and started doing some work on tally charts with my class in maths. At the end of the lesson Shivon presented me with an avocado, I was absolutely delighted despite not actually liking avocados. Shivon seemed to find it funny that I was so grateful for the present, but it had made me realise that I wasn’t disliked by the class as I had feared. After maths and English was lunch which was back to Posho, Mitoki and beans that I assume will be the daily meal unless something special happens.

Once I got back to the lodge I sent my dad a text wishing him happy birthday and letting everyone know how I was, and about my avocado.

Monday 29th July- First day

We woke up at 7 o clock and went straight to breakfast for dough balls, WOO! For school, boys have to wear long trousers and a collared shirt while girls have to wear skirts down to their ankles. The 4 of us going to Kindergatten piled into a van with the group going to Kyeijanga School which Dec, Emily, Lotty and Lucy. Kindergatten is a reasonably nearby school, so we were dropped off first after 10/15 minutes in the van.

We had never seen Kindergatten school before, so we were quite confused and nervous as we got out the van. When we got out there was a group of kids all crowded around something by one of the classrooms, so we headed over to them. It turned out that they had caught some mudfish on their way to school and were killing and skinning them outside the class. I asked them what year group they were and was slightly off put when the biggest kid holding the biggest knife said P4.

After that worrying encounter, we headed over to what looked like the main building and introduced ourselves to the teachers and the head teacher. The teachers all seemed very friendly and smiley, but I found the head teacher a bit creepy. He seemed overly friendly and slightly intimidating as a result, he would lean in very close and very unblinking when speaking to us, or waiting for our reply. But Katie, who had been teaching at the school for a few weeks already as she was one of the 12 weekers, assured us that he’s a decent guy.

After the brief introductions we were all taken to our classes, beginning with Kya’s P6 class. All 4 of us were taken to each class to be introduced to every student, at which point Gideon (our Kindergatten mentor) would announce to the class which of us would be their teacher, before we all headed onto the next class. Once all the student introductions were done we went to our respective classes. My classroom was a very small room with 4 students per bench, there was a doorway but no door, and a window gap with no window. Kya had the classroom on the other side of mine, the walls were not sound proof at all, and we can easily hear each other’s lessons. There were also some holes in the wall between our two classrooms.

When I walked in all the students in the class instantly stood up and in unison said ‘WELCOME TO P4 CLASS, PLEASE FEEL AT HOME! HOW ARE YOU SEBO (man/sir)’ to which I nervously responded ‘Good, cheers. How are you?’ Instantly the class responded with ‘WE ARE SUPER DUPER THANK YOU FOR ASKING!’ I told my class to sit down and then proceeded to dump my stuff on the floor. Instantly 2 of my class sprinted out of the room, making me think my class were already bunking off already within a minute of me turning up.  But a couple of minutes later one of them came back carrying chalk and loo roll which turned out to be the board rubber. The other child came back carrying a desk on her head which she placed down for me to put my stuff on.

I then began my lesson plan, beginning with handing out books to all the kids and asking which students needed a pen. Roughly a dozen of my 19 students needed one. Once the equipment was handed out I began by introducing myself to the class and getting them to fill in the front of the books. We then sorted out the class rules and began playing some games. I used a small sponge ball which I would throw to a child and they would stand, say their name and something about themselves such as favourite subject before throwing it back to me. I also got the class to write something about themselves as well as a picture of themselves on their first page of their books. We played some hangman and other board games, and at the end of the lesson they stood and sang a song, before I left so that their next teacher could come in.

During my free period and break I kind of dreaded going back in to the class, as I had felt quite awkward and nervous by it all, I felt as though the ice breaker lesson was very boring and not all that successful, but I was reassured by the fact that the rest of my group (bar Katie who had been with her class for a few weeks) had felt exactly the same. At break all the teachers came in and we sat and chatted a bit while eating bananas that were thrust upon us in bowls.

