Last few days in Uganda

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We now only have a week left in Uganda before flying for South Africa. We have a trip to Entebbe Zoo, a few meetings, and a final meal with the ‘hope for life’ team, see all the kids and say goodbye, a potential marathon, Freedom church and we need to make sure we take time to take in everything we have experienced here in Uganda.



Our past few days have been pretty interesting; our time came to an end renting of the place we have called home for the past 2 months. We have had some pretty cool memories of this place but it was time to leave. We left early Tuesday morning at 6am, with all our stuff, and went off to Jinja for 3 and a half days. We still have lots of work to do for our project but most of it can be done online. We are defiantly not city people and it is great to get out to the rural setting of Jinja to enjoy the peacefulness, the wildlife, the Nile and Lake Vic, and stay in a backpackers where there can be the most amazing people to chat with.

Our next door neighbour, for the time we have been renting in Kampala, also runs a project, called agape child care(.dk). He does great work with a Danish lady, who was over for a month whilst we were there. These 2 run various homes and get sponsors for the street kids, soon-to-be-mums, new mums and generally vulnerable people within Kampala. He went to Denmark and spoke in lots of schools to talk about life as a Ugandan, the project and Jesus. The Kids over there taught him some guitar in Denmark and since we have known him, he talks so enthusiastically about guitar playing. When invited Innocent over to gift him the guitar he was overjoyed and extremely thankful for the guitar. I am not sure who donated the guitar but whoever did, there is a big thank you from Uganda for the generous gift.

We got to Jinja and immediately felt a sense of spiritual, emotional and physical relief from the efforts in Kampala. We spent our first day in peace, working, sending emails, doing more on the website (coming soon) and organising the first part of our trip to South Africa. There is the potential to meet the most amazing people at Backpackers and this was certainly 1 of those days. We met a couple who have done a degree in zoology in Australia, a women who works in Scotland for RBS who gave me some helpful banking tips for the project, another Aussie who as offered a place to stay when we go to Oz, and lots of people with English accents which was so amazing. We enjoyed conversations with a guy from the West Country as we talked about cheese rolling and cider and some others which I will come to later.

Now the Wednesday and we have had the most amazing day; with the internet off we made the most of having a relaxed morning before going to an outdoor swimming pool (overlooking the Nile) and having a nice relaxing, refreshing swim in the heat of the sun. We leisurely finished swimming/sunbathing and went for lunch with the most amazing view over Lake Victoria, Chapattis with chicken and egg. We walked back to the backpackers, played some pool, tried to Skype (the internet was still off) when the guys who rafted that day came home. We quickly hoped on the bus to go to the other backpackers and watched the sunset go down over the Nile with pitta and humus. We looked at our professional rafting pictures and decided to buy them (so watch out for some very funny photos) and luckily jumped on another bus going back to the other backpackers we were staying in, which is where I am writing this.

We met some people who are from Exeter, one, a young doctor who specialises in tropical medicines and expedition medical care. A guy and another guy (they are interesting I’m just getting to the point quicker). They have decided to do the Kampala marathon this Sunday (in 4 days). I had seen billboards for it was quite interested earlier in the month but decided I had no one to run with so I wouldn’t. I have not too much excuse now I have potential running partners (not including that I hadn’t done any fitness training except for skipping twice, and I struggle in the heat walking to the fridge to get some water). I decided, in my mind, that I didn’t have the right shoes and cancelled it out, that is until, Megan had been speaking to the same people and came to me saying that she was keen to run the marathon in 4 days, in stupid shoes, in the heat, with no fitness. I hesitantly reseeded and said that I am up for it too. What do you think? Should we do it or should we take photos, laugh at others, get a lie in and be awake for our work good bye meal?



We have a couple more days in Jinja and are truly enjoying our time.



Last week in Uganda : (



Before we get to enjoy the beaches and seeing friends and family in SA : )

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