Sarah: Where is my bookbag?

Ugandan police stole my bookbag.

Let me backup:

Frank, his sisters Tracy & Lina, and I packed into the car and headed to the airport. I slept on the way. We get to the airport, but we are stopped by the police at the checkpoint.* The passengers have to get out of the car, go to a separate "secure point" to get wanded down. Meanwhile, Tracy is in the drivers seat and the policeman is "searching" the car for any kind of threat to the tiny, tiny, seemingly unimportant to the rest of the world Entebbe airport. 

I suppose we were labeled safe by the policemen, because we were sent on our way. As we park in the parking lot, open the boot (the boot is the trunk) to get out our luggage, I ask Francis, "Honey, where's my bookbag?" I immediately saw the panic in his eyes. He asked me "What?" He came around the side of the car to get a better look at the suitcases. He said, "It was here! They took it. The police must have taken it at the checkpoint."

We piled back in the car and pull ahead to talk to the other policemen. These guys were really nice. They listened to us, they were really sympathetic, but then they called over their "supervisor" who was a whole other story. He wouldn't listen to us, he kept saying "No, that's not possible", and he was overly defensive. We didn't even tell him that we thought they stole it. We said that maybe he just took it out of the boot to get a better look at the other contents and forgot to put it back in. "That's not possible." Well sir, if that's not possible then where is my effing bookbag??? He even went so far as to tell me that I probably put it somewhere else and I should check the rest of the car. So I pulled out everything in the car (not in the boot) and I looked around. Was my bookbag there? No. No it was not.

Eventually, we go back to the checkpoint with Officer Defensive to chat with the guys there and take a look around. Those men were just like Officer defensive. They wouldn't listen to our story and they certainly were not helpful. Their final decision was that, in our rush to make it to the airport, we must have forgotten it at home. Yeah, make it my fault. I started crying. Hard. I wanted those policemen to see a mzungu cry, to feel guilty, maybe to apologize and give me back my stuff. But no. I just got stares.

I lost my new macbook pro, camera (a canon xsi), journal, ipod, and sleeping pillow. I have none of the pictures I took while in Uganda. I am in mourning.

Feel free to comment on the post. However, please refrain from talking to me about this face-to-face. I guarantee you, I will cry. 

*Why do they even need the checkpoint before people enter the airport?! People aren't driving their cars into the airport! And (supposedly) they don't even take anything out of the car! How is that effective? If I have a bomb in the car, you better be sure it's going to be under the four 50lb. suitcases just chilling in the boot. So let me ask you again: HOW IS THIS "SECURITY" EFFECTIVE?!

Anger

In Uganda people say Hanger. When you want to eat you have anger/unger. When you are mad you have hanger. Also when you yawn it means you want to eat, it has nothing to do with being tired. Anyways I am angry. I think it has to do with the rain and the fact that it refuses to fall. My garden is drying up. The maize is wilting. The grass is dried up and brown. The dirt has lost all moisture so it is disgustingly dusty everywhere. It gets in my hair and my eyes, it makes everything in the house covered in a thin film of dirt within hours of cleaning. Its pathetic. I think without the rain we are wilting along with nature.

Today it sprinkled for 10 minutes. It was not hard enough to even feel it but only to barely hear it on the tin roof. It was a cruel tease.

Other than the rain my anger comes from problems with my witch of a neighbor. I am not calling her names, she actually practices witchcraft. That, somehow, is not even my problem with her. If I were to call her a name it would probably rhyme with witch... She is being evil to the members of the Otema house. It is such a long story that I don't think I will write it here. But it gets worse everyday and makes me want to scream.

The woman does not actually live next door but is the owner of the property next to us and rents a house to multiple families, who we get along with very well. Because she doesn't live next door I almost never see this woman. Denis will not tell me where she lives because he thinks I will march over to her house and give her a piece of my mind. A few weeks ago when this was all starting I never would have done that. I do not yell at people. I work things out. I am not afraid of conflict but I do not instigate it! Well not serious conflict, Becky will tell you that I constantly instigate small conflicts. But seriously I was stomping around the house seething but I would not have gone to her house and seethed! Is seethed a word? I think yes.

Well the woman has stopped coming around the property next door. Everyone (I mean everyone in the neighborhood who knows her and also knows the situation, news travels fast here) assumes that it is because she knows she is in the wrong but she can't back down now. It is good for me that she doesn't come around. Weeks ago I would have sat down and talked with her. At this point I have so much dislike for her that I would probably yell, or stomp, or slam a door, or kick a rock. I would definitely do something VERY smart. So good thing she stays wherever she is and I can stay here and try to learn to love my neighbor, who I really Really dislike.