Brit Chick Runs

Twas Hannah’s graduation today! She can no longer tick the box that says ‘Occupation: Student’ – she’s just plain old unemployed now!! WHAT a bum :p

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So my alarm was set for 5.40 this morning…NOT COOL. Not cool AT ALL. Especially not for someone who has a body clock trained to go to bed at midnight, and get up at 7.25 :s sheeks. I had to set it early though, cos, as per marathon schedule, I had a 3mile run on the cards (or 5k to me, cos it’s a nicer number :p). So after I’d dragged my butt out of bed, I downed some water, ate 2 dates and was on my way….it took me just 12 minutes to get out of the door; a personal record! The run was done in 26.50-something, and then I just had to manically get ready to leave for the train station.

Breakfast was somewhat random – after my run, I had an apple and two tsps wheatgerm to keep me going til we got on the train. Whilst travelling, I broke into one of my Whole Foods purchases:

A protein shake! I’m not normally one for protein powders or shakes – as I don’t need them – but for something easy and filling for the journey, I thought it’d be perfect My verdict? The flavour was certainly not vanilla..but the thickness was nice

Mid morning, I snacked on a seedy English muffin, all wrapped up warm in its’ plastic for the journey:

Then just before the graduation ceremony started, I had a banana, and part way through, some soya nuts. Now my small little camera was not very happy in the big graduation room the new one would have been fine, but the little one – not so much! So forgive the quality of these photos….

Hannah:

Hannah and my mama:

Hannah and my aunt:

The actual place where it all went down:

Annnd finally, Hannah collecting her scroll thing:

We were all very proud

AND, weirdly, I had another one of those ‘oh what a small world’ moments – a girl sitting along the row from me (ie an audience member) was a girl I used to best friends with for about 6months when I was 15/16! She even lives about 10mins from my house (or she did before she left school) – I haven’t seen her since she left – 4 years ago – so how random is that!?

Anyway, after the ceremony, we spent about a 1/2hr looking for Hannah, and then I said hello/goodbye, and set off (alone! I’m brave) home. On my way, I ate my lunch:

A seitan sandweeech – 2 pieces of seedy bread (apparently I liked seedy stuff today!), spread with savoury spread and topped with grated carrot:

Followed by seitan (which thankfully came out better than last time I made it!):

And roast parsnip:

Imagine that, but with its’ lid on – that was my sandwich! Friggin’ fine sandwich it was too.

For some veggie-ness, I had a little tub filled with courgette, cherry tomatoes, more roasted parsnip, and the rest of the carrot that hadn’t been grated:

The carrot sticks were hiding at the bottom….

But I made one stick stop being shy

While I was in Liverpool St, I may or may not have picked up a punnet of cheap blueberries, which may or may not have been consumed as lunch ‘dessert’

By the time I got home, I was haaaangry, cos I was later back than I thought I’d be. I actually stopped briefly in town on my way back, where I picked up season 1 of Ugly Betty, 2nd hand for £5(!), as well as 1/4 of a giant grey pumpkin, for £1 – BARGAINS! Anyone else seen Ugly Betty? I never have, but I’ve heard good things

Anyways, where was I? Oh yes, when I got home, I was hungry! I was that kind of hungry where you just want something quick, filling and carb
y, so of course, it was cereal – sprinkled with Whole Foods museli:

I felt sooo much better after that Aside from satisfying my stomach, it meant I could think straight about what to have for dinner. I knew I wanted kamut spaghetti, but the question was…tomato sauce with spicy chickpeas? Or tofu-cashew-nooch butter sauce? I opted for the latter

The sauce would be tofu, blended with cashew butter, nooch, soy sauce, mixed spice, salt, cinnamon and…I think that’s it OH, water, to thin it out. Served with celeriac, parsnip and the last of my kabocha :’(

Suuuuch a comforting, delicious meal!

Dessert later on will probably involve some kind of muffin madness…y’all know how I love my muffins

And errr..that’s about the it! LOLhan’s in jail, Brad shaved his beard off, and Jordan’s ‘song’ charted at number 60. I can’t think of much more to tell you! Soooo, good night!

Hello everyone! Phew, sorry for the lack of posting yesterday- I didn’t get back from London til gone 11pm, so I definitely didn’t want to blog :p I had an awesome day though!!

An apple and 2 tsps wheatgerm fuelled 50mins of DVD action, then I had an EPM – Epic Pink Monster if you will!

