Oli Jones' trip to Uganda: 2014

We're back!

This trip has been an amazing and life changing experience, I am so grateful to all those that have donated. Without you, none of this would have been possible. I'm sad to leave Uganda but I'm also glad to not have to worry about catching a deadly disease or fetching water. I am currently writing up as much as I can about the trip as I didn't keep a full journal when I was out there. Here is the first section. If you don't want to read tons of text you can scroll down, I have embedded videos and photos from the trip contextually in the text that you can look at.
Journal may be unmoderated in some sections

A snapshot of my trip:Beginnings

I went on the plane and I didn’t feel to sad or scared that I was leaving, I just felt excited. I saw some amazing views, like the Alps and the sunset over the Sahara desert. At one point the sun reflected off a lake and it was absolutely stunning. When we arrived in Uganda I was expecting a wave of heat to hit me as soon as the plane door opened, from what people at home had said, but it was too different although the air was thicker and more humid, even in the airport. I was already on edge as Previously on the plane, there had been an announcement that 50 bags had been left back at Heathrow and I was praying that wouldn’t be me, it couldn’t be me, after coming all this way, all the planning, British Airways wouldn’t dare cock it up.

With a bit of adrenalin I took the letter of apology about if you had lost your bags and the form I had to sign and walked down and followed the group down to baggage collection. We waited for five minutes, only George and Theo’s main bags arrived as well of one of Vicki's charity bags. The next twenty minutes consisted of frantic form signing and giving our contacts and trying to sort the whole mess out. Theo and George were so smug I felt like punching them both in the face. But strangely within the next half hour I didn’t feel too bad, I felt more excited about being in Uganda. I couldn’t really process what just happened enough for it to affect my excitement about being in Uganda. As I went to the visas office the man on duty there did exactly what Rob had told me he would, I gave him $50, he put it under something and then asked me for $50 again. I told him I just gave him $50 and he acted, looking down going ‘Oh yeah” before stamping my passport. He looked bored and disappointed that I wasn’t another stupid tourist to make some money from. I assume it works in some cases. With

that we passed the man with the Ak-47 near the airport entrance and applying Deet, we went out into the car park, it was night. I got a taxi with George and Theo to our hotel. As I came in on the plane I noted how far apart the lights were spaced out in the city. Like they were lanterns on the sea or something. They were white not orange, it was a completely different kind of light pollution. As I drove through Entebbe, although I could not see much, the city seemed so under developed or different to our own.

We were dropped off at the hotel and were welcomed in by a nice white man from Holland who owned the place and spoke very slowly. He showed us to our rooms, which were quite nice. I sent my parents an email. Just letting them know what had happened and then went to bed. In the morning, I gave Jess $100 to change up, (everyone gave their own amounts). I was surprised at the amount of notes I received back. Ugandan money is quite cool. As expected, Theo took a selfie of himself with all his money, unfortunately I could not bring myself to do so as I felt too much of a prick, and in that respect I put all my money in my money belt and played my guitar until breakfast. (I was so glad I had brought it with me as hand luggage as it proved extremely useful in the following weeks) We all had breakfast outside which was pineapple with pink yoghurt, toast with spreads, scrambled egg and bacon? and coffee. We were then visited by the sisters during breakfast, who had travelled to Entebbe with the minibus that would take us to the school. They were very warm and shook all our hands in Ugandan fashion, hugging us close and smiling. The owner of the hotel seemed happy to see the sisters, I think he already knew them. The sisters were offered breakfast and they accepted, so we sat with them at the table for a few minutes, before packing up and leaving. (Of course Elvin was the last to leave the hotel.) Then we all went in the minibus, which reflecting back on it was quite nice compared to all the other vehicles we went it in. It was cream and grey with curtains on the windows which flapped around all the time, and seat belts (which I later found out, seemed to be an optionalthing in Uganda instead of a requirement). We left the hotel through the large iron gates and drove into the noisy traffic. It was interesting seeing Entebbe and Kampala by day because I arrived in darkness, so it was like seeing it for the first time. The houses were completely different, most of them had corrugated iron roofs and painted for free by companies like Sadolin paint, Pepsi, Nile Special, Riham, MTN. Branding was everywhere.

