June
So the next morning I and a couple of folks who had been at the goat roast decided to go adventuring. After breakfast we enlisted the help of the only person in my village who has a car to drive us up into the mountains so that we can enjoy the scenery. I offer to pay, but he insists on driving for free if I cover the gas. So we load up, put gas in the car and away we go. The road going up to the mountains was pretty rough, but we were able to make it. Though, once we got up into the mountains it was a different story. We were in an all wheel drive station wagon, but really we should have been in a hummer. The road we absolutely ridiculous and our driver was quickly demonstrating the fact that he had not owned the car for long. We would try to get him to stop so we could get out and push before he entered a bad spot so the car would be less likely to get stuck, but he would just gun the engine and plow right in. Then we would get stuck and have to push him out. This happened at least a dozen times. We even suggested that maybe we turn around and go back, but it seems that his pride was hurt a little at the suggestion that he couldn't get us there, and we really did want to reach the valley down the other side of the mountain pass, so we pushed on. After a lot of grunting, sweating, playing in the mud and pushing, we finally arrived. A beautiful view of an incredibly green valley made all the struggles worth it. Only way off in the distance could you see any sign of people. A small hut was tucked in among the rolling hills some three or four miles away on the other side of the valley. It was so amazing to have this little Shangrala of rolling hills, multiple little streams and waterfalls, giant mahoganies just 30 miles from me. The rest of the landscape in my area is flat and grassy. There are some trees, but because people cut them down for firewood, few of the trees get very big. But here in this valley we were surrounded by a huge thick forest of giant trees, impenetrable stands of bamboo, and mountains rising up on all sides. So we marveled and marveled. Slowly we made our way to the village on the other side of the valley and meet Fr. Richard, a friend of mine. We feasted on some of the largest and sweetest lemons, oranges, and mangoes I have ever had. Even the lemons were as sweet as candy. It was absolutely amazing, but our day light was running out, so we turned around and headed for home.
Again we played in the mud pushing and grunting, heaving and hauling, and finally made it to the apex of our mountain pass. After this it was all down hill, but not in one day. Our prideful driver wouldn't let us get out and guide him in a particularly narrow part of the road and we wound up in a ditch. The car had slid off into a small stream bed that the rain had cut right along the road. For over an hour we fought and struggled to get this car out of the stream. Eventually we had to lift the back end of the car up, slide it onto the road and then get in front and push the car, very carefully mind you, onto the road. If we went a little too far then we would be in the ditch on the other side of the road. Success! We finally got our little wagon out of the ditch and were excited to not be spending the night in the mountains in the middle of nowhere. Or at least we thought. The car wouldn't start. I don't know why or how getting stuck in a ditch would cause the car to not start, but it seemed that it did.
So now what? What could we do? We were in the middle of the mountains, its about an hour from sun down and we have a car that won't start. So we send the fastest of us running back to the village to ask Fr. Richard for some help. Fortunately Fr. Richard was a little better equipped than we were and so he brought his big Land Rover to the rescue. It was getting too late to do any repairs by the time he arrived, so he loaded us up and took us back to the mission with him. After we got back we were offered a hot bath, dinner and clean beds. We came to him begging like a troop of raggedy vagabonds and Fr. Richard treated us likes kings. It was probably the best hospitality I have ever experienced in Africa. The next morning we were treated to freshly baked bread, omelets and hot tea. We got a few more mangoes and lemons and with a mechanic driving we headed for the car.
The car was still there in one piece, and nothing was stolen from it. I was a little surprised but happily impressed never the less. So with the mechanic and three engineers we were finally able to diagnose the problem. It turns out the driver, who is openly cursing me at this point, had failed to get his gas pump repaired properly. It seems that it had been replaced once, but the fuse that protects the gas pump had not been replaced at all, instead it had been jumped. This of course will get you to the nearest town where you can buy a proper fuse, but unfortunately this was not the case. Instead, the 25 cent fuse was not put in and so now the $60 pump will need to be replaced... again. So with no chance of getting all that in the middle of the mountains, Fr. used his Land Rover to pull us to the nearest village on the other side of the mountains. Slowly, and with a lot of jerking and stopping we finally made the 15 mile journey to the next village. Wow, what an ordeal! Fr. Richard couldn't take us any further as he has his own program for the day, so we pool all the money we have on us and give it to Fr. for the food, lodging, and fuel to pull us this far. His hospitality warranted more, but that was all the money we had. Our driver, of course, felt no need to pitch in and went so far as to demand that I pay for another tow to town where he could get the car repaired. I wasn't so agreeable to say the least. So with a temper high and no money, I just started walking. Its 22 km from there to my village and I wasn't about to sit and listen to the driver piss and moan about how this was all my fault. My friends and I walked the whole way to my village. At some point in the trek the driver passed us on a motorcycle and took time to try and argue with me some more. I was getting fed up to the point that I could have just about kicked his face in right there. I wasn't the one driving, I told him to let us get out and push or turn us around and not go any further, I wasn't the one who jerry-rigged the gas pump fuse, and I wasn't the one who's pride took us all the way out to BFE in a vehicle that wasn't up to snuff. I and my friends had already payed twice what it should cost to get his car to town and repaired and he still had all the fuel that I bought in his tank. I couldn't comprehend how this SOB could continue to blame me for his mistakes. But I guess logic doesn't matter, what mattered to him was that I was white and consequently rich and so obviously I should pay. So again, I started walking, without kicking his face in.
Good God! What an adventure! We made it home safe and sound that night and my friends were able to go their separate ways the next morning so I guess all is well that ends well right?
Monday, November 28, 2011
Monday, November 14, 2011
First term and goat roasting - from May 2011
If memory serves me correctly, my last writings were on the adventures of Sully and Dave climbing Mt. Elgon. If this isn't the case, then I'll let Sully post an entry on that when he gets a chance. Regardless, I have fallen way behind. So let me start catching up.
After Sully left at the end of January, I went back to my house to find everything in complete disarray. Termites had made short work of big sections of my fence. Neighbor kids broke my clay posts, goats and cattle destroyed what little greenery I might have had and somebody - according to the little boy next door - had come by during the night and tried to pick my locks. Dang! Can't a guy go a way for two months without everything falling apart? So I spent the next month slowly putting things back together.
I've decided that trying to be all natural on the fence issue isn't going to work. I was using bamboo and thorns, but that isn't holding up. So now I'm going to try soaking the ends of the bamboo in either poison or used motor oil. Then I'll see how that goes. Once the bamboo is woven together it is really strong, hence why they make their houses out of it. However, no one told me that before they coat their bamboo walls with cow shit, they also poor several gallons of poison on the bamboo and in the ground around it. I don't know what health risks there might be in this tactic, but it does seem to work really well. Now I just need a few hundred more pieces of bamboo and some poison. I'll let you all know how it turns out.
Aside from the fence, March and most of April have passed without any developments at home. At school on the other hand things went a bit south. First, the term was supposed to begin in early February. Most of the teachers - except me and the Deputy Principal - didn't arrive until mid February. But then again , only a handful of students arrived as well.
Notwithstanding, by the end of February we were in full swing. Then in the middle of March, oh beware the ides of March, we started having problems. The trouble is definitely two fold. First the S2 and S3 (sophomores and juniors) became "very indisciplined." Basically, they weren't coming to class or if the did they were late, out of dress code, lazy , unresponsive, or just rude. Try to understand that there is only one exam at the end of their senior year that determines their fate. When you're a kid, one or two years before the most important exam of your life seems like plenty of time. So there isn't a whole lot of reason to take classes too seriously. Plus, they aren't S1 (freshmen) any more so they are getting a little big for their britches so to say. Combine all of this with a few bold kids who really don't care at all and of course you are going to have problems. The second fold is that the teachers are pretty dang lazy. Most of the teachers didn't really want to be teachers, but if they didn't do well enough to go to university, then going to a teachers college at least buys you some time, gives you possible job options and is usually free or cheap. So of course the teachers aren't going to show any great concern or passion for the school, students, or teaching in general. They will , however, go to great lengths to tell you how lousy, lazy and indisciplined the students are. So now we have poor teachers (who are paid regardless of their performance), students who are only at school as a way to get out of chores at home and parents who know nothing about it because they only made it to the 3rd grade. KABOOM!
The explosion happened when the administration (principal) finally started coming to school and doing a decent job as opposed to doing something somewhere else. He really turned things around on both students and staff. Now all this time I was doing what I could to be a good example. I took roll call, graded homework, gave weekly quizzes and called students by name. You would think this would be good, in fact the other teachers commented that these are "serous teaching tools." Not that any of them tried to emulate though. But no, the students hated it. I was making them do more work and because of my record keeping and knowing their names, I was able to hold them accountable. Their anonymity was gone and they were really in trouble when I brought it to the attention of the principal.
So parents were called, blame was passed around like a hot potato and in the end we made a step forward but potentially two steps back. My physics students (juniors) said I wasn't giving enough notes (they don't have text books so they really do need notes) and said I wasn't covering enough material. What they really meant was that I wasn't giving them notes verbatim on the board for them to copy for 80 minutes and instead required them to participate. "Teaching" means you give students notes and problems to memorize. Anything outside of this isn't welcomed by teachers or students.
Then the students voiced complaints about other teachers not coming to class, or having the students do yard work when they didn't feel like teaching. The parents raised a fuss that we weren't caning (beating with a slender branch) enough and the administration said the parents need to check and make sure their kids are actually studying at school by looking at the report cards.