English was next so I headed back to the class, again they all stood and welcomed me to the class and declared that they were ‘READY TO LEARN’, when I said ‘Shtamma (sit down)’ to them they sat down while stating that ‘WE WILL WASTE NO TIME!’ I explained to the class that we would be looking at the ‘Expression of the Future’, I got the class to write down the objectives of the topic, and then began by seeing what they knew of the past tense, as it would be difficult to teach the future if they don’t understand the past tense. It turns out that they didn’t know much of the past tense despite it supposedly already been taught as the topic before me, so I decided I would try and teach the past tense for the next few days before going to the future. I felt as though the English lesson went quite well and I was beginning to feel quite confident about everything.

After the lesson I had a free period with Kya where I marked the books. At the end of the free period, Siobhan and Katie arrived from their lessons and we discussed how the day was going so far. After 20 minutes food was brought out; Posho, Mitoki and Beans, with a drink of porridge, which is basically liquid Posho.

Straight after lunch I headed back to my class for my first science lesson. This was easily the best lesson of the day and I was already beginning to realise which kids in my class were the very eager ones and smart ones, and which ones would need help. The lesson was about ‘Vectors and Diseases’, the vector we looked at was cockroaches. I was very surprised by how much the students already knew about cockroaches, vectors and how diseases spread. But this is probably because it is an important thing for these children to know, unlike in the UK where children don’t need to worry about getting malaria, typhoid, dysentery and other diseases. At the end of the lesson, I had another free with Kya while Katie and Siobhan had their lessons. One thing that I noticed about my class and the whole School was that the vast majority of children are bare foot; roughly 4 kids in my class of 19 had any kind of footwear, which includes flip flops.

We got picked up by the VU van at about 4:15 and taken back to the lodge where everyone discussed their first day, planned their lessons for tomorrow and had dinner. I felt as though my first day began OK, and got progressively better, and I’m feeling confident and looking forward to tomorrow.

Saturday 27th and Sunday 28th July- BBQ and prepping for school

A few hours after breakfast we went for the first time into the local town of Kanungu to have a look at the market and get something to eat. The market consisted of what seems to be donated charity clothes in piles on a rug next to someone sitting on the floor. As a result there are a lot of rubbishy items but if you look hard enough and are willing to take the time you can find some good stuff.

After looking around the market which takes 30 minutes max, we went to a bar called ‘The Cave’ where we sat and had a drink and played pool. After a couple of hours I went off and got a chewy goat kebab and a Rolex (omelette wrapped in chapatti) to eat. Once I had finished, myself and a couple of the lads were asked if we would help sort out the evening’s BBQ atop of a huge hill a 20 minutes’ drive from town.

View from the BBQ

When the small group of us got as high as the vehicle would allow us, we got out and had to carry crates of bottles for 20 minutes through bushes and across a hill. The walk was absolutely exhausting and we had to pause for brief breaks every few minutes, but once we got to our destination it was definitely worth it. The view overlooked a large part of the region. While we had been walking, our small group had managed to attract the attention of 3 or 4 children who had proceeded to follow us and began playing and sitting with us when we gave them a Coca-Cola. By the time the rest of the volunteers had arrived half an hour later, there must have been 30 or so kids hanging around and playing with us, some of them were sitting in trees staring at us, or wearing our sunglasses and hats. We played some football and catch with the kids until the meal began, where the children left until we had finished.

Topics for the Kindergatten classes

After we had finished eating, the team leaders revealed to us what schools we would be teaching at, what year group and who we were with. I found out that I would be teaching P4 (equal to year 4 in a British school) at a small private school called Kinderkatten, terms at the school costing roughly £10-15 per student. I would have a class of roughly 20 kids and would be teaching English, Maths and Science. The volunteers going to my school were Kya (P6), Siobhan (P3) and Katie (P5).Once the team leaders had finished saying what schools and year groups we were teaching at, the kids came back and we continued playing football and taking photos. One of the kids had accidentally kicked the ball off the hill, and spent close to an hour trying to climb down the massive steep hill to find a ball amongst the farms at the bottom. After a few more hours we headed back to the lodge where we hit the sack.

