Friends and Interviews in Soroti

Written on April 21-22, 2008 from Soroti, Uganda
By Anne Olson

Soroti – so good to see my Ugandan friends. Things are very different around here as Michael's guest house is open and there are staff members around. The children next door came to see me Sunday night and had songs to sing for me. I video tapped them on my camera and then we played them back and laugh. So fun!

I worked with Michael on Monday to write a job description for a new staff member they are going to hire. I interviewed 3 people; Michael will do a further interview and make a decision. I am involved with the interviewing as this is the person that I will be training on QuickBooks accounting when I return to Uganda in June.

Jinja to Soroti

Written on Sunday, April 20, 2008 from Soroti, Uganda
By Anne Olson

Travel from Jinja to Soroti by bus – about 3.5 hours. The road was pretty good most of the way so that helped the time go by fast. People again were very helpful when I had questions.

The River Nile

Written on April 17-19, 2008 from Jinja, Uganda
By Anne Olson

The first day after our long drive back from Bwindi was spent doing as little as possible. We sat by the pool and read books and relaxed. The next day we were rafting on the Nile!

There were 6 people for rafting the day we went. We had one guide and 6 safety people – 2 in a big raft and 4 in small kayaks. Our guide had us practice a bunch of things before we hit the first rapid (which was a small one) – forward paddle, backward paddle, "hang on", "get down", getting back in after the raft flips, feet up when in the water. It was so good that we practiced as we needed to know all of those things and it prevented me from being scared when we flipped the raft a couple of times going through the rapids. I went out once by myself (I don't think I followed the "hang on" command fast enough). The water was kind of shallow there so before I got my feet up, I "bonded" with a Nile River rock and left a layer of skin there (not a deep cut, just skin). My compatriots pulled me back in the raft in short time. We joked that my blood was going all the way to Egypt. Got a few other scrapes and bruises but nothing serious. The sunburn on my thighs, knees and arms hurt worse than the scrape on my knee. All in all, a very fun day!

On Saturday, Sharae and I went on a community walk with our guide Augustine. We visited his mother's house where 2 of her grandchildren were applying new mud to the sides. Her house girl was cooking matooke (mah toe key) bananas. They are peeled, wrapped in banana leaves and steamed for about 45 minutes over an open camp fire. Then they are mashed and served. I've eaten matooke (and like it) but had never seen it cooked. We saw many things growing as we walked the paths through the fields (they call them gardens). Fruit – bananas of many kinds, passion fruit, papaya, mango, avocado. Other things – maize/corn, millet, sorghum, cassava, beans of many kinds, potatoes (sweet and Irish/white), ground nuts, okra, eggplant, and more. We saw a woman grinding cassava into flour with stones. We saw many darling children and took pictures of most of them.

Augustine also took us to his home where we met his wife and daughters. His wife fixed a delicious dish of beans and cassava that we both enjoyed very much. His oldest daughter had just returned from nursing school where she had graduated at the top of her class. She and her parents were very proud. It was a great walk and very informative.

Nile Porch – our place of lodging.
Lyndsay, my friend from VEF US office, recommended this wonderful place to stay. We stayed in a tent cabin with wonderful views of the Nile from all parts including the bathroom and shower. The sound of the Nile put us to sleep each night. The staff was fun and efficient, the food was great, and the atmosphere was wonderful. Thanks Lyndsay!

Gorillas!

Written on Wednesday, April 14-16, 2008 from Jinja, Uganda

By Anne Olson

Another travel day – about 10 hours with 2 hours on REALLY bad roads. Our driver was very tired when we got there just before dark. Sharae and I were the only ones in the camp so we got great service. We had a great little tent cabin with bathroom and shower (hot water brought to fill up the "bucket" when we were ready to shower). They served very delicious (western) food and brought tea to our porch in the morning with our wakeup call. But the VERY best was the hot water bottle we found at the bottom of our cots when we got back from dinner! It was quite chilly there (especially for Uganda) so the hot water bottle was much appreciated.

Tuesday, American tax day, was our gorilla trekking day. We were in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest in western Uganda where half of the mountain gorilla population in the world live. There are 4 or 5 habituated gorilla families; habituated means they are used to having people come to see them as long as there is a guide in his uniform to bring us. Maximum group size is 8 and maximum time with the family is one hour. Early in the morning the trackers go out to find the gorillas who may be close to the park headquarters or far away. You then hike to wherever the trackers have found the gorilla family you are going to see. We went to see the Rusbegura family ("R" group) which has 15 members.

We met at the park headquarters and after orientation started off to find the gorillas. We hiked about 15 minutes and there they were. Further instructions were given and the cameras started snapping. At first they were high up in the trees eating. You could hear them making "ummm" sounds that indicated they were enjoying their food. The silverback, the lead male of the family, weighs about 500-600 lbs and he was the highest in the tree. It was amazing how the small branches would hold him; the guide said that he could also just grab the same size branch and snap it off if he wanted to.

