We were welcomed in grand fashion on the Kasiisi School playing field this day. Where once we worked mainly with Kasiisi School and to a lesser extent with Kanyawara School, now we are working with five schools with a total attendance of more than 3000 students. New to us are nearby nearby Kiko and Kigarama Schools, and Rweteera School about 7 miles south.
All five schools came in force, in celebration, performing multiple songs and dances each. Local dignitaries made speeches, including the District School Superintendent (who oversees hundreds of schools), the local political leader, Prof. John Kasenene of the Makerere Universtiy Biological Field Station, Kasiisi headmistress Lydiah Kasenene, a director from the Uganda Wildlife Authority, and several others. Barbara spoke for the Weston contingent, since their superindent, Cheryl Maloney, could not come at the last minute due to a death in the family. Parents and family of students gathered. People walked from nearby villages to watch and enjoy. A beef lunch - a notable luxury - was served to hundreds of the participants.
One particular Kiko dancer, a very small girl - but exceedingly determined and fluid and energetic - was honored by not just one but two older women, who separately emerged from the crowd to give her money. No other among the hundreds of performers was recognized this way. The visiting group and other guests including Richard Wrangham interacted with hundreds of teachers, parents, dignitaries and students. What a celebration!
We loaded our 30 duffel bags onto the two minibuses again - actually, Akiiki and Apuuli did nearly all the work after we'd hauled the bags from our rooms to the driveway. Then we embarked on the 7-hour drive of 165 miles to western Uganda, through the outskirts of Uganda, then to Fort Portal and onward to the university field station where we're staying.
We had a short stop along the way at a vegetable market stand, a buffet lunch at the Gardens Restaurant in Fort Portal - drinking Stoney Tangawesi, our favorite African ginger ale.
We also visited Richard (Akiiki) Tooro's fine travel and safari shop in Fort Portal (left). At the field station, which is run by Makerere University of Kampala, we were met, to our enormous surprise, by all of our visitors from last year's Uganda-Weston exchange! Many made the rather long trip from Fort Portal during working hours to do this. We had a long and heartfelt session of "kugwamunda": tummy to tummy in warm greetings.
The field station celebrated 20 years in 2007. The facilities are remarkably good especially given the remoteness of the location. Our quarters are at the left end of the long white building (below) which is behind and up the hill from the main buildings (left). We're just a few feet from the jungle. At night the colobus monkeys sound like lawnmowers as they communicate warnings to each other.
Barbara and I went down to the lake with the group to see them off on their boat expedition to the Ngamba Island chimpanzee sanctuary.The event moved slowly - it unfolded, as we've come to say. After the group left on their boat, Richard Akiiki drove Barbara and me from Entebbe to Kampala to buy textbooks and to visit a charity organization that helps schools plant indigenous trees.
On the way we learned that Ugandans call the lake Victoria when among non-Ugandans butNaruballi among themselves. The local names that have persisted for hundreds or thousands of years remain alive no matter what the rest of the world says the official name might be. Most likely the local names will supplant the imposed ones, as has happened for example in India in the last several years. Some Indian people, though, say that names don't really matter, and the effort to change the name of Bombay to Mumbai wasn't worth it. We are after all more global everyday, and probably for the better in most ways. Before the Bantu migrated east into what is now Uganda thousands of years ago, Naruballi must have had a different name. And a thousand years from now it'll have yet another name.
Also on the road to Kampala, there's an unusually large billboard filled with a photo of a beaming Juliana Kanyomozi, who's one of the most popular singers in Uganda. She's a Tooro from Fort Portal. The Batooro people are immensely proud of her.
A striking change from three years ago is the number of new wireless services and their service franchises along the roads. The service providers, among them principally Uganda Telecom, MTN and Warid, paint franchise shop façades their corporate colors in exchange for licensing the franchise and placing their advertising on the façade. In a tiny strip mall of 5 or 10 stalls and stores, half might be wireless franchises, sometimes even all for the same service. (Paint vendors seem to be doing well too; could this be part of why?)
