Traveling to Uganda

June 16, 2006
We woke up early at 5:25am and still fully from dinner (just like I
had thought). The electricity was out so we got ready in the dark. We
canceled our breakfast order, aside from some fruit and juice, but our
room guy (who had been trying to convince us the we need to eat more)
gave us our full order anyway. We didn't eat it for fear of feeling
sick in the car. We took our picture with him and then headed off.

The drive to Kibale was relatively short, but Scott realized he had
left the room key in his pocket so we had to figure out a way to get
it back to them. We also took some amazing sunrise pictures this
morning.

Once at Kibale National Forest, we found our guide, Johnson, and he
took us to where we began our trek. We trekked for approximately 30
minutes, stopping to listen for the chimps. After what seemed to us
very little time, we found them! At first, we could only hearthem,
then we were able to see them high in the trees. We saw several
males, including the dominant male, and some females with babies. At
some point they started making a lot of noise and coming down from the
trees. Sure enough they came down, one by one and they were quite
big!! We were able to get some great photos and Johnson led us onto a
dirt road. Soon the chimps began crossing the road right in front of
us! They came to within about 15 meters!

Next we saw some grey-cheeked mangabeys high in the tree. We got some
good photos of them as well. The are SO odd/ugly-looking! They also
make the craziest calls, very loud and garbled. When we were almost
back to the car, we spotted some Olive Baboons. These guys are much
better-looking than most species of baboons! Once at the car, we took
a picture with Johnson and went back to the canteen area for lunch.
We had both ordered a burger and chips, but realized we were both
still full from the previous night! Thus, we shared one plate and
gave the other chimp tracker, Chris, the other plate. The meal was
good and while the burger was plain (only burger and bread), it was
good because it tasted like meatloaf. We also had a nice conversation
with Chris.

Chris was on the chimp trek with us and had just come from Bwindi the
day before. He said that the gorillas were amazing! He was from the
US (CA, MA, etc), but has been living in England (Cambridge
University) for the past 6 years doing a post-doc dealing with hearing
impairment. He had done his PhD at MIT so he and Scott swapped
stories. After lunch, it was time to head to Bwindi. Christ hitched
a ride with us for 10km before getting out to catch a matatu. He had
done his trip the "brave way" and didn't have a tour guide/driver, but
was just "winging it".

The drive to Bwindi was long, but interesting. The first several
hours were filled with lush green surroundings, many people (lots of
children), and lost of bananas. At some point, the scenery changed
dramatically to dry desolate landscape (much like what you would find
in New Mexico). This was part of the "Rift Valley". We were also
told as some point that we were only 20-30km from the Congo border!
We sure didn't feel like we were in any danger! Next was Queen
Elizabeth National Park and the Equator. The park was quite dry and
savannah-like rather than the environment we had been getting used to.
We saw hippos, waterbuck, warthogs, antelope, and kob (deer-like
creatures). Unfortunately, we never saw the famous "tree-climbing
lions". I took this opportunity to nap.

We arrived at Bwindi Tented Camp around 6:30pm and unfortunately,
Scott was not feeling well at all. We moved into our rooms and Scott
went to sleep while I showered and did some laundry. He was in no
mood to eat dinner, so I went by myself and met some interesting
people. The was an African American girl from Chicago who had studied
at Tuskegge, but was currently at Yale doing a Public Health degree.
She had just arrived yesterday and was to spend the next two months
here at Bwindi working on education and public health issues
surrounding the townspeople and the gorillas. Another girl, a Ugandan
from a university here, was new with her and they were both trying to
get their bearings. They were to live in town with no electricity,
etc. Good luck! I also talked with Joseph and another driver who
seemed quite friendly. I finished dinner, checked on Scott (who was
feeling a bit better), and asked Joseph if he could pick up some
medicine (we had forgotten to bring this medicine from Nairobi).
Unfortunately it was closed so we had to pass. I got ready for bed
and Scott realized I had washed all of his socks. One would think
this is good news; however, this meant that he wouldn't have any that
were dry by morning. Oops! What a dilemma. This put Scott in a
worse mood and I just went to bed.

June 15, 2006
We woke up early and were on the road to find a bank by 7am. We
wanted to be back by 8:30 and Scott figured we were only 3km from
Kampala center. After walking and walking and walking past the most
grid locked traffic, we finally decided we would not soon find a bank
(we struck out at the first 2 banks we found: the first had no power
and the second only accepted Stanbie Bank ATM cards). We finally
caught a matatu and had them drop us off at Backpackers where we
caught (scarfed down) a quick breakfast of eggs on toast, paid for our
room, and left with Joseph, our driver, to go to Barclay's Bank and
meet Hassan to finish paying for the safari.