Look at that beast….SO GOOD!

• 2 cups strawberries/raspberries (I wanted volume :p)
• 1/2 c. yogurt
• 1/2 c. milk
• 1 c. cereal
• 1/2 tsp xanthan gum
• cinnamon (a heck of a lot)

Vincent did his thing, I did mine (namely topping the mix with blackberries, 2 dates, tree bark and cereal) and I was good to go:

Freaking fabulous!

I didn’t have a huuuuge amount of time after that – I had to pretty myself up ready for a trip to LONDON WHOLE FOODS baby!! I did have time to pack a quick lunch though, enjoyed on the train – a wholemeal English muffin, with a veggie burger and savoury spread/molasses:

And a roast veggie mix – beets, leek, courgette, turnip, celeriac:

Brill When I got to Liverpool St, I ate an apple, which looked far too delicious and lonely in its’ basket in a cafe :p

Theeeen, my mum went her way (to an interview) and Hannah and I went ours – to Oxford St, shopping central We wondered round the shops for a short while (and I got lost in Harrods trying to find the bathroom), including going into Selfridges where all the posh designer stuff was….I desperately wanted to see a celeb (Hannah saw Gwen Stefani last time she was in there for fun!) but alas, we did not Instead we put on posh accents and started talking about how Daddy gave us £2000 to spend on a coat, blah blah blah….we didn’t fool anyone :/ Instead, we just got trailed by a shop assisstant, who was probably miffed that I kept touching all the £3k coats. HA!

Anyway, Hannah continued her shopping and I set out on my sole mission: FIND WHOLE FOODS. The store I wanted (the biggest one in London apparently) was in Kensington – looking at the map, I thought I could walk it….yeah…no. After about 1/2 hour of walking in the BLAZING heat, I realised I’d covered about 1cm of the map (I had about 4 inches to go :p)…DUH! I did get 2 pics of London on my way though:

(Excuse the dodgy colour – I was using my small camera, had shades on, and didn’t realise the colour was off :p)

…..sooo anyway, in the end I braved it and did what no Freya has done before – the TUBE, for the first time EVER, alone! It was scary, but I did it and didn’t get lost

Out of the station, I had just a 1minute walk to my own personal Mecca A store called Tofu on the way signalled I was almost there:

So appropriate right!? Anyway, then I saw the sign…..

….And my heart sang with joy!

Peanut butter Clif bars people. OH MY.

Over two hours later….

So Whole Foods was super So many TOFU varieties! Vegan brownies! Vegan cake! Amazing snacks! Pistachio butter freshly ground right in front of me (I bought 34p’s worth)! Mix-your-own-museli (I got 85p’s worth)! AMAZZZZZZZEEEEE!!!! I’ll show you what I bought as I eat it

While I was there, I snacked on some So Crispy bites, and also picked up my dinner from the oh-so-cool salad bar -

A tofu spicy roll thing:

And a load of veggies – Butternut, sprout things, a ton of mixed bean stuff, skanky grilled fennel (no thank you, it got chucked), veggies…I’ve lost count of how much!

Those two boxes were my early dinner, and then later on, I had my late dinner in this cute little park:

Late Dinner was another veggie box filled with loads more yum:

And a Hugh Jass tofu steak, sandwiching grilled veggies!

That beast was ENORMOUS! I actually had to throw half (there’s another steak underneath) cos it was just too much. I can’t believe I was defeated by tofu…that’s never happened before. :s

Anyways, Hannah, my mum and I met up later, caught the train back, and got home around 11pm – then after a minor mini disaster – which I can’t go into on here. I finally hit the hay at 12am. Phew!

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Tuesday

Day off today! I think my body needed it, after all the walking about yesterday.In fact, I actually woke up feeling a bit stiff!! I had a quick apple and 2 tsp wheatgerm, then took Poppy out for her walk (1hr). Then came a fantabulouso breakfast

• cantaloupe melon
• strawberries
• 1/2 c. milk
• 1/2c. yogurt
• 1/2 tsp xanthan gum
• 1/2 tbsp chia seeds
• 1 cup cereal
• 1 tsp cocoa powder

Into Vincent they all went, and the result was another epic pink monster! Topped with cereal, tree bark, 2 dates, and raspberries:

100% delicious

The rest of my spare morning was spent packing up my lunch for today and tomorrow. The wonderous lunch of today contained this stuff:

That would be a smoked seitan steak! I asked the nice folk at my local health food store to get some seitan in, and that’s what they came up with It’s always good to ask IMHO. Yes, so I had 1/2 the steak with butter beans and mushrooms:

As well as roast courgette, carrot and leek:

The steak was FAB! As were the veggies, of course. Goes without saying really?