So the solution: I am now teaching freshmen physics, one teacher was fired as an example, four or five students were expelled as examples, and a whole slew of the others were caned by their parents right there on the spot. One kid, rumor has it, was even arrested for stealing because he took the money his mom gave him for school fees and went drinking instead. That pretty much wraps up term I and the end of April.
I spend Easter in the village just north of my house. It was nice and quiet. People celebrated, sang, danced, and had a good time. The next week I finally got time to go and climb the little mountain near me. Spectacular view of an incredibly flat and vast landscape. Plains full of grass, bush and trees. Green and Gorgeous! That brings me to to my next topic.
Gardening. April had a few showers, just enough to begin swing the hoe and busting sod. I let my hands get pretty raw before I put on the gloves Penny sent me (Thanks again Penny!). I had to make sure I had calluses and blisters to show everyone. Then in May, I just put in my corn and beans Mom and dad sent with Sully (thanks again Mom, Dad and Sully). Now I'm working on my herb garden. I've got lemon grass, ginger and basil. I planted mint, rosemary, and chives, but it seems they didn't come up. I'll have to try one more time. I also gave mustard, collards, swiss chard, carrots, lettuce and beets a shot. But I put them right before 3 days of hellacious rain. So I think they got washed away. Dang. My pumpkins are looking good though. I'll be making bies by August I hope.
Then May 10th rolled around and I had to go for PC training again. It was only two days long, but it ate up a whole week because travel it is 2 days there and 2 days back. Plus, I stayed an extra day to get my mid-service medical exam done so I wouldn't have to make the 4 day travel again. However, as much as I hate going to the capital for training, I do like seeing all of my PC friends. Its like a reunion every time we meet up. On top of that, a bunch of them wanted to come up to the North for a visit. Awesome! So I said we should have a little south of the border party at my place. See, its a joke cause I'm right south of the Sudan border. he he :)
So I hurried home to prepare while everyone else went gallivanting here and there as they made their way north. After a lot of hustle, hassle and harrassle, I finally got 20lbs of fruit, a 40 lbs goat (hanging weight), 35lbs of charcoal, and one case of beer. Thanks to Papa's butcher knives (razor sharp!) I made short work of the goat. My neighbors couldn't believe how fast was going, then I demonstrated how sharp the knife was by shaving the hair off my arm. Then I have the innards and head to a friend in exchange for helping me salt and stretch the hide. The heart, liver, lungs, and kidneys I kept though and ground them up with salt, onion, garlic and chili peppers, made them into patties then breaded and deep fried them. Oh, I made a deep frier and filled it with sunflower seed oil, most useful innovation I've made so far. Damn were they good!
Mean while, I had a pit, a rim off a 2 ton flat bed and a load of charcoal. I put it all together with the charcoal in the rim, and the rim in the ground. Burn baby burn! By the time I had the goat skinned and all the pinaable and mangoes sliced up, the fire was ready. So I stuffed the goat carcass with fruit until he was bursting, wired him closed, wrapped him in palm leaves and threw him in the pit. Then I covered it with more palm leaves and piled on the dirt. That was about noon.
I spent the next six hours making guacamole, fruit salad, tortillas, beans and potatoes and straining my homemade mango wine. A little vinigery, but good enough. Then mop the house and by the time everyone arrived (they had to hire a flatbed truck to take them all to my place and back, some PCV and some ex-pat from Kitgum) the goat was ready to rise again! We went to lift him out by the leg bones, but instead the leg bones just slipped right out. So I grabbed some gloves and pulled the wires. Again, the meat fell away and the wires pulled right out. So we had to get the palm leaves underneath and lift. Surprisingly, the leaves weren't burned. We put him on the table and I ripped off a piece. Glorious! I couldn't believe it turned out so well. Once the moment of truth had passed, the next two hourse was a flash of meat and beer. Not even the bones were left on the table as people sad around gnawing on them. Then someone brought out the guitar as the sun finally disappeared and we all proceeded to relax and have a helluva good time. It would have lasted well into the night, but lightning was on the horizon and a lot of folks had to get the early bus the next day so we loaded them up on and said goodbye. Three of the guests stayed behind for the night so we could go adventuring around the next morning, but that is another story.
Tune in next time for more adventures as I continue to examine life :)
After Sully left at the end of January, I went back to my house to find everything in complete disarray. Termites had made short work of big sections of my fence. Neighbor kids broke my clay posts, goats and cattle destroyed what little greenery I might have had and somebody - according to the little boy next door - had come by during the night and tried to pick my locks. Dang! Can't a guy go a way for two months without everything falling apart? So I spent the next month slowly putting things back together.
I've decided that trying to be all natural on the fence issue isn't going to work. I was using bamboo and thorns, but that isn't holding up. So now I'm going to try soaking the ends of the bamboo in either poison or used motor oil. Then I'll see how that goes. Once the bamboo is woven together it is really strong, hence why they make their houses out of it. However, no one told me that before they coat their bamboo walls with cow shit, they also poor several gallons of poison on the bamboo and in the ground around it. I don't know what health risks there might be in this tactic, but it does seem to work really well. Now I just need a few hundred more pieces of bamboo and some poison. I'll let you all know how it turns out.
Aside from the fence, March and most of April have passed without any developments at home. At school on the other hand things went a bit south. First, the term was supposed to begin in early February. Most of the teachers - except me and the Deputy Principal - didn't arrive until mid February. But then again , only a handful of students arrived as well.
Notwithstanding, by the end of February we were in full swing. Then in the middle of March, oh beware the ides of March, we started having problems. The trouble is definitely two fold. First the S2 and S3 (sophomores and juniors) became "very indisciplined." Basically, they weren't coming to class or if the did they were late, out of dress code, lazy , unresponsive, or just rude. Try to understand that there is only one exam at the end of their senior year that determines their fate. When you're a kid, one or two years before the most important exam of your life seems like plenty of time. So there isn't a whole lot of reason to take classes too seriously. Plus, they aren't S1 (freshmen) any more so they are getting a little big for their britches so to say. Combine all of this with a few bold kids who really don't care at all and of course you are going to have problems. The second fold is that the teachers are pretty dang lazy. Most of the teachers didn't really want to be teachers, but if they didn't do well enough to go to university, then going to a teachers college at least buys you some time, gives you possible job options and is usually free or cheap. So of course the teachers aren't going to show any great concern or passion for the school, students, or teaching in general. They will , however, go to great lengths to tell you how lousy, lazy and indisciplined the students are. So now we have poor teachers (who are paid regardless of their performance), students who are only at school as a way to get out of chores at home and parents who know nothing about it because they only made it to the 3rd grade. KABOOM!
The explosion happened when the administration (principal) finally started coming to school and doing a decent job as opposed to doing something somewhere else. He really turned things around on both students and staff. Now all this time I was doing what I could to be a good example. I took roll call, graded homework, gave weekly quizzes and called students by name. You would think this would be good, in fact the other teachers commented that these are "serous teaching tools." Not that any of them tried to emulate though. But no, the students hated it. I was making them do more work and because of my record keeping and knowing their names, I was able to hold them accountable. Their anonymity was gone and they were really in trouble when I brought it to the attention of the principal.
So parents were called, blame was passed around like a hot potato and in the end we made a step forward but potentially two steps back. My physics students (juniors) said I wasn't giving enough notes (they don't have text books so they really do need notes) and said I wasn't covering enough material. What they really meant was that I wasn't giving them notes verbatim on the board for them to copy for 80 minutes and instead required them to participate. "Teaching" means you give students notes and problems to memorize. Anything outside of this isn't welcomed by teachers or students.
Then the students voiced complaints about other teachers not coming to class, or having the students do yard work when they didn't feel like teaching. The parents raised a fuss that we weren't caning (beating with a slender branch) enough and the administration said the parents need to check and make sure their kids are actually studying at school by looking at the report cards.
So the solution: I am now teaching freshmen physics, one teacher was fired as an example, four or five students were expelled as examples, and a whole slew of the others were caned by their parents right there on the spot. One kid, rumor has it, was even arrested for stealing because he took the money his mom gave him for school fees and went drinking instead. That pretty much wraps up term I and the end of April.
I spend Easter in the village just north of my house. It was nice and quiet. People celebrated, sang, danced, and had a good time. The next week I finally got time to go and climb the little mountain near me. Spectacular view of an incredibly flat and vast landscape. Plains full of grass, bush and trees. Green and Gorgeous! That brings me to to my next topic.
Gardening. April had a few showers, just enough to begin swing the hoe and busting sod. I let my hands get pretty raw before I put on the gloves Penny sent me (Thanks again Penny!). I had to make sure I had calluses and blisters to show everyone. Then in May, I just put in my corn and beans Mom and dad sent with Sully (thanks again Mom, Dad and Sully). Now I'm working on my herb garden. I've got lemon grass, ginger and basil. I planted mint, rosemary, and chives, but it seems they didn't come up. I'll have to try one more time. I also gave mustard, collards, swiss chard, carrots, lettuce and beets a shot. But I put them right before 3 days of hellacious rain. So I think they got washed away. Dang. My pumpkins are looking good though. I'll be making bies by August I hope.
