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Published: September 16th 2023
I booked a walking tour through Tripadvisor yesterday, with a female guide, Faridausi and Glyn booked an Uber to meet her in town. She was almost 20 minutes late, but it seems in Uganda, that’s standard and not worth an apology.
The first stop was a statue of Edward Mutesa, the first president of Uganda, (after independence from the UK in 1962). He was also the King and pushed out of power by Milton Obote and sent into exile, aided by Idi Amin. And then Obote was ousted by Idi Amin, who made himself popular by returning the body of Mutesa, so he could be buried in Uganda.
Nearby stood a statue celebrating Uganda’s independence, a public place with a few homeless scattered around. A very old sign displayed photographs from 1962. A big hole had been smashed out of it, where Idi Amin’s photo had been. Why hasn’t this sign been replaced?
We saw a WW1 and WW2 monument near the courthouse, where police cars were parked up. I say police caRS, but they were like blue tanks in appearance. The green areas contained massive Beganda trees from which traditional Ugandan bark cloth is made, not so
popular now due to cotton. Maribou storks hung around like pigeons do in British parks, they’re so huge, it seemed quite surreal.
Faridausi walked us down to the craft market, which was a tourist trap of course, and every stall holder called out to us, as there were very few other customers. Faridausi clearly knew quite a few of them and she kept telling us we didn’t have to buy, but we’d already bought our gifts and souvenirs, so weren’t all that interested.
Currently we were uptown, and it was quite sedate here. However, when we got to downtown it was completely different. First off the noise, so much traffic; engines, beeping and the occasional ignored traffic police blowing whistles and being ignored. Everywhere were stalls, shops and street hawkers, all shouting their prices or making other noises, such as one guy rubbing two corrugated plastic bottles together. I think I saw less than 5 other white people, so the vendors were particularly shouting at us. The roads were a nightmare to cross, but often easier to walk along as the pavements were extremely uneven, often rubble and full of vendors, their wares and motorbikes.
It had rained in the morning, but as the day warmed up, everywhere smelt of a damp hotness.
Faridausi took us to a Hindu temple which was welcoming but not that interesting. We also visited a huge indoor fabric market, full of brightly coloured cloth, ready made garments and ladies working on sewing machines. You can get an outfit made to order within a day. All the mannekins were white, Faridausi says this is because they are cheaper.
Our first market, Nakawa, was the second biggest in Kampala. The stalls are full of fruits, veg, clothing, electricals and other standard market stuff. The paths through the stalls did not form any type of grid or pattern, and weaved around like a maze. There was barely any room to go single file, so passing others was a nightmare, and it was a constant stream of oncoming people.
Other stalls contained row upon row of smelly smoked fish. But what was worse was the chicken corpses, guts and entrails laid out. Worse to come were the live chickens, crushed in small cages, stacked upon each other desperately clucking for help and some compassion. It seemed to go on and
on forever and I asked Faridausi if we could avoid more of this, I’d got the picture. But she totally couldn’t grasp what I meant and dragged us through more of this stinking hot hell.
And then there was another market, Owino, bigger with around 2000 stalls, covered with tarp, umbrellas, and plastic. This is the biggest and cheapest in Kampala and Faridausi said getting in was easy, but getting out was very difficult. By god did she make us see most of it and it really was awful. Men kept grabbing at her and myself to get our attention, it was so tight, it was unavoidable all those hands pulling at my arms and waist. Glyn was behind me and I found out later, this didn’t happen to him. Neverending tight paths through endless stalls and people shouting. Constant pushing to get through, if you’ve ever been to a packed gig and tried to push through to the front, that is what it felt like. Stalls were full of second hand clothing, fruit, veg, spices, waiting to get knocked over.
More chicken torture followed, a memory that burned into my mind for eternity was a
pile of chickens, slung upon each other, but still alive. Too exhausted to escape, but terrified eyes gazing out, waiting to die. Faridausi said it was ok, some will soon be cut or go to witch doctors. She then asked if I wanted to try any food.
I’ve never been so happy to get out of a place.
We went to see the taxi park which is a highlight just to see the ‘organised chaos’. 100Os of private minivans parked up, all pointed in different directions. They all had a specific destination, anywhere within Uganda or neighbouring countries. You simply got in and waited for it to fill up. Once there was a van load, the taxi would depart. If it was parked in the middle of many more taxis, a lot of shouting would ensue until everyone had moved just enough for the taxi to leave without anyone getting too crushed.
Kamapalans seem to be proud of this style of taxi rank and there are more like it. Personally, I much prefer having numbered parking bays and a destinations board. Things were so cramped that food vendors were set up in the roofs of
nearby buildings, as there were no space on the ground.