Work was pretty good today too – lots of customers so I was on my toes Although I believe I have a slight crush on one of the guys who works with me…*sshhh!!*. He’s 31 with 3 children though (not with the partner), so definitely out of bounds!!! But still, it’s fun to have little crushes sometimes

When I got home, I was pretty haaaangry so I had some….wait for it…..CEREAL AND YOGURT! Oh yes:

When in doubt, cereal it…out…(I’m not a poet).

Dinner was some tempeh, with a balsamic/tomato glaze (1/2 tbsp balsamic, ketchup, mixed herbs, agave, cinnamon, s+p):

…served with some groovy new – Whole Foods bought – spaghetti:

Sweet potato and buckwheat!! Awesome right? That’s what I thought I also had kale, kabocha and parsnip:

Hmm I couldn’t really taste the sweet potato…but the glaze was faboosh!

For dessert, I made a tofu-banana-strawberry-cocoa pudding this morning, which I’m going to top with some of my Whole Foods museli mix:

OH the excitement!!!

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Ok. So I apologise in advance if I don’t manage to reply to everyone’s comments today/tomorrow – I’m off to London at stupid o’ clock tomorrow, as Hannah is GRADUATING! She’s so excited – but as of tomorrow afternoon, will officially be unemployed Anyway, so since the ceremony is early, I’ve got to get up about 5.30am to fit in my planned run :s sheesh! Can’t say I’m looking forward to it…but yeah, it means my normal window for sorting out emails (breakfast) will be gone. Tres sorry guys :s

ANYWAY! I better dash – lots to do, and I MUST get to sleep earlier today, or I WILL be a walking zombie tomorrow. Not attractive!

Good night

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Have any of you ever had an inappropriate crush? I’d say a 31 yr old father of three who I work with is pretty bad

Fiiiirstly – I won an award

Thank you to wonderful Jess from Healthy Exposures for it! It means a lot

As per the award rules, I have to give 10 random little facts about myself, and pass it on to 3-5 other bloggers. Sooo the recipients of this most prestigious award:

Jess – you can have it right back :p – most incredible pictures (of food AND horses), and great recipes

Jess number two at The Process of Healing – sweetest girl who is so, so strong and deserves some good stuff

Katie at Health for the Whole Self – always does such well thought and and informative posts

Annd finally – a new blog I’ve just found – Krystina at Organically Me – amazing vegan recipes! I can’t wait to read more of this blog

All you guys are such lovely people!

Ok, now my 10 random facts…this could take a while!! 25minutes later…..

1) When I was 2, I fell in the pond at home, and my sister ran to get my mum – asking for some clean knickers for me, cos they had pond weed in them :p Never mind the fact I almost drowned..!

2) I didn’t start riding til I was 18months old, cos I was scared of ponies; hard to believe now!

3) When I was younger, my favourite foods were: honey sandwiches, Nutella sandwiches, macaroni and cheese, and prawn cocktail crisps. I wouldn’t touch any of them with a very long pole now!

4) When I was younger (again…apparently a lot happened when I was younger), I had a tank of fish – the fish named Sharky got hungry and ate my mum’s [only] fish, Gilbert

5) Since writing this blog, I’ve begun to discover who I really am – throughout High School and my first year of uni, all I tried to do was fit in and be someone I wasn’t. I’m beginning to accept now who I am, and I’m in the process of learning to like that person.

6) If I’m eating (which is often!), I like to have even amounts of food in each side of my mouth – weird much!?

7) During the time Walking with Dinosaurs was on tv, I used to stalk about my house, rarwing like a T-Rex
I once tried to run away from home, aged about 12. I packed a pillow and an apple, and got as far as a 1/4mile down the road before I gave up and came home!

9) I used to be totally and utterly obsessed with Paris Hilton – that phase coincided with the same time I was trying desperately to fit in at school

10) My ultimate life dream is to live in America. I have no idea how to get there though! So any American bachelors out there….:p

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Saturday

Twas a day off today, bar the 10minutes of abs work I did which meant……I GOT A LIE-IN! Til 8am, it was raaaather incredible

Breakfast was an EGM, minus the green again:

With some of these..

