Gotta get outta here

After losing my job in Uganda I felt like it was time to move on. But I also was looking to escape so I chose nearby Kenya, as a place I've yet to really explore.

I was escaping from the mosquitos of the living room of my old Kampala house where I no longer had a room and tried sleeping on the couch...From the racist lady who charged me the same price for a fish as the local customer next to me who also got unsolicited sweet potato when I got nothing despite having asked for some sides...From the thief who took my favourite Equal Exchange hoodie...From the feeling of being stuck after 4 days in Gulu trying to sell my furniture to the same interested and broke potential customers (this describes 90% of the people there)...and from the peanut guy.

So I am a bit embarrassed about this but here goes: I've developed a pet peeve here of people sitting behind or in front of me on a bus reaching over my shoulder without asking to control my window. Almost always it's someone closing my window when I want it open. I think also when the temperature reaches 60 or below here people start feeling freezing, especially with the nice cool breeze that comes through while baking in the sun. Coming back from Gulu when this happened this week I just decided I had enough. So I turned to the huge Ugandan guy sitting behind me and asked him why he couldn't just ask me before invading my personal space and closing my window which I was busy throwing peanut shells through. But there was no conversation to be had, he just laughed at me, which of course just further infuriated me. So I took the peanut shells and threw them at him and asked him how he liked it. Well apparently not very much as things escalated quickly me and a scene developed with half the bus' attention now on us. He threatened to hit me and I yelled back that he should and it would be great to get him kicked off the bus. Eventually things settled down but we were both on edge for the rest of the 4-5 hour bus ride remaining.  

So hopefully I won't see peanut man again, the bosses of my company, or really any other undesirables while in Kenya. First stop the hustling, bustling city of Nairobi, a meer 14 hour bus ride. I'm not that interested in Nairobi, or "Nairobberie" as many refer to it so I'll probably just pass through after getting some rest. Then the plan is to do another 8-10 hours on a bus to reach Mombasa on the coast, stay tuned.

Teaching frisbee to 3 year old Bradley, son of couch surfing host Eric in Nairobi Kenyans

My Gulu friend James and me testing out my new Assus tablet‘s backwards facing camera

Back to UG

I'm back in Uganda now after a trying but interesting five days stuck in Rome. With my work just finished I took off to explore the beautiful and mountainous Western Uganda. I'll be posting hopefully somewhat regularly about my journey's as I plan to make my way around East Africa.

I started with Western Uganda because I had't been there and had been meaning to check it out when a nice opportunity came along to join two Canadian friends I had met from frisbee. People seem surprised sometimes to see these two nationalities traveling together which kind of surprised me. It's not like Canada and the U.S. don't like each other, it's just that everyone likes Canadians more.

I know there is something to traveling alone but I really prefer to enjoy experiences with others and I often push myself more when traveling with others...Such to the point that one day last week I found myself with these two Canucks in the middle of a jungle stranded in the rain. We had purposefully stranded ourselves in the naive hope that we would find chimps and avoid paying the $150 (tourism in Africa is really $$) chimp treccking fee. We had't planned for rain, especially only 5 minutes in, and after hiding under a tree for 10-15 min. and realizing it did very little to protect us as the rain only got harder and harder we started hitchhiking. By the time we got picked up we were soaked and shivering

Chimps - 1
Humans - 0

This is where we smartly decided to get off the matatu

One of the dozens of amazingly beautiful crater lakes of Western Uganda 

Duncan the Canadian with a Warthog at our campsite that we were told was "habituated to humans"

Queen Elizabeth national park boat cruise with the buffalo

Euro Trip: Yesterday in Lisbon, today in Rome, and tomorrow in…

Stuck. I won’t go into the boring details of why but I was supposed to be back in Uganda already and instead have spent hours in hell arguing with Priceline (NEVER USE THESE PEOPLE) in Rome (and don’t joke with this “when in Rome” with me right now!). Now normally being in Rome might be interesting as it’s a world famous city but I unfortunately just lost my job (which I also will not going into here) and the timing is not great. I suppose it’s better than being stuck in the poorly timed city of Cairo, which is where I was supposed to be stuck, if I had stayed with the original horrible change of flight plan.

I never meant for this blog to be a pure travel blog although it seems it has sort of turned into that (Travel blogs are the worse, so annoying and assumingly self-important!) and now it’s too late to turn back. Before Rome I was on vacation with Maya in Portugal which was amazing. It’s a beautiful country with great Mediterranean beaches, mountains, city night life in Lisbon and Porto, and a good amount of culture. Canyoning might be the thing I need to get into after trying it there (amazing). We toured the whole country almost in one week, although didn’t see anything obviously with too much depth. Unlike Rome, people are friendlier to foreigners and don’t mind that you don’t speak their language. Plus it’s cheap compared to the rest of Europe.

