If you follow my blog, you know that I hate going into Kampala. The smells, traffic, and massive hoards of people just turn me off. Needless to say, I have been to Kampala three times in the past three days. I know. I still hate Kampala, but EVERYTHING is there! My previous trip on Friday cost about $40 for a private driver, so I decided that I was going to travel like a Ugandan on Saturday. Yes, I know the embassy warns us about taking the local transportation, but when have I listened to authority? The local transport costs me a little over a dollar to travel to and from Kampala..A DOLLAR versus $40...yep, public transport is the way to go. I decided to go into town to go to the actual market with my friend Dorcas and Joy. Before we left, Joy and I make pancakes and bacon and then met Dorcas at the gate. We walked to Mukono and grabbed a taxi. The taxis look like this:
This is not an actual shot of my taxi, but exactly the same idea. They are crowded and hot, but the best form of transportation. They stop whenever you want and they constantly take on new passengers. I like to sit in the back so that no one has to crawl over me to get out. So, we spent most of the day at the market and by the time we wanted to head back to Mukono, I was exhausted. We found a taxi to come back home and climbed in. The guy wanted Shs2500, which was Shs500 more than I thought he should
charge, so I said I would pay Shs2000. He didn't like that and told us to get out of the taxi. After a few choice words of what I thought about the way he treated us, we found another taxi. I know I am supposed to keep my mouth shut like my mother taught me, but I was ticked. I was angry that we had to walk in the hot sun to find another taxi and I was irritated that they man treated us that way. Generally, Ugandans are very, very friendly and kind, so I was surprised by his behavior. He was an older man, so maybe he was having a bad day.
I took these pictures in Kampala on Saturday. It was a mad house.
After church today, I met my friend Emmanuel for lunch. He promised me Chinese, so we headed into Kampala. It was raining on our way down to find a taxi, but I didn't think anything of it until we started heading into town. It started raining harder and harder and the traffic was literally stopped. I asked Emmanuel what was going on and he said the road was flooded, but that the taxi would go through it. However, once we went through the first flooded out area, the driver realized we were not going to make it through the other flooded out area and turned around. So, we went through this area twice and I had ample time to snap pictures.
These were people on the side of the road just watching all of the commotion.
You can see the water as we approached the flooded area.
Many of these homes in the background were probably flooded.
There was water rushing around us as we passed it in our taxi.
View from the back of the taxi.
View from my window.
These guys were passing us while riding in the taxi. It was a little scary because the taxi had to stop while waiting for the traffic while we were still in the rushing water.
I love this picture of the person sitting in the middle with everything just rushing around him.
I imagine many of these places were flooded.
These were all of the boda bodas waiting to cross.
These was our sizzling beef and sweet and sour chicken. It was definitely worth our four-hour journey. The food was delicious!
My friend and lunch partner, Emmanuel. Emmanuel is the sound technician at UCU and runs everything for church, chapel services, etc.
On the way back home, there was a huge traffic jam, so the taxi decided to go "off-road" which just means that we were on dirt roads. The roads are very, very bumpy and take a lot of time to travel on, but it was better than sitting in the traffic. I feel like I got the true Ugandan experience this weekend...now off to do homework and prepare for classes this week!