There were Boda Bodas everywhere that would carry people around the city or even general goods. I saw huge bags of grain and pieces of wood as wide as half the road lashed on the back. At one point I even saw a huge expanse of chickens tied together by the feet, a huge expanse of feathers tied on the

back. I love the lack of health and safety regulations. I could see people ducking and jumping out of the way to avoid being smacked in the head, or avoiding the giant pieces of wood. There were also taxi type things, I can ‘t remember the name of them. They were like weird VW camper vans and they always had something religious on them, like Trust in the Lord, or Praise Allah. I later found out that they, the bit in front of the back front seat, there was a piece of metal by the seat that was so close to the engine that it became boiling hot and you would burn yourself if you touched it. I sat in one later on and found this out by nearly burning my self. You can also burn your leg on the Boda Boda exhaust pipe. On the journey to the school, the country side was very different to the UK, different to what I had expected it was much more luscious than the UK but also more yellow. But also all just a bit different. The wild life and stuff too is different. They still have wasps, but they are larger with longer legs that hang down while they fly. They still have the types of birds that we have in the UK but they are different colours. There were lots of new animals I had never seen before. Especially on Safari. There was a tree at the school that always had lots of weaver birds in it, which made lots of noise. The children at the school caught at least five of them during our stay. One thing that did remind me of home, were the swallows which migrate to the UK. So when I looked up and the sky is blue with swallows flitting around I feel like I am lying on the trampoline in my garden, because the view is almost exactly the same, just at a different time of year.

For the next 6 hours we drove through the countryside, out of Entebbe, Kampala, through Jinja and Iganga and to Busembatia. I remember seeing huge factories in the middle of nowhere. People were trying to sell us fizzy drinks and bananas while we were in the bus. There were often at least 3 to 5 people at one window, often. I never bought any fizzy drinks out of the window, but I did buy bananas

which were much better than any you can buy in the UK.That goes for all fruit in Uganda. I also remember connecting all out headphones up to a splitter so that we could all listen to music simultaneously and driving don a really straight road, with all the windows open and all the curtains flapping around. We did make one stop. I think we made one stop. Actually we made two stops. I can’t remember whether they were in Kampala or Jinja, I think the were both in Iganga. One, we stopped outside a supermarket in Kampala. People hassled us to buy stuff as we walked into the supermarket. Which got on my nerves. We bought some crates of water for 7,500 shillings which apparently was a really good rate. Water is more expensive than Coke in Uganda and that water lasted us nearly a week. The second stop was in Iganga, we walked around and looked for supplies, because most of us didn’t have our bags. Elvin found a clothes shop. He bought a fake, shirt with croc logo, can’t remember brand name, the ones that are usually really expensive. He also bought a pair of bright orange shorts, which had no crotch space and which we wore almost consecutively for the next few weeks. He looked like a bean. I bought two T-shirts, one billabong, probably fake, which was purple and I thought quite a good choice. I also bought a ‘Decibel Jeans’ T shirt, which was the plainest T shirt I could find. I didn’t buy any shorts as I didn’t want to have no crotch space like Elvin, I thought the chaffing would be unbearable and they were bright orange. Jess also looked into getting a SIM card for my phone but for a reason I can’t remember there was "no point" so I didn’t get one. We carried on driving.

As we went further into the rural areas I saw people riding more and more bikes, there were less cars. As we approached the school gates, we could hear screaming, excited screaming. We all looked at each other awkwardly, slightly scared and excited. As the gates opened, the screaming got louder and intensified as about 200 students, mainly girls and a few boys, swarmed around the bus as we drove in

to the school grounds.

When we stopped there were too many kids around the bus to get out, I swear I could feel it rocking, some of them were drumming on it. We opened the door and some of them were singing a song about ‘Welcome Vistas...’ and that they were happy, they are all great singers and dancers. A few of the boys were drumming as well. As we went into the crowd I felt like One Direction. They were all trying to hold our hands simultaneously. They were all around us. We didn’t know what to do, then a teacher lead us to some chairs, and all the girls sat on the ground opposite us.