Eventually we left downtown to go to Gadafi Mosque, also known as Uganda National Mosque, but most call it the former. It is the largest mosque in East Africa and was completed in 2006, it seats up to 15,000 worshippers and can hold another 1,100 in the gallery, while the terrace will cater for another 3,500.
It was named after Colonel Gadafi (Libyan dictator, terrorist and human rights violator) as he had funded a lot of it. But before that, it was begun by former Ugandan Military Dictator, Idi Amin, who is considered one of the most brutal despots in modern world history. Places of worship generally like to market themselves as places of love and tolerance, so I would have wrongly presumed they would want to distance themselves from these people, but Faridausi seemed unbothered by the connections, it was just fact. Maybe Gadafi has a different perception in Uganda; I remember reading in Portugal that Sir Walter Raleigh was a thieving pirate, but in the UK I grew up learning that he was a great explorer. Each country writes its own history.
The mosque was
huge, with nice carpets and a minaret from the top of which, you could get the best view of Kampala. Kampala has seven traditional hills, and this was placed in the one that was the site of the British fort, when Uganda was colonised., bits of the fort still exist, but they look very dull. All main roads in Kampala led to it. There was a massive prayer area for men, and a balcony at the back for women, because as Faridausi happily explained, “men’s prayers are more important”. Also, women come to the mosque less because, when they have their periods, they are “unclean”. Seriously, in 2023, that is still the attitude? It’s not like women leave a trail of blood wherever they go. What’s worse is that Faridausi, an educated women in her early 20s, absolutely sees no problem with this.
I asked if she ever thought the gender segregation would end and this was regarded as a weird question. So I put it to her, would she think it wrong if people were segregated because of their skin colour or if they were rich/poor. She agreed that this would be wrong and said no more. I
left it at that. She maybe is happy being submissive and didn’t seem bothered about being grabbed in the market. Or maybe she was being careful because I’m a tourist and we were in the mosque, although it didn’t feel that way.
Thankfully this was the end of the tour. I know it’s important to learn all sides of other cultures, but I’ve seen some rather unpleasant bits today and I’d had enough. I am meant to be on holiday after all. So we decided to go to the palace, avoiding Idi Amin’s torture chambers. “Don’t worry” Faridausi said with a smile “they don’t torture people anymore”.
It would take an hour to walk there, so we began, through the crowded streets, seeing who could spot the local carrying the most things on their head. Nowhere did it get less noisy or hot. Eventually huge roadworks made it hard to get to where we needed to be. We ended end up walking through a construction area and no one was bothered, although one guy waved to warn us that there was a digger coming up behind.
I convinced Glyn we should use the Boda boda motorcycle taxis.
So many had stopped, asking if we wanted to hire them and we should try everything at least once… no matter how dangerous. One guy stopped and then more and more of his mates appeared as they seemed to be genuinely confused by us asking for the palace. They didn’t recognise it on the map or the pictures we showed them. This is one of the biggest tourist attractions in Kampala, we were baffled that they didn’t know it. I decided we were better off continuing to walk, but they insisted and it was cheap.
So Glyn and I each got on the back of separate motorbikes (I have seen up to four on one bike, so I wasn’t sure) and off we went. No helmets obviously, although my rider had one that looked like it wouldn’t save him if he fell off onto a mattress. We sped through the roads and pavements like a gang of children on pushbikes; over pavements and potholes, cutting through petrol stations and pedestrian areas. We stopped a few times, whilst our riders had discussions with each other and people in the street about where they thought we were going.
We eventually
ended up at some private residence that was not the palace. I realised we could be doing this all day, so we got off, paid them the 5,000 Ugandan shillings and started to walk. The area we’d arrived at had some smart gated houses on the left and slum buildings on the right. The road was an orange dirt track, like those we’d seen in the country. I think the building we’d come to was named as a palace, but we were a long way from Kabaka’s Palace.
It was around 3-4 pm, we were getting hungry and decided to forgo the palace, as it didn’t look that amazing anyway. Google maps said it was a 40 minute walk to Dukem, an Ethiopian restaurant a friend at work had recommended, so we set off.
Although we were very much in a residential area, we received far less stares than downtown and no one hassled us. Parts of it looked rather poor, but it felt safe. A few goats ambled by and children shouted as occasional bikes shot past. It was refreshingly sedate with occasional shack-bars pumping music.
At the end of our hot walk, we were back on tarmac and even found an ATM, with armed guard of course. Dukem was very much a local place, with pool table and the entrance wasn’t obvious, tucked away at the side. If my colleague, Johannes, hadn’t recommended it, I doubt we would have gone in. I found a table with a furry bundle underneath, a mother cat nursing three tiny kittens! Bliss!
