Sunday, September 20, 2009

Return from Bwindi

The next morning we were on the road by 7AM. We had decided to take a different route home in order to drive through a game reserve and pass some crater lakes – both of which proved disappointing. Instead of heading NE to Kampala, we drove north, adding an extra couple of hours to our trip. The scenery as we left Bwindi was again breathtakingly beautiful – at least what we could see of it. For several miles, we were on a dirt mountain road which was under construction, making visibility almost zero due to the thick red dust kicked up by the construction equipment and other cars and trucks ahead of us. (Unlike in the U.S., there is no watering down the dirt when building roads.) Finally, the mountains and verdant hillsides appeared, as we left the road work behind us. After several hours, we passed a lovely little lake behind a wire fence. We stopped for a photo and continued on our way. I did not realize until later, that this was one of the crater lakes – in fact, the only one we saw!

We proceeded toward the game reserve, passing cyclists balancing enormous bunches of bananas behind their seats and women carrying their produce and wares on their heads. Needless to say, this results in very erect posture. However, I would think that their cervical spine would compress over time. I did learn from the orthopedic doc traveling with us, that the incidence of osteoporosis is extremely high in Uganda due to lack of calcium in their diets. They just cannot afford dairy products, but their life style certainly lends itself to weight bearing exercise. Many suffer fractures in their late 40’s. The average lifespan is early 50’s due to malnutrition, HIV/AIDS, and lack of access to healthcare.

We arrived at the game reserve in the heat of the day – high 90’s with high humidity. Our driver drove us around the reserve in search of animals. We did get to see warthogs, kobs and waterbucks (the latter two being members of the antelope family). We were disappointed with so little animal sightings, but the driver explained most were probably hanging about watering holes at this time of day. We left the park and proceeded to Fort Portal for what we thought would be a quick lunch. We ordered and then waited an hour for our food to arrive. One comes to learn that African time is quite different than our concept of time. Hoping to get back to Kampala before 9PM, we gobbled down our passable lunches and headed southeast.

Around 8PM we knew we were entering the capital, as the traffic was horrific – as always. Bota botas (motor bikes), bicycles, matatus (small van-like buses), and cars vie for the little space available on the roads. There are no street lamps or traffic lights and many vehicles have no headlights and reflectors on bikes are almost unheard of. Basically, it’s a free-for-all and extremely dangerous. Mulago Hospital gets about 1000 bota bota accidents a month – mainly open fractures and head injuries. Open fractures are particularly dangerous here due to the probability of tetanus, and most can’t afford to pay for treatment.

At 9 PM, we were back at our guest house and happy to sleep in our comfortable beds, after enjoying hot showers.

Next entry…my visit to the Acid Victims Foundation

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