A sour ending to a fun weekend

The weekend adventures and mishaps did not end with the broken down vehicles. On our way back, around an hour or so outside of Kampala, we had quite a disturbing experience.
To be honest, I was dosing at the time, so I'm not sure how accurate my synopsis is, but the others have filled in all the details for me. A car overtook us and I heard my friend who was driving shout 'oh my god'. The car in front of us had hit a guy who appeared from nowhere and jumped out in front of their car. I'm glad I didn't see the details, otherwise it would have been even more unnerving. We pulled over and so did the car in front. A couple of very shaken looking muzungus emerged from the car.
Many people say that if you hit somebody in the car here, you should just drive on. Mob justice often prevails here and tempers flare rapidly when a friend or family member has been injured. But in all honesty, who has it in them to do that? I once bumped my car on the M25 and there were no injuries, only my little Fiesta came to any harm, but I was very shaken all the same. I just had to stop. It's human nature. If you don't stop, how can you live with your conscience?
We had a little dilemma in our car. Should we get involved and try to help? But if we all got out, then we would risk aggravating the situation more. Besides which, it is always better to try to avoid getting implicated in anything that may involve a court case here.
The police arrived and miraculously an ambulance arrived within ten minutes. This was the best looking ambulance I have ever seen in Uganda. We have since heard that the man was not too badly injured and that he is recovering well. We also heard that he was very drunk and that the police were quite sympathetic. This is comforting compared to all of the horror stories that circulate.
However, the whole event made me think how we take our lives in our hands on a daily basis here. We may have camped in a national park, surrounded by hippos, lions and elephants but the real risks here in Uganda are much more mundane. If the man had run out five seconds afterwards, then our car would have hit him. It could happen to any of us and it is probably the worst nightmare for all of us.

Return to Murchison

More stories and photos from my little adventure camping in the wild to come later ...

Things you can only say in Uganda …

As I approach my final departure from Uganda, I am starting to think about some of the things that would seem completely ridiculous to an outsider, but are quite normal here. I have to admit that I stole the idea for this post from a friend after a post-work beer (shocking news, I know).

1. Has anybody seen the hot nut man today? For the record, I was looking for the man who sells hot nuts, rather than a hot man who sells nuts!
2. That cockroach gel is my new best friend!
3. Has anybody got the phone number so we can find out when the power’s coming back?
4. Can I have a refund on that fake DVD? You told me it was a whole series, but it only had 7 episodes!
5. Has anybody actually seen a physical copy of the Ugandan Highway Code?
6. I’m really skint – I’m down to my last ten thousand!
7. Can you find me a good mango for today and an avocado for tomorrow!
8. Do you think it’s OK to eat food from a microwave that has live cockroaches trapped between the glass in the door?
9. Wow – look at the new bus stops! (without a hint of sarcasm)
10. Brrr it’s cold … when the clouds form and it drops to about 25 degrees!

Looking forward to ...

Life is good, if not a little busy! I’ve decided to make the most of my remaining time in Uganda and have lots of ‘bucket list’ plans in the pipeline. I am now coming out of my phase of finding everything in Uganda triply more frustrating than usual to feeling a little melancholic about leaving. I'll be wearing rose tinted glasses until I leave ...

Sunday morning biking has been great fun of late. More often than not, I used to find myself the only girl in the group. These days, there are almost as many girls as boys, which means I am not the only one to complain about the swamps and single tracks. Funny how the male and female perspective is different on things – when I nearly went A over T today, one of the guys said I just performed a great front wheelie!

My biggest problem right now is that there are too many things to do and not enough time to squeeze it all in. Next week it’s the Irish Ball and I’m wondering whether I can manage to go to that, then go biking at the Lagoon Resort on the Sunday. I really want to do both, but I have a sneaking suspicion that next Sunday may be a little more sedentary! Watch this space …

Also on the cards is a trip up to Murchison Falls to camp on the Nile Delta. Yes – that’s me camping, in the middle of a national park, surrounded by wild animals from hippos, to crocodiles to lions.

If I survive that then it won’t be long until the Easter holidays when I head off Kenya for my final safari in the Masai Mara, followed by a third visit to the gorgeous Watamu on the Indian Ocean. Not very adventurous , I know, but it’s fabulous, so who cares? I’m going to be joined by a very old friend, so I look forward to showing her a few of the sights and scenes of Africa!

