Uganda
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    • Day 58

      More of Kampala

      February 28, 2016 in Uganda ⋅ ⛅ 24 °C

      We've been taking it easy in this big ol' capital. We walked over to a place called 1000 cups of coffee yesterday since both Jack and I have been itching for a good latte. So, so rewarding. Along the way was a little craft village with all your typical and repetitive tourist aimed crafts like wooden giraffes, drums and bags. We've decided to keep our shopping for our last stop - Nairobi. Thats hoping we'll find what we want there... You find yourself weighing the pros and cons of having to carry things for another month or not finding them again later.

      Visiting the Mengo Palace and Bulange Royal building gave us a good bit of new knowledge of Ugandan history and their attachement to their tribal history. The monarchs reign over social and cultural issues here, and are incredibly respected by the people. As our guide from yesterday put it, in newspapers here you will find many caricatures of the president, mocking him, but you will never find anyone saying something negative or mocking the kings in Uganda. The Buganda King, based in Kampala, has the largest Kingdom, was given the crown at 16 years old. It is passed on to the son of the Royal families chosing, and can not be given to the first son, unlike your usual royal line.

      Each Ugandan identifies to a tribe and a clan. The clans are all represented by animals or insects and such. It's interesting to hear them introduce themselves - I'm from the Buganda tribe, and the elephant clan. To this day, even the youth, are proud of their clans and follow the tradition (mostly) of never marrying someone from your clan, yet marrying within your tribe. They ask about Canadian clans and tribes. It's hard to justify that I know so little about our First Nations that I can't really contribute to that conversation.

      The visit at Mengo Palace also led us to this old underground torture chamber used by Idi Amin during his time as general commander. They say in the 6 years he used it, over 15000 people were killed here, mostly by the use of electricity run through the body of water kept along the corridor... It was marking.

      We made our afternoon into an art gallery one, quite like in Kigali. Free art galleries, why not. Again, having the money and space for these things, my apartment would look so eclectic and wonderful...

      Topped the night off with a movie - DeadPool! I was so excited! I've been talking about seeing a movie for a while, it's a way of letting go and really relaxing. My mind, which never usually stops working throughout that day, can finally stop and enjoy the movie. I laughed the entire time, loved it. I was probably in an extra good mood since I got to chat my sister thanks to the great Wi-Fi in the mall. It's was therapy of its own to get to hear her voice.

      Last day in Kampala before heading to Jinja for some River rafting... Wish me luck!

      FYI - I didn't elaborate yesterday, but the national mosque was beautiful! It had contributors from around the world, chandeliers from Egypt, carvings from Marrocco, stained glass from Italy... We even got to climb the minaret and had incredible views of the city. Only down side is the coverings they give - made me feel incredibly awkward to have to cover up into a hijjab and skirt... Like Halloween.
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    • Day 59

      Un café qui coûte cher

      February 5, 2022 in Uganda ⋅ ☁️ 27 °C

      But de la journée : se balader au marché d’Owino pour trouver des petits fruits et légumes, une chemise pour Sarah et des lunettes de soleil pour Robin.

      Nous longeons d’abord l’avenue principale qui mène jusqu’au golf de Kampala. La route est assez agréable à pieds, il y a de larges trottoirs et des croisements avec des feux tricolores décoratifs. Nous croisons quelques ambassades et longeons le golf de Kampala à l’herbe impeccable où joue la haute société ougandaise. Nous arrivons à l’Oasis mall qui accueille un magasin Carrefour. Nous prenons le café.

      Nous payons, Sarah fait un tour aux toilettes, et profitant de son absence, un homme vient s’asseoir en face de moi. Il baragouine quelques mots en anglais et semble me reconnaître. Je lui demande alors si c’est Norman, notre hôte Airbnb qui nous accueille à Kampala que nous n’avons encore jamais vu. Il me répond que oui, Apparemment, il nous a vu rentrer dans le café et nous a reconnu.

      Ensuite il me demande mes premières impressions de Kampala. Je lui réponds que tout va bien, que son appartement nous convient, etc.
      Il enchaîne la discussion en me racontant que sa voiture est tombée en panne, est au garage et qu’il a besoin d’huile de moteur, ou du moins c’est ce que je comprends car il est très difficile à décoder. Je lui dis que je suis désolé pour lui.
      Un blanc dans la discussion…

      Sarah revient. Je lui présente l’homme qui est à notre table. Norman raconte alors à nouveau son histoire d’huile et de voiture. Puis je commence à comprendre qu’il a besoin d’argent.
      - Combien tu as besoin ?
      - 60’000 UGX (equivalent de 15$).
      C’est vraiment bizarre de la part de notre hôte Airbnb de demander de l’argent comme ça, mais je finis par lui donner.
      Il me dit qu’il a besoin de 2’000 UGX de plus pour rentrer à la maison en moto. Je lui donne. Il me dit qu’il me rendra l’argent le soir même. Bon, étrange mais pas la première chose étrange depuis qu’on est arrivé en Afrique de l’Est. Il part.

      La journée passe et la nuit arrive. Une fois arrivés à notre appartement, je recontacte notre cher Norman pour lui réclamer l’argent prêté plus tôt dans la journée. Il me répond qu’il n’est pas au courant de ça.

      Confirmation que Norman n’était pas vraiment Norman.

      Morale de cette histoire : j’aurai du prendre un smoothie à la mangue au lieu d’un milkshake vanille

      Ps : Voici une photo des belles chemises que nous avons trouvées au marché.
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    • Day 57

      Finally the Capital

      February 27, 2016 in Uganda ⋅ ☁️ 21 °C

      We made it to Kampala! Busy, tons of people, impossible to walk effectively Kampala!

      I'm a small town kind of gal when it comes to travelling. I like peaceful, simple places. Big cities are sometimes overwhelming. But there's a certain character in Kampala that really needs to be experienced first hand. The streets are lined with street vendors everywhere, and that's on top of the multiple markets. As much as I'd like to say you can find anything you need around every corner, most of these vendors just repeat themselves. Fruits, second hand clothing, snacks, and a bunch of handkerchiefs.

      There's people everywhere. Again, we haven't seen that many tourist though. Maybe that's because of the size of the city. Who knows. But the vendors will grab onto you, they'll use pitty tactics like buy from me, help me. You basically have to ignore everyone talking to you because responding to everyone would take too much time.

      Jack has an incredible sense of direction, so she managed to get us to the hotel and get us to a mosque and Hindu temple we wanted to see... It was impressive. Because of the size of the city, I'm afraid we will have to take boda-bodas to get from site to site. We're currently in a very central hotel, 6 floors up, broken elevator of course. According to lonely planet, it's the best deal you'll find in town. Whether or not that's true, who knows, but the location is fantastic. The fan wasn't working, and in this room you need a fan! So when we returned from our walk around 7pm they came to replace it. 10 minutes and we had a new fan. Then the TV, which is wall mounted, had no electrical plug around it. Whoever thought that through should be fired. So we asked for an extension cord and eventually got it, only to realize there's 2 channels - one with really boring news, mostly a list of statistics, and one with football highlights. Hm. Then the hot water never made its way up. Good thing the location is great... And there's Wi-Fi!
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