Kindergatten timetable

On Sunday we spent the majority of the day chilling out and planning our lessons for our first day of school, as well as asking any questions that we had to the team leaders. The topics that I was doing were ‘Expression of the future’ for English, ‘Graphs and Interpretation of data’ for maths and ‘Vectors and Diseases’ for science. I planned an ice breaker lesson for my first period which would be maths at 9:30 and then some simple lessons for the other topics as to see what level the children were at. Afterwards, Frank (a Wachiga who works for Volunteer Uganda) turned up and we had to buy our class books and pens etc. from. As a result of everyone being pretty nervous we all had an early night straight after dinner as to get ready for our early start on Monday. 

Friday 26th July- LRTT

Today was pretty boring; we spent the majority of the morning in LRTT training. Today’s training was repetitive and uninteresting other than a chicken ran in and caused mild chaos.

 Later in the afternoon we went to the college to do our microteaching. This basically consisted of us being put into several groups, each group in a different classroom, and we would have to do 15 minutes of our lesson to our peers, and team leader who was observing us. Everyone in my group did pretty well and seemed to know what they were doing. The lesson that I had planned for the microteaching was an English lesson, I was extremely nervous and made a couple of mistakes in delivering my lesson, but overall it went pretty well.

Back at the lodge we had dinner, played some pool and cards before going to bed.

Thursday 25th July- Kirima Parents primary school.

The day began with more LRTT with Frank. The LRTT training consisted of more lesson planning and ways to motivate and interest students.

After the lesson we headed to one of the schools that VU works with, called Kirima Parents. This was our first interaction with the kids in Uganda. Instantly after stepping out the van we were absolutely mobbed by kids who were holding our hands, grabbing at our hair, faces and arms. We went from the van to the staff room where we were given our first (of many) proper Ugandan meals: Posho, Mitoki and beans. The only way I can describe the taste of Posho is that it tastes like mashed nothing. Mitoki is basically potatoed banana and beans are just beans. The food isn’t as bad as you would think, but it is incredibly dense, bland and filling.

The football pitch/play area

After the meal at the school, I, Dec and a couple of other lads went down to the football pitch to play with the kids. The pitch at the school was set up like an arena, a flat(ish), large patch of ground situated below the school. Calling the game the kids were playing as football is slightly flattering. A better way to describe it is to just randomly boot the ball in any direction.

Once the lunch break was over we were allowed to sit in on classes and watch how Ugandan teachers work in their lessons. I sat in on 3 or so lessons making brief notes, but mainly just observing how the children are taught and what I could do when I begin teaching. In one of the lessons Samir was observing in, a student had drawn him as the 'Indian Commando' which he absolutely loved and claims that he will be framing it when he gets home.

After school had finished we were taken to a nearby secondary school to play netball. Netball again was a flattering way to describe the matches, as it was a lot more physical than Netball. The girls lost their game, and then us boys were forced to play a game. We did really well and drew 2-2 despite being told we lost 3-1. Afterwards we went back to the lodge, had dinner and then went to bed.

Pav and Samir the 'Indian Commando'

Wednesday 24th July- The run and college

When I woke up, myself, Dec and Samir decided to go for an early pre breakfast run. We jogged out of the lodge and headed left at the end of the road, intending to run to a local football pitch and back. On the way back from the pitch, we somehow managed to miss the road to the lodge. We ended up at a crossroads, completely disorientated and confused. A local woman walked past and Samir decided to ask for directions. Because our Wachiga was so bad, and her English was so poor, Samir resorted to a game of sherades with the woman. Eventually the woman seemed to understand what we were asking and said that we had missed the lodge by 2 miles. On our way back to the lodge we got picked up a VU (volunteer Uganda) van on their way back from picking up supplies. Once back at the lodge everyone seemed to find our ‘adventure’ very funny, so we all had an embarrassing hour or so of being laughed at.

After breakfast we started our LRTT training with Frank (one of the Ugandan staff at the lodge). This just consisted of learning how to deal with misbehaving children, and how to communicate with the teachers. What is expected of us, and what the average day plan at school is.

College Library

After the lesson and lunch we were taken to a local college to look around. The college was at the time empty of students due to the holidays. We were able to look around the classrooms/seminar rooms and libraries. The library in particular was extremely limited, with books that looked at least 3^rd hand and were very out of date. The dorms of the students were very small but packed full of beds, at points, 4 beds on top of each other. We also found out at the college that only 100,000 people graduate a year in Uganda.

