Things have gotten progressively busier this week and the old Tanzlines has slipped again into neglect. Sitting here immobilized after what is likely my last Indian meal in Tanzania, I thought I would write a teeny-little bit about the last step of last week's adventures: white-water rafting on the Nile. Uganda is known for many tourist activities, but the two big ones are gorilla trekking and rafting the Source of the Nile at Jinja. The rafting part always piqued my interest, partly because that part of the river has multiple Class 4 and 5 rapids (the largest that can be commerically rafted), and partly because of the mystique of the Nile.
It was a great ending to fun week of traveling -- I met up with Esther (the one based in Kampala), Kelly, Caris, and a group of Esther's friends, some of whom I had met before. All told there were two full rafts of our group tackling the great river. The Jinja rafting experience is pretty incredible: it's 7 full hours of rafting, including large stretches of peaceful paddling, easy Class 1, 2 and 3 rapids, and several massive sets of rapids that flip the boats. I was sitting at the front so I got the full thrill when we went over the rougher bits. One of the largest rapids was an 8-foot drop off of Silverback, which surprisingly didn't tip our raft. I was tossed out of the raft twice (the best part of the whole experience, and one I had been semi-secretly hoping would happen). The second time it happened, the entire raft flipped right on its head. Someone fell on top of me, which, combined with the surging water, is actually quite a suffocating experience even if it happens only for a short time. It was fine in the end, of course, and I managed to swim back to the raft easily. Altogether, one of the more fun travel experiences I've had this summer in Africa.
Unrelated to any of the above: I'm flying out from Dar this Saturday on Ethiopian Airlines. I was just trying to re-confirm my flight online and I came across this gem of a result on google: "Ethiopian Airlines (Amharic: የኢትዮጵያ አየር መንገድ; የኢትዮጵያ for short) is an airline based in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia." Sure, that makes sense -- "የኢትዮጵያ" for short... a lot easier to say when you cut out the whole "አየር መንገድ" thing.
Showing posts with label Uganda. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Uganda. Show all posts
Thursday, 30 July 2009
Monday, 20 July 2009
Punishment Island
For this post, I managed to find what is seemingly the only computer in Kabale with working internet. I feel lucky to have gotten my turn. Nonetheless, the backpackers starting impatiently at me from the bench to my left have convinced me to keep this post short.
I've been in Kabale (and environs) for about a day now. I have accomplished three main activities during this time:
- be cold
- canoe around a lake
- visit a Bakiga museum
The being cold thing really caught me off guard. I was sitting on the roof deck of my hostel last night drinking a beer and sharing travel stories with other backpackers. It was *not* warm. I had on my hoodie, a grey shirty-jacket thing, jeans and shoes and I was still freezing. If I had to guess, I would say it was about 50s (F) or low 10s (C). I've really never seen temperatures like that before on this continent, and it's not like it's winter -- we're just barely over the equator.
I visited Lake Bunyoni today, supposedly Uganda's deepest lake. Incredibly beautiful place -- it has dozens of islands and inlets and is surrounded by rich farmland. The farms are built on man-made terraces built into the sides of the steep hills that surround the lake. From the lake shore, the terraces give the appearance of thousands of tiny patches of land each growing different products. The water is cold and relatively clean (it may even be bilharzia-free, although I didn't feel like exposing my ears to find out).
One of the big activities at Bunyoni is to rent a traditional dugout canoe and visit the islands on the lake. I was by myself, but I figured I could get around fairly easily. I am a Chief Scout, after all; I should be able to outperform a bunch of tourists. But it turns out that a dugout canoe is way harder to use than the standard birch-bark or fiberclass canoe pioneered in Canada. Without a keel, the dugout canoe really just slides around on the water and catches the wind unless you go against the wind head-on. About two hours out, I realized why most of the other tourists had rented larger, motorized boats to explore.
I did make it out to a few islands right in the center of the lake. The most interesting one was Punishment Island, a swampy, small island where villagers of generations past would take unwed pregnant women to die. Actually, it wasn't all that bad -- the women also had the choice of being tied up to a tree and eaten by animals, or of being shoved off a giant cliff onto rocks. Punishment Island was probably the option of choice is those situations. My rump was starting to feel a bit punished itself by the end of the trip; four hours sitting on a wooden plank ain't fun.