Then May 10th rolled around and I had to go for PC training again. It was only two days long, but it ate up a whole week because travel it is 2 days there and 2 days back. Plus, I stayed an extra day to get my mid-service medical exam done so I wouldn't have to make the 4 day travel again. However, as much as I hate going to the capital for training, I do like seeing all of my PC friends. Its like a reunion every time we meet up. On top of that, a bunch of them wanted to come up to the North for a visit. Awesome! So I said we should have a little south of the border party at my place. See, its a joke cause I'm right south of the Sudan border. he he :)
So I hurried home to prepare while everyone else went gallivanting here and there as they made their way north. After a lot of hustle, hassle and harrassle, I finally got 20lbs of fruit, a 40 lbs goat (hanging weight), 35lbs of charcoal, and one case of beer. Thanks to Papa's butcher knives (razor sharp!) I made short work of the goat. My neighbors couldn't believe how fast was going, then I demonstrated how sharp the knife was by shaving the hair off my arm. Then I have the innards and head to a friend in exchange for helping me salt and stretch the hide. The heart, liver, lungs, and kidneys I kept though and ground them up with salt, onion, garlic and chili peppers, made them into patties then breaded and deep fried them. Oh, I made a deep frier and filled it with sunflower seed oil, most useful innovation I've made so far. Damn were they good!
Mean while, I had a pit, a rim off a 2 ton flat bed and a load of charcoal. I put it all together with the charcoal in the rim, and the rim in the ground. Burn baby burn! By the time I had the goat skinned and all the pinaable and mangoes sliced up, the fire was ready. So I stuffed the goat carcass with fruit until he was bursting, wired him closed, wrapped him in palm leaves and threw him in the pit. Then I covered it with more palm leaves and piled on the dirt. That was about noon.
I spent the next six hours making guacamole, fruit salad, tortillas, beans and potatoes and straining my homemade mango wine. A little vinigery, but good enough. Then mop the house and by the time everyone arrived (they had to hire a flatbed truck to take them all to my place and back, some PCV and some ex-pat from Kitgum) the goat was ready to rise again! We went to lift him out by the leg bones, but instead the leg bones just slipped right out. So I grabbed some gloves and pulled the wires. Again, the meat fell away and the wires pulled right out. So we had to get the palm leaves underneath and lift. Surprisingly, the leaves weren't burned. We put him on the table and I ripped off a piece. Glorious! I couldn't believe it turned out so well. Once the moment of truth had passed, the next two hourse was a flash of meat and beer. Not even the bones were left on the table as people sad around gnawing on them. Then someone brought out the guitar as the sun finally disappeared and we all proceeded to relax and have a helluva good time. It would have lasted well into the night, but lightning was on the horizon and a lot of folks had to get the early bus the next day so we loaded them up on and said goodbye. Three of the guests stayed behind for the night so we could go adventuring around the next morning, but that is another story.
Tune in next time for more adventures as I continue to examine life :)
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Bungee, Mountains, and Food Poisoning! Oh My!
What and adventure! So I leave my house early in the morning on Thursday. My plan was to make it to Unyama, just outside of Gulu (about 5 hours away) before noon. Unfortunately, I got caught up in packing/securing my house (one of the little neighbor kids said a thief tried to pick my lock the last time I was away) and so I missed the lorry (10 ton flatbed truck) to town. So I start walking with all of my camping gear in a big heavy uncomfortable army rucksack a friend gave me before I left for Africa. It is big, durrable, and deters people from trying to steal from me, but it isn't the best for camping gear. So because of this I am trying to flag down every car that goes by. After about two miles a small pickup stops and gives me a lift to town - wheeeeew! This does not bode well for my mountain climbing ambitions though.
Once in town I see a very nice white toyota pickup with the Jesuit Refugee Service logo on the side. This must Fr. Richard, a very nice Irish priest doing work in Sudan, who must be in town for supplies. So I go and find Fr. Richard and shoot the breeze with him for a bit and explain that I'm headed to Ocer Campion College in Unyama. He knows some other folks headed in the that direction and so they give me a lift to the junction where I begin walking for about 10 steps when another pickup gives me a lift. Not a bad day so far concidering my late start.
Two flat tires and 4 hours later, I finally arrive at the college (oh, college here means high school) and I'm not feeling all that well. Perhaps too much sun. So I meet with Fr. Tony (an American from the mid-west) and got a tour of the awesome school that they are just getting under way. The buildings are built stablized-earth interlocking blocks that make the overall cost, both monitarily and evironmentally, lower. The entire school is off grid and self sustaining using water catchment and solar. The curriculum is still that of the Ugandan Ministry of Education, but there are plans to change that to something reasonable soon. The staff is wonderful and the education approach is much more wholistic. The students maintain the campus, grow thier own food, some are even working to build some of the buildings during the holiday and soon they will be making thier own uniforms. It really is quickly becoming a model school, not just for Uganda but even for the world. Inshort, this is the kind of school I want to teach at. I really don't think Uganda needs any more aid funding. Uganda really just needs donars to check up on how the money is used, as the "big men" at the top seem to be all but drownding in everything they skim off the aid. So, if you want to donate to a worthy cause and want to be assured that all of the money is used properly then check out http://www.ocer.adventuredock.com/. If you like what you see, then send them a few dollars. The Jesuits will use it well to give these kids a real education.
However, the awe from the inspiring leap of faith Fr. Tony and his supports, donors, and staff have taken is short lived. I am really feeling aweful now. Headache, high fever, weak, and my guts are about to explode. So after a good hour or so in the latrine, Fr. Tony kindly offers me a room for the night. That puts another delay in my travel plans, but I feel so terrible I decide to accept.
I spent that night sweating out one of the worst fevers of my life. Luckly, I have a very nice 6L MSR bladder and re-hydration salts (like gatorade only it tastes like medicine) with me and I nurse on that all night (thanks Hal!). By morning I'm better, the fever is broken and my guts have called and armestice with whatever was causing all the ruccous. So I pack my bags and get ready to head out after thanking everyone abundantly when, wouldn't you know, there is a truck full of goats, tubers, poultry, and priests going down to the capitol. Just enough room for me to squeeze in the back seat, and my bag to slide in under the goats. A short 4 hours later (woohoo I'm back on schedule) and I'm in the over-sized sewer most folks call the city of Kampala.
I check in at the PC office now that it is Friday. No one is around so I sit at the computer for a while. Sully is supposed to land at 2:10 am on Saturday, so there really isn't any reason for me to get a hotel room. So as the hours pass and productivity dwindles I decide to check email one more time. Guess who I just recieved and email from: Sully! A quick inquery from him showes me that I am, in fact, an idiot. I read his arrival time correctly, but I read his departure date instead of his arrival date. He isn't landing until Sunday morning at 2:10 am. Well crap. Its now about 1:00 am, I'm sad and tired. So, against regulations, I decide to camp out at the PC office. Shhhhh, don't tell. I don't really sleep much because there are so many mosquitoes and no nets. But at 7:00 am I am feeling better.
I spend the rest of the day just kind of goofing around and chatting with the PCV's as they come into the office for this and that. Devon, one of the people planning on climbing the mountain with us, is also in the office, so we decide to split a hotel room. We arrive at one of the few PC approved hotels in Kampala and find out they are full. So we figure they have a roof, we have camping gear, why not let us sleep on the roof? Well, after an hour or so of arguing, reasoning and insisting, a room magically opens up. It is just big enough for the cot sized bed. The door doesn't even open all the way because it hits the bed, but we split it anyway. Devon, being 6' 2", takes the bed and I sleep on my camping pad on the floor partly under the bed. Besides, I have to get up at 2:00 am to meet Sully at the airport so I might as well be closest to the door so I don't have to step on Devon.
Sully finally arrives. I got a private taxi to take me to the airport and bring us back. Sully seems to be doing well by the time we make it back to the hotel. So we sit and chat till breakfast, eat, then head to the PC office to pick up the rest of my stuff, drop off all the goodies Sully muled over for me, and find out the game plan for leaving for the mountain.
Well, long story short, we had trouble getting the discount we should have gotten for being members of the Wildlife Clubs of Uganda so we decide to spend Monday arguing and then we will climb on Tuesday. That means that for Sunday we go and visit a family friend Sully knows.
Rob is a really awesome guy who is living in his bachelor pad on the beach of Lake Victoria. We go down and visit him, walk through the botanical gardens right nex to his house, try out his monkey gun (kind of like a potatoe gun that shoots pop corn to scare away the monkeys) and then drink beer and cook steak. IT WAS AWESOME!!!! It has been nearly a year since I have had steak, and this was great steak! Then we sleep in Rob's spare room with a fan (did I mention what a generous man Rob is?). I slept like the dead, it was glorious.
The next day we head off to Mbale, with a quick stop in Jinja to bungee jump into the Nile. We read on line that the price was $55, but when we got there it was actually $80, so only Sully jumped as I had already done some bungee jumping when I was in NZ. Then in Mbale, we spend the rest of the day arguing with the park service to no avail. So we continue on to the base of the mountain and crash on a friends floor.
Tuesday found us in the park office at Mt. Elgon arguing yet again. Finally we give up and start climbing. The first day was rough. I'm sucking wind, I'm over packed, and my rucksack is all but an oversized feedsack strapped to my back. But we make it with some time to spare. It is cold for me up on the mountain, but Sully seems to be in good form now. Especially compared to his earlier overheating at the base of the mountain. We cook some good old American camping food (man was it good) and call it a night. Since we didn't get the discount, we are trying to do a 4 day hike in 3 days, so tomorrow morning comes early.