Those cherries took me forEVER to pit :/

EGMs without green are actually super nice Especially when you add in a huge tbsp of peanut butter, as I did! WHOLE new level folks, whole new level.

Straight up after that was a fab lesson on Chika – she had a slightly sore back before we started, which my mum sorted out in a flash (she’s a horse back physio). We then did 35minutes of good schooling, before having her back done again after. She was fine

I then took the doggeh out for a wonder nd ate an apple for snack-ness while I was out, then made a delightful lunch

Lentils, kale, soy sauce, aubergine, parsnip, celeriac, carrot, green onion, pear, veggie burger – it was a ‘everything-including-the-kitchen-sink-meal’ today!!

Obama stole my photography spot….

Then she decided she’d had enough of me and the kitchen and ran off

It was proper good – pear and burgers go very well together 2 tsps of wheatgerm afterwards was the perfect finish.

The afternoon was spent cooking <- my favourite past time I made another batch of seitan (which thankfully came out much better than the last lot), as well as apple crisp muffins:

And some oatmeal raisin (& fig & apricot & sunflower seeds – my additions) bars for my mum and sister, as requested:

Both came out fabulous, thank GOODNESS!

Snackwise, I wasn’t hungry but thought I’d do a bit of carb loading for my long-ish run tomorrow ; enter the old cereal and yogurt combo:

Dinner wise, it was more carb loading. I thought I’d finish off my chickpea spaghetti (my last ever time eating it..*sob*), with my favourite veggies. I also made a tomato sauce:

• 1/2 can chopped tomatoes
• 1 raw garlic clove
• about 5 big basil leaves
• 1-2 tbsp balsamic vinegar
• cinnamon
• onion powder
• salt (lots of :p) & pepper

Blended in Vincent….

Voila!

I’ll probably have one of my apple crisp muffins for dessert (carbs!) with some yogurt later on (*EDIT – I had an apple crisp muffin and some yogurt – muffins were fabulous! Full of spice; bake them guys!)

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Sunday

Attempt Two at 7miles was on the cards today. I was SO nervous last night, after what happened last Wednesday…but I took everyone’s advice, and packed in the salt last night

Before I left, I had a big apple, 2 tsps of wheatgerm and a date. During the actual run, at about 4.1miles (just before a big hill :p) I had 2 more dates. I think it did the trick! I felt pretty good; no walking, no feeling like I was about to keel over and die….all in all, a good run! It took me 1hr1minutes, with an extra 15minute/1mile walk at the end to cool off and stretch out. I’ve noticed having a walk after a long run results in my feeling much better later on (ie less burn if I walk up the stairs after a tough one!). Plus it’s lovely to walk in the sun

Breakfast was an EGM, minus the green again…

…I seriously need to top up on spinach! Anyway, I topped the…Epic Monster (?) with cherries, dates, granola and jam, as well as grated cacao:

BEAUTY.

During the morning I ran some errands for my mum (as well as walking the whhoooolllee way round a huge store to find a cool bag/box, only to be told they were right next to the door I walked through. Hurrumph.), and baked some chocolate courgette muffins I was a little bit short of courgette though, so I topped the mix up with some grated beetroot:

Such gorgeous colour

The result was part of my lunchtime dessert. Talking of lunch – it was SCRUMMEH today! A 4 course meal in fact…Part 1 – cereal and blackberries (reduced to clear, 75p!):

A smoothie, made from cantaloupe melon, a very ripe pear and strawberries, with mixed spice and xanthan gum:

AMAZING combination!!! Part 3- soya mince, cooked in water and milk, with curry powder and 2tbsp nooch, as well as mushrooms, on a bed of roasted kale:

Oh my. I didn’t have particularly high hopes for that part of the meal, but it was actually really really delicious! I haven’t had soya mince (textured vegetable protein) for soooo long; I’d totally forgotten how much I LOVE the texture! And nooch – well, that’s always a win.

The final part of the meal was a courgette chocolate muffin:

YUM!

The afternoon was spent walking Poppy, cleaning my car out, mucking out, doing washing..pretty dull really I hoped I’d work up something of an appetite for an afternoon snack, but alas- I did not Soooo I had Bear granola nibbles:

With some yogurt:

I’ve no idea why, but carb + yogurt is a snack I find really easy to eat, even if I’m full. Verrrh peculiar.