Once we got back to the lodge we chilled out, had dinner and went to bed.

College grounds

Tuesday 23rd July- Wachiga lesson

Our first day at the lodge consisted of our welcome talk, a wachiga lesson, meeting the people already at the lodge and chilling out. The welcome talk was pretty uneventful, just telling us about the camp, what the rules and expectations were and answering any questions that we have about the coming weeks of teaching and generally life at the camp.

The wachiga lesson was a lesson in the basics of the local tongue. We learned how to greet someone, ‘Agandi’ and how to reply ‘neejay’. Regardless of your situation you must always say ‘neejay’ meaning ‘I’m fine’ before saying anything. We learned some other useful words that would help in our teaching such as ‘hoo nama’ meaning ‘be quiet’, ‘ya ma rela’ as ‘stand up’ and ‘shtamma’ meaning ‘sit down’.

After our lesson we relaxed for the rest of the day, had dinner and hit the sack.

Main part of the lodge

Monday 22nd July- Journey from hell

After a night of heavy drinking, waking up at 5 o clock in the morning was definitely not the greatest way to start the night, especially with a 10-11 hour van journey to look forward to. By 7 o clock the tents were all packed up and we just setting off from the Red Chilli to our final destination of the Volunteer Lodge in the Bwindi region of Uganda bordering the Democratic Republic of Congo.

I was in a van with 7 other people including our driver who for the whole 10 hour journey had a tape of Christian hymns on repeat. I cannot emphasise how bad, monotonous and repetitive the music was. The tape lasted about 45minutes to an hour, so we listened to it about 10 times. By the end of the journey we all knew the words to the crowd pleaser favourites, ‘Im forever faithful’ and ‘I believe in Jesus’.  Apart from myself and the driver, we had 6 other volunteers; Dec, Mel, Kelly, Marissa, Catherine and Shiobhan (pronounced shivon).

After almost 2 hours on the road, our van was pulled over by a large and scary Ugandan policewoman, who Kelly (The photograph queen who already had 800 photos on one of her cameras, despite being in Uganda for less than a week) really wanted to take photos of until we managed to persuade otherwise stating that it probably wouldn’t be the greatest idea. The policewoman then proceeded to take our driver’s license and make him leave the vehicle for 20 minutes. Which to say the least was slightly worrying, we even had a plan to drive away in case our driver didn’t come back, or if the situation became worse.

Eventually our driver came back claiming that everything was OK, and we continued on our journey. An hour or so later we arrived at the Equator which was a brief stopping point for us. The equator was a tiny string of buildings in the middle of nowhere. It was a ‘tourist spot’ as a result of it being at the exact point of the equator, a line was drawn across the road leading to two arcs reading equator, one on either side of the road. There was a Ugandan man who was showing how the water was affected by pouring it through a cylinder. Myself and Dec wrote our names on a cactus where previous visitors had done the same.

Cactus

After leaving the equator we carried on driving for a few more hours, dodgy Christian hymns berating our heads, everyone in the van managed to get some sleep for a bit other than myself (as usual). We then arrived in the Ugandan city of Mbarara where I took out some desperately needed money and got some bits and bobs from the supermarket. The ever unpredictable Pav bought a massive watermelon for himself and was handing out amongst us all. Those of the group who smoke were ushered around a corner into an alley by Ugandan security guards. This was because it is seen as impolite and is frowned upon to smoke in public, it also apparently symbolises criminality because supposedly only Ugandan criminals smoke.

THE TWIXES!

We all then packed back into the vehicles only to find that Graeme (one of the team leaders) had decided he would use our van to store boxes of twixes, alcohol and other commodities. So as if the van wasn’t cramped enough before, the next 5 hours were to be uncomfortably cramped and full of items we were not allowed to use. The boxes of twixes eventually gave way filling the van with twixes which all melted or ended up getting squished.

The final 5 hours of the journey was extremely bumpy and jolty, with the only pauses being for Kelly to take a photo or 200. The driver wouldn’t even pause for a slash on the side of the road, although that’s probably because he couldn’t understand anything we said, or couldn’t hear us due to his immersion in his hymn tape. By this point we had realised that there was something wrong with our van, as it seemed that there was more dust and dirt in the van then there was in the rest of Africa.

