SATURDAY, JUNE 16: SATURDAY SCHOOL AND A WALK IN THE WOODS

Saturday School makes it the best day of the week! Vincent was there at 9:00, and we were ready to go. As we walked out, I noticed a woman mopping the floor in the hall on the ground floor. Thinking back, I’d seen people doing this more than once. And I had noticed a very faint smell there, too.

We hurried to church where about 200 kids were waiting. Practically every child had at least one hand that had to be shaken and an unlimited number of smiles to endow upon whoever would look. There was another program, this one a bit less well organized. Some of the kids sang, and several were very good. And there was a drama that seemed to never end about some robbers who eventually die for some unexplained reason. Every time I looked out at the kids, there were at least half-a-dozen trying to get my attention. They wanted a wave or a wink or a grin, and I got back giggles.

There was something very unusual about Saturday School. For the first time I can ever remember, every child had a chair!

They asked me to talk to the kids and I did. I told them that there was a chance that I wouldn’t be coming back to Africa for a while, but that I would pray for them and thank about them all the time until we met again. I nearly broke down!

We distributed a number of mosquito nets to kids who couldn’t take them when we saw them at school, like younger kids who, we were afraid, might lose their net to a thief. So I stood up front and gave them out one by one. In the end, we had passed out about 270 of the 300 nets bought. We’re planning to give nets to Moses, one of our former employees, for his family. He lives in a terrible place with tons of mosquitos. And there are others around the church who also need help, far, far more than the few left over nets we have.

There were also some kids who we’d missed for one reason or another. We talked with them a bit and made pictures.

Around noon, we said our goodbyes and headed for the van. The kids were in clingy moods, so it was almost a fight to get away. They wanted us to stay and play and talk, and we wanted to stay, but there was still much to do.

One of Wayne’s sponsored girls is in a boarding school that only allows visitors on Saturdays. We picked up the girl’s mother and drove to yet another new part of the city through a market area and into a very nice residential neighborhood. The school was another one on a very large piece of land. It ran to the top of a hill. It was beautifully maintained and landscaped. The most interesting thing was here we saw girls in slacks! It wasn’t their uniform, but the school was obviously allowing it on Saturday. We went to the administration building and waited for the girl who was studying. They had told her that her mother was visiting, so our crowd really surprised her. We visited for a while, then the mother joined us in the van for the drive back to the Kiwatule area.

After dropping the mother, we drove downtown to Bon Appetit. This is a chain of Ugandan fast-food places and Vincent had chosen the best of the bunch. There were very few tables in the place, but Joseph managed to commandeer chairs for everyone. Each of us placed an order, then waited in line until it was filled. Lisa was first with a one samosa order. She was the last order filled and she had to wait for a time even after all of us had eaten. These places never have the food on the menu, you always have to settle for something else. They are crowded. Seating is so limited that you can hardly ever all sit together. Not my favorite place, though my two samosas (they filled my order in no time!) were pretty good.

Our next stop was Garden City. We had to exchange the money for the hotel bill. With fresh cash in hand, we went to Umuchi, the grocery/super store, and bought coffee for ourselves and a few others.

Our last stop on Saturday was to be the national forest. I have tried for several trips to get a trip here, but it has somehow never worked out. It dawned on me last year that they really don’t want to go to the forest because they are scared to death of it, and this trip proved my suspicions. We had dragged our feet until it was after 3:00 before we even started toward Mpigi. We drove through the Saturday market traffic and we quickly slowed to a crawl. Once things thinned out, Vincent flew! He was going so fast that he missed the turn. He stopped to go back, then decided to go on. He and Joseph had a sharp discussion in Luganda. It sounded as though Vincent had decided we should go somewhere else. Joseph told him to go back.

So we turned off the highway and followed a dirt road a mile or so through grassy land. There were a few homes along the road. They were not impressive. We came to a sign routing us to either the camping site or the visitors’ center. We turned to the visitors’ center and found two picnic tables on decks beneath thatched roofs and another house, this one brick and wood. We parked the van. There was a commotion overhead in the trees. We looked up and saw black and white colubus monkeys jumping from tree to tree. We walked in front of the visitors’ center to a map of the forest. A young woman came running up to us and asked what we wanted. She said she was closed, but we could pay our fee and still go in.

