23 March 2009

Post date: Apr 7, 2009 6:25:53 AM

23 Mar (Monday) Morning:

Arrived in Entebbe 15 min ahead of schedule yesterday at 8:45 PM. For my first time I debarked a plane in Uganda through a jetway, rather than unloading onto the tarmac and walking into the first level. The airport remodeling looks to be finally finished – a year after CHOGM --- and I think to myself again of printing T-shirts that say “I’ve been CHOGMed” or “Life after CHOGM.”

Immigration processing costs haven’t increased in the past year and are still 50 USD. I imagine they would still baulk if you tried to give them the equivalent in Ugandan Shillings (UGX) instead. That’s all I had in my pocket when I returned to Uganda from Zanzibar about a year ago. Immigrations had a tough time thinking outside their box with that one, but finally decided it was a money making opportunity and gave me an awful exchange rate. Now immigrations has large glassed in areas for the officers and it looks like a typical have computers and the process goes much faster. It actually seemed like everyone was enjoying themselves in the process.

Everything else at the airport went equally as smooth. My luggage was waiting for me and it all fit easily on my rolling cart. The ATM machine worked and I remembered how to translate USD into the amount of UGX that I would need for a few weeks. My MTN SIM card for my phone is not working. Apparently MTN took back the phone number during my year long absence, and I’ll need to go to their store in Garden City today to see if I can get it restored. Luckily my private hire taxi driver, Steven, was waiting for me just outside the airport and, since it was a Sunday, the ride into Kampala was relatively quiet with little traffic. It’s been hot and dry hear so the humidity is a little lower then I’m used to experiencing and the foliage doesn’t quite smell as strongly sweet as it usually does.

By 10:30 Steven and I arrive at La Fontaine guest house and restaurant. There’s a bustle of people gathered in the small lobby – filling up nearly every seat. I walk around a bit and notice a Ugandan that seems to be the one who might know something about the guest house. When I first inquire he seems perplexed – with a look on his face that says they don’t have a guest house and I’m in the wrong place. After I inquire a few times about it with an equally perplexed look – he tells me they are full. With a little despair I explain that a friend of mine called on Friday to reserve a room for the week. After I explain that two more times – he finally decides I must be the person for whom he was told the last room in the guest house was reserved.

Yeah, okay, things are still going well. I get my two trunks, computer, and guitar from my driver. The desk worker carries one of the trunks up to the room as I pay the taxi driver. As the desk worker and I prepare to finish bringing I the rest of my stuff one of the American woman in the small lobby approaches and asked if I need a hand. I give her my computer bag and we all head up to my room. On the way back down she asked if I’m looking for a place o stay. She’s stayed at La Fontaine before, she tells me, but she wouldn’t last here for long. She’s leaving Uganda unexpectedly in a week, for Bangladesh, and needs someone to take over her lease for $350 a month. Perfect I tell her. I was expecting to only stay at La Fontaine temporarily until I found another place to stay. I just didn’t expect to find that place within 5 minutes of my arrival in town :o)

She introduces me to the rest of the gang – some of them residents in the guest house – but most of them just visiting for the evening to have some dinner and social time. It’s a great little group of mostly Americans with a few Ugandans interspersed. There are no other Westerners represented which really surprises me. Usually you can’t find many Americans in Africa and here are three men, including myself, and six women. They’re all in their twenties and I’m sure they all think I’m thirty or less. That’s good enough for me.

I’d like to text my sweetie in Portsmouth, NH and tell her I’ve arrived and already have a place to stay – but my phone is mot operable yet. After ordering some dinner and bring my computer and try to log in. It isn’t for another hour or so that the girls figure out that the reason I can’t get onto the internet is because they’ve pulled the connection to the Wi-Fi and plugged it directly into their computer so they can watch the Kansas State basketball game. Around midnight, when the game is over, they try getting the Wi-Fi operable again. It seems everyone there is familiar with the quirky tricks to make that happen, but no one is successful. My sweetie will have to wait another day to hear from me.

Time for Yoga, then off to get the phone working, then off to Mango Tree to begin working.

23 Mar (Monday) Noon:

Well, it turns out the reason my phone doesn’t work is because it’s locked to T-Mobile. I couldn’t understand it at first – I contacted T-Mobile unlocked my phone two years ago. Then I remembered – this was a new phone. I had run over the old phone with my 4Runner last summer. Cheese and rice --- no wonder the phone won’t work with my Ugandan MTN SIM card in it. So I emailed T-Mobile and maybe that will be resolved by the end of the week.

I goofed around with the internet service at the guest house this morning – found a loose cable and reset everything. The lights all blink pretty now but still no service. After my phone epiphany I went to an internet site at Garden City and “got through the morning mail.” I also looked into buying a fan. The costs 93000 UGX and I thought holy smokes $49 for a floor fan. Actually as I think of it I don't know what a floor fan costs ---- still I need to buy it so I can sleep in the heat. After I eat lunch that will be my next purchase and then I’ll grab a private hire taxi back to the guest house before getting a Matatu out to Mango Tree. With some luck I’ll be there by 2PM and get started on the work there. I have gained a week head start this trip because the grant was signed on Saturday. Getting the grant signed has caused me a weeks worth of work and headaches in the past after getting here. It’s nice that Mango Tree has a new Director (Sjoerd from Amsterdam) that has the strength and courage to get the grant request completed and signed before I arrive.

Maybe a little background on some of the crowd from last night might be interesting . . .

Kate is a short American girl from Kansas under 5ft. She’s the big basketball fan that disconnected the Internet from the wireless router and connected it direct to her computer last night. This allowed solid audio of the game play-by-play and a refresh rate of about 1 picture every min. She’s about 30, an adopted child and a graduate of Kansas State. After working her way through school and now living in Uganda for a few years she’s about on her last penny and her parents are helping her pay for her Masters degree work Makerere University in Peace and Conflict Resolution - same degree as our friend Dinah from APCT. Kate wasn’t familiar with Action for Peace and Conflict Transformation (APCT) --- the founders of which have the same degree. It sounds like I’ll get to do some introductions there. You knew I would get to the big punch line sooner or later didn’t you? Kate also sets up Fair Trade companies. She's working on her second one. She said she wasn't too impressed with Beads for Life - a fair trade company in Uganda with HW in Boulder. Something for future inquiries . . .

Naashom is a little taller than Kate. She is the one that helped me with my bags last night and asked me if I needed a place to stay because she needed someone to take over her lease. She’s probably a little younger than Kate. I’m not sure where she grew up, but she got her degree in Marketing from Regis University in Denver. She’s fun to talk to since she loves Colorado. Naashom was in the Peace Corps for a while and it pretty well traveled. I think she’s working for USAID but not positive about that. She travels a lot and seems to not know how long she’ll be in any one location or where she’ll be going next. That sounds like a typical NGO. I’ll try and catch up with her soon so I can see the place she’s staying at and determine if it will work well for me. I’m pretty sure it will be a good fit and I can move in on May 1^st when she leaves. Naashom is also very interested in the Elements of Design instructional information that my cousin Michelle created for Mango Tree a year ago. I didn’t get much opportunity to chat with the rest of the gang – but I know there are people interested in Mango Tree, Technology for Tomorrow, APCT, and Children’s Global Peace Project - pretty good for my first two hours in town.