Rome, in contrast, is incredibly expensive. Today I bought a milk shake that was 7 euros ($9.50). But it makes sense, like Paris, it’s a top global travel destination. Literally people are here from everywhere and it’s crazy how many languages are being spoken all around you constantly. Additionally, roses are sold all around you constantly (although it’s only the guys who buy for their ladies and sadly I’ve been alone when I’ve been in both Rome and Paris).  

“It was some castle, or was it a palace?”

A guy at a hostel told me this when describing an amazing site he say today. Also like Paris, you can’t walk in Rome without tripping over a statue or monument almost every block. I’ve lost track of the fountains, monuments, statues, castles, palaces, forts, walls, churches, and other famous and ancient things I’m supposed to be in awe of but none of which I know anything about. Most Americans who visit Europe remark how old everything is but Rome takes that to a new level. Certain attractions have blown my mind with their immense scale. So much of the city draws people interested in Ancient Rome (or the Vatican) and its crazy how integrated that side of things is with modern Rome. The coliseum, over 2000 years old, is also a subway stop that hundreds of thousands of the 3.5 million + citizens pass every day, probably with very little notice.

In Portugal we went to Sintra, just outside of Lisbon, which is sort of like a Disneyworld of attractions and museums, much like Balboa park in San Diego. They put it all in one place and it’s overwhelming. Similar to how I’m feeling with Rome, Sintra or this sort of thing is sensory overload. It’s too much information, and lot of the information you do get is about things and people you probably don’t care that much about or maybe have never heard of.  Palaces and churches can be nice, or we think they can be nice, but actually we think that because that’s what we are supposed to think and we can check it off some list of things to see. But it all sounds better in theory than practice actually.

All of this is to say that travel is exhausting and as I embark on a potential few months of unemployed travel I’ll need to get a strategy to make sure it stays fun and meaningful. Any tips?

Up North

On a recent business trip up North, two things happened in one time that made my day particulary memorable. The first going through a small village seeing a completely naked man hand and foot cuffed waddling around in no particular direction. The more surprising thing perhaps was the fact that no one even turned their heads as he walked around (like the same nonchalance I saw in Rwanda when no one really reacted to the vomit in the bus scene going to Bujumbura). I actually later realized that he was probably mentally ill and the town people had done that to him, which really isn't so funny and it reflects how poor services are for people with mental disabilities.

Later in the day I was on a bus that broke down several times. We would start-up and go some short distant and then the engine would fail. We were stopped for about an hour trying to fix it when a passenger lost patience. He somehow got a boda boda taxi to come find him (we were in the middle of nowhere so I’m not sure how he managed this) but as soon as he left the bus and jumped on the boda the engine failed. He started rolling backwards down the hill on the moto and it was just too hilarious to not burst out laughing.

Acholiland, as some people call it up here, is the home of the Acholi people. It’s not a place most or really any tourists go but it has its own particular charms. Like for example, the abundance of pork roasting joints or the way it can almost sound like singing when people greet each other with their common call and response. Or how for some reason people think when I say my name that it’s “Henry.”

The North has a distinctly different feel from the rest of Uganda. People don’t really eat the normal ever-so-popular banana based dish matoke. The roads are even worse and dustier. The Acholi’s don’t seem to be huge fans of the Buganda, the Kampala based dominant people. Sometimes I see something that I don’t see anywhere else in Uganda: NEW cars, even wrapped in the plastic still. I recently had the chance to ride in one and can elaborate a bit more.

I was actually in a very uncomfortable matato (bus taxi) on my way back up North recently on what should have been leg 1 of 3 with transfers and 8 hours of no leg room and three babies, chickens, and whatever else usually gets thrown onto your lap in a matato. We were several hours from any border but these new cars are so recognizable and really are only going to a few places; mostly South Sudan for government officials there. 1 hour into my trip, somehow our matato driver knowing my final destination, he was able to flag a driver down of one of these new cars and get him to agree to take me up North. There’s really only a few roads which go that way and again no cars that look like this so it makes some sense but is still pretty amazing. Mike, the driver, is a transporter, driving the +20 hours every week from Mombasa, a port city in Kenya, to Juba in landlocked South Sudan. Besides the interesting conversations with such a person, air conditioning, and ridiculous leg room comfort, one other bonus from the trip was a funny story. Mike pulled up beside another nice car blasting African music with a dancing--alone-driver and got him to pull over and literally trade the CD’s from each other’s stereos on the spot. The exchange made me smile.

I’ve also included some recent pics. from Acholiland here

The little girl who cries when I came close to her. This is where we keep the chickens

Fort Baker (also sometimes referred to as Fort Patiko) -a very old Arab slave fort

Arua falls, about an hour from Gulu

On the road with co-worker Dennis at the landing site in Panyimur

Going Native

This expression is used for white people going to 3^rd world (or sorry “Global South” for those politically correct readers) who live without 1^st World (“Global North”) amenities, eat the local food, adopt local customs, and live generally simpler lives. It’s offensive for a number of reasons but also, as it can be the case with offensive things, is somewhat hilarious. Think about your best friend, your father, really anyone, deciding to give up wireless internet, wearing some feathers or local dress, subsisting on a regular diet of cassava and strange local plants, and learning a language that may have clicks and other sounds that are so incredibly foreign you wouldn’t even be able to guess which side of the planet it’s coming from.