We followed her into the center. There were three sets of bunk beds in the main room which are apparently for rent each night. She took us into a small office and collected 5,000 shillings for each Muzungu and 3,000 for each Ugandan. She gave us a small map and told us to take the 2.5 hour base line tour. She said the rain the night before had made the other trails a bit messy.

So we left the office and walked into the jungle! The trees soared above us, some well over 60 feet high. And the air was alive with sounds – strange birds calling, disturbed trees where monkey’s jumped, a group of Ugandans and Bazungu going through the woods.

Within 100 yards of starting out, I looked down and saw a moving black line of termites at my feet. “Do not stop,” said Michael. “These move very fast and their bite hurts very much. You must keep going. Everyone tried to step over the termites and we all succeeded, except David. As we all hurried past, David stood at the edge of the termites and looked them while commenting to us. He finally did step across and as he did, he let out a yell.

“You must hurry and find it,” Michael said. “They will climb very fast up your leg.”

David kept yelling and jumping around. In the end, the termites made it to mid-thigh before he got rid of all of them. He offered to show any and every one his bites, but he found no takers!

Grace and Michael were both scared to death in the jungle. They seemed concerned that something would get them. At one point, Michael told me, “Vincent was in the very back behind everyone when I saw him. I do not know if he is still there.” He meant that something might have gotten him!

We saw two other groups: a group of fellow hikers and a woman and her two sons who were gathering sticks in the forest. She refused our request to photograph them and we realized it was because she wasn’t supposed to be there.

We saw a number of birds, but not the shoe bill we had hoped for. There were red monkeys deeper in the jungle. We saw all kinds of trees and ferns and a lot of unusual insects. David got a fabulous shot of a dragon fly with fluorescent blue wings. Ray was in heaven! He looked at leaves and picked up things from the floor. At one point he left on a side trail for a while.

Our friends eventually settled down and everyone had a great time. We walked in the jungle for about two hours. We wanted to finish the base line tour, but weren’t sure about the light once the sun started down. None of us wanted to be lost on our first jungle outing. The amazing thing was that none of our friends had ever been to this place. “I have driven past hundreds of times and did not know this was here,” said Vincent. I had been with him on a half-dozen such trips and every time I asked about the forest, he said there was nothing there. So we have now been on a real live hike in the African bush.

The drive back to Kampala was uneventful. Vincent drove a bit more slowly than the day before. Traffic was lighter because fewer people were coming into Kampala. There were many more on the streets, but at least they weren’t in cars!

We drove to Century Park which sits between Garden City and the Hotel Africana. At Christmas, I visited a Turkish restaurant on its opening day. The food was great and the man who ran the place very interesting. So I suggested we go there. The outdoor restaurant was crowded with people from all over the world! I ordered a mixed appetizer plate and a mixed grill for the Ugandan team. Lisa and I ordered a small version of the Ugandan platter and David ordered a lamb kabob with eggplant. Well, actually, he ordered something totally different, but he got a lamb kabob with eggplant!

The food was so simple, yet spectacular. The mixed appetizer was really a series of spreads for the home made Turkish bread. We had everything from cheese to yogurt to olives to humus on the plate. Lisa and I had a generous selection of beef, lamb, and chicken kabobs, as well as a piece of fish, fries, and rice. The Ugandans had the same, but MUCH more of it. They were slow to start on the food because they had never seen it before, but they soon decided this was one of their favorite places. David’s egg plant was the best I’ve ever tasted anywhere.

The meal was spectacular, but frustrating in that way that only Africa can frustrate. The waitress asked for drink orders. Lisa ordered Turkish coffee, thought better of it, and changed her order to Stony. I told the waitress I wanted the same, so we both got Turkish coffee! It was good, but not what I wanted that late at night. David’s order was wonderful but not what he ordered. So a great place, great food, and frustrating service. In other words, welcome to Africa!

The owner came by as we were finishing to ask if we’d enjoyed the meal. I told him I had eaten with him on his opening day and I was very impressed with the changes he’d made. He seemed very pleased, and seemed to try to place me, but couldn’t.

Vincent took us back to the hotel and we said goodnight to everyone. As we started upstairs to our room, we passed a Ugandan woman in her bath robe screaming at the desk clerk. When we got to our room, we knew why: there was no water at all. We had none for a shower or bath. We couldn’t even flush the commode! It was the hottest, dustiest day of our trip and we had no way whatsoever to clean up for church the next morning.