Of to Kenya

Tomorrow we are going to leave to Kenya for the Masai Mara game reserve. I wont’t be probably updating these pages for a while, but I will be keeping notes on my laptop and compile them here at some point, hopefully with brilliant photographs of savannah.

Today was not extremely eventful although I got my share of both African and Indian cultures. Lot of time was spent in chores, which I thought could have been taken care in few hours and to end the day had to spend an hour in the traffic jam. Well I guess I would be rather stuck in traffic here than in Helsinki. Nandish seems to be annoyed from time to time as I’ve been tugging along everywhere with him. We shall see how the 12 hours in the car will turn out  as the internet connection died, I am writing this on a dial-up, which is so SLOW. I guess the images need to wait… Should not complain though, most of the locals, I guess, do not have even electricity at the moment. (Nandish has a converter and few batteries)

Entebbe & Ange Noir.

actually should have been posted yesterday...While the thunderstorm rages outside, I have difficulties in finding the words to describe the daily events. Not that there would have been anything very dramatic to write about. the day started by arguing with nandish about the definition of a public good in a local taxi/bus and a bit later pointing out to myself and Nandish’s grandma few cultural differences regarding haria family’s religious beliefs and my own family background. then we spent the day with Nandish in Entebbe, which lies about 30 kilometers from Kampala. the traffic was annoying as usual, but we made it to the animal orphanage in time to see all the animals (monkeys, chimps, lions, boar, kob, birds, cevet cats, crocodiles, & few others) without a major fuss. With Nandish, these caged fellows were actually quite fun to observe. Went to eat for a beach restaurant of a fancy hotel, I had few beers and a dip in the lake Victoria. hopefully did not get any parasites… also saw the botanical gardens of Entebbe, which were quite nice too with cerubus monkeys and fisherman on the shore. during the day Nandish had some mysterical discussions with the family, while I was reading a book and this seemed to affect the mode of the evening as well. after listening to karaoke at the garden shopping mall restaurant and watching Nandish writing text messages we ended up thanks to N. to Ange Noir, which was a bigger and probably better night club than the ones we already visited. Despite being quite tired I was pestered by N. to dance and actually had fun shaking the booty with several black girls. Unfortunately, the most promising girl, Valentine, was a Kenyan and would only stay until middle of next week, when we would not be back from the safari in Kenya…some irony innit. nevertheless, the boring evening turned out for a surprising good night out.

wonders of a swimming pool

after taking several "showers" at the house of Nandish's parents during my first week here, the Kabira club swimming pool and gym just few hundred meters from the Haria residence was a terrific experience. my thoughts ranged from why doesn't Nandish have a swimming pool to I want to move to Uganda permanently. even during the rainy season the weather has been great and despite the small inconveniences such as the african mentality towards work, I think I could be happy here for longer than just few weeks or months.

safari planning

safaris are very expensive to arrange even from kampala. information on what is required and what is not is bit conflicting and as me and Nandish are looking for a slightly different kind of a safari experience (is shower needed twice a day or not) it is difficult to make decisions. We might very well end up going to Kenia for the safari in masai marala instead of the ugandan savannahs. gorilla tracking permit would be available, but with the accommondation would cost me around 400 euros to seem them. soon I need to decide... as what comes to the ealier posts I just got the time and electricity to put them all up. next thing will be the pictures.

black & white

Sunday was composed of very different halves of a day. First there was Easter service in a small church near the Makerere University and the Bahai temple, then in the evening there was the night club of Speke resort, which was full of black prostitutes and booty shaking to the bollywood beat. On the other hand there was huge contrast between the night and day, but on the other hand you could find the similarities. I’ve never seen such a church service in Finland, with the singing, dancing and praising; people truly celebrating the Easter. While this could be expected from the stuff I have seen from the tv on the African church, one would need to really experience it first hand to get the feeling of joy, even though I only went as far as the church doors. Then there was the Bahai temple, which was calm and beautiful, and I wish I could have meditated truly and stayed longer without having to worry about my mobile phone starting to beeb. had a good long talk with Nandish about life on the temple grounds before we drove back to eat and get ready for the evening.

The speke resort bar (outdoor Rock Garden with a covered dancefloor) was pretty dark with the exception of the illuminated dance floor. immediately after finding the seats we also had company from three girls. I ended up talking with this supposedly 19 year old rhuandan girl, who claimed to have been an university student before having to quit due lack of money. For me the situation was both disturbing and exciting at the same time and I do not find the right words to describe how I felt.

life in uganda

What I’ve been doing here a lot is talking, and talking about wide range topics covering love life, cultural differences, economy, politics, religion, engineering, exports and electricity. The topic of electricity comes up often as the power supply is something between cut of every other day and suddenly back for the day. One would think that this poses quite few problems, which would be solved as soon as possible by the government, but of what I learned from Nandish this might last as long as five years. talk about bad planning of energy supply… the World Bank is involved and it would be interesting to find out what kind of environmental impacts assessment they have done for the new hydro power plant.

but enough of that, I am here as a tourist after all.. so what have I seen so far... hazardous bodaboda (scooter) drive to town along pot holed roads, some military parade field/monument, which you could drive through with a car, taken a picture of the house of parliament from afar, which was interrupted by a guy with a riffle, the packed Kampala city center, haggling for a digital camera, (which still are rarity in the local shops) and the general flow unexpected things as cows walking past Nandish’s house or sugar canes on bikes.

first impressions… my third day in Uganda and I feel like I have experienced more life during these days than in Finland in a month. maybe conflicting the earlier line, things in general happen here with very relaxed pace. The whole mind set of people towards life is different and I am happy that I am here on holiday. trying to get things done here with the pace I am used to in Finland would lead to lot of frustration. What I find staying with Nandish and his parents is off course an Indian perspective on Uganda, which in itself is very interesting. unlike the circles in which I hang out in Finland, the Indians seem to make very tough value judgements based on culture or race. personally I would have been more inclined to explain differences by temperature or other external factors, but I have my own bias towards the sort.

on the road…

I wrote few lines before getting the opportunity to update these pages...

or actually high up in the sky. flew over the alps few hours ago. quite an impressive mountain range. slept only few hours last night but fortunately everything has been going smoothly so far and I am happy to leave my daily routines behind. I was surprised to find out that we are flying to Nairobi after all… should read the small print such as stopovers = 1.

flying by black clouds and orange sunset. lightning flashes every second illuminating the cloud mass. not too close to be frightening, but awe inspiring. no way to record this from the small window of the plane, but I wish that the memory stays.

first nervous scribblings

I woke up at 7.15 after 6 hours of sleep. The first thought in my mind was that I will be leaving tomorrow to Uganda. I am always nervous when I am leaving abroad and worry myself with all the details excessively. I hope that I am able to sleep at least some hours during the next night. Thanks for the party last night for all whom could attend at such a short notice.

PS. I will not bother with spell checking of any of the posts here....