I took a motorbike back to town after the lake and visited the cultural museum at my hostel. The museum is basically a tiny room inside the building, inside of which they've built a (fake) shrine, a (fake) homestead, and a (fake) latrine. The idea was to recreate a traditional village from the Bakiga (bah-CHEE-gah) people indigenous to this area. Rather than give you a blow-by-blow of the experience, here are the key takeaways:
- Bakigas don't like pygmies, because the Bakigas think they're lazy and steal animals and beer
- Witch doctors/medicine men just trick people into thinking they actually do something. Most of the time they just get drunk on the beer that patients bring to appease the gods
- The prize livestock used to sleep in the master bedroom underneath the bed of the mother and father of the family. This was to prevent theft by pygmies (supposedly).
The other backpackers are now foaming at the mouth. Will write more from Kigali.
I've been in Kabale (and environs) for about a day now. I have accomplished three main activities during this time:
- be cold
- canoe around a lake
- visit a Bakiga museum
The being cold thing really caught me off guard. I was sitting on the roof deck of my hostel last night drinking a beer and sharing travel stories with other backpackers. It was *not* warm. I had on my hoodie, a grey shirty-jacket thing, jeans and shoes and I was still freezing. If I had to guess, I would say it was about 50s (F) or low 10s (C). I've really never seen temperatures like that before on this continent, and it's not like it's winter -- we're just barely over the equator.
I visited Lake Bunyoni today, supposedly Uganda's deepest lake. Incredibly beautiful place -- it has dozens of islands and inlets and is surrounded by rich farmland. The farms are built on man-made terraces built into the sides of the steep hills that surround the lake. From the lake shore, the terraces give the appearance of thousands of tiny patches of land each growing different products. The water is cold and relatively clean (it may even be bilharzia-free, although I didn't feel like exposing my ears to find out).
One of the big activities at Bunyoni is to rent a traditional dugout canoe and visit the islands on the lake. I was by myself, but I figured I could get around fairly easily. I am a Chief Scout, after all; I should be able to outperform a bunch of tourists. But it turns out that a dugout canoe is way harder to use than the standard birch-bark or fiberclass canoe pioneered in Canada. Without a keel, the dugout canoe really just slides around on the water and catches the wind unless you go against the wind head-on. About two hours out, I realized why most of the other tourists had rented larger, motorized boats to explore.
I did make it out to a few islands right in the center of the lake. The most interesting one was Punishment Island, a swampy, small island where villagers of generations past would take unwed pregnant women to die. Actually, it wasn't all that bad -- the women also had the choice of being tied up to a tree and eaten by animals, or of being shoved off a giant cliff onto rocks. Punishment Island was probably the option of choice is those situations. My rump was starting to feel a bit punished itself by the end of the trip; four hours sitting on a wooden plank ain't fun.
I took a motorbike back to town after the lake and visited the cultural museum at my hostel. The museum is basically a tiny room inside the building, inside of which they've built a (fake) shrine, a (fake) homestead, and a (fake) latrine. The idea was to recreate a traditional village from the Bakiga (bah-CHEE-gah) people indigenous to this area. Rather than give you a blow-by-blow of the experience, here are the key takeaways:
- Bakigas don't like pygmies, because the Bakigas think they're lazy and steal animals and beer
- Witch doctors/medicine men just trick people into thinking they actually do something. Most of the time they just get drunk on the beer that patients bring to appease the gods
- The prize livestock used to sleep in the master bedroom underneath the bed of the mother and father of the family. This was to prevent theft by pygmies (supposedly).
The other backpackers are now foaming at the mouth. Will write more from Kigali.
Sunday, 19 July 2009
A Place of Contrasts
Hi again. I'm writing from Kabale, a beautiful mountain town in southwest Uganda.
Not sure if this post is going to work or not, given the precarious internet situation here. Blogging in Kabale is kinda like writing in your diary on the edge of a cliff. It could work out, but things might go wrong and nobody will ever know what you wrote. So I'm gonna keep it short.
