This is being typed to the backdrop of the marching band practicing down the road. So imagine sitting in the middle of a high school band practice room but they only have one melody and it repeats itself every three measures and it mostly bass drums counted in 4/4 time. OK - now we're ready. And the thrill of it all is that when I arrived home today there was and still is electricity. And I have the electric kettle heating water for tea. Ah yes - going to fix... back in a jiffy. Ah - now we begin. Oh! There has been a lull in the thudding of bass drums and now there are choral stains of some lovely "hallelujah hymn" drifting in. Sound is everywhere here - you just can't always pick. But I'm getting off topic...
Yesterday was a day to remember - or more correctly put - a day I will not forget. It was my first real day to go into the field to see what's done there - so we set out at about 9:00AM. I got to the office at 8:15 and no one was there. Went to Uchumi to get treats for the trip and by the time I got back there were two small marching bands assembling in the parking lot. I'd like to claim they were for me, but I've not achieved that level of fame - infamy perhaps - but not fame. Some dignitary obviously coming to town. Remember - the last marching band was hired for National Hand Washing Day.
I have been warned that it's a loooong day when we go to Amuru - the roads are bad, even on a good day and it's well, pretty much in the bush. I've packed rain gear, water, phone, Acholi dictionary and notebook, PBJ sandwiches, a Snickers bar, hard candies for fellow travelers, apple, hand sanitizer and handi-wipes, hat, sunglasses... Still, I'm sure I've forgotten something. The day will tell. Since I get car sick riding in the back seat and have lost one of the two anti-motion sickness pressure point bands that have been the saving grace of bus, taxi and car trips thus far, I improvise. This is done by squeezing a hard candy between my turned-upside down-Timex and the pressure point, hoping that this spark of genius works. The pecking order of Ugandan culture puts my counterpart in the front seat... no calling "shotgun" here. Besides - here everyone would duck or run for cover.
Now on the road about 2 hours - being bounced around in the 4-wheel drive Toyota truck, I am trying to think of parallels in the states and all I can come up with is those horrid carnival rides that make any sane person want to throw up. I'm getting it for "free," if you don't count giving up two years of what was a pretty comfortable life. Here - just driving is a thrill ride. I'm not being tacky - the Ugandans feel the same way. As we are slip-sliding around potholes and two foot deep ruts, we notice a great assembly of humanity on the road. Easily 100 people standing around - women with monstrous baskets of ground-nuts (peanuts) balanced on their heads, men with hoes and bikes hauling HUGE bundles of charcoal or wood with chickens hanging off the handle bars, more women with babies strapped African style to their backs, many pregnant with the next one. As we climb out of the truck to wander down and see the trouble, there - down in a trough - are not one, not two - but three mammoth vehicles all tipping precariously in different directions. All the people have climbed out of the two busses coming from the Sudan and a huge cargo truck has been unloaded its contents all over the ground. There is no forward motion - just a team of six men trying to push the cargo truck upright.
We take pictures, rub our chins, 'Hmmmmmm" (an entire conversation in Uganda) with the other observers, and realize there is no way these are going to be cleared out in time for us to make our rounds.
We turn around - a precarious act itself - and find a detour road. This continues along happily enough for a while, but it becomes clear that this is more of a trail than an actual road. The grass gets higher and soon reaches over the top of the truck and holes appear. OMG - now there is no road, just the hint of one where the grass in the middle is only 4 feet high. I am trapped in a National Geographic episode and no one is filming.
Finally - out of the jungle, a road re-appears and we continue on, stopping at learning centers that consist of some logs on the ground, set up theater style in rows - a group of men sketching a map where another organizations is contributing a bore-hole (think well) for the village. Women sitting on the ground, nursing babies - and little kids hovering staring at the Munu.
Onward like this for the next few hours, visiting other centers one of which is very advanced because it has a thirty foot long thatch roofed, mud-dob structure and classes can be held there when it rains, which is does while we are there. The wind is blowing like a hurricane, it's getting down right cold (in the middle of Africa - this is a dream right?) and the roof - of course - leaks. I realize that what I have forgotten was a jacket.
It pours torrentially and we set out for home, the roads now worse. At least the three busses are cleared out by the time we reach that point and I'm thinking we're home free. No so. Just ahead the road "slopes down" and in the dip, the stream has swallowed the road, but Emmanuel, the driver, is convinced we can make it across. Thank God, there is another vehicle stalled in the middle, so he does not (cannot) cross and we turn around again to find another detour, picking up a drowned-out motor cycle and its two passengers on the way. They are loaded into the bed of the pickup and many hours later - in the dark - we are home.
I kiss the ground when I arrive safely home, discover a friend needs to spend the night because she has malaria and set up the air mattress and sleeping bag for her. Starving, we attack the bread to discover it is moving.... having been discovered by millions of ants. I suggested we make toast, thereby killing the little -uckers, but she declines, reminding me she is a vegetarian. I scramble an egg instead and climb in bed, mud and all.
A friend today asked what I want her to send in a care package and horrified, I realized at the top of my list was ant bait. It seems I have not fully acclimated.
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