About 20 minutes before we arrived at the lodge we were pulled over by a couple of volunteers who needed to be taken to the lodge after finishing their day at their schools. They were from the group that had already been at the lodge for 4 weeks. So for the last 20 minutes we had boxes of twixes and other items everywhere as well as 2 more volunteers sitting on our knees. By the time we arrived at the lodge the original group of us were so brown and dirty from all the dust that I couldn’t remember what I originally looked like.

The view from the lodge is pretty impressive, its situated on a hill within a national park. It is in the middle of the ‘impenetrable forest’ which eventually leads to the Democratic Republic of Congo. That night we had dinner, some drinks and unpacked our stuff in the dorms before going to bed.           

Sunday 21st- Red Chilli

Today began with a 3 hour journey to a camp called Red Chilli in Kampala. Once at Red Chilli we set up our tents, had a decent lunch, Ugandan curry for me and then played some cards. Afterwards we just chilled out and began getting ready for the night out in Kampala.

The first stop was a restaurant/bar/club called MishMash. We all sat around eating and drinking for an hour or so, I had a good cheeseburger. After eating we headed into the main part of MishMash and sat on the steps and tables watching the band and smoking Shisha. When the band finished they asked for people to come up and do a karaoke.  The highlight of which was Pav’s (Afro wielding eccentric Russian/Israeli/Canadian Jewish volunteer) who sang a rousing rendition of the Pokémon theme tune in Hebrew. We all joined in on the choruses and yelling Pokémon where appropriate, although we’re not sure how much of the ‘experience’ was understood by the confused and amused Ugandan locals.

We then left MishMash and went to a club practically next door called Casablanca, which I could only describe as a weird (but cool) small Ugandan version of Lola Los. Our group were the only Westerners in the club and got some interesting looks from the regulars there who were all smoking fags and shishas inside. After the initial awkward few minutes of everyone looking confused, regulars and volunteers included we began drinking and having a laugh. After 15-20 minutes the club suddenly began filling up with more locals and regulars who had obviously heard that a big group of Muzungus (what Ugandans call Westerners) had hit their club. It was a very friendly atmosphere and belong we were all intermingling with the locals who were dancing and joking with us. A couple of them got a bit overly friendly with the girls but all in all it was a very good and funny night. At around 3ish we left the club and headed back to Red Chilli for the night and early start for Monday.

Saturday 20th July- Rafting

This morning we woke up had to be ready to begin the day by 9:30am. We then bundled into a couple of mini buses and drove for two hours to where the water rafting begins on the Nile. We were split up into groups of 9s and 7s and given a brief training exercise on the river which included flipping the raft over so that we ended up floundering in the Nile. The whole rafting trip was 22km and lasted about 5 hours.

As soon as the training exercises were done we were instantly thrown into the deep end. Our raft chose to do the most difficult route which began with going over a waterfall called overtime and then a rapid called Chop Suey. Overtime was pretty scary and we were all drenched, but the raft didn’t flip and no one fell out. Our rafts under the leadership of the mad and hung over Aussie Captain Tom were the only raft to do the Chop Suey rapid. The rapid began pretty well, Tom was continuously yelling at us to row and then to get down and hold on. Chop Suey saw the raft’s first loss, Holly disappeared from the raft when a huge wave crashed over us. It was later revealed that Captain Tom may of accidentally pushed her off the raft while trying to protect himself from the wave, but the details are contested.

We went through one more rapid before we arrived at the BAD PLACE! Before we went into the bad place we got to see a raft flip over with volunteers going everywhere, this surprisingly didn’t do much to boost our confidence. As soon as we got into the bad place we were hit by a huge wave that instantly took out Emily. Next thing I saw was Chris’s legs as he was thrown out. The raft steadied out for a split second as a huge wave came up behind us which Robyn, sitting opposite me couldn’t see. The last thing she did was laugh before she was flung overboard. Kate decided she didn’t want to be taken overboard so decided she would leap off the raft. Suddenly I was the only remaining person left on my half of the raft and the last thing I saw was the panicked wide eyes of Samir before I was plunged under water, spinning around and swallowing half the Nile. I briefly resurfaced and then went back under; I was picked up by a screaming man in a kayak and put into a safety raft. According to one of the instructors who filmed our raft, we did the best surf all year. As I was in the safety raft I was able to watch a couple of other rafts attempt the bad place, one raft full of Chinese people lasted literally 3 seconds. As the raft went up the wave the instructor leaped out straight away, the raft continued up the wave and then went upside down in the air. It seemed as though for a brief moment the sky was full of screaming Chinese people.