After I finished up yesterday, I went to see the tombs of the Buganda kings, which was pretty interesting. There are basically a bunch of buildings from what used to be the old palace of the Kabakas (kings) before they realized that a villa with satellite TV and a swimming pool was preferable to a giant grass hut. I had a brief history lesson from my guide, George, on the role of the Buganda kings in Ugandan culture and politics. Like many tribes in Africa, the Buganda are composed of many clans and subclans who traditionally specialized in different trades (e.g., milking, fishing, guarding) and recruited actively from other ethnic groups. Although somewhat independent, the different groups all pledged loyalty to the king. In fact, there's still a king today, although only 20% of Ugandans are his nominal subjects and there's quite a bit of tension with the central government. I really don't like monarchy or monarchs really, but it's interested to learn about. Other points of note at the tombs: a stuffed leopard from the late 1800s that served as the king's pet, and a round of a game called Yawezo (I think) that involving dropping seeds in little bowls and stealing the other person's seeds. It's not the best game in the world, but it's ok -- I'd rank it somewhere between Mouse Trap and Monopoly.
Yesterday night, we met up with my old friend Esther from school and a couple of her crew. It was a really fun night out -- we went to get Turkish fare then get drinks at a bar. The Turkish food was probably some of the best food I've eaten in a long time. Although I've only been there for two nights, Kampala really does seem like a great place to live. Unlike in Dar or other cities, where the restaurants are all spread out, Kampala has a number of massive entertainent places with over a dozen bars, restaurants and clubs in one small area. It makes it really easy to walk around different places and try out a few spots. One other thing I've got to point out: the music in Uganda is awesome. The actual Luganda stuff is actually pretty mediocre, but I've heard music from multiple bars that's really great -- blends of US hip hop, Bongo Flava, some classics (read: MJ), and even the more tolerable strains of European electronic. I got a little more good music than I might have liked yesterday, since our hotel room was 7' away from the popular Iguana Bar.
Today has been fun, but totally unrelaxing. I've basically just spent the past 11 hours traveling what was supposed to be a 6-hour trip. To pass the time, I bought a Ugandan English-language newspaper. It was one of the better 45-minute chunks of my day. I'm not sure if this is true of Ugandan dailies in general, but this paper (the "New Vision," I think) devoted its content equally to three topics:
- corruption scandals and government disputes
- religion
- nightlife and sex
The corruption part interests me hugely, but I'm going to leave that for another post. The religion thing is worth writing about though. Ugandans are largely Christian (especially Kampala and the southwest), and have traditionally been Catholics until quite recently. In the past few years, however, pentecostals and other evangelical/born-again/charismatic Christian groups have been flourishing and winning tons of converts from the traditional Catholic congregations. I noticed that the most common billboards in Kampala (after mobile phone ads) show duos or trios of famous preachers giving massive performances in stadiums or concert halls. Most of the posters I've seen feature a prominent Black evangelical preacher from the US, hosted by a Ugandan bishop or pastor. The newspaper article I read today was describing how the Catholic church has been forced to respond to the rising evangelical tide by offering its own charismatic elements (including speaking in tongues, more praise-y sorts of music, etc.). Apparently there are now official Charismatic Catholic priests in Uganda who blend the two approaches together.
The nightlife-and-sex section of the paper was also pretty fascinating. It was pretty news-free, actually, but contained a bunch of columns, op-eds and special features. One article discussed mistresses of married guys -- in other words, women who maintain long-term adulterous relationships with wealthier men in a very overt lovin'-for-financial support exchange. Rather than condemning what seems like a very widespread practice, the (female-authored) column was trying to explain that mistresses fulfill an important demand in the market because many married men are neglected by their wifes and need to feel loved. If that's the women talking, you have to wonder what the men would say. Reading the rest of the section made me realize how difficult the public-health workers have it in East Africa. I have a few friends who work on behavioral AIDS prevention and health marketing on the continent, and it's insanely tough to try and change behavior when hunting for casual love (even paying for it) is so accepted.
Back to Kabale. It's a cool place: leafy, green, and mountainous. I'm staying tonight in a museum and am going to go explore the nearby lake tomorrow. Local tourist info calls this place the 'Switzerland of Africa,' although I doubt I'm going to find any fondue tonight.
Not sure if this post is going to work or not, given the precarious internet situation here. Blogging in Kabale is kinda like writing in your diary on the edge of a cliff. It could work out, but things might go wrong and nobody will ever know what you wrote. So I'm gonna keep it short.