Wednesday, 5:00 am. I'm cold, sore, and tired. Devon and Brian, the other two PCV's, don't seemed to be phased at all by yesterday's workout and are already up. Sully and I get dressed, pack up and eat the oats Devon and Brian had already cooked for us. Man do I feel like a slacker. But once we get moving I'm doing much better. The scenery has changed a lot. At the base were cultivated fields, then we moved up into bamboo groves, then thick trees with moss all over them and finally scrubby trees and bushes. Yesterday was also about 2000 meters of elevation gain, and today we only have to do 800 meters to reach the summit. What will make today tough is that we need to summit then go back down a different trail to the next camp. Supposidly a hike of 29 km, most of it going up and down.
We broke camp at around 6:30 ish, and summited at 9:30. I'm impressed, especially since they told us it should be 4 hours if you are moving without your packs. We still have our packs because we aren't going back to the same camp. The guide is a little annoyed, he didn't plan on working this hard. Apparently, most of the time the tour groups only do 4-6 hrs of hiking a day (with porters, feel a little better about myself) and we are planning on hiking from sun up to sun down. I guess I wouldn't be too happy either if I was the guide. Nevertheless, our moral improves greatly once we hit the top. I'm the slowest of the three and ever so greatful to know that the next 10 km will be down hill. The view is awesome. The caldera at the top of Mt. Elgon is supposed to be the 4th largest in the world. I don't know if this is true or not, but it sure is pretty. Scrubby trees and bushes break up the bowl of dry grass that fills the landscape. The sun is still pretty low, the wind is down and the clouds are just beginning to roll in. I enjoy the scene for a bit, toast with some Turkey 101 with the others and then I leave them to marvel and take pictures so that I can get a head start. I hate being the wimp of the group.
The whole day we haul butt to make sure we don't run out of day light. We don't even stop for lunch. The guide made it sound like we would make it to camp just before dark. But I think he was just trying to scare us out of our 3 day plan, because by 3:00 pm we were at the next camp. Man are we good! I was worried that at my pace we wouldn't make it, but we had plenty of time to spare. Now I wish we would have slowed down to enjoy our hike more. Oh well. A quick dip on the icey cold mountain stream, dry clothes and food later and I'm ready for bed at 5:00 pm. Everyone seems tired, but I am just plain exhausted. However, Devon seems pretty intent on gathering some firewood so we can have a camp fire and sing songs I guess, big hippie. So I help him retrieve some firewood. By that, I mean I nearly kill myself. I spend 20 minutes hacking away at a burned tree stump with a very well used machete, then Devon gives it a yank. No dice, so he goes to get smaller stuff and I keep hacking for another minute or two. Then I decide that maybe if I push on it in a different direction I might get it to give. I adjust my feet, lean into it, and give a sound push. That sound push snapped the log loose and send me somersualting down the riverbank. I did a full front flip followed by 20' of tummbling and am luckily caught by a thick shrub full of thorns. The drop into the water was another 8' away or so.
Needless to say, after that my adrenaline was flowing and my desire to find more firewood was all but non-existant. The most frustrating part was that I never did find that piece of log that almost got me killed. So we sat and played some rummy until it started getting dark, then we lit the camp fire. It was nice, the evening was calm and the moon was really bright. Not a bad way to end a long day.
Thursday morning found us sleeping in until 6:00. The guide says that it is 34 km to the end of the trail, but after yesterday, we are confident that we can make it with no troubles. Sure enough, by 10:30 am, we are already halfway. So we stop, have a leasurely snack. Explore the cave, fill our water and fertilize some bushes. We really enjoyed this hike down. The pace was much more relaxed, the incline on this side of the mountian was much more relaxed, and our overall mood was much more relaxed. Yes, it was a fairly relaxed hike. The trees also became bigger and bigger with more song birds and other critters. The jungle and folliage became much thicker and more dense and we just enjoyed all that we had to see. We even came to one section where the jungle just turned into a heavey patch of vines full of these little white flowers. It was like it had snowed or something. Then within 50 paces or so, they all disapeared. Really magical.
We were all pretty exhausted with very tired feet, but the sense of accomplishement with cannopy of trees being shot through by warm sunshine elevated our mood to make the day much more enjoyable than the two previous days.
We exited the park, thanked our begrudging guide and then headed down the road to Sipi Falls. A short hike off the road gave us a marvolous panorama of the three cascading water falls, the gorge, and part of the mountain in the background. Three entreprenuing 10 year-olds showed us where to go and even provided a stand for the camera. Then after these kids showed us around, some drunks and supposed proprietors tried to charge us for coming down to view the falls. I suppose they get a lot of money from tourists that way, but we told them that the kids did the work so the kids get the fee. We payed the kids the equivalent of $0.25 each and headed into town. We crashed with the same friend who hosted us the night we arrived at the mountain and enjoyed a very nice local dinner prepared by one of the teachers at our friend's school. What a wonderful day.
We had every intention of getting up early on Friday and hurring to my home in hopefully one day. But when 6:00 am rolled around, we just rolled over. So by 8:00, we had breakfast and finally got on a taxi into Mbale town. Devon went his way while Sully and I went north to Soroti and then Lira. While on the bus ride, I made arrangements to do a boat Safari at Murchinson Falls National Park since reaching my house today was out of the question. So we continue to Gulu. On the way, however, tragidy strikes. We must have gotten some bad rollexes (omlet burrito) on the bus because Sully isn't feeling so hot. I guess I'm used to it because I feel fine. Actually, he feels down right aweful. As soon as the taxi reaches Gulu, he gets out and unleashes a torrent of vomit all over the parking lot. So I let him catch his breath long enough for us to get to a hotel. The first one is booked, the second one is booked, the third one is booked, and the fourth one is too far to walk especially with Sully being sick and it already being well past dark. So, back to hotel number three and we beg for a room. When the get a look at Sully they magically have a room availible (thank God). Some hagling, then we are in like flin. Sully spends that night in the bathroom for the most part, and the next day (Saturday) just resting in bed. Meanwhile I rearrange our boat ride and safari, but we have to leave at 4:00 am on Sunday and this means no time to reach my house. So I also rest up. Saturday was fairly uneventful. Though I did take advantage of Sully's poor health and whoop his ass in rummy a few times.
We get in our private safari truck at 4:30 am on Sunday. We pass out in the back while the driver and owner do the navigating to the park. At 6:00 am we are at the gate and a very disgruntled attendant informs us that the park doesn't open until 7:00, but she lets us in anyway. We drive into the park just as the sun is rising. Some beautiful views of a very red sun coming up over acacia trees and rolling lowlands. About 6 km into the park and we are already surrounded by bush-bucks, impalas, buffalo, giraffes, and the Ugandan kop. It is awesome. The roof of the safary truck opens so we can stand and get a full 360 degree view of everything. Then we come upon another car around 7:00 and follow them for a while hoping they are going to find the lions. They have a park warden with them, so thier odds are better than ours. We stop to take a picture with some elephants. If I was stupid, I could have thrown a stone and hit them. We were close, but they are ginormous and I'm not that stupid. We continue following around the other vehicles and are joined by more until we have quite a caravan going on. Still no lions though. Sad, but we are so close to all the animals that we see that it is still a spectacular experience.
Then at noon we stop at the boat launch, fairy the car across and get lunch. Sully still isn't keen on food, so I get two beers. It looks tempting but he wisely declines. But that means I have two beers, oh what to do? I take care of the beers, but we are getting low on monies and the resuraunt is expensive. So it looks like two beers for a liquid lunch. I'm out of practice, tired, and on an empty stomach. By the time we reach the boat, I'm a bit tipsy. Not that it matters though. All I have to do is sit and watch the wildlife pass by. Song birds, fishing birds, hippos, crocodiles, bush elephants, and water bucks are copious as we slowly make our way up the Nile to the falls. The falls themselves are worth the trip. Not nearly as big and awesome as Sipi Falls, but covered so thickly in vegitations and adorned with so many critters all around, they made for an enchanting sight.
Then back down the Nile to our landing. I catch a few Z's along the way. The day is wrapping up though. It is now 5:00 pm and we have been awake since 3:30 am. Our driver and the safari truck owner inform us that goining out the other park entrance will take too long, so we should fairy the boat back accross and go out the same way. I'm pretty annoyed at this news because he agreed with this exact time line yesterday. He didn't know the park opened at 7:00 am, he didn't know that there is a 30,000 USH entrance fee for vehicles, and now he tells me he didn't realize that going out the other way was so long. I get the distinct feeling that he hasn't done this before. If it wasn't for his prices being almost half of the others, I would be really pissed off. So after wasting 28,000 USH to fairy us across the Nile, we get back on the barge and go back. Luckily the fairy price is always for a round trip so we didn't have to pay again. The drive out gave us another helping of big game and a glorious sunset just as we left the park. What a day!
Sully and I pass out on the drive back to Gulu. Then we say good night, pay the owner and find a cafe still open at 10:00 pm. I devour two dinners and Sully restrains himself to only eat half of his sandwich. Then we go and find a bus headed to Kampala that is supposed to leave at midnight, so I figure it will actually leave around 1:00 or 2:00 am and we will get into the city by 7:00 am. We could have waited for an early morning bus, but that would mean getting another hotel room. So we sit on the bus, organize our stuff and pass out again. Around 5:30 am we are woken by the sound of an engine and the conductor collecting fairs. The bus is just now preparing to leave. Damn. So we check our stuff and then go back to sleep until 6:30 am when the bus finally leaves. Damn.