We discovered that once you meet your daily limit on your account you
cannot take our more, even if it is from a savings, rather than a
checking account. Alos, please not that Mastercard is worthless at
most places! We barely managed to pay as we had some Kenyan
schillings that were were able to convert to Uganadan shcillings.
Once this was all sorted out, we began our journey.

We rode for a LONG time, but in more comfort than the past few days
(simply because their was much air circulation) and Scott napped while
I studied Swahili (now I'm working on the 2nd grade reader). We past
some wonderful scenery of lush green forests, banana plants
everywhere, and farms with maize and tea. We got to Fort Portal
around 2pm and ate lunch (chicken and chips) and got settle into our
room. It was quite nice, although the place seemed to be deserted.
We didn't care!

Around 4pm, we headed to the cave, but stopped briefly for an outdoor
child dance competition sponsored by "Blue Band" butter spread. They
little kids were "getting down" and it was quite cute/funny to watch!

We arrived at the cave and met our guide. He told us this very
interesting story of how the cave got its name. The cave was
beautiful, albeit not really deep like we think of a cave in the US.
There was a beautiful waterfall coming off of it and a curtain of
vines. The rainforest environment we entered was amazing! Next, we
went for a walk up a hill and had a wonderful view of a couple of
carter lakes (2 which were filled and one that was dry, but
beautiful). We also had a fabulous 360 degree view of the land! The
mountains are gorgeous!!

We had a soda, filled in the comments section of the visitors book and
headed back. We had dinner at 7:30 and it was again delivered to our
room (this had happened at lunch, but we though it was because we had
arrived late). It was great with fruit salad, spaghetti (Monica's),
chicken curry (Scott), and banana fritters (most of which we were too
full to eat so we wrapped them up for later). I'm going to get fat
off of this trip for sure!! L We ordered breakfast for tomorrow
since we planned to leave so early in the morning at 6:30am. I tried
to order light, but the guy wouldn't let me! He added some things to
my order saying that I must "eat like an African", meaning "the more
you eat the better". I agreed to do my best seeing as I wasn't
convince I would be at all hungry the next morning. We watched
another world cup game, updated our journal, and went to bed.
Tomorrow would be an early, but exciting day.

June 14, 2006
Today was a very early morning! Even after waking up at 5:30, we
still managed to be too rushed to catch breakfast. We got to Akamba
by 6:30 and were the first people on the bus. The seats on this bus
were really big (you could fit 2 of me in them and my feet couldn't
reach the seat in front of me!). They handed out free bottled water,
but the problem with this was I couldn't drink it because I would have
to go to the restroom and we had noticed only minutes before that even
this "posh" bus didn't have a restroom on board! There were very few
people on this bus which was nice and allowed us to change seats.
This proved to be quite handy as I was soon baking in the sun and the
windows would not open, so there was a distinct lack of a breeze.
About 4 hrs into the trip, we stopped for a bathroom break. From my
previous experiences I have learned that one must run if they wanted
to be able to catch the bus before it leaves without you. Next, was
the border crossing. Scott and I had both thought it would be a big
deal, but instead, it was rather quick and painless. Two stops, two
forms, and two passport stamps. My passport may actually be full by
the time I return to the US!

We reboarded the bus and were off towards Kampala. We crossed the
Nile and Jinja and were excited to be going over the Nile! It is a
beautiful and sprawling river as it flows out of Lake Victoria on its
northward journey. Just when we thought the view was over, Scott saw
a group of police officers huddles next to a rail of what looked like
a hydrow plant as were were leaving the bridge. They had a pole and
at the end of the pole in the water was a body of a man in a blue
shirt, face down in floating. Creepy!

Going into Kampala, they turned on the radio to some nice American
hip-hop, which was interrupted by a heartfelt song (ad) with a female
diva singing about "pure vegetable oil". "Its good for my family…"
We thought it was hysterical! The traffic in Kampala was crazy and it
took us at least and hour for the bus to pull into the station. We
were immediately accosted by taxi drivers. After deciding we had no
clue where we were, where we were going, or how much to pay, we
decided to take a taxi. We asked a driver how
much…20,000ush…no…15,000?…how about 10,000…ok (it is probably safe to
assume that ½ of the first offer is probably closer to the "fair"
price). Once we settled this, we were off…ish. It was 7:30pm and
rush hour was still in full force. An hour later, we turned into the
Backpackers Hostel and checked in. I was already on the verge of
whiny, but checking email pushed me over the edge (an email from
Robert Patterson that looked bleak on the prospects of finding a new
advisor for my upcoming Master's program had been waiting for me).
Scott ordered some dinner, and Monica joined shortly thereafter. We
realized we did not have enough Ugandan shillings to pay for our room
and everything else and I was very concerned about paying for our
safari tomorrow. We were both getting cranky, so after I had a
heavenly bath, we headed off to bed. We resolved to wake up early the
next day to find a bank.

