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Published: March 17th 2008
In the last week or so I’ve been a bit more adventurous and have ventured out of the relative calm of the triangle between home, the hospital and the local shops/wine garage.
I took my first solo trip into Kampala last Saturday with the aim of getting to a party. My mission was to get a matatu into the centre of town and then find my way to a restaurant called Faze 2 which I had vague directions to. Getting on the matatu was fine - you just stand by the road looking like you’re waiting for a bus and they stop. Inside is just a small tatty looking minibus with 14 seats - two in the front with the driver. Once it’s full the conductor sort of perches. I haven’t worked out where the best place is to sit yet - but as there’s a lot of getting on and off I think the back row or next to a window is your best bet if you’re going to the end of the route. The journey was fine - a bit bumpy and some alarmingly close calls with bodas and pedestrians but I went a bit wrong on my getting out point. Instead of getting out with all of the sensible people who abandoned four wheels in favour of two legs as soon as we started approaching gridlock I stayed on until we reached the taxi-park I got out in the middle of chaos and also had no idea which way I should go - except that uphill and out of the ‘pit’ which I’ve christened the horrible bit in the middle where the taxi parks and a huge market are. After a fairly stressful 20 minutes of walking through crowds and gridlocked traffic I was on Kampala Road and back in my comfort zone - I arrived at the party quite early and so had time to catch up with Adrian and Jess before meeting loads of people, including a couple who very kindly gave me a lift home and spared me negotiating my way home on public transport.
This week at work I’ve continued with my orientation and been to a 2 day conference for organisations which are getting money from the Ugandan Aids Commission Civil Society Fund. IMF (the charity part of the organisation which I work for) has applied for funds to do an outreach and treatment programme in the local area and this has almost been granted. The conference was quite formal and held at a very posh country club (a good use of donor funds???) - lots of presentations about various aspects of the fund and the information which each organisation would have to submit. I think the Ugandan government has had it’s fingers burned a lot with donor money ‘vanishing’ with little to explain what it’s been spent on so the control of this money and the ‘outcomes’ it delivers will be very very tight. I felt sorry for Goffrey who was the main facilitator and so in charge of keeping everything to time - given the fondness of a lot of Ugandans for talking at length once they have a microphone and the impossibility of serving coffee to 90 people in 15 minutes it was a bit like herding cats. On the first day of the conference we were the only people to turn up without a laptop and/or all of the information needed for our application … the Programme manager who I went with was very cross that she hadn’t been told to do this but apparently it’s standard practice at this type of event.
I went to a Ugandan dancing lesson on Tuesday - organised by VSO people who have been here a while. It was very funny as the gap between the attempts of the new people and what we were supposed to be doing was considerable - I think I was easily the worst as I lack both co-ordination and rhythm but it was very good fun. In order to make up for the buckets we’d sweated we went for a beer afterwards (I know it doesn’t do anything for rehydration but it did taste very good) which involved walking down the road to Kabalagala (made for Geordie pronounciation!). Kabalagala is a bit like the Bigg Market at night, but with a very busy road running through it and loads of charcoal barbeques selling chicken, pork etc so a few additional hazards.
From Friday night onwards there have been a lot of power cuts all over Kampala - euphemistically called ‘load shedding’. I was a bit unprepared when the power went off as I had no idea where my torch was and fumbled around in complete darkness for what felt like ages. Then Duncan appeared with his head torch and proceeded to peer around my room - I think he thought it was really messy because I’d been whirling around in a distressed state when the power went off. I didn’t disillusion him! Due to the lack of power we had a house outing to the Wine Garage, which was very busy and looked very pretty with lots of candles on the tables. They were doing a ‘tasting’ of something called Night Train. It was really terrible - much worse than even village wine from the Greek Islands or Uncle Wilf’s wierd concoctions.
On Saturday night Marcel, who is a Dutch volunteer who’s been here for nearly 2 years had a birthday party. The party was due to start at 7.30 but being fully integrated into Ugandan time we got there about 2 hours late due to a combination of ‘challenges’ (Ugandan English for problems/cock-ups) and bad traffic. Having got lost a bit we almost ended up on something called the Northern by-pass (something like the M25 except it’s still being built - which doesn’t stop people trying to drive on it) we got stuck behind a big bus and car which seemed to have broken down simultaneously. I cursed the decision to not buy screw top wine as a car journey through Kampala is quite hard on the nerves even when you’re just a passenger! When we eventually got there we were treated to a lovely barbeque, lots of VSO gossip and a drag queen floor show. Not something I was expecting at all …. Dut to the consumption of too much red wine Sunday was a very lazy day and I did very little - and then stayed up late watching a very odd film ‘The three burials of (somebody Mexican)’.
Next week real work starts and I definitely feel ready for it. Next time I’ll respond to Paddy’s request for the lowdown on the people at the Guest House and possibly work … you might even get some more pictures!
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Alison Lay
non-member comment
Ugandan dancing
Hi Helen Can we please have some pictures of the Ugandan dancing! Sounds wonderful so far - when are you going to do some proper work? Everyone is well here - Stephanie is busy preparing for her big day - Danish hairdressers are threatening to go on strike, which is a bit of a worry for her. Hope somebody is relaying the Uganda Tale to Mrs Lay and Mrs Oliver, who will probably have serious bouts of déja vu .... power cuts, half-built roads, expat parties Love Alison