Eating Out
It is a huge chore to cook when you are living on your own. Well, I think it
is anyway. It is especially hard here as supplies are so hard to come by and you
cannot bank on the fridge working as power cuts are so frequent.
To
keep from fading away altogether what I usually do is to visit the local
'restaurant' in Kasana - about a kilometer away from my house. Everything is in
kilometers here by the way. I have named it 'Alex's Place' because the Luganda
name is just too hard to remember. In the photo on the left you can see Alex
sitting between Dad and me. Behind us is the woman who never smiles. I always
greet her cheerily enough but she just skowls back at me. In Buganda (the area
of Uganda that I am in) it is bad manners to greet someone if they are eating.
Maybe years of working in such an environment have made her this way. With her
'Mona Lisa' smile in this photo she is the happiest I've ever seen her.
On entering the establishment, the typical dialogue goes as follows: -
Me - 'Hello. How are you?
Alex - 'Fine. How are you?'
Me - 'Fine. How is the day?'
Alex - 'The day is OK'
Me - 'Do you have meat?'
Alex - 'Yes' (usually)
Me - 'Do you have potatoes?'
Alex - 'Yes' (sometimes)
Me - 'Do you have vegetables?'
Alex - 'No' (often)
Me - 'I would like some meat and potatoes please'
The meat arrives in one bowl and everything else in another one. The photos
on the left show a typical serving of meat and of potatoes and matoke (a type of
savoury banana). Poor Dad found the food a bit bland when he was here. I think
it was the whole deal of eating the same thing every day that got to him.
Still,
it is good value. No matter what you order, you get charged for a 'plate of
food.' A plate of food and a 500ml Coke comes to 1,900 Ugandan Shillings which
is less than a pound. Interestingly enough the receipt shows that once goods are
sold they are 'non-returnable'. When was the last time you saw that on a
restaurant bill?
Home
To
keep from fading away altogether what I usually do is to visit the local
'restaurant' in Kasana - about a kilometer away from my house. Everything is in
kilometers here by the way. I have named it 'Alex's Place' because the Luganda
name is just too hard to remember. In the photo on the left you can see Alex
sitting between Dad and me. Behind us is the woman who never smiles. I always
greet her cheerily enough but she just skowls back at me. In Buganda (the area
of Uganda that I am in) it is bad manners to greet someone if they are eating.
Maybe years of working in such an environment have made her this way. With her
'Mona Lisa' smile in this photo she is the happiest I've ever seen her.
