I would tell you to close your eyes and imagine Uganda, but you’re reading, so don’t close your eyes. You are in the back of a taxi, or matatu, a 15-passenger van heading from Mukono to Kampala. There are only 19 passengers this morning though, so it’s not overcrowded, which is nice. To your right is an elegant woman on the phone and to your left is a man listening to music. Even though his headphones are on you can hear he’s listening to Nicki Minaj and bobbing his head to the beat. The girl in the front row keeps looking back and smiling because even though you keep quiet and try to blend in, you look different, you stand out. Blending in here is not usually an option, so you embrace it, smile back and wave (from side to side, not opening and closing your palm – which means ‘come here’). The road from Mukono to Kampala is paved, which only means that there’s more traffic, really. The taxi bumps in and out of potholes and jerks to a stop every few seconds to avoid fill in the blank. Drivers here are surprisingly good at avoiding obstacles, or pedestrians here are surprisingly good at stepping just far enough back to avoid getting clipped. Most of the time vehicles and the people outside are close enough to shake hands, or even hug.
As you drive through towns along the way, your senses are bombarded by the surroundings. After being here a month, things have become commonplace but no less fascinating and even sometimes amusing. You see people of all different ages, styles of dress and participating in different things. Children with holes in their clothes roll a tire down the road with a stick. Women carrying baskets on their heads walk without moving anything but their legs. Other women stand inside their booths selling vegetables piled in neat little pyramids. Men work in the shops, or walk carrying goods either bought or sold. The conductor of the taxi is always leaning out the window yelling out our destination to possible passengers. The shops, down a small slope, line the street. They are all painted with “Sosoft” fabric softener, “MTN” mobile, “Sadolin” paint, or “Mirinda”, “Coke” or some other beverage. If you hadn’t seen the men painting the buildings and signs, you would think they were decals. The storefronts rarely ever sell what they are advertising though. Instead they are Internet Cafés, clothing boutiques or small general stores. Along this particular stretch, people are selling furniture – everything from hand carved bunk bed frames to art-deco plush couches. The sight of a motorcycle driving down the street with a full sized couch hanging off the sides will never get old. Even though the boda-bodas can be annoying, it’s amazing the things they can carry: hundreds of pounds of bananas, 10+ foot long sugar canes, 4 passengers (and a baby), and…couches.
The smells are no less overwhelming. Here, diesel is the most predominant; the cars, motorcycles, coaches and taxis fill the air with exhaust. Inside the taxi, it’s impossible not to smell the other passengers – and everyone smells different. The smell of burning garbage wafts in and out as you pass piles engulfed in flames. Sometimes you can even get the smell of maize, or chapatti being sold by the street vendors. Through everything is the smell of dust, the red dust that permeates everything.
The sounds that accompany the journey are the sounds of engines, hundreds of vehicles taking people or things somewhere. The taxi conductors yelling to the people on the street. People bartering. Children laughing and calling “bye mzungu” if they catch a glimpse of us passing. Grinders of people sharpening machetes, the all purpose tool. Chickens and goats as they graze in the tall grass that grows in the unclaimed spots along the road. Vendors coming to the window of the taxi to sell his goods, today it’s juicy fruit gum. Silence is hard to come by, especially on this crowded street. But the sounds are of community, people interacting with one another on a level that doesn’t often happen in the States. The closest comparison would be a flea market or farmers market – only that it takes up the whole city.
Kampala is different. If New York lost most of it’s people, all it’s traffic lights (except 2), had fallen into disrepair, and was filled with red dust that might be Kampala. There are pockets that seem entirely out of place. Garden City and Nacumat Oasis, for example, where westerners, Asians, and Wealthy Ugandans can go to get everything they need without having to interact with the local majority, except at checkout. You have to pay extra for that kind of convenience, but they don’t seem to mind. It’s strange to be there, because even though it reminds you of Walmart or a grocery store at home, you know that the people you spend your days with don’t generally have the opportunity or ability to purchase things from a place like that. So you marvel at the fact that they sell real cheese, but are appalled at how expensive it is and wonder if luxuries like that are really necessary. Part of you is grateful for the taste of the life you’re used to back home, but the bigger part feels uncomfortable because this is only reality for a small percentage of Uganda and a small percentage of the world.
Traveling back to campus is relieving. The sights that have become familiar are comforting. Back at UCU the monkeys jump from branch to branch and as you walk up the hill to Florence Hall dorms it hits you that you’re in Uganda. This is life.
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