A friendly waitress helped us order and I soon had a beer and some lovely food. It was the best meal I’ve had in Uganda. No one stared at the whiteys eating with their hands and it was a good experience. Between us we had a big meal each, two beers, a coke, a tea and it cost less than £7. The loos weren’t severely unpleasant either, always a bonus!
The traffic was far worse now, being rushhour (gridlock). It would have been a two hour walk back, we weren’t going to risk the boda bodas again, so Glyn booked an Uber. The journey took 90 minutes in some of the most solid traffic I have ever seen. We only saw one (minor) accident. Our Uber driver looked exhausted at the end and I think he stopped for a rest before continuing.
We were leaving at 2am, so the evening was spent packing and getting a nap. Zedius said he’d pick us up at 2am, I was dubious about using him for getting to the airport as he is always late. But I figured that at 2am there’d be no traffic and he would not let us down over a flight.
At 2.15am I messaged him, asking if all was ok and that we were worried. It was an hour’s drive to the airport and our flight was at 4.55am. He replied at 2.23 saying he was coming. At 2.30 I tried to call and messaged. At 2.40 he said he was almost there. A dubious looking car pulled up claiming to be a taxi, did we want to go with him? A guy working on the gate came and asked if we needed help, he said he was from Nepal and that you can’t trust Ugandan men, he’d get us a taxi. I got a voice message from Zedius saying the vehicle had previously broken down and he’d had to get another, this is why he was late. Why didn’t he tell us that before, why when he knew he couldn’t make it on time, did he not message us and advise us to get a taxi instead, rather than leaving us there, getting more and more worried?
At 2.45, Nepal doorman took Zedius’ number and called him, I heard him ask many times, how long will you be and not get an answer. Eventually he said 10 minutes. Do we take the taxi? We could go now, but we thought Zedius was our friend and didn’t want him driving all this way for nothing.
Nepal man said that a taxi will be 150,000 Ugandan shillings. Hmm, because that’s what Zedius was charging us, claiming it was a fuel only price. That small lie made me decide to go for the taxi, it was 2.50 now and I doubt Zedius would have even called us if we hadn’t called him. I felt that he would have risked us missing our flight to get some extra work.
Now the taxi nearby was charging 170,000 and Nepal man said no! At this point, given 20,000 Ugandan shillings is less than £4, for the sake of missing a plane, we were more than happy to pay this and got in. Glyn tipped Nepal man for his help, we stuck our packs into the boot of the small car and got in, explaining our urgency.
We left at 2.55, no sign of Zedius and the last words of Nepal man was “only pay 150,000!” The taxi sped through the dark streets and onto the toll road, going at well over the speed limit. My seatbelt was broken, but I hooked my arm through it. We got there in 40 minutes and paid the guy 180,000, plus a coin I’d found at the bottom of my purse. It was just about the last of our Ugandan money. We thanked him a lot, although he had dropped us at Arrivals. Luckily it’s a small airport, but I did have to run uphill, with heavy backpack and very heavy camera bag, my heart was pounding!
And…… the plane was late. But we caught it and that’s what matters. Zedius messaged to apologise, I was annoyed though. Seeing as he must have been over an hour late, he wouldn’t have even left by the time he was meant to pick us up, why wasn’t he just honest about it? He took a big risk with us missing our flight to get a taxi fare from us and we’d already given him a massive tip, so I did feel let down by this. But I have replied and let him know we got home and that we’d had a great holiday.
I have really enjoyed Uganda, the chimp and gorilla trekking was a once in a lifetime and amazing experience. Seeing the lion in the tree and leopard was also a wonderful blessing. The other game drives were good, but not as good as those I’ve experienced in Tanzania. The people were all nice and I never felt unsafe, if at sometimes stared at. But being a white tourist, seen as a fountain of money in a poor black area, being stared at isn’t a problem.
I would recommend going, but I doubt I personally would go again. I don’t think I could top the experiences that I have had there, so why try when there’s so many other places to see? If you want to see gorillas in the wild. It’s cheaper than Rwanda and safer than the Congo, just get there soon! And don’t expect anything to be on time!
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gangopa
tab gangopadhyay
Great experience!
It was a good read. I had to cancel my trip to Uganda and Reanda during pandemic time, but they are in my bucket list. Yes, safety is an important consideration in any unknown place and I take that seriously. Fortunately, I made some good friends in Kenya and TZ during my trips, but Uganda is still unknown to me. Someday.....