Truckin' Along Too

There have been a handful of random experiences and anecdotes that have occurred over the last few weeks that I deem worth telling, so here goes:

I took the car to Amber Court (just down the street from us) one morning to get some documents printed out. I had been there just long enough to have a gentleman tell me “You are from Kimaka, from the orphanage…” and have him challenge me on the fact that we only care for children with special needs (as if there wasn’t enough regular orphanages in Uganda…) before hearing a strange sound. It was clear immediately that the sound was electrical in nature, but there was no questioning that fact as a rather thick power cable came crashing down onto the road, having broken off the pole that stood just 10 feet from where I was standing. There was a moment of being stunned before I began looking around to see if anyone was seemingly on their phone notifying the power company, which there wasn’t and watched as bodas, cars and people continued to go by as though nothing was out of sorts. There were people who stepped up to holler at anyone who came near and the guy from the printing shack placed his wooden sign at the end of the cable, but as I did not have the number for Umeme (the power company) and I was not interested in seeing anyone die that day, I got back in the car, drove over the cable and sped home as quickly as possible. I ran into the house, grabbed the power bill, called multiple times before getting through and was reassured that something was, in fact, being done; as confirmation, the power in our house was cut the second I hung up the phone. Emily was sceptical that it would be handled efficiently but the two of us went into town about an hour later and, thankfully, there was no sign of the cable.

I had to go back to the local chairman to have another letter signed a couple weeks ago expecting the same experience as the first time I went to see him. Aaron came with me again, we drove over (because it was too hot to walk) and found him sitting on a wooden bench against one the brick homes. His demeanor was completely different. As he asked why I was back, questioned me about whether or not the bank had given me proper guidelines, criticized the letter and demanded signing fees, I began to question myself whether or not this was really the same person. I kept glancing at Aaron, looking for some explanation as the LC took his time and the group of children around us continued to stand and stare and laugh every time I glanced their way. Once we had the signature I needed, we headed back to the car and I was able to ask Aaron out loud what the heck was going on. His answer? He was drunk. It was flabbergasting to me the extent of the contrast in his behavior; so much for having a friend in high places.

There was a fire in town recently; a plastics factory just at the end of Main Street. Emily W and I had gone to market in the morning and made a stop at The Keep to grab a coffee before heading home. It was as we were leaving The Keep and turned out onto Main Street, we saw the huge amount of smoke coming from the end of town. Market is on the same side of town, so we were grateful it started just after we were done our shopping, but that didn’t stop us from taking a “detour” in order to get a closer look. As we were nearing the end of the road, we heard an explosion that to both of us sounded like a gun releasing some kind of a canister and witnessed a crowd of people start running towards us; there was no question that a swift u-turn was in order and we headed straight home. The next day, I did a little search for any kind of news coverage on the fire. The article I found ended with a small paragraph about how the police fired tear gas to deter looters which subsequently caused a moderate stampede; thus confirming what we`d seen.

Recently a little league baseball team from Langley, BC made the trek all the way here to play against a local team in Uganda. The quick story is that this was the first year that the Ugandan team made it far enough to play teams from other countries, in this case, Canada. Not surprisingly, the team could not afford to fly to the BC, so the Langley team got involved and some pretty heavy fundraising started on both a private and corporate level to get the kids to Canada. But when the time came for them to head out, due to sketchy or non-existent passports and identification, they were not allowed to leave. So Langley came to them. I was aware of it, but was under the impression that everything was happening in Kampala, but one morning, I got a text from a friend (who got an email from some Canadian lady) to say that they were playing here in Jinja. After some mis-information and confusion, I tracked them down at a secondary school a bit out of town. Though I missed the game, I caught them as they were settling down for a sandwich lunch and struck up a random conversation with the first adult that I saw. Throughout the 15-20 minutes that I hung around, I met a couple people that had graduated from DW Poppy (The high school where I work) and another few people with whom I shared some significant mutual acquaintances. It was nostalgic, to say the least.   

Other notable events and occurrences? Emily W and I trying to learn to krump via a YouTube instructional video, a really great bonfire night at Brice`s house, watching a boda drive straight into the back of a mutatu and then watching the mutatu reverse over the front of the boda (don`t worry, no one was hurt), a lizard that was hanging out on the ceiling peed on my foot and Emily W and I accidently started a wee fire on top of her book shelf. Actually, Emily started a wee fire on her bookshelf by placing a candle in a plastic cup. I was lucky enough to be there to help put it out by first throwing a cup of water, then emptying out a water bottle and then yelling at her to “Get over here! “ as I was too short and kept missing the actual fire.   

Emily, George and I are on holiday right now; I`m actually writing this as I sit outside our little cottage on Lake Bunyonyi, in Kabale near the Rwandan border. We left on Wednesday and will be heading home first thing tomorrow morning, so my next post will be all about it.