Dinner was rather fine – I had a lone plum sitting in my fridge, so I chopped it up something silly, then mixed it with balsamic vinegar, water, date syrup, s+p, cinnamon and cocoa powder, to create a simply fabulous sauce:

The sauce went over baked tempeh, and was accompanied by corob durum wheat, mixed with one of my aunt’s funky home grown purple potatoes:

As well as kabocha (almost run out ), parsnip and celeriac:

*Happy Dance* That’s all that needs to be said

I’ve now got Gossip Girl to watch, and a muffin (peanut butter? Apple crisp? Chocolate courgette? Quinoa? Black bean brownie? Too many choices!) and some yogurt to have for dessert *Ecstatic Dance*

Have a lovely evening guys!

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Sooo I don’t think I’ll be able to blog tomorrow – I’m going to zee most VUNDERBAR store in zee WURLD – Londres Town’s BIGGEST WHOLE FOODS!!!! Ohmygod. After hearing sooo much about it, I can’t believe I finally get to go….I literally want to fall over with excitement So anyway, I’m going in the afternoon so I’ll be back pretty late But you never know, maybe I will summon blogging energy If I don’t, come to the blog anyway and read Hannah’s Uganda post! It’s super good

QUESTION: Have any of you ever won an award? What for?

Uganda post by Hannah coming at the end, so it’ll just be a short one from me

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PHEW it’s Friday! I am reeeelieved!! I kinda forgot last night that I had changed my marathon plan, so at about 11pm I suddenly realised I needed to be up much earlier than normal to get a 5k run in, and walk the dog and do everything else before I was meant to leave for work…oops :p oOOOH well.

The run was OK though – before I left I had 3 dates and 2 tsps of wheatgerm, and then did the 5k in 26minutes

I got back, ate a biig apple, and then took Poppy out for her walk. THEN I got to have my breakfast – an EGM….just without the green! I had no spinach, but I still wanted the same type of breakfast, so I just blended:

• 1 cup cereal
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1/2 cup yogurt
• 1/2 tbsp flaxseed
• carob powder
• 1 biiiig frozen banana (actually, 1.5 small ones :p)

I topped it all with granola, dates, GIANT blackberries and giant raspberries:

Oh it was FABULOUS!!! Best breakfast evah :p

Lunch was delish too – part 1 was a roasted veggie mix: carrots, beets, parsnip, tomatoes, yellow courgette:

Look at the beautiful colours! So good…

Just not on my hands!

Alas. It was yum

Part 2 was a wholemeal English muffin, hummus, and left over chickpeas:

Sooo good!! A little odd eating it in the car park but whateverz.

Work was pretty quiet (though still tiring), but when I got home I was pretty darn hungry – a problem only cereal, yogurt and cherries will solve:

WOOP WOOP.

Hmm..dinner was a toss up between hummus-coated tempeh with durum wheat, or chickpea spaghetti (yes it’s not vegan – but I am NOT wasting it – I bought it, I will eat it, and never buy it again)….I opted for the tempeh/hummus combo

Tempeh, hummus – topped with smoked garlic -, aubergine, kabocha, parsnip.

Oh, it was GOOD!! Hummus + tempeh = a meal I NEED more in my life!!! Outstanding.

Dessert is probs gonna be a peanut butter muffin with some yogurt Who knows if it’ll be as good as last night’s…:

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OK – Y’all have been very patient with waiting for the Uganda post, so – at last! – here it is! Enjoy OH – and if you want to know more, or want to help or talk to Hannah or anything, just email me and I’ll pass it on.

Uganda Trip (Pictures at the end, but here’s a taster ):

Hello everybody! Firstly thanks to Freya and all of you for taking an interest in my trip last week! I’m guessing most of you already know roughly who I am, but in case you don’t… I’m Hannah, I’m Freya’s sister, I’m 21 and (since this is a food blog after all) my favourite foods are sweetcorn, chocolate and smoked salmon pate with real butter on freshly baked crusty white farmhouse loaf

Before I talk about the actual trip, I think first I need to explain a bit about its background. I’ve just graduated from university, and for most of my time there I was involved in an organisation that uses business principles to teach others how to make money and lift themselves out of poverty. If you’ve ever heard the saying ‘Give a man a fish and he’ll eat for a day, teach a man to fish and he’ll eat for a lifetime’, you’ll understand exactly what we aim to do!

