Snarky in Africa

Got up in time for dinner, ran again into the Irish couple who not only did all the water falls but went on to another one farther away and seemed quite well-rested and chipper (what are these people, freaks??). I have an excuse that the bruise I got on my thigh when I slipped and fell the other night has turned a spectacular shade of black/purple, so maybe that’s why I am mush compared to everyone else around me. Clearly when I get back I am going to need some serious getting-back-in-shaping.

So, nothing terribly eventful that night. Still no electricity, but the place is so peaceful and chill I don’t really mind. I get up early the next morning because I want to leave early given as getting back to Kampala could take anywhere from 5 to 10 hours. I am packed and ready to go when I realize I can’t find my cell phone anywhere. I unpack everything, look thru every bag, nook and crannie, and finally find it in my pocket that I had looked in 18 times already (don’t ask!). Frustrated, I go down for a “quick” breakfast (translation, at least a half hour at this place to order and get a plain chapati) so I can take my malaria pill and then go down to the road to catch the matatu to mbale.

At the road I run into the Irish couple who are going back to Kampala. At this point I had been thinking of getting a matatu to Jinja and then getting the free shuttle back to Kampala from the white water rafting people, but since the Irish couple were going to Kampala I figured safety in numbers and now I’d tag along with them.

We get into the matatu which was smaller than a normal one, it was a van technically built for 8 people, which means on a matatu level, it should have held around 10-12 people. Because there are so many people in this area and so few means of transport, they pick up every human being who needs a lift. By the time we were truly underway, there were 19 people in the vehicle in total. That includes 5 kids ranging in age from about 10 to infant.

As a note about matatus, you are not paying for a “seat” when you pay for a matatu, nor are you paying for transport within a certain timeframe. You are simply paying for the privildge of being brought from point A to point B. So if that means you have to have someone sit on your lap, or you need to stand, or it takes twice as long as it should, so be it. By the time we really get underway with all 19 people, the Irish girl had a 5 year old on her lap, I was holding both her and my daypacks on mine, and everyone else was scrunched in as necessary. It was not even possible for me to move my leg around when it began to fall asleep.

After an hour ish we make it to the bus park and there is a bus, a real full-size bus, that says “Kampala Express” on it and the Irish folks say “that looks like it” so I buy a ticket and get on. They need to go exchange money and the bus starts to leave a half hour later but they’re not yet on it. But false alarm and eventually they just make it on. Meanwhile the bus station has the usual set of vendors and beggars. The kids just hold out their hands. One teenager kept holding out his hand that was missing parts of several fingers.

So far as the bus goes, I’m pretty happy as compared to the cramped matatu it is quite roomy, I have a row to myself and the seats are plush fabric and clean. I buy a newspaper and am reading as the bus is toodling along at a good clip when, about 45 minutes outside of mbale, which puts us squarely in the middle of nowhere, the bus pulls over to the side of the road and stops. After a few minutes many of the men get off the bus and stand on the grass and the bus staff open a panel that looks down on the engine. Most of the passengers just sit passively, the Irish couple among them (she had been in Africa over a month teaching so was quite used to the routine). Eventually I get up and go over to look down at the engine. Now, what I know about engines would fit on the size of a postcard, but I can see this guy holding a piece of what is clearly the fan. I look down at the fan, about the size of a truck tire, and see that every single blade had broken off. Crap.

Again, most everyone is very calm just waiting around. This is apparently not an uncommon experience. I go up to the main driver guy and ask him what’s going on and he says he has called his company to figure out what to do. We wait around and I alternate between sitting in the bus and hanging on the side of the road. Every village child within 3 miles at this point has come to look at the broken bus, and again, I am the Queen of England in terms of popularity. Everyone wants to wave and talk to me (as they would have the Irish if they’d gotten off the bus).

The other passengers included a number of women and a few men who were very dressed up. Sort of “sunday best” dressed up. Yet only one of the women seemed to be even approaching being pissed off. I decided to stick near her. It really is amazing how different this experience is compared to what would happen in the US. From my own perspective,I had absolutely no where I needed to be, so it could have taken hours and hours to fix and it would not really have impacted my life, so I guess if you don’t have much to do and you don’t have the power to make a difference, you become passive.

Still, after about 45 minutes I get my backpack down from the rack and take all my stuff outside. I didn’t know when they were going to send replacement vehicles but I did realize that whatever they sent it wouldn’t likely be big enough and I was going to be on the first matatu out of there once it arrived. The Irish couple had put their backpacks underneath the truck and still didn’t seem to be keen on making the bus company get them out. Speaking of baggage, one of the bags the other bus riders had included a live chicken. It had been stuck under the bus, wrapped up in a plastic bag. I felt really bad for it when they pulled it out to go in a matatu (not mine!). Animal rights is definitely not a concept here.

Sure enough only two matatus arrived and I was on the first one. When we drove off, I looked back to see that the two matatus were not large enough for everyone (shock!) and that the Irish couple were two of about 4 or 5 that didn’t make it on. At this point I felt it was time to keep to my own judgment and go back to independent travel.

The trip back was otherwise uneventful. We stopped for gas a few times and at each stop we were mobbed by vendors selling meat-on-a-stick, corn on the cob, drinks, and etc. Most people got food, which looked good, but I didn’t want to risk the high likelihood of stomach ills as a result. A bright side of being in a matatu is instead of going all the way back to the bus park in Kampala and retracing my steps in another matatu to my hostel, we were passing not very far from where I was staying and I was able to have them drop me off and get a boda-boda back. I feel so cosmopolitan being able to get around so confidently and efficiently!

I arrived back and got my room, but unfortunately the power was out from power-rationing. So, I got a matatu into town and went to an internet cafe where I posted the other posts but then the guy was shutting down and so I left and got really good Chinese food at a place on the main drag called Kampala Road. Kampala is apparently known for its Indian and Chinese food.

I went back to the hostel around 8 and to my surprise ran into A, one of the med students I mentioned earlier. We had run into each other a bunch and I had thought his group was going on to Zambia but he said the rest were but he had to fly back for his fiancee’s sister’s wedding (or maybe it was his sister’s wedding). So we spent the evening catching up and talking and that was fun. He told me about a craft market he went to and bought oodles of gifts and whatnot so I decided to do that the next day.

Today I got up around 8, had breakfast, and asked one of the washer-ladies for a bucket so I could do my laundry. She asked why I didn’t have them do it and I said because they weren’t allowed to do women’s underwear (which really pisses me off) so I might as well do it all myself. She said she’d do all my laundry for me if I pay her directly. She had a deal!! I only wish I actually had more underwear that needed cleaning at this point!!

I was on my way to leave to go to the craft market when I ran into C, who was one of the professors from Gainsville, FL who was here working at a pediatric infectious disease clinic. She is leaving late tonight and didn’t have anything to do so we went to the market together. It was only about half open because it is Sunday, but the stalls mainly all had the same stuff. Mostly crap, but some nice things mixed in. I’ll probably go back later this week and buy a few things. Right now I’m back at the Garden City mall (home of the supermarket extraordinaire) as C and I both catch up on email and I finish the blog.

Until next time…

This entry was posted on Sunday, August 5th, 2007 at 5:11 am and is filed under Travel, Uganda. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.