Sunday July 18, 2010 - Sorry, too busy to blog this week..

Sunday July 18, 2010 - Sorry, too busy to blog this week..

Well I guess getting complaints about being out date on the blog means people are reading it so that’s a good thing. I may have “blogged myself out” last week! First off, I’m fine and my small life in Uganda has not changed much. Apart from what I see on the television and the news, which is simply rehashing old stuff at the moment, the only difference is that on Thursday I saw 2 army guys in uniform (normally the army is really invisible) and Friday I saw 3. I am well tied in with the Americans at the USAID RESPOND office, and my phone number has been put on their “warning” system if anything big happens, I’m registered with the Canadian Government Travel Site, and that’s really about all there is to do at this point. I don’t tend to frequent the busy downtown markets and the vet school is out in a suburb and well out of the centre of things, so I’m well positioned not to be involved it anything were to happen again. And as it goes with these things, Sunday may well have been a one off and that will be the end of it. So - safety bulletin over, what have I been up to? I’m going to blog retrospectively, so I’ll get this one up and try and fill in the earlier part of the week as I get a chance. I’m also not sure how many pictures I can post on my current net access so that may have to wait a bit.

Today - we had the first rain of my visit. We had thunderstorms and it poured and poured for about an hour. When I was here in the fall we had rain almost every day, so it is definitely a drier time of year. But when the rain stops the sun comes out and everything is almost perfectly dry in a very short period of time.

On sleeping in

I had a sleep in this morning, which takes a bit of effort. The world starts early here - well before the sun comes up the birds start singing. At least some of them sing. There are things called plantain eaters that are a kind of go-away bird and they make the loudest most obnoxious hysterically insane chimpanzee screeching noise that you can imagine. Apparently, when one of the original Tarzan movies was filmed at the Entebbe Botanic gardens they sound of the plantain eaters was the chimpanzee background noise. There are also the hadeda ibises, who true to their name say “HADEDA” in really really loud voices very very early. And then some dogs and pigs and cattle and sheep and boda bodas and people and all in all one has to work at staying it bed, let alone sleeping in. But I managed it today.

On bird watching and cows on roads

After a number of hours of reviewing protocols and powerpoints I gave it a rest and went out for a birdwatching stroll around campus. Picture me standing under a tree, staring up at the sky, binoculars around the neck and big book open in my hands. Yup, I draw attention. There is never anywhere without people walking around, so they either look at me quite oddly, or stop to see what I’m looking at. It seems to make sense that I might be looking at birdies, and everyone agrees that there are a lot of them. I haven’t cracked up a lot of species, I haven’t really been trying that hard, but it’s fun anyway.

The vet school is at the far north end of campus, and is surrounded by some fields - hence the cattle, although they actually spend more time wandering around the roadways and the lawns that they do in the fields. In fact, yesterday when I walked into town there was a bullock walking ahead of me down the university lane towards the gates out to the main street. He was proceeding with great purpose and no one was stopping him or seemed the least bit disconcerted. I wondered if I should head him off and do something dramatic in the middle of the road waving my arms and such, but in the end I decided against it. Perhaps this is his regular route. Anyway, I bird watched my way around the scrub land behind the ruins of what was to be the Small Animal Clinic (I was told the Entebbe raid put paid to the Israeli aid money that was building it and work has never been resumed). There are half hearted plots of mealies and other crops out here, presumably everyone knows what belongs to who. It doesn’t have that tidy market garden appearance, rather more like a straggle of randomly placed and rather scruffy plants.
But nice to have some green space as outside the University grounds things are totally built up.

Uganda is hilly, and the university is built lengthways along Makarere Hill. We are about halfway up on the east side, so I headed up towards the top to look for a view. There is a big roadworks project on, which is great. The roads on campus are pretty atrocious - potholes, gulleys, ridges, and the odd killer speed hump. There are little stretches of remaining tarmac in some areas, evidence of a once smoother ride. And the sidewalks are either major hazards or non-existent. The drainage ditches have big concrete covers lining their lengths, at least most of the way. There are pit traps every now and then, actually more often than that, so it’s a bit of a challenge walking at night (not much in the way of regular street lamps). Anyway, the grader and roller were out there in full force, along with some guys with pickaxes who seemed to be just digging everything up, so there is major progress at work. There is a little camp down the way where there are big piles of gravel and barrels of pitch bubbling over wood fires, so maybe there is a plan for some paving, or a least patching. Would be welcome.

Anyway, I wended my way up the small roads to the top of the hill, and over it, where I found the Food Technology building looking to the west over Kampala. What a magnificent site - right up high with an amazing view and a wonderful breeze. Pretty spiff new building as well. The university is a tremendous mix of “seen much better days” and “wow nice new building”. I think the former predominates, money for maintenance is hard to come by here even more than at home. So many buildings, both residential and official, have broken glass in the windows with ragged curtains streaming out, and a generally really run down look to them. The area I walked up through today is made up of nice sized plots with rather attractive houses on them. I suppose at one point this was faculty housing. Most of them have converted into aid organization offices, but some still appear to be residential although its likely they have been subdivided into smaller units. Sort of a faded dream of days gone past.

Betty’s Family

Betty has had various family over visiting, two of her brothers, one with a wife and young baby has stayed for a few days. The concept of brother and sister is a bit more ambiguous here than at home - many men are polygamous, so the “half-siblings” are considered full brother or sister, and if cousins were brought up together they are also. So when you ask someone how many brothers or sisters they have its not such a simple question, sometimes requiring a fair bit of calculation and the resulting answer might be preceded by “I’m not really sure but... “ . I need to take some cooking lessons from Betty - it might actually be useful to know to make posho or Gnut (peanut to us) sauce. And I have a feeling these recipes don’t turn out so well unless someone shows you how to actually do it. I’ve been dodging cooking anything particularly meaningful, although I have broken down and made spagetti and rice with stuff. I made myself the most delicious grilled cheese and tomato sandwich the other day - I offered to make one for Betty as well but she declined with rather a look of horror on her face. Not in the repertoire I guess.