We were outside the place we were going to stay. The tree with the weaver birds in was extra loud. We sat and one of the deputy heads, (there are 3) introduced us, and expressed his gratitude that we had arrived, and how long they had waited for this moment. I think he also talked about Fi and Vicky and how greatful they were for them bringing us to this school. After his speech, each class sang and danced for us. It was amazing how talented they all were, and their energy. All the dancing involved a lot of hip shaking. Where they tied jumpers around their waists. The songs I remember most are , ‘Oh happy day” I loved their accents when they sang. Their accents changed everything. There were many songs, in each song people would come to the front and have a section where they could have a blank space they could fill in and say who they are and where they came from and what they like, which is nice, they don’t do that in our schools.

After the singing and dancing the teachers all introduced themselves to us. They all looked very nice. Then the deputy head made another speech and the children dispersed. Then we ate with the teachers. I later found out that this was a very special meal to have at the school. All the teachers ate with their hands, but we were given knives and forks. I felt very English. We drank fizzy drinks, like mountain dew, coca cola and apple mirindas. Which I also found out was something they only did on special occasions. The meal consisted of potatoes, that stuff they bake in leaves, whitely yellow stuff baked in leaves, Sweet potatoes, stewy stuff with some kind of meat in it, chicken, almost KFC type chicken, and saucy stuff to put on all the food, I can’t remember all of the meal, but having meat is a real privilege there as it is very expensive. I felt quite guilty as they were so happy for us to be there but we

had nothing to give them as our bags with all our gifts had not arrived. We didn’t have any resources for teaching either. I felt annoyed with BA as all the planning we had done felt like it had gone to waste and without medication, the whole mess was not only endangering our lives but most importantly taking away what we had promised the kids which was even worse, all because a stupid cock up that didn’t need to happen and could have been prevented. I would rather be late, than stranded without any of my bags. The deputy head told everyone that we were missing all our bags and that they would pray that they would arrive which was very kind.The school provided a blanket, a sheet a mosquito net and a pillow, most of us didn’t have our stuff as it was lost in our baggage, this was really appreciated.I slept like a log as it felt that I hadn’t slept for two days. The next day we had a meeting about what we would be teaching at the school with Rose and sister Josephine.

Stuff we did at the school

I haven't fully written about it all so here are some video clips and photos:

PE:

We introduced PE to the school, it was not part of their original curriculum but they loved it so much they are going to continue it. Here are some games we played, all the equipment we took out there was left there so they can continue to use it.

Bulldogs with hundreds of excited kids:

giant pass the ball game with hundreds of excited kids:

Giant scrambles:

Slacklining, (like tightrope walking but more fun):

We also taught English, Library, Science, computers (We brought some over) and (I taught) Music:

Getting the children to sing "We are the youngusta" (one of their songs) in a round:

An early jam session with the boys, I brought my guitar as hand luggage, (many better sessions followed):

(Later on) Jam session:

The school is mainly a girls school but there are a few boys there who are treated as secondary. Their living conditions are pretty awful, they get rat bites and malaria and their room floods. We tried to educate them into killing rats/not eating in the dorms and putting malaria nets down etc. so their lives are a bit better. Despite this they are all great, energetic, willing, clever, kind kids and I think I bonded with them perhaps the most out of all the kids. They loved music and playing football.

Boys Dancing:

Makaya catches a weaver bird:

Raving:

We had a big dance at our leavers party which was fun too

Painting an educational mural:

Moringa (Miracle) trees are amazing, they grow them in Uganda because, among the many uses of the tree, the leaves are amazingly nutritious. Here we are pounding them into a powder that can be added to food as an essential supplement. Pounding Morninga leaves with nurse jude:

There are so many amazing things I did that I can't fit them all in.I'm going to France tomorrow so I'll update a bit more when I get back. Quickly here are some videos from safari, it was amazing.

Heartbeast: