"Day" 1

    On January 27th, I received a very clear call to go Uganda. Less than two months later, on March 22nd, I was dropped off at O’Hare (by my wonderful sister-in-law) with a backpack of my stuff and two 40-lb duffel bags filled with items for Imprint Hope. If Nathan of early 2020 saw Nathan of early 2021, there would be a lot of questions. I talked to a few people while waiting for my flight, but mostly prayed that the first (14h) flight would go well. Somehow, I made it through two separate security/bag checks with a bag that was twice the allowed weight, twice the allowed size, and had twice the allowed batteries. When I boarded and finally got to my seat in the second to last row (47), I was dismayed to see that I had an aisle seat that would make sleeping difficult. I started talking to the woman sitting next to me as we waited more than an hour for the plane to start moving. A few minutes after take-off, a flight attendant asked me if we were traveling together. I told her I was traveling alone, and she quietly said “there are empty seats in the next cabin if you want to move after we reach altitude. You can also move now if you’d like.” I threw my things back into my carry-on and zoomed to the next cabin up the 30-degree incline of the climbing plane. On top of getting a window seat, I ended up in an empty row. Like a bird in spring, I grabbed the extra pillows and blankets and built a little nest for myself. I barely made it through one movie before dozing off and on for most of the flight – basically only waking up for food/drink services. 

    We arrived in Qatar and I was disappointed that I didn’t have the opportunity to connect with the woman from my original seat before getting off the plane. Before getting to the next gate, we had to go through security yet again. I braced myself for the inevitable discovery of my battery stash as I waited in line. They said to leave everything in the bag – no way for me to spread my batteries and prevent them from realizing they all belonged to me. I made it through the scanner and waited for my bag to get through. Then the luggage belt stopped moving. I hoped it wasn’t my bag, but one look at the monitor showed that it clearly was. I saw the stack of batteries, along with a bunch of objects that looked very suspicious to me. After an eternity of turning knobs and staring at my bag, he started moving the belt again and held his hand out towards the bin holding my bag. He grabbed the bin and… helped it move from the belt to the rollers. I was surprised but quickly grabbed my things and moved along. I landed at 1700 and wasn’t boarding until 0010, so I began wandering around the large (and very impressive) airport. I was intending to explore Doha (the surrounding city) but was told that I couldn’t leave the airport due to covid. After about 30 minutes, my path took me less than 10 feet away from the woman I had been sitting next to on the plane. She was waiting until 0030 to board, so we decided to hang out. We explored a bit more, tried to get vouchers for a meal or lounge since we had a 7+ hour layover (“I’m sorry sir, we can’t do that because of covid.”), then settled on a café area that had fancy, plush booths. We started chatting and the time flew by. She was going to Nairobi to visit a friend and to try to re-center herself after a crazy year. They announced our gates about an hour before our flights and we parted ways after praying together. 

    As I waited to board, I noticed that I was getting a lot of looks from other people waiting to board the flight. I wasn’t totally sure why, but I guessed it was because I was the only white face out of the 100+ people waiting for the flight. Once on the plane, I was greeted by a very friendly flight attendant who said, “why is your hair so much nicer than mine? It’s not fair!” 😊 The back of the plane had about 20 people for more than 200 seats, so I made another nest and settled in. Next stop, Uganda! I woke up when we were about an hour away and was too excited to go back to sleep. We started our descent and I got my first glimpse of the continent of Africa – I’m pretty sure we were above Rwanda at the time. There were small patches of light and then I saw the sprawling lights of Kampala. A short time later, we were touching down. I had a sudden rush of thoughts and feelings as the wheels made contact, but mostly I was excited. Once I was off the plane, nervousness began to replace my excitement. The airport was the smallest I’d seen, and I was getting a lot of looks from people. Maybe I don’t belong here. I started to think of all the things that could go wrong – they could reject my covid test results, they could refuse my visa, my bags might not have made it… not to mention that I was relying on someone I didn’t know to have made the 4-5 hour drive from Jinja to be there at 0800. We lined up for customs, right next to a bunch of posters showing the causes and symptoms of various things like Ebola, yellow fever, and malaria. I really did not need to see illustrations of people with explosive diarrhea, violent vomiting, and bleeding from the eyes/nose/mouth. Once I made it through customs, I walked the 50 feet to the baggage claim area and almost immediately spotted my duffel bags. One was smashed into a pancake and the other one was in a large plastic bag because the seam had ripped open on one side. I grabbed my pitiful bags and walked another 50 feet to the front door of the airport. 

