Day 2

So hard to believe it’s been only 48 hours since we pushed our bags out of the small Entebbe airport doors and scanned the many faces and signs for those of our host.  We have seen and experienced such a multitude of new things and discovered a world both wonderfully and tragically foreign to that we know.

Monday is a school day.  Alicia is already up long before 7:30 am when she has the pleasure of watching the children in their various coloured school uniforms leave for their studies.  Victoria hires a motorcycle taxi (boda boda), whose driver she has carefully and personally screened for safety & caution despite her own morbid fear of riding on motorbikes.  This driver picks up the youngest children to transport them to & from school.  The rest of the kids walk.  “Mama” dreams of purchasing a boda boda, renting it to a driver to give her a weekly income and save on the cost of school transport. 

 

Once I drag my bones out of bed and endure another cold shower, Victoria leads us on a walk to the supermarket.  Alicia pointed out to me that the contraption on the shower wall is a water heater controlled by a switch outside the bathroom, so warm showers are a possibility, provided hydro is working and I remember to flip the switch 20 minutes before bathing.  BKU is on a dirt road in a small township named Kisubi on the edge of Entebbe.  We walk perhaps 1.5 km back towards the main road, frequently moving out of the way for cattle herds, trucks, vans and boda boda who vie for paths around the deep potholes and valleys.  The journey requires enough caution to fear for the safety of the younger schoolkids.  Folks working outside their small shacks or tending vending stalls tend to take a long glance at the “muzungu” (white folk), but usually respond with a friendly “hi” or wave when spoken to.  The children invariably stare openly at us, and shout and wave when we acknowledge them.

Dodging traffic

Bananas stacked at a shop

The supermarket is the size of a moderately large convenience store back home.  Alicia finds the drinking water and milk at the home quite unpalatable, so we pick up some bottled water and Coke for her.   Jam, pasta noodles, a bag of flour, a bottle of wine, some unfamiliar snack chips, 3 newspapers, and a couple of other small items difficult to identify were all to be had for $64000 Ugandan Shillings, for which I traded about $30 USD at the expensive airport foreign exchange.  Inexpensive to us, but terribly dear for a local worker who may be paid $2600 shillings for a day’s work chopping rock for bricks in the hot equatorial sun.  Hence the need for the young man with the rifle sitting outside the supermarket and the many staff, one of whom accompanies us on our rounds through the aisles and carries our basket.

Alicia finds a furry leopard skinned bottle of liqueur which I have to promise to buy from duty free for the trip home.

Victoria purchases 3 pairs of “Croc” type sandals from a vendor on the return journey, replacements for a few children whose footwear is excessively worn.

The last leg of our flight here stopped at Kigali, Rwanda where we lounged on the craft for 45 minutes while passengers disembarked & new ones boarded, headed back to Brussels.  The young man sitting beside me for the last short bit of our journey is a teacher from the UK.  He planned to volunteer for two years training teachers in rural Rwanda, but gave up after 6 months.  The local teachers spoke enough English that he felt he was accomplishing something in his chosen mission, but he found the isolation imposed by the language barrier became unbearable after a while.  Apparently the Rwandan language is terribly complex, and after six months he still could manage no more than a few phrases and superficial greetings, so he had no one with which to converse from the time he returned to his lodgings until the next work morning.  Fortunately for us, one can get by quite comfortably using English in Uganda.

This fellow repeated something I’d heard from another African visitor: the smells are something that will assault your senses and which you may not have expected.  Truly, the road from BKU to the supermarket provides a riot of stimulation to all senses, and smell is not the least of those.  From the ubiquitous wood-burning cooking facilities, to diesel fumes, fresh cattle dung, luxurious vegetation and the occasional throng of humanity, one cannot fail to realize “this is not Kansas, Toto”.  I find it more interesting than unpleasant, but Alicia, who has a vivid sense of smell and hearing, struggles a little more at times, I think.

Once re-hydrated upon our return, we have a little ceremonial presentation of our donated supplies to the clinic and I meet nurse Rosemary.  There is a photo op, of course, and I sit down to review the clinic supplies and needs, some of the screening and preventative care she is currently undertaking, and what assessments and treatment she is allowed to perform.  Her scope of practice is closer to that of a nurse practitioner back home.  Rose is allowed to diagnose illnesses and prescribe and administer medications.  She has some quantity of antibiotics and dressings on hand, but will require more.  An otoscope would appear to be highly desirable.  I ask her to make a list, and we will visit a pharmacy warehouse shop tomorrow when we accompany Isaiah to the HIV clinic in Kampala.

Nurse Rose is pleased with our cache of supplies

This is the clinic building and workers busy completing the second floor.

One of Victoria’s relatives arrives to consult with me in the afternoon.  This elderly (and elegant) lady has been plagued with pain in her left thigh and knee for many months, and lately is feeling the pain in her right leg.  She saw an orthopaedic specialist in the city, was advised the source of the problem was a spinal disorder which I didn’t quite understand in the translation, and she was given some medication and advised to get a firmer bed, which does not seem to have helped much.  I do not find much physical evidence of spinal disease, and her hips and knees have surprisingly good pain-free range of motion, so I have nothing to add to what she had been advised.  She plans to return tomorrow with her X-rays and the name of her medication, which may provide more clues.

An unfamiliar quiet descends on BKU during the school day.  Ten month-old Don and busy toddler Arnold keep us on our toes when they are not napping, but mostly the staff has a welcome chance to rest and catch up on chores that have been waiting, such as hand laundry.  Still suffering jet lag, I take the opportunity to nap for an hour.

Alicia & Sister Immaculate watch over Don

Alicia works on the evening meal while I sleep

At 10 months of age, Don is the youngest BKU kid

Victoria and Sister busy in the kitchen

In the later afternoon, Sister Immaculate takes Alicia and I on a walk in the other direction from the supermarket.  We pass Banana Village, a small resort tucked away in the trees that is popular with Caucasian visitors who head out from there on tourist or business sorties.  Also a quarry where the red rock is hacked out by hand and shaped into bricks.

Our destination is a satellite property of BKU that houses two small barracks, a cookhouse, outdoor washrooms and gardens growing cassava, maize and sweet potatoes.  It is situated on a hillside overlooking a picturesque river and marsh.  We wave and smiled in response to the many lively shouts of “muzungu” from the residents we see on our return walk, and our ears are treated to the strains of evening prayers from a local mosque.

Sister Immaculate leads me on the path to the older kids' compound

All the children’s sleeping quarters are crowded, often six or more to a room and sometimes children sharing beds.  With the numbers of those in care continually growing, there is certainly a need for more accommodations.

The boys at play outside the kitchen hut

One room of the boys' quarters

one room of the older girls' dorm

View of the older kids' compound from the girls' dorm

Janat

Justine

Janat, Olivia & Vicky

The older girls pose with their "Auntie" Matron

Vegetable garden (foreground) and boys' dorm behind

This evening Alicia & I are amused to speak with Richard, one of the older boys, and educate him about Canada.  The concepts of four seasons, snow, leaves changing colour, maple syrup harvesting and McDonalds are all completely foreign to him.  It is fun to bring up Google images to show him what we were speaking about.  Even Victoria, who has traveled to the USA and Israel, has not experienced maple syrup, so we will need to ensure some future visitor brings a sample.