An "old mama" came down first and sat down to look at us and eat some leaves from a branch that she had. She was maybe 10-15 feet away. She looked like a fat Buddha sitting there with such a peaceful look on her face. She is about 35 years old with a life expectancy of about 50 years. She was pretty funny – once she posed with her hand on her hip like a bathing beauty, then she got tired so just laid down on her back and crossed her arms like she was hugging herself. Sometimes she had her eyes closed and sometimes they were open but she was definitely relaxed. And not one bit afraid of us nor trying to frighten us.

The silverback came down next and that started the descent of the others. He was so big and his hands are HUGE! He "posed" for us for a while in all his majesty and then went over to lay down and sleep. As the younger gorillas came down, they would go over to sleep with him. At one time there were 5 youngsters and an adolescent gathered around him.

When the adults came down, they used the tree trunks. When the youngsters came down, they used the vines that were hanging from the lower branches – sometimes just sliding down like it was a fireman's pole. One of them was hanging on the vines and practicing his chest thumping with one hand.

A mother and her 16 month old baby came down and he was riding on her back. He sat up as mom was walking away and did a two-handed chest thumping practice. That had us all laughing. Small babies ride on the mother's chest, much like monkeys.

All at once the silverback decided that his nap was over and it was time to move on so he got up and started off. Most of the others followed him right away. After he crossed the path into the jungle, he stood up, made a loud noise, and beat his chest – a show of domination (I was convinced!). He continued on a bit further and then sat down to rest again. One of the youngsters and the adolescent male were close behind him; when they stopped the young one put his arm around the other one. Brotherly love??? When we were getting ready to leave at the end of our time, the young one walked over to a member of our group and touched his leg and his hand. He had his back turned and didn't know the gorilla was approaching him until it touched him! Then the young one walked in front of us – about 3 feet away. What amazing creatures they are! I like them as much as I like elephants!

The gorillas stayed in and by the tree we found them in for most of the time we had to view them. They were not afraid of us at all and were not threatening to us. Our guide was very good, telling us stories about some of their personalities and laughing at their antics. He truly loves those gorillas, is passionate about his work with them, and likes spending time with them.

The gorillas know the guides by their green uniform shirts. Our guide, Obed, once went to the forest in a tshirt without his green shirt and one of the gorilla charged him. Just a reminder that they are wild animals and not pets.

I found a book on Amazon.com called The Impenetrable Forest by Thor Hansen. Thor was a Peace Corp volunteer in the mid-1990s who was sent to Uganda to habituate the first group of gorillas for visitors. (One was already habituated for research.) The book is about the people and the gorillas during his stay in Bwindi. Fascinating! So while we were there (after trekking which ended about 11am due to our short hike), we started looking for some of the people in the book. We found 4 of them. One saw Sharae holding the book as we were turning the car around and said "I'm in that book!" So that was the start of our autograph hunting. Two of them still work for the park (our guide is the younger brother of one of them) and there are many who are retired and still in the area. It was so fun to talk with them and hear additional stories that were not in the book. One of them told us the story about walking sticks. Because the terrain is very steep, most trekkers, guides and trackers use walking sticks. So one day they found the gorillas in a meadow with some reeds growing there and the next thing they knew, the gorillas had broken off the reeds and were using them for walking sticks. Can you imagine that scene? He said they were all laughing so hard that day.

In the afternoon, we went to the Gorilla Clinic. It is a lab where the health of the gorillas is monitored with fecal samples that the guides and trackers bring in. The lab technician is working for an organization call Conservation Through Public Health (http://www.ctph.org/ ). This organization monitors the health of the local people and livestock as well as the wildlife. They have found that if the people and the livestock are healthy, the wildlife has a better chance of being healthy. In 1996 and again in 2000, a baby gorilla was found with scabies. As they did research, some of the local people had scabies and the gorillas had gotten it from them. TB and dysentery are also hazardous to the gorillas. So their goal is to educate the local people and treat them and their animals in order to conserve the wildlife in the area. Thomas, the lab technician, was interesting, knowledgeable and working with all three (people, livestock, and wildlife) in a unique job opportunity. What a great cause.

Wednesday was a long drive back to Jinja. At least the 2 hours of bad roads were at the beginning and not at the end. The countryside is beautiful – thousands of acres of matooke banana trees and trucks and bicycles loaded with matooke bananas. Lots of tea fields too. Mountains, valleys, greens of every shade. Beautiful!

Travel day to Uganda

Written on Sunday, April 13, 2008 from Uganda
By Anne Olson

Travel day – public transportation from Kenya to Uganda by myself. It was relatively easy as I had done it with Charles before so knew some of the ropes. A Ugandan friend picked me up at the border and took me to a place to catch a bus to Jinja for the start of my vacation. He took the big box of "stuff" that I had brought for my Ugandan friends. I was happy to have it off my hands. I left my computer in Kenya so I didn't have to deal with it either. So I was traveling light (remember "light" is a relative term! J). My friend from home, Sharae Gunn, met me in Jinja Sunday night.