4th March – day seven

So after a sparrow-fart start (that’s 7.15 to you) we headed for Mbale Municipal Stadium to meet the local teachers at 8. 75 minutes later 16 teachers arrived greeted by the local welcome ( “You are late!). While we were waiting we were treated to a fantastic display of Ugandan football in the dust – half the team playing in barefeet and not one dive! There were some distinctly skilful playing and they weren’t affected by the heat and dust. We all admired the coach who barely moved yet retained total control!
Straight into it led by Chris with a quick ABC from Mike. The first move was the running and getting the leg over all 4 stumps – easy for the men but the women in skirts were disadvantaged!
After catching practice, one handed pick ups, we had some batting (the front foot drive then the pull shot). Then Chris demonstrated bowling spin, medium pace then some quickies. We decided that in this heat he should demo them all again especially the fast stuff.
So that was the morning done. After a quick bite they were al back out again in the heat to play a game of non-stop cricket. Everyone enjoyed the game and the laughter could be heard all over town!
So with plans made for tomorrow we headed back to base to regroup, have a beer, shower and swim before 3 of us headed into town on the boda-bodas (local motorbike taxis) we witnessed the local market, sampled local food and had a cold beer before heading back to base.
Now for the in-group stuff : the young pros beat the old pros down for breakfast but it was all in vain as our driver was fast asleep in the back of the bus. The rest of the day was fairly incident free ; however Jack managed to trip over a pool tile chasing after a ball he dropped whilst playing catch in the pool and Chris failed in his challenge to beat our driver (Joseph the Bear) and now we are off to town to sample some local nosh from the Indian restaurant!