Without a paddle...

According to my soon-to-be-expired entry visa, I’ve been here for three months now. To be honest it feels more like a year. I’m not quite sure what to put that down to, long days, new stuff to learn, some type of “Africa Effect” maybe? I really don’t know.

The view from the balcony in Entebbe

A re-enactment of the nightly "bed invasion" at the Entebbe Office

The last month has been a bit more “business as usual,” yet I’ve still managed to do some new stuff and come back with a few stories. Achievement for the month is the fact that I am now a certified chimpanzee tracker, which means I can take people into the forest to find the chimps. I did have to sit through a week of training run by Disney (yes Disney… we even watched The Lion King!), but as they say – “no pain - no gain”.

Funnily enough, the first day after my training when I got some time to go on a full-day habituation patrol, the chimps nearly had me twice! First was in the morning, it had rained hard all night and I was sitting under a tree with another guide watching some of the chimps feeding. One of them must have put its weight onto a log which was dead and weakened by the rain, because it snapped and fell towards us. I’m talking a proper big ole bough here, something you could make a canoe out of!

It’s amazing sometimes what you can do in certain situations. Before I had even thought about it Id put one foot onto a tree stump and pushed off into some kind of spinning dive backwards. A move I could never hope to replicate under normal circumstances. Fortunately, Justin, the other guy had rolled sideways, also avoiding death-by-squishing, so we both sat in silence for a minute while the chimps in the tree shrieked and screamed about it all.

If that wasn’t enough, throughout the day we were watching a male called Shaka, who is known for being a bit of an “angry man”. On this day he was constantly getting shut-down while trying to mate with one of the high-ranking females. Unfortunately for us, we walked straight into him and his home boys on one of the paths.

"Shaka" having a wee sulk after lucking out with the ladies

The chimps in the forest have never attacked a person, but they do charge now and again if they are startled. Shaka, who was clearly having a bad day, stood, picked up a branch and started screaming at us. When these guys get angry their hair stands on end making them look enormous. They’re also 5-8 times stronger than humans! Justin was whispering to me “Get down, be small”. In this situation you’re meant to crouch down, not make eye-contact and put your hands in your armpits (otherwise they might rip off your fingers!). My heart was thumping and it took all my will power not to turn and run. After that I had to concentrate my energies into not wetting my pants. I’m serious, it nearly happened!!! Fortunately for us, Shaka’s posse wasn’t in the mood to back him up, so after a bit more screaming and stick waving he hurled the branch into the forest and ran of screaming. ..

Nile Rafting

I’ve been sitting at the keyboard for the last ten minutes trying to think up some superlatives to describe how amazing this was. I can’t really do it justice with one so I’m going to have to make up a new word to encompass a few. It was RANG’n (Radical, awesome and gnarly).

I should also mention at this point that all the rafting photos below I have taken from the Adrift Rafting website, as you couldn't carry a camera and I was too cheap to buy the trip photo CD. But I can honestly say they are a fair representation of the trip I was on.

Actually I did take this one, it's the view from the bar at the camp

I went out to Jinja by myself, but fortunately there was a massive group of people doing the two-day trip so there was a good crew. The rafting is done just after the mouth of the Nile and the rapids are the largest commercially rafted anywhere in the world. After the usual safety run-down we jump in our boat with our guide Tutu, who was “The Man”. As the rafting company is run by New Zealanders it was kind of amusing to have a Ugandan guide who constantly came out with lines like: “Sweet as bro” and “No worries mate”. We did a few warm ups, back paddling, turning, and then practiced flipping the raft and not panicking when you get sucked under a rapid. At this point it might all sound a bit dodgy, but it’s a really professional operation, we were accompanied the whole way by a safety raft and fifteen or so guys in kayaks.

We get to the first rapid, which from our vantage point in the boat you could see the river drop away into a roaring cesspool of froth and waves. We paddle up to the rapid with Tutu yelling in the background “Forward! Forward! Right Side! Forward! Harder! Get Down! Get Down! Hold On!!!” We drop into this rapid, the raft bucking beneath us and all I could see in front is a wall of white water! Next thing the raft is thrown in the air, sideways, onto another bit and then we’re off – all still in the boat. As I said, RANGn!!!

The only photo of me in a boat

We hit a few more rapids in this way, and then we went for our first “swim”. I figured that when we did flip the raft Id be tossed in the air, hit the water and float for a bit. Well. Pretty much one second I was in the raft, the next I was underneath it. I tried to get out from under it, but the old sense of direction wasn’t really happening and I kept popping up into the boat. Fortunately, just as my lungs were starting to question my brain on the sudden halt in oxygen flow I popped up alongside the boat, still in the rapid. Tutu at this point had recovered the upside down boat and is standing on top of it. Once he was happy that everyone was floating and accounted for he starts whooping and doing back flips on the boat. Nutter.

After 30kms of river we got to the camp where we stayed the night, then the next day, got right back into it. The second day had a few long sedate stretches which meant we could lie on the raft, sun bathe, swim and take in the scenery of the Nile… but it also involved a few more wild rides and crazy flips along the way. At the end we get to a rapid which has a continuous standing wave. First the guys brought out a whole lot of body boards, so we could jump into the rapid and ride for as long as you could hold on for.

There's always one...

Then we let some air out of the rafts and took those into the wave. This was awesome; it was like being on a rollercoaster with the raft jumping about but staying in the same spot. All up it was one of the best weekends of my life and something I’m planning on doing at least once more before I leave Uganda!

Flip and Flop – R.I.P

Sometimes, the most simple of possessions can take on a sentimental value. This happened with Flip and Flop, whose obituary follows:

In memory of Flip and Flop, who sadly perished in the jungles of Africa on February 24^th 2009. Flip and Flop were purchased in the Beijing Silk Markets, June 2007. Mainly by Marcus as he is better at arguing with people than I am. Originally one pair of blue and one pair of brown flip flops, an “altercation” over who got what colour, followed by some throwing of said flip flops, resulted in us both owning one of each. Flip and Flop have pounded pavements, climbed mountains and generally kept my feet from mankiness in 55 cities throughout 19 countries over 4 continents. Guys, you’ll be missed.

A New Messiah?

Uganda has a rather strong Christian presence, many people are very religious. It seems to be the fad to name your business or taxi with certain religious quotes. Some of my favorites are: “Jesus-Loves-You Stationary – for all your school supplies” and “Praise-The-Lord Dry Cleaning”.

It’s also interesting here that Jesus appears in many forms. Sometimes he comes in classic white;

Sometimes in cool black;

In reality, being of Middle Eastern decent – he probably bore more resemblance to the guy on the right…

But I digress.

Now there’s a new kid on the block;

Obamaaaaaaa!

Even though I’m willing to bet that 95% of Ugandans wouldn’t know the meaning of the words “Democrat” or “Republican”, as far as most people here are concerned there’s an African guy in charge of America now! Slowly we are beginning to see signs of this new messiah. The ever popular Jesus calendar for sale in the markets is slowly being replaced with Obama calendars. New businesses are springing up, painted in red, white and blue with names like “Obama Beverages and Dry Goods”.

In Barrak We Trust. All Rise.