Day 2:  The first full day in the town of Nkokonjeru. 

We were stuck drinking semi-muddy boiled water or bottled water that some sources say you can't trust. I was reminded of that scene from Slumdog Millionaire where that poor kid was refilling empty bottles of water and then using crazy glue to reattach the cap onto the plastic ring. My colleague Albert and I were on our way to buy water purification tablets when we just stopped by our office at the town's credit union to see if our contact, Moses, had arrived from the capital. He was there. We spent the rest of the morning chatting away, mostly about what previous Duke students had accomplished in earlier years. 

We invited him out to lunch with us to this restaurant named Matthew's. Apparently Matthew was this foreigner who came and one night spent most of the Ugandan shillings he had in his wallet to buy beers for anybody who was lucky enough to stop by that restaurant that particular night. Supposedly, the town's folk had such a good time that night that the restaurant owner renamed the restaurant after him. Below is a picture of what I had for lunch. A typical local dish will be composed of a lot of starches and a small piece of meat, fish, or beans.

As if a rural town outside the capital city wasn't enough of an adventure, Albert and I set out by motorcycle deeper off the main road to go visit a nearby fishing village, hoping to get to know the kind of people we were dealing with. It was the bumpiest ride I've been on in a while. The road was wide enough only for 1 car or truck to drive along. 

The villagers in that fishing village broke out the alcohol and threw us a party when we arrived. Two people hosted us: a friendly English-speaking villager named Patrick and a friend of his who was so drunk he tried to kiss me on the lips. 

We went from house to house where we were served the local spirit, some of form of Ugandan vodka, in addition to some form of muddy-looking fermented drink that locals drank from cut-away plastic containers. Albert and I both decided to stay sober while the people around us were drinking on our behalf. Children were following us by the droves. I've never seen such a festive combination of drunk adults and children all in one room. Then again, I've never seen a non-white guy named Patrick before.

 I took as a souvenir a gruesome poster celebrating the death of Muammar Ghadafi that many locals had posted to the wall inside their huts. Imagine hating a dictator so much that people post this poster over their beds.

Welcome to Uganda 2012

Even at midnight, the road from the airport to the capital city was colorful and bustling. A poor choice of flight time led me to arrive way too late to enjoy the initial scenery that I often look forward to whenever I first land in a country I've never been to. But despite the darkness, the road just outside the airport had much excitement going on. The insides of houses were lit with either white or yellow lights, including the occasional pink. The sidewalks were filled with women wearing colorful dresses and men wearing the usual business casual attire, which they wear at all times of the day. During the few moments when I was not taking in the nighttime scenery, I was bracing myself for how close from on-coming traffic the driver of my taxi was driving and how close he had almost hit the motorcycles passing us by. We arrived at the hostel after about 50 minutes of such close zigzagging through traffic I'm surprised nobody got killed. I was greeted by a tall, skinny man with one eye at the front desk. This was the type of man who needed to be wearing an eye-patch, but wasn't. As I was staring at his bad eye for a second, he broke the silence and said to me “Welcome to Uganda.”

Monkeys and large pelican's, as opposed to sloppy-looking European backpackers, were the first ones to greet me the next day. Although I shouldn't be saying anything about my European bunk-mates. My T-shirt and cargo shorts would have allowed me to fit in with local Ugandan men as well as I had fit in with investment bankers that time I went to some investment banking info session in a sweater and jeans just for the free food. I met my colleague Albert a few minutes later; he was dressed to fit in. He spent the rest of that morning helping me get set up with a working phone and internet.  Thankfully, he had arrived three days before I did and got himself acquainted already.

Just before we packed up our belongings and took off into the countryside where were to meet our hosts for the summer, Albert and I decided to go into the city to taste some local Ugandan cuisine. The food we saw reminded me of the free vegetarian dinner that is offered every Monday at Duke's Bryan Center. Namely, they had beans, spinach, and some kind of mashed corn, mashed banana or rice. The fast food joints that Albert had seen in the city served chicken that was too greasy for his comfort. For my first meal in Kampala, we went to a Chinese restaurant.

We took a taxi into the countryside. The most noticeable marks along the road were red hills of dirt that were about the height of a person. The taxi driver told me they were created by termites.

Upon arrival in Nkokonjeru, we were greeted by...well...nobody. Our contact, Moses, whom I had tried to get in touch with many times prior to our arrival, turned out to be back in Kampala. None of the colleagues that worked in the credit union in that town knew we were coming. So we turned to our next best option: find the RASD, the hostel we were going to stay at.

Ignitious, the charming fellow who understands my English without me needing to slow down my speech, gave us a tour of the town. We spent most of the tour walking around the hospital, where we anticipate we'll be doing some of our work this summer. The medical fees were listed near the cashier's window. You can get a minor operation for 10,000 shillings ($4), major operations for 35,000 shillings (roughly $14), and a week's stay at the hospital for malaria treatment for 68,000 shillings (roughly $28). Sadly, most people here in this town have trouble affording hospital treatment, so we were told. And this cost of treatment leads to problems with retaining trained medical staff, since they consider their wages to be too low to be worth staying in this town.