 

    There was a soldier/guard with an AR near the entrance and he seemed friendly enough – or maybe I was just desperate since there was almost nobody around – so I asked him which of the 10 wifi networks I should connect to. He told me the best one and then started chatting a bit, which I thought was nice… until he said, “you should give me some money so we can be friends. Maybe I will come visit you in Jinja.” My foggy brain took a few seconds to process what was happening, then I attempted to deflect by asking him if he goes to Jinja often. “No, but maybe I will visit you there. You should give me some money.” I stuttered a bit and told him I didn’t have any shillings on me. Another guard came out to talk to him and I seized that moment to turn and walk away with my bags. Yikes. I sent a message to the person who was supposed to be picking me up, but I couldn’t tell if it went through. I found a seating area for “meeters and greeters” and decided that was a good spot to wait. Almost immediately, I was approached by a taxi driver that asked if I needed a ride. I told him someone was coming from Jinja and thanked him for the offer. He said there was no hope of someone being there that early with that long of a drive. He asked if I had talked to him that morning and laughed when I told him I had not. “He will not come.” This happened with 3 more drivers over the next 30 minutes and did not help my nerves. Meanwhile, I killed 10-20 mosquitoes and noticed that they all had spots or stripes on them – aren’t those the ones they told me to avoid? Hm. Around 0745, someone walked up and said “Nathan?” My new friend, Ashraf! He helped me carry my bags to his car, where I stood next to the driver side door until he softly reminded me that I was on the wrong side of the car. Oops! We stopped for some breakfast at the Victoria Mall and then began our long drive to Jinja. Wow, what an amazing drive! Such a beautiful country and so full of life. Ashraf seemed happy to chat and I learned all sorts of things about Ugandan culture and the various cities that we were driving through. The first part of the drive was on an expressway that was nicer than most of the roads in Indiana and he told me that I should not expect all of Uganda to have such nice roads. We passed all sorts of roadside vendors with fruits, chicken on a stick, and drinks. In some of the bad traffic, they were wandering between the standstill traffic – Ashraf warned me to keep my phone away from the window so it wouldn’t get swiped. Apparently boda bodas (motorcycles) will sometimes drive past a car and snatch phones out of them before zooming away between the cars. I think the most amusing part of the drive was seeing cows crossing a concrete bridge over the road. Ashraf also taught me a handful of phrases in Luganda, the most common language in southern Uganda. The 4-hour drive went by incredibly quickly with all the sights, sounds, smells, and information being thrown at me. 

(I later found out that they will confiscate your phone if they see you taking a picture of the bridge. It is owned by the Chinese and that building is their security.)    

    When I arrived at my home for the next 2 months, I was happy to find that it was even nicer than the pictures I had seen. It’s a “hostel” that caters to muzungus (white people, but literally “someone who wanders aimlessly”) who are here to serve Uganda in some way. The first guest I met lives 40 minutes from South Bend and is here with one of his kids to finalize the adoption of a Ugandan boy. He’s been here for 2 years because the process keeps hitting snags and bumps – nothing happens quickly here, so I keep hearing. I also met two people from Barcelona who are here for a week to do a project for the NGO that employs them. Tomorrow they are going to a jigger clinic for two days before they return to Barcelona Saturday. There are also two (young) women that are staying here for the night with a Ugandan boy they are taking to a nearby hospital for a hernia repair. They are 25 and 23 with about 6 years living in Uganda after moving from Georgia. They nicely told me that I’m wasting my time by taking malaria meds because malaria is pretty rare in southern Uganda and the preventative treatment will mess me up more than malaria will, assuming I catch and treat it quickly. They also had some jigger experience, so we talked about that over dinner. 😖

    

    Definitely an eventful 44 hours since being dropped off!

The view from my bedroom. 😄

Living room

Backyard