The ride was uneventful and we arrive safe and sound. We get to the PC office around noon on Monday, repack Sully's stuff, go souvenier shopping and then offer to take Rob out to dinner. We hitch a ride with PC halfway to Rob's house and arrive just in time to find out he got tired of waiting for us and went and got more steak. We were a little sad that we couldn't repay him for all his kindness, but happy to hear the word steak again. By now Sully's appetite had returned and I am always ready for more steak. So we humbly accept and have a few beers while we grill our beautiful strap of cow. After dinner, we watch a real American movie on a real nice tv while sitting in really comfortable chairs. If the movie wasn't so good, I would have been dead asleep. Then Rob offers to take Sully to the airport for his 3:00 am flight. This give Sully and I time to play some more rummy and shoot the breeze until Rob is ready to go at 1:30.
We drop Sully off at the airport, Rob lets me sleep in the spare room again (I hope he realizes that if he keeps treating me so nice, I'm going to keep coming back), and the next morning I'm ready to go back home. It was a whirlwind adventure with a few low points, but more than compensated for by awesome beauty and awesome people. Just think, if you come to visit I'll be even better at this tour guide gig. Hardly anthing will go wrong :)
Oh, finally I recieved another care package from Penny G. I would like to offer my deepest gratitude to Penny and let everyone else know that you can never send too much jerkey. Yuuummmmmmm!
Once in town I see a very nice white toyota pickup with the Jesuit Refugee Service logo on the side. This must Fr. Richard, a very nice Irish priest doing work in Sudan, who must be in town for supplies. So I go and find Fr. Richard and shoot the breeze with him for a bit and explain that I'm headed to Ocer Campion College in Unyama. He knows some other folks headed in the that direction and so they give me a lift to the junction where I begin walking for about 10 steps when another pickup gives me a lift. Not a bad day so far concidering my late start.
Two flat tires and 4 hours later, I finally arrive at the college (oh, college here means high school) and I'm not feeling all that well. Perhaps too much sun. So I meet with Fr. Tony (an American from the mid-west) and got a tour of the awesome school that they are just getting under way. The buildings are built stablized-earth interlocking blocks that make the overall cost, both monitarily and evironmentally, lower. The entire school is off grid and self sustaining using water catchment and solar. The curriculum is still that of the Ugandan Ministry of Education, but there are plans to change that to something reasonable soon. The staff is wonderful and the education approach is much more wholistic. The students maintain the campus, grow thier own food, some are even working to build some of the buildings during the holiday and soon they will be making thier own uniforms. It really is quickly becoming a model school, not just for Uganda but even for the world. Inshort, this is the kind of school I want to teach at. I really don't think Uganda needs any more aid funding. Uganda really just needs donars to check up on how the money is used, as the "big men" at the top seem to be all but drownding in everything they skim off the aid. So, if you want to donate to a worthy cause and want to be assured that all of the money is used properly then check out http://www.ocer.adventuredock.com/. If you like what you see, then send them a few dollars. The Jesuits will use it well to give these kids a real education.
However, the awe from the inspiring leap of faith Fr. Tony and his supports, donors, and staff have taken is short lived. I am really feeling aweful now. Headache, high fever, weak, and my guts are about to explode. So after a good hour or so in the latrine, Fr. Tony kindly offers me a room for the night. That puts another delay in my travel plans, but I feel so terrible I decide to accept.
I spent that night sweating out one of the worst fevers of my life. Luckly, I have a very nice 6L MSR bladder and re-hydration salts (like gatorade only it tastes like medicine) with me and I nurse on that all night (thanks Hal!). By morning I'm better, the fever is broken and my guts have called and armestice with whatever was causing all the ruccous. So I pack my bags and get ready to head out after thanking everyone abundantly when, wouldn't you know, there is a truck full of goats, tubers, poultry, and priests going down to the capitol. Just enough room for me to squeeze in the back seat, and my bag to slide in under the goats. A short 4 hours later (woohoo I'm back on schedule) and I'm in the over-sized sewer most folks call the city of Kampala.
I check in at the PC office now that it is Friday. No one is around so I sit at the computer for a while. Sully is supposed to land at 2:10 am on Saturday, so there really isn't any reason for me to get a hotel room. So as the hours pass and productivity dwindles I decide to check email one more time. Guess who I just recieved and email from: Sully! A quick inquery from him showes me that I am, in fact, an idiot. I read his arrival time correctly, but I read his departure date instead of his arrival date. He isn't landing until Sunday morning at 2:10 am. Well crap. Its now about 1:00 am, I'm sad and tired. So, against regulations, I decide to camp out at the PC office. Shhhhh, don't tell. I don't really sleep much because there are so many mosquitoes and no nets. But at 7:00 am I am feeling better.
I spend the rest of the day just kind of goofing around and chatting with the PCV's as they come into the office for this and that. Devon, one of the people planning on climbing the mountain with us, is also in the office, so we decide to split a hotel room. We arrive at one of the few PC approved hotels in Kampala and find out they are full. So we figure they have a roof, we have camping gear, why not let us sleep on the roof? Well, after an hour or so of arguing, reasoning and insisting, a room magically opens up. It is just big enough for the cot sized bed. The door doesn't even open all the way because it hits the bed, but we split it anyway. Devon, being 6' 2", takes the bed and I sleep on my camping pad on the floor partly under the bed. Besides, I have to get up at 2:00 am to meet Sully at the airport so I might as well be closest to the door so I don't have to step on Devon.
Sully finally arrives. I got a private taxi to take me to the airport and bring us back. Sully seems to be doing well by the time we make it back to the hotel. So we sit and chat till breakfast, eat, then head to the PC office to pick up the rest of my stuff, drop off all the goodies Sully muled over for me, and find out the game plan for leaving for the mountain.
Well, long story short, we had trouble getting the discount we should have gotten for being members of the Wildlife Clubs of Uganda so we decide to spend Monday arguing and then we will climb on Tuesday. That means that for Sunday we go and visit a family friend Sully knows.
Rob is a really awesome guy who is living in his bachelor pad on the beach of Lake Victoria. We go down and visit him, walk through the botanical gardens right nex to his house, try out his monkey gun (kind of like a potatoe gun that shoots pop corn to scare away the monkeys) and then drink beer and cook steak. IT WAS AWESOME!!!! It has been nearly a year since I have had steak, and this was great steak! Then we sleep in Rob's spare room with a fan (did I mention what a generous man Rob is?). I slept like the dead, it was glorious.
The next day we head off to Mbale, with a quick stop in Jinja to bungee jump into the Nile. We read on line that the price was $55, but when we got there it was actually $80, so only Sully jumped as I had already done some bungee jumping when I was in NZ. Then in Mbale, we spend the rest of the day arguing with the park service to no avail. So we continue on to the base of the mountain and crash on a friends floor.
Tuesday found us in the park office at Mt. Elgon arguing yet again. Finally we give up and start climbing. The first day was rough. I'm sucking wind, I'm over packed, and my rucksack is all but an oversized feedsack strapped to my back. But we make it with some time to spare. It is cold for me up on the mountain, but Sully seems to be in good form now. Especially compared to his earlier overheating at the base of the mountain. We cook some good old American camping food (man was it good) and call it a night. Since we didn't get the discount, we are trying to do a 4 day hike in 3 days, so tomorrow morning comes early.
Wednesday, 5:00 am. I'm cold, sore, and tired. Devon and Brian, the other two PCV's, don't seemed to be phased at all by yesterday's workout and are already up. Sully and I get dressed, pack up and eat the oats Devon and Brian had already cooked for us. Man do I feel like a slacker. But once we get moving I'm doing much better. The scenery has changed a lot. At the base were cultivated fields, then we moved up into bamboo groves, then thick trees with moss all over them and finally scrubby trees and bushes. Yesterday was also about 2000 meters of elevation gain, and today we only have to do 800 meters to reach the summit. What will make today tough is that we need to summit then go back down a different trail to the next camp. Supposidly a hike of 29 km, most of it going up and down.
We broke camp at around 6:30 ish, and summited at 9:30. I'm impressed, especially since they told us it should be 4 hours if you are moving without your packs. We still have our packs because we aren't going back to the same camp. The guide is a little annoyed, he didn't plan on working this hard. Apparently, most of the time the tour groups only do 4-6 hrs of hiking a day (with porters, feel a little better about myself) and we are planning on hiking from sun up to sun down. I guess I wouldn't be too happy either if I was the guide. Nevertheless, our moral improves greatly once we hit the top. I'm the slowest of the three and ever so greatful to know that the next 10 km will be down hill. The view is awesome. The caldera at the top of Mt. Elgon is supposed to be the 4th largest in the world. I don't know if this is true or not, but it sure is pretty. Scrubby trees and bushes break up the bowl of dry grass that fills the landscape. The sun is still pretty low, the wind is down and the clouds are just beginning to roll in. I enjoy the scene for a bit, toast with some Turkey 101 with the others and then I leave them to marvel and take pictures so that I can get a head start. I hate being the wimp of the group.