June 13, 2006
Around 1am, Scott woke me up on the bus and wished me a "Happy
Anniversary!" Only about 6 more hours til Nairobi. By now I was
needing the restroom, but I wasn't fast enough on our first stop and
the second I soon realized was just a "bush stop" where all of the men
were peeing at the side of the road. I didn't join them! Finally,
around 2:30am we had the real stop, and I was able to relieve myself.
Guess they don't have restrooms on Scandinavia either. We'll have to
see what Akamba is like.

We arrived in Nairobi around 7am and realized that it is not nearly as
chaotic and hectic as we remembered! Actually, maybe it is just that
we have been living on the coast for a few months, but it is very
Western looking. We arrived and caught a taxi to check into the Sirona
Hotel, a nice little place located close to the National Museum. It
seems like a nice place and pretty reasonably priced. We have been
enjoying the TV, which we have not seen in months. The channel of
religious Swahili music videos is especially entertaining! We had a
"fast food" breakfast of doughnuts, maandazi, sausage, and samosa, and
I took this opportunity to buy a couple of Swahili VCDs.

We texted Beatrice to arrange a time and place to meet in Nairobi. We
had a cab take us to the Hilton, where we had decided, but the taxi
misunderstood that we were just meeting friends and dropped us off at
the main entrance. Before we knew what was happening, the bellhops
were taking our bags into the Hilton! We had to catch them and
explain that we were just meeting people here.

We chatted with Beatrice and met her sister, Lydia. Unfortunately,
Beatrice had a 2pm appointment so we went with her sister to catch a
matatu to Beatrice's house. Little did we know just how far this
would be. First, we carried our bages all over Nairobi in search of
the "famed" #45 matatu, almost getting run over or trampled several
times in the process. Once we got on the matatu, it was approximately
a 30 minute ride. All the while were were wondering, "Where is this
place?", "How are we going to get back tonight?", "Does she think we
are staying with her?", "If so, how are we going to get out of this
situation tactfully since we have already paid for a hotel room?"
Once we got off the matatu, we had about a 15 minute walk to her
place. Her apartment was also on the top floor so we were getting
quite the workout!

Her place was very nice and we were soon given another clue that some
miscommunication had occurred when Lydia took us to a room and told
us, "This is where you will sleep." We said, "Oh, ew are not too
tired right now. We should chat!" We helped her make ugali and
secumaweki and spinach and watched some very interesting TV in the
process. First, there was a Gary Colman movie from the early 1980's.
Wow, it was cheesy beyond belief! Next, it was a show with a
televangelist from Detroit who was out to save us all! Lydia probably
would have changed channels, but we were trying to be tolerant of this
show, so we commented on the woman's accent. She mistook this for
interest and turned up the volume! We could only take so much of it
so we decided to do dishes. It was our only escape!

After seeing that it was 3pm and still Beatrice had not yet arrived,
she told us we would be having dinner in about 4 hours. I knew I had
to confront her about our miscommunication. Sure enough, they had
though we were staying the night for in African culture, if you say,
"I'm coming to Nairobi.", it means, "Make room, we're moving in!" We
would have loved to stay with them and will likely do so when we get
back from Uganda. Once she realized the situation, she called
Beatrice and suddenly many people arrived. First, was Beatrice, then
her kids (twins Wendy and Randy), then three neighbors, Moses, Ruth,
and ??, then finally Beatrice's husband, Ken. We had a great time
conversing with all of them and got to see some pictures of Beatrice's
famly. We watched some "Tyra" on TV which started a discussion about
plastic surgery and trying to make one's self more beautiful/perfect.
Next we played some Poker with her kids until we realized that I
didn't understand how to play. The TV turned to the world cup just as
the food arrived. We had pilau, meat, and sauce with matoke. It was
very good. They also had made sure to have some boiled water for us
(they just drink the tap water and seem to stay perfectly healthy!).
We were quite thankful!

When it was time for us to leave, Beatrice's husband walked us to whee
we catch the matatu and came with us so we would be safe. We rode the
coolest matatu/bus! It was huge and filled with black lights and
black light stickers. Soon the music started and IT WAS BUMPIN'!
They were playing good songs too—rap and R&B from the US such as
Beyonce, R Kelly, etc. They call these kinds of matatus, Manyangas
because of the loud music. I wish the US had something like it. He
came with us to catch a cab as well and rode with us til we were
secure in our hotel.

What a great night! Scott and I had such a great time with their
family. I can't wait to stop by their place again! Hopefully, next
time we can minimize the confusion. We finished it up with a drink at
the hotel bar and then were off to bed. What a nice, yet unique, way
to celebrate our 2 yr wedding anniversary!!