Kampala TownThis morning I forayed into Kampala to visit the book store (and look at guidebooks and maps of course), check out an African craft village which the students from NDSU went to, and visit the Uganda Tourist Agency for some information. Early in the morning on the weekend is a great time to go into Kampala as the city is a shadow of it’s weekday self. There are still people and vendors and taxis and bodas, but just less. I asked the fellow sitting on the taxi how much the fare was (it varies according to whether you get on at the start of the route or the end, and the time of day, and a few other things I haven’t quite figured out), and he insisted on making sure I had correct change as “sometimes the conductor doesn’t give people like you the right balance (change)”. How nice of him. People like me would be mzungus, or whites.
Aristoc bookstore is just wonderful - apart from a great selection of guidebooks and maps, it has all sorts of novels, biographies, and just interesting books about travelling and being in Africa. Plus a selection of more “sophisticated” western novels (i.e., not too much Danielle Steele), technical and trade books, and school and children’s books including a series of illustrated readers telling traditional African stories. That was a big success, the Tourist Bureau less so. I was there in the fall and was unimpressed, and my second visit didn’t change my opinion. They had either no information or outdated information on the places I was interested in, and refused to do any phoning around for me (of course they may have had decent reasons for that - like no phone or no phone budget. But I don’t know what the average tourist without a phone is supposed to do. I guess they are supposed to have a private tour guide or company to sort it all out for them. The African craft village consisted of stands selling mostly Kenyan and Tanzanian trinkets, which the students thought were great. I’ll stick with the upmarket place I did my Christmas shopping at last fall.
Betty had a friend’s 5-year old daughter over for a visit, who wasn’t quite sure of what to do with a while person actually having lunch with her. She had her hair done in the most exquisite tiny braids, which apparently took a LONG time to put in but will last 2 months. Hairdressers do a variety of elaborate things with synthetic hair extensions, braids, twists, loops. They come in a variety of colours as well, but fortunately for all I’m not tempted.
World Cup Football
I went out for dinner and to watch the consolation round of the World Cup with Roger a fellow originally from the UK who has lived in Uganda for many years and makes this his home now. His partner is a woman I met in California on sabbatic many years ago, and she introduced us on my last visit. At that point Roger was kind enough to take me out for dinner when I was in desperate need of a meal that didn’t include posho and matoke. Roger’s 20 year old son is home from university in the UK so the two of them and there labrador puppy picked me up and we had dinner at their house before heading out to watch the game. The house is a classic for much of African ex-pat living - rather sprawling on a nice plot with lots of greenery, fences and gated, and filled with lovely things collected over a lifetime of living and working around the world. Roger sorted out feeding the dogs, and interesting mix of posho, vegetables, and a bit of meat. The local tourist magazine has classifieds in the back, one of which is “Dog meat for sale” with “this means meat for dogs” in brackets after it. I don’t think commercial dog food is a big seller.
We had rabbit stew, the rabbits being raised by a friend and it made me think of Farmer McGregor or Hogan’s Heroes to eat it. After dinner we headed off to a bar in town where there was a good sized mixed crowd there to watch the game. Initially we had the football with a soundtrack by Bob Marley, which at least protected us from the sound of the vevesalas (or however you spell that) but they got it working shortly into the first half and we all enjoyed a very exciting game.
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