I later got back to my raft and it turned out the last people on the raft were Lotty, Samir, Holly and Zeddy  who were wiped out some time after me. After the panic of THE BAD PLACE we had lunch and went back out rafting. We did a couple of more hours of rafting and leaped into the Nile a couple of times, had a BBQ by the rafts and then went back to the campsite.

At the campsite we stayed up late drinking, we made Captain Tom do 6 shots, down a pint, do a funnel and hang upside down in the kayak attached to the ceiling while he did another shot. He was very hung over the next morning. I ended up being talked into doing a funnel and a load of shots before going to bed.

Friday 19th July- Bungee

Leap of faith

After everyone had got washed, ready and had breakfast we were all bundled into a minibus to take us to the next lodge where we would be spending two nights. Along the 3 hour journey the minibus was surrounded by street vendors trying to sell their wares. I bought a meat skewer for the equivalent of 25p, the meat was what I could only assume (and hope) was goat. I have never had a chewier lunch and disturbingly in one of the blocks of meat there was some bone. On the bright side I surprisingly didn't get any food poisoning.

At the lodge we thankfully had proper rooms and beds with an incredible view over the Nile. Once we had settled down we had the option of bungee jumping from a 44metre height over the river Nile. Out of the 25 or so volunteers a dozen or so were doing the bungee jump. I had absolutely no intention of doing it what so ever, but an hour later I found myself standing on a ledge, staring downwards with a piece of towel in between my legs and a massive Ugandan man yelling 3-2-1 right behind me.

My body tried to resist jumping but a split second later I was hurtling through the air towards the Nile. Part of the bungee jump included being dunked in the Nile, so one second I was speeding through the air and then the next I was shooting back upwards absolutely drenched from the river. Bungee jumping is easily one of the most terrifying things I've ever done but as soon as I jumped I realised how good it was and would happily do another.

In the evening we went to the lodge’s bar overlooking the Nile and with a view point of the bungee. We all stayed around chatting and drinking as well as celebrating Declan’s 19^th (the youngest volunteer) birthday before going back to bed.

Wednesday 17th/Thursday 18th July- travel

Wednesday 17^th/Thursday 18^th

After a tearful farewell at Gatwick airport from my family, I was on my own. The journey started off badly when I was stopped by security so they could go through my bag and they confiscated my prize possession…MY HP SAUCE!

An hour later I was on my first flight which would take me to Dubai. As soon as I sat down in my seat, one of the largest men I’ve ever seen sat down next to me. This guy was huge and required two seatbelts to strap him in. He was also too big for his seat and so I spent the 7/8 hour flight with him spilling over me.

I arrived in Dubai early Thursday morning and had to jog through the airport to get to my gate in time for my flight to Uganda. WOOP! Once at Uganda airport I met up with some other volunteers and we went to get our luggage and try to find our rep.

On the bus with some volunteers from the airport.

We then had a 2 hour bus ride to the first campsite where most of the other volunteers were already at hanging around by the pool. The pool had a massive diving board 10metres high which I was forced into doing. After we’d came back from the pool and back to the campsite we had dinner, which was a two hour wait for pizzas, the entertainment for those two hours being a documentary about The Saturdays, with a group of girls trying to educate me to the ‘musical talent’ of the band. Later we headed over to the local bar for some drinks, pool and table football. The locals at the bar were extremely friendly but highly competitive at the pool tables and table football.

After a few hours we went back to the campsite and attempted to sleep in the tents. However I and a few others were woken up by some off-putting sounds coming from a random backpacker’s tent, who had clearly taken a liking to a local woman.