After I finished up yesterday, I went to see the tombs of the Buganda kings, which was pretty interesting. There are basically a bunch of buildings from what used to be the old palace of the Kabakas (kings) before they realized that a villa with satellite TV and a swimming pool was preferable to a giant grass hut. I had a brief history lesson from my guide, George, on the role of the Buganda kings in Ugandan culture and politics. Like many tribes in Africa, the Buganda are composed of many clans and subclans who traditionally specialized in different trades (e.g., milking, fishing, guarding) and recruited actively from other ethnic groups. Although somewhat independent, the different groups all pledged loyalty to the king. In fact, there's still a king today, although only 20% of Ugandans are his nominal subjects and there's quite a bit of tension with the central government. I really don't like monarchy or monarchs really, but it's interested to learn about. Other points of note at the tombs: a stuffed leopard from the late 1800s that served as the king's pet, and a round of a game called Yawezo (I think) that involving dropping seeds in little bowls and stealing the other person's seeds. It's not the best game in the world, but it's ok -- I'd rank it somewhere between Mouse Trap and Monopoly.
Yesterday night, we met up with my old friend Esther from school and a couple of her crew. It was a really fun night out -- we went to get Turkish fare then get drinks at a bar. The Turkish food was probably some of the best food I've eaten in a long time. Although I've only been there for two nights, Kampala really does seem like a great place to live. Unlike in Dar or other cities, where the restaurants are all spread out, Kampala has a number of massive entertainent places with over a dozen bars, restaurants and clubs in one small area. It makes it really easy to walk around different places and try out a few spots. One other thing I've got to point out: the music in Uganda is awesome. The actual Luganda stuff is actually pretty mediocre, but I've heard music from multiple bars that's really great -- blends of US hip hop, Bongo Flava, some classics (read: MJ), and even the more tolerable strains of European electronic. I got a little more good music than I might have liked yesterday, since our hotel room was 7' away from the popular Iguana Bar.
Today has been fun, but totally unrelaxing. I've basically just spent the past 11 hours traveling what was supposed to be a 6-hour trip. To pass the time, I bought a Ugandan English-language newspaper. It was one of the better 45-minute chunks of my day. I'm not sure if this is true of Ugandan dailies in general, but this paper (the "New Vision," I think) devoted its content equally to three topics:
- corruption scandals and government disputes
- religion
- nightlife and sex
The corruption part interests me hugely, but I'm going to leave that for another post. The religion thing is worth writing about though. Ugandans are largely Christian (especially Kampala and the southwest), and have traditionally been Catholics until quite recently. In the past few years, however, pentecostals and other evangelical/born-again/charismatic Christian groups have been flourishing and winning tons of converts from the traditional Catholic congregations. I noticed that the most common billboards in Kampala (after mobile phone ads) show duos or trios of famous preachers giving massive performances in stadiums or concert halls. Most of the posters I've seen feature a prominent Black evangelical preacher from the US, hosted by a Ugandan bishop or pastor. The newspaper article I read today was describing how the Catholic church has been forced to respond to the rising evangelical tide by offering its own charismatic elements (including speaking in tongues, more praise-y sorts of music, etc.). Apparently there are now official Charismatic Catholic priests in Uganda who blend the two approaches together.
The nightlife-and-sex section of the paper was also pretty fascinating. It was pretty news-free, actually, but contained a bunch of columns, op-eds and special features. One article discussed mistresses of married guys -- in other words, women who maintain long-term adulterous relationships with wealthier men in a very overt lovin'-for-financial support exchange. Rather than condemning what seems like a very widespread practice, the (female-authored) column was trying to explain that mistresses fulfill an important demand in the market because many married men are neglected by their wifes and need to feel loved. If that's the women talking, you have to wonder what the men would say. Reading the rest of the section made me realize how difficult the public-health workers have it in East Africa. I have a few friends who work on behavioral AIDS prevention and health marketing on the continent, and it's insanely tough to try and change behavior when hunting for casual love (even paying for it) is so accepted.
Back to Kabale. It's a cool place: leafy, green, and mountainous. I'm staying tonight in a museum and am going to go explore the nearby lake tomorrow. Local tourist info calls this place the 'Switzerland of Africa,' although I doubt I'm going to find any fondue tonight.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