People talk about Peace Corps volunteers “going native” and moving to the bush. I am not in the Peace Corps but in my latest East Africa adventure, I find myself “going native.” Of course I’m being facetious but my new situation is quite different than what I’ve experienced up to this point. I am only a 7-8 min. walk from the main road and about 30 minutes of walking from the main city of Gulu population 150,000; however, I’m surrounded by huts (I myself am in a non-self-contained house), have no running (or hot) water, often have no electricity due to frequent outages, no Western bathroom, no gas stove (I’m going to buy one though), and there’s plenty of goats, animals, and small African children in my backyard.

As if I was in a movie, Mama Basil is my elderly lady roommate, one of my co-worker’s moms who speaks very little English and probably finds me very strange. We don’t interact too much (or haven’t yet I should say). For example, last night I went off to go see some live music in town as she sit in the dark with just a small candle listening to the radio. I’m sure I’ll have more to say about her later.

Mama Basil’s sister’s child also either lives there or is just always around (not sure which yet) and is terrified of me. It’s funny how small children here are either fascinated by white skin and want to touch you or can be terrified and run away in fright when you get within a few feet.

Layibi is actually a very peaceful and pretty place to live and I am happy to be living simpler, if only for a few months while I get into some more sales and field based work from Fenix.

Better grab an umbrella

I am back in the North of Uganda for work and enjoying myself. But it’s always music that triggers the strangeness of the situations I sometimes find myself in; whether it be an old forgotten Salt & Pepper hit, classic French hits in Rwanda, or something else. This time it was riding in the back of a cargo vehicle with local staff from several different NGO’s on our way to visit a very large SACCO (Savings and Credit Cooperative Organizations) when "Make it Rain" by Lil. Wayne came booming into my life. It’s been days since I've heard that one and I think my fellow passengers just enjoyed the beat and didn't try too hard to interpret the lyrics. I may have continued eating the raw cassava and sugar cane, chewing and spitting everywhere and making a mess in the car with this foreign group (as that’s how it is with those items), and not thinking anything odd about the moment, if it hadn't been for that song. It’s as if the out-of-place American gangster rap brings me back to the fact that me, as a White (Mazungu), am also totally out-of-place. 

When life gives you lemons

Make Kenya! Wait, that doesn't make any sense. Go to Kenya?

Just one day after returning from Rwanda, I’m on a bus on my way to Kenya now because I screwed up and forgot that my Uganda Visa was expiring. Apparently it’s like $100/day fine for each day you are here after your Visa has expired, so with almost no notice I had to take off and leave for Kenya – the closest border (a mere “6” but actually 8 plus hour bus ride) from Kampala.

So I decided to make the best of it. I chose Eldoret, a town known for producing some of the world’s best runners as these Kenyans continually train at high altitude (above 6,000 ft.) and it’s also a popular hang gliding destination as it overlooks the Great African Rift valley. Furthermore, Wikipedia tells me there is a good cheese factory there.

Sitting next to me on the bus is Maku Anderson, a Ugandan man that appears to be around my age. He’s very chatty and friendly and he’s looking me up on facebook just minutes into our trip. We spent at least 15 minutes alone talking about the Rolex, a Ugandan classic –simply an egg and chapatti (the Ugandan equivalent of Nan bread) that’s pretty bomb. It also reminds that everywhere you go in the world, people love the egg/bread combination, just like my birdy-in-the-nest back home. You can normally find Rolex on the street in Uganda (in contrast to Rwanda where street food is sadly forbidden) for $.50 and it makes an excellent snack. But I also learned from Makuy about variations of the Rolex that I hadn’t previously known existed – such as the commando (with veggies), the Titantic (4 eggs with 4 chapati’s wrapped on one side and 4 on the other –it’s hard to imagine just how massive this is), and “for thugs” Maku say’s, the Sugar Rey – which is a Rolex made with spirits (usually whisky). This sounds disgusting to me.

We also got to the topic of woman where Maku teaches me: “Rwandaise woman are like tortoises – they are shier than Ugandans, and even if they hide their heads, watch out, they can still come out and bite.”  This is contrast of course to Ugandan woman, who, Maku informs me, “are more like ostriches. When the leopard comes to hunt them they may hide their necks in the bushes but they forget about the biggest part, their behinds, the meat, just sticking out there for the leopard.”

Update from Eldoret:

I didn’t find the cheese factory, but I did find some amazing hiking. Despite being described as somewhat of a tourist town, very few African towns are actually set up for tourism and Eldoret was no different. I left after just one day since the only buses back to Kampala were hellish night buses and I have work Monday. Considering the ride was 90% of the point, it was not such a horrible trip after all.