The Uganda Weekenders

Martin (left), Okumu, and the mobile clinic vehicle.

A nice sunset after one of the mobile clinic/awareness program days.

Eastern Uganda, out of the window of a matatu. There were lots of low-lying, swampy areas that were planted.

This is a picture of me. And the White Nile, very near the source of the Nile: Lake Victoria. This is where its long journey to Egypt and the Nile river delta begins with a thunder...

Last Friday, we waltzed over to Uganda. The border crossing was surreal, and for a while I felt a bit like I was on that thick black line on the map, and then! Suddenly I was in Uganda. There are 60 Kenyan shillings per dollar. And 24 Ugandan shillings for 1 Kenyan shilling. So, everything was listed in really large numbers...there were 100 and 200 shilling coins. The visa into Uganda was $50 usd.

The campground was a bizarre oasis of American/European travelers and tourists that were in just for the rafting. The deck overlooking the White Nile was incredible, and the view was of our first class 5 rapids of the day; there were four total. The only time we fell out was going down a 4 meter waterfall that was after a 3 meter drop that wasn't quite a waterfall. The video at the end made me wish that we had flipped more often.

We reached the campground using a motorcycle (pikipiki; also: motor-boda), after the matatu ride into Jinja, Uganda. All the tourists made the place feel quite strange, and while it was nice to have a change in pace as far as food is concerned (bacon cheeseburger?! Eggs and real butter?!), and to meet other traveler/volunteers...but I was glad to lget back to ICODEI. I was enormously impressed with Ugadan ifrastructure though! And I had a traditional Ugandan dish of dried and the smoked fish in a nut sauce in Jinja that was one f the best meals I've had here...accompanied by Marinda, a pineapple softdrink.

The one stand-out as far as people are concerned in Uganda was this guy that was selling bananas at the border. We talked for a while...he initialy walked up to me and said, "You need to get some potassium...how about a banana?". He was all about the healthy foods...he's in std. 5 in school, and probably will be Uganda's equivalent of Bill Gates one day as far as I can tell. That was Sunday, on the return to Kenya.

Today I taught math to std. 4, and Tom was in the clinic working on the ceiling. He put a board in for another new door over the weekend, and now he just needs to show up often enough to get it all the rest of the way complete!

Tonight we're going to Red Hat again. We had some new arrivals: two from Canada (Quebec) for MDP, and a medical student from Australia. Another member of the water filtration team just arrived.

My phone number here, if for some reason I need to be reached, is 254738269872. Also, I have CelTel as my service; I think it's only 3Ksh/minute if you also have CelTel and are in Kenya between certain hours...

I don't think I've mentioned Martin's twins...In short: The picture at the top of the page is of Martin and Okumu. Okumu is the Clinical Officer and goes on the mobile clinics. Martin is a driver and translator, and his wife gave birth to Patience and Precious (twins, of course!) last week. We visited them in the District Hospital twice to check on them, and to find the cost for having a C-section delivery and 5 nights in the hospital. The total was 6500 Ksh, which is just about $110. They went home last Friday and all are doing well. They now have 6 children and he says that they're "probably done"--that's probably about normal sized for a family here. Reuben and Betty have 8.

The rest of the week will be more of the same as today: teaching, inproving the clinic, and maybe an awareness. This weekend, we're going to try to go to Kisumu--see some hippos, get some good fish [Kisumu is on Lake Victoria], and have a look around. For now, it's time for dinner!