The whole day we haul butt to make sure we don't run out of day light. We don't even stop for lunch. The guide made it sound like we would make it to camp just before dark. But I think he was just trying to scare us out of our 3 day plan, because by 3:00 pm we were at the next camp. Man are we good! I was worried that at my pace we wouldn't make it, but we had plenty of time to spare. Now I wish we would have slowed down to enjoy our hike more. Oh well. A quick dip on the icey cold mountain stream, dry clothes and food later and I'm ready for bed at 5:00 pm. Everyone seems tired, but I am just plain exhausted. However, Devon seems pretty intent on gathering some firewood so we can have a camp fire and sing songs I guess, big hippie. So I help him retrieve some firewood. By that, I mean I nearly kill myself. I spend 20 minutes hacking away at a burned tree stump with a very well used machete, then Devon gives it a yank. No dice, so he goes to get smaller stuff and I keep hacking for another minute or two. Then I decide that maybe if I push on it in a different direction I might get it to give. I adjust my feet, lean into it, and give a sound push. That sound push snapped the log loose and send me somersualting down the riverbank. I did a full front flip followed by 20' of tummbling and am luckily caught by a thick shrub full of thorns. The drop into the water was another 8' away or so.
Needless to say, after that my adrenaline was flowing and my desire to find more firewood was all but non-existant. The most frustrating part was that I never did find that piece of log that almost got me killed. So we sat and played some rummy until it started getting dark, then we lit the camp fire. It was nice, the evening was calm and the moon was really bright. Not a bad way to end a long day.
Thursday morning found us sleeping in until 6:00. The guide says that it is 34 km to the end of the trail, but after yesterday, we are confident that we can make it with no troubles. Sure enough, by 10:30 am, we are already halfway. So we stop, have a leasurely snack. Explore the cave, fill our water and fertilize some bushes. We really enjoyed this hike down. The pace was much more relaxed, the incline on this side of the mountian was much more relaxed, and our overall mood was much more relaxed. Yes, it was a fairly relaxed hike. The trees also became bigger and bigger with more song birds and other critters. The jungle and folliage became much thicker and more dense and we just enjoyed all that we had to see. We even came to one section where the jungle just turned into a heavey patch of vines full of these little white flowers. It was like it had snowed or something. Then within 50 paces or so, they all disapeared. Really magical.
We were all pretty exhausted with very tired feet, but the sense of accomplishement with cannopy of trees being shot through by warm sunshine elevated our mood to make the day much more enjoyable than the two previous days.
We exited the park, thanked our begrudging guide and then headed down the road to Sipi Falls. A short hike off the road gave us a marvolous panorama of the three cascading water falls, the gorge, and part of the mountain in the background. Three entreprenuing 10 year-olds showed us where to go and even provided a stand for the camera. Then after these kids showed us around, some drunks and supposed proprietors tried to charge us for coming down to view the falls. I suppose they get a lot of money from tourists that way, but we told them that the kids did the work so the kids get the fee. We payed the kids the equivalent of $0.25 each and headed into town. We crashed with the same friend who hosted us the night we arrived at the mountain and enjoyed a very nice local dinner prepared by one of the teachers at our friend's school. What a wonderful day.
We had every intention of getting up early on Friday and hurring to my home in hopefully one day. But when 6:00 am rolled around, we just rolled over. So by 8:00, we had breakfast and finally got on a taxi into Mbale town. Devon went his way while Sully and I went north to Soroti and then Lira. While on the bus ride, I made arrangements to do a boat Safari at Murchinson Falls National Park since reaching my house today was out of the question. So we continue to Gulu. On the way, however, tragidy strikes. We must have gotten some bad rollexes (omlet burrito) on the bus because Sully isn't feeling so hot. I guess I'm used to it because I feel fine. Actually, he feels down right aweful. As soon as the taxi reaches Gulu, he gets out and unleashes a torrent of vomit all over the parking lot. So I let him catch his breath long enough for us to get to a hotel. The first one is booked, the second one is booked, the third one is booked, and the fourth one is too far to walk especially with Sully being sick and it already being well past dark. So, back to hotel number three and we beg for a room. When the get a look at Sully they magically have a room availible (thank God). Some hagling, then we are in like flin. Sully spends that night in the bathroom for the most part, and the next day (Saturday) just resting in bed. Meanwhile I rearrange our boat ride and safari, but we have to leave at 4:00 am on Sunday and this means no time to reach my house. So I also rest up. Saturday was fairly uneventful. Though I did take advantage of Sully's poor health and whoop his ass in rummy a few times.
We get in our private safari truck at 4:30 am on Sunday. We pass out in the back while the driver and owner do the navigating to the park. At 6:00 am we are at the gate and a very disgruntled attendant informs us that the park doesn't open until 7:00, but she lets us in anyway. We drive into the park just as the sun is rising. Some beautiful views of a very red sun coming up over acacia trees and rolling lowlands. About 6 km into the park and we are already surrounded by bush-bucks, impalas, buffalo, giraffes, and the Ugandan kop. It is awesome. The roof of the safary truck opens so we can stand and get a full 360 degree view of everything. Then we come upon another car around 7:00 and follow them for a while hoping they are going to find the lions. They have a park warden with them, so thier odds are better than ours. We stop to take a picture with some elephants. If I was stupid, I could have thrown a stone and hit them. We were close, but they are ginormous and I'm not that stupid. We continue following around the other vehicles and are joined by more until we have quite a caravan going on. Still no lions though. Sad, but we are so close to all the animals that we see that it is still a spectacular experience.
Then at noon we stop at the boat launch, fairy the car across and get lunch. Sully still isn't keen on food, so I get two beers. It looks tempting but he wisely declines. But that means I have two beers, oh what to do? I take care of the beers, but we are getting low on monies and the resuraunt is expensive. So it looks like two beers for a liquid lunch. I'm out of practice, tired, and on an empty stomach. By the time we reach the boat, I'm a bit tipsy. Not that it matters though. All I have to do is sit and watch the wildlife pass by. Song birds, fishing birds, hippos, crocodiles, bush elephants, and water bucks are copious as we slowly make our way up the Nile to the falls. The falls themselves are worth the trip. Not nearly as big and awesome as Sipi Falls, but covered so thickly in vegitations and adorned with so many critters all around, they made for an enchanting sight.
Then back down the Nile to our landing. I catch a few Z's along the way. The day is wrapping up though. It is now 5:00 pm and we have been awake since 3:30 am. Our driver and the safari truck owner inform us that goining out the other park entrance will take too long, so we should fairy the boat back accross and go out the same way. I'm pretty annoyed at this news because he agreed with this exact time line yesterday. He didn't know the park opened at 7:00 am, he didn't know that there is a 30,000 USH entrance fee for vehicles, and now he tells me he didn't realize that going out the other way was so long. I get the distinct feeling that he hasn't done this before. If it wasn't for his prices being almost half of the others, I would be really pissed off. So after wasting 28,000 USH to fairy us across the Nile, we get back on the barge and go back. Luckily the fairy price is always for a round trip so we didn't have to pay again. The drive out gave us another helping of big game and a glorious sunset just as we left the park. What a day!
Sully and I pass out on the drive back to Gulu. Then we say good night, pay the owner and find a cafe still open at 10:00 pm. I devour two dinners and Sully restrains himself to only eat half of his sandwich. Then we go and find a bus headed to Kampala that is supposed to leave at midnight, so I figure it will actually leave around 1:00 or 2:00 am and we will get into the city by 7:00 am. We could have waited for an early morning bus, but that would mean getting another hotel room. So we sit on the bus, organize our stuff and pass out again. Around 5:30 am we are woken by the sound of an engine and the conductor collecting fairs. The bus is just now preparing to leave. Damn. So we check our stuff and then go back to sleep until 6:30 am when the bus finally leaves. Damn.
The ride was uneventful and we arrive safe and sound. We get to the PC office around noon on Monday, repack Sully's stuff, go souvenier shopping and then offer to take Rob out to dinner. We hitch a ride with PC halfway to Rob's house and arrive just in time to find out he got tired of waiting for us and went and got more steak. We were a little sad that we couldn't repay him for all his kindness, but happy to hear the word steak again. By now Sully's appetite had returned and I am always ready for more steak. So we humbly accept and have a few beers while we grill our beautiful strap of cow. After dinner, we watch a real American movie on a real nice tv while sitting in really comfortable chairs. If the movie wasn't so good, I would have been dead asleep. Then Rob offers to take Sully to the airport for his 3:00 am flight. This give Sully and I time to play some more rummy and shoot the breeze until Rob is ready to go at 1:30.
We drop Sully off at the airport, Rob lets me sleep in the spare room again (I hope he realizes that if he keeps treating me so nice, I'm going to keep coming back), and the next morning I'm ready to go back home. It was a whirlwind adventure with a few low points, but more than compensated for by awesome beauty and awesome people. Just think, if you come to visit I'll be even better at this tour guide gig. Hardly anthing will go wrong :)
Oh, finally I recieved another care package from Penny G. I would like to offer my deepest gratitude to Penny and let everyone else know that you can never send too much jerkey. Yuuummmmmmm!
Saturday, January 15, 2011
Ups and Downs
So the previous blog post was written sometime in October and mailed to the US. Sully was kind enough to type it up for me. Thanks Sully.
A lot has happened since then. November was spent grading homework and quizzes every day. I would get to the school around 7:30, teach, then spend the rest of the day in the library grading till about 4:00. Long days, but it paid off. I saw a significant improvement overall, and outstanding improvements for the students who started coming to class everyday. The world over, math and science are usually dominated by males. In Africa, as you can imagine, it is even more of a stereotype that girls can’t do math and science. Well ladies and gentlemen, I have just calculated the averages for all of my classes and in each of them the girls averaged at least 10% higher than the boys. “Why!?!” my students ask. Simply because the girls, on average, come to class more often and come get help outside of class more often than he boys. Putting those results up on the board really made me smile.
