When we were at the Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary on Saturday we a really interesting bird. It is bright yellow and called a “Weaver Bird”. It weaves these really neat round nests that hang down from the tree branches. The birds enter them from the bottom. In the past, I’ve never been able to get a decent picture. You have to have a good zoom lens to capture birds, but this time, despite my inadequate zoom, I was able to get a picture that is good enough to demonstrate these interesting creatures. 2nd picture show the yellow bird’s bottom as it burrows up into the nest from the bottom. I hope you can get the gist of the 3rd picture which is showing you how there are numerous nests in one tree.

INTERESTING COLLOQUIALISMS:
1. In Uganda, when one wants to cut the grass the activity is called “slashing”. The one who does it is the “slasher” as is the implement with which it is done- basically a long knife that is swung in an arch-like motion back and forth. Sentence: my son is out slashing the lawn. If you thought mowing the lawn with a push lawn mower was a lot of work, you haven’t tried slashing a several acre piece of land.:)
2. The people in Uganda are extremely welcoming, kind, and generous. They are also excellent hosts. Whenever you come into a store or go Up to someone’s house, they always remark “you are most welcome”. When we return to the hotel from a day of work, we are greeted by everyone we meet “welcome back, how was the day or how was the work?” They greet us like long lost cousins they haven’t seen in awhile. When we go to meet with people whether planned or on the spur of the moment, we are ushered in and everything stops until enough chairs are brought for us to sit. If there aren’t enough chairs, they will get up and insist we take the seats. It is also quite normal for tea and water and sometimes snacks to be brought even if we said we didn’t need anything. Of course then the appropriate thing to do is to graciously accept the offerings.
3. Two other interesting phrases are “ok please” and “It’s ok, it’s ok”. The former is used why we might just say “ok”. The latter is used when you ask if it is ok to do something, like take a picture. We might say “sure” or “ok” or “yes” but they would say “it’s ok. It’s ok” in rapid succession- kinda of like how we might say “no problems” or “no worries”.