Last year we were approached by a charity based in Uganda which had been running various projects across the northern part of the country attempting to address problems such as unemployment and the spread of HIV/AIDS. Though the work they were doing was proving hugely successful, a lack of funds meant they were desperate for help, so they came to us. Two weeks ago a friend and I flew out to Uganda to meet the charity’s team, visit the projects and, hopefully, discover how we could support them in the future.

If I told you that just two years ago Uganda finally emerged from a 20 year civil war that had raged across the northern districts, forcing thousands of people to abandon their homes and move into cramped, dirty camps for Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs), or that these people had only just begun returning home and attempting to rebuild their lives, then you would know more than I did when I arrived!

My first impression on driving into the capital city, Kampala, was that it was tiny, especially for a capital city. There were no huge, fancy office blocks or smart restaurants and shops, but instead a mixture of tarmac and dirt roads and ramshackle wooden or mud huts scattered in clumps between concrete buildings. On the 5 hour drive to Lira, our home for the majority of the stay, I began to get an idea of what genuine isolation felt like – we didn’t pass a single town (at least not by my definition of a town). Lira was even smaller than Kampala, mainly dirt roads littered with huge potholes and houses built from random collections of materials: sheets of corrugated iron, uneven wooden planks and the like.

Our itinerary was planned with military precision and involved a mixture of courtesy calls to district officials and members of local government alongside trips out into the countryside to spend a few snatched hours with the communities. Our first community visit was to a health centre, one of the largest in the area, where we were shyly greeted by the locals. The doctors and nurses were extremely proud of their facility and happily showed us round the wards, concrete rooms with nothing in them besides beds and mosquito nets.

I had woken up that morning aching all over and after struggling to eat breakfast worried I was falling ill. As we stood in the maternity ward talking to mothers with newborn babies I suddenly began to feel overwhelmed with the heat and the next thing I knew I was lying on my back on one of the beds being told I’d fainted! I have never felt so embarrassed as they walked me outside to sit down and get the colour back in my face, and I wondered what the locals must have thought of the English girl swooning in the heat when a few beds away were patients battling HIV and malaria with little or no medication. Luckily by the following day I felt fine again, but this was the point when it hit me just how lucky we are to have the healthcare that we do – I was now a 6 hour drive from the nearest city, but had I been genuinely sick I would have been rushed to Kampala straight away where my insurance would have paid for me to receive the best treatment in a private hospital before being flown home. None of the people I met that day had the same luxury; they considered themselves lucky to have been able to get to this empty concrete room. I will certainly never take the NHS for granted again.

After our tour of the hospital, the locals fetched us chairs and sat us in the shade of a huge tree, and we were then treated to an hour of singing, dancing and drama. I thought this would be a one-off, but at every community we visited we were treated as guests of honour – some places greeted us with singing, some carried a desk into the middle of a field for us to sit behind and some provided a continual supply of Fanta and bottled water. The charity we were visiting had set up drama groups in several communities, and the young people involved would then use drama to educate others about topics such as the spread of HIV. We were treated to several of these performances and the teenagers involved were unbelievably good actors and actresses. Hundreds of locals would gather to watch the performances, but what I found unusual was the fact that they could have their audience literally crying with laughter as they acted out, for instance, a scene where a father takes his daughter, dying of AIDS, to hospital, but the incompetent doctors do nothing. For the people we were visiting such things were a part of life, so I suppose laughing about them was therapeutic in a way.

Each meeting would start the same way – first we would pray, then the village leader would address the community, speaking about the various problems it faced. Next, the various ‘groups’ of the village would be introduced to the guests. These groups were not what you would expect – farmers, young people or retired people – but instead were widows, orphans, those living with HIV/AIDS or school drop-outs. They would stand in front of us expectantly waiting for us to take pictures; at first I found this uncomfortable, until I realised that to them being photographed meant their stories would be shared with other people in the UK, and perhaps that would mean help would come in some form.

In each village, the problems were the same – hundreds of widows whose husbands had been killed in the war, children orphaned in the same way or because of AIDS, people left disabled by the fighting, youth who’d been forced to leave school because they could no longer afford the uniform or the fees and were now illiterate and unemployed.

Even more shocking was the reaction of these people to us, guests from the UK. I felt humbled as elderly men stood in front of me, thanked God for sending me to their village and asked that I please help them to buy new farm equipment so they could produce more food. Women in their forties and small children knelt down on the ground in front of me when I shook their hands. Elderly women in their seventies sat on the floor while I sat in a wooden chair in front of them drinking bottled water. There were many occasions when I wanted to scream that just because I had a British passport I wasn’t any better them, that in fact I was just an English Literature student with barely any money or influence, and that there was far more for me to learn from their strength, humility and hope than I could ever dream of teaching them.