However, my grin was short-lived. A few days after the end of the term, I was in the middle of our first rugby meeting. The ball was pumped up, we were tossing it around, there were 12-15 guys there, I was explaining the basics when all of the sudden my neighbor comes over and says there is an urgent phone call for me. He hands me his phone and my Peace Corps supervisor is on the other end. She says “You must leave.” I’m a little confused, so I reply “Now?”
“Yes, right now. Bring your passport and cloths for two weeks. Meet the others in town as quickly as you can.”
I’m mildly panicked and really confused. I know that the Peace Corps is worried about the referendum in Sudan, but that isn’t for another month and I haven’t heard of any trouble on that side of the boarder. The presidential election in Uganda is also a big concern, but that isn’t until February so I still have no idea why I need to leave my site.
In spite of my confusion I hang up, cut the meeting short saying that I have to go and meet someone in Gulu and that I will be back in a couple of weeks, then hurry home to pack my things. Ten minutes of packing later and I am in a sweat as I hurry to the road where I start walking to town. About a mile or so later, a car picks me up and takes me to Kitgum town. From there I meet three of my fellow volunteers and we get in a taxi to take us to Gulu where a Peace Corps vehicle is waiting for us. I’m really worried that we are getting evacuated from the country and that my community isn’t going to have any idea what happened to me. When we finally reach Gulu four hours later, the whole story is finally explained to me.
There have been several cases of a strange illness in the area. Apparently people are dying from something that is causing severe fever, head ache, vomiting blood, diarrhea, bleeding from the eyes and nose, and body aches. This of course catches Peace Corps’ attention and naturally they want to get us out of there as fast as possible. Fair enough, but that still really sucks for me. I had big plans for this holiday break now that the term was over. Besides the rugby meeting I was going to learn some cultural dances, take some of my girl students to the Girls Leading Our World (GLOW) camp, learn how to hunt the elusive-but-tasty bush rat, and fix my solar death ray. But now I got nothing. I’m an exile from my own home. On top of that, PC wanted me to stay in the capitol. I hate that dirty, disgusting, expensive city.
Well, after a few days of being bummed out like never before, I found something to do. The US embassy sponsors a World AIDS Day event in several of the larger towns to help promote AIDS/HIV awareness. So I got in contact with the leading lady for this traveling road show and made myself a roadie. It gave me something to do and it had some awesome perks. The embassy doesn’t operate like the PC. They have their own cars (with AC!), stay in nice hotels (with AC!), and eat good food (with AC!). So for about three weeks I got a free tour around all of Uganda in exchange for handing out T-shirts.
I know that sounds like an easy job, but please, let me explain. Handing out T-shirts in the US would be fairly relaxed. Maybe you have a table, a stack of shirts, and one or two people giving them to people as they pass by. If they had something particularly interesting or clever on them, then a lot of people might want them so a line might form. In Africa, walking into an event with a sack full of T-shirts would be like walking into an orphanage with a box full of puppies, walking into a refugee camp with a tray of doughnuts, or walking into a prison with a keg of beer. They have absolutely no shame and no integrity. Opening the back of the SUV with the shirts is like the poor guy who has to open Wal-Mart on Black Friday. It is simply awful. The people will lie to your face. They will take one shirt, stash it under what they are wearing, and then demand another one. All of this taking place right in front of your eyes! Even though you just stood there and watched them, they will insist that you did not give them a shirt. And when you call them out on it, they get mad at you and say that you are a bad person. It was by far the most depressing and disgusting thing I have ever experienced in Africa. So I think I earned my AC, comfortable hotel, and nice food.
However, after all the World AIDS Day stuff was done, I still wasn’t allowed back home. So I visited a few other PCVs here and there. Then for Christmas a few guys were headed down to the Kabale district in the southwest, near Rwanda, to climb some volcanoes. I tagged a long and I am really happy that I did. It was absolutely gorgeous! When I get the pictures, I will post them. It is exactly the kind of scene you think of when you think jungle. Thick dense forest, bamboo groves, birds, moss, rain everyday, forest buffalo, lizards, snakes and all kinds of stuff. The view part way up he mountain was like the opening scene in Jurassic Park where he helicopter is coming into land. We climbed Muhuvura (which means “The Guide”) on Christmas Eve and then climbed Sabinyo (which means “Old Man’s Teeth”) on Christmas Day. On Muhuvura we were able to stand in Uganda and Rwanda at the same time, and on Sabinyo we were able to stand in Uganda, Rwanda and the DRC at he same time, take that border patrol!
Muhuvura was a rough 23 Km round trip and elevation gain of about 6,000 ft. I was really slow and in an obscene amount of pain all the way up. A month of eating greasy food and sitting around depressed about my situation didn’t do much for my fitness. I still made it to the top though. It may be the tropics, but at the top of a 13,000 ft peak it is pretty dang cold. Still, when I came up finally, huffing and puffing, I was sweating like a grub worm in a chicken coup. So naturally I stripped down to my birthday suit and dove into the crater lake (lake is misleading, it was a large puddle) at the top of the mountain. No warning or questions. I just got naked and jumped in. Our Ugandan guides just laughed and after I got out the other three guys followed suit one by one. I thought it was refreshing, but everyone else said it was the coldest water they ever swam in. To be fair, they were at the top a while before me, so they were already cold when they went for a dip. That was Christmas Eve.
Christmas Day we climb Sabinyo which is a shorter round trip and slightly less elevation gain. On the other hand, we were sore, tired and hungry (the only lodge there is over priced and under portioned). But we climbed never the less. If Muhuvura was the beast, Sabinyo was the beauty. Much more vegetation, more song birds, more grandeur in general. We followed up a three peak ridge to reach the top. On each side of the ridge was a gorge that stretched out into the land ending in a beautiful river that flowed into the rolling foothills. Each of the foothills looked like a quilt because the locals terrace and section them off for farming, making for stunning view after stunning view. On one of the sub-peaks we stopped to check out a couple of chameleons as they crawled on us changing colors. The day progressed and we were greeted with some warm moist wind blowing in from east. As it rose, though, it cooled condensed and turned into wispy fast moving clouds that would envelope us one second and then vanish the next. It made the experience all the more mesmerizing, but made taking pictures tough. Finally, as we approach the top, we have to use some locally made wooden ladders staked into the mountain side because it is so steep. They are made of, what appeared to be, solid cedar branches. They weren’t bad, I only pulled out a few rungs on the way up, and one more on the way back down. Fewer than I expected. At the top we had lunch, recuperated, and braved the cold wind and fog for as long as we could so we could stand in awe at the majesty around us. Sun light was piercing through the clouds like arrows lighting up hill and valley in a marvelous symphony of illumination. It was like having box seats to God’s own concert of mountain, valley, clouds, wind and sun.
Finally though, the wind, clouds, and fatigue overcame us and we began our descent. Much faster going down, a little too fast at times. Slipping here and there wasn’t bad because the ground and vegetation was pretty soft. But if you slipped a little too far, you were likely to pitch right over the side of the ridge. That drop was far enough that it didn’t matter how soft the ground was, you weren’t going to walk it off. So we took it slow and steady and made it down to the bottom of the mountain into the thick bamboo grove. This alone was an accomplishment and a spectacular way to end our day, but then the clouds saw fit to bless us with some hail. Little pea gravel hail that kind of stung your hand, but bearable at first. But then it really opened up on us and came down in such a torrent that we were walking in a river of pebbled ice. Despite the discomfort we counted it as a bonus. We got to have a white Christmas.
After our stay on the mountain we moved out to a beautiful lake for New Years where we meet up with about 60 other PCVs and enjoyed three days of lounging around in the sun, swimming, drinking, playing cards and being Americans. On top of this, I finally got word that I could return to site. Wooooohoooo!! Apparently the Center for Disease Control had officially declared the mysterious disease “yellow fever.” I don’t know if I buy that, but I don’t care. I am vaccinated for yellow fever and PC said I could go home. So on January 1st, I made the long three day journey from the very wet and cold southwest to the very hot and dry north.
When I arrived home, everyone was happy to see me and commented on how fat I was looking (fat equates to health here so it is a compliment). Then I got right to work. So much to catch up on. Clean my house, do laundry, roast g-nuts, fix bike, patch tires, make a road, organize rugby team, meet with the chief, check in with the head teacher, visit friends, fetch water, and fix the fence. So much to do and so little time to do it. I was home for about a week, and then I had to leave again, only this time with a smile on my face.
John Sullivan is making his way out to visit me as I type this. We are headed out to Mt. Elgon, the highest peak in Uganda. Then we’ll play the rest of the trip by ear, but our options seem to be: Riverboat Safari in Murchison falls (hippos, crocs, leopards, birds and such), white water rafting on the Nile (they are putting in a new dam soon so that may not last long), or go to my place and see if we can shoot some critters with bamboo bows and arrows (the local favorite is the bush rat, but guinea fowl and bushbucks are a possibility too). He will be here until the 25th of January, so we don’t have that much time.
I guess that brings me up to date for now. We’ll see how Sully’s visit goes and then maybe I’ll have some more to share with you all. Maybe even some pictures too.
