This is still Africa!

There are some things which are very different about our life in Dodoma (Tanzania) or Juba compared to this big city of Kampala. Here, there is so much development and some great facilities: places to take the children out for the day, lovely cafes, ice-cream shops, restaurants, a choice of many good schools and churches, supermarkets galore which gives us competitive prices and choices about where to shop for our family groceries...

There are other things which are reminiscent of some of the challenges I have previously experienced when living life in an African context... like the bold and horrible RODENTS!! These foul, pesky, germ-ridden creatures keep turning up as I move from African country to African country...

Last week, I discovered droppings and a half eaten banana on my kitchen counter. On further investigation, I uncovered a lot MORE droppings IN MY LARDER!! OH NO,
 OH NO, OH NO!!!!
And not only that... the nasty little 4-legged thief had OPENED a vent on one of my tupper-wares and tried to eat the chocolate cake inside!!! :-(

I moved the entire contents of the larder to the lounge. Our house looked ridiculous, with sealed tupper-wares of supplies and food and cleaning equipment, as well as the draining board contents now decorating all the lounge surfaces, well away from Ratty's domain:

Yesterday morning, much to my delight, Andrew announced that we had caught the rat on a locally- bought glue-trap! Since he clearly liked chocolate, we had plced a chocolate biscuit as bait-- and it got him! Horray! I was too fearful to go an look at the thing myself, but sent my braver children in to the larder (!!!) to take this photo for me:

Unfortunately.... the saga is not over. This morning, to my horror, we discovered more droppings in the  kitchen- argh!!!!!!
I have now booked some industrial-strength fumigators to come in and KILL anything on 4 or 6 legs in my house. The house will stink and we will have a lot of inconvenience,,, bit I am not sure what else to resort to.... I'll keep you posted on what turns up when the exterminators have finished their job!