I could go on for another hour about the people I met and the stories I heard, but to illustrate the kind of problems the people there face I want to tell you about one community in particular which I’ll never forget – Barlonyo. We were told as we drove to meet the people of Barlonyo that their village had become something of a minor tourist destination, but couldn’t have been prepared for what we would find when we arrived. We were met by a group of ten women singing ‘You are very welcome!’ as they ushered us out of the car, and they were followed by the community leader who immediately took us to a simple stone memorial in the centre of a huge circle of concrete strips, forming a walkway. He told us the story of the community, while a member of the charity translated.

During the war the area had been the home to one of the largest IDP camps in Uganda, with thousands of people living in tiny mud huts crammed together, inches separating them, and thatched with straw roofs that would would regularly catch fire, leading to large chunks of the camp needing to be rebuilt. Clean water, sanitation and healthcare were all enormous problems, especially with the camp being in the heart of the fighting, and separated from the rest of the country by appallingly bad roads.

One day in February 2004 the rebel soldiers stormed the camp, and on that single day over 300 people were murdered; some were shot, some were beaten to death, and some were forced into huts which were then set on fire. Men, women and children were massacred; the village leader told us he and a few others survived only because they were able to hide in a storage building. And then the soldiers left.

The following day the government’s army arrived, but instead of helping, they were embarrassed by what had happened, and their response was to build a mass grave and bury the bodies. Many had not yet been identified, and those who could not find relatives were left wondering if they were dead or abducted. Several months later, the government agreed to build a memorial in the middle of the site where the grave had been, but even then they would acknowledge that only 120 people had died.

The community we met was a traumatised one. The village leader told us that he personally cares for 20 orphans, alongside his own family, and everyday he must find the money to feed them, but as he pointed out if he didn’t care for them there would be nobody else. A group of widows and formerly abducted women performed for us the most spectacular dance in which they sung that this was their home and they would not be forced from it, but their songs were also filled with references to death, rape, disease and the many other horrors they had faced in the past and continued to face in the future. As I looked at the huge group of orphans sat at our feet, and the slightly smaller group of young people sat at the back of the crowd, I commented to one of the charity’s volunteers that there didn’t seem to be any children aged between 10 and 16 – she replied that the children of this age group had all been abducted during the war since young children could more easily be turned into child soldiers.

Several members of the community stood in front of us and shared stories of the most horrific violence inflicted on them by the rebel soliders; to think that every day they lived in the very place that this violence had occurred, with little to no support in dealing with their trauma, is a heartrending thought.

Yet despite everything their country has been through, Ugandan people are the most welcoming I have ever met, and so filled with pride for their country. One particularly memorable moment was when a community offered us a taste of their local delicacy, the name of which I couldn’t quite make out but which sounded like ‘whitean’. They all gathered round, watching intently and we tried the strange brown paste on our plates… All I can say is that I hope I never have to eat it again! Early on I knew it would be tough, but when somebody mentioned that the guests had to finish the bowl, and I saw the size of the bowl, I suddenly felt quite sick…! My friend and I battled on, mixing the paste with vegetables, goat stew and any other food that would disguise the taste, until finally dessert arrived (honeycomb fresh from the hive) and were able to stop without offending anyone. It was only on the drive home that we learned ‘whitean’ was actually White Ant, a local delicacy consisting of honey mixed with a type of fungus that is scraped off anthills at a particular time of the year. That at least explained the taste…!

People in Uganda are inspirational in the way that they support one another; we visited beekeeping projects, workshops were young people are taught carpentry and metalwork, a group who sell bottled juice and a progressive farm using modern techniques to create impressive crop yields, all of which is down to local people sharing their time and skills with others.

The need was overwhelming, but our focus now will be to raise small amounts of money that will go a long way – the purchase of a honey extractor for one community, for instance, will allow it to begin selling honey in larger volumes and thus to make more money. We hope not only will each benefiting community teach other people its new skills, but also that part of the new income will be used to reinvest in equipment for other villages.

The people we met on the trip wanted above all to know that when we came home we would be sharing their stories with others, and I’m very grateful to Freya for allowing me to do so. I hope some of you reading this will one day have the chance to visit this beautiful, inspiring country and to meet its incredible inhabitants; if not, I hope you’ve enjoyed reading about it!

