My last weekend :-(

Elaine as Sacajawea

A Hooded Vulture at the Riverlodge

I can't believe I've been away a whole month! It's gone so quickly and I've had my last weekend in Wau!
It started with the Explorers barbecue on Saturday night, at what is going to be the new aparthotel - the Marula village - named after the trees they have planted there. You were supposed to go as a famous explorer so I acquired a couple of feathers from the local vultures and went as Sacajawea the Indian guide.
After a lazy breakfast on Sunday I wanted to go exploring! Beautiful Wau is famous in Sudan for 2 things - the largest brick built building in Southern Sudan and two sets of traffic lights! In all the time I've been here I've never seen the lights working. Andrew assured me that they were sometimes on but...
Anyway as it was my last Sunday I wanted to visit the market and try and get a photo of the RC cathedral - the largest brick building in Southern Sudan.

The airport road in Wau

By the by - the Sudanese do not like you taking photos. They assume you are spying for the North and get very upset - so this picture of the airport road was a sneaky one taken through the car windscreen on my phone as I pretended to text! The market is off the road to the right.
On our way to the cathedral we had to pass through the traffic lights which were working!! We assumed the Governor was worshipping at the cathedral so they had switched the lights on.

Wau Roman Catholic Cathedral

As you can see from the (furtively taken) photo, the cathedral is a very impressive building. It was also full as people were standing outside and the service was being played to them over loud speakers.

Exhausted after volleyball!

We wanted to check out the market as there have been rumours of food shortages since the Government in Khartoum introduced austerity measures banning the import of frozen meat and dairy products, amongst other things. Prices have certainly risen sharply in the last couple of weeks, including the price of fuel which of course has a knock on effect on the price of goods. There seemed to be plenty of fresh produce for sale but we didn't ask the prices - we caused enough chaos just walking through the stalls!
There are so few white people around on foot that we caused great excitement. I'm so sorry I couldn't take photos but you can't capture the smells and the noise of the market on film anyway.

We met some friends at Asmara for coffee then back to the Riverlodge for pizzas and what seems to be the traditional Sunday afternoon volleyball session - again I volunteered to fetch the ball and take photos!