A lot has happened since then. November was spent grading homework and quizzes every day. I would get to the school around 7:30, teach, then spend the rest of the day in the library grading till about 4:00. Long days, but it paid off. I saw a significant improvement overall, and outstanding improvements for the students who started coming to class everyday. The world over, math and science are usually dominated by males. In Africa, as you can imagine, it is even more of a stereotype that girls can’t do math and science. Well ladies and gentlemen, I have just calculated the averages for all of my classes and in each of them the girls averaged at least 10% higher than the boys. “Why!?!” my students ask. Simply because the girls, on average, come to class more often and come get help outside of class more often than he boys. Putting those results up on the board really made me smile.
However, my grin was short-lived. A few days after the end of the term, I was in the middle of our first rugby meeting. The ball was pumped up, we were tossing it around, there were 12-15 guys there, I was explaining the basics when all of the sudden my neighbor comes over and says there is an urgent phone call for me. He hands me his phone and my Peace Corps supervisor is on the other end. She says “You must leave.” I’m a little confused, so I reply “Now?”
“Yes, right now. Bring your passport and cloths for two weeks. Meet the others in town as quickly as you can.”
I’m mildly panicked and really confused. I know that the Peace Corps is worried about the referendum in Sudan, but that isn’t for another month and I haven’t heard of any trouble on that side of the boarder. The presidential election in Uganda is also a big concern, but that isn’t until February so I still have no idea why I need to leave my site.
In spite of my confusion I hang up, cut the meeting short saying that I have to go and meet someone in Gulu and that I will be back in a couple of weeks, then hurry home to pack my things. Ten minutes of packing later and I am in a sweat as I hurry to the road where I start walking to town. About a mile or so later, a car picks me up and takes me to Kitgum town. From there I meet three of my fellow volunteers and we get in a taxi to take us to Gulu where a Peace Corps vehicle is waiting for us. I’m really worried that we are getting evacuated from the country and that my community isn’t going to have any idea what happened to me. When we finally reach Gulu four hours later, the whole story is finally explained to me.
There have been several cases of a strange illness in the area. Apparently people are dying from something that is causing severe fever, head ache, vomiting blood, diarrhea, bleeding from the eyes and nose, and body aches. This of course catches Peace Corps’ attention and naturally they want to get us out of there as fast as possible. Fair enough, but that still really sucks for me. I had big plans for this holiday break now that the term was over. Besides the rugby meeting I was going to learn some cultural dances, take some of my girl students to the Girls Leading Our World (GLOW) camp, learn how to hunt the elusive-but-tasty bush rat, and fix my solar death ray. But now I got nothing. I’m an exile from my own home. On top of that, PC wanted me to stay in the capitol. I hate that dirty, disgusting, expensive city.
Well, after a few days of being bummed out like never before, I found something to do. The US embassy sponsors a World AIDS Day event in several of the larger towns to help promote AIDS/HIV awareness. So I got in contact with the leading lady for this traveling road show and made myself a roadie. It gave me something to do and it had some awesome perks. The embassy doesn’t operate like the PC. They have their own cars (with AC!), stay in nice hotels (with AC!), and eat good food (with AC!). So for about three weeks I got a free tour around all of Uganda in exchange for handing out T-shirts.
I know that sounds like an easy job, but please, let me explain. Handing out T-shirts in the US would be fairly relaxed. Maybe you have a table, a stack of shirts, and one or two people giving them to people as they pass by. If they had something particularly interesting or clever on them, then a lot of people might want them so a line might form. In Africa, walking into an event with a sack full of T-shirts would be like walking into an orphanage with a box full of puppies, walking into a refugee camp with a tray of doughnuts, or walking into a prison with a keg of beer. They have absolutely no shame and no integrity. Opening the back of the SUV with the shirts is like the poor guy who has to open Wal-Mart on Black Friday. It is simply awful. The people will lie to your face. They will take one shirt, stash it under what they are wearing, and then demand another one. All of this taking place right in front of your eyes! Even though you just stood there and watched them, they will insist that you did not give them a shirt. And when you call them out on it, they get mad at you and say that you are a bad person. It was by far the most depressing and disgusting thing I have ever experienced in Africa. So I think I earned my AC, comfortable hotel, and nice food.
However, after all the World AIDS Day stuff was done, I still wasn’t allowed back home. So I visited a few other PCVs here and there. Then for Christmas a few guys were headed down to the Kabale district in the southwest, near Rwanda, to climb some volcanoes. I tagged a long and I am really happy that I did. It was absolutely gorgeous! When I get the pictures, I will post them. It is exactly the kind of scene you think of when you think jungle. Thick dense forest, bamboo groves, birds, moss, rain everyday, forest buffalo, lizards, snakes and all kinds of stuff. The view part way up he mountain was like the opening scene in Jurassic Park where he helicopter is coming into land. We climbed Muhuvura (which means “The Guide”) on Christmas Eve and then climbed Sabinyo (which means “Old Man’s Teeth”) on Christmas Day. On Muhuvura we were able to stand in Uganda and Rwanda at the same time, and on Sabinyo we were able to stand in Uganda, Rwanda and the DRC at he same time, take that border patrol!
Muhuvura was a rough 23 Km round trip and elevation gain of about 6,000 ft. I was really slow and in an obscene amount of pain all the way up. A month of eating greasy food and sitting around depressed about my situation didn’t do much for my fitness. I still made it to the top though. It may be the tropics, but at the top of a 13,000 ft peak it is pretty dang cold. Still, when I came up finally, huffing and puffing, I was sweating like a grub worm in a chicken coup. So naturally I stripped down to my birthday suit and dove into the crater lake (lake is misleading, it was a large puddle) at the top of the mountain. No warning or questions. I just got naked and jumped in. Our Ugandan guides just laughed and after I got out the other three guys followed suit one by one. I thought it was refreshing, but everyone else said it was the coldest water they ever swam in. To be fair, they were at the top a while before me, so they were already cold when they went for a dip. That was Christmas Eve.
Christmas Day we climb Sabinyo which is a shorter round trip and slightly less elevation gain. On the other hand, we were sore, tired and hungry (the only lodge there is over priced and under portioned). But we climbed never the less. If Muhuvura was the beast, Sabinyo was the beauty. Much more vegetation, more song birds, more grandeur in general. We followed up a three peak ridge to reach the top. On each side of the ridge was a gorge that stretched out into the land ending in a beautiful river that flowed into the rolling foothills. Each of the foothills looked like a quilt because the locals terrace and section them off for farming, making for stunning view after stunning view. On one of the sub-peaks we stopped to check out a couple of chameleons as they crawled on us changing colors. The day progressed and we were greeted with some warm moist wind blowing in from east. As it rose, though, it cooled condensed and turned into wispy fast moving clouds that would envelope us one second and then vanish the next. It made the experience all the more mesmerizing, but made taking pictures tough. Finally, as we approach the top, we have to use some locally made wooden ladders staked into the mountain side because it is so steep. They are made of, what appeared to be, solid cedar branches. They weren’t bad, I only pulled out a few rungs on the way up, and one more on the way back down. Fewer than I expected. At the top we had lunch, recuperated, and braved the cold wind and fog for as long as we could so we could stand in awe at the majesty around us. Sun light was piercing through the clouds like arrows lighting up hill and valley in a marvelous symphony of illumination. It was like having box seats to God’s own concert of mountain, valley, clouds, wind and sun.
Finally though, the wind, clouds, and fatigue overcame us and we began our descent. Much faster going down, a little too fast at times. Slipping here and there wasn’t bad because the ground and vegetation was pretty soft. But if you slipped a little too far, you were likely to pitch right over the side of the ridge. That drop was far enough that it didn’t matter how soft the ground was, you weren’t going to walk it off. So we took it slow and steady and made it down to the bottom of the mountain into the thick bamboo grove. This alone was an accomplishment and a spectacular way to end our day, but then the clouds saw fit to bless us with some hail. Little pea gravel hail that kind of stung your hand, but bearable at first. But then it really opened up on us and came down in such a torrent that we were walking in a river of pebbled ice. Despite the discomfort we counted it as a bonus. We got to have a white Christmas.
After our stay on the mountain we moved out to a beautiful lake for New Years where we meet up with about 60 other PCVs and enjoyed three days of lounging around in the sun, swimming, drinking, playing cards and being Americans. On top of this, I finally got word that I could return to site. Wooooohoooo!! Apparently the Center for Disease Control had officially declared the mysterious disease “yellow fever.” I don’t know if I buy that, but I don’t care. I am vaccinated for yellow fever and PC said I could go home. So on January 1st, I made the long three day journey from the very wet and cold southwest to the very hot and dry north.
When I arrived home, everyone was happy to see me and commented on how fat I was looking (fat equates to health here so it is a compliment). Then I got right to work. So much to catch up on. Clean my house, do laundry, roast g-nuts, fix bike, patch tires, make a road, organize rugby team, meet with the chief, check in with the head teacher, visit friends, fetch water, and fix the fence. So much to do and so little time to do it. I was home for about a week, and then I had to leave again, only this time with a smile on my face.
John Sullivan is making his way out to visit me as I type this. We are headed out to Mt. Elgon, the highest peak in Uganda. Then we’ll play the rest of the trip by ear, but our options seem to be: Riverboat Safari in Murchison falls (hippos, crocs, leopards, birds and such), white water rafting on the Nile (they are putting in a new dam soon so that may not last long), or go to my place and see if we can shoot some critters with bamboo bows and arrows (the local favorite is the bush rat, but guinea fowl and bushbucks are a possibility too). He will be here until the 25th of January, so we don’t have that much time.
I guess that brings me up to date for now. We’ll see how Sully’s visit goes and then maybe I’ll have some more to share with you all. Maybe even some pictures too.
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