Kampala roads and streets are a riot of color and action. Richard Akiiki and others from Tooro don't like the city: "It's troublesome, dirty, polluted". The air is heavy and pungent with exhaust fumes from ancient vehicles, charcoal smoke, and the not-unattractive sour smell of tropical vegetation and wet soil. But the city is tremendously alive, growing, rising up, spreading, vital.
Back in Entebbe in the late afternoon, we all walked in a large group to an exchange office that offers very good rates. We were the center of attention for hundreds of eyes every second of the way as we wandered around half lost. A young Ugandan man accosted us, trying to sell us small handmade necklaces. We said no. He persisted. When we kept on saying no he turned accusatory, saying that the whites have abused the Africans and that our day of comeuppance would be soon. We didn't try to tell him that our mission is ultimately in support of that day. Nor did we try to tell him that Africans would have abused whites the same way had the power balance been reversed. This was the only overt hostility Barbara and I have experienced in two trips. It rattled the whole group a bit. We ended up phoning our vehicle and being driven back to the hotel, rather than walking back carrying what onlookers would know to be thousands of dollars worth of Ugandan cash. The guidebooks warn explicitly against letting people know you have lots of cash with you.
We had an excellent barbecue that night at the Boma Hotel, featuring native tilapia from Naruballi. Someone asked if the the Southern Cross constellation might be visible - and there it was, halfway up the southern night sky, placed perfectly in a break among buildings and trees for us to view.
Boston was humid and warm, Amsterdam was cool and humid, and Kampala was very warm and very humid.
The flight from Amsterdam to Kampala seemed filled mostly by people from charity organizations and missions. It felt like a cocoon of westerness as we crossed over the Sahara Desert for hours. Our excellent meal was elaborately designed and presented: covered with a custom designed and recyclable molded plastic cover, it consisted of Cretan soup, a cucumber salad, Tillamook cheese with crackers, a packaged honey cake, and a fresh roll. How different from what those on the plane are likely to eat in Uganda.
We sat next to a young man coming home from Denmark. He and several colleagues had just finished software development training for their startup company, which is building a microfinance site to connect global investors with local entrepreneurs. This is good - it's new in Uganda (to my knowledge) and a welcome sign. I found myself thinking, the time will come when the Ugandans will tell us not to come any more in order to help, but instead to come only if we'd like to enjoy some life with them. That's the time I believe we're ultimately seeking.
Night fell suddenly, shortly before we landed in Kampala. The airport terminal windows swarmed with large tan-colored flies or beetles that were attracted to the light. Too big to be lake flies. On the lower level where a door to the outside was open, with every pace or two you'd step on one with a loud sound like popcorn popping.
Richard Tooro (nickname Akiiki) and his wry sidekick William (Apuuli) met us at the airport with Toyota minibuses. After a near mishap over what might have been lost car keys, we drove the ten minutes to the Boma Hotel (photo) , unloaded our 30 large duffel bags of gifts for the Ugandan schools, signed in, and gathered on the verandah in a cool Lake Victoria breeze for beer and laughs.
This blog is about our trip to Uganda from mid-June to mid-July 2008. We're accompanying an exchange visit by a dozen educators from the Weston, MA, school system.
Where once we worked mainly with Kasiisi School and to a lesser extent with Kanyawara School, now we are working with five schools with a total attendance of more than 3000 students. New to us are nearby nearby Kiko and Kigarama Schools, and Rweteera School about 7 miles south.
Local dignitaries made speeches, including the District School Superintendent (who oversees hundreds of schools), the local political leader, Prof. John Kasenene of the Makerere Universtiy Biological Field Station, Kasiisi headmistress Lydiah Kasenene, a director from the Uganda Wildlife Authority, and several others. Barbara spoke for the Weston contingent, since their superindent, Cheryl Maloney, could not come at the last minute due to a death in the family. Parents and family of students gathered. People walked from nearby villages to watch and enjoy. A beef lunch - a notable luxury - was served to hundreds of the participants.
One particular Kiko dancer, a very small girl - but exceedingly determined and fluid and energetic - was honored by not just one but two older women, who separately emerged from the crowd to give her money. No other among the hundreds of performers was recognized this way.
The visiting group and other guests including Richard Wrangham interacted with hundreds of teachers, parents, dignitaries and students. What a celebration!