A hospital ward:

Claire (in orange) and Hannah in Barlonyo:

Beekeepers at one of the projects:

Happy kids!

Planting a celebratory jackfruit tree in Apac District (this lovely lady did a good post on jackfruits a few days ago if you want to know more):

Tomorrow is Friday. WO HOO!

Has Thursday totally dragged by for anyone else?? I feel like today has gone on forEVER. Lots has been going on here though…mainly for Chika, but I still had to be involved. Before I get onto all that though…I asked yesterday for folks to help me name my new Vita Mix (a machine that good deserves a name!), and I had some great suggestions! But there was only one winner – Karrie Anne, who suggested Vincent! Yep, my Vita Mix shall now be known as Vincent Thankyou Karrie Anne! Your prize can be..um….unlimited use of Vincent

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Soo anyway, today – designated cross training day today, so after my usual pre-workout fuel, I did an hour of DVD craziness. Theeen, Vincent and I held a secret rendez-vous in a corner of my kitchen…….I have to say-  I am blown away by Vincent. With The Blender We Do Not Speak Of, an EGM would take a good 10mins to blend, with constant stopping and starting and prodding and poking to try and get it blended. Vincent however – (literally) 5 seconds and the job was done!! I had to hold onto the counter to stop myself falling over in shock. He produced a truly fabulous EGM (except I used 1 cup of milk, not half milk/half yogurt, and I added in nutmeg and date syrup):

Look at the size of that blackberry (reduced to clear – 99p!) – surely not normal!?

It was dang fine anyway; so lovely to have an EGM again – it’s been too long.

Straight after breakfast, I dragged Chika out to work – she was super (though quite tough to crack) today, despite the crazy weather. England was having a ‘bipolar’ day – whilst I was riding, I had heavy rain, strong wind, and blazing sun, all in 35minutea!! Up and down, up and down…mad.

When she was done, I did a short reading-walk, washed my hair, made a tofu-pear-plum dessert with Vincent, and later on made a DELICIOUS early lunch!! I had a wholemeal English muffin, spread with hummus – half topped with tempeh strips, and half with chickpeas. I also had mixed spice coated and roasted butternut squash, carrot (no wonder I have yellow hands :p), left over turnip and a bit of parsnip. The resulting excellence:

OH so scrumptious!! One of the best lunches I’ve had in a long, LONG time! I didn’t want it to end Dessert was half a black bean brownie, and later on, some So Crispy bites.

Literally the second I finished lunch though, the vet and farrier turned up. Chika was having her nose checked out cos of her mild head shaking – he prescribed some nice herbal type supplements to help combat it, and wrote me a nice list of suggestions if it doesn’t work – ranging from the herbal supplement I just said, all the way down to having the nerves in her nose cut out, and giving her a medication that schizophrenics have, which would literally make her brain dead!! Hopefully the herbal supplements will work

After everyone had left, I made some peanut butter bread from my Vita Mix cookbook (after a 20minute drive to find baking powder…..) -

However, I didn’t want bread, I wanted MUFFINS! So I did the exact same recipe, but in muffin form

I ended up having half of one for my afternoon snack:

Along with 1/2 cup of yogurt, with a sprinkle of this stuff (made just down the road from me):

Delicious!!

The muffins were super too I would’ve liked a slightly less subtle PB flavour, but the texture and lightness of the muffins cancelled that negative out

For diiinner, I had been thinking about doing some kind of maple roasted chickpeas- but then I my cashew-banana-maple sauce came into my head randomly (and once the seed is there, you can’t get rid of it :p) and so the maple chickpeas were scrapped Instead, I did tempeh with the above sauce, kabocha, aubergine, parsnip and chickpeas:

Ooooohh I LOVE THAT SAUCE! Words cannot describe how much….Good gracious.

Dessert is going to be the pear-plum-tofu-cocoa dessert I blended up earlier. Can’t wait!!!

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Sooo the Uganda post should come tomorrow, all being well And then next week, there’s lots going on too. A trip to Wholefoods (the biggest store in London!) and my sister’s graduation may well be happening

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What’s your favourite TV show? What are you addicted to at the moment? I’m well into Gossip Girl (which I’m about to go watch now on DVD :p), and ER And I’ve got the American version of The Office waiting in the wings – anyone seen it?