Feeling the heat!

You may have noticed that my posts have been a little thin on the ground recently. It's not for lack of trying, but the internet has no been very co-operative of late and has not been letting me write. Humph!

It's been a hot and hectic few weeks. The hottest I have ever known it to be in Uganda. To my knowledge, it has not rained in Kampala at all THIS YEAR! Temperatures in my classroom are soaring well into the thirties, and this combined with a couple of weeks of broken generator make it almost unbearable. I have had to disperse the children into shady and breezy corners in the afternoons just to make it through! I have been trying my best to drink gallons of water to avoid going home with a dehydration headache. Today clouds gathered around lunchtime, but to no avail.

The dry season has brought new challenges to the biking. Gone is the sticky and squelchy mud, replaced with deep patches of sand and dust. What they do have in common though, is that they can both make you wobble and fall off your bike if you're not careful! Today the leaves appeared to have taken on an autumnal tinge, but on closer inspection it turned out to be a thick layer of orange dust! It takes a serious amount of scrubbing to get rid of it too. I didn't quite manage today and when I looked down at my legs it looked like I'd done a really bad job with the fake tan!

We have one more week before we break up and I'm off to Ethiopia. One more place to tick off the bucket list! Plans are for a quick loop around the north, taking in Lake Tana, Gondar, Lalibela and the Simeon Mountains. My friends who have been before say it was one of the most inspiring and amazing holidays they have ever taken. If nothing else, I'm looking forward to a spot off cool mountain air in Addis!

Are you bearing arms?

Today, my friends, I bring you another classic example of Ugandan tact and diplomacy.

This morning, as I pulled up to the supermarket car park for the obligatory glove box check (surely any would-be terrorists are not storing their bombs and firearms in the glove compartment anymore), I was greeted with a wide smile and the disturbing words ‘good morning, sir’.

“Sir?” said I. “I am not a sir, I am a madam!”

I paused, to give the guard the opportunity to retract his opening greeting. Perhaps to apologise and say he was distracted and didn’t really look at the driver of the oncoming car.

I wondered how I could possibly be mistaken for a ‘sir’, given that I was wearing a low cut, lilac top, positively feminine sunglasses and had my chin length bobbed hair down.

But no. This is Uganda, where the foot never strays far away from the mouth.

“Oh madam. I thought you were a sir because of your arms!”

I’ve always quite liked my arms. They are quite normal looking arms, spattered with a few freckles and of average size and length. They’re not particularly muscly, but then the bingo wings aren’t that bad either. Nor are they hairy or covered in sailor style tattoos.

For the sake of my sanity, I decided not to delve any deeper.

I told the ssebo I was not bearing any dangerous arms and drove off.

Cutting For Stone

This is my first post of 2012 - so if it's not too late to say so, Happy New Year! I decided to take a little holiday from blogging when I was on home shores, so I think my writing has got a little rusty.

Yesterday, we had our first book club of the new year to discuss 'Cutting for Stone' by Abraham Verghese. It was a feast for our bellies as well as our minds as we tucked into some Eritrean food, that was kindly prepared by one of the generous mums from my class. She explained what all the food was ... then I lost the bit of paper, so you'll just have to look at the pictures ...

According to the book:

The mark of a native is that your fingers are never stained by the curry; you use the injera as your tongs, as a barrier, while you pick up a piece of chicken or beef sopped in the sauce.

We ate like ferenjis!

Now I thought we had made an effort by organising to have some traditional food from the region. It would seem not though, when you compare to this website that I found when I googled some book club ideas. Most disturbing is the fact that this woman decided to recreate the amputated finger in a jar for her party. Some people have too much time on their hands!

For the record - I highly recommend the book (but won't give any more away now)!

Flaming Rain

"It's just a little drizzle," said one of the Belgians as we set off for our Sunday bike ride around Flametree Stables, 20km or so out of Kampala.
Clearly, he was unfamiliar with the Peter Kay definition of drizzle of being 'that fine stuff that gets you wet'. This was no drizzle, but a continuous, all day downpour.
And with the rain, came mud, and lots of it. By the end of the ride, my wheels were completely blocked and I had to shovel great big chunks out with my hands. I was ready to abandon my bike altogether and give the village kids a very generous early Christmas present.
As usual, the planned 40kms turned into 48km as we had to divert along different routes.
In spite of the rain and cloud, Factor 30 and wearing a coat for most of the day, I still managed to get sun burnt ... how is that possible?
Here's a few pics from along the ride ...

An old friend ...

8 men + 2 women = too much mud for my liking ...

Swamp number 1

Mud enforced walking

Feathers!

Today I received a complaint from a parent about our production of Seussical the Musical. She thought it was unfair that the male teachers were given bottles of wine as a 'thank you' whilst the women got bunches of flowers. I couldn't agree more!

It's been the usual hectic rush of making props and scenery, organising costumes, programs and displays. For the past few days I've been coming home covered in glitter and feathers. Luckily, this year, the feathers in question were prettily coloured ostrich feathers from South Africa. In my first year here, the experience was a little less pleasant. Our team ordered some feathers to make costumes for some of the kids. Instead of the brightly coloured synthetic feathers us teachers are accustomed to we were presented with a big black bin liner full of chicken feathers. Straight from the abattoir. Smelly, dirty and complete with lumps of recently deceased foul fowl flesh. With metaphorical pegs on our noses and rubber gloved hands, we sat in the open air and rinsed the feathers in soapy water and snipped off the offending lumps of flesh. My vegetarian soul was scarred to the core.

Feathers: dyed and processed - just how I like them!

Doctor Doctor ...

Today I had to pay a visit to the doctor's for a bit of tummy trouble. If there's one thing that I have learnt since arriving in Kampala, it's that if you're sick you should go to the doctor's straight away, otherwise things will only get much, much worse.

Now there are many stories surrounding a certain British doctor who has a somewhat unorthodox bedside manner. Disconcerting as this may be, at least the doctors here seem to focus on the areas with the symptoms. Complain of a fever and the doc will promptly stick a thermometer in your mouth. Mention a funny tummy and you will be instructed to poo in a pot - sorry if this is a little graphic, but TIA!

This is more than could be said for some of the doctors in Colombia. Given that it is a nation of hypochondriacs, you would think they would be more on target. A friend of mine once visited the doctor's complaining of a sore throat. Rather than shine a torch on the affected area to take a closer look, she was told to stand against the wall chart to see how tall she was? Why, I don't know. The only possible explanation I can think of is that Bogota stands at an altitude of 2500 metres above sea level. Perhaps if you are over a certain height, you are more susceptible to afflictions of the throat due to lack of oxygen ... Another time, a friend went to the doctor to sort out an old knee injury. The first diagnostic question? How old were you when you lost your virginity? How is this relevant? And there she was thinking it was a running injury!

As for my tummy - I was diagnosed with food poisoning, most likely caused by the mayonnaise in my egg mayo sandwiches. I blame Umeme ... I'm on the mend though!

Small acts of kindness

I’ve never been much into religion. Those who know me may be surprised to hear, since I am tone deaf, that I was once a member of the church choir. My reasons for joining though were purely mercenary. Firstly, I knew that they passed notes in the back of the hymn books during the sermon, secondly, they sneakily ate Polo mints throughout the service and finally, you got paid a pound to sing (or mime along) at a wedding on a Sunday. I am, however, a firm believer in passing on random acts of kindness.

Kampala is still a cash based society and consequently my friends and I often find ourselves caught out. There is rarely a moment when I am not either owed money or in debt to somebody else.

This weekend was no exception. I wanted to have some money to go to the Christmas Bazaar to buy presents for folks at home and also needed a bit of shopping.  Typically, whenever you need money it is hard to come by. Every ATM I tried was either completely down due to the power cut or had a network failure. I was not impressed. However, a couple of things put a smile on my face that day.

•   I used my entire cash reserves and a little more on presents for myself and friends on the awava stall. I emptied my wallet and was given a hefty discount for being a loyal, returning customer.

•   When I went to saloon (as they say here) for my wash and blow dry before the Scottish Ball (precautionary booking in case there was a power cut) I asked if I could pay by card. There was afterall, a big sticker saying Visa on the counter. When I was told that it wasn’t working I was about to skulk home, contemplating what I could do with my post bike ride hair in twenty minutes without the aid of a hairdryer. I was delighted to hear the words ‘you can pay us when you have some money’.

Call it karma or whatever you will, but I like it.